O'er give he lived and me, From seeking sent he lifted me,
With tender hand he lifted me, From shades of night to graves of white,
O praise his name he lifted me.
His brow was pierced with may a thorn, His hands like cruel nails were torn.
Went from my guilt
everyone and welcome to steadfast Baptist Church. I'm gonna go ahead and get our
service started. If you could go ahead and find a seat.
It's a beautiful Sunday morning. We're gonna start this morning service off in
our binders this morning. Song near the back, rejoice in the Lord.
Joyce in the Lord.
It's a great hymn to get our service started.
If you know it well,
I want you to sing out nice and loud.
Sing it out all together, on the first,
Joyce in the Lord.
God.
Heavenly Father, we thank you for this church.
We thank you for everyone that's gathered here.
We ask, Lord, that you please put your blessing
on the preacher today,
help him to preach and edifying sermons
so we can walk out better Christians
in the way we came in,
and help us to always honor and glorify you
with all that we do.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
All right, next up we have song number 86 in your hymnals.
Song number 86 in the garden.
This one's a little bit more familiar.
Song number 86
Welcome to steadfast Baptist Church. Thank you for coming out this morning. Our Bible memory passage is Jude
Verse 5 so memorize continue to keep up with that memorization on Jude verse 5
And I think you'll receive a prize. I'm new to this do you receive a prize for?
Memorizing the verse. Okay, awesome
Let's continue
We got our clubburn soul winning marathon coming up on May 24th we
Who can I get a show of hands of everyone who signed up for that?
Pretty good amount of people there's shine up sign-up sheets in the in the hall
So if you need to sign up for that someone in marathon, you can go ahead and do so
For I got news that the Scott family had their baby boy born this morning at 6 50 a.m
So congrats to the Scott family
Yeah
The baby's name is Elisha James Scott, weighing 5 pounds 10 ounces and 19 inches long.
So congratulations to the Scott family, that's awesome.
Continue to pray for everyone on our prayers list and that's pretty much it with the announcements.
We'll go ahead and sing our third song.
All right for our third song we're going to go to back to our binders. This can be Psalm 148
Psalm 148
Sing it out
Praise He the Lord from the heavens.
Praise Him in the highest praise He hath.
All His angels praise He hath.
All His roads praise.
Shalom and praise.
We know,
offering plates are going around would you please turn in your Bibles to James chapter number one
James chapter number one
James chapter number one will read the whole chapter as is our custom.
James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered
abroad, greeting, My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into diverse temptations,
knowing this that the trying of your faith worketh patience, but let patience have her
perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.
If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that giveth to all men liberally, and
abradeeth not, and it shall be given him.
for he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed, for let not
that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord. A double-minded man is unstable in all
his ways. Let the brother of low degree rejoice that he is exalted, but the rich in that he is
made low, because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away. For the sun is no sooner risen
with the burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of
of it perished, so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways.
Blessed is the man that endureth temptation, for when he is tried he shall receive the
crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.
Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God, for God cannot be tempted with evil,
neither tempted he any man.
But every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed.
Then when lust hath conceived it bringeth forth sin, and sin when it is finished bringeth
Do not err, my beloved brethren.
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father
of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
Of his own will begahee us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits
of his creatures.
Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to
Wherefore, lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness
the engrafted Word which is able to save your souls.
But be ye doers of the Word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.
For if any be a hearer of the Word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his
natural face in a glass.
For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgeteth what manner of man
he was.
being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his
deed.
If any man among you seem to be religious and bridal if not his tongue, but deceiveth
his own heart, this man's religion is vain.
But pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the Fatherless
and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
Let us pray.
Heavenly Father, thank you for steadfast Baptist Church, Lord, and thank you for
honest to be here. Thank you for all the souls that have been won. I just pray that you would bless.
The preacher filmed with the Holy Spirit, Lord,
to preach a word unto us and let us receive it
and make applicable changes in our lives.
Pray us in Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
Well, it's good to be here this morning.
First off, I just want to thank Pastor Shelley
for giving me this opportunity to preach
in the house of God.
It's a great honor and privilege to be here
with all of you this morning.
Me and my wife just moved to Steadfast Baptist Church.
So if you haven't come and met us yet,
we're not gonna bite, we're nice.
We'll greet you.
We have been serving at Shirt Foundation Baptist Church
the past six years faithfully,
and we decided to move down here.
We love the church, we love Steadfast,
we love the weather, we love everything about Texas.
It's just a great place.
Maybe one of the greatest places I've ever lived in my life.
I grew up in Ohio, I grew up in Amish country,
but it's not as good as Texas, all right?
