Music
Amen, good morning to you all, welcome to the Baptist Church, welcome to the Baptist
Church.
Joy to the world, first hands are ready, sing.
Joy to the world, the Lord is come,
Let earth receive her King,
Let every heart prepare Him room,
And heaven and nature sing,
And heaven and heaven and nature sing,
Joy to the world, the Savior reigns,
And heaven and nature sing,
While fields and floods, from hills and plains,
Repeat the sounding joy, repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat, repeat the sounding, on the third,
No more that sins and sorrows grow,
Nor lords and blessed crown,
He comes to make His blessings grow,
For us the curse is found, for us the curse is found,
He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove,
The glory's up, despite justness,
And wonders of His love, and wonders of His love,
And wonders, wonders of His love.
Let's pray.
All right, good morning everybody, welcome to Verity Baptist Church,
and take out your bulletin, we'll go through some announcements real quickly.
Let's start by counting up any salvations that are unreported from this past week.
Let's start in this section, were there any salvations to report?
One, anybody else? Four, anybody else?
Let's see, how about in this section, any salvations to report?
Two, let's see, how about over here, any salvations to report?
Anybody I missed? All right, seven salvations to add to the bulletin.
Of course we do have soul winning this afternoon,
the song will start at 1.30, we'll have soul winning start at 1.45.
And a few things on announcements under upcoming activities in the middle of your bulletin.
Next week is our official Christmas church service,
and so we have our annual Pink Elephant gift exchange event,
and of course if you've been with our church before, you know how this works.
We're doing one gift maximum per family, and we're putting the maximum amount at 500 pesos.
Now, yes there's always people that get something more expensive,
but don't bring like a new iPhone or something, it's not the type of gift exchange,
it's meant to be something small and expensive,
and literally you can get a gift that's very inexpensive,
because the reason why it's called pink elephant, or white elephant is the other name for it,
it's kind of like it's the most useless thing.
Like a pink elephant is like useless.
If somebody gave you like a pink elephant, it's like that doesn't even exist, you know.
And you know often in the U.S. kind of the joke is who gets the worst gift?
That's kind of the joke.
So you don't have to get an expensive or nice gift or whatever,
but it's always fun how you know somebody gets a gift,
the next person you know might steal that gift,
or they'll draw from the lot, and then it keeps going, it's a lot of fun.
It's a lot of fun, but because we have, obviously we're bigger as a church,
and I'm sure we'll have a big attendance next week,
one gift maximum per family,
and if you take a gift, you have to bring a gift, okay.
You don't have to bring a gift though, you can just kind of come and partake in the fun and everything.
We're also going to be having a dessert competition next week,
and so it's going to be exciting, be prepared to gain some weight, right,
you know be prepared to eat a lot of food,
and so you know if you want to enter, you know you're welcome to enter,
and so you know bring a dessert, we'll pick out a couple judges that will judge it,
but this is very dangerous, you know, during the dessert competition,
we've seen pies thrown across the room when they didn't get voted on and everything,
people get very mad, right, we always have the ambulance on call,
you know during the dessert competition, no I'm just kidding,
but it should be a lot of fun, and the other thing to take note of,
we are going to be moving the church services during Christmas week,
and New Year's week, the midweek service,
just because Wednesday falls on December 25th and January 1st or Wednesday,
there will be crazy traffic, we're going to change those services to Friday,
so the soul winning will be meeting at 4 p.m. on Friday,
on Christmas week here at the church building,
and then the next week as well, with church service at 7,
and so that will be the change that's in the bulletin.
Anyways, I believe that's it for announcements,
we'll have Brother Rafi lead us in another song.
The first song is called, Hymn number 434,
Hymn number 434, Hymn number 434,
Oh little town of Bethlehem.
The first song is called, Oh little town,
the first song is already singing,
Oh little town of Bethlehem,
How still we see thee lie,
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep,
The silent hours go by,
Let in the dark and shine,
In the everlasting light,
The hopes and fears of all the years,
Are many in thee tonight,
For Christ is Lord of merry,
And gathered all above,
The mortal sleep and angels speak,
The wandering love,
The warning stars together,
Proclaim the holy birth,
And praises sing to God of peace,
And peace to men on earth,
How silently, how silently,
The waters give his gift,
So what is more beautiful,
The blessing of his hand,
No ear may hear his coming,
But in this world of sin,
Where beatles will receive him still,
The real Christ enters the everlasting,
Oh holy child of Bethlehem,
He sent to us we pray,
Yes, thou art still entering,
We mourn in us today,
We hear the Christmas angels,
The great, the tidings tell,
Oh come to us, abide with us,
Our Lord Emmanuel.
Oh come to us, abide with us,
The great, the tidings tell,
Oh come to us, abide with us,
Our Lord Emmanuel.
For our script reading, please open your Bible to Macho chapter number 11.
Macho chapter number 11, we will read beginning from verse number 16 to verse number 30.
Macho chapter 11, beginning from verse number 16, the Bible reads,
Quatrantos shall I liken this generation,
It is like unto children sitting in the markets,
And calling unto their pillows,
And saying, We have five unto you, and ye have not danced,
We have four unto you, and ye have not lamented.
For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say he hath a devil.
The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say,
Behold, a man glutinous in a wine weaver,
A friend of publicans and sinners,
But wisdom is justified of her children.
Then began heat of praise,
Thy cities wherein most of his mighty works were done,
Because they repented not,
One to the equal sin, one to the outsider,
For if the mighty works which were done in you
Had been done in Tyre and Cyron,
They would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.
But I say unto you,
It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Cyron
At the day of judgment than for you,
And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven,
Shall be brought down to hell,
For if the mighty works which have been done in thee
Had been done in Sodom,
It would have remained until this day.
But I say unto you,
That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom
In the day of judgment than for thee.
At that time Jesus answered and said,
I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth,
Because thou hast hearth things from the wise and prudent,
And hast built them unto babes.
Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight.
All things are delivered unto me of my Father,
And no man knoweth the Son but the Father,
Neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son,
And he to whomsoever the Son will rebuild it.
Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavenly laden,
And I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me,
For I am meek and lowly in heart,
And ye shall find rest unto your souls,
For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
Let us pray.
Amen.
All right.
We're here in Matthew chapter 11.
We're going to finish up this chapter here today.
The name of the sermon is Woe unto thee, Chorazin.
Woe unto thee, Chorazin.
And we have four points here in the last 15 verses we're looking at.
And point number one, we see a comparison
between John the Baptist and Jesus.
A comparison between John the Baptist and Jesus.
Now, when it comes to us forming our beliefs,
you need to make sure you avoid what the TV says or movies.
Because if you ever see a movie with Jesus and John the Baptist,
everything I always saw, and I don't watch movies like this,
but I used to watch the Christian movies or whatever,
it's like John the Baptist is a wild man.
He looks homeless.
His hair is a mess.
Very rugged and everything.
And then here comes Jesus with long hair.
He looks very girly.
He's very effeminate.
And he's like, you know, you're the Lamb of God.
