We're here in Galatians chapter 6, and we're going to be finishing our series on a dissolver of doubts.
We'll go back to Daniel here in a second. I just want to show you some of the Galatians real quickly.
So what we've covered here so far in the series is, one, we saw that everybody's going to have doubts and fears in this life.
That's going to be true whether you're a believer or an unbeliever. You're going to have problems that can further arise in your life.
We talk about the doubts that the world has.
If you remember, the world has a lot of doubts that are foolish things that we don't have to doubt about as Christians.
And then we talk about the doubts of believers and the doubts of the family last week.
What we're going to be talking about here is how to dissolve or get rid of doubts in this sermon.
But I want to show you something first in Galatians 6 verses 2 through 5.
And this is considered one of the great Bible contradictions.
These atheists are saying, no, this can't be answered.
And the reason why they say this is a contradiction is, in verse 2 it says,
bury one another's burdens. And then in verse 5 it says, for every man shall bear his own burden.
And so this is one of the great contradictions where they say, well, see, what is it?
Do you bear other people's burdens or do you bury your own?
Well, the Bible's going to make it very clear what it's talking about here.
But it says in verse 2, bury one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ.
For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself.
But let every man prove his own work, and then shall he rejoice in himself alone and not in another.
And so it tells us in verse 2 that we are to bear one another's burdens.
But then it said in verse 3, if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself.
He said, what is that saying? Well, basically, even though we're supposed to bear one another's burdens,
if I'm not a very spiritual person and I've got a lot of problems in my life,
I really can't focus on burying other people's burdens.
I have to focus on the things that I have wrong in my life.
That's why it says in verse 5, for every man shall bear his own burdens.
Because it doesn't matter who you are, you have certain burdens that you need to work on.
So when we're talking about dissolving doubts, obviously we need to dissolve our own doubts before we help other people out.
For example, if you're someone who just doesn't read the Bible, you know you should, but you just don't read the Bible,
you're probably not the best person to give advice on how to read the Bible.
Because that's something that you struggle with.
So we have our own burdens we need to figure out, but if there's something that we're doing okay on,
we can help bear other people's burdens.
And help bear their concerns and their doubts and their worries and show them what the Bible says.
Now turn to Daniel 1.
So that's one of the great Bible contradictions.
I don't know about you, but it doesn't really seem that complicated.
Yes, we have our own burdens, and we should try to bear other people's burdens if we can and are able to,
but don't deceive yourself.
If you're someone who you really have your own struggles, you need to worry about those things and get them things.
And so when it comes to dissolving doubts, first and foremost, get rid of your own doubts.
And if possible, then hopefully you can help get rid of other people's doubts as well and help them out.
Obviously when I preach sermons, there are certain things that I need to try to get rid of other people's doubts.
But before I preach these sermons, I need to get these things figured out in my own life,
if I'm going to be able to help other people out.
First you've got to figure it out for yourself.
Now Daniel 1, verse 8, about Greece.
But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with a portion of the king's meat,
nor with the wine which he drank.
Therefore he requested of the prince of Phoenix that he might not defile himself.
The first thing is, if you're going to be a dissolver of doubts and get rid of people's doubts,
the first thing is you must be a holy person.
You must be a godly person.
See, it says here in verse 8, Daniel purposed in his heart.
He decided in his heart, I will not defile myself for any reason.
But when we live in this world, this world's a pretty wicked place.
And unless you make a conscious effort to decide in your heart that you won't defile yourself,
then you will defile yourself.
You must make it a point to live for God.
See, nobody accidentally lives for God.
You don't come to the end of your life and say, man, I wasn't even trying to live for God.
I got all these people saved and, man, I did all these great things.
I read through the Bible a hundred times and, man, I wasn't even trying to read.
No, you've got to make it a point to say, I'm going to read the Bible no matter what.
I'm going to go soul winning no matter what.
Why? Because you don't always feel like going soul winning.
You don't always feel like reading the Bible.
You don't always feel like praying.
If we only lived for God when we felt like it, we wouldn't really do much for God.
Because the truth is that even though we love this church, we love the fellowship, we love the soul winning and the preaching,
it takes an effort to live for God.
It's not an easy thing to do.
And if it was so easy, this place would be packed.
And there would be a hundred Baptist churches here preaching the exact same sermon just in Metromino.
And there would be people that were living for the Lord and great soul winning expeditions being done.
Why? Because it would be so easy. But it's not easy.
You have to purpose in your heart.
You have to make the decision to live for God.
And see, Daniel knew, I'm going to be living in a wicked world and I must purpose in my heart
that I will not defile myself with a portion that became to me nor with the wine which he drank.
