All right, everybody, welcome to Springcrest Baptist Church.
If you would at this time, turn in your Bibles to Deuteronomy chapter number 17.
We'll read the whole chapter of Deuteronomy, chapter 17.
The Bible reads,
The Lord thy God, any bullock or sheep, wherein is blemish, or any evil favoredness, for that
is an abomination unto the Lord thy God.
If there be found among you within any of thy gates which the Lord thy God giveth thee,
man or woman that hath wrought wickedness in the sight of the Lord thy God in transgressing
Either the sun or moon or any of the host of heaven, which I have not commanded, and if it be told thee, and thou hast heard of it, and inquired diligently, and behold, it be true, and the things certain, that such abomination is wrought in Israel, then shalt thou bring forth that man or that woman, which have committed that wicked thing
unto thy gates, even that man or that woman, and shall stone them with stones till they die.
At the mouth of two witnesses or three witnesses shall he that is worthy of death be put to death,
but at the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death. The hands of the witnesses shall
be first upon him to put him to death, and afterward the hands of all the people. So
If there arise a matter too hard for thee in judgment,
between blood and blood, between plea and plea,
and between stroke and stroke,
being matters of controversy within thy gates,
then shalt thou arise and get thee up into the place
which the Lord thy God shall choose,
and thou shalt come unto the priests the Levites,
and unto the judge that shall be in those days and inquire,
and they shall show thee the sentence of judgment.
and thou shalt do according to the sentence,
which they of that place which the Lord shall choose
shall show thee, and thou shalt observe to do
according to all that they inform thee,
according to the sentence of the law
which they shall teach thee,
and according to the judgment which they shall tell thee,
thou shalt do, thou shalt not decline
from the sentence which they shall show thee
to the right hand nor to the left.
and the man that will do presumptuously, and will not harken unto the priests that stand at the
minister there before the Lord thy God, or unto the judge, even that man shall die, and now shall
put away the evil from Israel, and all the people shall hear and fear, and do no more presumptuously.
When thou art come into the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, and shall possess it,
And shalt dwell therein, and shalt say, I will set a king over me, like as all the nations that
are about me. Thou shalt in any way set him king over thee, whom the Lord thy God shall choose.
One from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee. Thou mayest not set a stranger over thee,
which is not thy brother.
but he shall not multiply horses to himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt,
to the end that he should multiply horses. For as much as the Lord has said unto you,
ye shall henceforth return no more that way. Neither shall he multiply wives to himself,
neither shall he greatly multiply to himself silver and gold.
And it shall be when he sitteth upon the throne of his kingdom,
that he shall write him a copy of this law and a book
out of that which is before the priests, the Levites.
And it shall be with him, and he shall read therein
all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God.
to keep all the words of this law and these statutes to do them,
that his heart be not lifted up above his brethren,
and that he turn not aside from the commandment to the right hand
or to the left, to the end that he may prolong his days
in his kingdom, he and his children in the midst of Israel."
Let's pray. Dear Father, thank you again for this church and this opportunity we
have. I pray at this time that you fill Brother James with your spirit.
and help us to have a 10 of years to the message
that you've laid on his heart.
In Jesus' name I pray, amen.
Amen.
First of all, I wanna thank Pastor Reyes,
Pastor Cobb for this opportunity to preach here.
Springcrest Baptist Church has been around for a while
and I am very thankful to be able to preach here.
And so,
The title of my sermon tonight is Read the Bible.
Read the Bible.
So how does God speak to us through His word?
If you guys would turn to John 17, verse 17.
John 17, verse 17.
And so a lot of people are looking for truth today and, you know, especially with like AI, it can get confusing out there.
What's real? What's not? What's true? What's fake?
And so God has given us the truth and there in John 17 17 it says sanctify them through thy truth.
Thy word is truth. And so God is plainly telling us here that his word is the truth.
The Bible we should be reading the Bible, you know
You remember Pilate saying what is truth? Well, here's the answer. It's the word of God
It's the Bible and so if we have the truth, we should be reading the truth
I want to have you guys turn to
Deuteronomy 5
Deuteronomy 5 verse 22
I'm going to read for you Deuteronomy 9 verse 10 and the Lord delivered unto me two tables
of stone written with the finger of God and on them was written according to all the words
which the Lord spake with you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of
assembly.
And what I like about this verse is God starts out with writing his word down.
This is the example he gives us of him literally writing with his finger on the tables what he said.
So, what did he say to the children of Israel, the kingdom of Israel?
He said to them the Ten Commandments.
And when he spoke that in their presence and they heard that, that's what he wrote down
on these tables.
Because it says right here, it says, And on them was written according to all the words,
which the Lord spake with you on the mount out of the midst of the fire.
His word is truth, the Bible is the truth, it's his word, and it's so important to him what he spoke, what he told the children of Israel, that he wrote it down, so that they would always have it, because God doesn't...
speak to us out of a fire or a pillar or a cloud or something like he did back in the Old Testament.
And so we have his word and we can trust that it is true. We don't have to worry about, you know,
is the Bible true? Is it not? We can know for sure that the Bible is true because God Himself with
God does not, I'm sorry, these words,
the Lord spake unto all your assembly
in the mount out of the midst of the fire,
of the cloud of the thick darkness with a great voice,
and he added no more, and he wrote them
in the two tables of the stone and delivered them unto me.
So he didn't add any more, he just added what he spoke,
and that's how we got the 10 Commandments.
So what did he say out of that pillar again?
He said the 10 Commandments,
you know those commandments they're truth and they are the word of God and they're written down in
the Bible for our benefit God wanted us to know what he said and so if we want to find out what
God says about something we always have to go to the Bible we can always trust that it's true
it's not something that we have to wonder you know if I do what it says in the Bible is it going to
We can guarantee that the Bible, the Word of God, is true.
So, what he spoke, he wrote, and it's written down for us today.
Turn to 2 Peter 17.
I'm sorry, 2 Peter.