And it's just like, you know, you got John the Baptist,
it's the wild man.
And then Jesus is like the long haired looking homo-like figure, right?
I mean, that's what you see in the movies.
That's the pictures.
And I'd like to tell people, you know,
the image you have of Jesus is because people made paintings
hundreds of years ago.
It's not what the Bible says about Jesus Christ.
You would never get that when the Bible says it's a shame
for a man to have long hair, okay?
But this is what the Bible says here in Matthew 11, verse 16.
But whereinto shall I liken this generation?
It is like unto children sitting in the markets
and calling unto their fellows and saying,
We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced.
We have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented.
What he's saying is, you know, if you pipe unto someone,
you would expect them to dance.
That would be the normal protocol.
If you would mourn to someone, you'd expect them to be lamenting
and in sadness and to mourn with you.
What he's saying is, John the Baptist preached to you.
The natural response is to listen to what he said and make the changes,
especially if you said, We are the group that are God's people.
We have the oracles of God.
Here's the prophet in our day.
We heard the truth.
We're going to make the changes.
And he's saying, You did not have the right reaction.
Instead of actually doing what God said, you got mad about what the Bible said to do.
It says in verse 18, For John came neither eating nor drinking,
and they say, Ye hath the devil.
You know, John lived a pretty austere lifestyle.
He was living out in the wilderness.
He's eating locusts and wild honey.
And, you know, there's nothing wrong with, I mean, honey's a very good tasting food.
Locusts, I mean, it's a bit unique.
You've got to eat what you can find.
You've got to eat what you can find, right?
And so, you know, he ate whatever he could find.
I mean, it's like, well, you know, I mean, I would eat honey more often if it wasn't so expensive,
but it's like I don't eat locusts and honey as my normal diet, right?
You know, I eat other food, you know?
And so John, though, as he was doing his, you know, work for serving God,
he's out in the wilderness and he's like, You know what? I'm going to live by faith.
I'm just going to, you know, drink from the river, eat whatever food I can find,
and just, he wasn't living his life to just have all the luxurious things in this life.
He wasn't living his life to save up a lot of money and, you know, have a 401K
and have a fancy house and have a fancy car.
He said, You know what? I'm going to make sacrifices in order to serve God.
And here's the thing. When you make sacrifices to serve God, at first it might actually be very difficult.
You remember what Paul said?
He said, I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content.
And the context is about whether I'm abounding or abased in terms of my money and what I'm eating.
He said, I have learned to be content.
You know what that word learned means?
It means it did not come naturally for Paul the Apostle.
He's saying that when I first was living my life, I had an okay life, a nice life,
and as I started serving God, I don't know where I'm going to sleep at night.
I'm traveling to different countries trying to figure things out.
And he's like, You know what? But I've learned to be content. I've learned to be happy.
You know, one of the big lessons we need to learn in our lives is to learn to be happy
no matter what our situation in life is.
If you're the sort of person that is only going to be happy if all of these conditions are met,
you will never be a happy person because you're going to want something else.
We need to learn and look at the situations in our life and say, You know what?
Maybe I don't have everything that I want, but you know what?
I can be happy in what God has given me.
Of course, all of us would love to have more money and a nicer house and all of these things.
Of course. But you need to learn to be content with what God has given you.
One of the big things I learned as a parent, you know, raising our children,
is to teach them to be happy with whatever they get. Right?
I mean, if a kid gets a gift from someone and then they're like, Oh, I don't like that.
That is the wrong attitude, and that needs to be corrected.
We need to learn to be content and happy with whatever blessings that God gives us.
You know what? John the Baptist said, You know what?
I didn't come to just give myself into all these luxurious things.
He was out in the wilderness, and what's the reaction?
They said, This man's insane. He's crazy. What is he doing? Right?
I remember when I worked at a secular office in the U.S.
And, you know, sometimes at the office, it's Friday, they're asking like,
Hey, what are you doing this weekend?
And it's like, I remember a couple of times, you know,
we did so many marathons in other states where we drove through the night to get there.
So basically, on Friday night, we'd start driving to New York City.
Friday night, we started driving to, I think it was in, not in Cleveland.
Boston, Massachusetts.
And I remember, you know, just telling them, it's like, Well, you know,
me and my friends, we're going to drive through the night to go to Boston, Massachusetts tonight.
They're like, Oh, what are you doing there? We're going to tell people how to go to heaven.
And they're like, What?
I mean, my reputation, my office, everyone said, Hey, he's a nice guy.
He works hard. He's quiet. But he's a bit weird with, you know, how he likes to be entertained. Right?
And see, what they don't understand is there is great happiness.
There is joy in serving God, isn't there?
As we sang in the song, there's joy in serving Jesus.
I enjoy being in church. I enjoy reading the Bible. I enjoy telling people about Jesus.
They don't realize that. And they say they see the way we live our lives.
And they're thinking, You're crazy.
I mean, I'm sure a lot of you have family members that have asked you many times,
like, Why do you drive over an hour to come to church?
You've got a Baptist church right there.
It's like, OK, you're not going to go to Catholic church with us, but there's a Baptist church right there.
Like, why are you driving so far away to be a part of church?
They don't get it. They think it's crazy. They do not understand.
I promise you, though, if you were to talk to John the Baptist today, he would have said,
You know what? I was a very happy person. I enjoyed my life. I enjoyed serving God.
I didn't feel like I was missing out on anything.
I was serving God. I was happy. God was providing. I was in the will of God.
You know what? There's nothing happier than being in the will of God.
There's nothing better than going to sleep at night with a clear conscience,
where, of course, you don't live perfectly. We all sin, but you know that you're right with God.
You're serving God. You have a clean heart, a clean mind, a clean attitude.
There's nothing better than that.
But what they said about John the Baptist is he's insane,
because what kind of a person would live in the wilderness and just preach?
I mean, why doesn't he just live in town? What is he doing?
But Jesus was a bit different.
And, of course, Jesus traveled around and preached at a lot of different locations.
But notice what it says about Jesus.
The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say,
Behold, a man gluttonous and a wine-bearer, a friend of publicans and sinners.
Jesus would get invited by various people, such as publicans and various sinners,
to eat over at their house.
And Jesus took them up on their invitations.
Now, why did Jesus do that?
Well, he's going there to preach the gospel.
Right? I mean, he's going there to serve God, preach the gospel.
And so, basically, Jesus, although he did a lot of traveling,
I mean, he would go over and eat nice meals at people's houses that had money
in order to preach the gospel, and they say,
Well, look at this guy hanging out with sinners.
So John the Baptist is in the wilderness, and they say he's insane.
And Jesus, on the other hand, would sometimes go and eat nice meals to preach the gospel,
and they say, Well, look at him hanging out with sinners.
You know what that shows you?
People will always find something to criticize you for if you're trying to serve God.
You know, I remember, this was very humorous to me.
This was years ago when I was still in Sacramento,
and, of course, Verity Baptist has, you know, much larger social media than us.