And so he makes a point, he purposes in his heart that he will not defile himself.
Now turn to Ephesians 1. Ephesians 1.
You say, why is it that it's so important if you want to help dissolve people's doubts that you live a holy life?
Well the truth is this, that God cannot use you effectively unless you're living in God.
You say, well I'm saved.
Look, that's the first step.
If you want to be used by God, you need to be saved.
But look, if you want to be effective in your life, you better be a Godly person.
You say, Brother Stuckey, you know, I come to church, I listen to service.
You better be holy in your life if you want to be used greatly by God.
You say, Brother Stuckey, I'd like to become better at soul winning.
How do I get better at soul winning?
Start by living a Godly life.
That's a good start.
Start by living a Godly life and you're going to find out you have so much more boldness out of soul winning
that you just know the Bible better, that people are more willing to listen to you,
that you're more filled with the Spirit.
You're going to be much more effective preaching the Gospel if you are holy.
Why was Daniel used so much by God?
Because he was the most holy person there was.
That's the reason why he was used by God.
Now it says in Daniel, not Daniel, but Ephesians 1,
Blessed be to God, verse 3,
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ,
according as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world,
that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love.
You know, I understand I just preached a whole sermon against Calvinism,
but it's good just to kick that dog when it comes around, right?
See, in verse number 4, what were they chosen for?
To be holy and without blame.
Not chosen as salvation, chosen to be holy and without blame.
Look, God expects us as believers to be holy.
That's what He wants from us.
He's chosen us to be holy and without blame,
having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself,
according to the good pleasure of His will.
So us as believers, He's predestined us to be the adopted children of God.
The people that would believe on Jesus Christ, they become children of God.
What do I want my son to do as he grows up?
I want him to obey my rules.
I want him to be a good person.
Look, God wants the same from us.
He doesn't just want you to believe on Him.
He wants you to live a godly and holy life.
And that is how you're going to be used greatly by God.
Turn to 1 Corinthians 2.
It's this thing of living a godly life.
This is not something that's kind of optional for us.
If we want to come to church, if we want to go soul-winning,
if we want to live for God, we can.
But hey, we're already saved, so that's all that matters.
No, that's not all that matters.
God expects you to become a good person, to obey His rules.
He wouldn't give us so many rules unless He expected us to obey those rules.
You say, aren't there just Ten Commandments?
You need to do a little bit more Bible reading.
If you think there's only ten rules God has for us.
He wants you to do more than just not kill people.
He has a lot of things that He wants you to do.
There's a lot of commandments in this Bible.
Now it says in 1 Corinthians 2 verse 9,
But as it is written, I have not seen nor ear heard
neither entered into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared
for them that love them.
Now I've heard this verse used a lot of times to talk about how
when we get to heaven, there's going to be things that we get to behold,
but that's really not the context of what's being said in 1 Corinthians 2.
When it talks about the things that He's prepared for us,
these are things He's prepared for us in this life that we can have.
Now obviously when we go to heaven, it's something that we can't really imagine.
Obviously it's going to be the greatest thing ever,
but in this life He's prepared things for us.
That's what the Bible says.
You say, well how do I get those things?
You get those things by being holy.
Now I'm not talking about you rolling on the ground speaking in tongues
like the Pentecostals would say,
but in terms of knowing the Bible and understanding the great truths of the Bible,
this comes not just by being saved and having the Spirit,
but also living a godly life.
He's prepared those things for His children that would live a godly life.
When it comes to dissolving doubts,
hey, that's something that we can do in this life.
Now I'm not saying you're going to be like Daniel and have these dreams and things like that,
but when we go soloing, this is what we're doing.
We're help getting rid of people's doubts about their eternal destiny.
That's all we're doing.
We're showing them how they can know they're going to heaven.
Look, God can use you for even more things in this life if you live a godly life.
Now I want you to notice what it says starting in verse 10.
The first thing we saw was we need to be holy.
The second thing we need, though, is to be knowledgeable, to know the Bible.
See, He's prepared these things for us.
He's saying, well, how do we get these things?
Well, verse 10, but God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit,
for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
See, the Bible speaks about deep things in the Bible,
and these are things that can be revealed to us by the Spirit.
There's a lot of things that you might hear preached or see when you read the Bible,
and these are things that a lot of other churches, they're wrong about, quite simply.
A lot of churches just preach a lot of false things,
and you might see things that you just are very obvious to,
but see, that's not really a deep thing.
Understanding the word after is not a deep thing in the Bible.
See, there's things in the Bible that you might not have even heard me preach before
or one of the other pastors that you respect,
but when you're reading the Bible, you're like, man, this is what this verse is saying,
and it makes sense to you. It clicks to you.