I didn't put the chapter down. I apologize. I'll get there for you
I'm sorry, it's second Peter chapter one.
I apologize for that.
And we're gonna start in verse 17.
It says in verse 17,
for he received from God the Father,
honor and glory,
when there came such a voice to him
from the excellent glory.
This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.
And this voice which came from heaven, we heard.
When we were with him in the holy mount we also
We have also a more sure word of prophecy, where unto ye do well that ye take heed as unto a light that shineth in a dark place until the day dawn and the day star arise in your hearts.
Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation, for the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but by holy men of God.
spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. So in this verse, it's talking about, you know,
they had heard the voice of God whenever Jesus got baptized and the voice of God said,
hey, this is my son and whom I'm well pleased. They heard literally with their ears this voice
And what I think is very interesting is, you know, that doesn't happen today, but what it says here in verse 19, it says we have a more sure word of prophecy.
And that's the Bible. So, you know, if somebody says, hey, I heard God with my ears, you probably
should run the other way. They're not hearing from God. And, you know, God, God set this
up so that
You know, there is no private interpretation, you know, all scripture has been given, and
so nobody's going to get an extra biblical word from God and add it to the word of God.
That's not going to happen.
And so what God is saying here is we have a more sure word of prophecy.
We have the Bible, the written word of God, which is the truth.
And so we should be reading this.
And, you know, most people don't read their Bible, and so when it says we have a more
sure word of prophecy, it says we're unto ye do well, that ye take heed.
And so we have our Bible, and we should take heed, we should read our Bible.
that no prophecy of scripture is of any private interpretation.
So again, you know, God's word can't be polluted by somebody that is saying,
hey, well, the Holy Spirit told me this, or hey, there's, I found the Episcopal of Barnabas.
Let's add that to the to the collection here.
So we know that we have the Word of God and that it's true and nobody can add to it.
and we should be weary of people that say,
hey, God told me this or God told me that.
And especially because when it doesn't line up
with the Bible, it means nothing
because the Bible is what's true.
And it says in verse 21,
for the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man,
but holy men of God spake as they were moved
by the Holy Ghost.
And so, you know, whenever a prophecy came
and a prophet said,
thus sayeth the Lord,
that's because the Holy Spirit had moved him to,
you know, prophesy or say those words of God.
And it wasn't his own will.
And so, you know, a lot of people argue, is the Bible true, is it not, man wrote it down.
And yeah, man did pin down the Bible, but they were moved of the Holy Ghost.
They were inspired by God.
not by
their own will it says and so I think the easiest way to explain that to somebody is
you know if you have somebody on a stage with a guitar singing a song and
They're playing the tune and they're singing the song and I sit in the in the audience
And I write down all of the words they say all of their lyrics. I write down all the notes to the sheet music
I pinned down
everything that they said, everything that they played. But it wasn't my inspiration,
it was theirs. They were the inspiration of it. They're the ones that gave it to me,
but I did write it down. And that's exactly what the Bible is saying here, is that,
you know, men were moved to the Holy Ghost. They were inspired by God to write down the things that
And so, that is another reason why we can count on the Bible to be true.
We don't have to worry about, is this true, is this not.
Like if you read the Bible, it's amazing how it's been written over hundreds and hundreds
and hundreds of years, and there's no contradictions.
It's like if you read the Koran or some of the Buddhist writings or all of this other stuff,
they contradict each other. They don't make any sense. It's very hard to read through these things.
But when you have the Word of God, it's not because it was inspired by God. It's perfect.
It's without error and we can trust that our Bible is true. Now, some people today
Especially false prophets, you know, they say they heard God speak to them and
Or they said they prayed about a situation and well the Holy Spirit told me this right like the Holy Spirit moved them to
to give them the answer and
and that the Holy Spirit led them to do whatever it is that they wanted to do.
And I'm not against that idea, like the Holy Spirit can move upon us and lead us and direct us.
But the problem is, if it contradicts the Bible, it wasn't the Holy Spirit.
because the Holy Spirit doesn't speak of itself,
the Holy Spirit only speaks what is in the Word of God.
It's just like Jesus said, I am not going to say what
I want to say, I'm saying what I heard my Father say.
And so another way we can understand that the Bible is true is if
somebody is saying something weird and false prophets love to do this.
um, you know, go ahead and get divorced. It's okay. God's not mad at you, you know, it's all right,
but that contradicts the word of God. And so we know that that person, they're, if they're calling
themselves a pastor, I'm wondering, are they even saved if they don't even understand the Bible?
And that's why we should read the Bible.
is because we need to fact-check the preaching that we hear.
We need to fact-check the things that people tell us.
Like if they said, hey, God said I should do this,
but it's not in the Bible.
then we need to fact check that and make sure that we don't copy what they're doing,
don't do what they're doing, or if we know what the Bible says, we can actually lead them
unto righteousness and help them get that corrected if they have a soft heart and actually want to
hear the truth. And so we should be reading the Bible and that's one of the main reasons is because
And it's God's word is perfect and it will help us out in our lives now
In
Also in like Galatians 1-8, I'm just going to read this, it says,
But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you,
Than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.
And so, you know, these false prophets, these ministers of light, they like
you know, speaking lies, things that are not the truth.
Even if we saw an angel that's speaking something
contradictory to the Bible, we should be like,
all right, that's not of God.
And so the Bible is very important.
Reading it is very important.
We need to know what's in the Bible
so that we can protect ourselves from these things.
And in the next verse it says,
and no marvel for Satan himself
is transformed into an angel of light.
Therefore it is no great thing
if his ministers also be transformed
as the ministers of righteousness
whose end shall be according to their works.
So, you know, if somebody prophesies something
or like tries to predict the future
They're not getting the word of God, or they're not getting the truth of the word of God.
The Holy Spirit did not tell them that that is true. They shouldn't be prophesying that.
And so...
And it's very confusing sometimes because these ministers of Satan that act like ministers
of light, they can say a lot of right things that line up with the Bible, that line up
with doctrine we know is true, and then they just sprinkle in or add in the lies, the stuff
that's not true, and totally just changes the doctrine or the belief.