And I remember I preached a sermon at Verity Baptist,
and it was in the same week that I got two different comments about this.
I preached a sermon, and somebody in the comments was making fun of my eyebrows.
And, you know, one person was making fun.
They're like, Oh, it looks like you have a unibrow.
Newsflash. I'm a guy. I don't look in the mirror.
I don't care how I look.
It's like when my wife tells me, Hey, you know what? You need a haircut.
I say, Okay, I need a haircut. I mean, I'm not even paying attention, right?
I don't pay attention to my eyebrows.
But what's funny about it is, in the same week,
somebody criticized me for the opposite thing about my eyebrows.
They said, Look at you taking care of your eyebrows.
And I'm thinking, You've got to be kidding me.
It's like the exact opposite accusation.
I'm like, I look in the mirror. It's like, My eyebrows seem normal to me.
I don't get it, right?
It's like, But I'm just saying, people will find something to criticize you for.
You know that's true. I mean, I'm sure that a lot of you have relatives
that are Catholics that are not living godly lives.
They're living sinful lives.
They drink. They fornicate. They do all these things.
You're trying to serve God, and yet they will find anything they can to criticize you for.
Well, you know, you say you love God, but you did this.
They'll find anything.
That shows the importance of us trying to have a good reputation
because people are going to try to attack our character.
But even if you do everything correctly, they will attack something.
Whether you're living in the wilderness or whether you're going to nice houses,
it's like, you know, no matter what you do, they're going to find something to criticize you for.
Now, you know, my opinion when it comes to Jesus and John the Baptist,
I don't believe that John the Baptist looked as homeless as he does in the movies.
I think he washed his face every night and tried to take care of himself the best he could.
But obviously you can only do so much living in the wilderness, right?
And, you know, with Jesus, he did not have long hair.
He had short hair.
I don't care how many tricycles show you that long-haired, homo-looking Jesus.
That is not what Jesus looked like.
Because it is a shame for a man to look like a woman.
And Jesus was a tough man.
He had short hair. He was a tough man.
I mean, it's so humorous in these movies
because you see what Jesus is saying, like, woe unto you Pharisees.
And in the movie he's saying it in such a nice way.
It's like, woe unto you Pharisees, hypocrites, ye generation of vipers.
It's like, the tone doesn't fit the words.
The way I see it, it's like, woe unto you Pharisees, hypocrites.
That's the tone that works for that.
Don't sit here and tell me that Jesus had long hair when the Bible says it's a shame for a man to have long hair.
But no matter how you live your lives, people will find something to accuse you.
But here's what it says, but wisdom is justified over children.
What that basically means is the proof is in the pudding.
I mean, what I'd like to ask those people that criticize my eyebrows,
but what about what I preached?
Why are you obsessed with staring at a man's eyebrows?
That's weird.
But what about what I preached?
I said, thus saith the Lord.
I mean, why don't you attack what I preach?
It's like, but you can't find anything to attack what I preach, so I'm going to criticize your eyebrows?
People are going to try to find something to criticize you.
It's like, but what about what I said?
Because when I criticize people that have other religions or different beliefs, I criticize what they believe.
If I talk about Catholicism, you know what my criticism is?
That they worship Mary.
They bow down to idols.
They teach that you have to keep the sacraments to go to heaven and infant baptism and all of these heresies.
That's what I criticize.
I don't criticize their eyebrows.
And you know what? When we're criticizing people, we look at what the word of God says and it's like, well, thus saith the Lord.
Because our beliefs stand and rise on what does the Bible say?
The Bible says wisdom is justified over children.
So point number one, we see the comparison of John the Baptist and Jesus.
Point number two, we see a rebuke of cities.
Verse 20, then began he to upgrade the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done because they repented not.
What the Bible is going to show you here is this.
That Jesus preached the word of God and in certain areas, they just did not listen to what he had to say.
They did not care. They did not change.
It was like in one ear and out the other.
They did not care.
He's going to criticize those cities.
And the cities he's criticizing are cities that you would have thought would listen.
You would think, but they're a city that has some godliness and is spiritual.
And yet, he's saying wicked places would have actually listened, but not cities that were of the Jews that you would expect to listen.
He says this in verse 21,
Woe unto thee, Chorazin, woe unto thee, Bethsaida!
For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.
I mean, Tyre and Sidon are not exactly godly places in the word of God.
But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you.
Now, one application we can take away, which is not the main context, is just the fact that you're held more accountable for what you hear.
And so, for example, if there's somebody in this world that never believes on Christ, but they grew up in a Muslim country,
they're not going to be held as accountable as someone that grew up in a Baptist church that heard the word of God and rejected it.
Because they didn't have the same opportunities to hear the truth.
And the reality is that when you hear the truth, you're held accountable.
I mean, when you're raising kids, if I tell my kids to do something and they do not listen, I will hold them more accountable.
Because, for example, kids will often make a mess, and until you ask them to clean it up, they do not clean it up.
Now, I'm not happy when my kids make a mess, but then when I specifically tell them, clean that up, and then five minutes later it's not clean,
well, they're in more trouble than they were before.
Because they heard what I wanted and they didn't do it.
You know, if you hear the truth and you do not apply it, you're going to be held more accountable.
One of the things that constantly amazes me is how many people will listen to a lot of preaching,
but they do not go to church, they do not serve God, they do not read the Bible, but they listen to a lot of online sermons.
I mean, in Metro Manila, there are people that listen to our type of preaching, but they don't come to our church.
And I just think to myself, you would be better off not listening to any preaching.
Literally. You say, well, why? Because you're going to be held accountable.
Now, obviously, all of us are sinners and we do wrong.
And when I got saved in college, I had a lot of things I needed to change in my life.
My music, my movies, and all of those things.
But here's the thing, as I started to hear the word of God preached after I got saved,
it's like, okay, well, now I'm really going to be held accountable because I know, thus saith the Lord,
it's like setting a wicked thing before your eyes.
It's like, whoa, I better quit watching movies like that.
You're held more accountable because you know what the Bible says.
And he's saying, I preached in these cities and guess what?
They didn't listen.
Chorazin and Bethsaida were locations in Galilee.
And in the Bible, there's a lot of miracles done in Galilee.
Go to Matthew four and I'll show this to you.
Matthew chapter four.
And in Matthew four, it says here in verse 23,
And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom
and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people.
And his fame went throughout all Syria.
And they brought on them all sick people that were taken with diverse diseases and torments
and those which were possessed with devils and those which were lunatic
and those that had the palsy and he healed them.
And there followed a great multitude of people from Galilee and from Decapolis
and from Jerusalem and from Judea and from beyond Jordan.
You're seeing a lot of miracles are being done in Galilee.
So here's the thing.
If miracles are happening every week where you live
and then you're still not taking the word of God very seriously,
it's like, of course, God's going to hold you accountable
because you had the opportunities and you just did not adhere to it.
You did not want to listen to the message.
Go to Matthew chapter 11.
Matthew 11.
Now Tyre and Sidon are in modern day Lebanon.
