Whenever it gets old, I thank you so much that I have it in my hand, a copy of the pure
Word of God, the King James Bible.
And Father, I just pray that you would speak to our hearts from the Word of God this morning.
Help us to learn what we need to learn.
And in Jesus' name I pray, amen.
Now the particular part of this chapter that I want to call your attention to is in chapter
7, beginning in verse number 4.
Hosea here, obviously it's God speaking, but through Hosea, he's using an illustration
of a baker.
Look, if you would, at verse 4.
They are all adulterers as an oven heated by the baker, who seeth from raising after
he had kneaded the dough until it be leavened.
And then it says in verse 5 that he's drunk, he's been drinking, this baker, and he prepares
the dough, he makes this cake, he puts it in the oven, and then he gets drunk, and what
happens?
He passes out, he falls asleep, and in the morning this thing has just been baking in
the oven all night.
And it's just a raging fire, it sets the whole kitchen on fire, you see that?
And then after that he uses another illustration, look at verse number 7 of Hosea 7, they are
all hot as an oven, and have devoured their judges, all their kings are fallen, there
is none among them that calleth unto me.
Ephraim, he hath mixed himself among the people, Ephraim is a cake not turned.
You see that?
What is he talking about, a cake not turned?
Well think about when you're making pancakes.
Who's ever made pancakes before?
Okay, when you're making pancakes, imagine trying to make pancakes without turning them
over.
Now, it doesn't matter what you do, it doesn't matter how low you turn that heat, it doesn't
matter how high you turn it, if you just try to cook one side of the pancake, it's not
going to ever be heated thoroughly, it's never going to be finished.
And I remember my mom taught me when I was growing up, I used to make pancakes, one of
the few things that I know how to cook, okay?
So when I would make pancakes, you know, you'd put a couple spoonfuls of the Bisquick dough
that you make there, from scratch, right?
And you put that together, and then it begins to bubble, and that's how you know it's time
to turn it over.
Am I right about that?
When it starts bubbling, that's when you know to turn it over.
Well, you see, if you just turn down the heat and say, well, if I just turn the heat just
right, maybe the heat will somehow, you know, work its way up and cook the whole thing,
there's no way.
What's God saying here?
He's talking about people who are one-sided, like a one-sided type of Christianity.
They have one thing straight, and he says, you know what, it doesn't matter how much
you cook that one side of your life, or that one side of an issue.
He says, no matter how much you cook that, it's never going to be done.
He says, you've got to turn that thing over, you have to have both sides.
He says, my people, Ephraim in this case, are like a cake that hasn't been turned.
They've got everything straight in one area, but the other side is just raw.
And the more they try to just cook that other area without addressing the raw side, it's
just going to get burnt on one side, and raw on the other side, it's going to be worthless,
it's going to be good for nothing, as God says here, it's going to be trash.
And I was thinking about this, there are two sides to everything.
Think about electricity, I was telling brother Bosco here before the service that I'm an
electrician, my dad was an electrician, my grandpa was an electrician, I don't know,
who knows, maybe the guy before that was an electrician, I don't go back that far.
But I'm an electrician, and if you work with electricity, when you're working with DC,
you must have positive and negative.
Think about in your car, if you disconnect the negative or the positive terminal, you're
not going anywhere.
And it's the same thing, and there's so many illustrations like that in life, think about
male and female, it's going to take to produce a child, it's going to take to produce a life.
You have to have both sides there, positive, negative, hot, cold, male, female.
Turn if you would to Ecclesiastes 3, this is all the introduction and then I'll get
into the sermon.
But right now I'm just trying to establish the premise for the message.
Look if you would at Ecclesiastes, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, look at chapter number
3 of Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiastes chapter 3 verse number 1.
The Bible reads, Ecclesiastes 3, 1, to everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose
under the heaven, a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to
pluck up that which is planted, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to break down
and a time to build up, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time
to dance, a time to cast away stones and a time to gather stones together, a time to
embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, a time to get and a time to lose, a time to
keep and a time to cast away, verse 7, a time to rend and a time to sow, a time to keep
silence and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time of war and a time
of peace.
You see, God is showing us the duality here.
There are two sides that you must have in your Christian life.
He says, don't be all love, there's a place for hatred.
Don't be all peace, there's a place for war.
Don't be all tearing down, there's a time we need to build up.
Don't be all embracing because there's a time to refrain from embracing and all throughout
the Bible and all throughout just the natural world, God is showing us that we must have
the positive and the negative.
We must have the hot and the cold.
We must have the kill and the heal, the breakdown, the build up and on and on that we saw here.
Now I'm going to give you a few examples of this because the sermon is called balancing
both sides.
That's the title of the sermon.
Now think about a scale like the scales of justice.
Now when you have a scale, in order to balance that scale, do you put something right in
the middle?
Just put something right in the middle and get it balanced out right now, absolutely
not.
That's going to be very difficult to do.
The way that you balance it out is you put an equal amount on this side as you put on
this side, right?
If you have a whole lot on this side, you put a whole lot on this side and you're going
to be balanced out.
Now a lot of people think that balance in the Christian life is achieved by being a
middle of the road Christian.
Well I'm not too excited about the things of God, I'm not too worldly, I'm not too
sinful, I'm not too righteous, I'm just right in the middle.
Or what do you believe about such and such doctrinal issue?
What do you believe about the King James Bible?
Well I wouldn't call myself exactly King James only, but I don't just think you can use any
Bible out there.
That's what God calls being lukewarm.
That's called being half in, half out.
That's not what God wants at all, that's not balance.
Balance is when you have both sides of the equation, both extremes create balance, not
the middle of the road.
What am I talking about?
I'm going to give you three examples this morning of what I'm talking about and this
is something that you can apply to many areas of the Bible, many areas of life.
But number one, my first example this morning is you need to have both sides of preaching
the gospel.
There are two sides to preaching the gospel.