You know it says here that there are false apostles
And, you know, it makes me think of apostolic churches.
And it's just like, hey, I'm an apostle.
And I'm just like, hey, you're a false apostle,
because they don't exist anymore.
That was back in the days of Jesus.
It's like, oh, did you see Jesus?
Okay, well, yeah, Jesus appeared to me.
All right, Angel of Light, right?
That's really an angel of death.
we can understand this stuff if we're reading our Bible.
And if we're not reading our Bible,
then we're not gonna know what to think.
We're not gonna know what to do
when things in life hit us like that.
And...
In Second Timothy 3.16, I'm just going to read this real quick, it says all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction, and righteousness.
And so, you know, God is...
He has put the Bible together and put all the truths in there that we need to know for our lives.
He didn't leave anything out.
He didn't forget about anything.
We don't need the Dead Sea Scrolls that came in the 1800s to give us more light on the Bible.
He says that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine.
And so it's the Scriptures.
that we need to be focusing on, and be reading, and knowing.
It's not our feelings, or what somebody else said that they heard from the Holy Spirit, or some false prophet.
And it says, profitable for doctrine, what we believe.
So, you know, what we believe should be based on the truth, on the Bible.
And so, we come up with ideas maybe we think is good or it maybe sounds right,
but we need to double check that with the Bible and make sure that it is.
If it is not what the Bible talks about, if it's not what the Bible teaches,
then that belief system needs to go out the door.
That is not going to take us down the right road.
You know, it's like, you know, when men just do whatever they want, you know,
according to their own heart, that's not going to work.
And it says for reproof.
So if we know, if we read our Bible
and we know what's going on in the Bible
and we have these doctrines down that are correct
and what the Bible teaches,
then we can reproof somebody
because when you reproof somebody, that's an act of love.
Okay, so if you want to help out somebody that's wrong and you know if they said hey the sky is
green and you're like okay I understand right away this guy does not know the truth. So I'm
gonna give him a proof. I'm going to correct him in a gentle way and show him that the sky is blue.
I mean that's just a stupid little example but you know that's what the Bible does is it gives us
the knowledge, the understanding to be able to
reprove somebody, you know, especially in a loving way to those that we care about
and for correction. And so, you know, we all have, like, weird things we've
believed over the years, you know, especially as a new
Christian, just getting saved or, you know, not going to a good
church for years and years. You can believe some weird stuff or you just
You know, I think we've all believed weird stuff before and yeah, it's embarrassing.
I get it, but you know, you do grow if you're in the Bible reading.
If you're reading your Bible, you're going to get this stuff figured out.
It just takes time.
And so.
You know, the correction that the word gives us is so important because we want to be corrected
by the truth.
We want to be reproved by the truth.
We want our doctrine to be the truth, and it all comes from the Bible.
And then it says, for instruction and righteousness.
And we all should be striving to do the right thing.
And so the word of God, the truth of the word of God,
that's what instructs us when things get crazy
or weird or life happens, what do we do?
How do we deal with it?
Well, the instructions that we need every single one
to navigate any problem or issue in our life
is found in the Bible.
And so, that's why we need to be reading our Bible.
You know, God speaks through His Word.
He doesn't speak audibly to our ears.
And so, if we want to know what God says about something,
we have to be reading the Bible.
We can't read anything else, Wikipedia, or this dude on TikTok that sounds pretty cool or says half of the right things and, you know, I have people come up to me sometimes and say, what do you think of this or that?
And I maybe listen to the TikTok and I say, well, that's good. That's good. That's good. That's not what the Bible teaches. Probably you just stay away from this guy.
God speaks through His Word. We should be reading our Bible. We should be doing that daily.
But we know that the Word of God is true, that the Bible is true, and maybe not in this church,
but a lot of people have this question, which translation do we use?
Which one should we use?
I mean, think about the guy that goes to the store
and he sees like a dozen different Bible versions
and he's just like, all right, which one do I get?
I mean, he has no clue.
Maybe he's saved or maybe he's not.
Maybe he just got saved
or maybe he's just been in a bad church
that doesn't teach King James only.
And so, you know, this is a legitimate question for a lot of people.
And so I know that there's, I mean, I assume that nobody here is using anything other than a King James Bible.
So I'm just going to say maybe this is what you can take out of it is I'm going to give you something that might help your friend understand.
a little bit more. And so a saved friend might have this legitimate question. They may go to a
church that doesn't really believe in King James only. And so
turn to Acts 835. 835. This should be familiar with a lot of people if you read your Bible.
If you do soul winning, probably run into this quite a bit, but this is one of the examples that, you know, why we use a King James Bible.
And before I dig into this, you know, this thought of like, why is it that the King James Bible is the only Bible being attacked?
Why is it not the Mormon Bible? Why is it not the Koran?
I mean, I guess those Bibles get attacked by us because we're just pointing out all the the false
Garbage that's in those things. But why is is the King James Bible?
It's the one under attack. It's the one under scrutiny. It's the one they're casting shade on just because it's the truth and
you know God said that
He would preserve his word forever to all generations, so Satan can't stop that. It's impossible.
He's preserved it. It's as it's done. So what does Satan do?
He attacks the legitimacy of it just like he did with Eve in the garden, you know
Thou shalt not surely die, right?
Just casting shade on the truth of what God said and so Satan has come up with a way to just like come up with these other
translations that are just very confusing
some people don't understand the differences or understand the doctrinal changes and
You know, he can't destroy
the word of God, he can't destroy the truth.
So he's just polluted the world
with all these bad translations,
hoping that somebody picks up like an NIV
and says, hey, I'll take this.
I was told, read an NIV,
it's easier to read than that King James stuff.
And I wasn't even saved.
And I was just thinking, I kind of prefer the King James.
And this is when I was a lot younger.
