And so we see that the Antichrist, the devil, they're slick.
And you know what?
There are a lot of preachers that can fool us for a while and to think that they're good.
You know, I went to a church for a couple years where the pastor was a horrible false
prophet, but here's the thing.
I didn't realize that.
I thought he was a man of God because he was basically just repeating and parroting all
the teachings of his father-in-law.
So his father-in-law is a man of God and he comes in, beware of the evil son-in-law.
The evil son-in-law comes in and he's just repeating a lot of the things from his father-in-law
and it sounded great, sounded great, but then after he'd been a pastor for about five years,
all of a sudden he started rolling out the false doctrine and started teaching worse
and worse heresy and weirder and weirder doctrine and it's like the frog in the hot
water.
He's getting people ready for more and more bad doctrine and heresy and false teaching.
And eventually he was exposed and he's in federal prison right now as a total phony,
but the thing about that is that the Bible says about false prophets, their folly shall
be manifest unto all men.
And God has a way of exposing false prophets in the long run and exposing false teachers
in the long run and showing them for what they are.
The Bible says by their fruits you shall know them.
This would be meaningless if the false prophet can have good fruit, then this check's not
going to work, is it?
How is this going to work?
How am I going to know them by their fruits?
This Bozo that recently taught, this independent Baptist Bozo who recently taught that Judas
got more people saved than any of the other disciples.
He had the most converts of any of them.
How can this test work?
You shall know them by their fruits.
So I guess Judas had all this good fruit, right?
That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life.
You want to know how many people Judas got saved?
Zero.
Because you have to be saved to get someone saved and so Judas got precisely zero people
saved.
Now some people say, well then why didn't they know that he was the phony then if he
got zero people saved?
Because number one, we don't know who's saved and who's not right away.
That's especially not always apparent right away.
You could go out soul winning with somebody and watch them explain the Romans road to
somebody and pray with that person, but look, I've got bad news for you.
When we go out soul winning and go through the Romans road with somebody and go through
the Gospel with somebody and pray with them, we don't know 100% sure that that person actually
got saved, do we?
I know that's terrible news for you, but you know the number in the bulletin is not exactly
right.
It's not 100% accurate.
I confess.
It's not.
How could it be?
How could we see inside people's hearts and see if they're actually getting saved?
Now in the long run you see if people are saved, right?
Because you can tell because they continue believing and you talk to them later and they
still believe the same.
You know, but look, what if I want somebody to cry through the door and then I went back
a week later and talked to them and they have no clue about salvation?
You'd say, look, this guy didn't get saved.
He was going through the motions.
He was repeating.
He was just going with the flow, but he didn't actually believe it because as soon as we
left he reverted back to his wrong belief.
But if I go back a week later and that person is still sound in the faith and I talk to
them a year later and they still believe in Christ, then I'd say, okay, yeah, this person's
obviously saved.
Look, I know a guy, and this guy's actually a friend of mine, and he says, oh, I grew
up Christian and he went to Bible college and everything, but now he says I'm an agnostic.
I don't believe in Christ.
I don't believe in the Bible.
Is that guy saved?
No, he's not saved.
And it's not that he lost.
You can't lose your salvation when you get saved.
You have eternal life.
You're a child of God and nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ
Jesus, our Lord.
This guy was never saved in the first place, but you know what I'll guarantee you that
this guy doesn't have people that he won to Christ back in his Christian days.
You know, all back when I was a Christian, yet you won zero people to Christ back when
you were Christian.
Show me an example.
Folks, this goes to show how we need to base what we believe on what the Bible actually
says.
Show me in the Bible Judas bringing people to Christ.
Show me in the Bible Judas getting people saved.
Show me in the Bible false prophets getting people saved.
Show me in the Bible false teachers getting people saved.
Show me in the Bible people getting saved on their own by themselves, just reading the
Bible with no one teaching them, but yet I have scripture after scripture after scripture
this morning showing you the opposite.
So if you went to Romans chapter 10, the last place will turn, but what kind of a ridiculous
statement to say that Judas got the most people saved?
He got zero saved, and this same bozo false teacher said that Judas was a superstar apostle.
Now anybody who's even done a casual reading of the New Testament knows who the superstar
apostles were.
Out of the 12, who were the superstars?
Peter, James, and John.
If you want to know who the inner circle is, how many times is Jesus like, okay, I'm just
going to take three guys, Judas, let's go.
How many times does Jesus say, hey, I'm going up in the Mount of Transfiguration, just three
guys?
Peter, James, and John.
Oh, all right, we're not taking everybody, just you guys.
Peter, James, and John.
How many times, folks?
That's the inner circle.
You know, he had a big crowd of people following him.
He had the 12 apostles.
He ordained 70 other apostles, but the 12 were a more tight-knit group.
But within the 12, it's Peter, James, and John that are the key players.
And as we roll into the book of Acts, who are the key players as we roll into the book
of Acts?
It's Peter and John.
Peter and John.
Who's writing the books in the New Testament?
Peter and John.
