you
For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
Wherefore take unto you the whole armor of God, that he may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all to stand.
Now, this is a very famous passage of scripture, and there's many reasons for it.
It mentions pretty much everything in our Christian life.
It mentions soul winning in this passage of verses 10 through 20.
It mentions prayer.
It mentions having strong faith in your life.
You know, it mentions basically everything, right?
And so this is a great passage, and what it's talking about is being involved in a spiritual battle, spiritual warfare.
Go in your Bible to 1 Timothy chapter 1.
1 Timothy 1.
Look, of course, when we're talking about getting into a spiritual battle, we need to know who we're fighting against.
That's obviously important. You know, we say at a church like ours, which is true, that we're not competing individually against one another.
It's not like I'm competing against somebody else to be more spiritual or read the Bible more or anything like that.
Obviously, our battle is against the devil and against basically the systems that he set up, right?
But we are involved in a competition. We're involved in a battle.
1 Timothy 1 verse 18.
This charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went before on thee,
that thou by them mightest war a good warfare.
And the Bible says that basically the Word of God, the prophecies, the Scriptures, this will help us war a good warfare.
Knowing the Bible, memorizing the Bible, reading the Bible, hearing the Bible preached is going to help you in the spiritual battle, right?
Many people basically have no chance because they go to churches where they never learn anything,
and since nobody else reads the Bible, they're not motivated to read the Bible.
It's like getting involved in a battle. Imagine going to a war without a gun, right?
Or imagine back in these days going to battle and just not bringing a sword.
No armor, no sword, good luck, right?
And that's the reality in today's world that most people aren't spending a lot of time in the Bible.
How are you going to war good warfare and win that competition if you don't actually prepare yourself?
Any competition, anything you want to get good at, you've got to be prepared for it.
You don't step in and just run a marathon if you've never run before and expect that you're going to do a good job.
You're going to get tired after 30 seconds of running if you don't have experience and if you haven't trained your body.
Go in your Bible to 2 Timothy chapter 2, 2 Timothy 2, 2 Timothy chapter 2, 2 Timothy chapter 2 verse 3.
And look, I think it makes sense that Paul tells Timothy this over and over again because Timothy was in spiritual leadership and he's saying,
hey, you need to know what you're getting involved in. You're getting involved in a battle.
You're getting involved in a fight, right?
2 Timothy 2 verse 3, thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.
And so think of an actual war. If you're involved in a war, you've got to endure hardness.
You've got to endure difficulties. It's not going to be easy.
You don't get involved in a war and then at night it's like, okay, well, let's just check into this fancy hotel, have this five course meal for dinner and just everything's all nice.
No, I mean, you're going to be there not necessarily sleeping in a nice place, not getting a lot of sleep, right?
It could be very cold temperatures. I mean, whenever you see countries go to war with another country, I mean, it's difficult when you go to an enemy territory because it's just different there, right?
It's not going to be easy. It's going to be hard. Lack of sleep, lack of adequate food.
I mean, in the Bible, you see the people that are involved in war, sometimes they go a few days without eating.
Sometimes they go a few days without water, right? That would be difficult.
I've never gone a day without drinking water, but, you know, when I go just eight hours without drinking water, I start getting a headache.
I feel lightheaded. I don't feel very well. It's like, okay, I need to drink some water, right?
I mean, it's an important part, obviously, of our lives. And yet in the Bible, sometimes they're going without it and then they have to still fight in a war.
It's difficult. You've got to endure hardness as a soldier.
So if you're getting involved in a spiritual warfare, you can't spend all your time focused on the things of this world.
If all your time is focused on the things of this world, you're not going to work in warfare.
You say, what? You need the Word of God in your life. And if you're not reading the Bible, you're not memorizing the Bible, you're not hearing the Word of God preached, you're going to fail.
It doesn't matter how naturally gifted you are or how naturally zealous you are, that's going to die out, right?
You need your spiritual energy every single week, and it comes through reading the Word of God.
Verse 5 talks about striving for the mastery, and what that's talking about is basically striving to win a competition, striving for a gold medal, right?
And if you're fighting to win a competition, if you're fighting to win a gold medal, you've got to watch what you eat, you've got to watch how much you sleep, you've got to make sure you're training, you've got to make sure you're stretching, something I hate doing, right?
It's like, you've got to do all of those things because it's very important if you're going to be successful.
A lot of the best NBA players, after the games, they soak in an ice bath for an hour, right? I remember hearing that's what Kobe Bryant used to do. I'm like, man, that would be miserable, right?
I mean, I love playing basketball. It's like, okay, I'll stretch. I'm not going to be in an ice, you know, bath for an hour, right?
But they do that because I guess it keeps your muscles fresh, it keeps you from getting injured and stuff. You want to ice them down after the game.
Go to Ephesians chapter four. Ephesians four.
So when it comes to wearing a good warfare and our life being filled with battles, you might think naturally like our biggest battle is against the devil.
And I would actually say to you, I don't really think that's what the Bible teaches. Now, the devil is someone we're fighting against, and there are verses that talk about that.
But honestly, the biggest battle we have in our lives is not against the devil, not against his forces, but it's actually against our own flesh.
Notice what it says in Ephesians four, verse twenty two.
That he put off concerning the former conversation, the old man, which is corrupt, according to the deceitful lusts and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
So in verse twenty two, it says we've got to put off the old man. This is not talking about when you get saved. The Bible is saying on a daily basis, put off the old man, the fight against the flesh and walk in the new man.
Be renewed in the spirit of your mind. You say, what do you mean by renewed? Here's what I mean.
Twenty four seven, you get brainwashed by the world, whether you realize it or not.
Even if you're not trying to, you say, Brother Stuckey, what are you talking about? I don't even have, you know, social media. I don't have a TV. How am I getting brainwashed?
If you walk into a grocery store, you're going to be brainwashed by the things you're seeing, whether you realize it or not, because when you see it, it feels normal because it's common.
Right. Whether you realize it or not, it's going to start to feel kind of normal.
I mean, when I first moved here, I'll tell you what, it didn't I mean, it was bizarre to me ever seeing a guy dressed as a woman because you just don't see that in the US.
But, you know, when you see it all the time, it just doesn't shock you anymore. You just get used to it. That doesn't make it right.
I'm just stating this is reality. When you see things all the time, you just naturally think, you know, I mean, you see the way the women are dressed in public and they don't even know any better.
I don't know what the Bible says, but you see it all the time. You start thinking, maybe it's not that big of a deal because it's around you all the time.
