Alright, now 1 Kings 13, that's probably one of the better known stories of the Old Testament.
Of course this is taking place right after the death of Solomon and then Jeroboam takes
over the northern kingdom when it's divided and he's the first king of that divided kingdom
of the northern kingdom of Israel.
And we see here that one of the first things that Jeroboam does is he sets up this altar
in chapter 12 where he's trying to convince the people of Israel that these are their
gods and he sets up this altar and the golden calves because he's afraid, if we were to
read chapter 12, he's afraid that the people are going to grow, they're going to start
to long and go back to Israel, or back to Judah it would be rather at that time, and
to start to worship in the house of the Lord.
So instead he decides that he's going to set up his false religion and that he's going
to make sure that everybody kind of stays in his kingdom because he's afraid to lose
the power that he's come into.
And it's an interesting chapter, there's a lot there, I mean a guy could get up and preach
so many different messages out of this one chapter, I think there's a lot we could learn
from it.
But one thing I want us to take note of first of all is that in verse 1 it says that this
guy, he's not given a name if you notice, he just says, and behold there came a man
of God out of Judah.
And we never learned this man of God's name, we never learned what his name was, and it's
kind of interesting because in the Bible a lot of times the prophets that preached
a hard message or did what was right by the word of God, their names are mentioned.
We can talk about Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, and so on and so forth, all these
great prophets that go out and preach a bold and hard message, and their names are mentioned,
it's kind of like an honor that's given unto them, their names are just immortalized in
scripture.
But this guy is not so, and I've heard, and I don't think this is a wrong interpretation
that some people say, well it's because of his disobedience, you know, he was held back
from that.
God kind of took that reward from him and just said, you know what, because of the fact
that he didn't obey, that he's kind of an example of compromising there at the end or
allowing himself to be deceived, that was taken from him.
And I think that could very well be the interpretation, but I also think there's another interpretation,
you could say that they're both right.
And the way I want to come at it here is to show us that I think the reason why this man
of God isn't mentioned specifically by name is because of the fact that names are unimportant,
you know.
It goes to show us that it's not the name of the man that matters.
I mean, he has that title, the man of God, but is his name really important?
And if you go, if you were to turn over to 1 Corinthians chapter 1, we'll see why names
aren't unimportant.
1 Corinthians chapter 1, and then look there in verse 11, 1 Corinthians chapter 1, and
verse 11, the Bible reads,
For it hath been declared unto me of you, my brethren, by them which are of the house
of Chloe, that there are contentions among you.
Now what's the contention?
Now this I say, that every one of you say it.
I am of Paul, and I am of Apollos, and I of Cephas, and I of Christ.
Is Christ divided?
Was Paul crucified for you, or were you baptized in the name of Paul?
So Paul here is laying down and he's saying, look, you guys need to quit getting so hung
up on names.
You shouldn't worry so much about whether you're of Paul or whether you're of Apollos
or Cephas.
And if you would turn over just over to 1 Corinthians 3, in fact, he kind of puts the
smack down a little bit for having this attitude of thinking that it's the person's name that
we need to get behind.
1 Corinthians chapter 3, verse 4, and he says, For while one say it, I am of Paul, and another,
I am of Apollos, are ye not carnal?
So he's saying, you're carnal, if you're going to get hung up in thinking that it's
a name that's important, that being associated with a person's name and lifting that name
up, he's saying that's a carnal thing to do.
And he says, Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believe?
That's the important thing about Paul and Apollos.
It's not that they had a name, that they were these great lofty men, but rather that because
they were ministers, they were servants, they were willing to go out and help others to
believe in the Lord.
As it says there, they were ministers by whom he believed, even as the Lord gave to every
man.
And he says, I have planted, Paul is watered, but God gave the increase.
And I was thinking about this yesterday, this verse, as we were out soul-wetting, because
I ran into a guy I was not going to ignore, and he kind of got me flustered.
I'll have to admit, I kind of came up against the wall, I was about ready to just throw
my hands up and say, this guy just wants to argue and walk away.
And he came at me with this real strange, kind of just, out of left field argument.
I said, I was just starting to get into the gospel and I showed him, I said, you know,
the Bible says that we deserve hell, you know, it took in Revelation 20 and 21,8, and showed
him all the list of sins and how we're all liars and because of that, you know, the wages
of sin is death.
And I used that word deserve.
And something about that word deserve just hung up on him, like he got hung up on him,
well I don't like that word deserve.
You shouldn't say that.
I said, well what do you mean?
He's like, well, you know, you don't really deserve hell.
So, well, you earned it.
So of course you deserve it.
He wanted to kind of argue about this.
And I said, well, you know, tomato's model, potato, potato, so you know, you say one thing,
I say another, it's all the same.
And he kind of wanted to make a point of contention, but eventually I ended up getting through
the gospel with him.
But the whole time I have to admit that I'm going through it and I was just kind of, the
whole thing had thrown me off and I wasn't really ready to come back and recover.
But the point is, is that the end of it, I said, you know, I asked him if he believed
all this stuff and he got hung up and he didn't want to pray, and I kind of shook his
hand and said goodbye.
But then my partner that was with me, you know, he piped up and said, hey, can I show
you one more verse?
And praise the Lord, he was able to take him and show him from the scripture where he was
hung up at, and the man ended up getting saved.
