Man, the title of my sermon tonight is guided into all truth.
Guided into all truth.
There are so many people in this world who are misguided.
People who have so many wrong beliefs and wrong views and it just blows your mind sometimes
that the strange ideas that people follow and the foolish teachings and the false religions
and false prophets that people get sucked in by.
How do we make sure that we actually believe the truth and that we are actually following
something that is right and true?
Well, the Bible teaches us that the Holy Ghost's ministry is to guide us into all truth.
The reason why we as Christians have been given the Holy Spirit is to guide us into
all truth and that's what I want to preach about tonight.
First I want to show you here in chapter 16 at the beginning, beginning in verse number
one, how misguided some people can be.
The Bible reads, these things have I spoken unto you that ye should not be offended.
They shall put you out of the synagogues.
Yea, the time cometh that whosoever killeth you, watch this, will think that he doeth
God's service and these things will they do unto you because they have not known the Father
nor me.
The Bible is saying people can be so mixed up, so messed up that they would think that
killing a follower of Jesus Christ is actually doing God's service.
They think that they're actually serving God by doing that and of course we see that
in the Bible with the Jews wanting to kill Christians.
There are today Muslims who want to kill all kinds of people and blow themselves up in
the name of Allah and everything and they claim that they're doing God's service and
many of them believe that they're doing God's service.
The Bible says they believe that, but yet they are so wrong.
Why is it that we're right and they're wrong?
Why is it that we believe the truth?
How is it that we, many of us from very different backgrounds and very diverse histories have
all come together to the same place and it's not just us, my friend, it's Christians all
over the world who believe the same basic doctrines that we believe about Jesus Christ
and about salvation, about the word of God.
We have been guided to this point in our lives by the Holy Spirit.
Now if you would go back to John chapter 14 and let's see how this works in the Bible.
John chapter 14.
Look at what the Bible says in John chapter 14 verse 26.
It says, well let's start in verse 25, it says, these things have I spoken unto you
being yet present with you, but the comforter, which is the Holy Ghost whom the Father will
send in my name, watch this, he shall teach you all things and bring all things to your
remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you.
So the Holy Spirit's job is to teach us as believers all things.
When we go to read the Bible on our own as saved Christians, it's not independent studies,
it's not a self-study, self-taught program, but rather we are to rely on the Holy Spirit
as our teacher.
Without the Holy Spirit as our teacher, it is impossible for us to understand the Bible
which is why you run into people who say, oh I've read the Bible, I know what the Bible
says and yet they believe all these wrong and stupid and foolish and incorrect things.
Oh, when I was in prison I read the Bible several times and yet they don't know what
they're talking about.
Why?
Because they're not saved.
You have to have the Holy Spirit as your teacher in order to understand the Bible.
Someone could read the Bible every single day and if they're not saved, if they have
not believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, if they've not been indwelled by the Holy Spirit,
that person will just be ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the
truth.
Right?
They're just going to just be spinning their wheels.
And I think it's important to talk about this particular idea, especially as we're on the
eve of the new year, because I hope that one of your biggest goals for the new year is
to read your Bible cover to cover in the new year.
That should be your number one New Year's resolution, your number one goal.
And let me say this, I've been a Christian a long time.
I grew up in a Christian home from birth and I got saved as a six year old boy and
I've been around church, I've been around Christians, I've been in lots of different
kinds of Christians and Christian institutions and let me tell you something, I would estimate
that more than 99% of Christians who are truly saved have not read the Bible cover to cover.
And it's probably more like 99.9% that have not read the Bible cover to cover.
That's my personal experience.
You want a source for that?
I don't have one.
Okay?
I'm just making that up.
But it's based on just a lifetime of talking to people and experiencing church and Christianity.
The vast majority of people just don't read the Bible cover to cover.
You'll talk to people who've been saved for 20, 25, 30 years that haven't read the Bible
cover to cover.
And this is a shame.
And then people get mad at biblical preaching, they get mad at a man of God getting up and
telling the truth.
Why?
Because they don't even know what the Bible says.
And then they want to call you out for being wrong.