All of us get brainwashed. You say, well, what do you do? Well, here's what you need to do. Get renewed in the spirit of your mind.
What does God say? Not what is common to the world or what they say. What does God say?
You say, Brother Stuckey, it sounds like you're saying we need to get brainwashed by the word of God. Exactly right.
My goal is to brainwash you. Oh, you guys are a cult. My goal is to brainwash you into what the Bible says.
And, you know, here's the thing. A cult doesn't tell you to read the Bible on your own.
What a cult does, you look at the famous cult and they'll say, yeah, you can read the Bible, but only the verses that we tell you.
And then we'll give you the interpretation. Religions like Jehovah's Witnesses, they don't read the Bible for themselves.
They read these little booklets that interpret everything. They don't actually read the Bible for themselves, though. That's reality.
I want you to read the word of God for yourself. I want you to be renewed in the spirit of your mind.
And I'm just preaching the things that you should be learning. Hopefully you woke up today and you got renewed in the spirit of your mind.
You say, why do I need that? Because you got brainwashed yesterday. Whether you realize it or not, you need to be renewed all the time.
These things are going to fade out. You're going to start thinking they're not that serious unless you choose to renew your mind on a daily basis.
Look, I don't really understand how people interpret salvation and say you got to repent of your sins, you got to give your life to Christ.
And then they say, well, if you really get saved, then you're automatically going to live for God.
Then why does the Bible talk about this battle that's taking place?
I mean, if you automatically live for God after you get saved, why does God have to tell you, hey, put off the old man and put on the new man?
I mean, does that just make sense? I mean, think about it. If it's automatic, why does Paul say, well, you know what, you got to put off the old man and put on the new man?
Because you're not in a competition if it's automatic. There is no battle. There is no spiritual warfare because you're automatically just going to do right.
It doesn't make any sense. What the Bible actually teaches, though, is that when you get saved, you enlist with the war and you know we're fighting against the devil.
We're fighting against his systems. But primarily you're fighting against your own flesh because the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.
See, when you're in church and you're hearing the word of God preached, you know, you're getting filled with the spirit. You're hearing the word of God.
It's exciting. And whenever I hear sermons, I'm always thinking, man, I want to start reading the Bible more. I want to start going soul anymore.
I want to fight against sin more. And you're really excited because you're filled with the spirit. But then once you go home, it just kind of starts to fade away because you're not always walking in the spirit.
Right. This is why an altar call doesn't make sense. I mean, everybody would come down every week because you're feeling guilty.
At least I feel guilty when I hear sermons. I'm like, man, I could make some changes in my life. Right.
But it's not easy because it's a competition. It's a battle. And it's not just a battle that you automatically win.
It's a daily basis of fighting this battle. And quite honestly, we lose that battle most of the time. Every single day we sin. Every single day we do wrong.
It's a battle that we often lose. But here's the thing. If you have this mentality, well, you know, I just don't want to fight. I want an easy life.
Well, you're never going to do anything for God. You have to be willing to fall face first on the ground and get up and humble yourself and say, man, I'm going to do better next time and learn from my mistakes.
Turn in your Bible to 2 Corinthians 4. 2 Corinthians 4.
I mean, it's a tough reality to face, but the Bible talks about that even if you do everything correct or try to do the best of your ability and follow everything God says, you're still an unprofitable servant.
What that means is if you have a job and you're given assignments and you do the assignments your boss told you to do, it's like, OK, well, he told you to do it. Of course you need to do it.
It's not like you went above and beyond what your boss expected. And spiritually speaking, even if we did live one day perfectly, which I don't believe anybody ever has other than the Lord Jesus Christ, you're still just doing what God told you to do.
And you're a servant. Right. And that's a tough reality to face, because oftentimes the reason why it's so important that we don't that we realize we're not competing against other people is because at a church like ours, we could look at ourselves and say, you know what?
Man, I go soul winning. I read the Bible. I'm doing more than 99 percent of other Baptists. Right. Isn't that what takes place sometimes?
I've been at churches where nobody read the Bible and you start getting comfortable and feeling like, well, I already know the Bible better than everybody else.
Now, of course, that's an arrogant thing. You're not going to say it audibly. But, you know, inside of myself, you feel very spiritual because the people around you aren't that spiritual.
And you compare yourself to other people. It's a very foolish thing to do, because at the end of the day, no matter how well you do, even if you're the best person on earth, you're not perfect.
And your battle is a battle with your own flesh. And you don't always win that battle. You're not competing against somebody else.
It says in Second Corinthians four, Second Corinthians four, verse three.
But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not.
Now, if you notice in verse number four, the word God is lowercase. Okay.
Throughout the Bible, if you've read the Bible, especially the Old Testament, it uses the word God to refer to a false god.
And it'll have a lowercase g or it should in your Bible unless there's an error. But basically what I'm saying is this.
When it's saying the God of this world, it's not talking about the actual God. It's basically referring to the devil here.
And what it says is he's blinded the minds of them which believe not. Because obviously the Bible says God wants everybody to be saved.
He's not blinding people from getting saved. He wants people to be saved. But the devil tries to set up this world so nobody will get saved.
He tries to deceive the unsaved and he tries to make the actual saved unproductive. Right?
And it says he's blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ who is the image of God should shine onto them.
So basically the devil is brainwashing us with his systems all the time. You say, how does he do that?
When you watch television, you're getting brainwashed by the devil. Whether you realize it or not.
And when you watch it, it just feels normal. It doesn't feel that strange because it's always very common.
Right? I mean if you're actively serving God and then you watch some dirty movie, you're going to feel guilty.
But once you watch it over and over again, you don't feel guilty anymore. Because you're used to it.
You get desensitized. Right? Especially if you're not renewing yourself and what the Bible says.
And see, the social media, all this entertainment, you cannot tell me that the actors and actresses of this world, of Hollywood, Bollywood, the Philippines or wherever,
you cannot tell me that our Heavenly Father put those people in a position of power.
You're not going to sit here and tell me that God decided, you know what, I want Vice Pange to represent me and be really famous.
Because he's going to help promote my message. Who's the one who puts someone like that to be very famous?
Obviously the devil. Obviously not God. The music that's out there, you cannot tell me that our Heavenly Father wants these rock songs to be very popular.
People sing them, they don't even think about what they're saying. I mean the music I used to listen to before and even after I was saved,
just talked about drugs and all these stupid things. And you sing it all the time and you're getting brainwashed whether you realize it or not.