And I remember walking away feeling pretty inadequate, thinking, man, why can't I do
that?
I should have been able to take the word of God and do what he did.
You know, and it's just one of those things that sometimes that happens.
And I told my partner, I said, man, thanks, I was kind of drowning there, appreciate you
were there.
But I thought about this verse, that it's not about me, the fact that I didn't get to
lead someone to the Lord, he did.
It's not about the name, it's not about the person that got to do it.
It's about the fact that somebody got saved.
It's about the name, it's not about the name, it's about that message.
That's the title of the message this morning.
It's the message that matters.
It's not what, it's not who's saying it, it's what's being said that matters.
And if you turn back to 1 Corinthians, or 1 Kings chapter 13, we'll be there all morning,
so I should have told you that first of all, but just keep something bookmarked there.
Look at verse 2.
So what is it?
You know, we see first of all that it's just a man of God.
He's not given a name.
Because I think the Bible is trying to show us that his name is not important, it's his
message.
So let's look at his message.
And let's look at how he preached it, because again, it's the message that matters.
And not necessarily what's being said, but also I believe the nature in which it is said,
how it's being said.
Verse 2, it says, and he cried against the altar.
I think that's really important, that's what we need today.
We need some people that are going to cry.
We need people that are going to lift up their voice.
And it's not that he got there and was like, when it says cried in the Bible, it doesn't
mean, like we would think of it today, where he literally cried, and was like, weeping
and feeling sad.
And if you would turn over to Isaiah chapter 58, keep something in 1 Kings 13, Isaiah chapter
58.
We'll start to look at some examples, and a lot of people, this is important because
today we have a lot of people, they don't like loud preaching.
They get offended by people who lift up their voice.
There's a lot of people today, they say things like, well I don't want anybody, I don't want
to go to church to get yelled at.
Well you wouldn't have liked any of the old prophets in the Old Testament.
We're going to look at a couple of them here, in Isaiah chapter 58.
You know, me personally, I like loud preaching.
I like preachers that'll lift up their voice.
It says here in Isaiah chapter 58 verse 1, God's saying to Isaiah, cry aloud, spare not,
lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and show my people their transgressions, and the house
of Jacob their sins.
You see, we need a loud message today.
That's what God is showing Isaiah here, in Isaiah chapter 58.
He's saying, cry aloud, don't be quiet, he's saying, lift up thy voice, and he likens it
unto a trumpet.
Now anybody that's had any kind of a background in band, maybe in junior high or high school
or anything like that, or has been around any kind of a brass section or a wood section,
they would know that trumpets, though they're a smaller instrument, they're very loud.
They're much louder than a larger instrument.
That's what we need.
We need a loud instrument for our voice today.
When we're preaching the word of God, we need to preach loudly, we need to preach clearly.
We need to not have, like you would think, well let's compare it to a trumpet.
It's interesting that he uses a trumpet.
We compare it to another instrument.
There's a lot of preachers out there, you would think that this said, lift up thy voice
like a clarinet, like a soft, like an oboe, just a soft, soothing, you know the trumpet's
a very brassy, it's a very loud, it's very distinct, and these other instruments, sometimes
you hear them, you're not quite sure, is that the clarinet, is that the oboe, is that the
French horn?
What is that I'm listening to?
But a brass is a very, the trumpet has a very distinct, loud sound.
That's what we need, and that's what God expects of his prophets.
He wants them to lift up their voice like a trumpet, and that's the example of the prophets
that we see.
I mean, if you read Isaiah, if you read Jeremiah, if you read all these other prophets, that's
what they're doing.
They go into a city and they cry aloud.
They lift up their voice and they cry aloud.
So that's the nature of the message.
It's the message that matters.
The way it needs to be preached is it needs to be preached loud and clear.
If you would, turn over to Jeremiah chapter 20.
Jeremiah chapter 20, look at verse 7.
We'll see another example of an Old Testament prophet who did as he was instructed and lifted
up his voice like a trumpet.
Isaiah chapter 20, beginning in verse 7,
O LORD, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived.
Thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed.
I have been derisioned daily, everyone mocketh me.
For since I spayed, I cried out, I cried violence and spoil, because of the Lord was made unto
me, made a reproach unto me, and a derision daily.
So we see here that in Jeremiah, he said that's how he preached.
He cried out against the violence.
He cried out against the spoil, because of the word of the Lord that was made a reproach
unto him.
That's another example.
So if people today have a problem with a preacher that gets up and lifts up his voice or speaks
loudly or speaks clearly, they wouldn't go for Jeremiah.
They wouldn't like Isaiah.
And not only that, they wouldn't like John the Baptist.
If you would, turn over to John chapter 7.
John chapter 7, while I read to you from John chapter 1.
John chapter 1, the Bible reads, this is John the Baptist.
John bare witness of him, so he's bearing witness of Christ, we know that.
John bare witness of him, and cried, saying, This was he of whom I spake.
He that cometh before me is preferred before me.
So the man, the precursor to Jesus Christ, the man that was ordained of God to go and
to speak the word of God to the people and to make straight the paths for Jesus Christ,
to prepare the way for him, he was to do it in a specific way, and the way he did it was
that he cried aloud.
He spared not.
He didn't go there and speak a nice soft spoken message.