They don't even know what the book says.
They haven't even read it a single time.
And look, my friend, reading the Bible a single time is a start.
That's just the beginning.
That's just scratching the surface.
If you haven't even read it once, I mean, you need to read it once to even just get
to first base when it comes to studying the Bible.
I remember I was talking to a guy one time at my work and I was admonishing him, hey,
you know, you should read the Bible cover to cover and he said, oh, I don't have time
for that.
There's no way.
Cause he said, and this guy was a zealous Christian, at least in his own mind.
And he said, oh, I don't have time for that because he said, you know, I've got this devotional
I'm doing over here.
I'm working my way through this prayer of JBES book over here.
I got the daily bread over here.
I'm going to this Bible study over here.
I'm going to this service over here.
I don't have time to read the Bible cover to cover.
I said, look, man, it's literally going to take you 15 to 20 minutes a day.
And don't you think that that would be more important than the prayer of JBES or whatever
Christian book that you picked off the shelf, just getting a cover to cover read through.
I mean, the guy was a real nice guy, but he just didn't get it.
It was just going over his head.
Friend, read the Bible cover to cover.
Now, here's the thing.
A lot of people have various news or new year's resolutions.
I don't know what you got in your heart today about all the, you know, the weight loss
or whatever that you get to join the gym or whatever you're going to do in the coming
year.
But I'll tell you this right now.
You know, I've been, like I said, I've been saved for a long time.
I've obviously read the Bible a lot, many, many, many times, but yet even at this stage
in my life, having been saved for 36 years or so and having passed through the church
for 18 years and having read the Bible for hours a day for I don't know how long, you
know, my biggest goals for the new year actually have to do with Bible reading.
Okay.
So, you know, so if I need to read my Bible, you need to read your Bible too.
It doesn't matter if you've read it 20 times, 50 times, read it again.
And if you've read it zero times, man, this is the year that you need to read it cover
to cover.
And I'm not exaggerating when I say it takes 15 to 20 minutes a day.
Okay.
And all kinds of charts and programs, just mathematically, it boils down to less than
four chapters a day.
And I'm not a speed reader.
I don't do speed reading.
I read at a pretty normal pace.
In fact, I might even read a little bit slower than you do.
I'm not one of these people that just flies through things.
And yet I can get it done in like 20 minutes, just the once a year deal.
And that's a great place to start for 2024.
But what does that have to do with the sermon tonight?
Here's what it has to do with the sermon tonight.
Wouldn't it be a shame to do a whole bunch of Bible reading and not understand what you're
reading, not get a lot out of it?
Step one is obviously being saved.
If you're not saved, you literally can't understand the Bible.
You have to have someone else explain to you the gospel and you can piggyback off their
Holy Spirit to get saved.
And then after that, now you got the Holy Spirit, now you can understand the Bible.
So let me say this, not only am I just saved, but I also, when I approach the Bible, I ask
God to teach me the Bible.
I'm constantly praying to God and saying, Lord, open now mine eyes that I may behold
wondrous things out of thy law.
I'm constantly going to God and saying, God, I don't understand this passage.
Please reveal this to me.
Show me the truth.
Help me to understand.
And then it's amazing how as I'm reading the Bible and I'm praying those kind of prayers,
God shows me the truth and God reveals truth to me.
And then I'm able to get up as a pastor and impart that truth onto other people.
But of course, you as a believer need to be getting truth on your own from the Bible,
just you and the Holy Spirit.
And so I would just encourage you, if you have a plan to read through the Bible cover
to cover this year, let me just add one thing to your plan.
How about this year when you pick up your Bible and go to read it, you start by just
praying and asking God to teach you, asking the Holy Spirit to guide you into all truth
so that if you're going to spend that time, you can get the most out of it by inviting
God to help you understand and to show you truth.
I run into people all over the world that I've never had any contact with.
We haven't run in the same circles whatsoever, but we have the same Bible and the same Holy
Spirit.
And it's amazing how we're just in tune.
We start talking scripture, we start talking doctrine and boom, there's just a certain
synchronization that's there from having the same Bible, same Holy Spirit, same teacher.