Well it doesn't feel like that big of a deal and yet it subtly brainwashes you. Another thing is the public school system.
That is a big brainwashing thing in 2022. And look, I don't think it necessarily used to be so bad 100 years ago, but the way it's coming now, it's getting worse and worse and worse.
When I was a kid they didn't promote the LGBT. You better believe they do now though. You're getting brainwashed.
And look, we've all got to make our decisions of where we cut off our worldliness and stance that we take and everything like that.
I understand you can't be completely separate from it. I've had jobs where you had to go to training where you're getting brainwashed by these false things and there's just no way to avoid it.
I understand that, but here's what I'm saying. You better renew yourself in the Bible every single day because you're getting brainwashed whether you realize it or not.
Go to Deuteronomy chapter 6. Deuteronomy 6. There's a spiritual battle. There's a spiritual competition.
Now I want to give you a quick example of why we're not competing against other people, spiritually speaking.
This is something you often hear preached, so I wanted to think of an example that would really help drive home what we mean by that.
Just recently, I don't know if they finished it yet or not, they had the Olympics, the Winter Olympics in China.
I know a lot more about the Summer Olympics than the Winter Olympics, so I'm going to give you a Summer Olympics example.
But let's say for example that I was competing in the long jump.
And look, the people that win the gold medal in the long jump, they jump over 25 feet. That's crazy. I don't know how they do that.
I watched a few highlights just because I'm using this as an example. The long jump, they're just flying through the air. It's like, how do they do that?
But let's say I jumped 20 feet in the Olympics, but somebody else jumped 21 feet. I'm going to get the silver medal. I finished in second place.
Let's say the next Olympics I jumped 19 feet, but the next highest is 18 feet. I get the gold medal, right?
Now here's the thing, my jump in the first Olympics was better than my jump in the second Olympics.
My performance was better in the first Olympics than the second Olympics, right?
But the reason why I got less of a reward is because of the fact I'm competing against other people.
But see, in the spiritual race, it's different. Because if I read through the Bible 20 times in my life and somebody reads through it more, it's not like God says,
you know what, I thought you did a good job, but somebody just finished above you, so I'm taking away some of your rewards, right?
Look, if people outdo me, they get more rewards. I don't lose rewards because the Bible says you're rewarded for the own work that you do.
Meaning this, if everybody in the world stopped going soul winning and you got just one person saved the rest of your life, God would not say,
well done, my good and faithful servant. I mean, you get more rewards than anybody else, maybe, but you wouldn't get very many.
Whereas if you're just going soul winning every single week, even if other people outdo you, you're going to get more rewards because you accomplished more.
Right, now obviously when we look at rewards in the Bible, it's not as simple as two plus three equals five. God's got to look at situations.
We understand that. I'm just giving you an example that if it was in the Olympics, it really doesn't matter how I perform as long as I do better than everybody else.
Don't take that mentality to the spiritual life though. Yes, the Bible used the analogy of competition and fighting and war, but here's the thing,
your rewards are based on the work that you do. It doesn't matter if everybody else is lazy and does nothing. What matters in the eyes of God is, did you obey what I said?
Think about if you have kids, right? I have two kids. Let's say for example one day that they're both supermakulites.
And then Zeph is like, well, you know what, I don't deserve to get spanked because Christabel was worse than me today.
It's like it doesn't work that way, Zeph. You get punished based on what you did. Same thing spiritually speaking, God looks individually at what you did.
He doesn't compare you to other people and say, well done, you did better than everybody else. This is very important because of the fact as a church like ours, realistically speaking, we do more than most Baptist churches.
We get more people saved than most Baptist churches. We do more soul winning. We read the Bible more and you know what, that's true.
But here's the thing, that doesn't mean you can just calm down because you're doing more than other people.
Turn in your Bible to Deuteronomy 6, Deuteronomy 6.
One major competition or one major battle we have is just the spiritual battle, spiritual warfare. And look, whether you realize it or not, you're involved in spiritual warfare.
And here's the thing, if you don't want to compete, you don't want to battle, the devil's not going to attack you if you're doing nothing.
But once you start doing something for God, the attacks come. The battles come.
Everybody wants to do great things for God with no effort and no hardness and no problems. Isn't that true?
Everybody would say, I want to do something for God in my life. It's like, okay, wake up early in the morning and read the Bible. Man, I really love my sleep.
Right? It's like, I mean, Sunday, I mean, that's, that's, you know, that's my day off.
I mean, I want to do something for God, but every Sunday go to church, right?
It's like, that's the mentality that people have, whether they say it audibly or not, they don't want to go through the difficulties and the effort.
Another thing is raising your family. Raising your family is a competition. Now, once again, we're not competing against each other.
All the kids in our church have different personalities. They're different. There's no need to compare our kids to one another.
It's not like we're competing like, well, whose kid can be the smartest or the strongest or whatever?
The kids aren't competing against one another. And as parents, we need to make sure we're very careful not to try to compare our kids.
Right? Well, while the other kid did this, so you ought to do that too. It's like, well, don't, don't bring that burden upon your kids. Right?
I mean, your kids are going to fail. Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child. Just focus on your own kids and not on other people's kids. Okay?
But it's a battle to try to strive to do a good job as a parent in 2022 because it's not easy.
You're not going to succeed in this competition of raising your kids unless you put in the effort.
It says in Deuteronomy 6, verse 6,
And these words which I command thee to say shall be in thine heart, and thou shalt teach them diligently on to thy children.
Now look, diligently is implying with great effort. Now, here's the thing.
Some of you are hearing this and you're thinking, that sounds pretty easy. Just every day, just show them the Bible.
Yeah, but you know what? Honestly, that's because you don't have any kids.
It's a lot more difficult when you have kids. Your life gets very busy and everything like that.
It's very easy to just say, man, I just want some free time, no stress and everything like that.
You got to put in effort to train and teach your kids.
And I'm not standing up here saying I'm perfect at that because there's times where it's just like, man, I'm tired. I'm exhausted.
It's just it's not an easy thing to do to train your kids and to teach them the Word of God in 2022.
And I think it's harder now than it was 50 years ago because of all the influences.
I mean, sometimes your kids will say something and you're like, don't say that. Where did you hear that from?
Right. That's the world we live in now where there's all these other influences, whether it's social media or they're learning it from other kids.
And sometimes, you know, your kids will pick up a bad habit or something. And it's like, no, that's not right.