Here's the first side.
The gospel is that salvation is 100% by faith without works, period.
Now if you don't believe that this morning, then you're not saved and you need to get
saved.
That is, for by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is the
gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.
Let me read for you some other verses quickly, Romans 1.16, for I am not ashamed of the gospel
of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth.
No works mentioned, just everyone that believeth.
The Bible says in 1st John 5.1, whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born
of God, and everyone that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of
him.
John 6.40, and this is the will of him that sent me, that everyone which seeth the Son
and believeth on him may have everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last
day.
John 3.15-18, of course the famous verses, that whosoever believeth in him should not
perish but have eternal life, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life, whosoever
believeth.
For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through
him might be saved, he that believeth on him is not condemned, but he that believeth not
is condemned already because he had not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
Why is he condemned?
Because he's an unbeliever.
That's clear throughout the Bible.
And on and on, there's so many different scriptures on that, let me read you a few more.
John 11.26, and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.
Jesus Christ spoke those words.
Acts 10.43, to him give all the prophets witness that through his name whosoever believeth
in him shall receive remission of sins.
Peter said all the prophets of the Old Testament give witness to the fact that whosoever believeth
in him shall receive the remission of sins.
That's why David said in the book of Psalms, blessed is the man whose iniquities are forgiven
and whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin, Romans 4.5.
But to him that worketh not, that's no works, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly,
his faith is counted for righteousness.
Even as David also described it, the blessedness of the man, and there's that quote from Psalms
again, blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.
On and on throughout the Bible, God is clearly stating to us that faith is what saves you.
Saved by faith.
Believe on Jesus Christ, the Bible says, what must I do to be saved?
And they said believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved, that if thou shalt
confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in thy heart that God has raised him
from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
Brother Dave and I were out soul winning last Sunday afternoon and we ran into a pastor,
he was a Church of Christ pastor.
And so obviously he's completely wrong on the gospel.
And so we walked up to him and we asked him the question that we asked everybody, we gave
him the invitation, and we said, do you know for sure if he died today that you'd go to
heaven?
Well, we asked everybody.
And he said, yes, I do.
And I said, how do you know that?
And he said, the reason I know that is because the Bible says in Mark 16, 16, whosoever believeth
and is baptized shall be saved.
And he says, I believe and I've been baptized, therefore I'm saved.
Now, is that man saved?
No, he's not believing faith alone.
He believes in baptismal regeneration.
Church of Christ teaches that baptism is necessary for salvation.
And so I said to him, I said, well, I pretty much used two points because the Bible says
a man that is in heretic after the first and second admonition, reject.
And so this man's a heretic.
He's teaching heresy.
He's teaching work salvation, faith plus works.
And so this heretic, I gave him two admonitions and then I left.
And so these were my two points.
I said, number one, I said, how did people get saved for the first 4,000 years of human
history since no one was ever baptized until John the Baptist came on the scene?
How did people get saved for the 4,000 years before that?
And of course he had no answer that he changed the subject because that's the truth.
Because how could people get saved?
If baptism saves, or is God just constantly changing the plan of salvation?
No, my friend.
The Bible says Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.
Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness.
For this reason, the gospel was preached unto Abraham, the Bible says.
And on and on, you could go down that road.
I said, well, how did people get saved for 4,000 years without baptism?
So immediately he changed the subject.
Well, let me show you something else in the Bible.
Here was my second point.
I said, okay, you have one verse, you know, he pulls out Mark 16, 16, this is his one
big verse.
Now, I literally, I could read for you 300 verses and I've read in this church, I think
I've preached like 100 verses in one sermon about how it's all belief, it's all faith
on Jesus Christ, and he was basically putting his one verse, Mark 16, 16, against the hundreds
and hundreds that say, everyone that believeth or whosoever believeth or all who believe,
you know, whatever wording God is using to say that anyone who believes on Jesus Christ
is saved.
And so, I said, well, listen to me.
I said, this is like a math problem.
I said, you believe that whosoever believeth and is baptized shall be saved, because that's
what Mark 16, 16 says.
I said, I believe that too.
I believe that a person believes and is baptized, they'll be saved.
Case in point, I've believed and I've been baptized, am I saved?
Sure, okay, and I said to him, now, I can show you 300 verses right now, here's one
for example, John 3, 16, that says whosoever believeth.
I said, now, if your interpretation is true, John 3, 16 is not true, because whosoever
believeth, well, if they don't get baptized, according to you, they're going to go to hell.
So you don't believe John 3, 16, you don't believe 1 John 5, 1, you don't believe Acts
16, 31, and on down the list of 300 to 400 verses that make that clear.
But I said, if my interpretation is right, they're both true, because if I told you whosoever
believeth and hops on one foot shall be saved, okay, they're still saved because they believe.
If I believe and dress in a green suit and put on a hat and put a feather in my hat,
am I still saved?
Yes.
And there's a reason why God states it that way, I could go into that another time, why
he talks about being baptized, but the second half of the verse that he wouldn't quote,
it says he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not
shall be damned.
It doesn't say he that's not baptized will be damned.
Believing is always the deciding factor whether or not you go to heaven.
All he's telling them, he's telling people, he says in the verse before, go ye therefore
into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature, he says whosoever believeth
and is baptized shall be saved, he said, if somebody believes in their heart and then
tells you that they believe or gets baptized to show others that they believe, he says,
you know, they're saved, don't worry, you know, don't sit around questioning people's
salvation, if they believe and they're baptized, they're saved, but he's not saying that if
you don't get baptized, you're not saved because the whole Bible teaches otherwise from Genesis
to Revelation and the Bible says whosoever believeth, that's the deciding factor and
never take one verse and try to negate the whole rest of the Bible with one verse.