I'm not Amish, so don't be scared.
I just grew around them, so.
Moving from Amish country to Portland, Oregon was a huge shock, so that was very shocking.
Ohio to Portland, Oregon is very different, but we love Texas. We're glad to be here.
We love steadfast. But we're in James chapter one. Let's look at verse 22. It says,
But be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be here
of the word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass.
for he beholdeth himself and goeth this way, and straightway forgeteth what manner of man he was.
But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueeth therein,
he, being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed."
And the title of my sermon this morning is Be Doers of the Word. Be Doers of the Word.
Now this is a very, very important doctrine in the Word of God,
fall away or don't endure until the end in their Christian life is because they are only
a hearer as a Christian. They don't put it into practice, okay? And isn't it true today
that only a few people are serving God? Only a few people actually want to go out into the
fields and labor for Jesus Christ and get people saved. A lot of people show up to church.
but they don't actually put it into practice
and they don't follow the commandments, okay?
Now Jesus Christ himself taught us
that a few people are actually doing the work.
In Matthew 9, verse 37, it says,
then saith he unto his disciples,
the harvest truly is plenious, but the labors are few.
Pray, therefore, the Lord of the Harvest that He will send forth labors into His Harvest."
So Jesus Christ Himself knows that there are few people in this world actually putting
in the work, okay?
And He wants people to go out into the field and labor in His Harvest and see souls won
and people saved and...
That's why we love Set Fast Baptist Church is because there are a lot of doers of the
work around here, people who actually labor, who actually want to serve God and win souls
and further the kingdom of God.
But this doctrine of being a doer, a worker, being diligent to keep God's commandments,
it's all over the Bible.
I mean, you could almost just open your Bible and that doctrine is pretty much there.
So, who turned tuned in to the King James Conference this week?
Anyone?
Man, the whole building should be raising their hands right now.
Shame on you!
The King James Conference was amazing.
And Pastor Shelley is preaching there this morning.
I am so thankful that we have a trustworthy, reliable Bible.
My family grew up Christian. We went to a non-denominational Baptist,
or good night, I'm all mixed up.
There are no non-denominational Baptist churches.
They're just non-denominational.
But I grew up on the NIV and I read the NIV,
but I could never just quite understand it.
It was always like kind of going over my head.
It was confusing.
It just wasn't clear and there was just something off about it.
It's just not trustworthy. It's not reliable.
And I'm just so thankful that
I'm around Christians who believe that we have God's perfect, preserved Word of God and we can rely on and trust it and it's great.
It has everything we need that pertains to life and godliness.
And there's no confusion, no corruption, no contradictions, no deception, but the modern versions, that's exactly what it is.
Corruption, deception, confusion. God is not the author of confusion.
So, if we want to be doers of the Word, we have to have the right Bible in our hands.
We have to know what God says in order to do what God says.
So I believe that we have it.
There's nothing missing.
It's in our hands, and God providentially made it so that the English population would
have the Word of God, and that we can preach it with boldness, with the Holy Spirit, and
it be true and it gets people saved.
And that is the power of God, the Gospel.
And as Christians, it is vital that we take hold of this doctrine and not waste our calling
to preach the Gospel.
God preserved his word for us in order for us to be able to do that. Why would you be lazy?
Let's not be lazy and just get out there and do some work. If you're just coming to church and only being a hearer
What's the point?
You should be applying the message to your life every single week, no matter what the message is.
There is some way, somehow you can apply the message.
You can go out and preach that message to people when you're going soul-winning.
You may not have a hang-up, but if you were paying attention to the sermon,
and if you purpose it in your heart that you're going to preach that truth to someone one day,
you might, yeah, you're applying it to your life.
And that's exactly what God wants you to do.
Don't be a forgetful hearer and leave church and not do the work of God.
We need to be doers of the Word.
Okay, now my first point this morning is preaching is not for your personal
entertainment, okay? Preaching is not for your personal entertainment. Preaching
is not only for you, okay? Well, it is geared towards the individual, but we are
a team here at Steadfast Baptist Church. You shouldn't just come to church and
just be entertained by the preaching. Now Pastor Shelley, he's an amazing
He says a lot of great things, things that are going to help you in your life.
He drops a few cuss words here and then, which is a lot of people hate that, but it's pretty cool.
It's entertaining, right?
But at the end of the day, we should not just be coming to church
to just be wanting to hear something cool or something entertaining.
We're here to hear the Word of God.
We are here to serve God and to do the works.
Now, turn to Ezekiel 33.
Ezekiel 33.
Steadfast Baptist Church is not here to entertain you.