It's very hard in 2022. The Bible says, diligently teach your kids. Well, when do I need to do that?
And shall talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, sitting down for dinner as a family.
Right. Just relaxing, playing a board game or whatever. And when thou walkest, by the way, so you're going out walking with them.
You know, maybe on a family day or going out sowing with them, be ready to teach them the Word of God.
And when thou liest down, so you're going to sleep. Right. I mean, we put our kids to sleep at night.
And you know what? When you're putting your kids to sleep, that's your opportunity to actually talk to them.
Now, a temptation in your flesh might be just to spend all your time on your cell phone and ignore them.
That's actually the time you can really talk to your kids and explain things from the Bible.
Ask them how their day goes. And look, advice I heard when my kids were very young was,
you should strive to have conversations with your kids, even if you think they're really young and they're not picking up everything.
And just asking them real questions like, how was your day? Right. You know, how are you doing? Did you have fun today?
What did you do today and everything? You should strive to do that at a young age.
And look, when you're putting them to bed at night, that's a perfect time to just talk to them and teach them spiritual things.
That's your opportunity. But in your flesh, it's like, man, I'm ready to go to sleep. Right.
And then it says, and when thou risest up. So first thing in the morning you wake up, it's like it's your opportunity to talk to your kids.
What the Bible's showing you is, at all times, be ready to teach your kids the Word of God.
And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes.
And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house and on thy gates.
So that's kind of indicating just having a Bible verse on the wall or something like that.
The Bible says that's a good thing to do. Right. It's a good idea to put some Bible verses on your wall.
I mean, you don't have to buy anything. You can just print off a piece of paper with a Bible verse or something like that.
And that's things that I've done before. You know, just print off Bible verses. We have them at our house.
I always had that in college just to remind me. And I would put verses like, read therein all the days of thy life.
So when I wake up in the morning, it's like, okay. Or maybe a verse on your fridge, I've esteemed the words of God more than my necessary food.
It's like, okay. All right, God, I'll read the Bible before I eat. All right. Or read it while I'm eating or whatever. Right.
Go to Proverbs chapter 6. Proverbs 6.
If you're going to succeed raising your kids, you've got to be willing to compete and fight because you know what, you're going to fail sometimes.
Losing is part of competition. Everybody loses. You're going to make mistakes raising your kids. You're going to make mistakes serving God.
But you must be willing to keep fighting and stand back up and rise again.
The last one I want to look at, and this is just kind of in the first point, is working hard. Working hard is a battle that you've got to fight every single day.
It's not an easy thing to do. The Bible says in Proverbs 6 verse 3,
Do this now, my son, and deliver thyself, when thou art coming to the hand of thy friend. Go, humble thyself, and make sure thy friend.
Give not sleep to thine eyes, nor slumber to thine eyelids.
Now, look, obviously all the Bible must be taken together, and the Bible says that he's given his beloved sleep.
I'm not standing up here saying that you can no longer sleep if you're going to serve God. Okay. That's not realistic.
You're going to probably die in a week or something if you just don't sleep any. Right.
But what I am saying is this, that there's the tendency in the morning to just be like, oh, I'll just wake up in another hour. Right.
And look, I set my alarm for five in the morning, but I'll be honest, every single day it's a battle.
Am I going to wake up? Am I going to get up? Or am I just going to be lazy? Right.
Am I going to wake up and read my Bible and get started on stuff? Or am I just going to sleep in and just hit the snooze a million times or whatever?
Look, that's a battle that we all face.
Look, I understand some. I'm very much a morning person.
I've always been. When I was in high school, I woke up before six in the morning as well just to train for soccer and stuff like that.
But here's what I'm saying. You know, even if you're not a morning person, everybody still fights this battle. Right.
The temptations and problems you have in life, they're common to man. Everybody struggles first thing in the morning.
It's not your natural tendency to want to just wake up early and just get going.
Your natural tendency is to be lazy. You say, why is that? Because every single day you must start to walk in the new man.
And when you wake up, it's a new day. So you're not just naturally like, man, I can't wait to read the Bible. Can't wait to go soloing.
You got to choose to walk in the new man. Now, once you start doing that, once you start reading the Bible, then you're like, man, I want to serve God today.
But you've got to be willing just to take that first step, whether you feel like it or not.
Think about going to work. Most people probably aren't always that excited to go to work every single day.
It's like, man, I can't wait to go to work and sit in front of this computer for 10 hours or whatever, you know, whatever you do on your job.
It's something that you do because you got to get paid. Well, spiritually, you need the word of God every single day.
And if you want to serve God that day, if you want to successfully run the competition that day, you've got to make sure you're walking in the new man.
Early in the morning, read the word of God, memorize the Bible, pray, do that early in the morning.
Now, turn in your Bible. Turn your Bible to Matthew 10.
Sometimes I think we look at these characters in the Bible, we kind of think they're all like Superman or something like that.
No, I'm not advocating Superman. I'm just giving an example.
I'm just saying it's not like these characters in the Bible just naturally were just so super zealous.
They had to make the same choices we do.
I don't believe I'm going to accomplish what people like Paul the Apostle or Moses or those people did, but it is actually possible in 2022 to be just as zealous as they were.
It is possible to do just as much for God. I mean, just get as many rewards in heaven if you put in the time and the effort in 2022.
It's not like all the greatest characters that ever existed already happened thousands of years ago.
Today, if you decide to dedicate yourself, you could do great things for God as well.
Point number one, life is filled with battles.
And point number two, some battles are not worth fighting.
Now, I often write my sermons in advance. This one I actually wrote last week.
But the sermon last week, I kind of talked about this, this idea of a Pyrrhic victory.
So maybe it's just fresh in my mind or something.
But especially as a Baptist church, we like to fight a lot of battles.
We stand up here and say we're not backing down.
We believe in soul winning, salvation by grace through faith, eternal security.
We're not going to be watered down. We're not going to back down.
We're going to fight the battles and serve God.
But we also have to realize not everything is a battle. Right?
Life is filled with competitions, but not everything is a battle.
What I talked about last week is what's known as a Pyrrhic victory.
That's the term for it. And let me read you about what this is.
It says, the army of King Pyrrhus of ancient Greece defeated the Romans in battle.
So the Greeks defeat the Romans in this battle, but only after suffering terrible casualties.
According to the historian Plutarch, Pyrrhus said,
if we win another such battle against the Romans, we will be completely lost.
So what a Pyrrhic victory is, is you win an individual battle, but it actually doesn't help you.