And I think the religion of Lebanon today is actually very, very interesting
because it's like one-third Sunni, one-third Shiite, and one-third Christian.
That would be a pretty interesting place to live.
My understanding is with the laws, they try to please everybody
because you've got three very different religions
because when it comes to Sunni Islam and Shia Islam, they don't get along at all.
If you know anything about in the Arabic countries,
the countries that are Shiite, which is the minority,
it's like 10 to 15 percent of the Muslims are part of Shia,
like Iraq, Iran, Azerbaijan.
Those countries do not get along with the Sunni countries.
And so you've got Christian and two types of Islam in the same country today.
It's very, very interesting.
But these are areas in modern day Lebanon.
What he said is it's going to be more tolerable for those areas
that did not see the miracles.
They did not hear the truth that it's going to be for you.
Now, it is true that when we go soul winning,
sometimes we can get a pretty good idea if somebody's going to listen to the gospel.
I mean, you can look at somebody and form outward appearances and assumptions.
If somebody is younger, they're probably more likely to listen, right?
If somebody's a teenager, 20 years old, it's like as a soul winner,
you get excited because you think that's a pretty common age to get saved.
I got saved at 18, and probably a lot of people in this room,
you got saved around that age frame, right?
If somebody's like 70 years old, they're probably less likely to believe on Christ.
You know, there are exceptions to that.
I've walked up to groups and I'm thinking, man, they're all going to get saved.
I can tell. They're like the perfect candidates.
And then they just like mock you, and I'm just thinking, what?
And then sometimes you talk to somebody else that you do not expect to get it,
and then they actually do listen and get saved, right?
I think it would surprise us in our modern day
if the word of God actually freely went into certain countries
that are not primarily Christian today.
It would probably surprise us, some of the countries that decided to actually make changes
and those that did not.
I'll give you an example. My opinion, and I could be completely wrong
because this is sort of like a thought theory or whatever, you know.
I think that if North Korea was open to the gospel,
I actually think North Korea would really turn around as a country.
And I could be completely wrong, but I feel like since they've had no access,
people could actually be longing for it.
And I could be completely wrong, and obviously it's not open today,
but, you know, that's my opinion.
And, you know, there might be another country, maybe a country, an Arabic country that's Muslim.
If churches actually went in and started preaching the truth, maybe they would actually change
because in the Bible we have Assyria.
Assyria was wicked in the word of God.
I mean, they are the most wicked empire that's ever ruled the world of the major empires,
by far, when you're seeing what the Bible says.
And archaeological evidence proves this as well with the Assyrians.
They would mock their enemies as they destroyed them.
It's said that they basically worshipped a god of war, so as they won battles
and, you know, tortured people, kind of gave glory to their god.
I mean, they were evil, and we see that in the Bible with Nineveh.
That's why Jonah's like, I don't want to preach to Nineveh.
And then he preaches, and then the king of this country ends up saying,
man, we're in sin. We didn't make changes.
He's like, put on sackcloth and ashes, fast, and he requires the animals to fast.
That's the most hardcore fast I've ever heard of.
He's like, I don't know whether it had an effect, but he's like, even the animals are fasting.
Right? And he's doing everything to get right.
You would never have guessed that would take place, and yet it does. Right?
And we see here what he's saying is, you know, I preached in areas that you probably would not expect,
but he said actually Tyre and Sidon, they would have turned around if I was there preaching the word of God.
You know, I remember that when I was a sophomore in college,
I had one of my friends come up from high school. Actually, I was still a freshman, I think.
And he came up to visit me, well, visit other people that he knew,
because I was in college 45 minutes from my hometown,
so sometimes people from my hometown went up to visit various people in college.
And I had gotten saved as a freshman in college, and this person was just one year younger than me,
and, you know, I was sitting at a table with a group of people, and, you know, I started bringing up the Bible.
And then he's like, I knew you were going to start talking about the Bible.
He's like, I heard you became very religious in college. He literally told me this.
He said, you are the last person I ever expected to become a really religious person.
Now, that was kind of surprising to me because I never drank or smoked as a homeschool kid,
so I'm not really sure why he said that, but, you know, maybe he thought I just wasn't into religion or whatever.
I mean, I always believed in God. I just didn't know what the truth was.
But that was his assumption. He's like, I would have never guessed that you would become religious, right?
Anyway, I would say that, you know, sometimes it surprises you. There are people.
That's why when someone first starts coming to church, be very careful about looking at the outward appearance
and just assuming they will never serve God.
Well, how do you know how they're going to react once they start hearing the word of God preached?
You know, when I first started going to church, I would go in shorts and a soccer shirt
and Adidas soccer shoes every single week because I did not like dressing up.
I probably did not look like the best candidate to one day be a pastor because it's just like I just didn't like dressing up.
So it's like, well, I went to church, but I would go, you know, just dress comfortably. Right.
And so, you know, I probably did not look like the person.
But, you know, when I started hearing the word of God and I started, you know, reading the Bible,
it just really worked on my heart.
And it's like, you know, once, and here's the thing, once the inside switches, it's going to fix the outside.
That's why we don't have to worry that much about the outside.
Somebody's new to our church, yeah, it's going to take them some time because I'm still growing and I've been saved for 20 years.
And so, yeah, of course, you know, it takes people time to grow and make changes.
And, you know, honestly, it would probably surprise us sometimes.
You know, people, I look at a room full of people and I see people that love God and serve God.
I don't know everybody's past. And, you know, sometimes people tell me things and it surprises me.
It's like the other day somebody told me that they used to smoke like a pack of cigarettes a day
and I'm thinking, really, I never would have guessed, you know, because I only know them as being in church. Right.
You only know me from church. You don't know me from a long time ago.
But it's like, you know, people start hearing the truth and they just make changes.
You just do not know what is going to take place.
It says in verse 23,
And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, it shall be brought down to hell.
For the mighty works which have been done in thee have been done in Sodom.
It would have remained until this day.
But I say in you that it should be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for thee.
Now, this is even more extreme.
What he says here in Matthew 11 is if I was doing these mighty works in Sodom,
you know, Sodom and Gomorrah, you know, Sodomites, the LGBT, it's like it would have remained until this day.
Go to Ezekiel chapter 16.
Ezekiel 16.
Ezekiel chapter 16.
Now, a couple things to say about this.
Number one, of course Jesus is making a true statement because he's not lying.
And he's obviously using an extreme example to prove a point because everybody knew Sodom and Gomorrah as being the most wicked area.
I do not believe, though, that he's saying that in Genesis 19 that if the word of God was preached, they were going to turn around.
I don't believe that at all.
It was way too late by the time Genesis 19 rolled around.
Now, when Lot first came to town, maybe, right?
There's no way, though, in Genesis 19, we're not going to go to Genesis 19 for sake of time.
We've gone there plenty of times as a church.
We know what Genesis 19 teaches.
It is too late in Genesis chapter 19.
But here's the thing.
What if, when they were already wicked but not at that point, the word of God started getting preached?