Now go with the whole message of the Bible, don't take one half of a verse out of context
and so on and on I can show you that salvation is by grace through faith and that if the
Bible teaches what he says that baptism is necessary for salvation, then the Bible is
contradicting itself because it says whosoever believeth over here and he's saying that that's
not true.
Now Acts 8 37 says if thou believeth with all thine heart thou mayest and so the deciding
factor of whether a person is saved is whether they're believing with all their heart.
That doesn't mean that they say, oh I've just believed so much, it means they're not believing
on anything else, all their heart they're believing on Jesus Christ, they're not trusting
their church, they're not trusting baptism, they're not trusting their good works, their
good life, but they say to God be the glory, great things he hath done, so loved he the
world that he gave us his son who yielded his life and atonement for sin to open the
light gate that all may go in.
And of course the second verse of that great song says the vilest offender who truly believes
that moment from Jesus apart and receives, it's a great song because it teaches the Bible
that faith is the deciding factor of who is saved.
Now let's talk about the other side of that coin though, okay, because we don't want to
just cook our pancake half way and when we can stand up and yell and scream and shout
it from another, by grace, through faith, to God be the glory, Jesus paid it all.
But if we don't have the other side of that coin, then we're not going to be an effective
soul winner.
What's the other side of the coin?
You say, well I know Pastor Anderson, it's works, they've got to have works too, right?
That's the other side of the coin.
See I'm balanced because I believe in faith and works, wrong, no.
The balance is to be all the way on the one extreme of saying it's all by faith, no works,
you live however you want, if you're saved you'll go to heaven, of course God's going
to chastise you in this life, but if you believe you're saved, if your faith is in Jesus Christ
a hundred percent, this is how we balance the coin.
Look if you would at John 14, and we'll see the other side of this.
John 14 verse 15, great verse in the Bible, committed to memory, it's a short verse.
John 14, 15, if you love me, keep my commandments, you see that?
If you love me.
Now right away Jesus is questioning the love of his disciples, he's not saying because
you do love me I know you're going to keep my commandments, he's saying no, if you love
me, I don't know if you love me or not, he's saying, if you love me, keep my commandments.
And so once you're saved a hundred percent by the act of Jesus Christ, a hundred percent
by the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross, the blood of Jesus Christ, now he says,
if you love me, keep my suggestions.
Now he says if you love me, keep my commandments, he says, I'm going to save you one hundred
percent for free, I did it all, I shed my blood, I died for you, I went to hell for
you, I rose from the dead for you, and now I'm going to give you the free gift of eternal
life, but now that you're saved, I'm going to tell you what to do.
It's called my commandments, it's called the book of 1189 chapters telling you what
to do, telling you what not to do, telling you what's right and wrong, and I'm going
to tell you to live by the strictest, highest moral standards that anybody lives by on this
earth.
That's how you balance the coin, see.
You don't water down salvation and say good night, you're off the deep end Pastor Anderson,
you need to, you need to be a little more moderate, you need to be a little more balanced,
you're just getting up and saying that it's all by faith, salvation, can you balance that
out a little bit?
Sure.
This is how I balance it out.
I say it's all a hundred percent by faith, but now that you're saved, God wants you to
obey him and to do everything that this book commands you to do, all of it.
You see it's interesting, maybe you've noticed this in your life if you've been saved for
a long time, you might have noticed the fact that the people who believe that you must
work your way to heaven, and they're all varying degrees of this.
Over here is Pastor Steven Anderson and Jesus Christ and every other Bible preacher that
preaches the truth about salvation that says it's all faith, not of works.
No works.
Then over here you have the Roman Catholic Church telling you that it's just works, works,
works.
Now you're going to have all different varying degrees in between in all these denominations.
People who say well it kind of works, or well you do have to give up some of your sins,
or well you kind of have to at least try, or you've got to ask forgiveness every time
you sin.
Of course that's all you'd be doing all day is asking forgiveness, that's all I'd be doing
all day.
But the truth of the matter is, in order to balance this thing out, we're all the way
on this side and there's all these different degrees.
While on the exact same scale of people who believe it's all by faith and people who believe
it's very much about works, you will notice that the way people live on this side, and
this might have been an enigma to you, that the people who live on this side, they seem
to live the strictest, you know, standards.
They seem to live the cleanest, most holiest life is the people who believe that works
are not necessary, it's all by faith.
And then these people over here, the Roman Catholics for example, they live like hell.
Let's face it.
I mean I remember I used to, I worked at a pizza place as a teenager and I'd be giving
the gospel to my friends at this pizza place and there was a guy there that was a Catholic
and boy he says blankety-blank this, blankety-blank that, just talking about fornication that
he was committing, just blowing off his mouth every filthy thing.
And I begin to present him the gospel and you know what he says to me?
I mean this guy who's just living like the devil, he says to me, well you can't just
live however you want.
Okay?
That's what he tells me.
You know, here I am trying to live a clean life, trying to do what's right, here I am
preaching the gospel on the job and he's telling me, well you can't just live however you want
and go to heaven.
Good night.
Try.
So why, does that ever confuse you?
You've probably found that in your life too.
But why, does that ever confuse you why the people who say it's all by faith seem to live
the most strict life and the people who say it's works seem to just do whatever they want?
Well here's why.
Because if you believe that you have to work your way to heaven, you've got to set the
bar pretty low, okay, about what sin is and what sin isn't.
I mean if I told you, you must not sin in order to go to heaven.
No sin allowed.
If you're going to go to heaven, no sin.
I never sinned.
I haven't sinned in years.
Okay?
If I were to tell you that, then obviously my definition of sin is going to have to be
a lot lower.
I mean I'd probably be limiting it to like the Ten Commandments or something and say
well I live by the Ten Commandments, what about the other, you know, thousands of commandments
in this book?
But see, when you believe like I believe, I'm not good enough.
I'm a sinner.
For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
If I call somebody good, Jesus said, there's none good but one that is God.
And he said, I'm God, so I'm good.
And no one else is good.