And so I did read the NIV for a couple of years
Even when I wasn't saved I was just like I don't know there's something different about this
And so I just put it down and I got another King James Bible
And so but that's what Satan is trying to do. He's trying to confuse people slow down their growth
You know if a person is safe and they don't understand that the King James Bible is the only Bible that is true then
You know, that can get them off course a little bit and confuse them and vex them when they're going through the Bible and they read a verse and it looks like homos can get saved.
And it's like, no, they can't. You get a King James Bible. You will understand that a little bit better, right?
And so in Acts chapter 8, this is just one example you can give your friend.
to kind of show them and he started exposing these false versions and I'm gonna pick on the NIV tonight just a little bit and
so in verse 35 it says then Philip opened his mouth and began at the same scripture and preached unto him Jesus talking to the
Ethiopian Munich that was in his chariot and he was reading the book of Isaiah and he did not understand it and
God sent Philip to him and he preached unto him Jesus and he was
He was preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ through the scripture through the word of God and as they went on their way
They came to a certain water and the eunuch said see here's water. What doth hinder me to be baptized and so
What the NIV does is it takes out the very next verse?
So the question is asked what what doth hinder me to be baptized? I mean you would thank God
and his infinite wisdom would answer the question, right?
Well, in the King James Bible, he does.
And so it says here.
And Philip said, if thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest."
And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
In the NIV, it strikes that out and deletes that verse.
Or maybe sometimes you will see, well, some of the earlier manuscripts do not have this
verse.
So they cast shade on it and it just confuses people.
This is one of the reasons why the NIV is a horrible, horrible version is because it
literally deletes verses out of the Word of God and changes the truth of what's going
on here.
Because, you know, if you're a Catholic priest, you love this change because now you can sprinkle
water on babies and call it baptism.
Right and we pretty much know that the Catholic Church is basically a church of Satan
Like everything that the Catholic Church does is like the complete opposite of what's found in the Bible again
We should be reading the Bible every day and knowing these things that hey, I see a priest in a dress
That's a red flag. They're calling the priest father. That's a red flag
They're confessing their sins so they can be forgiven to the priest
That's a red flag. And so this is just another thing where
you know these false Bible versions they they change the truth and they turn it into a lie and
you know, this is just one example you can show your friend is like, why did they
delete how to get saved? Like what salvation is? He says, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of
God. And so it's because Satan is in control of these committees that do all these translations
and do all these things in the Bible and attack the truth. And I just want to give you
a little taste or little information on one of these people and I just got this
off of Wikipedia this is not like you know some King James only site or even a
Baptist site or even a Christian site this is Wikipedia and thankfully this
reprobate is dead and burning in hell right now but before she died it says
right here the NIV literary consultant
This is from Wikipedia. Virginia Raimi Molencott was an American feminist writer, big flag.
She spent her 44-year professional career teaching college level, English literature and language,
but developed specializations in feminist theology and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender
theology during the second half of that career.
So, we have somebody that hates God in their heart in control and influencing the NIV Bible.
Now that might be a little hard to get over to your friend that you're trying to trying to show this
But for those of you are saved our King James only
I just wanted to add that in there because you can show other people that are saved and King James only and they can
Add that to their arsenal of things to explain to people that will listen to that and you know
I lot of say people they think that faggots are disgusting and it's just that the world has made it today where you you kind of have to fear
Saying what you believe in your heart because you'll get banned off Facebook and people will say that you're a hate monger and all this stuff
And just bully you it's funny how the LGBT they say oh, we don't want to be bullied and it's like they're the bullies
You know, it's just like it's it's because they're of the devil their liars and nothing good can come out of them
So yeah
There was another guy
He was a chair of the Old Testament committee Dr. Martin Woodstra, and he was a faggot
And so but the good thing about this is is boy
They heaped up a lot of pain and suffering in hell for doing this
so you know at least you know we'll get to see them at the White Throne judgment and
God will have the last laugh and so
Those are a couple of things about the NIV Bible and you know we're King James
only for a reason and it's kind of out of the scope of the sermon so I'm not
gonna go any more than that with it but the point is is we need to be reading
our Bible daily it's the only truth that we have and that is the King James Bible
Reading the Bible daily, I pulled this off the internet.
I can't remember where I got it.
And if you want to fact check it, go right ahead.
I did get like some conflicting numbers.
This is more conservative, I guess,
kind of like more favorable.
But here's what I did was I just asked the internet,
you know, who reads the Bible every day?
Who are these people that read the Bible every day?
How many people do that?
And it says regular readers, roughly 34% of the U.S.
adults read the Bible.
Once a week or more. So that's not daily. It's just like once a week
Occasional readers that's what these guys are called around 16% read it more than twice a year
But not weekly. That's pretty sad
That's that's disgusting
Infrequent non-readers about half of Americans read it less than twice a year
Including those who never read it. These are sad like this is supposed to be a Christian nation built on
The Bible like our laws and everything came straight from the Bible in the beginning
Daily readers a much smaller percentage around 10 to 14 percent read the Bible every day
That's still
a low amount of people.
And so why are people so deceived today?
Why do they just believe anything they hear?
Why is AI tricking everybody and they don't know what to do
and everybody's in fear because they don't read their Bible.
And I pulled up some other stats that I don't have here,
but if you break this down,
it's like who reads the King James Bible only?
It's even more grim.
It's not very good.
Turn to Joshua 1-8
Joshua 1-8
We need to read our Bible daily. I guess that's point number one
Read your Bible daily
Joshua 1-8, I'm gonna read to you Deuteronomy 17-18,
our chapter reading.
And it shall be when he sitteth upon the throne
of his kingdom that he shall write him a copy
of this law in the book out of that,
which is before the priests and the Levites.
And it shall be with him and he shall read therein
all the days of his life that he may learn to fear
the Lord, his God, to keep all the words of this law
and these statutes to do them.
that his heart be not lifted up above his brethren and that he
turn not aside from the commandment to the right hand or to the left
or to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom he
and his children in the midst of Israel. So it says here that he shall read
therein all the days of his life and there's a lot of benefits to that
for him his children and for Israel. And one of the
So, you know, if somebody gets, uh, prideful against another brother,
you know, they're probably not reading their Bible.