People that were not yet reprobates, not yet evil people, could have changed their lives and started serving God.
And that's what he's saying, that they would have actually turned around like Assyria did.
Ezekiel 16, verse 48.
As I live, saith the Lord God, Sodom thy sister hath not done, she nor her daughters as thou hast done, thou and thy daughters.
Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom.
Pride, fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters.
Neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy, and they were haughty and committed abomination before me.
Therefore I took them away as I saw good.
Now, here's what I will say about this, that in Genesis 19, this is not the sin that is going on.
So what he's talking about in Ezekiel chapter 16, because people want to turn to Ezekiel 16 to tell you why visepangit can be saved.
And I'm here to tell you he's not getting saved.
What Ezekiel 16 is talking about is the root causes that led Sodom to become so wicked.
Pride.
And of course you see the remnant of that with the LGBT, like gay pride, right? Proud, gay pride.
It says fullness of bread and abundance of idleness. Well, what happens when people have a lot of free time?
Even godly people with too much free time, they get into trouble.
Look at David, committed adultery because he had a little bit too much free time, sitting around, doing nothing, being laziness.
I mean, you could look at countries that have a lot of money, and often associated with that is an abundance of idleness.
And what's the result? They're very sinful.
No one could make an argument anymore in 2024 that the United States of America is a godly country.
Now I do believe that there is one time you could make that argument, but there is no way, and I get it, I probably pay attention more to American news than you do,
but when their president is having the homos take off their clothes on the lawn of the White House,
literally they had like a transsexual day where all the homos are taking off their clothes.
You cannot tell me that the United States of America, I mean, on recent polls I've seen,
the United States, Israel, and the Philippines were tied for first in the highest percentage of the LGBT in the world at 11%.
That doesn't speak well of us either.
And it does not speak well of Israel, okay?
Which is kind of what he's rebuking here, right?
But here's what I'm saying, it's just like you could not argue it.
Now I don't think you'd really argue about any country that I'm aware of being a godly country in 2024,
but it's just like, you know what one of the major problems with the United States is?
Too much money and idleness. Too much money. Leads to problems.
People don't really work by the sweat of their brow anymore, and they have abundance of idleness all the free time in the world, and guess what happens?
They just get into major sin, right?
You know, in the United States, the homeless are an epidemic. It is horrible.
Now here in the Philippines and in other countries, there can be a person who's poor and down on their luck, and that doesn't mean that they're crazy or a bad person,
although often homeless people here are also crazy and addicted to drugs and out of their minds as well, but there can be exceptions to that.
In the United States, if you're homeless, that is an accomplishment.
You say, why? Because that means none of your family is willing to take you in off the street?
How bad of a life do you have to live where your parents don't want to see you, your sister doesn't want to see you?
Look, I know a lot of people in the U.S. that would take me in in a minute if we fell on rough times.
Like, what do you have to do where no one wants to have anything to do with you?
And the other thing is this. The government pays you to not work in the U.S.
You don't have to work a single second the rest of your life in the U.S. and you have food to eat and a place to stay.
Anyway, if you look at people that live sinful lives, the homeless in the United States are right near the top of the list of living sinful and ungodly lives.
An abundance of idleness.
Go back in your Bible to Matthew 11.
You know, when I was talking, giving the gospel yesterday, the person I talked to, he said, he was talking about being free.
And he was talking about how, like, well, you know, if you're serving God, you have all these rules.
But if you're not serving God, you have freedom. And, you know, you think of the homeless as being, I guess from his perspective, the homeless would be like the freest people in the world because nobody tells them what to do, right?
But, you know, I asked this person, I said, well, wait a minute. Is someone who smokes cigarettes every single day, are they free?
Because here's the thing about this. If you smoke cigarettes, you do not want to smoke cigarettes. You want to quit and yet you cannot.
Meaning you're not doing what you want to do. Is that freedom? He's like, no, that's not freedom.
Right? Or drunk. You think a drunk wants to be a drunk? But they can't stop.
And I told him, it's like, you will not have 100% freedom in this world. And I said, you know, if you serve God, it's like, yes, you're serving God. He's your authority. If you don't serve God, you're serving sin.
And I said, we will never have 100% complete freedom in this world until we get our glorified bodies and we're delivered from the bondage of corruption.
Right? Point number one, we see John the Baptist versus Jesus. Point number two, we see a rebuke of cities. Point number three, we see knowledge to babes. Knowledge to babes.
Matthew 11 verse 25, at that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes, even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight.
And what Jesus says here is these things have been revealed unto babes. Now, when he says babes, I do not believe that he's referring to a newborn physical baby. Okay?
I believe he's referring to a spiritual baby. And I think he's also referring to people that are humble and willing to hear the truth.
We talk to certain people that think they really know the word of God, and they don't listen or learn anything because they think they know everything.
But then there's people that, you know, are just kind of new and they don't feel like they know a lot. They're just trying to learn. And you know what? They can learn a great deal.
Right? I mean, I would say that if you're in this room, you'd probably say that when you got saved, you didn't know that much about the Bible.
And yet now you know so much more. I didn't know anything about the Bible when I got saved.
I mean, 20 years ago when I got saved, I knew very little. I could not have quoted a single verse in the entire Bible. I could not have quoted John 3.16 when I got saved.
You say, well, how do you learn then over time? You went to Bible college, right? Nope. Didn't do that.
You know what I did? I started going to church and started reading the Bible. And you know, over the course of 20 years, hearing several sermons a week,
over the course of 20 years, you know, reading through the Bible about four times on average per year,
over the course of 20 years, you know, memorizing a chapter of the Bible per week, it's like you start to learn a lot.
If somebody's new, it's like, of course, there's a lot of stuff that they're going to be like, man, this is intimidating. How am I going to ever learn that?
But here's the thing. We all feel that way at one time. If you've been at a church for several years, you know, you probably felt that way when you first started coming.
Like, man, there's so much information. I don't know these things. But then over time, you start to learn these things, right?
It's kind of like if a five-year-old were to look at a calculus problem, right? If I were to put a calculus,
I mean, my son Zeph is good at math, but if I were to put a calculus problem in front of him, he wouldn't know what to do.
You say, why? Because you have to slowly learn. And, you know, calculus is up here. You learn, you know, your addition, subtraction, multiplication, division,
algebra one, geometry, algebra two, trigonometry. But then eventually, I mean, if that's the field that you go into, all of a sudden, it's just one step above this.
And in the Bible, sometimes we hear things, and they're so complicated because they're like four steps above us.
But then maybe a year from now, they're only three steps above you. And another year, they're only two steps.
And then another year, it's like, okay, man, I really understand the book of Revelation now, because we learn unti, unti.
And what the Bible says is, he's revealed these things onto babes. So don't get over-intimidated coming to our church and saying,
pastor, there's so much I don't understand. Well, that's why you just keep hearing it and slowly learn, right?
Matthew chapter 12, Matthew 12. And I want you to notice the emphasis that Jesus puts in the Bible on personal Bible reading, personal Bible reading.