I have preached plenty of sermons where I've never heard anybody talk about a certain verse,
and it's not a new truth. It's not like it's some weird doctrine,
but I understand the verse like I didn't understand before.
You say, well, how do you get that?
That's a deep thing of God that the Bible reveals to you by His Spirit,
but just because you're saved and you have the Spirit, it's not automatic.
You still have to put in an effort to actually read the Bible.
Verse 11, for what man knoweth the things of a man save the spirit of man which is in him?
Even so, the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God.
So these are things that, unless you have the Spirit of God,
you're not going to be able to understand.
You must be a saved person, but it doesn't stop there.
You have to be a holy person. You have to actually know God's Word.
Notice verse 12.
Now we have presumably seen not the spirit of the world,
but the spirit which is of God,
that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
Which things also we speak,
not of the words which man's wisdom teacheth,
but which the Holy Ghost teacheth, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
You see, in the Bible, there are certain things that we will understand
when we compare spiritual things with spiritual things.
That means that when you preach sermons,
and this is good advice for men that are practicing sermons,
if you have certain words that pop up,
you might want to cross-reference those words
and see how they're used in other parts of the Bible.
There are certain words that maybe they're used five or six times
and they need a specific thing,
and when you actually look them up and you compare spiritual things with spiritual,
you're going to understand something you didn't.
When I write sermons, I learn certain stuff in every single sermon I write
because I'm looking up information, I'm understanding stuff better.
You compare spiritual things with spiritual.
Now, obviously, when you preach a sermon, this is something you need to do.
Because, look, in this room, there are people that listen to sermons online all the time.
If all I did was re-preach what you've already heard, I would get very boring.
The truth is you must learn new things if you're going to preach sermons,
or you won't become very boring to the people you preached to.
You can't just re-preach what people have heard many times.
Now, obviously, most of what I say is stuff you've already heard,
and I'm not talking about new doctrines,
and explaining passages and giving examples and things like that.
You need to bring something new to the play.
Otherwise, people are going to get bored.
But this is not just something when you preach sermons.
You as individuals, when you read the Bible,
you can learn deep things out of the Bible when you compare spiritual things with spiritual.
Look, you don't need to read a Bible commentary to figure it out.
You don't need to listen to a sermon on the chapter to figure it out.
God can reveal those things to you.
What if I'm reading this and I just don't understand this verse?
Well, maybe you're just not ready to understand that verse.
You know, when you first get saved,
it's not really the most important thing to understand the deep doctrines during the end times.
That's not the most important thing for you.
If it was the most important thing, guess what I would preach on all the time?
I just preach by the end.
Now, that's very interesting, but it's not the most important thing for you.
Things that are important for you are learning how to read the Bible,
learning how to be a good husband, good father, good wife, learning how to pray.
These are things that are actually really important to you.
And when it comes to knowing things,
there might be things that God doesn't reveal to you
because it just might not be as important to understand Ezekiel 19
as it is to understand some more common chapters in the Bible.
So it's not the biggest deal in the world if you don't understand something
because you keep reading the Bible and maybe in a couple of years you'll understand things.
But you know what? In terms of understanding deep things,
these are things that we all can learn.
If we have the Spirit of God, we'll read the Bible for ourselves.
Now turn to Daniel 1.
One thing I want to do, one doubt I want to get rid of from everybody in this church,
I want you not to doubt about whether or not you can learn big things in the Bible
by reading it on your own.
See, a lot of people go to churches and they honestly don't believe that they can learn something new,
that their pastor doesn't know, or the person preaching.
Look, you can learn things I don't know from the Bible.
When you're reading, you can read a chapter, you study it, you look at it,
you can learn something I've never even thought of before.
You don't have to be someone who's been preaching for years.
You and your individual free time can learn things in the Bible
if you have the Spirit of God and you actually read it.
But the key is that you read it.
Because if you don't read it, you're not going to learn those deep things.
You learn those deep things by comparing spiritual with spiritual.
You don't compare commentary with commentary to figure out, hey, what's this first pocket?
You compare the book of John, the book of Acts, the book of 1 Corinthians, the book of Romans.
You compare all these books together and you look at certain things
and then you're going to understand these things.
Now it says in Daniel 1, verses 17 through 20,
Verse 17,
And so what we see from Daniel, before he was this man who was known as a guy who dissolved doubts,
before he was able to dissolve and get rid of all these doubts that people had and understand everything,
he was someone who had knowledge.
See, it starts with you being holy, which Daniel was.
Daniel 1a, he purposed in his heart that he would not defy himself.
But then you have to actually have knowledge.
See, you say, one day I want to be used greatly by God.