And so that can help a lot.
It's like, the more you read the Bible, the more you understand the Bible,
the more you understand how sinful you are, and that's humbling.
Or it should be humbling, right?
The people that don't read the Bible, you know, we meet them all the time out soul-winning,
hey, I'm going to heaven because I'm a good person.
No, you're not.
You know, so we should be reading our Bible every single day right here. It's commanded. He read the Bible all the days of his life
And I'm gonna read again for you Psalms 1 1
Blessed is the man that walketh not in the council of the ungodly nor standeth in the way of sinners nor sit
In the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law that he meditate day and night and so
You know, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.
You know what one of those counsels are, yourself.
So we have a lot of good ideas, we think sometimes, but you know what we need to do?
We need to read our Bible daily and we need to take that counsel and replace it with whatever
we have that doesn't line up with what we're finding in the Bible.
And so we need to be reading the Bible every day.
And so we should be meditating on the word day and night.
You can't meditate, you can't think about it
if you don't read it.
Joshua 1-8, you should be there.
It says, this book of the law shall not depart
out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate there
in day and night, that thou may observe and do according
to all that is written therein.
For then shalt thou make thy way prosperous,
and then shalt thou have good success.
So again, we need to be meditating in it day and night.
our Bible reading every single day and so one of the the things that you get
from that just in this verse is you know it says that it'll make your way
prosperous and you'll have good success and so you know a way that you're not
gonna be prosperous the way that you're not gonna have good success is by not
is by not doing what it says. And so I want you guys to turn to Acts 1710, Acts 1710.
As you're getting there, I just want to talk a little bit about this. The Church of Thessalonica
It was a good church. Paul had a lot of good things to say about this church up to
the very end of the second book or the second letter that he wrote to them and he was
complimenting them. He was encouraging them. He was saying you guys are doing a lot of things, right?
You're doing this good and he is really just
emboldening them to do better and just encouraging them and he really didn't have a whole lot of bad things to say.
Here's the one thing, I'm gonna be the negative Nellie,
I'll point out the one thing that he said,
it says in second Thessalonians 311,
for we hear that there are some
which will walk among you disorderly,
working not at all, but are busy bodies.
And so that's the negative thing that Paul had to say about the church of Thessalonica.
It's a very good church. It's not like the church at Corinth, right?
Where there's a lot of weird stuff going on in that church.
And those letters were pretty, you know, weighty and powerful, as Paul said.
That was not any compliments that that church was getting.
Acts 1710, is that where I had to go? 1710, it says,
And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea,
who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews.
These were more noble than those in Thessalonica,
and that they received the word with all readiness of mind
and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
the church of Thessalonica, they're awesome.
They're doing great.
And he's saying that the men of Berea
were more noble than this church
that he just give all these compliments to,
had just been just encouraging them
and tell them to keep it up.
But these people were more noble.
They were doing better.
And why is that?
Because it says right here, they received the word.
with all readiness of mind. So, you know, they're, they're reading the Bible.
Because the very next part is this, and search the scriptures daily,
whether those things were so.
So somebody that's searching the scriptures daily, they're fact-checking what they're hearing,
they're comparing it to the Bible where there's through preaching that they hear,
something their friend says, if they're taking that information in and they're
searching the scriptures daily, whether those things are so, you know, that's a huge compliment
that God is giving these people. He's saying, hey, church of Thessalonica, they're great,
they are reading their Bible every day because they love the truth, because they don't want to be deceived.
And so that would be what I want to encourage everybody here. We need to read our Bible daily.
And so point number two,
The Bible sets the standards for our life. The Bible helps us make righteous judgments.
The Bible helps us, you know, do the right thing or make the right decision.
And so, you know, point number two, the Bible sets the standards for our life. Turn to Proverbs 2.
Proverbs 2.
and we'll start in verse two.
Proverbs two, we'll start in verse two.
My son, if thou wilt receive my words
and hide my commandments with thee.
So that thou incline thine ear unto wisdom, and apply thine heart to understanding.
Verse 3, yea, if thou cryest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding.
If thou seekest her as silver, and searchest for her as for hid treasures, then shalt thou
understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God.
Verse 6, for the Lord giveth wisdom out of his mouth.
come knowledge and understanding, he layeth up sound wisdom for righteous, for the righteous,
he is a buckler to them that walk uprightly, he keepeth the paths of judgment, and preserveeth
the way of his saints."
And verse nine, then shalt thou understand righteousness and judgment and equity, yea, every good path.
And so what I want to point out in these few verses is, number one, in verse two, you know, the Bible sets the standards for our life,
I'm sorry, and so that thou incline thy ear into wisdom, again reading the Bible, yea,
if thou cryest after knowledge and liftest up thy voice for understanding, if thou seekest
her for silver and searches for his hid treasures, that's reading the Bible.
What do you get out of that?
The fear of the Lord, and you find the knowledge of God.
For the Lord giveth wisdom out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding. Well, we're not hearing it with our ears
We know that so out of his mouth is coming knowledge and understanding through his word
Through the written word of God through our King James Bible because it says it you know
if thou will receive my words up in verse 2 and then it says
He keepeth the paths of judgment and preserveth the way of his saints
then shalt thou understand righteousness and judgment." So the thing that I wanted to take
out of this is the Bible does set the standards for our life, and we have to be reading the
Bible every day to be able to pick that out and understand...
what righteousness is, what the right thing to do is,
and what the right judgment is to do.
And I just wanna give maybe a few practical applications
for this because I'm sure we all agree
with what I just said.
And these applications, I just picked out a lot of stuff
that just happens today in the world.
you can just take this and just apply it to whatever maybe you need to change
your standard in your life or know what to do or how to act in a certain
situation but the first thing I want to hit on like the standards for our life
that we should be getting from the Bible this is one is adultery and
fornication like you know in America it just seems like that is just not a big
It's just like nobody cares, you know, even like churches, they won't kick out fornicators,
you know.