Ezekiel 33.
Look at verse 30.
Ezekiel 33.30 says,
The children of thy people still are talking against thee by the walls and in the doors
of the houses, and speak one to another, every one to his brother saying, Come, I pray, you're
in here, what is the word that cometh forth from the Lord?
And they come unto thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and
they hear thy words, but they will not do them.
They're saying amen, they love the preaching, they're agreeing with it, all those things,
they show much love, but their heart goeth after their covetousness.
So as soon as they agree with the preaching, they yell amen, they're leaving church and
they're just worldly.
They just are serving mammon, they just love covetousness.
All they love is money.
They didn't really come to church to apply the word to their lives.
And lo, thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and
can play well on an instrument, for they hear thy words, but they do them not."
So the idea here is people are coming to hear Ezekiel preach, not to apply the word to
their lives, but for entertainment.
I know they enjoy it, but they're still worldly and going after their covetousness.
Now we as Christians, this is a trap that we can potentially fall into.
When we hear biblical preaching, we hear the commandments of the Lord, but we just don't
do it.
We're not applying it to our lives.
Now listening to preaching is not a bad thing.
God is all for knowledge.
The fear of the Lord is at the beginning of knowledge.
Now we should fear the Lord, we should come to church to gain wisdom and knowledge, but
Even though that's good and here at Stephath Baptist Church. We can be spoiled with really good preaching, can't we?
We can be spoiled with really good, you know deep dives into the Word of God and
well, you know
You know, he's serving up a silver platter with some of these doctrines and some of these
Sermons from the Word of God and it's it's delightful. We think it's honey. It's sweet. We're Christians. We love the Word of God
But let's not get spoiled by it
and just come and be entertained by it,
let's put it into practice.
So, and also church, not only is it for
not for your personal entertainment,
it's not to just come and eat, drink, and be merry either.
You know, it's not to just come eat ice cream cones
and brisket every Sunday, if you're expecting that,
but I know we love that as Texans,
is that we love the, I love the brisket, man.
And the brisket down here is unlike anywhere in this world.
It's great.
But you shouldn't just be looking forward to a potluck at church
You should be coming here to hear the word of God and to not forget it and to apply it to your life
Turn to Matthew chapter 5
Now don't listen if you tuned tuned into the King James conference
Don't just listen to that and be a forgetful hearer. I mean the King James conference
It was entertaining. A lot of good sermons were preached at the King James Conference.
But hopefully you weren't just sitting on the couch with chips on your chest and just, you know,
eating popcorn or something and just sitting there.
You know, just for entertainment, you should be taking notes.
You should be in your Bible as they preach.
You know, you should be applying all of the things that they taught to your life.
And if you speak Spanish, Pastor Mejia Sermon was perfect for you.
If you speak Spanish, that's how you apply and be using the Spanish Bible in your own
life.
And that's a goal of mine is to learn Spanish.
I'm always motivated by all of you Spanish speakers, but I mean, there are corrupt Spanish
that we should stray away from just like the English Bibles.
There's a corrupt modern version of the Spanish Bible,
the reign of Valera, Gómez, no, not that,
you're like, no brother, the reign of Valera 1960 is corrupt
and the Gómez is right.
So, great sermon, you should go tune into that.
Now, you're in Matthew chapter five.
Look down at verse 13.
Matthew 5.13 says,
ye are the salt of the earth,
but at the salt have lost to savor,
wherewith shall it be salted?
It is thenceforth good for nothing,
but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men.
Now, imagine going to work tomorrow
and your employer comes to you and says,
hey, I need you to get X, Y, and Z done today.
Get it done.
And you're like, okay, I'll get it done, I'll get it done.
and you're trying to be a good worker,
but you end up taking 10 bathroom breaks,
you end up taking five smoke breaks.
If you still smoke, you need to repent of that
and get to work.
But you're just lazy.
Imagine if you were to not get those tasks done,
what's gonna end up gonna happen to you?
You're gonna get fired.
Your employer's gonna show up the next day
and he's gonna be like, what were you doing all day?
Why did you waste your time?
I told you to get X, Y, and Z done.
Why weren't you doing it?
Whether that's, you know, cleaning the toilet
or there's a lot of programmers here,
whether that's getting programming done.
Whatever your job is, you should get the job done.
Now imagine you just being lazy.
Your boss thinks that you're just good for nothing.
You're just useless at that point.
What's the point of me just having you around
if you're not even gonna do any work for me?
So the same mindset goes with God.
God thinks, what are you doing?
You know, why are you so useless?
Why aren't you putting my tasks, my commandments
into practice?