It becomes apparent that you're talking to a saved person.
And so the Holy Spirit, the Bible says, will teach us in verse 26, he will teach you all
things and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I've said unto you.
So he'll teach you the Bible and then he'll also remind you of scripture when you need
it.
So you'll be in a situation, boom, the Bible verse that you need pops into your mind, right?
That's the Holy Spirit bringing that verse into your remembrance.
So flip over to chapter 16 and I just want to encourage you again, read the Bible cover
to cover in 2024.
I don't care how many times, if you've read it zero times, then you're especially who
I'm talking to.
But if you've already read it one time, you must read it again.
Don't just say, well, I'm done onto the next thing.
There is no next thing.
I remember the first time I finished reading the cover, the Bible cover to cover.
I was 17 years old, I believe.
I don't remember if I started or finished when I was 17.
I want to say I finished when I was 17.
And I remember feeling a little sad when I first finished the Bible cover to cover because
I was sort of like, you know, Alexander the Great weeping because there were no more worlds
to conquer.
And I kind of just thought to myself, you know, man, I've found so many new exciting
things and so many great stories that I'd never heard in any church, that I'd never
heard from any pulpit.
And I just thought, wow, there were so many cool new things and I'm never going to see
anything for the first time ever again.
I remember feeling that way.
But then what did I do?
I just started reading it the second time.
And as I started going through it the second time, I started being like, wait a minute.
I don't remember this part, you know, and it turned out there was all kinds of new stuff
even the second time.
And even the third time.
And so don't underestimate the ability of the Holy Spirit to bring new illumination
and new teachings to you every time you read the Bible.
It's a living, breathing book here and every time we read it, God's going to show us something
different.
God's going to teach us something different.
I mean, even the most basic passage that you've read so many times, Genesis chapter one or
John chapter one or, you know, it always blows my mind how I continue to learn new
things from these passages that I've just heard hundreds of times.
You've heard so many sermons.
You've read it so many times.
And then I'll preach a sermon.
Somebody will walk up to me and point out something that I've never heard, never thought
of.
The Bible's deep.
And so whether you've read it zero times, one time, 20 times, 50 times, 100 times, read
the Bible again in 2024 and pray and ask God to show you truth from the Bible.
I think it's easy for Christians sometimes who've been in church a long time to just
feel like they already know it all.
Or how about children who grew up in a Christian home like, oh man, I was raised on this stuff
and I've sat under pastor Anderson's preaching for the last 10 years and I already know what
the Bible says, but you don't know everything.
I remember having this thought when I was in my early 20s thinking, you know, I'm still
learning stuff from my Bible, but I feel like there aren't really going to be any more like
really big groundbreaking revelations at this point.
I feel like I've pretty much got all the big stuff covered and figured out, you know, because
that, you know, cause there were, you know, the first few read through, read throughs
of the Bible, there were some things that kind of jarred me and shocked me and changed
my thinking on things.
And I just kind of thought, you know, at this point, uh, the rest of my life as I read
the Bible, I'm just going to be making little tweaks, little adjustments to things.
I don't know if there's really going to be anything really super earth shattering or
big.
And the funny thing is that at that point I still thought Israel were God's chosen people
today.
So it goes to show you I had a long way to go of reading and studying about, in fact,
I'd read the Bible 24 times and I still thought that if you can imagine that.
I know I'm stupid, but I'm still, I keep reading, but I'm telling you, you know, you
got to keep reading.
You got to keep studying.
You don't know what you don't know.
It's just, Oh, I already know what the Bible says.
You don't know what it is that you don't know.
If you knew what it was, then you wouldn't not know it.
Just the very nature of not knowing something is that you don't know what that thing is
that you don't know.
And so you're like, well, there's nothing in the Bible.
I don't know.
Well, how do you know?
Yes.
And so you got to keep reading the Bible to find that thing that you don't know.
And I guarantee you, and look, I'm not talking about changing doctrine or being carried about
with divers and strange doctrines.
There are just a lot of things in the Bible that maybe you just haven't even thought about
or haven't even applied.