I'm glad that, you know, the pastors that we have, they will do that.
And so, you know, one standard that people should be adopting from the Bible is the standard
of staying pure until you're married.
just wait until marriage. There's nothing you can do about it now. And so
fornication, the definition of fornication in the Bible is people that
are not married, you know, knowing each other before they get married. That's
basically what fornication is. And so
That is how the Bible can set a standard for us.
Maybe we didn't have that standard,
and that's something that was happening in our lives.
Before we got saved, we read the scriptures,
we changed our standard,
and you know what, God's happy with that.
He's not happy with breaking the commandment, but he is happy with somebody that changes their heart and adopts that standard
Or if you grew up in a church like this with
Parents that love the Lord and you just never did that because you'd already had that standard set in your life
That's great, but that came from the Word of God that standard came from the Word of God
And so it's very important that we're setting our standards to what the Bible says
Oh
You know adultery is the same thing in Matthew 9 19 or 19 9
And this is what I tell everybody in the Philippines because over in the Philippines. It's really kind of weird sometimes
It doesn't happen often, but sometimes people will be like hey, are you single? I'm like yes, and I like oh have a cousin
I'm like well hold on a second. I'm single for life. I've been divorced
I don't qualify for marriage and I take them to this verse because I have no clue what I'm saying
They literally just like deer in the headlights because they don't read their Bible
And I do that, I take that opportunity to show them what the Bible says because in the Philippines you can't get divorced.
I think maybe there's a law changing that soon, but you can't get divorced so people just like leave their spouses and just go make a new family.
And I show them 19-9 because it says,
and I say unto you, whosoever shall put away his wife,
except it be for fornication,
and shall marry another, commiteth adultery with,
and whosoever marryeth her,
which is put away, doth commit adultery.
So if you put away your wife and you marry another,
you are committing adultery.
And if you're the person that they're marrying,
you're causing them to commit adultery.
And so I tell them, you know, if I go marry somebody else,
I'm basically saying, I hate this woman.
I'm causing her to commit adultery.
I'm causing her to sin against God.
And so I like to take that time to just do that.
because it's just helping people understand the truth of the Bible.
They're not reading the Bible.
Their standards are not set to the Bible.
And that is one way you can help turn people to righteousness.
And if they have a soft heart,
and they want to dig into it further and change their standard,
then that person is going to do it.
And if they don't, then they don't care.
With marriage, there is another standard and also with friends and people you spend your extra time with in life.
And that's if you would turn to 2nd Corinthians 6-14.
If you want to marry somebody, this is the doctrine, this is the standard you should have, is they must be saved.
you don't want to marry somebody that's not saved.
And there's a whole plethora of problems with that.
And again, I kind of show this to people in the Philippines
after I preach the gospel and I have some questions.
And I say, you know, if you marry somebody
and they're not saved,
what if they have a weird false religion?
They believe something that is not true is not the Bible
and they teach your kids that stupid false religion
and then your kids die and go to hell.
I'm like you don't want that you don't want that happening so you can just get rid of that all together by not marrying an unsaved person
And then I say this as well, you know, what if you do marry that person's that's not safe and
You live a ripe old age and you have a lot of grandchildren life is great
There's no big issues. You guys get along you're like best friends and you're hundred years old each and you know
That person is gonna die and go to hell
Because they just never believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. That would be horrible. That'd be awful
And so you can avoid that stuff by just making sure that you marry a saved person
Your friends should be saved people
the people you hang out with should be safe people and I know that we have work we have
we have to be in this world right and I'm not saying that you just have to cut everybody off
that's not saved that's just not practical it's not going to happen we have to take care of business
and do things but what I'm saying is is your best friends they should be saved the people you're
spending time with like your extra time that you don't have to spend with them and you just want
Those are some standards that the Bible says that if you're reading your Bible daily you can change
Your heart and your standards and do what the Bible says
second Corinthians 614 be not unequally yoked together with
unbelievers for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness and
What communion hath light with darkness so there's the verse that's the standard
that's how you can apply it. Another thing on marriage is divorce is not an option.
God hates divorce. And if somebody has gotten divorced, I've been divorced. And, you know,
I wish I could do things differently now that I know what the Bible says. But I didn't have that
standard, you know, way back in the day. And I regret it.
I wish I was reading the Bible daily.
I wish I was doing the right thing.
So, you know, when you read like Mark 10, nine,
it says, what therefore God has joined together,
let not man put us under.
So there's your standard, another standard for marriage.
Make sure they're saved and it's forever.
It's, that's it.
You're not, you're not getting out of that one.
And it says here,
turn to
Proverbs 23 29
The next one is drunkenness again fornication adultery
Drunkenness it just seems like that's so prevalent in society. That's why I'm going over these things
Because a lot of people are just like, you know, I
Don't think it's a sin to drink
Okay, well, where'd you get that? Where did how did you set that standard up for your life?
Well, let's look at what the Bible says.
Who hath woe, who hath sorrow, who hath contentions,
who hath babbling, who hath wounds without cause,
who hath redness of eyes?
I think we already know the drunkard.
They that tarry long at the wine,
they that go and seek mixed wine.
Look not thou upon the wine when it is red,
when it is given his color in the cup,
and when it moveth itself aright.
At the last, it bighteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder.
Thine eyes shall behold strange women, and thine heart shall utter perverse things."
And you know what? It just cracks me up, or it just, I don't know, it frustrates me
that people will just say, well, there's wine in the Bible, people like drunk wine all the time.
Okay, when's the last time a grape juice
Stingeth like an adder, or a bit like a serpent, all right?
So there's two types of wine in the Bible.
There is a grape juice, and then there's a fermented wine.
This is talking about a fermented wine, you know?
I grew up kind of with rough friends
and not like the nicest crowd.
And when people got drunk, they would say the most perverse and weird and stupid things.
You know, when I was hanging around them, I just, even an unsafe person, I was just like, wow, that's okay.