There's none that do with good, no one out one.
When you believe that, then you can open the Bible to Matthew chapter 548 and see where
Jesus said, be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
And so we preach living a perfect Christian life.
We say this is wrong, this is wrong, because we know that we're not going to achieve it,
that we can preach that and say, we're striving toward that, we're cussing toward that mark,
but that's not our hope for heaven.
Our hope for heaven is the blood of Jesus Christ.
But see, the people who think that you have to work your way to heaven, they're going
to focus on just a few major sins.
And I'm going to tell you something, there are independent fundamental Baptist churches
in this area, and it's not the church that you go to, I'm not saying that, there's another
church that I know of not too far from here that preaches work salvation and they're an
independent fundamental Baptist church and they preach.
He said, you have to repent of your sins, and he said, you have to be willing to give
up your sins in order to be saved.
He said, you have to be so sorry for your sins that you will change.
Now that is work salvation, if you have to change your life and give up your sins in
order to be saved.
Now let me ask you something.
The man who preached that, he's about 300 pounds, okay?
He's not willing to give up one of his sins, I'll tell you right now.
But number two, the whole point is, if he's going to say, you must be willing to give
up your sins to be saved, I'll guarantee you, he's setting the bar very low.
I'll guarantee it.
Because if he believed that the things are sins that I believe are sins, then good night.
How could anyone be saved?
Because I believe that even thinking of bad thoughts is a sin.
I believe even thinking of curse word in your mind is a sin.
I believe if you look on a woman to lust after, you've committed adultery with her already
in your heart.
I believe that watching anything on TV that has anything on God, which is everything,
is a sin.
I believe all the rock musics are sin.
I believe the rap musics are sin.
The country musics are sin.
All the worldly musics are sin.
I believe that it's a sin.
The thought of wickedness is sin, the Bible says.
And so I'm setting the bar up high and I'm saying, God, there's no way I'm worthy to go
to heaven.
But see, he says, you've got to be willing to turn from your sins to go to heaven.
Well, count me out then.
But if it's believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, with all your heart, I can do that.
And I did that when I was six years old and I'm on my way to heaven.
Glory to God.
And consequently, to whatever degree churches do not emphasize that it's by grace, through
faith, the free gift, the Bible says in Romans 5 18, the free gift, justification unto life.
To the degree they don't believe it's free is the degree that they're going to loosen
up their stand on sin.
And they'll just, 10 commandments.
10 commandments, 10 commandments.
10 commandments.
The Bible mentions the phrase 10 commandments two times, two times in the whole Bible.
Two times does it mention those words, the 10 commandments.
And yet these days, there's not 10 commandments, there's thousands of commandments.
And we preach every single one of them in this church.
You say, pastor Anderson, you're giving people a license to sin by saying that it's all by
faith.
Yes.
Go ahead.
And just like God gave Adam and Eve a license to sin, he gave them the choice whether they're
going to sin or not.
He gave them the freedom to decide whether they're going to do right or wrong, but I'm
going to stand up in this pulpit, I'm going to thunder forth against sin.
This is how we balance in this church between preaching the gospel, I got to hurry because
I have two more points that I'm going to go through more quickly, but it's how we balance
it.
It's all by grace through faith, getting to heaven.
You don't have to live a certain way.
You don't have to go to a certain church, you just believe on Jesus Christ, all your
faith in him.
You can't trust baptism.
You can't trust works and on and on.
We balance that out by preaching hard against sin, by striving in our own personal lives
to live a holy life because we want to love God, because we want to keep his commandments,
and because we want to be perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect.
I mean think about this, God loved us so much on the cross that he's being butchered on
the cross.
He's beaten beyond human recognition, he's hanging on a cross.
The blood is flowing out of his body, he's about to give up the ghost, he's about to
pay for the sins of mankind in hell for three days and three nights, and he says, Father
forgive them for they know not what they do.
And he's willing to save the worst of us, and give us a brand new life, give us a home
in heaven, make us a joint heir with Jesus Christ.
Look, that should compel us to have love for him in return.
How do we balance preaching on the love of God?
We preach that God loves us so much that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever
believeth.
How do we balance that?
We preach 1 John 5-3, for this is the love of God, the Bible says in 1 John 5-3, for
this is the love of God that we keep his commandments, and his commandments are not grievous.
Hereby perceive we the love of God, 1 John 3-16, that he gave his life for us, and we
ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.
You see there's a balance there, there's a scale that must be balanced.
People who just preach, grace, grace, grace, well you balance that out, I'm glad you're
preaching this by grace because it is, I'm glad you're preaching this by faith.
But balance that out, man, preach on sin.
Preach on the love of God from both sides.
The love of God that gives us salvation, and the love of God that we have toward God, which
gives others salvation when we live a clean life, when we live life, when we preach the
Gospel.
You see, you've got to balance the coin there.
Balance is not, well, I kind of believe it's by faith.
No it's, I believe 100% by faith, and I'm 100% against all sin.
Let me balance it out right now.
Hey, get rid of your stupid hellavision, this is how you balance out the freeness of salvation.
Get that stupid hellavision out of your house, quit looking at all the sin, the filth, the
alcohol, the adultery that's promoted, the fornication, all the faggots on there.
Hey, get rid of that thing, and read the Bible, and pray, and go soul wedding, and come to
church three times a week, and don't, by the way, don't touch alcohol, I'll preach in this
church.
Why?
Because I believe salvation's free, because I believe it's by grace through faith.
Because I believe if you love God, you'll keep his commandments.
And the Bible says in Proverbs 23, 31, not to even look at alcohol.
It says, look not on the wine when it is red, when it giveth its color to God.
He says, your eyes are going to behold strange women.
Your mouth's going to utter perverse things.
He said, at the end thereof, when you drink it, he said, it's like an adder biting you.
He said, it's like taking hold of a poisonous snake.