Matthew chapter 12, verse one. At that time, Jesus went on the Sabbath day through the corn, and his disciples were in hunger and began to pluck the ears of corn in to eat.
When the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, behold, that his disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the Sabbath day.
But he said unto them, have you not read what David did when he was in hunger, and they that were with him?
He's like, have you not read? Because if you had read, then you would realize that I'm not doing anything wrong.
It's like you don't understand the Sabbath day, right? I talked to someone on Thursday, and I asked him what church he went to,
and he told me Sabbatista. And I'd never heard anybody say Sabbatista before, but I assumed he meant it was Seventh-day Adventist,
which I was told that that is Sabbatista. And so I told him, you know, Seventh-day Adventist? He's like, no.
I'm like, I don't think he's correct. But it's like, well, more important, you know, and I just kind of moved on.
And, you know, he didn't even believe that Jesus died for him. So I was thinking, when I got done, I was thinking maybe Sabbatista is like a spiritista or something.
I don't know, something really weird. But it's like, here we see this story, and it's like they do not understand about the Sabbath day.
And, of course, the Seventh-day Adventists are like the big religion today that they do not understand about the Sabbath day at all,
but they're like obsessed with the topic. Verse number four, how he entered into the house of God and did eat the shewbread,
which was not lawful for them to eat, neither for them which were with him, but only for the priests.
Or have ye not read in the law how that on the Sabbath days the priests in the temple profaned the Sabbath and are blameless?
You see, the emphasis that he's saying is, have ye not read? And what he's saying is, you could have personally read the scriptures for yourself and known.
And I'm here to tell you today that what I'm preaching, you could read on your own and actually learn.
Because I'm preaching to you what the Bible says. I'm quoting a lot of verses here today.
You know, as I said, when we start January, I want everyone to hit the floor running January 1st with your Bible reading.
Try to get through the entire New Testament in January. We're going to give you the chart. We're going to have a prize.
And, you know, it's kind of like a reminder every January to put aside all the distractions and get into the Word of God.
And the idea is that you keep that momentum, and as February comes, you just keep going with it.
And you just have that pattern of just reading the Bible every single day. You say, why?
Because the Bible's emphasis is on what? Have ye not read? Go to Matthew 19.
Matthew 19.
See, I wouldn't blame someone who's unsaved, you know, and say, well, you know, like, obviously this is a Catholic country.
I mean, obviously most Catholics don't read the Bible, but it's like, they can't even understand the Bible.
As an unsaved person. But if you're saved, you can understand the Bible.
If you've got the Holy Spirit of God inside of you, you can understand the Bible when you read it.
You've got the Holy Spirit of God being your teacher, so here's the thing. You don't really have an excuse.
You've got the Holy Spirit of God. You've got the Word of God. You can read the Bible and understand it for yourself.
And what the biggest thing people need to do is start having a personal time with God where they're reading the Bible and studying the Scripture and learning the Word of God.
Now, look, I think online preaching is a great thing to learn extra things, but I think people are way too obsessed with sermons online.
Because you're going to get more out of your personal Bible reading than you are listening to sermons.
Now, you might say, well, pastor, if that's the case, why even come to church?
Well, obviously, if you come to church, you know, the idea would be the person preaching probably knows the Bible better than you because they've been studying it for a long time.
They can probably teach you a lot of stuff and motivate you, but my big motivation is to get you in your personal life to have that walk with God.
Because you can only learn so much in three hours in a week. You can only learn so much in this one sermon.
And that's not going to get you through the week. I mean, if you were to look at people spiritually speaking, you know, people that do not read the Bible,
they come into church on Sunday and they haven't read the Bible since like the previous Sunday. They haven't heard the Word of God at all.
It's like they come into church, it's like, I'm weak, I don't think I'm going to make it.
And then I preach the Word of God, it's like, you know, jolting that electricity into them like boom.
It's like, all right. And it's like, all right, I'm going to read the Bible tomorrow morning.
And then Monday morning, they don't read the Bible. It's like, oh, I'm feeling weak, I can't go on anymore.
And then Tuesday, Wednesday, and by the time Saturday, it's like, oh, I can't do it, pastor.
And then on Sunday, it's like, I jolt you back to life. Don't live your life just yo-yoing back and forth.
You need to have a healthy balance, have stability in your life. You say, well, how do I have that stability, pastor?
It's pretty simple. Have your personal walk with God every single day.
And it will help you not to just oscillate all over the place.
It says here in Matthew 19, verse 3,
The Pharisees also came unto him, tempting him and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?
This is one of the dumbest questions you're going to find in the Bible.
They don't just ask, is divorce okay? Because that's what put away means. They said, for every cause.
It's like, you know, pastor, it's like, you know what, I asked my wife to cook dinner by 5 p.m., and it was not there until 5.02.
Can I get a divorce for that? For every cause? I asked for chicken, and she cooked fish. I want a divorce.
For every cause, it's like, you know, it's been said before that there are no stupid questions, just stupid people that ask questions, okay?
And maybe that's an example here in Matthew 19, for every cause, right?
And I don't want to go into a long rabbit trail talking about divorce and what the Bible says. I've talked about it plenty of times.
But here's what Jesus says as a rebuke, and he answered and said to them,
Have ye not read that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female?
And he's saying, you would not have asked that question if you knew what the Bible said.
Now, look, I'm not against you asking me questions. I'm not against you if you don't understand something, saying,
Pastor, can you help me out with this? Or if you're a lady, you can ask my wife, and I don't always know the answers.
I might say, That's interesting. I'm not sure. Let me think about it. Let me try to get back to you.
And then maybe sometimes I forget to get back to you, or I'm not sure myself, because there's plenty of things I don't know in the Bible as well.
I'm not saying it's wrong to do that. I'm not saying it's wrong to learn from someone else at church.
Maybe you're new. You're trying to learn soul winning, and you're going there as a silent partner.
You're trying to learn, Well, why did you do this? Why not this? I'm not saying that's wrong.
But there has to come a point in your life where you're going to the Bible to get your answers.
You're not going to Google. You're not going to YouTube. You're not trying to pull up one of my old sermons or somebody else's sermons.
But you're like, You know what? What does the Bible say? Right? Because the answers are found in the Word of God.
Go to Matthew 22. Matthew 22. Matthew chapter 22. Matthew 22, verse 29.
Jesus answered and said unto them, and this is when they're basically asking stupid questions about like,
Well, what if you get married to multiple women on earth? Who are you married to in heaven, huh?
Jesus answered and said unto them, verse 29, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God.
For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but as the angels of God in heaven.
But as touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read?
He's saying, you know, like you're asking this question about who you're going to be married to.
He's like, There's no marriage in heaven. It's like, What are you talking about?
There is no marriage in heaven. It's like you're like the angels of God in heaven. There is no marriage in heaven.
All right. And I don't want to go on a rabbit show. I did yesterday, but I'm not going to for sake of time.
You know, a lot of people teach weird things about the sons of God in the Old Testament.