I want to do whatever, preach these sermons and get all these people to say,
look, that starts with you being holy and you having knowledge.
You need to start that now and one day you can be used greatly by God.
You say, I want to be a pastor one day.
Well, look, you need to put in the time now to live a godly life and to read the Bible
and then one day you can be the person who preaches sermons and shows people new things.
But first, you in your individual time need to be a holy person
and you need to have knowledge.
You need to read the Bible.
Look, if you're preaching three sermons a week,
it's going to be pretty hard to come up with the material if you don't know the Bible very well.
You're going to start spending a lot of time on every sermon to try to figure it out.
I mean, good luck with that.
You're better off putting in the time now.
Look, a lot of people say that, I mean, I'm sure in this room,
I know there's some people that want to be pastors one day.
That is a great goal to have, but if you want to reach that,
you put in the time ahead of time.
You learn the Bible now and one day you can be used greatly by God.
Look, you know, the most popular sport in this country is basketball, right?
No question. Basketball is the most popular sport.
It's the second best sport, so that's good.
Basketball is pretty cool too.
But look, I'm sure a lot of people grew up in the Philippines
and they wanted to be like Michael Jordan.
But you have to understand, Michael Jordan didn't just become a pro player.
He actually probably put in five hours of practice every day to one day
become who everybody knew.
Now obviously that shouldn't be the goal of our lives,
but if you have a goal to know the Bible and to teach people great things,
you need to put in that time now.
Things don't happen by accident.
You have to actually put in the time, put in the effort.
Turn to Hosea chapter 4, Hosea 4.
Now one thing you saw from Daniel 1 as you're turning to Hosea 4,
Daniel was given special wisdom by God.
And so you have to understand this, that simply reading the Bible
will not necessarily give you that knowledge
because of the fact if you're living a godly life,
God will show you more things.
That's what the Bible shows us, that if you're living a godly life
and you read the Bible, you're going to get a lot more out of it.
And if you're not living a godly life, then you read the Bible.
You might have this attitude, well, you know, I spend 30 minutes a day reading the Bible,
but you just live a really worldly and sinful lifestyle.
Good luck learning new things from the Bible
because God's probably not going to show them to you.
But see, Daniel was a man who not just put in the time to learn,
he also was living a godly and separated life.
And these things need to go together.
It says in Hosea 4, verse 6,
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge,
because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee,
that thou shalt be no priest to me.
See, thou hast forgot the law of thy God, I will also forgive thy children.
And see, you know what God says is,
his people were destroyed for lack of knowledge.
Now, wouldn't it be embarrassing to say,
if you go to church and then everyone's like,
you know, I've never read the Bible.
That's not good.
You don't want to be destroyed for lack of knowledge.
You know, churches, people should be reading the Bible.
People should have knowledge.
You say, well, the person preaching has the knowledge.
No, you learn the knowledge.
You read the Bible.
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.
If you don't know what the Bible says,
you're in bondage to the person preaching to you.
And you know what, if you're at a good church,
then you won't end up in the worst situation.
But you say, why do people stick with some of these Baptist churches in the Philippines?
Because they have no knowledge.
They don't even realize what they're hearing is false.
They have no idea about it.
So no matter who you listen to,
that's when you're going to think, tell me the truth.
It's all going to make sense to you.
It's all going to sound quiet.
If you don't have your own personal knowledge,
you're going to be in bondage to what you're listening to.
Now, look, obviously, you know, this church,
we stress people reading the Bible.
I want you to read the Bible in your free time,
and I'm not perfect on everything I say.
I'm going to make mistakes.
I don't want you to be in bondage to what I preach to you.
If I preach something wrong,
I want you to realize that, hey, you know what?
That's not what the whole Bible says.
I'm going to believe what the Bible says.
I want you to learn.
You don't want it to be said to you
that you're destroyed for lack of knowledge, okay?
And the sad thing is it's not unbelievers here in Hosea chapter 4.
This is believers.
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.
People that are saved,
people that would claim to be Christians
and they're destroyed for lack of knowledge.
The same thing could be said in the Philippines
in 2019, that God's people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.
They don't know what the Bible says.
Now turn to John 14.
John 14.
Now, the truth is that there are certain times
in the Old Testament where maybe people had an excuse
to not really know the Bible.
But you have to understand that in 2019,
March of 2019, there's no excuse.
Right.
You say, why?
Because most of you have the Bible on your cell phone.
Most of you have the written Word of God.
You have the Bible at your fingertips, okay?
It's not like, well, I can't get access to the Word of God.
No, you have the Word of God right at your fingertips.
You can just open up your cell phone,
just type in it, and you'll see what the Bible says.
So you can't sit here and say, well, you know what?