You're gonna be good for nothing if you don't.
What did he say in Matthew 5.13?
It says, if you're the salt of the earth,
wherewith shall it be salted?
If we've lost our savior, then it's good for nothing,
but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men.
So it's possible for you.
to be wiped out by God if you're not keeping the commandments not being a doer of the work.
So you're basically a good-for-nothing Christian at that point.
Okay?
It's why this doctrine is so vital because we shouldn't just come to church and hear the word of God.
We should apply it to our lives.
Which leads me to my next point.
My next point is doing the word or doing the work is equivalent with blessings from God.
If you do God's commandments, you will be blessed.
Turn to Deuteronomy chapter 6.
Deuteronomy chapter 6.
And I believe I'm sitting in a room,
preaching in a room today
where people have done the Word of God
and I see a room full of blessed people.
Families, children,
everyone's well-groomed, well-dressed,
everyone has houses.
I mean, we have so many blessings,
we can't even count them all.
But why is that?
because we love the Lord,
it's because we keep His commandments,
it's because we've actually applied it to our lives.
And that's exactly what the Lord wants us to do.
Deuteronomy chapter six, look at verse one.
Now these are the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments which the Lord your God commanded to teach you.
You might do them in the land whether you go to possess it, that thou mightest fear the Lord thy God to keep all his
statutes in his commandments, which I command thee, thou and thy son and thy son's son, all the days of thy life,
that thy days may be prolonged. Here therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it, that it may be well with thee.
that ye may increase mightily as the Lord God of thy fathers hath promised thee in the land
that floweth milk and honey." Skip down to verse 17.
You shall diligently keep the commandments of the Lord, your God, and his testimonies and his statutes, which he hath commanded thee.
And thou shalt do that which is right and good in the sight of the Lord, that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest go in and possess the good language the Lord
swear unto thy father." So just over and over and over again, if you read the book of Deuteronomy, there's a lot of commandments or a lot of
big commandments, small commandments, but
The main theme here is that you diligently keep the commandments of the Lord and if you do and if you do write
And if you do good in the side of the Lord, he will bless you. Okay, let's skip down to verse 24
I love this verse and
the Lord commanded us
to do all these statutes to fear the Lord our God for our good always.
I just love that right there.
If we keep the commandments, it's for our own good.
It's for our own good always.
I mean, who wouldn't want that?
that he might preserve us alive as it is at this day,
and it shall be our righteousness if we observe
to do all these commandments before the Lord our God
as he hath commanded us.
So again, it's just reiterated.
We should keep the statutes,
keep the fear of the Lord and do good.
And if we do that, we will be blessed.
This is why you don't want to just come to church, hear the word of God, and leave and
forget it, okay?
And it also said in James chapter one that if you're a doer of the word, this man shall
be blessed in his deeds.
So if you keep the word of God and continue in it, you will have a blessed life.
I've always been countless of my friends and Christians that I've known, who they come
And they endure for a while, but they end up falling away.
In our church, well, I went to Stur Foundation Baptist Church
for the past six years, and we are teaching soul winning.
We are teaching doing works for God all the time.
So it's like they hear that,
but they never apply it to their life, okay?
Now, if you're someone who just comes to church,
you should try to get a soul winning presentation going.
You should try to memorize verses.
You should try to preach to someone for your first time.
and try to work towards that goal.
And this is a major commandment from God
is that we go out into all the world
and preach the gospel to every creature.
And if you're lacking.
in that area work towards preaching the gospel.
I remember when I first heard about soul winning,
I had gone out as a silent partner,
I had gone out a couple of times
and heard my partner preach the gospel.
But I was still a senior in high school,
so throughout my week of school,
I would actually sit in class and memorize Bible verses.
I would just sit there while the class was going on
and I would write down and memorize
the gospel presentation verses to memory.
And that's how I learned.
Man, I had so much time back then compared to now.
I mean, raising a family and going to work every day
is not like just sitting in school in class all day.
I thought I had no time back then,
but I had scores of time.
But that's how I memorized the Bible
in order to go out soul winning.
So, if you're still in school, if you're still in home school, now's the time to do it.
Start memorizing those verses, start reading your Bible, start going out and preaching
the Gospel.
You have so much time right now, it's unbelievable.
Once you grow up, you're going to be paying the bills.
And you're going to be working that 8-hour shift, that 12-hour shift.
And you're going to wish you had school back.
Yep.
You're going to wish you had school back.