And they'll say, Well, the sons of God are fallen angels that mated with women.
And it's just like, Do you realize how weird it is to say that an angel mated with a woman?
And, you know, they said, But the Bible says they're giants.
News flash. Shaquille O'Neal, biblically speaking, is a giant.
When it's saying a giant, it's not like the Jolly Green Giant or Jack and the Beanstalk.
It's saying someone who's very tall. Someone who's seven foot, that's a giant.
Because if Kai Soto walked down the street, I don't know what Kai Soto looks like.
But you know what? If he walked down the street, I guarantee you I would stop and stare like, Who is that guy?
Right? Because he's very tall, right? He's like, What? Seven four or whatever, you know?
It's like he's a giant, biblically speaking, but he's not 500 feet tall.
The interesting thing about this, you know, this is why logically this is just stupid.
When a mom gives birth, if the baby's too big, you're going to have a C-section.
Here's the thing. If this angelic human was born and ended up being 500 feet tall,
or let's say 600 feet tall, 100 times the average size of a normal human being,
logic would say that that means they're 100 times bigger when they're born.
I mean, can you imagine a woman giving birth to a 700-pound baby?
Does that make any sense? It does not make any sense, right?
But what the Bible actually specifically said in Genesis 6 was, you know, there were giants in the earth in those days,
and also after that, when the sons of God.
So that happened after. What it's saying is, the world before the flood, there were giants then,
just like there's giants now. It's just kind of telling you what the world was like,
because we only have a small little section that tells us what the world was like.
And the Bible's saying, you know what? There were tall people before the flood,
just like there's tall people now, right? I mean, obviously they lived a lot longer before the flood.
It's possible that they were taller, but we're still not talking about 500-foot tall people, okay?
Go back in your Bible to Matthew 11.
Probably the craziest conspiracy theory I've ever heard in my life, and there's a lot of them out there.
But this is one that I thought was so crazy that when I heard it, I thought it was a joke.
But there are people out there, there's videos with like 100,000 views,
and what they believe is that before the flood, there was like these super tall, like angelic humans,
the Nephilim and everything, and they believe that during the flood, they died, and that's what the mountains are.
So Mount Everest is like an angel that died in the flood.
And they'll say, well, look at this mountain. You can see the nose on the mountain.
And I'm like, are they joking? They're joking, right? And I thought they were.
I was like, okay, but no, they're not joking. There's websites and all this devoted.
They're like, you can see in this mountain, you can see the mouth, you can see the eyes, right?
You can see three angels died in this mountain to form this one.
It's like, wow. That is the craziest conspiracy theory that I've ever heard personally.
Maybe you've heard something crazier. Tell me after the service, and I'll preach on it next week.
I don't know. Okay. But anyways, point number one, we see John the Baptist versus Jesus.
Point number two, rebuke of cities. Point number three, knowledge to babes.
And the key that Jesus mentions is, hey, just read the Bible, and you can learn.
Unti, unti, you can slowly learn. Do not get intimidated because there's a lot of new things.
And lastly, let's talk about salvation because that's how the chapter ends.
Matthew 11, verse 27.
All things are delivered unto me and my Father, and no man knoweth the Son but the Father,
neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.
Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
You know, the Bible speaks about when you get saved, you enter into that rest, right?
Just as no works were done on the Sabbath day, which pictures Jesus Christ,
getting saved involves no works on our part because it's the work of God.
He died and paid for our sins.
Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart,
and ye shall find rest unto your souls.
For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
Now serving God is not easy, but being saved is very easy.
Three examples the Bible gives.
The Bible says, Jesus said, I am that bread of life.
How old does a baby have to be to eat bread on their own?
Seven months.
Eight months.
They don't have to be a year old.
I mean, Ezra was eating before he was a year old, just feeding himself.
Right? Eating bread.
You know, I mean, Jesus said, I'm the living water.
How old does a child have to be to drink water on their own?
I mean, Ezra was drinking water and my other kids also,
before the age of one, holding a cup and drinking on their own.
He said, I am the door, opening a door.
Not that hard.
But how about never being bitter, always patient, never losing your temper,
always a good attitude, never worldly, always reading the Bible.
That's pretty hard, isn't it?
If we had to work our way to heaven, it would be very difficult.
Yeah, it would be even impossible because you'd have to be perfect.
And none of us are close to that.
The Bible says the thought of foolishness is sin.
And if you're anything like me, you think a lot of foolish thoughts.
Right?
We're nowhere close to being perfect.
But salvation is actually very easy.
Okay?
Now, go to Matthew 7.
And we covered this before, but I want to go back here to Matthew 7.
Because there's a passage in the King James Bible that is very changed in modern versions of the Bible.
And of course, you know, as a church, we believe that in the English language, the King James Bible is perfect.
We believe there are no errors, no adjustments needed.
It's 100% perfect, 100% the Word of God.
Nothing needs to be changed or added or taken away.
It's perfect. Okay?
And, you know, what we believe as a church is you get saved from the incorruptible seed of the Word of God.
I don't believe people get saved from modern versions of the Bible because they're corruptions of God's Word.
They change all the passages and verses on salvation.
Now, before 1611, people say, well, wait a minute.
If that's what you believe, how do people get saved before the King James Bible came?
Okay?
Well, in the English language, even if they didn't have a Bible in front of them,
and there were forerunners to the King James that were pretty much identical on salvation verses,
but you could translate from one language to the next.
I mean, how hard is it to translate the gift of God into Tagalog?
That's pretty simple, isn't it?
It's not that hard.
And guess what? It's just as powerful saying that in Tagalog or English.
You say, why? There's nothing magical about the English language.
They did not speak English before the Tower of Babel.
They're not speaking English in heaven.
God is not bound by a language. He's outside. He created English.
Okay?
The Word of God can be in any language.
It can be preserved and perfect in any language.
But in the English language, the King James Bible is the perfect and preserved, inherent Word of God.
Okay?
And, you know, if that's new to you, I get it.
But, you know, if you start reading the King James, I would say this.
The proof's in the pudding.
You can read this and say, you know what? This is different than any other book.
Right?
But notice what it says in Matthew 7, verse 13.
Enter ye in at the straight gate.
Now, when you see this, enter ye in at the straight gate,
it is important to actually read this and not just hear it.
Because if you just hear it, it's going to sound like one thing.
And you're going to think this.
But in reality, a gate is a passageway. Right?
It's not referring to the gate being straight.
It's referring to the gate being narrow.
Because if you notice the spelling of that word, S-T-R-A-I-T.
How do you spell derecho, straight?
S-T-R-A-I-G-H-T. Right?
This is not an old-fashioned way to spell S-T-R-A-I-G-H-T.
You say, what is this?
Have you heard of the straight of Magellan?
Did you pay attention in school growing up?
Bearing straight?
Yeah, there's one thing I love as a preacher.
It's like, I didn't really pay attention when I was young.
And it forces you to learn things like, oh, okay. Right?
The Magellan Strait. I mean, the Strait of Magellan, the Bering Strait.