Every time you take hold of a glass of booze, no social drinking is not right.
As long as you have your eyes closed, it's right, because God said don't even look at
it.
He said, don't even look at it.
And so if you can drink it with your eyes closed, if you just stumble over to the fridge
and pull that out and drink it, but I don't think that's what God's meaning by that.
And there's so many other places we could go with that.
But don't touch it.
You see, because we believe salvation's free, because we believe in the glorious gospel
of Jesus Christ, because we believe in the free gift of salvation, that's why we take
a stand against sin and preach hard on sin.
That's why we preach, if you're a man, hey, dress like a man.
Be manly.
Be masculine.
Don't dress like a queer little sissy.
You know, dress like a man.
Don't get all the little fashion stuff, the little tailored shirts and the little tight
hip-cugging pants.
It makes me sick when I see a guy dressed like that, and you know what, I'll be honest
with you, when I see a guy dressed like that, I just automatically assume that he's a queer.
You say, well, that's not right for you to judge after the outward appearance.
Hey, look, then why is he dressed like a queer?
If he doesn't want me to think he's a queer, then he needs to start dressing like a man.
And I'm sick of us backing up in independent fundamental Baptist churches, and I'm sick
of us backing up as male Americans and backing up and backing up to where we walk in the
department store now, and you're searching to try to find a white shirt or some kind
of a gray or something that's not, something blue, but something that's not pink and purple.
I mean, come on.
Go to the department store.
You can't even tell the men's section.
You can't even tell the men's section from the ladies' section.
It's all the little, the pink shirts and the little lavender shirts.
Isn't it so cute?
It's not cute.
It's disgusting.
And I'm sick of it, and so I'm not backing up, my friend.
And so when I see one of these little twinkies, when I see one of these little sissified little
homos, hey, and I don't care if I'm in a Baptist church when I see one of them, I say,
why don't you dress like a man?
Why don't you get your hair cut like a man like the Bible says?
You don't love God.
Keep his commandments.
Dress like a man.
God says you're an abomination because you don't dress like a man.
Deuteronomy 22.5.
And of course, I believe the converse for women, that women should dress like women
and be feminine.
You don't have long hair.
Be feminine.
Dress like a woman.
Wear skirts and dresses and not be, you know, wearing work pants and work boots and this
stuff.
Yes, I'm against women wearing pants.
And on and on.
You say, Pastor Anderson, tone it down.
You're preaching too hard.
Look, the reason that I preach this hard is because I preach so hard on the Gospel.
I preach so hard on the love of God.
I spend so many hours a week preaching the Gospel to people, knocking doors, telling
them how it's free, telling them how it's not by works.
Tell them you don't have to change your whole life right now.
Just receive Jesus Christ and let him change you.
Let the Bible change you.
So I've got to balance that out, my friend.
I've got to balance that out by standing up and preaching on sin.
And so I'm going to move off of that point just for sake of time.
But be zealous.
Live for God.
Save it to you for free.
You're never going to be able to pay him back for your salvation.
You should be working as hard as you can to show God that you love him as much as you
can.
It's never going to be as much as he loved you.
Do what you can to repay him.
You know, there's so many things that I preach.
Go to your job and be the hardest worker on the job.
Don't milk the clock.
Don't steal from the boss.
Ephesians 6, Titus 2, the Bible says that you are supposed to be the hardest worker
on the job.
Work hard.
Excel at your job.
Don't take these breaks and everything that you're getting paid for, and on and on.
But number two, and on this subject of having both sides balance, what is real balance?
Not the balance that the world thinks where you're just halfway between, you know, Republican,
Democrat.
I'm halfway between liberal and conservative.
I'm halfway between this and that.
That's not balance.
That's not God's kind of balance.
God created two places.
This is God's balance.
Heaven and hell.
Why isn't there a place that's kind of good and kind of bad?
God says no.
I don't like lukewarm.
He said, so then because they're lukewarm, I'll spew the out of my mouth.
He says I create heaven and hell on balance.
That's my balance.
That's both sides of the coin.
He says I created summer and winter.
That's the way I balance things out.
And so number two, have both sides of child rearing.
Look at Proverbs 29.
I'm going to show you the wisdom of God here about child rearing.
Proverbs 29 verse 15, because you want to have balance in child rearing.
You say, well, how am I going to have balance in child rearing?
Is it I'm kind of strict, I'm kind of lenient, I'm kind of give them nice things, I kind
of spend time with them, I kind of don't.
Look, again, that's not balance.
This is when you have both sides 100%, okay?
Not 50-50.
Okay, you have 100% and 100%, this is balance according to God.
Well, look if you would at verse number 15 of Proverbs 29, and here's really the key
verse.
There's several verses I'm going to show you, but here's the key verse.
The rod and reproof give wisdom.
There's one side of the coin.
Rod, it's talking about spankings, okay?
A rod is a tool that you use to spank.
And then reproof is telling somebody that they're wrong.
It's when you say no, Johnny, you're wrong, you did wrong.
That's what a verbal reproof.
So the rod and reproof give wisdom, here's the other side of the coin.
But a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame.
You see, you have to balance out spankings, discipline, you balance that out with spending
time with your children, loving your children.
He says you can spank them and reprove them and beat them and yell at them, but if you're
not loving them, you know, if you're not spending time with them, if you're just leaving
them to themselves, and then every time they do wrong you beat them, hey look, that's the
imbalance in child rearing.
And I've seen parents that are very militant and very authoritative, and I think it's great.
But if that's all they are, they might produce a rebellious child, because they don't have,
basically their pancake, boy, they turned the heat up on that one side.
They turned the heat up on their kid's backside, okay?
And they turn that thing up, but the other side of that thing's raw and bubbling, and
it's ready to be turned over, and they're not giving them the other side of the coin.
Believe it or not, I am constantly getting accused of, you know, just by different people,
I've been accused of spoiling my kids constantly.