Now us adults we still have time we just got to like block it out of our day and turn the phone off and turn the
Texts and calls off and really dig down and get home and get our word in you know
Get the word in and if you need to memorize verses memorize verses if you haven't gone soul-winding it
You just got to do the work
Turn to Matthew 5 Matthew 5 with me
Now as Christians we should always be striving for perfection, to be striving for perfection.
Now this is not striving to be sinless but to be complete, to be the full package as
a Christian.
The Bible says that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for
doctrine for reproof, correction, for instruction in righteousness and that the man of God may
So, the Bible is here to teach us how to be perfect, how to be thoroughly furnished into all good works.
Now, Matthew chapter 5, verse 19, Jesus Christ made it very clear.
that if we don't dismiss even the smallest commandments,
we may be potentially the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
And that's pretty motivating.
It says in Matthew 5.19,
Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments
and shall teach men so,
he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven.
But whosoever shall do and teach them,
notice that, do and teach them,
the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
Turn Deuteronomy 22. Deuteronomy 22.
Now Jesus points out to us that there are least commandments.
And if you do and teach even the smallest commandments, you will be considered great.
Now, I love Stapfast Baptist Church also because Pastor Shelley preaches the whole counsel of God.
He leaves no stone unturned.
He's going to preach on any verse, and he's not afraid to do so.
Now, what is he doing there?
He's preaching the least commandments.
He's preaching the commandments that people are not very familiar with or that may be obscure.
He is bringing them up, and that is to our own benefit.
He's going to be great in the kingdom of heaven and if we do and follow that example, we will be great in the kingdom of heaven
if we keep the least commandments now
There are a lot of commandments that are not priests and churches these days
Okay, but steadfast is one of them and I'm thankful for that now what maybe some of these at least less commandments
Okay, that about women should have long hair and men should have short hair
That's a pretty small commandment.
That just comes by nature though,
but it's still commanded that
women should have long hair
and men should have short hair.
About women should wear skirts and dresses.
That's going to offend
large crowds today
if you even say that
without providing the Bible verse
Deuteronomy 225.
But that is a small commandment.
That women should not put that
on which pertains unto a man.
What's some other smaller commandment is that women should marry,
bear children, guide the house, and be in obedience to their husbands.
It's, well, we should preach that women should bear children, guide the house, and get married.
Young, okay?
Now, that's not what most churches preach, okay?
Most churches say, hey, you need to go to Bible college early on.
You need to spend four years there.
You need to wait to get married.
You need to wait to have children.
Let me tell you, that's really wicked to say
because the Bible says that we should,
once we find a wife with good potential,
we should marry them and to not burn.
And we should start having children early
because what do they usually teach that
you should use contraceptives?
And that's really wicked.
And we know people personally that they've gone to Bible college for four years and they
found their spouse, and then they get married, but then they don't have children for like
five to seven years, sometimes even like ten years, but sometimes with their own regret
because they use contraceptives.
So what these churches are teaching can go deep and really wicked and derail the whole
family without, you know, they...
I'm sure deep down inside that those ladies would want children, but they're just brainwashed
into thinking that they need to hold off from having children, hold off from getting married
longer, and then they're like 30 years old and they have no children and sometimes no
husband and it's a sad thing.
So we should not use birth control, okay?
It's wicked.
The old IFB preaches all this junk and all this contraceptive junk and that they should wait on marriage
But you know those are keeping smaller commandments. It really is you know women should bear children
guide the house and
Raise their children love their husbands and be obedient to them. Those are small. It's like commandments within marriage
So you're in Deuteronomy 22. Let's look at some seemingly small commandments, but they're still important
Deuteronomy 22, Luke 1, Thou shalt not see thy brother's ox or his sheep go astray and
hide thyself from them.
Thou shalt in any case bring them again unto thy brother.
First two, and if thy brother be not nigh unto thee, or if thou know him not, then thou
shalt bring it unto thine house, and it shall be with thee until thy brother seek after
it.
Thou shalt restore it to him again, and like manner shalt thou do with his ass, and so
which he hath lost, and thou hast found, shalt thou do likewise, thou mayest not hide thyself."
Now, a lot of us in here, we don't have sheep, we don't have cows,
we don't have this cattle that we're farming every day.
Now, what would be like a modern application of this? If you see your brother's car get stolen,
you should report that, or try to find your brother and get his car back to him.
How about his phone or his wallet?
If you see someone steal your brother's wallet
and someone's just running away with it,
you should try and find that guy
and maybe return it to your brother.
And if you get the possession, if you get it back,
you hold it with you and you're kind of like a lost
and found to your brother.
I mean, wouldn't you want someone to find
your lost possession and then bring it back to you?
And they held it for a day, they held it for a week,
they held it for a month.