Now I'm not saying that every guy that gets up in a pulpit has to get up and growl like
a grizzly bear.
I mean, that would be great.
But everybody's different.
And I enjoy a preacher who will lift up his voice as much as what's in him.
If it's obvious that the way he's preaching is that that's him fired up.
When he gets fired up, when he cries aloud, that's the way he sounds.
You can tell when a guy is like that.
And that's the kind of preaching that we're instructed to have out of the word of God.
That's the type of preaching that I like to listen to.
And I think a lot of God's people, they like a nice, loud, clear message.
In John chapter 7 we'll see, so we see that, you know, to cry aloud, that's the example
of Isaiah.
That's the example of Jeremiah.
That's the example of many of the Old Testament prophets.
That's the example of John the Baptist, but it's also the example of Jesus Christ himself.
John chapter 7, look at verse 25.
John 7, 25, the Bible says,
Then said some of them of Jerusalem, Is this not he whom they seek to kill?
But lo, he speaketh boldly, and they say nothing unto him.
Do the rulers know indeed that this is the very Christ?
Howbeit we know this man whence he is, but when Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence
he is.
Then cried Jesus in the temple.
Now again, this doesn't mean Jesus got the Kleenex out and was crying in the corner.
You're thinking of weeping, you're thinking of wept, and Jesus did weep and he wept in
places.
But here it's saying, when he says he cried, it means he lifted up his voice like a trumpet.
Then cried Jesus in the temple as he taught, saying, Ye both know me, and ye know whence
I am, and I am not come of myself, but he that sent me is true, whom ye know not.
So there he is crying and lifting up his voice and preaching a hard message.
That's the example we see of Jesus Christ over in John chapter 12.
You can turn there if you like or I can just read it to you, John chapter 12, beginning
in verse 42.
Nevertheless, among the chief rulers also many believed on him, but because of the Pharisees
they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the sin of God.
For they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.
Jesus cried and said, He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent
me.
Jesus has this message for them and he wants to make sure that they hear it.
So he doesn't just send them a newsletter, he doesn't get them on his emailing list and
preach this hard message.
No, he lifted up his voice at an exact moment and he cried aloud that they could hear him.
And that's what we need to do.
That's the type of preaching, if you would turn back to 1 Kings chapter 13, that's the
type of preaching.
It's the message that matters.
Well okay, if it's the message that matters and not the man, what's the nature of that
message?
It doesn't even need to be preached.
1, we see that it needs to be preached aloud, it's something that needs to be cried aloud.
Look at verse 2 again where it says, And he cried against the altar of the Lord.
Not only do we need a man of God to cry aloud, to lift up his voice, but he needs to be specific
about what he's crying against.
He needs to cry against something.
And that's what we really are lacking today.
I mean there's a lot of preachers today, they do find getting up and raising their voice.
But it's a bunch of hot air.
They're not really preaching against anything.
And there's so many things today that we need.
We need confrontational preaching today.
We need preaching that's going to call a spade a spade, it's going to call sin out, and it's
going to preach against some things.
The man of God here didn't just show up and cry aloud against anything, he just didn't
start reciting the alphabet or something, he had something specific that he wanted to
cry against.
He cried against the altar.
We need preachers today that are going to stand against some things.
Like this man of God, he preached against something.
And we could think here, we could make a whole list, just pages of notes of things that men
of God need to preach against, and they're not.
We could think of things like drunkenness, right?
That's a big sin today in America.
We got a bunch of drunks in this country, everyone's giving to wine, everyone's drinking
all the time.
And the Bible is very specific, it condemns drinking in the Bible, it condemns drunkenness
in the Bible.
There's so many preachers today, they wouldn't touch that subject with a ten-foot pole.
Because they're just afraid of it, they don't want to offend somebody.
That's not the nature of this man here.
That's not what matters, it's not whether or not you're going to offend somebody.
It's the message that matters.
They need to preach about drunkenness or fornication.
I mean, you go into these fun centers, you go into these non-denom churches, they're
full of fornication.
I know when I first got saved, I was kind of in and out of these things, and I saw people
drinking wine, I saw people that were fornicating, and it's all just tolerated in these churches
today.
And do you think any of those guys, any of those pastors in those churches are ever going
to stand up and cry aloud and lift up their voice against fornication?
No.
No way.
Not going to happen.
I'd be shocked if it ever happened, but that's what we need today.
And then you wonder why our nation is in condition in its end.
Because there's no men of God that are willing to cry against something.
There might be some guys that get up there and get fired up and start crying aloud about
the pre-trib rapture, or why the Jews are God's chosen people, all these false doctrines.
They'll get up and they'll cry aloud, they'll get all fired up about something.
It's very rare that we're finding any men of God today who get up and cry aloud against
some things that need to be cried aloud against.
Drunkenness, fornication, adultery, divorce, all these big sins that the Bible goes on
and on about whole chapters that are dedicated to these sins, never get preached about.
Never get cried against by a man of God.
Now I'll say this, if he won't preach at those people that are without...
If you've got a man of God who'll get up behind a pulpit and he's afraid to even preach against
the people that are without the church, he's afraid to preach against the Sodomites, which
by the way, that's where they belong.
Outside the church.
Not inside the church.