It actually hurts you in the actual war that you're fighting. Okay?
Now, this is an analogy from an actual, literal war, where basically Pyrrhus was involved in this battle.
And of course, when you're in a fight, you don't want to lose.
You're in a competition, you want to win.
And basically, the Greeks were not doing very well in the battle,
so they just put in all their reinforcements and all of their energy.
It's like, okay, we won the battle, but wait, we lost a lot more lives than they did.
The smart thing would have been to just kind of withdraw and say,
hey, let's just live to fight another day.
And what the reality is, sometimes in life, that's the best strategy.
Notice what it says in Matthew 10, verse 16.
Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves.
Be therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves.
The Bible tells us that we are sheep in the midst of wolves.
We're saved people living in a world where people are against the things that we stand for.
And the Bible says, be wise as serpents, be wise as a snake.
What does that mean? Here's what it means.
A snake does not attack every single opportunity it has.
It doesn't just attack every animal or every human, it can't.
I mean, that's not the reality.
I mean, I know people are afraid of snakes, and I'm not particularly a fan of snakes myself.
But what I'm saying is this, a snake's not going to just come and randomly attack you.
The only way it's going to do that is out of fear, out of desperation for food.
Whenever a snake attacks you in the wilderness, you know, my grandmother got bit by a rattlesnake a long time ago, before I was born.
She almost died, actually.
But the thing is, snakes attack because you're hiking or whatever, and you step close to them, and out of fear, they just attack.
But here's the thing, they don't go out of their way, oh, I see a human, let me just come after it.
That's just not the way it works, unless there's some reason why they had this strange reaction, right?
Basically, snakes will attack when they know they can win the battle.
Doesn't it just make sense only to attack when you can win the battle?
Not just always attack, but be wise about it, be smart about it.
Why is that important?
Verse 17, but beware of men, for they will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourge you and their synagogues.
What the Bible shows you in this links to the end times is that when it comes to people that rule this world, they're not Bible-believing Christians.
When you think of politicians and people that make the rules and set the rules, they're not independent fundamental Baptists.
If I had a goal to get arrested as soon as possible from preaching God's Word and making YouTube videos, I could probably do it by the end of February, if I wanted to.
But is it worth it?
Well, you gotta take a stand, Brother Stuckey, don't back down.
No, you gotta be not Bobo.
That's reality.
I mean, yeah, I'm all for taking a stand and fighting fights, but sometimes you gotta realize not all fights are worth fighting.
I mean, living in the United States, some things are a little bit different.
When it comes to preaching against false prophets, just name the names, you don't have to worry about it.
They're not gonna sue you, you don't have to worry about anything happening.
Well, I just kind of took that approach when I came here, because that's what I'm used to.
I realized very early on, okay, I'm gonna get arrested or killed here if I do this.
Right? I had famous religious people like threatening me, it's like, whoa, wow, I didn't realize, I'm not used to them fighting back.
Usually it's like, you know, I'm just, you know, little compared to them in terms of power.
I realized, you know, it's actually not a smart battle.
You gotta be wise as a serpent and harmless as doves.
Why? Well, our goal is to get as many people saved and do something.
Me getting arrested for being foolish is not gonna help.
Right? Go to Titus chapter 3.
Titus 3.
In your personal lives, realize what battles are worth fighting spiritually.
Right? I mean, we all have families and we have relatives that believe some different things in us.
And look, sometimes there's a time to fight and just say, hey, thus saith the Lord.
Oftentimes though, it's actually not worth it.
Oftentimes it's worth it to just kind of calm down and back down and live to fight another day.
It's not always worth it to make, I mean, there's many situations you can think of.
But, you know, if you're around your family for Christmas and you're trying to give people the gospel and stuff in your free time, of course that's great.
But, you know, you're gonna see family members do things that you don't agree with, that aren't things that we would preach or believe or teach and everything.
Does it really make sense just to rebuke them?
What's your end goal?
Would it make sense to rebuke a family member for the way they're dressed if they're not even saved?
I mean, it makes a lot more sense just to try to get them saved.
Right.
Right?
Look at what the Bible says in Titus 3 verse 9.
But avoid foolish questions and genealogies and contentions and strivings about the law, for they are unprofitable and vain.
You say, Brother Stuckey, do you answer every single foolish question and things people put on YouTube?
No, usually I just avoid them.
Because what's the benefit?
What's the goal?
Right, I mean, it doesn't do any good to spend like five hours just debating on Facebook or YouTube.
It ends up being a waste of time, right?
What am I actually doing when I do that?
Then it says a man that is in heretic after the first and second admonition rejects.
Now look, you can apply this to soul winning and outside of soul winning as well.
But let's just talk about soul winning.
You're going soul winning and you show them Revelation 20, 14.
I always ask people if they believe in hell before I show them Revelation 20.
And if they say no, I show them Revelation 20 verse 14 and 15.
Right?
I say, well, the Bible says it's a place of fire.
And if they say they don't believe in it or they're not sure, I just say, well, where is hell located?
I show them the verse and I say, where is hell?
They say in the center of the earth.
What's the temperature in the center of the earth?
Pretty hot.
Where's the volcano come from?
Right?
Like lava numb volcano.
I mean, if they're not being stubborn, it's just like, well, it's kind of hard to deny that the center of the earth is thousands of degrees or whatever the temperature is.
Right?
But sometimes people say, well, I still don't believe it.
I mean, I'm a Jehovah's Witness or whatever.
Right?
It's like I don't believe it's a literal fire.
I don't believe it.
And I've said this before, do you believe in volcanoes or is that not something that you believe in either?
Right?
But then it's just like you show them Revelation 20, 14 and they say, I just don't believe it.
Well, that's one admonition.
You showed them what the Bible said and you know what?
They just refused to believe.
Honestly, even after the first admonition, you could throw in the towel if you realize they're not interested.
Sometimes it's just obvious they don't care what you're saying.
Right?
Well, show them Revelation 21, 8.
I don't believe it.
I still think if you live a good life, you're going to go to heaven.
Well, you've already given them two admonitions.
You say, what do you do in that situation?
What I do is I just say, well, you know what?
On the back of the invitation, you know, we have the Bible way to heaven if you want to check it out in your free time.
But we'd love to have you come visit church sometime.
You know, thank you.
Have a nice day.
I walk away.
You say, why?
It's a waste of time to debate them.
Now look, one thing I learned very early on when I started soul winning is that other religions don't know much about the Bible.