I mean, consider how happy you'd be
to find something that was at value to you.
You know, I lost my cow, he ran away,
but your brother found it, he kept it and returned it.
I mean, cattle was money back then.
I mean, that was their livelihood.
So, I mean, today we use cars to commute to work.
If we lose our car, someone steals it,
we want that car back.
We can't afford to buy a new car, same with like a phone or a wallet that may have money in it.
Let's keep reading.
Where are we at here?
Verse 4,
Thou shalt not see thy brother's ass or his ox fall down by the way,
and hide thyself from them. Thou shalt surely help him up to lift them up again.
Now, of course, we don't have cattle. Now, what's a modern-day application?
What if you see your brother or sister broken down on the side of the road?
They fall by the way, they have a flat tire, their engine blew up, well you might need a new car now.
But my brother just recently had a flat tire and I had to go pump it up for him on the side of the highway.
Now if I wasn't here, he'd be really screwed.
But I mean, if you see your brother or your sister fall down by the way, back then it'd be like on their cattle or whatever.
But if you see them broken down, hey, you get a call, you get a text, hey come help me, go and help them.
This is showing kindness and love towards your brother.
And it's a seemingly small commandment,
but that brother may need money that day or that week.
He needs to get back to work, you go help him out.
Verse five, the woman shall not wear that
which pertaineth unto a man.
Neither shall a man put on a woman's garment.
For all that do so are abomination unto the Lord.
Now we pretty much all know this first
that women should not wear that
which pertaineth unto a man.
And that is talking about pants, right?
And men, I may never ever see you wearing a dress.
You will be, I'm sure Pastor Shelley will back me up
on this, he'll kick you out right away.
All right, so men, never wear a dress.
That is for women, that is a woman's garment.
Verse six, if a bird's nest
Chants to be before thee in the way in any tree or on the ground whether they be young ones or eggs and
The dam sitting upon the young or upon the eggs thou shalt not take the dam with the young
But thou shalt in any wise let the dam go and take the young to thee that it may be well with thee and that thou mayest prolong thy days
I mean, it kind of sounds serious.
What if I don't take care of these eggs
that I chance to see on the side of the road?
I mean, like when God says
that thou may prolong thy days,
what do we usually think of?
You usually think of like honoring our father and mother
that we may live a long life.
So, I mean, like if you want to prolong your days,
you better be taking care of these nest eggs.
Now, this commandment was funny, I was reading it.
Kind of seems a little feminine.
Like, men, we're probably not paying attention to these little cheeky eggs in the nest as
we're going down the road or something, but women, they'll be walking through the parks
with their kids.
They might see a little cheeky egg on the side of the sidewalk.
You know, the mother's not there or something, but they're showing kindness unto the nest
and unto the eggs, and they take it back home and take care of them.
Now what's the principle here?
Is that you're kind of animals.
You're you're you're respectful to animals. You're you're not just like neglecting them
So if you have animals or you see a little nest egg on
On the side of the road take care of them be kind unto them seems small, right?
But it's still important and if God sees you not do that. He's
Potential that you could he could not prolong your days. It's what it says
so
So God even cares for the smallest creatures now look look at verse 8
Here's a here's my last small commandment. When thou buildest a new house
Then thou shalt make a battlement for thy roof that thou bring not blood upon thine house. If any man fall from thence
I didn't even I didn't finish the verse. So that's all I have in my notes. Anyways, it's talking about
having safety on the work on the work site
So, you should set up safety precautions on the work site.
So it seems seemingly small, but I've been in construction for quite some time now and
I've seen some pretty shady things, where people are on scaffolding, they're not roped
up, they're not tied up, and they could fall and kill themselves.
So make sure that you put in safety precautions if you're an employer or an employee.
So I worked in a rebar shop for three years
and there was some shady stuff going on in that shop.
If Osha would have showed up, we would have been screwed.
But, you know, it seems small,
but it could get you fired potentially
or kill you if you don't keep safety precautions
on the job site.
Now, that leads me to my next point.
Point number three is doing the work avoids atrophy, okay, so if we keep God's word if we do God's word
We're going to avoid atrophy as a Christian now. What's atrophy?
Atrophy is a gradual decline in effectiveness or strength
due to underuse or neglect, okay?
It's a gradual decline in effectiveness or strength
due to underuse or neglect.
Now, what are some examples of atrophy?
Your muscles might atrophy.
Who's ever had like a broken arm or leg
and they were in a cast for some time.
Who's had a cast?
Yeah, a few people.
Now, as soon as you got that cast off,
were you just pumping iron in the weight room?
Like that week?