I never had access to the Word of God.
I couldn't do anything about it.
Yes, you can.
You have a Bible.
You read the Bible.
Look, we do everything we can to help you.
We gave you guys charts to read through the Bible, okay?
You have 11 more months.
Don't wait the next 11 months to decide
how much you're going to read the Bible
or to start reading the Bible again.
Make a decision in your own mind.
Say, hey, I'm going to read, whatever, five chapters a day,
five pages a day, 45 minutes a day, whatever it is.
Make a decision.
Make a plan.
Because you don't want it to be said to you
that in 11 months you couldn't finish reading
the entire Bible.
11 months you couldn't finish the Old Testament.
Look, you could set aside 15 minutes a day.
And most of us set aside where the 15 minutes a day
would be to finish.
That's the truth.
Most of us set aside 15 minutes a day to text on our phone.
You say, man, I was reading the Bible at my table.
I got away from distractions from 6 in the morning
to 7 in the morning.
I only finished one chapter of the Bible.
Yeah, because your cell phone's on.
Because you're getting a text message every minute
and you're responding to it.
And you're looking on Facebook.
That's why you're not really reading the Bible much.
Look, just put aside distractions and decide
to read the Word of God.
In John 14, verse 25 through 26, these things
have I spoken on you, being yet present with you.
But the comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom
the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things
and bring all things to your remembrance
whatsoever I have said on you.
Notice that what the Holy Ghost is going to do in verse 26
is bring things to your remembrance.
What does that mean?
It means that these are things you already learned.
It's not like, well, I'm saved now,
and the Holy Ghost is showing me new things every single day.
I'm getting all these new revelations.
Look, there's a Pentecostal church down the street
you can go to.
That's not what we believe here.
What we believe is you read the Bible,
and there's certain things you've read before,
and then the Holy Ghost kind of reminds you of those things
or helps clarify those things.
But those are things that you've already read yourself.
It's not some new revelation you're getting.
It brings true remembrance.
That's what the Holy Ghost does.
It teaches you.
It brings these things in your remembrance,
which means you need to have actually already learned this.
I'll turn back to Daniel 2.
So if you want to be someone that can get rid of doubts,
first you need to be living a godly life.
You say, I have so many fears and doubts in my life.
You might want to start living a more godly life.
You want to help get rid of those doubts.
You also have to be a knowledgeable person.
But the third thing that's really important
is if you want to learn deep truths of the Bible
and be able to help other people,
you better be a humble person.
Daniel 2, verses 27 and 28.
Daniel answered in the presence of the king and said,
the secret which the king hath demanded
cannot the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians,
the soothsayers show unto the king.
But there is a God in heaven that reveals secrets
and makes known to the king everything as
what shall be in the latter days,
thy dream and the visions of thy head
upon thine bed are these.
Verse 27, Daniel makes it a point to kind of just
kick around with false religions there.
The soothsayers, the magicians,
people practicing this black magic and stuff like that.
And you could take that verse by itself
and feel like maybe he's promoting himself.
When he knows the next verse, you see that's not the case.
Because then he makes it a point to say
there is a God in heaven that reveals secrets.
So he's not saying that, hey, this is something I'm revealing.
He's saying, you know what?
I'm only telling you what God's revealing.
There's a God in heaven that reveals secrets.
God is the one who has these answers.
So what is he doing?
He's glorifying God.
He's not glorifying himself.
Now this is what it says in verse 47.
It says in verse 47, the king answered on to Daniel
and said of a truth it is that your God is a God of gods
and a Lord of kings and a revealer of secrets
seeing thou couldest reveal this secret.
And so King Nebuchadnezzar's response is,
is not that Daniel reveals secrets,
but that the Lord reveals secrets.
Now why is it that he's aware of that?
Because Daniel made the point to promote God and not himself.
See, Daniel could have promoted himself,
and then Nebuchadnezzar would say, hey, Daniel,
you're somebody who reveals secrets.
But he realizes it's God up in heaven.
Why?
Because Daniel didn't promote himself.
He promoted God.
Verse 48, then the king made Daniel a great man
and gave him many great gifts and made him ruler
over the whole province of Babylon
and the chief of the governors over all the wise men
of Babylon.
Like I said, the way up in life is down.
Daniel humbled himself, and look,
he's getting promoted by the king.
That's the secret to success in life.
Verse 49, then Daniel requested of the king,
and he set Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego
over the affairs of the province of Babylon.
But Daniel sat in the gate of the king.
Now turn to Exodus 20.
Exodus 20.
And so the same thing with Daniel's friends.
They get promoted because they're humble people.
They're living a godly life.
God wants us to be able to reveal,
you know, help people out with their doubts
and concerns and their worries.