If you've got guys who say they won't even get up and preach against those that are outside
the church, do you think he's ever going to get on your sin?
Do you think he's ever going to help you by preaching against the things in your life?
It's never going to happen.
If he's too afraid to preach against those that are without, he's never going to preach
against those that are within the church.
Now one thing they could preach...
We talk about these sins that they could preach against, right?
The drunkenness, the fornication, but what did this guy in 1 Kings 13 preach against?
He preached against the altar.
He preached against some false doctrine that was being set up.
He preached against the false religion.
And boy, that would be another one some of these guys could stand to get up and rip on,
couldn't it?
That they could lift up their voice and preach against it.
All the false doctrine that's being preached in these churches.
I believe that there's some guys out there that are standing up behind pulpits week in
and week out, they know what their Baptist brethren believe is completely wrong.
They know they've been reading their Bible, they've been listening to other sound preaching,
and they know that the people they're associated with are dead wrong about what they preach
and what they believe when it comes to end times prophecy or the nation of Israel.
You name the subject.
There's so many out there.
But they're too afraid to get up and preach against it, and they need to.
They're afraid to preach against it because of those that are without, you know, the backlash
that they'll get from their Bible college.
You know, big deal.
So what?
That's another subject you guys need to preach against, Bible colleges, right?
But they're afraid to preach against these things because they don't want the backlash.
But you know what, that means they're just not going to ever preach against the people
that are in the pew.
And we need that.
We need that hard preaching to keep us right and to help us grow.
And they need to preach against the false doctrine, like repent of your sin's salvation.
That's a battle that's been raging for a long time now, and it's not going anywhere, because
it's still going to be heavily promoted by all these false prophets that are out there.
And we need some guys that will get up and preach against this altar of false doctrine.
You know, this lose your salvation, you know, preachers will say, you know, you could lose
your salvation, it's not one save always saves.
Well, yes it is.
The Bible is clear about that.
And we need some men to get up and preach against this false doctrine.
Amen.
But they don't want to do that.
They want to get all excited about, you know, how Israel is, you know, God's chosen people.
That's what they get fired up about.
So it's not just enough to get fired up and cry aloud.
It needs to be against something.
It needs to be against something that God is against.
God is against some things, you know.
We could turn to some passages and see some things that God hates.
Now we'll see here next that it's the message that matters.
And because it's the message that matters, we need to understand that when people are
offended, that's okay.
People are going to be offended.
And we should not allow that to help cause us to hold back offending people.
The offended, you know, they can't refute the message.
Because it's the message that matters.
If the message is sound, if the message is biblical, they can't refute it.
And that's what we see so often.
They can't refute it.
Instead they just attack the messenger.
You know, if you have a hard time believing this, just go on Pastor Anderson's YouTube
channel and read his comments.
You know, I'm thinking specifically about this whole video that Pastor Anderson put
out against Greg Locke, this pastor that just got divorced recently.
You know, he's going to say, well you don't know the details.
I don't need to know the details.
The fact is, he's a pastor, claims to be a pastor, and he's divorcing his wife.
Now the scripture is clear, you know, you have to be the husband of one wife.
And if a man knows how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?
If you can't take care of that most important fundamental relationship in your life as
a man, your wife, you have no business trying to lead other people, being an example to
other people.
That's just the facts.
That's the fact that matters.
I don't need to know the details of what happened between this man and his wife.
The fact is, is he's getting divorced, which the Bible condemns.
And you know, Pastor Anderson puts out a video like that, just calling this guy out, which
ought to be done, because there's so many people that he's just leading down this primrose
path down to destruction, because people are going to follow his example.
And a man of God gets out and cries aloud like he ought to, and he cries against this
sin that this man's guilty of, and you go and you read these comments.
And these people are just like, they can't refute the message.
They can't take you to a passage in scripture and say, well actually, here's where you're
wrong.
You know, if I'm wrong, go ahead and correct me.
I mean, you name the doctrine, by the way.
I mean, if our doctrines that we believe, like the post-Trib pre-wrath rapture, like
that Israel is not God's chosen people, if we're so dead wrong on these doctrines, it
should be very easy for a man of God to get up and just take the Bible and just clearly
explain it, and clearly debunk us, but they can't.
And they don't.
And you go and you read these comments, and all you see is just attacking the man.
Just attacking the man.
You see that in 1 Kings chapter 13, look at verse 2 again.
And he cried against the altar in the word of the Lord, and said, O altar, altar, thus
saith the Lord, behold, a child should be born unto the house of David, Josiah by name,
and upon thee shall he offer the priests of the high places that burnt incense upon thee,
and men's bones shall be burnt upon thee.
Jump down to verse 4.
And it came to pass when King Jeroboam heard the saying of the man of God, so he's hearing
the hard message, right?
Watch how he reacts.
Which he cried against the altar in Bethel, that he put forth his hand from the altar,
saying, lay hold on him.
He wanted to shut this guy up, probably maybe, who knows, do what to him, once they got a
hold of him.
Put him in prison, kill him, anything.
But he couldn't refute the message.
He didn't want to get up and say, well, here's where you're wrong, man of God from Judah.
Let me straighten you out.
This is why what I'm doing is right.
Let me show you how what I'm doing is correct.
No, he just attacks the messenger.
So when we offend people, that's okay, because it's the message that's offending them.