Now obviously the apostle Paul came later, but of the original 12 with the Lord Jesus
Christ on this earth.
It's Peter, James, and John.
Judas was not some kind of a superstar, ultimate, folks, he's just blending in.
He's just average.
Now look, did they suspect Judas of being a traitor?
No they didn't.
That does not mean that he was a superstar.
They didn't suspect him because he was just kind of a nothing burger.
You know what I mean?
He's just a guy, he's just a disciple.
And here's the thing.
They're going out two by two preaching.
So they're going out two by two, they're preaching in these towns, a bunch of people
show up and follow Jesus.
You know, they're not saying, they're saying like, okay, well who gets the commission on
this salvation?
This isn't J.C.
Penney where it's like, hey, was anybody helping you?
You know, when people come to Christ and hear him preach, he's like, okay, who is helping
you?
So I can make sure that they get the commission on your salvation.
Folks, they're going out two by two, preaching the gospel.
Judas' soul winning partner was the one that was getting people saved.
Judas is not getting people saved.
They preach to a whole bunch of people, a whole bunch of people show up because they
went out to the towns and villages and then people came to hear Jesus, they came to Christ
and you know, they're not sitting there and doing contact tracing, you know, trying to
figure out which ones came from Judas and which ones, that's stupid.
And look, I guarantee you that I personally have gone out soul winning and given the gospel
to people who went through the motions with me and prayed with me and I walked away thinking
they were saved and they weren't actually saved.
I guarantee that.
I guarantee it's happened to all of us who've been soul winning a lot because we can't see
the hearts.
But I will say this, when I go out soul winning and when you saved Christian go out soul winning,
we pray to the Lord to guide us and direct us, don't we?
Isn't that something that we pray a lot like, God, please lead us to the people who want
to get saved.
Please lead us to people who want to hear the gospel.
And you know what?
God answers that prayer.
Because God wants people to get saved as much as I want people to get saved.
And so I want to get people saved.
God wants to get people saved.
Here I am, Lord, send me, I've read the Bible, I've prayed, I've got the Holy Spirit living
inside of me, I'm ready to go.
Don't you think when I'm saying to God, put me in coach, don't you think he's going to
send me to somebody that actually wants to get saved?
Amen.
I mean, we get people saved.
We get people saved.
God's leading us.
God's using us.
But I guarantee you, you're also going to just run into the odd person who's just going
through the motions with you.
So has every person I've ever witnessed to that prayed the prayer with me, did they actually
get saved?
No way.
There's no way.
I guarantee you.
Because I've even checked up on some of them afterward and they turned out not to be saved.
But I guarantee you that tons of them are saved.
And that's no mystery in this church.
Many people in this auditorium right now, I went to Christ.
I've got my fruit right here, friend.
But let me say this though, I guarantee you that a person who's not saved, they could
pray that prayer.
Oh God, leave me.
It's a joke because they're not even legit.
They don't even believe the Gospel.
They're fake.
They're a fraud like a Judas Iscariot.
They're going to go out and God's probably going to give them all the doors with the
bozos who weren't going to get saved anyway.
You know what I mean?
And so yeah, they could go out and go through the motions with people and maybe you'd say
well I saw a brother so and so get someone saved out sowing him before they started denying
the Trinity.
You know, are you sure they're not saved?
Folks, if they're denying the Trinity, they're not saved.
They're not abiding in the doctrine of Christ.
They're not saved.
And so no, they didn't get someone saved.
Okay?
You might have appeared that way.
You might have thought that.
Now look, I want to make sure everybody understands.
I'm not saying that we should doubt our salvation or anyone else's salvation based on who won
them to Christ because here's the thing.
The vast majority of people had a whole bunch of people preach to them over their lives.
I mean did you just hear the Gospel from one person in your whole life?
No, you probably heard it from a bunch of different sources, a bunch of different places.
And look, you know whether you're saved or not.
Like I said, if I go out and knock somebody's door, I can't guarantee that that person actually
got saved.
But you know who I can guarantee is saved?
Moi.
Okay?
You can guarantee that I'm saved.
You can guarantee that you're saved.
Why?
How do you know?
If you know in your heart whether you believe on Jesus or not, you know whether you believe
on Jesus Christ or not.
You know whether the love of Christ is in your heart or not.
You understand that.
You know that.
The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we're the children of God.
So we know that we are saved.
So I'm not trying to get anybody to doubt their salvation because they say, well I just
got saved reading the Bible.
You're just wrong about how you got saved is all I'm saying.
I'm not saying you're not saved.
If you believe, you're saved.
Period.
Full stop.
End of story.
But I'm just saying you're wrong about how you got saved.
And it's funny because when somebody will sometimes bring up an example, somebody brought
an example to me one time and they said, well this preacher, this famous preacher, he's
a great evangelist, got many people saved.
You know, he got saved just from reading a tract or reading the Bible.
Then I went back and listened to that guy's testimony and he talks about being given the
Gospel multiple times, how his buddy at work's going through the Roman's road with him, the
guy at the diner's going through the Roman's road with him.