I don't think I should hang out with these people anymore.
And also, it's just like, you know, who's gonna commit?
the adultery, the fornication, you know, all these other standards that God has set up, who's going to break all these commandments?
Well, people whose judgment is
has been
altered, thank you, and and so that's what
Fermented wine will do to you and then there this is the one that really makes me mad. Well, Jesus
He served wine to people and I just love
ripping that one apart and
because a lot of times you run into people and there's like smug about it too and
I'm gonna go to John 2 10 where this verse is and it says and say it unto him every man at the beginning death set forth
Good wine and when men have well drunk then that which is worse
But thou has kept the good wine until now
So, you know because they're they love drinking. They're just like
Well, yeah, you know you give the the strong drink in the beginning
And you get the weakened down, you know, whatever drink at the bar or whatever later because you're drunk and you don't understand how bad it is and the establishment is making more money on you.
Because that's the way they think, you know, from the abundance of the heart. So that's how they interpret this verse. But it couldn't be more opposite.
Basically what they're saying is Jesus Christ is a sinner.
It's exactly what they're saying because think about this.
It says when men have well drunk, they're already drunk.
So you're telling me that Jesus Christ is giving alcoholic beverages to people that are already drunk.
That's what you get out of this. When we just read that it stings like an adder
that it biteeth like a serpent that
thine heart shall behold strange women and utter perverse things. So you think that's what Jesus was trying to get?
When he was giving these people, they had already well drunk.
Well, maybe the truth is, is that this is not alcoholic.
It's wine. It's grape juice.
And these people, yeah, they were well drunk and that they've drunk a lot.
But they were not drunkards. They were not drunk.
Jesus is not a sinner. That's so...
just blasphemous to say that Jesus was giving drunk people more alcoholic beverage.
That's a wicked heart that just wants to do what they want.
They set their own standard up and if they're saved, if they were smart,
they would wake up and stop drinking alcohol because it's destroying their life.
Now, people that don't have standards, they don't like the truth and that's just what it is.
And, you know, we have this idea in the culture.
And I can remember it even in movies and just growing up in the past 20 years.
And it's this idea of we just need to be all inclusive and accept everything.
Just tolerance, tolerance, tolerance, no standards.
That's what that's saying is, hey, I want to do this sin, so don't judge me.
Okay, and I won't judge you. We'll just do whatever we want. We have no standards and we'll just be tolerant of each other
everybody's in
included in this and
you know, that's that that's the mentality of the world today is do as that will and
You know, that is not what the Bible teaches or what as what the God wants us to have he wants us to have standards
It's his commandments and that's why he has those and so
It's funny how, like, all these, uh, how the government's pushing all this LGBT crap for the last 10 years or whatever.
And it's just like, oh, be inclusive and let them in and they're just different and whatever.
It's like, it's funny how the LGBT, all these faggots running around here, all these dykes, these weirdos, these God haters,
they want everything to be inclusive except God.
They're literal Satan worshipers, they're sons of the devil, they're daughters of the devil.
And so it's like, yeah, be inclusive, be inclusive, tolerate everything, oh,
bless your Christian. And even worse, if you believe that the Bible is true,
if you actually live right just leave, boy, they really hate you. So, you know,
this stupid ideology that is just crept in to society, it's just attacking the truth,
attacking the word of God, it's garbage. And so how do you fix that? You read the Bible daily.
You change your standards to fit what the Bible says. You change your judgments to fit what the Bible says.
And I want you guys to turn to Deuteronomy 1719.
The next point, a good relationship with God is reading and doing. It's like the Father-Son relationship.
If you get instructions from your father and you don't do them, you're not going to have a good relationship.
It's the same way with God. If you want a good relationship with God, then you need to do what He says to do.
The people that just pray all the time and they don't read their Bible, they're asking God for stuff.
But they're not receiving the answer because they're not reading their Bible. This is how the communication works
This is how the relationship works. What if you said to your children, hey, I want to give you this
I want to bless you and they just totally ignore you and just don't listen to you
There's like one way communication
What if your husband you're like you want to do something nice for them and you talk to them and they just ignore you
There's just one avenue of communication. There's no nothing back. There's no conversation
That would be horrible. You have a horrible relationship yet. It seems like you know a lot of people might just hey
I'm in a tough spot. God, please help me, but they don't want to read their Bible every day
They don't want to get the answers. So it's like hey, I'm talking to you God, but I'm not listening
And so they're going to have a horrible relationship with God, and you know, if they're saved and they get to heaven, they're going to be very sad that they treated God like that.
They'll still be in heaven, you can't lose your salvation, no matter how bad your relationship
is with God.
But you do want a good relationship with God because life is tough, and it's hard, and
the devil is roaming around seeking who he may devour, and that's all of us.
But what if you read the Bible all the time, and you don't do it?
That's a big time problem.
So again, you are, you're praying and asking God for help
and you're reading the Bible
and he's giving you the answers
or maybe you're coming to church
and you're getting the answers from the Bible
but then you don't do anything with it.
So it's like, hey, mom, dad, I need help with this.
All right, son, here you go.
This is what you need.
Nothing happens.
It's like...
You know you have everything right there, and you don't do anything about it. It's a joke, and I know we all can
You know do this from time to time or whatever, but I
Want you guys to read and Deuteronomy 1719
And it shall be with him and he shall read therein all the days of his life that he may learn to fear the Lord his God and
Keep all the words of his law these statutes to do them
So we read this earlier and what I like in this again. He's reading all the days of his life
But he's also keeping all the words of this law and these statues to do them
So why is he reading the Bible?