This man of God from Judah, we read on later where he makes his mistakes, but when you
consider the way he started out, I think he's a great example.
He's somebody who understood that fear is not an option for a preacher.
That if you're going to be a preacher, you can't be afraid.
You cannot be afraid of their faces.
You cannot be afraid of the message that you have to preach.
The Bible says that fear is just not an option.
We turn over to Matthew chapter 10 real quick and we'll see a great example of this.
Matthew chapter 10 where Jesus calls his 12 disciples and then sends them forth two by
two to the lost tribes of the house of Israel.
Matthew chapter 10, look at verse 16, Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of
wolves.
Now that sounds scary, right?
You're being sent out as a sheep.
Now a sheep is not a fearsome creature.
In case you hadn't, I mean the sheep has really no way of defending itself.
There's no fangs.
There's no claws.
You know, little kids don't have nightmares about sheep.
In fact, it's quite the opposite.
We count sheep to go to sleep, right?
So he's sending them out as this harmless, helpless creature in the midst of wolves.
I mean when we talk about a devourer, somebody who can destroy, that's a wolf, right?
That's the situation that Jesus is describing here.
He's sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves.
Be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmless as of doves, but beware of men for they will
deliver you up to the councils and they will scourge you in their synagogues, and ye shall
be brought before governors and kings for my sake for a testimony against the Gentiles.
But when they deliver you, take no thought of what ye shall speak, for it shall be given
you in that same hour what ye shall speak.
For it is not ye that speak, but the spirit of your Father which is in you.
And he talks about how the brothers shall deliver up the brother to death, and you'll
be hated for old men's sake, and then they will persecute you in this city.
And then he tells them, you know, that's the way it's got to be, verse 24.
The disciples not above his master.
It is enough for his master to be as a disciple.
Then verse 26, he says this, Fear them not, therefore, for there is nothing covered that
shall not be revealed, and hid that shall not be known.
What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light, and what ye hear in the air, that
preach on the housetop.
And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul, but rather
fear him which is able to destroy both body and soul, soul and body and hell.
He said, you know what, I'm going to give you a hard message.
You're going to have to go out there and you're going to be hated.
There's people that are going to not like the things that you have to say, but what
do you tell them?
Don't be afraid.
You can't be afraid.
Fear is not an option for the preacher.
Fear is not an option for the soul-inner.
Fear is not an option for us when we go out to preach the gospel.
That's good.
I mean, it's our natural inclination.
We might get nervous.
I know for a long time, and even now often, you know, that first door I go to knock, got
the butterflies a little bit.
I don't know how this is going to be received, but you know what, after that first person
comes, it's just like, no matter the outcome of that first door, it's just like, what was
I so worried about?
This is, you know, it's not, it's not, the worst thing they can say is, you know, I had
some person the other day, we were talking about receptive, I think I had one person
that was kind of a jerk, knocking on their door and I could hear him.
It was one of those security screen doors.
I hate Phoenix for that because they come to the door and you can't see them, right?
So they come to the door and they're not even at the door.
I can hear walking back and forth and I knock on the door, go away, dude, not interested.
Oh man, you told me to go away.
You know, is that what we're afraid of?
Just being told to go away?
You know, and I'm sure there's other places we could go to where it's much more, you know,
if you go to some of these more liberal places, well, they'll, oh, you want to come to my
door at the Bible, let me give you a piece of my mind.
And we've all probably had experiences like that if we've gone out so many, but that should
never be a reason for us to be afraid that somebody's going to say something mean to
us or be nasty to us.
You know, and that's one thing that I think people struggle with the most when it comes
to soul winning is they have a hard time.
I know for myself and I've seen others do it, it's something, it's a discipline that
you have to put into practice that when you have a bad door, when you get a bad reception,
you need to learn to just leave it there.
You need to just be able to walk away and shake the dust off your feet and keep a good
attitude and move on to the next one.
It seems like so often we get that bad door, we want to keep talking about it through the
next three or four doors and then it'll begin to affect our spirit and affect our attitude
and we'll become discouraged.
When you have a bad door, just leave that bad door there and move on to the next one.
That's always good to have a different conversation going on with your partner when you're out
soul winning.
Be talking about something that's completely unrelated so that doesn't become the focus
of the conversation.
But the point I'm trying to make here is that Jesus is showing us in Matthew 10 that fear
is not an option if you're going to be a soul winner.
Fear is not an option if you're going to be a preacher, if you're going to be a man of
God like the guy in 1 Kings 13.
If you're going to cry aloud, if you're going to make others hear the things that you have
to say and you're going to cry against something, if you're going to preach the word of God,
you're going to offend people.
And if you're afraid of offending people, then you're going to trim back the message
you're going to hold back.
Which is not what we need.
We need people who are going to be unafraid and then they're going to preach.
Turn over to 2 Timothy chapter 4.
2 Timothy chapter 4.
We'll see where Paul exhorted Timothy to have this kind of an attitude, to not be afraid.
2 Timothy chapter 4 verse 1, I charge thee therefore before God.
So this isn't optional.
He's not saying, hey, you're going to be Timothy, man of God, my protege, the one who I'm leaving
to ordain elders.
You know, I charge thee.
You must do this.
I charge thee before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge the quick and the dead
of his appearing in his kingdom.