Then he went home that night, read the tract, read the Bible, got saved or whatever.
And I'm just like, did you even listen to this?
You know what I mean?
Like the guy.
Now, so first of all, I want to make sure that we understand, number one, I'm not saying
to doubt your salvation or someone else's salvation because of how they supposedly got
saved.
I would just doubt the story of how they got saved.
Doesn't mean they're not, if you believe, you're saved.
But secondly, I would say this, it is possible for an unsaved person to plant the seed because
of the fact that the word of God does have power and even if the Bible is just written
on a billboard or even if we just hear a verse, it could cut to the heart.
It is powerful, but that's not the point.
Being emotional or cut to the heart or wanting to seek God is different than salvation.
See the apostle Paul on the road to Damascus is cut to the heart and now all of a sudden
he wants to seek God now.
He wants to get saved now.
But did that make him saved?
No.
So here's the thing, I've heard all kinds of testimonies where people heard a Bible
verse in a Hollywood movie and it got them thinking and then that ultimately led to them
getting saved.
God used a Hollywood movie produced by a bunch of unsaved Jews or whatever to get the word
of God to them or you know my wife talked about just growing up and hearing in the Roman
Catholic Church, I'm the way the truth and the life, no man cometh unto the Father but
by me.
And that verse just ringing in her ears and just thinking about it and thinking about
it and thinking about it and she as a little girl got on her knees and prayed, God reveal
yourself to me, show me, you know what I mean?
And she was sincere and she's hearing Bible verses in the Catholic Church and she's praying
to God to show her the way and you know what happened?
It didn't work and as a teenager she's still unsaved and as an adult she became an agnostic.
Totally just not believing in Christianity.
Until I came along and won her to Christ because I'm saved.
Isn't it interesting how she was sincere and she's taking in the word of God and she's
praying to God for an answer.
Now did God answer her prayer?
Yeah, because he sent 19 year old or 18 year old Steven Anderson who was actually saved
to bring her the Bible and explain her the Gospel and get her saved.
But was she, so here's the thing, the Catholic Church planted the seed there.
You know or didn't you see like a signage or something of that Bible verse or was it
just in, yeah.
But I've been, when I was in Germany I saw signs that said you know, ich bin der Weg
und das Leben, niemann kommt zum Vater den deus mich.
You know, no man cometh unto the Father but by me.
And I saw that all over the place and I guarantee you when people see that it gets them thinking.
When people hear a Bible verse it gets them thinking.
When people hear a Christmas song it gets them thinking.
When people hear scripture the word of God cuts to the heart and it's powerful.
But that's not enough to get saved, you have to understand the Gospel to get saved and
it takes the Holy Spirit of God working through someone to give you the Gospel and show you
the Gospel and explain to you how can you get saved except some man should guide you,
ministers by whom we believe, even as God gave to every man.
And you may not know the name of the person that won you the Lord but I guarantee you
that somebody up in heaven is getting the commission on that salvation.
And here's the thing, Judas is not, his commission check is hell.
Because the wages of sin is death.
That's his paycheck, that's his pay day.
It's not like he's in hell reaping dividends on salvation that he did, it's ludicrous.
Just when you think false doctrine can't get any more stupid, you have pastors getting
up and saying, Judas got the most people saved.
And then last night I heard another bozo preacher get up and say, well Jesus didn't know which
one was going to betray him, he just knew one of them was going to betray him.
It's like, hello, is anybody home?
It says in John chapter 6, he knew from the beginning who it was that would betray him.
It's like he knew from the beginning who it was that would betray him.
And defending this weird thing about Judas getting the most people saved, well you know
Jesus just knew it was one of them.
I mean Judas was so good Jesus didn't even know.
He chose him so that the Scriptures would be fulfilled and he knew from the beginning
who it was that would betray him.
He knew who believed not.
And then the same bozo reads John 6, 64 where he says, there be some of you that believe
not and he says, oh he's just talking to the 12 there.
Two verses later the crowd walks away and then he's left with the 12.
In verse 64 he's talking to a big crowd, then a bunch of disciples don't follow anymore,
then he turns to the 12 in verse 66 and says, well are you also going to go away?
And this bozo says, well you know when he says there's some of you that believe not,
you know he's only talking to the 12 there.
So basically like implying that there's just other guys that aren't, like Jesus has all
these unsaved crew and it's like, I got a bunch of unsaved crew, I wonder which one's
going to betray me.
Don't get to find out until the very end of the season, the plot twist.
Folks, this is the kind of stupid garbage when you don't read your Bible.
Oh us preachers you know, don't ask us where stuff is in the Bible, we're the last people
you should ask, shucks.
That's why we're never that good when people ask us where things are.
Hey you better be good at finding stuff in the Bible if you're a pastor.
You're supposed to know the word of God, that's the job.
The job is to know the Bible.
And you know what, when you don't know the Bible you get into all this goofball teaching
of oh Judah's got people saved.
Folks, no unsaved person has ever gotten anyone saved.