But if you're an arrogant person,
he's not going to lose you today.
You say, why?
Because God is a jealous God.
God wants the glory for you.
He doesn't want you to glorify yourself
and talk about how great you are
and how much you know.
He wants the glory.
What does it say in Exodus 20, verse 5?
Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them nor serve them,
for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God.
Amen.
What does that mean?
It means the fact that God gets the glory.
He doesn't want you to say, well, look at me.
Look at how great I am.
No, God's a jealous God.
God wants the glory.
And you know, if you in your life, you know,
you learn great things, but you just use them
or you want to use them to promote yourself
and talk about how smart you are,
look, you know, God doesn't really want to use you then.
He'll just use somebody else.
Now turn back to Daniel 4.
Say, what's an example of this?
Well, let's say, for example, you know,
you're someone preaching in the Sunday afternoons, okay?
And let's say, for example, you listen to a sermon online
and you hear some great 2005 that you didn't know.
Okay?
Now, obviously, we preach things sometimes.
I learned a lot of great things from people I listen to.
But you know what?
There's a way you can make it a point not to glorify yourself
because if you get up here
and make it seem like you learned that
and say, well, you know,
I was reading Daniel chapter 4 yesterday,
which isn't really a lie
because you started reading it after you heard it preached.
I was reading Daniel chapter 4 yesterday
and noticed this.
You're making it sound like you learned that.
You're trying to bring glory to yourself.
Right, right.
There's no need to do that.
And I'm not saying you have to say,
I learned this from such and such person.
You don't have to do that.
But don't make it seem like you learned it on your own
if you didn't learn it on your own.
No.
Right.
There's no shame in the fact
that you learned something from somebody else.
You say, well, brother, how did you learn to go so many?
I learned from people that already knew how to go so many.
Right.
I didn't figure it out on my own.
I learned from other people.
I'm not going to make it seem like I figured it out on my own.
None of us figured it out on our own.
We learned from other people.
And if you learned something great in the Bible,
praise the Lord,
but don't go around and make it seem like
you learned that on your own.
Okay, now, you can show it to people
and help people out,
but, you know, don't use it
to make yourself horrified
as if you're some really smart or spiritual person.
It says in Daniel 4 verse 8-9,
But at the last, Daniel came in before me,
whose name was Belteshazzar,
according to the name of my God,
and in whom is the spirit of the holy gods,
and before him I told the dream, saying,
O Belteshazzar, master of magicians,
because I know that the spirit of the holy gods is in thee,
and no secret trouble be,
tell me the visions of my dream
that I have seen in the interpretation thereof.
Now, this is before Nebuchadnezzar is saved,
but he makes mention of the God of Daniel.
Now, later on, he gets saved,
but he does not understand salvation at this point.
You say, why is it that Nebuchadnezzar makes mention
of the God of Daniel even though he's not saved?
Because of the fact Daniel always mentioned
his God that he believed in.
And because Daniel's always talking about his God,
the result is Nebuchadnezzar has some understanding
of who that God is.
He doesn't understand salvation yet,
but because Daniel didn't promote himself,
guess what?
Nebuchadnezzar makes mention of the God of Daniel.
Why?
Because Daniel was never glorifying himself.
When he learned something new,
when he was showing something,
he made it a point to let him know
God's the one who showed that to him.
Now turn to Daniel 5, Daniel 5.
And so to be a dissolver of doubts,
what we need to do is, one, be holy.
Number two, we need to be knowledgeable.
Number three, we need to be humble.
The fourth thing I want you to see is this,
that if you're gonna be someone
who gets rid of people's doubts,
you must be willing to speak the truth, okay?
Daniel 5, verses 22 through 28,
and in Daniel 5, we're dealing with Belshazzar.
This is someone Daniel does not like, okay?
When you read this story,
it seems like he probably believes
he's a child of the devil, a wicked person.
He probably was, because Daniel just has no respect for him.
Daniel respected Nebuchadnezzar,
even though Nebuchadnezzar did some bad things.
You can see that Daniel kind of likes Nebuchadnezzar,
because when he first tells him how basically
he's gonna be rolling around the ground like an animal,
he feels bad about it.
He's not happy to tell Nebuchadnezzar that.
But what Belshazzar, he has no problem
with just telling him what's gonna happen to him.
He doesn't like him.
Daniel 5, verse 22,
And now his son, O Belshazzar,
hast not humbled thy heart,
though thou knewest all this,
but hast lifted up thyself against the Lord of heaven,
and they have brought the vessels of his house before thee.
Now thy words thy watch, thy compromise,
and drunk wine thou.