And I'm telling you there, there's so much good stuff in there.
And God has something special for you in 2024 in the Bible.
And when it comes to reading the Bible, one of the things that I often think about is
the manna that fell from heaven.
Because the reason that God fed them with manna was that they would know that man does
not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
And so the manna pictured the word of God.
And they would get up every morning and they would gather the manna.
And if you remember, they weren't supposed to gather extra one day and try to double
up and then not gather the next day.
They had to go out every day and get a little bit every day.
They can't double up one day and then not do it, except for, of course, the Sabbath
day.
They were not supposed to go out and then God would give them double, et cetera.
But in general, if they did not get up early and go get the manna, then let's say they
went out there at 11 or noon or 3 o'clock in the afternoon, it's gone.
When the sun came up and the sun was hot, the stuff would just kind of melt away and
it was gone.
So you had to get it while it was there.
And then tomorrow there's a fresh batch and you got to get it when it's there.
And I think about that a lot with the Bible because of the fact that there are certain
things that are in the Bible for you that are going to be there on January 1st.
They're not going to be there on January 2nd.
Now obviously the text is the same text, don't get me wrong.
As long as you have the King James, your Bible isn't going to keep changing, like these new
versions keep changing.
But I'm not saying that the text itself is changing, but I'm saying God kind of had something
for you that day to teach you on January 1st, and he had something to teach you on
January 2nd, and he had something to teach you on January 3rd.
The Holy Spirit's got that lesson plan ready for you, and if you're not there, you're missing
out.
And you might think you're just going to catch it up later or something, but you know what?
God's got something for you now.
You're at a certain place in your life now.
You have a certain frame of mind now.
And when you approach the Bible, God's got what you need today.
He's got what you need tomorrow.
And so we need to understand that reading the Bible is not like just picking up any
other book and reading it.
It's not like just grabbing that fictional novel and just sitting down and reading it.
Okay?
Because you don't have the author sitting next to you and explaining it to you and expounding
it to you when you read a fictional novel, do you?
Whereas when you read the Bible and you're saved, you've got the Holy Spirit there, and
He's actually there guiding you, teaching you, jogging your memory of things, bringing
things to your mind.
This is also part of why I do not recommend study Bibles, okay?
Because this can distract you from what the Holy Spirit's trying to show you, you know?
And people will say, well, you know, you need to be taught by other great men of God and
things.
You know, here's what I liken that into.
It's sort of like in marriage.
There are times when my wife and I will interact with other people.
Maybe we'll go out somewhere and we'll take the kids with us, or maybe we'll go out and,
you know, with relatives or friends or whatever, and we'll go to church and we're interacting
with each other but also with other people.
But don't you think that my wife and I also need some time alone, just my wife and I together?
Okay.
And so here's the thing.
When you have the study Bible, what you're basically doing is you're not spending time
alone with God.
You're bringing in this third party.
You got the third wheel there.
Every single time you go to read your Bible, you got somebody sitting there, oh, let me
tell you what it means.
Like, shut up.
I'm trying to listen to the Holy Spirit, buddy.
I don't want to hear what you have to say.
Let's hear what you have to say later.
Right now I want to hear from the Holy Spirit.
You know, I don't want to be there every time you're reading the Bible.
Let me tell you what that means.
Let Pastor Anderson tell you what that means.
Pastor Anderson, study Bible.
I'll tell you what this means.
You know, what's better is that you actually just quiet, quietly read the Word of God and
let the Holy Spirit speak to you.
Now look, I want you to listen to what I have to say too.
You know, come to church on Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, listen to preaching.
From me, great.
I hope that's going to help you learn and grow.
But when you're with the Bible alone and the Holy Spirit, it should just be the two of
you without any other interruptions or people butting in because you need that one-on-one
time with the Lord just reading your Bible and being taught by the Holy Ghost, not being
taught by a human being.
Being taught by a human being is great but what's even better is to spend that time with
the Lord where you're just reading the Bible.
John chapter 16, the Bible says in verse number 13 of John 16, it says, how be it when he,
the spirit of truth has come, he will guide you into all truth.