Because before you go soul winning, you kind of think the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons know a lot about the Bible.
Then you realize they don't.
They know very little.
They have a few things memorized and that's it.
And look, if you're new at soul winning or if you haven't encountered them, let me just help you out.
Jehovah's Witnesses know very little about the Bible.
They know a few doctrines and they'll say, especially about the name of God, they really focus on that.
If you know the verses, it's easy to refute.
And you know what?
They don't know just basic things about the Bible.
They just know the things they trained at.
Okay?
But here's the thing.
Sometimes you're going to run into Jehovah's Witnesses and they don't want to listen.
They want to debate you.
When we're going soul winning, our goal is to show people what the Bible says.
If they don't want to see it, well then why am I at that door?
Right?
I'll give you an example from a couple years ago.
I was knocking doors just, you know, right in that compound or whatever, you know, behind INC.
And I was knocking doors and this person walks behind me and he starts, you know, wanting to talk to me and to debate with me.
And I asked him what religion he's from.
He said, ang datting daan.
And he's just standing there and debating.
And you know, I could tell this guy's not going to listen.
So I basically just, you know, ignored him.
I gave him an invitation.
Yeah, if you ever want to come to church.
I just kept knocking doors and I realized he's just standing behind me waiting for me to debate him.
Right?
And then I've knocked a couple doors and I just turn around because he's going to be like that crazy woman in the Book of Acts that's just annoying me the whole time or whatever.
And I just said, you know, we believe different things.
I'm not here to debate.
He's like, are you afraid to debate?
You don't know what you believe?
You can't defend what you believe?
And here's the thing.
In my flesh, it's like, okay, we're going to go to war right now.
I'm going to show you who knows something about, I mean, in your flesh, you want to debate and make them look like a fool because they're being super myaba.
Right.
But, you know, I just told him, it's just like, yeah, I'm not interested in debate.
Right.
And I just, and thankfully he just kind of walked away.
Here's what I'm saying, though.
Would it make sense for me to just get involved in that battle?
Would it do any good whatsoever?
Not at all.
And this is a tough thing to do sometimes outsole when he just walk away.
But, you know, sometimes somebody will stand there and debate with you and you try to end it on a nice tone and they just won't quit.
And then you've got to just like say, all right, we'll have a nice day.
And sometimes you've got to be a bit rude just to get away from the situation.
Now, let me help you out with something, though.
If you're going soul winning with someone and you're sticking together at a door, okay, you got two of you together.
If one of the people leaves the door because of this sort of situation where the person wants to stay and argue, do not stay there at that door.
Also walk away at that time.
Because I've had times where there's somebody trying to debate me and I just walk away and the other person just stays there for another 30 minutes.
And after, I'm like, what are you doing?
You wasted your time.
You made me look like a fool also.
What are you doing?
Right?
It's like that was your opportunity to walk away, not waste your time.
If somebody walks away because it's just a waste of time and they're trying to argue, also leave.
You're just wasting your time and that's your opportunity to just walk away.
It's okay if you lose the battle.
It's okay if that false prophet feels like they know more about the Bible than you.
What difference does it make?
What difference does it make if that undotting to un-member thinks that, man, this church, the person who runs their church knows nothing about the Bible.
He wouldn't even debate me.
Well, I mean, I've read Romans 1.
What does the Bible say about debating?
Right?
Or foolish questions.
Right?
Turn in your Bible to 1 Corinthians 3.
1 Corinthians 3.
Living godly is a major thing where you've got to choose what battles you fight.
I mean, on social media, the things you post, the things you say, you've got to think really hard about what you're going to say.
Is it worth it?
Right?
I'm not going to focus on it because I talked about it last week, but when you get into a disagreement with your spouse,
that is a battle that is not worth trying to fight and win.
It's just like it doesn't do either side any good.
It doesn't improve your marriage.
It's just going to make things worse if you choose to fight those battles.
Okay?
Also, winning an argument with a church member.
Look, it would be great if church members always got along and there were no problems.
But, hey, if you're someone at a church that's never had a problem with anybody at a church, then that's great.
But let me just help you realize something.
That's not always the case.
Right?
We've had church members, you know, have problems and get in disagreements.
Now, honestly, we don't have as much of that trouble anymore because we kind of got rid of all the people that were always the ones involved in the fights.
They were all kind of kicked out of our church for various stupid things that they did or whatever.
And it's amazing how we just don't have a lot of fights anymore because all the Mayavang people are gone.
Right?
But the reality is when you're around each other all the time, sometimes you're going to disagree because we're sinners, we do things wrong, we're in a bad mood, we say things.
Sometimes church members are going to disagree.
Right?
1 Corinthians 3, verse 1,
And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ.
I have fed you with milk and not with meat, for hitherto you were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.
For ye are yet carnal, for whereas there is among you envying and strife in divisions, are ye not carnal and walk as men?
What the Bible says here in 1 Corinthians 3 is that if you're involved in the wrong type of competition,
if you're involved in a fight with a fellow church member, which you shouldn't be, it's actually showing that you're walking in the flesh.
See, some battles are not worth fighting.
What the Bible's saying is, hey, you know what, you're living carnally like a baby Christian.
Because think about babies.
Babies cry, you know, and they get upset, they fight over a toy, all these little things and stuff like that.
Well, look, as God's people, we need to grow past the stage of being baby Christians.
And if you're always fighting with fellow church members and getting in arguments, it's just proving you're carnal.
Now, I'm not saying that you can't ever have a problem with another church member.
Obviously, things happen. Sometimes somebody might sin against you.
But if it's always happening, don't sit here and tell me it's always the other person.
And look, that's what I've seen. The people that are involved in a lot of fights, they'll always say, well, they started it.
It's like, there's like 15 people that started a fight with you. It's like, what are you talking about? Right?
Turn in your Bible to James 4. James chapter 4.
James 4.
See, point number one, life is filled with battles.
Point number two, some battles are not worth fighting.
And here's what takes place, though.
If you're involved in the wrong battle and the wrong fight, you're actually going to find yourself fighting against God.
This is what we see in James 4. James 4, verse 1.
See, if you choose the wrong side in the battle, you're going to find yourself being the enemy of God.
If you have the wrong competition, the wrong fight, and you're not wise about your battles, you're actually going to find yourself fighting against what God wants.
And now you're the enemy of God.
Yeah, we stand up and we fight, we compete, and that's important.
That is part of our lives.