Now hast praised the gods of silver and gold,
of brass, iron, and wood, and stone,
which see not, nor hear, nor know,
and the God who holds hand in thy breath is,
and whose are all thy ways, hast thou not glorified.
Then was the part that hand sent from him,
and this writing that was written,
this is the writing that was written,
Mene, Mene, Tequil, and Parson.
This is the interpretation of the thing.
Mene, God, have numbered thy kingdom,
and finished it,
Tequil, thou art laid in the balances,
and art found wanting,
here as thy kingdom is divided,
and given to the Medes and Persians.
But these are strong words.
These are not good things that you want to hear.
But you know what?
Daniel was not afraid to say this to the king.
He says, I'm just going to preach the truth.
And you know what?
If you want to be someone who gets rid of doubts,
oftentimes what you have to say are things
that people don't want to hear.
Okay?
Now turn to Daniel 4.
Daniel 4.
Now, there's kind of two aspects to being someone
who speaks the truth.
Okay?
Because of the fact,
if you just walk around the people
and be a jerk to them,
then look, you know,
that's outside of the scope of what God wants you to do.
Okay?
Obviously we need to be long-suffering with people.
When people visit this church
that are not part of this church,
they're probably going to have a lot of things
that they need to fix.
Okay?
But the average Catholic out there
that can open up their purse or book bag or whatever
and pull out like 50 different idols,
if they first get saved,
they're probably still going to have some stuff
that they need to get fixed.
Okay?
Obviously we need to be bold,
but you know,
we need to be kind and long-suffering with those people.
Okay?
And we don't want to be jerks to those people.
We want to give them a chance to grow
because of the fact that this is new to them
and people are being rude to them
by saying they need to change all these things.
They're probably going to leave.
Right.
We do want to be long-suffering with them,
but at the same time,
there comes a time when we must speak the truth.
And sadly, when it comes to having this balance,
it seems like pastors haven't figured out
when it's time to speak the truth and when it's not
because they won't preach against anything.
They're afraid to preach anything
that would be offensive to people.
Yeah.
You know, it blows my mind.
I understand here,
you got to be kind of careful
what certain people you call out,
but people are afraid to preach anything against anything.
They're afraid to preach against sin.
They're afraid to preach against false religions
like the Catholics or the Pentecostals or whatever.
They won't preach against anything.
Why?
They're worried about what's going to happen to them.
Well, you know what?
If you want to be someone who gets rid of doubts,
you have to actually speak the truth.
And because these people make it a habit
of not speaking the truth,
they're not going to be very good like this.
They're not going to be like Daniel.
Now, I want you to understand something,
that when it comes to speaking the truth,
it's not that hard to speak the truth
to someone you don't like.
See, when Daniel spoke the truth to Belshazzar,
that's not really that tough.
He doesn't like it.
He said, hey, you're going to be destroyed.
Well, that's not that difficult to say
because he doesn't like the guy.
Okay?
We know it is difficult
when it's someone you do like.
That's when it's difficult.
Notice what it says in Daniel 4, verse 19.
Then Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar,
was astounding for one hour,
and his thoughts troubled him.
The king spake and said,
Belteshazzar, let not the dreamer
the interpretation there are troubling.
Belteshazzar answered and said,
My Lord, there dream be to them that hate thee,
and the interpretation thereof to thine enemies.
See, notice how Daniel doesn't want to say this
in that one answer.
He feels bad about this.
He said, this is to those that hate you.
He says, this is not going to be good for you.
He's not happy to have to tell the truth.
But you know what?
Daniel still speaks the truth.
He still says the truth.
When it comes to this church and the people here,
I like the people of this church.
I can't think of anybody in this room
that I don't like.
If there was someone I didn't like,
I wouldn't tell you that,
but I like everybody in this room.
I like the people of this church.
I love this church.
But you know what?
There are times when I preach things,
and I know there's certain people that are guilty,
but it's like, you know what?
You have to preach the truth.
If you're the person preaching behind the pulpit,
you must preach the truth.
And one thing that we all need to do,
my job is to preach the truth.
In turn to Proverbs 27.
Proverbs 27.
But you need to understand something here.
That when it comes to me preaching the truth,
you might say, Brother Stuckey, we're friends.
Look, I still need to preach the whole Bible,
whether or not you're guilty of it or not.
And look, I want to be friends with the people in this room,
but at the same time,
I'm also in a position where I need to be
kind of a leader here to help you out.
And there are going to be times when,
you know what, maybe I preach something,
and you say, man, I can't believe
Brother Stuckey's preaching against me.
Can you get mad at me in the church?
That's a foolish thing to do.
You get mad at me for something I say,
and you leave the church.
Well, you know, I hope you find a good church out there.