Preach the word, be instant, in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all
long suffering and doctrine, then it has this period.
There's no option there.
You didn't give them an out.
Unless, of course, Timothy, you know, the mayor walks in or somebody with a lot of money,
you know, Mr. Moneybags walks in or you know that if you preach this, you're going to lose
people.
No, he says preach the word.
Be instant, in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and
doctrine.
Why?
Then he gives them the exact reason why.
For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own
lust shall they heed to themselves teachers having itching ears.
He didn't say, Timothy, when that time comes just try to blend in with those other teachers.
You know, just try to blend in with them and maybe we can get our message across to them
that way.
Maybe we can just be incognito.
We can just be, you know, an undercover Christian and we can sneak in with all the false prophets
and kind of, you know, work from the inside out.
He's saying, no, you need to preach the word, be instant, don't be afraid, for the time
will come.
The time comes when people don't want to endure sound doctrine of church, or when people get
into sin, that's the time to preach against it.
That's not the time to hold back, that's the time to lift up your voice and cry aloud and
spare not.
Preaching the word will offend everyone, everyone.
If you preach the whole counsel of God, I guarantee you, you're going to offend everyone
at some point or another.
Every single person that hears the sound of your voice, if they stick around long enough,
is going to be offended by something you preach.
That's perfectly natural because not one of us is perfect.
We're all sinners, we've all come short of the glory of God, we're all going to have
sins in our life, we're all going to have things that we need to work on or get better,
or areas in our life where we're coming up short, or things that we need to improve on,
and if we stick around a man of God that's going to lift up his voice and cry aloud and
spare not, mark it down, one day it's going to fall on your lap.
It's going to come across to you.
The preacher's going to come to you and preach to you.
Now he might not be going out of his way to preach to you, I mean that's the great
thing about having a church with a lot of people in it.
The preacher can just start preaching and it's going to apply to somebody at some point.
But the preaching of God's word will offend everyone.
Bible says in James 3, I'll read for you, my brethren, be not many masters, knowing
that we shall receive the greater condemnation.
Now I used to read this and think that he's talking about the fact that God is going to
hold them accountable and maybe they're going to be condemned by God for some of the things
that they did wrong.
But I think what it's referring to, the condemnation, is the condemnation of others.
If you're going to be a preacher, if you're going to be a master, if you're going to
teach the word of God, you're going to receive greater condemnation than somebody that isn't.
Somebody who says, yeah, I believe the word of God and they live by the word of God, they'll
probably offend some people along the way, they're going to offend their family members,
they're going to offend their friends, the people at work maybe, but the guy who gets
up and he's going to be the master, he's going to be the preacher, he's going to be
the teacher, he's going to receive greater condemnation from the world.
There's going to be more people that he offends.
For in many things we offend all.
We offend all.
The guy who gets up and spares not and lifts up his voice, he offends all.
You see, those that teach and preach are condemned by those that hear them and are offended.
Let's look at Hebrews chapter 13 on this point.
Hebrews chapter 13.
Look at verse 17, the Bible says, Obey them that have rule over you and submit yourselves,
for they watch for your souls as they that must give account, that they may do it with
joy and not with grief, for that is unprofitable for you.
You see the preacher here, he's not trying to offend you.
If you're ever staying in a church and the preacher gets up and preaches something that
rubs you the wrong way, you don't understand that he's not trying to offend you.
As it says here, he's saying, Obey them, submit to that preaching, submit to that instruction
to those that have the rule, and he's saying why, because they watch for your souls.
Now they're not looking for an opportunity to make you mad.
Let me see if I can just ruffle this guy's feathers, let me see if there's something
I can find out about whoever it is, and let me just get on their point and really get
after them, right?
Just be a bully from the pulpit.
That's not what happens.
A lot of times preachers get accused of that, well that guy's just a jerk in the pulpit,
you know, he's just out to get people.
Well no, maybe it's because you've got a sin in your life that he touched on, or maybe
he went and got on an area of your life that you need to improve.
Maybe that's what happened.
And is that not what we've been reading here in James and in Devers here, that people are
going to be offended?
But the thing is, it's profitable for you to be offended.
It's profitable.
You profit from hard preaching.
You know that when a guy gets up and preaches hard, it's for your benefit.
It's for everybody.
It's for the congregation.
He doesn't do it, you know, to make a name for himself, because again, it's the message
that matters.
It's not the man.
It's the message that matters.
That's what's going to profit us is hard preaching.
Now I'll say this, soft preaching, you know, that profit's the false profit.
That's the profit.
He makes profit off of that.
He's the one that's going to get the big crowd and the money coming in.
The hard preacher, he's not going to make profit, you know, financially speaking.
He's there to profit you as a true minister.
You know, if the pastor comes one day, if you find yourself in a church where there's
hard preaching going on, and the pastor rips your face off, you know, you've got to just
thank God for that.
Thank God that you're not in some lukewarm, watered-down, lame church that is just abundant.
I mean, if you want to go find that church, you know, just go pick one.
They're everywhere.
Thank God that you're in a church where a guy's not afraid to get up and lift up his
voice and cry aloud and rip some face, because, you know, you can always grow a new one.
You know, you can always grow a new face, and he can rip that one too later.
That's good.