But we need to know, who is our competition and what battles should we be facing? What battles should we be fighting?
Let me give you an example. In 2 Chronicles 35, in your Old Testament, 2 Chronicles 35,
one of my favorite characters in the Bible is King Josiah.
Who likes King Josiah? You know the story about how the word of God was missing?
And this is someone who became the king when he was eight years old.
Not 18, eight. Right?
And this was a kid who wanted to do what was right.
He becomes the king, he's removing the idolatry, he's making changes, he's like, we need to clean things up.
And it kind of makes sense, because honestly, a lot of kids, especially if they're raised with some spiritual foundation,
they want to follow God and do right.
And at the age of eight, I mean, he's probably not tempted with a lot of things you are when you're older and stuff like that.
Wants to do what's right, he's cleaning house and everything.
Later on in his life, though, we find out that there's one big problem.
The word of God was missing.
It's not that the word of God didn't exist, because forever, O Lord, Thy word is settled in heaven.
It always exists. Right? I mean, there were copies, it was just literally missing.
They found a book, they said, wow, it's the law of the Lord.
It's like, okay, you don't have the law of the Lord? Right?
They read it, and then all of a sudden, Josiah's reaction is like, you know, tears his clothes,
and he's like, man, we are guilty. Right? Sackcloth and ashes.
We need to make some changes, because God's judgment is upon us.
It's interesting, because this is someone who wants to do right,
and yet when he actually hears the word of God, he realizes, oh, we're not even close.
And I think that the same is true for many people in this room.
You know, a long time ago, you probably wanted to do right, and you were doing better than other people,
but you didn't necessarily have the word of God as much as you have now.
You're reading it a lot more, you're hearing it preached,
and the result is, there's other changes you realize you need to make,
because you're drawing closer to the light, and God's revealing the flaws that you see. Right?
Josiah's a great character.
And yet, a lot of people don't even realize how Josiah ended his life, though.
Let me show you in 2 Chronicles 35, verse 20.
After all this, when Josiah had prepared the temple,
Niko, king of Egypt, came up to fight against Karkamesh by Euphrates, and Josiah went out against him.
So in 2 Chronicles 35, verse 20, you've got Pharaoh Niko of Egypt fighting a battle against Karkamesh,
and then Josiah is going to join the fight against Pharaoh Niko.
Okay? Verse 21.
But he sent ambassadors to him, this is Pharaoh Niko sending ambassadors, saying,
What have I to do with thee, thou king of Judah?
He's like, I'm not fighting against you. Why are you coming against me?
I come not against thee this day, but against the house wherewith I have war.
For God commanded me to make haste, forbear thee from meddling with God, who is with me, that he destroy thee not.
What the Pharaoh says is, hey, this battle doesn't involve you,
and actually you're going to be fighting against God if you join this battle.
He's actually right.
I mean, you're not normally going to side with the king of Egypt, but he's actually right in this situation.
It's like God doesn't want you to get involved in that battle.
Now let me just say on a side point, I believe the United States of America just needs to read these verses,
because it's just like it's always war after war. It's like it doesn't involve you.
Right? My parents update it on me every week. I mean, they told me recently,
I guess the United States is fighting against Russia now because Ukraine and Russia have this battle.
And it's like, why are they fighting? It's like, okay, you're done fighting Arab countries.
Now let's just move on to Russia. It's like, what are you doing? Right?
It doesn't involve you. What's the purpose? I mean, it's a fight between Ukraine and Russia.
Let them fight. Right? I mean, it doesn't involve the United States of America. Right?
And this is what you see in the story where the Pharaoh says, hey, I'm not fighting against you.
I don't want to fight against you. Verse 22.
Nevertheless, Josiah would not turn his face from him, but disguised himself that he might fight with him.
So Josiah puts on a disguise so he can still fight in the battle.
And hearkened not unto the words of Nico from the mouth of God, and came to fight in the valley Megiddo.
And the archer shot at king Josiah, and the king said to his servants, have me away, for I am sore wounded.
His servants, therefore, took him out of that chariot and put him in the second chariot that he had.
They brought him to Jerusalem, and he died.
And so king Josiah, one of the greatest kings in the entire Bible, dies when he's like 40 years old.
40 years old. I mean, he's a young guy, and he dies simply because he gets involved in the wrong battle.
You need to be very careful in life that the battles you fight are the right battles.
Go to Ecclesiastes chapter 9. We'll close off Ecclesiastes 9.
Our life is filled with battles, but you've got to be very careful, you know, what battles are you going to fight.
And look, it's tough because when a battle comes to you or a competition comes to you,
you don't want to back down because you feel like the loser if you don't fight in it.
I mean, let's say, for example, you're walking down the street and some random guy just challenges you to a fight.
And then he just kind of gives you a slight little jab to the face.
Well, look, my natural reaction would be, well, let's just beat this guy unconscious, right?
But here's the thing. Is that a smart battle to fight?
I mean, honestly, if some random guy is trying to fight you, it's best just to, you know, get into a jiffy and just leave.
Just walk away from the situation.
Now, of course, in your natural flesh, I mean, especially as a guy, physically fighting, you don't want to back down.
You don't like being cold soft or, you know, baklar or whatever.
So, again, I'm going to fight this battle. You're going to bring it to me.
OK. Right. But it wouldn't be a smart battle to fight.
You're just wasting your time. You can get injured very badly.
They could pull out a knife on you.
But naturally, that's a battle you're going to want to fight because, hey, you get challenged.
Let's just go. But it's not a smart battle to actually fight.
Point number one, life is filled with battles. Point two, some battles are not worth fighting.
And point three, the winner is not always the best or most talented.
The winner of fights, the winners of competition is not always the best, not always the most talented.
Right. Now, you say, Brother Stuckey, you're just making excuses for losing all these competitions.
Well, maybe I am. Right.
Ecclesiastes 9, verse 11, I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift.
Right. Now, of course, there's a famous fable by Aesop, you know, the tortoise and the hare were basically the tortoise.
It's very slow. And then the hare is very fast. And yet the tortoise wins the race just because the tortoise is more dedicated.
In a spiritual sense, if you want to make an application from that, which I think it's a good story, actually.
But here's the thing. You know what? Somebody might be very talented and very skilled, but it doesn't mean they're going to do anything for God.
Because honestly, the person that just kind of slowly runs the race and reads the Bible every day, even if it's just for 10 minutes or whatever,
at the end of the race, you've done more than the person who was maybe fastest or the most excited or most skilled.