Yeah, here they are sitting in church, good, you know, they're not acting up at all, they
sing out.
But I've been accused of spoiling my children, because we take them lots of places, you know,
we buy them things, we take them all kinds of exciting trips and fun things.
But then other people have accused me of abusing my children by spanking them and being
so mean to them.
And so it's amazing, but I've been accused of both being too strict with my kids many
times, and I've been accused many times of spoiling my kids.
They're both right.
Not that I'm abusive, but they're both right that I am very, you know, strict and disappointing
them on one hand, and on the other hand, very loving and generous to my kids, because I
don't try to withhold my, well, I don't want to love my kids too much, they do not show
too much affection, they're going to start taking advantage of me.
No, because that's where this comes in, okay, they're not going to take advantage of me.
But you see, I'm not just going to be just wham, wham, do what I said, do what I said,
without saying, listen, I love you, let me teach you something, let me train up a child
on the way he should go, and when he's old he will not depart from it.
There's a training that I do, constantly training my children, training them in the Bible, training
them in different athletics, you know, training them how to do work.
I'm training them, but I'm also disciplining and reproving them.
I love them, I take them to the Grand Canyon, you know, take them here, take them there,
but I have to balance that out.
And so I don't try to say, wow, am I being too strict, well, maybe I should let them
have a few, you know, DVDs or whatever, you know, maybe a little bit of rock music's not
going to kill them, they're going to hear it anyway, right, hey, you know, well, maybe
I should just let them dress how they want to dress.
They're not going to, they're going to dress how I want them to dress, isn't it amazing
how they look a lot like me this morning?
And so they're going to dress the way I say they dress, but these are the happiest kids
that I've ever met, because I balance the rod and reproof, I balance that with love
and affection, with training, with time that I spend with them, because he says if you
leave them to themselves, they're going to cause you to be ashamed.
Look at the next verse, this is Proverbs 29, verse 16, the Bible says, when the wicked
are multiplied, transgression increaseth, that's the day we're living in, by the way,
the wicked have multiplied themselves in the United States, and that's why transgression
increaseth, even for God's people, because the wicked have multiplied, that's what that
verse means, but the righteous shall see their fault, correct thy son, and he shall give
thee rest, yea, he shall give delight unto thy soul, that's the discipline side, correct
thy son, straighten him out, where there is no vision, the people perish, but he that
keepeth all happy to have a vision for your children, and then the next verse, a servant
will not be corrected with words, this is talking about a servant as an employee, but
God's relating this to child rearing, he says a servant will not be corrected by words,
for though he understand, he will not answer, now I, you know, I have people that have worked
for me over the years, and that is a true statement, you try to correct them with words,
it doesn't work, you have to actually do something to stop the problem, you have to give them
some kind of an actual correction, you can't, you say, well, do it right, or you're not
going to get paid, you know, do it right, or you're fired, you know, and then that seems
to work sometimes, but he says, a servant won't be corrected with words, he says, though
he understand, he will not answer, seest thou a man that is hasty in his words, there's
more hope of a fool than of him, he that delicately bringeth up his servant from a child, shall
have him become his son at the length, an angry man stirreth up strife, and a furious
man aboundeth in transgression, now these four verses go together, 19 through 22, here's
what he's saying, he's saying, take an employer, for example, he's talking about child-rearing
a little earlier, but he says, take an employer, he says, if he just tells somebody, hey, you
did this wrong, do it right, that doesn't work, he's saying, he's saying, you have to
have a system, you know, you have to have a management structure of, if you do this,
these are going to be the consequences, you know, it's not a beating, like with children,
spanking, but he says, if you do this, these are the consequences, that's the way you have
to manage your company, and he says, if you just try to correct him with your words, if
you're hasty with your words, it says in the next verse, and then he says, if you're angry,
if you're furious, that's the yelling at employees, he says, it's not going to work, he says yelling
at your children is not going to work, screaming at your children, furious, angry, and there
are other parts of Proverbs where it talks about the anger in relation to child rearing,
he says, it's not going to work, he says, you must delicately bring up your son, he
says, if you delicately train your employee, he says, he'll be like a son to you, he says,
this will even work if it's not even your son, and so you balance the reproof, the rob,
the correction, the discipline, the Bible says, spare not, it says, let's see, he that
spareth his rod, hateth his son, but he that loveth him, chasteth him betimes, he says,
if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die, and of course, the Bible word beating
is not talking about, you know, with your fists, the beating is talking about what we
would call spanking, but here he's saying that yelling at your kids is not the answer,
speaking roughly to your kids is not the answer, he says, speak delicately to your children,
speak delicately to your employees, but draw a line in the sand, and they'll let them push
you, and there's going to be consequences for their actions, I don't scream and yell
at my kids, and the people who do not spank, the people who do not obey the Bible, and
discipline their kids with the rod, and give them a spanking, and you know, there's a reason
why the Bible uses the word beating, and I'm not talking about child abuse, but I don't
think this is what he's talking about, when he says beating, okay, obviously he's talking
about a spanking that actually hurts, you know, you shouldn't be injuring them, or leaving
marks or something, but it should be something that actually hurts, or else it's worthless,
and so he says, if you don't beat your children, spank your children, as the Bible says, then
what's going to happen? You're going to start just screaming at them, that's why the Bible
says he that spared his rod hated his son, and you'll see these women in the grocery
store, their monster child, throwing himself on the ground, right? No rod, no reproof,
no correction, and then finally she gets mad and starts screaming at him, I can't believe
you're here, you know, or I've seen even parents this, I'm mad at you, you know, I'm talking
like a three year old kid, I'm mad at you Johnny, because you're not obeying mommy today,
I'm mad at you, I'm never mad at my kids, because when they do wrong, I spank them and
then it's over, and then I speak delicately to them, I talk to them nicely, now there
are times to yell at your kids, but not hasty with your words, he says, see some man that
is hasty in his words, you know, there are times when you decide that somebody needs
a verbal correction that involves a little yelling, that's fine, but flying off the handle,
which is what people do who don't spank daily, they fly off the handle, they're mean to their
children, they scream at their children, that's abusive my friend, spanking is not abusive,
spanking is loving and kind, because you balance out the training by saying, if you
do this, you will feel pain on your backside, you will feel a stinging burning pain sensation
when you do wrong, when you sin against me, when you sin against God, you will feel it,
but I'm not going to, you know, call you names, I'm not going to tell you that you're bad,
I'm not going to tell you that you're a brat, I'm going to tell you I love you, I'm going
to tell you you're a good kid, and because you're such a good kid, and because I want
you to continue being a good kid and become a good adult, I will spank you when you do
wrong because I love you. You see the balance there? You see how you can balance that out
perfectly by just showering as much love and affection, as much time as you can give them,
as much training as you can give them, and then balance that out by saying spanking consistently
when you disobey, you'll get a spanking every time, and it's going to hurt by the way, it's
not going to be a little pat on the bottom, it's going to be something that actually hurts,
and so that's the most loving way to rear your children by balancing the two sides.