You know, a lot of times if you go to these guys, you know, the pastor might rip your
face, but he might hand it back to you when he's done, like, oh, you're missing something.
You know, here, put this back on.
Let me help you suture that on.
He's not out there to just, you know, make you look hideous or hurt your feelings or
something like that.
But if it happens, praise God if that happens, if we're offended by the preaching of the
Word of God.
That means, like, now we have an opportunity to get right, to correct something.
And we have a preacher who's not afraid to tell us like it is.
I mean, I know I've had that happen.
I mean, I know I sit under a hard preacher, and, you know, has Pastor Anderson ever gotten
up and, you know, whether he knew it or not, just like, you know, got up in my business
and made me feel, like, this big?
Yeah.
More than once.
But praise God, if you stick it out, you know, you'll grow from that.
You see, the no-name preacher that preached like you should is better than that big shot
liar.
Isn't he?
The no-name preacher that gets up, the one that isn't, you know, revered by the world
and just known by all men, and just, and it's just, you know, some big shot, these Joel
Olsteins, Rick Warrens, all these guys that'll just get up and tell you what you want to
hear?
They're no good.
It's the guy that doesn't have the name, but has the right message, because it's the message
that matters.
The no-name preacher that preaches like he should is better than that big shot liar.
Look at 1 Kings 13, look at verse 11.
Now there dwelt, verse 11, now there dwelt an old prophet in Bethel.
Well, what's he doing?
You know, he's already there.
This guy had to come from Judah to Bethel to cry against the altar.
This guy's already in Bethel.
Why did God just use this old prophet?
Because he's a liar, because he's just an old, washed-up liar.
He was already there.
You see, that's what we got there.
We got plenty of old IFB guys that already have a pulpit, that already have a crowd,
that already have a congregation, that already have all these things already made ready to
their hand, but they don't use it like they should, and they just preach whatever they
want.
And God won't use a guy like that.
God doesn't want to use a guy who's afraid to tell it like it is, a guy who's going to
hold back, who's going to spare the message.
Look at verse 14.
He comes to him, he says, and he went from the man of God and found him sitting.
So the old prophet, right, he gets up and he goes and finds the guy.
Verse 14.
And he found him sitting under an oak and he said unto him, art thou the man of God
that came from Judah?
And he said unto him, I am.
You see, these old IFB guys, whether they want to admit it or not, they know a man of
God when they see one.
They know when they hear some of these younger guys getting up and preaching the whole counsel
of the word of God, preaching things that they used to hear when they were coming up
in these pulpits, preaching things that they heard their preachers rip face on, they know
that that's right.
Amen.
And it's because they're the ones that are afraid to say it.
They're the ones that are old and washed up and don't have the backbone anymore to tell
it like it is, but they still recognize a preacher when they see one.
They still recognize the man of God, whether they want to admit it or not.
And these guys, they know good and well that the doctrines that they're shying away from
are biblical.
The ones that they're pulling back on, the ones that they're attacking, the ones that
they're attacking the messenger over, they know that that message is right.
They just don't want to admit it because they know that they've gotten soft on it because
they're weak when it comes to it.
So this guy comes and says, you must be the man of God.
Does the guy have a name tag on him, man of God?
We recognize the guy, right?
These old guys, they can still recognize the man of God when they see one.
They don't want to be perceived as legit.
They don't want to be perceived as, they want to be perceived as legitimate though.
Look at verse 18.
And he says, he said unto him, I am a prophet also as thou art.
He said unto him, just like you.
Oh really?
That's funny.
Why didn't God use you to cry against the altar?
You were already in Bethel.
Why did this guy have to walk from Judah all the way over to Bethel to preach against this
altar?
If you're just like me, why didn't you stand up and preach against it?
Why does he have to call me all the way?
Does this guy have something better to do with his time, to come out and rip face on
somebody?
You know, come out and tell Jeroboam how it is?
I'm sure he had things he could have done, maybe he had a family, maybe he had business
to take care of, maybe he had people back in Judah and he'd hear the preaching of the
word of God.
Now this guy's got to go out of his way, you know, because the old prophet, you know, just
wants to sit around and he's old and washed up, and he doesn't want to tell it like it
is.
He doesn't want to lift up his voice about against something.
He might lift up his voice about how he's just full of spirit and prays God, he got
all the way saved, and he never sins anymore, he doesn't even desire sin, he'll take his
jacket off and wave it around and jump in a baptistery and run up and down the aisles,
and he'll cry a lot about some pretty silly stuff, but he doesn't want to get up and cry
against something that needs to be cried against, and as a result somebody else has got to come
up behind him and do the job for him.
But they still want to be perceived as legit, as this, oh I'm the real deal, I'm a prophet
also as thou art, no you're not, the only old prophet ever the man of God, that's interesting,
that's how this guy is only referred to, the old prophet.
Not an old man of God, not even a prophet of the Lord, just an old prophet, who knows
what he was preaching, who knows if that guy was even saved, who knows if that guy was
even a prophet of the Lord, he could have been a prophet of anybody.
That's how he's just referred to as the old prophet.
But what are they?
They're liars, that's what a lot of them are, they're just straight up liars.
Look at verse 18 again, he says, I'm a prophet as thou art, and an angel spake unto me by
the word of the Lord.