Right. It's not just necessarily to the fastest person. The race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong.
Right. I was saying the fastest person doesn't always win a race. The strongest person doesn't always win the battle.
I remember the finals of the arm wrestling competition. I finished second.
Brother June beat me fair and square. Right. With both arms.
Okay. But the Bible is saying this. It's not always the fastest or strongest that wins the race.
But it says neither yet bred to the wise nor yet riches the men of understanding nor yet favored a men of skill.
But time and chance happeneth to them all. What the Bible says is, you know what? There's luck and gold.
Time and chance happens to everybody. Right. You enter competitions and sometimes you lose.
Now, of course, you know, the more skilled you are, the more likely you are to win.
But it doesn't always happen. The best basketball team doesn't always win.
I mean, if one team shoots 15 for 25 from the three point range, the game's over.
Even if they're not as good. I mean, if they're shooting like that, there's nothing you can do.
Right. I mean, I've played basketball games and the other team shoots it from outside. It bounces off the backboard.
And you're just like, you've got to got to be kidding me.
Or they shoot it. It bounces off the rim like 20 feet in the air and goes in.
It's like, how am I supposed to win?
And there is luck involved sometimes. I mean, that's reality. The best does not always win.
You say, Brother Stuckey, are you saying that it's just random and it's all luck?
Not exactly, because look at the previous verse. Ecclesiastes 9, verse 10.
Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.
For there is no work nor device nor knowledge nor wisdom in the grave whither thou goest.
And the Bible in verse 10 is speaking about whatever you find to do, put all of your energy and effort into it.
And isn't it amazing, the more time and effort you put into something, luck just kind of goes your way.
You make your own luck in life. That's reality. You make it by the hard work you do.
Now, of course, there's still luck involved in everything. We understand that.
But it's not random, though, because the harder you work, the luckier you are.
It's just reality. The more effort you put into something, you're just going to end up doing better.
That's the way it works. It works this way with anything that you do. If you want to get good, you put in the work.
You put in the effort and you're going to get better. And then all of a sudden, you know, you're going to get more lucky.
Right? That's the way it works with anything.
I'll give you a chess example just because that's a game I regularly play and a lot of us play, but there's something called a blunder in chess.
And what a blunder is, is just like a terrible, terrible move, terrible mistake where you basically give the game away.
Now, if your opponent does a blunder, then you basically win kind of by luck.
But here's the thing, the less skilled you are, the more blunders you make.
Now, everybody still makes blunders and major mistakes. But the reality is you could always use the excuse, well, it's just because I blundered.
That's why I lost. But yet the most skilled people in the world, they don't make as many big mistakes.
I mean, the most skilled basketball players don't turn the ball over.
I mean, there are a lot. James Harden, Russell.
But I'm saying the more skilled you are, if we entered an NBA game, we'd be turning it all over all the time.
But the more skilled you get, the less you turn it over. The less you make bad mistakes.
Now, you still make those mistakes. You'll still see the best of the best do things that just make them look terrible.
Just major, major blunders, mistakes or whatever.
What I'm saying is the more effort you put into it, the less you make.
The better you are at something, the more skilled, the more practice you do at it, the better you become.
I mean, when it comes to, you know, applying for jobs and getting jobs, there's a lot of luck involved.
Because there's oftentimes a lot of applicants.
But, you know, amazingly, somebody that applies for a hundred jobs gets hired.
Somebody who applies for a couple jobs doesn't get hired.
I just don't have any luck, because you make your own luck in life.
You're not putting in enough effort.
If you put in enough effort, even if you only have a 10% chance of getting the job, 90% times 90% times 90%,
eventually you get below 50%, meaning you're more likely to end up getting a job after five or six tries or whatever.
Right? When you put in the effort, you're eventually going to end up getting luck.
Because you make your own luck in life based on how hard you work.
Right? If you want to be successful at any competition, how much effort do you put into it?
Right? And this is just an introductory sermon, just basic ideas about life is filled with battles,
we need to know what battles to fight, and the best doesn't always win.
But, you know, next week is going to be a very practical sermon about being a sore loser.
You say, why do we need a sermon like that? Because I don't like to lose.
Right? I'm a sore loser. Right? Which, there's truth to that.
But honestly, because kids especially, they do not like losing.
I mean, I hear it all the time from my son about how, I win, Christabelle loses.
I'm thinking, at what? It doesn't look like Christabelle is competing with you.
Right? But it's just like, naturally, kids, they don't like to lose.
I mean, it's something, we're really training our son because, like Zeph, it's okay to lose. Right?
And there's nothing more obnoxious than a sore loser in a competition.
Right? If you win versus them, and then they make all these excuses, why was better, but...
There's nothing more obnoxious than a sore loser. Right?
And then the other thing that's obnoxious is obviously an ungracious winner.
Somebody wins, and they're just like, man, I'm the best, I'm better than everybody else.
And look, especially in a church, we do have a lot of competitions.
I think it's fun, but the reality is, we're gonna lose most of the competitions we compete in.
If there's a competition, one person gets the gold medal.
That's the way it works. Right?
It's like, my wife has told me before when I finished second in a competition,
you did good, you finished second. I finished first loser.
I didn't finish second. It means I was first loser.
It's like, that means I'm not good enough.
It means I gotta get stronger. I gotta be prepared next time. Right?
It's like, that's the mentality I take. The second place is first loser. Right?
But the reality is, in life, when we compete, most things you compete at, you lose.
And I don't want to preach next week's sermon. We'll talk about it next week.
But it is a very important sermon, because honestly, kids struggle with this idea of being a sore loser and an ungracious winner.
Let's go to the word of prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be here today and getting to see your word on this topic.
Help us to realize that life is filled with competitions, but help us also realize not all competitions are worth fighting.
But help us also to realize, God, that hard work is really the secret to getting ahead and getting more so-called luck in our lives, God.
We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.
Amen. For our last song, let's turn to hymn number 205.
Let's sing a song, He Keeps Me Singing.
Keeps me singing.
It's not a dream, it's just a dream
It's not a dream
It's not a dream, it's just a dream
!
One last move and sing it Okap Speak
Ready on last sing
Soon it's coming back to welcome me
Far beyond the starry sky
I shall win my k realise two worlds unbilled
I shall reign with him on high.
Everybody on the chorus.
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus,
sweetest name I know,
fills my every longing,
keeps me singing as I go.
Great singing.
Brother Juneau, can you pray for us?
Amen.