No, it took some time to heal, right?
Like, your muscles were probably weak.
Why?
It's because they sat there and they didn't do anything for quite some time.
You weren't using them.
You were neglecting them.
They were just sitting there.
So, your muscles atrophied if you don't use them, so you're not just going to be coming
back pumping iron in the weight room that week, okay?
Take some time to rehab.
You're gonna atrophy and personally it happened to me because
Last year I had this pain in my right inside right knee
I don't know why it was happening, I just couldn't think of a reason why, but I think
it's a slightly torn meniscus in my right knee.
But I was kind of not active when I think about the last like two or three years of
my life, I wasn't going to the gym, I was just kind of going through the motions, just
going to work, I worked on the truck a lot so I was sitting a lot, so I wasn't like really
doing like any squats or heavy lifting or things to strengthen my muscles.
my right leg is actually weaker than my left leg,
and it's like visibly noticeable.
But for the past year, I've been having to rehab
and really work hard to get this leg back in shape.
And the pain has gone away 90% of the time.
But back then it was like, man, this hurts 100% of the time.
But it's because I had a muscle imbalance.
I had this pain because my muscles weren't strong.
So, if you don't go to the weight room,
try to get a gym membership.
Even though you're not feeling any pain right now,
it's gonna sneak up on you.
You might start to atrophy, okay?
Now, what are some other examples of things
that might atrophy?
Maybe your memory, this kinda creeps up on the elderly.
Your memory might become dull,
or it's not as sharp as it used to be.
If you want to keep up on your memory, read lots of books, listen to sermons, preach the Gospel, that's going to keep you sharp.
It really is.
So, the elderly, don't neglect doing God's work.
Read your Bible, go preach the Gospel and keep your mind sharp because you don't want to lose that in the latter ages of your life.
Some other things, your relationships might atrophy, your personal habits might atrophy.
We can become desensitized to sin.
We can have a weak conscience.
Our morals start to atrophy.
So if you have enough exposure to sin,
if you do this sin long enough,
your conscience might atrophy like,
ah, this isn't as bad.
It's not really affecting me,
but it's gonna catch up to you sooner than you think, okay?
So we need to be very cautious of keeping the commandments and not letting ourselves go.
Turn to Matthew chapter 13.
Now spiritually speaking, I just went through a lot of carnal things, your memory, your muscles, your habits.
Spiritually speaking, we can start to attribute with our Bible reading.
We can start to attribute with our church attendance, our prayer, our soul winning.
So, we shouldn't let these things slip in our Christian life.
And part of the reason why is because we're just hearing the word of God only.
We're not putting it into practice, we're not doing it.
So if we actually read our Bible, if we actually attend church, when the doors are open, if
we actually pray, if we actually go soul-winning, we're not going to destroy ourselves in atrophying
and declining in our spiritual walk.
Now look at Matthew chapter 13 verse 22.
Matthew 13 verse 22, he also that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word and
the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choked the word and he becomeeth
unfruitful
Okay, I love this verse because it really shines a light on
You know, you may be saved you might have heard the word of God
but if you just care about this world you just care for riches and money and
That's all you're serving it's gonna choke the word and the in Jesus Christ says you're gonna become unfruitful now
What is what is the whole goal here is to bring forth fruit unto God?
And that's that's how we glorify God is bring forth fruit unto him
And it's possible for a Christian to become unfruitful and that should be very scary now reason why?
We want to come to church is to hear the word of God
But we should put that in the practice and step fast Baptist church does a great job at that
But you should be very very cautious of becoming unfruitful. Okay, go on missions trips
Plan for those trips go soul-winning do all these things. You're not gonna atrophy if you do now turn to 2nd Peter chapter 1
2nd Peter chapter 1
2 Peter chapter 1. Look at verse 2. It says grace and peace be multiplied unto you through
the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.
According as His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain to life and godliness,
through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue,
whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises that by these you might be
partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, into virtue knowledge,
into patience, godliness, into godliness, brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness charity.
For if these things be in you and abound, they make you the issue that ye shall neither be barren
nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." There's that word unfruitful again.
Now, what is it saying? It says, hey, you're saved. Just add to your faith virtue. Add to your faith knowledge.
If you add to your faith, Bible reading and soul winning in all these works, you won't be barren, you won't be unfruitful, you will be a fruitful Christian.
And I love that.
Verse 9,
That's good right there.
If you do these things, seems really simple.
It's easy to say, but it's hard to do.
It's hard to bear across every day.
It's hard to follow Jesus every day.
It's hard to read our Bible.
It's hard to go soul-winning every week.