There's a lot of straights that are, you know, here near the Philippines.
Just various passageways.
And it gets its name straight because it is narrow.
But the context will actually tell you that this is saying it's narrow.
Because look, it says, because entering in at the straight gate,
for wide is the gate, the opposite.
And broad is the way.
Broad and wide are synonyms that lead it to destruction.
And many there be which go in there at.
Because straight is the gate and narrow is the way.
So what the Bible's doing is saying the same thing over to re-emphasize.
Sometimes you can say something twice in a little bit of a different way
and it adds extra emphasis. Right?
So when it says, because straight is the gate and narrow is the way
which leads unto life and few there be that find it,
what it's saying is most people go the broad way down to hell
and few people go the narrow way to heaven.
Now, in expression you'll hear people say is,
well, you've got to stay on the straight and narrow.
And what they mean is you've got to stay on the straight and narrow.
But that's not what the Bible's saying.
It's saying the straight and narrow.
And here's the thing, once you enter, it's like it's eternal life.
So you don't have to worry, oh, I fell off.
You don't fall off. Okay?
You're saved, you're forgiven, you're on your way to heaven.
Well, here, when it says entering in at the straight gate,
what it tells you is few people are going to heaven.
Most people go to hell. And that's true.
Even in broad statistics, Christianity represents around 33% of the world.
Well, that means two-thirds of the world is for sure going to hell. Right?
Because you have to believe on Jesus.
And I remember when I first got saved, you know, I started to realize,
wow, you know, a lot of people that say they're Christians,
they believe the wrong thing,
but I probably would have guessed 10% of the world is on their way to heaven.
You start learning more, and it's like, oh, wow, it's really narrow.
It's really narrow.
I mean, actually, the vast majority of this world is on their way to hell. Right?
So it's very straight, it's very narrow,
but that doesn't mean that it's hard to get to heaven.
It just means few people are going.
Now, people assume, well, wait a minute, since few go there, it must be very hard.
No, it's because they're trying to go the wrong way.
Because we just used examples that said how easy salvation is,
eating a slice of bread, drinking a glass of water, opening a door.
It's very easy.
But here's the thing, in modern versions of the Bible, they change this.
So you're looking at your King James.
Let me just read you from the New King James.
Enter by the narrow gate, for wide is the gate,
and broad is the way that leads to destruction,
and there are many who go in by it,
because narrow is the gate, and difficult is the way,
which leads to life, and there are few who find it.
You know what it says in the New King James?
Few find it to heaven because it's very difficult.
Right?
Now, I find it interesting that they change the word straight to narrow,
and then they change narrow to difficult.
I don't know why they didn't just change straight to difficult.
But if you notice there, it's like straight is the gate,
they say narrow is the gate, narrow is the way, they say difficult is the way.
Right?
But they say it's difficult.
Yet it's clear from the context, it's describing the same thing and emphasizing.
You can tell that from the contrast between heaven and hell.
It's not difficult to get to heaven.
I mean, it's as easy as drinking a glass of water.
It's believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
We don't have to do anything.
It's easy to go to heaven.
People go to hell because they're trusting the wrong thing.
They're making it hard.
But that doesn't mean that it's difficult to get to heaven.
And when you say it's difficult to get to heaven, what does that imply?
Work salvation.
It sounds like what it's saying is, wait a minute, it's difficult.
I mean, you've got to be baptized.
You've got to keep the sacraments and the commandments and go to church every week
and never commit this sin or that sin or that sin.
And you've got to pray and pray and pray and then just hope and hope.
And you might make it.
Well, here's the thing.
That's what every unsaved person already believes.
We're trying to teach them the opposite.
And so people that are unsaved read the New King James and it sounds pretty good to them.
Like, yeah, that's what it teaches. We've got to work for it.
You can't just go out and believe and do whatever you want.
No, you've got to work and work and work if you want to make it.
But yet, all you've got to do is believe on Jesus.
You don't have to work for it at all.
It's not hard to get to heaven.
It's actually very easy to get to heaven.
I remember just when I got saved.
A few of the feelings I felt immediately after I got saved, if I remember correctly.
Number one was relief.
And probably everyone in this room, when you got saved, you felt this relief.
Man, I'm not going to hell. That's like the greatest feeling in the world.
And I also felt like an idiot.
I was like, it's so easy.
I argued with my friend for an hour.
I was like, no, you've got to live a good life to go to heaven. What are you talking about?
It's just like, how could I be so dumb to think that my good works would impress God?
As a saved person, when you think about it, it sounds pretty foolish to think that
going to church every week is going to impress God and forgive your sins.
It doesn't really make a lot of sense, does it?
But salvation is actually a very easy thing.
All it is is believing in the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's what he said. My yoke is easy. My burden is light.
It's very easy to be saved.
Living for God is not so easy.
That is a battle that all of us are working on.
And that is a battle that any one of us can drop out along the way,
including myself.
Anyone can drop out along the way.
We see great characters in the Bible that temporarily drop out,
or even people like Demas that just kind of permanently quit serving God.
You say, why? It's hard.
I mean, I preach sermons, and it seems so easy when I'm preaching it.
Like, oh, yeah, I'm never going to do these things again. It's so obvious.
And then when you go home, you've got to battle the flesh.
And the Bible speaks about your fleshly lust that wore against the soul.
It's a battle.
It's a fight. You say, well, pastor, how do I fight against these things?
Read the Bible every day.
Spend time with God. That is your spiritual strength.
Every day, set aside your Facebook.
Set aside your cell phone.
Go to a quiet place with the Bible.
Just read. Spend time with God.
Spend time in prayer.
That is your spiritual energy that's going to help you not sin against God.
And, of course, you're still going to sin. We're all going to sin. We're going to make mistakes.
But that is what you need to do every single day if you want the energy to keep serving God zealously until the day you die.
Let's close in word of prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be here today,
and I ask you to help all of us, including myself, apply this to our lives.
God, help us to serve you and obey your rules.
Help us to fight against our fleshly lust, God.
Help us just to constantly have a time every single day just spending time reading the Bible.
God, we pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.
For all the Lord has done for me. For all the Lord has done for me.
For all the Lord has done for me.
I never will cease to love Him.
And for His grace so rich and free.
I never will cease to love Him.
My Savior, my Savior.
I never will cease to love Him.
He's done so much for us again.
He gives me strength for every day.
I never will cease to love Him.
He leads and guides me all the way.
I never will cease to love Him.
Everybody!
I never will cease to love Him.
My Savior, my Savior.
I never will cease to love Him.
He's done so much for us.
One to third.
Though all the world is love neglect.
I never will cease to love Him.
I could not such a friend wage heck.
I never will cease to love Him.
My Savior, my Savior.
I never will cease to love Him.
He's done so much for us.
While on my journey here below.
I never will cease to love Him.
And when to that bright world I go.
I never will cease to love Him.
Everybody!
I never will cease to love Him.
My Savior, my Savior.
I never will cease to love Him.
He's done so much for me.
Amen.
May I dismiss Paul?