Don't be half lenient, half strict, don't be half loving and half cold to your kids,
and I'm mad at you. No, 100% loving and 100% disciplined, and you're going to raise kids
that live for the glory of God according to the Bible. You say, well your kids are little,
you know, you don't know. Well I know because I read it in the Bible, okay, I'm not perfect,
but I'm doing it the way the Bible says it, my kids will turn out right. You say, well
I don't believe that. Well, you believe what you want to believe, but I'm believing what
the Bible says here, and I'm doing it the way the Bible says. So I don't, even if my
children are not grown up, and I can say, see look, it works. Well I've never seen heaven
either, but I know that the blood of Jesus Christ works to get you there, whether I've
seen it or not. But number three, I'll hurry. My third point this morning, so number one,
I gave an example of having both sides of the issue when it comes to preaching the gospel.
Not medium. You know, I've never ordered a medium drink anywhere. I'm serious. If I
go, I don't need a medium. Take it off the menu. Do you want small or do you want large?
Make up your mind. I'm serious. If you think I'm kidding right now, I'm dead serious. If
I walk in, I say, give me the biggest size that you have. That's what I order. Or maybe,
you know, if it's another situation, I might say, just give me a small. Okay, medium. I'm
serious. I don't get medium. I get the full blown, all the way. When I buy orange juice,
I get the extra pulp, the heavy pulp. Okay? That's what I get. I want to be all the way
on one side or the other. And so what God is saying is, turn the pancake over. Cook
it on both sides. Well done. Okay? And he says, don't balance by being halfway anything.
I don't want to be halfway anything. I want to be all the way for Jesus Christ. All the
way a Baptist. All the way loving God. All the way King James Bible. All the way, all
the way fundamental. All the way independent. 100% independent. 100% fundamental. Well come
on, be balanced. You're too independent. No, you can't be too independent. You just be
all the way independent. That's what God ordained. No denominations whatsoever. And so number
one, we applied that to the gospel. All the way by grace through faith. And then all the
way preach the devil out of anything that we can think of, that we can find in the Bible.
Get up and yell and scream and preach the Bible. Balance. Do whatever you want, but
you're going to hear about it on Sunday. Okay? Do whatever you want. No rules. We have no
rules at this church. We have no dress code. No rules. We have no rules. We have nowhere.
You know, I've seen churches have these church covenants that you sign. I'm not going to
go to the movies. I'm not going to drink liquor. We don't have anything like that. We have
no rules. We don't need rules, because we love God, because we preach the Bible. And
people who want to live like the devil, they probably just wouldn't even want to come here.
Not because we're going to be unkind to them, because we're loving and kind to everybody,
but just because they don't like to hear the Bible preached like this. And so that's how
we balance those two things. Number two, think about child growing. How do you balance it?
With both extremes. Very strict, very loving. And that's why sometimes you'll get accused
of spoiling. Sometimes you'll get accused of being too harsh. I just have both sides
of the coin, my friend. If you look at the whole picture, you'd see the balance of my
child-rearing philosophy from the Bible. But number three, turn to Psalm 1. This is the
last place that we'll turn. Psalm 1. Right in the middle of your Bible is the book of
Psalms. Psalm 1. And this is a very familiar passage, and it's a famous passage. Look at
Psalm 1, and look at verse number 1. We'll just read the first few verses here. Blessed
is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of
sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. See, that's a very extreme verse. He doesn't
have anything to do with worldly, sinful, ungodly things. Okay? Then here's the other
side of the coin in verse 2. But his delight is in the law of the Lord. See, it's completely
100% positive in verse 2. 100% negative in verse 1, 100% positive in verse 2, but his
delight is in the law of the Lord. And in his law, the Bible, doth he meditate day and
night. And now watch this. Listen to this great statement. And he shall be like a tree
planted by the rivers. Notice that S on the end. The rivers of water. Now why is there
an S on the end of rivers? Now, you say, come on. Look, the Bible is very much splitting
hairs. There's some verses, I don't have time to turn there, the book of Galatians, where
God says in Galatians 3, the Bible, he said in the Old Testament, does not say seeds,
plural. He says it says seed as of one. And so God splits hairs. God puts an S on things
that he wants an S on, and he doesn't put an S on other things. This is the Holy Bible.