The sad thing is there's not a lot of great churches.
And look, I am going to preach things that,
you know what, in my opinion.
Look, when I was at,
our natural reaction when something's preached
that we are guilty of
is to get kind of upset about it.
That is our natural fleshly reaction every time.
You say, Brother Stuckey,
when you went to Verity Baptist Church for three years,
was there ever anything
that Pastor Mendis preached about
that you were guilty of or you got offended by?
Yeah.
Of course, I'm not perfect.
Not so perfect.
That's why we all need church.
Yeah, there were things where it's like,
you know what, I'm guilty of that.
And there were things where, you know,
I'm pretty positively new.
You know, I was guilty of whatever and he preached it.
But you know what, you can't be upset
because the reason why we're at church
is to help fix our problems.
So don't be upset at me if I preach something
and I highlight that problem
because I'm here to help you out.
Church is here to help you out.
And so if it gets preached,
don't get offended at me
because it's not me.
If I'm showing you from the Word of God,
it's not my fault.
It's what God says.
And if you're a personal operator,
you're going to see the same thing
if you read the Bible.
And so, you know, my job is not just to speak
the truth to those I don't like,
but to speak the truth to those I do like.
Right, right, right.
Okay?
Look, if I run into some pastor of, you know,
I don't know, such and such church,
if I run into a Catholic priest,
you know, it's not going to be too hard for me
to tell them what I think about, okay?
Because I'm not really a fan of that guy.
But when it comes to people that you do like,
it's not always easy.
And, you know, the truth is, you know,
for people in this room, you say,
I want to be pastor one time.
Well, you better have some guts then.
Because you have to realize
you're going to preach certain things
and people might get offended, they might leave.
But you must preach the truth
no matter what the results are.
Proverbs 27 verses 5 and 6,
open or rebuke is better than secret love.
Faith for the wounds of a friend,
for the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.
And see, the Bible says,
faithful are the wounds of a friend.
And obviously when it comes to preaching at a church,
I need to preach to the whole council of God.
You know, when it comes to people
that maybe you're really close friends with,
there have been times in my life
where I told friends certain things
that, you know what,
that could have been offensive to them.
But it was something they needed to hear.
Now, this is something where every week
you feel like, man, I got to tell such and such
this and this and this.
Well, I mean, you've got a bit of a problem there.
Okay?
But, you know, there are times
where you've got to tell a friend like,
hey, you know, so and so.
You know, I think you need to make a change here.
You know?
There's times when that's appropriate.
Now, the enemy will just compliment you.
You say, why is it that you go to all these other churches?
They never preach against you.
Because they're your enemy.
I mean, kisses of an enemy are deceitful.
They're your enemy.
That's why they're always saying good things to you
and making you feel like you're the greatest person.
Why?
Because they don't care about you.
Look, Joel Osteen doesn't care about his members at all.
That's why he's always saying how great they are.
But you know what?
Faith for the wounds of a friend.
If you actually care about someone,
you have to actually show them where they even make changes.
That's the truth.
Now turn back to Daniel 5.
We've got one last place.
The first sermon was a bit of a marathon sermon.
It's kind of a shorter one.
And so we had four points we learned here today.
They're not complicated points.
They're just the basic things that make you successful in life.
One is just that God expects you to be holy.
He also expects you to be knowledgeable.
He expects you to be humble.
And you know what?
You also need to be holy.
But when we preach the gospel to people,
we have to tell people that they're on their way to hell.
That's not a nice thing to say to them.
It is a nice thing because we're helping them out.
But in terms of their reaction, sometimes,
not usually but every once in a while,
people get pretty offended.
They get really mad when you show them that,
hey, you know what?
For all of sin it comes short of the glory of God.
Sometimes they get mad about that.
But you know what?
We have to speak the truth to that
because they will never believe in Jesus
unless they realize they need a Savior.
Daniel 5 verse 17.
Then Daniel answered and said before the king,
let thy gifts be to thyself and give thy rewards to another.
Yet I will be the writing unto the king
and make known to him the interpretation.
And so you see here with Daniel, just in conclusion,
that his whole life was patterned around this.
He never sought a reward for what he was doing.
He was never trying to, because you have to understand
that when Daniel was telling Nebuchadnezzar stuff,
he probably could have told Nebuchadnezzar,
hey, you know what?
I just helped reveal something that nobody else could.
You should promote me.
And you know what?
He probably wouldn't promote me.
But see, Daniel wasn't seeking a promotion.
He wasn't trying to lift himself up.
He just realized he was doing this on behalf of God.
And look, there's a time to earn money,
and that's out at your job.
But you know what?
When you're doing things on behalf of God,
that's not the time to earn money.