Now did we read that taking place in the passage anywhere?
No.
But an angel spake unto me by the word of the Lord, saying, Bring him back with thee
unto thine house, that he may eat bread and drink water, but he lied unto him.
So these guys are liars, a lot of these people, they want to, and we see a lot about these
guys that are attacking the messengers today.
They attack the messenger, they can't deal with the message, so they just go after the
messenger.
I think in particular one guy, Sam Gipp, we want to talk about a guy who just attacks
the messenger.
It's Sam Gipp.
He just starts slandering, just starts making up things, just starts attacking people that
are getting up and preaching the word of God like it ought to be preached.
People who are right biblically, people who are right doctrinally, they can't handle it,
they can't get out the Bible and refute it.
They can't lay down a solid foundation of the scripture and preach something clear and
true out of the word of God.
So they just attack the messenger and make up lies and slander, and that guy is notorious
for it.
They see a real man of God and they get jealous and they lie.
This guy wants some of the glory, he's like, well hey man, I'm the prophet here, I'm the
prophet in Judah, or I'm the prophet in Bethel, I've been here a long time, I'm old, I'm the
old timer, you've got to show some respect son.
He wants this guy to give him some credence because he's jealous and all he can do is
lie to him or lie about him.
Look at verses 19-24 where he goes,
So he went back with them, and did eat bread in his house, and drank water.
And it came to pass, as they sat at the table, that the word of the Lord came of the prophet
that brought him back.
And he cried unto the man of God that came from Judah, saying, Thus saith the Lord, for
as much as thou didst disobeyed the mouth of the Lord, and hast not kept the commandment
which the Lord thy God commanded thee, but came of thou, and hast eaten bread, and drunk
water in this place of the which the Lord did say to thee, Eat no bread, and for eat
no water, thy carcass shall not come unto the sepulchre of thy fathers.
And it came to pass after he had eaten the bread, and after he had drunk, that he saddled
for him the ass, to wait for the prophet whom he brought back.
And when he was gone, a lion met him by the way, and slew him, and his carcass was cast
in the way, and the ass stood by the lion also by the carcass.
So what is the purpose of the old prophet here?
I mean, he does still fulfill a purpose, doesn't he?
It's to serve as a warning.
That's all he's good for.
It's just to serve as a warning.
You know, it's unfortunate we see the downfall of this man of God here from Judah, but it's
just showing us that even these old guys, these old washed up liars, they can still
serve a purpose as a warning, you know?
Don't let that be the purpose in your life, by the way, you know, to serve as a warning
to others.
That'd be kind of bad, right?
But what we can learn from it is we don't need to make their mistakes.
Don't make the same mistakes that the old prophets made.
You see, the man of God made the same mistake as Jeroboam did, didn't he?
What was Jeroboam's mistake?
He put the man before the message.
He said, you know what, I can't handle the message the man's bringing against this altar,
so I'm going to go after the man.
You know, in the same way, the man of God did the same thing.
He said, oh, this is an old prophet, you know, the Lord's spoken to him.
I know God spoke to me and told me directly not what to do and what not to do, but here's
this old man, here's this old prophet, you know, he's speaking nice to me.
You know, I'm under the cedar tree and I'm tired, I've got a long journey ahead, and
he's saying the angel spoke to him, he's putting the man before the message.
He's making that same mistake.
He's not taking heed to the message that was given him, he's giving place to a man.
That's the mistake that he made.
And we would see that in verses 29 through 31, we'll see the mistake, what that results
in.
If we make these same mistakes as these old prophets did, we'll end up in the same place.
Verse 29, the Bible says,
You see, if we make the same mistakes, we're going to end up in that same hole as that
old prophet.
And if this generation of young preachers that's coming up, and the men of God in this
movement, if they make the same mistakes of putting the man before the message, they're
going to end up in the same hole as that old prophet.
That's not good.
Nobody wants that.
That's the purpose that we can take from the man who got the old prophet here, as a warning
that we don't want to end up like him, old, washed up liar.
And how do you do that?
By not being willing to preach against something, by not being willing to lift up your voice.
So the message is this, let's preach hard.
We need some hard preaching, let's not shy away from hearing it, let's not shy away from
doing it.
Let's preach hard, let's receive that hard preaching, and understand that it's the message
that matters, not the man.
Amen.
Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, again, thank you again for the Bible, thank you for the great stories,
that we can glean these truths from.
Father, I thank you for the Bible, and Lord, I just pray that you bless us as we go our
own way this week.
Help us, Father, to never shy away from hard preaching, Lord, from either receiving it
or doing it ourselves, Father, that understand that we're living in a time where hard preaching
is needed more than ever, Lord.
Our nation is ungodly, wicked, adulterous, perverse, Lord, and it's going to hell in
a handbasket, and the world is following after it.
And Father, help to raise up a generation of men that would cry against the things that
need to be cried against.
Help us to never make the mistake of putting men first, Lord, or holding back the message
so we don't want to end up like that old prophet, Lord, just useless to you.
A man you can't use, a man that, you know, ends his life just, you know, seeking vainglory.
But Father, that we would avoid those snares, those pitfalls of the generations that came
before us, that we would take heed to your word, that we would preach the whole counsel
of God.
Father, be with us as we go, bring us back again, we ask in Jesus' name, Amen.