It's preserved. It's exactly 100% accurate. And so when the Bible says rivers of water,
he says this tree is located near more than one river. He said it doesn't just have one
source of its water and nutrients. He says it has more than one river. He says the person
who shuns the ungodly, who walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in
the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful, they also delight in the
law of the Lord, and in his law they meditate day and night. They have a positive to their
Christianity and a negative to their Christianity. And so this tree that you're going to be like,
that's fruitful, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season, that's productive, that's strong,
that's unmovable, he says it's planted by more than one river, more than one source
of life, more than one source of water. I went out in the backyard recently and I found
a weed, and it was huge. Seems like it came up overnight. Weeds grow very fast, don't
they? I mean, they grow fast. And this weed, just one day it wasn't there, and it seemed
like seemingly overnight it just became a giant weed. It was about this big. Big, giant
weed. And I walked up to that weed, just hardly even, you know, this one hand just
kind of reached out and just picked it up. I mean, it was that easy to pick up. Now why
was that weed so easy to pick up? Well, because if you look at the root on a weed, this is
what the root on a weed looks like. I'll draw you a picture. You know, here you got your
weed, and I'm not a good artist at all. Here's your weed, right? Here's the ground, right?
This is what the root of a weed looks like. Is that the truth? The root on a weed is just
one straight down weed. Now look at the root on that tree out front. Now did that tree
spring up overnight? That tree is probably about 50 years old, literally. That tree took
50 years to grow. Does it have one root that goes straight down? Absolutely not. It has
roots going in all different directions, all different ways. The difference between a weed
and a real, you know, productive, useful plant is that useful, real plants, they don't spring
up overnight. They take years to be produced, and they have roots going in all different
directions. They're planted by the rivers of waters. They're not just relying on one
thing, one source, one-sided, cooking the pancake on one side. No, they say, I've got
all different directions going, all different things going, and so nobody's going to pull
me out, my friend. No trial or tribulation is going to rip me out of church. No hard
times are going to get me to stop reading the Bible and stop soul winning. No, it's
going to take a lot more than that, because I don't just have one root, one issue, one
big thing. I have all different roots. You see, there are churches and there are Christians
who say they're a soul winner. They say, man, I want to win people to Christ, I want to
give the gospel to people, but then they're very worldly. See, this is what they're like
right here. Soul winning, soul winning, soul winning, soul winning, soul winning, soul
winning, soul winning. Now look, I'm as much for soul winning as they are, and I think
I'm even as excited about it as they are, or more, but I'm not all about soul winning.
That's not all I am. I go soul winning every week. I win people to Christ practically every
single week, but this is not me, okay? Because I have another root that's called, we hate
sin. We fight sin. We scream and yell and hate and cuss about sin. And then you say,
well not only that, but I'm also King James Bible only, and that's my big issue. King
James only, King James Bible, King James Bible. You say, Pastor Hansen, you sound like a broken
record about the King James Bible. That's not all though. Read the Bible. Read the Bible.
Bible reading. You need to know the Bible. You must know the Bible. You've got to know
the Bible. Be in church three times a week. Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night.
Be in church. Be in church. And you see how I have so many different issues that I'm pushing
for, that I'm striving for. That's the way you have to be in your Christian life. You
say, well that's not my gift. None of the things that I just mentioned are listed in
the Bible as gifts. There's no gift for soul winning. There's no gift of Bible reading.
There's no gift of prayer. There's no gift for being King James only, okay? There's no
gift. There's no gift for going to church three times a week. It's not a gift. These
are commands of God. Okay, all these things are commands that God tells you to do. If
you have all these things, if you're balanced, this is what I mean by balanced. Not halfway
on any of these things. I'm not halfway on any of these things. You can't read the Bible
too much. You can't. You can't go soul winning too much. You can't pray too much. But, if
all you're doing is just praying, you know, all you're doing is just reading the Bible.
It's not that you're doing it too much. It's that you're missing all these other things.
Okay. But see, if you get all these things together, try uprooting that plant. And the
two plants might even be the same size. They might even look very similar from the outside
if you look at the weed and the real plant. The difference with the weed, the weed just
plink. That was easy. It only had one thing going for them. The real plant, the real tree,
I mean even these little twigs out front that we just planted last year, try and uproot
those. It's going to be tough. Because they don't just have one root. They have several
roots. They have both sides of the coin. They have positive. They have negative. They have
time that they spend with God alone. They have time that they spend preaching the Gospel
to others on the job and friends and knocking doors. Not only do they spend time in prayer
talking to God, but they also spend time reading the Bible, listening to God. I've known people
who pray for hours a day, but they don't know the Bible. And so they make foolish decisions
in their life and they don't believe right doctrinally. And I'm sure God loves to hear
them pray to him all day and I'm sure that it's a blessing to him to hear that. But you
know what? They'd be a lot better off if they actually knew what to pray about and
they knew what to live and they knew about soul winning. And I've known people who are
just soul winning, soul winning, soul winning. But they are just watching every DVD that
comes out. They're listening to all the rock music. They're not going to be an effective
soul winner. And worse than that, they're going to be uprooted from church and they're
going to be uprooted from Christianity because they have one thing going for them. Balance
in the Christian life. Balance the Christian life by being perfect. By having the whole
package. Everything that this church has to offer. Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday
night, soul winning. Okay? That's balance. You get a balance between the Sunday morning
service. The Sunday night service is different. Wednesday night service is different. Balance.
Okay, you get a balance by being a soul winner and by listening in church you've got an intake
and an outflow. Prayer and Bible reading. The in and the out. The hot, the cold. On,
off. Heaven, hell. God is the God of both sides. Turn the pancake over in your life.
You say, well all I've ever done is just read the Bible. I've never given the Gospel to
anybody. It's time to turn that thing over. It's been bubbling for a long time. Turn that
thing over. You say, well I mean I love the Bible. I love the doctrine but I'm not too
sure about this preaching against the world and ripping on sin and the television and
homos and all this stuff. Hey, turn it over, would you? It's going to taste a lot better
if you turn that thing over. And so have both sides. Balance both sides of the equation.
Let's bow our heads in that word of prayer. God, I thank you so much for the Bible and
God I thank you so much that my whole life is now just wrapped up in one thing. That
it's not just one thing over and over. Boy, that would be like a broken record. And God
I just pray that you would help me to balance my life by having...