To keep the law keep the statutes to do them
What a waste of time it is to read your Bible all the time and you never do it. What a waste. You might as well not read it
I mean, what's the difference? You ask God for help. He gives you the answer. You don't do it
You ask God for help. You don't read the Bible. You're still not getting things done
So it's a it's it's a waste of your time if you're not gonna do them turn to John 14 24
I'm gonna read to you John 14 15 if you love my if you love me keep my commandments
Notice it doesn't say if you want to be saved keep my commandments. That's a false doctrine again
These false prophets just love to twist the word of God and the truth. They hate it and in John 14 21
It says he that hath my commandments and keep with them he
it is that love with me and he that love with me shall be loved of my father and I will love him
and will manifest myself to him so that's a lot of love going back and forth right there sounds
like a great relationship sounds awesome right well what made it happen he that keep my commandments
and keep with him and keep with them the the guy that's doing them go to 1st John 2 3
1st John 2 3
And hereby we do know that we love that we know him if we keep his commandments
He that saith I know him and keepeth not his commandments as a liar and the truth is not in him
But whosoever keep his word in him verily is the love of God perfected here by know we that are in him
So, a good relationship with God, reading every day, and doing it, asking for help.
Read the Bible, do it.
Bad relationship with God, I'm reading the Bible, and I don't do it.
A lot of people say they have a relationship with God, but they don't read the Bible or
do what it says.
So they're deceiving themselves.
We run into it all the time out of soul-wining.
It's just like, I know I'm saved because of my relationship with God.
Right, and it's just like, okay. Well, have you read the book of Hezekiah? Yeah. Yeah, I've read all the books
It's like
okay
All right, and so they're not reading the Bible and you know if you
If you say you have a relationship with God
And you're not reading the Bible and doing what it says.
You're deceiving yourselves.
Turn to Acts 29.
I'm gonna read to you James 1, 22.
But be doers of the word and not hear us only
deceiving your own selves.
And so, how can we deceive our own selves
by not doing what we're reading?
We ask God for help.
We read it in the Bible.
We get the answer.
We change our standards.
That's doing, okay, but if we don't that's not doing and we're deceiving ourselves
We're thinking oh I found this truth and the Bible is gonna change my life
And if I don't do anything about it, I'm hearing but I'm not doing and so
There's an example of this. I have to give a shout out to Pastor Stuckey. I'm I'm stealing this from him
I just love this because I think it applies and it says here in Acts 20 verse 9
And there sat in a window a certain young man named Utikus being fallen into a deep sleep and as Paul was long preaching
He sunk down
with sleep and fell down from the third loft and was taken up dead.
Now, you know, Uticus was sitting in this window and I just picture him like,
you know, maybe like straddling the window and he's got half of his body
outside the window and half inside the window and he's falling asleep
he goes out. Or maybe he's sitting on the window and he just goes backwards. But he's kind of like
half in and half out is the way that it was explained. And it makes sense that, you know,
if you're half in and half out in your Bible reading, guess what's going to happen? It's going to fall
It's gonna go away if you're just like, oh, I read the Bible a little bit this month and next month. I don't well
You're you're not gonna progress. You're only gonna go backwards
The only way that you go forward is that you do it every single day
The only way you go forward is if you change those standards whenever you see what's going on and you do those things
But if you're like, hey, I'm reading a lot of Bible. I read it four times this year, but you're not changing anything in your life
you're going to go backwards in your life. And so this is an example of that where, you know,
he sat in the window, he's kind of like half in, half out, and, you know, he was deceiving himself
if in this analogy of, hey, I'm not reading my Bible every day, and then boom, you just fall out.
So, you know, I think that's a very good picture that we can get with Uticus here.
Sorry to pick on your Uticus. I'm glad you came back to life though. I'll see you in heaven, I hope.
But
You can't be half in and half out.
You have to keep progressing
because if not, you're going to backslide.
It's just the way that it goes.
If we're not hearing,
or if we're hearing and not doing, we're gonna fail.
Turn again to Joshua 1-8.
We're almost finished.
It says here in Joshua 1-8.
This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth
But thou shalt meditate therein day and night and thou may that thou mayest observe to do according to all that was written therein for thou
Shall make thy way prosperous and then thou shalt have good success. You want good success with your relationship with God read your Bible
Do what is written daily change your standards
We're not gonna be perfect
And if we're half in, half out, we're eventually going to fall, correct it now.
The child that hears his father and does what he says, he's a good child.
The one that hears and doesn't do what he says is a bad child.
And although he's still a child, just like we're saved forever, he's just going to be
a bad child of God.
You have to do what the Bible says things that can help you stay on track reading the Bible
I'm gonna wrap this up real quick
Set a realistic goal for each day have a goal of what I want to get done
Every single day this will help if you don't have a goal to shoot towards you're just not gonna do it and
It has to be a realistic goal
Read early in the day. If you get your Bible reading done as soon as you wake up or early in the day
I don't know about you, but I don't have to like, you know
Try to fit it in the day somewhere because the day gets busy and so read early in the day
Look for time during the day ten minutes two or three chapters of reading
There's there's 10 minutes. Maybe you can find if you don't have a job like that where you don't have 10 minutes
I get it. I get it try to find time sometime in the day and read a couple of chapters
It's really five or ten minutes. You can get a couple chapters in
Replace other things you do with reading time
You know, that's where you just got to crucify the flesh
This one's kind of hard when we're in a rut of just doing things, you know, I play chess a lot on my phone
I can not do that. That's a easy way to
to come up with some Bible reading time.
Do extra reading when you have the time.
When you get up early, you get all, you know,
you get your chapters done that you want to do
and you find that 10 minutes and you read a couple more
and at the end of the day, you just have this extra time.
Read some more Bible.
But the next day, you start from scratch.
It doesn't pile up.
You still have to hit your quota
that you have from the next day.
So the conclusion is read your King James Bible every day.
The Bible is how God speaks to us.
it sets the standards for our life and a good relationship with God is reading
and doing and if we're half in and half out we're gonna fail. So with that we'll
just end in a word of prayer. Father God in heaven thank you so much for the
King James Bible. Thank you for the good churches out there that promote King
James only. These churches it tells me that they love the truth.
please help us do our Bible reading every day, take it serious, and do what is written so that we
can change our standards and become a better child of God. And just thank you so much for all of
your blessings. In Jesus' name I pray, amen.