But if you do these things, you shall never fall.
If you love God, if you love this church,
I believe that you will do these things.
Because if you love Jesus, he says, keep my commandments.
If you truly love Jesus, you will keep the commandments.
and he says, you shall never fall.
That's amazing.
I mean, I don't wanna fall as a Christian.
I've been a Christian for too long now
that if I fall, that would be devastating.
That'd be a shame.
And you could probably say the same thing.
Hey, I've been going to Set Fast Baptist Church
for 10 years now, five years now, three years now.
And if you fall, everyone's gonna see it,
and it's gonna be a shame.
And you didn't only just disappoint your brethren,
but you're gonna disappoint God.
And it is very possible that he may punish you on this earth and chastise you because
if you are a child of God, all are partakers of his chastisement.
So it's a fearful thing to fall in the hands of the living God.
So do the works and you will be blessed.
And let's turn to Titus chapter 3 verse 8.
Now, why did I preach on this topic?
You know, I've heard the sermon over and over again.
Pastor Shelley already preached the sermon.
It's all about the works.
I already know I should do works.
Well, part of a Christian is having reminders.
Aren't we reminded daily and renewed daily
in the inward man of these things?
And if you don't want to fall,
you need to be renewed daily of doing works, serving God.
And what is Titus, verse three?
chapter 3 verse 8 say, this is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou
affirm constantly. I mean, how often do we need to hear this doctrine? Constantly, all
the time.
Maybe every sermon there's a lot of stuff in the Bible, but this is a big topic
And this is a vital doctrine for the Christian that he does the word of God
Let's not just show up to church and do nothing about it
Let's not just talk to our brethren talk about doctrine do nothing about it. Let's plan trips
Let's plan so many marathons. Let's get people saved and do the work
It says, I will without a firm constantly, that they which have believed in God might
be careful to maintain good works.
No, we have to maintain a lot in our lives.
We have to maintain the children.
We have to maintain the house.
We have to maintain the car.
We have to maintain at our work, our business, our finances.
I mean, the list goes on of all the things we have to do to provide and to live a Christian
life, but don't forget the works.
Don't forget the Saturday summoning time. Don't forget your midweek summoning time and
don't forget your Bible reading and prayer and
All the things that you could be doing for God and don't squander your opportunity
don't waste it and
I mean, I hope that you keep coming to church. I mean a lot of people are faithful to church. Amen
A lot of people come here to hear the Word of God and that's exactly what you should be doing
to be put in remembrance of the fear of God and keeping the commandments,
but never waste the opportunity that you have here at Steadfast Baptist Church.
One of the main reasons why I came to this church, because I see the work that you guys are doing.
I see the work that you're putting in. I mean, the numbers are astonishing.
I mean, you go on missions trips and you come back
with over a hundred salvations.
I mean, here in this area alone is so receptive
compared to where I came from, it's unbelievable.
I mean, I would go sometimes two months
without seeing a salvation.
I mean, yeah, going out faithfully every week.
And people just don't wanna talk up in Washington.
I believe Washington is the most unchurched state.
out of all 50 states.
I mean, very ungodly, very dark.
I mean, we lived in Vancouver, Washington,
and as soon as you drive over the bridge into Portland,
there's like this spiritual darkness.
I'm not kidding, everyone you talk to up there,
as soon as they go into Portland and come back,
there's like a breath of fresh air
as soon as you get back over the bridge.
It's like, man, that place is wicked.
There's something dark about it.
I don't know what it is,
but you can just feel it, you're vexed.
People just don't want to talk.
And as soon as I get down here, people are more friendly.
People are willing to talk to you.
And you need to realize that you need,
you don't want to take that for granted
that you live in an amazing part of the country.
People want to talk, people are receptive.
Don't waste that.
Go out soul winning, read your Bible
and stay on top of it as a Christian.
All right, that's all I have.
Let's pray.
Dear Heavenly Father, I thank you
for step fast Baptist church.
I thank you for all the works that we do here.
help us to recognize and realize that we should not take this for granted and that we should do
what the Word of God says. Thank you so much for your perfectly preserved word. Thank you for
everything that you've given us in this life, all the blessings. I pray that we would stay
diligent and steadfast, that we would always be abounding in the work of the Lord. Jesus Christ,
Amen. All right, for our last song, we're going to go to song number 173 in your hymnals.
Love, Lifted Me, song number 173.
Song 173, Love, Lifted Me.
Let's sing it out nice and loud.
All the way.
I was sinking deep in sin Far from the peaceful shore
Very deeply stained within Sinking to rise no more
Got the master of the sea Burned by despairing pride
And so