Of course, the Holy Spirit is a person, right?
Holy Spirit is God.
For he shall not speak of himself but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak and he
will show you things to come.
He shall glorify me for he shall receive of mine and shall show it unto you.
All things that the Father hath are mine, therefore said I that he shall take of mine
and shall show it unto you.
And so the Holy Spirit's ministry is to illuminate the Word of God.
He doesn't speak of himself, meaning that he doesn't just teach you things that are
brand new from him, not from Jesus Christ, rather he takes of Christ's Word, he takes
of the Bible and shows it unto you and illuminates it for you and teaches you and guides you
into all truth.
And so that's why the Bible says, he shall glorify me, verse 14, for he shall receive
of mine and shall show it unto you.
All things that the Father hath are mine, therefore said I that he shall take of mine
and shall show it unto you.
Now flip over to 1 Corinthians chapter 2, 1 Corinthians chapter number 2, 1 Corinthians
chapter number 2, the Bible reads, I'll start reading while you get there.
It says in verse number 9, but as it is written, I have not seen nor ear heard, neither have
entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for them that love him.
But God has revealed them unto us by his Spirit, for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea the
deep things of God.
For what man knoweth the things of a man save the spirit of man which is in him?
Even so the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God.
Now let's stop and think about that verse for a minute.
What man knoweth the things of a man save the spirit of man which is in him?
What the Bible is saying is that, you know, you don't really know what's going on inside
my head or inside my heart, right?
Only I really know what's going on inside my heart and inside of my head.
And you are the only one who really knows exactly what's going on inside of your head
and what your thought process is, right?
And the Bible says here, even so the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God,
right?
We can't, as it were, read God's mind, okay?
But the Holy Ghost, he does have the mind of God, he does know the mind of God and he
will reveal to you the meaning, the intent, he will actually guide you into all truth
so that you don't misinterpret scripture, right?
Just like I could say something and you could misinterpret what I said.
I'm like, hey, wait a minute, that's not what I meant.
Here's what was going through my mind.
Here's what I actually meant, you know.
You took that the wrong way because sometimes I might say something that could be taken
a few different ways and I know what I meant but you might get the wrong idea.
Well, here's the thing.
There are things in the Bible that people will sometimes take the wrong way.
They miss the point.
They think that the Bible's saying something other than what it's actually saying.
Well, the Holy Spirit of God, he knows exactly what that means and what is the right interpretation
and what is the wrong interpretation.
And so no human being has supreme knowledge of the mind of God.
It's the Holy Ghost that knows what God meant, okay?
And so it says in verse 12, now we have received not the spirit of the world but the spirit
which is of God that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
So as saved Christians because we are indwelled by the Holy Spirit, now we do have access
to the mind of God.
We do have access to the original intent of the author and God will explain to us in our
hearts as we study the Bible what the Bible means.
The things that are freely given to us of God, talking about the word of God, look at
verse 13, which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth but
which the Holy Ghost teacheth comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
So the key to understanding the Bible is not necessarily getting a bunch of history books
and trying to understand the culture of what life was like back during the Roman Empire
or life in ancient Israel or something like that.
There's a lot of man's wisdom.
There's a lot of scholarship about the Bible that could be interesting and some of it could
be informative but really that is so much less important and so much less a key to understanding
than having the Holy Spirit illuminate scripture to you.
You might be able to know some trivia or some ideas about what history has to offer when
it comes to the Bible or you might know these little tidbits here and there that might help
you in a few places but honestly that's nothing compared to the understanding you're going
to get from actually having the Holy Spirit guiding you into all truth.
Why?
Because of the fact that the word of God is not taught by man's wisdom, right?
This is all the scholarship of academia and all of the things you could delve into, the
archaeology, the history, the linguistics and look, I'm not saying that those things
have no profit because obviously anything that you learn is typically going to come
in handy at some point or maybe help you understand something but first of all, we don't really
know if all of those things that you're being taught from academia are even true.
You know, as long as we just take history for granted, a lot of the stuff that you learn
as history that you're taught as fact, you know, it might not really even happen that
way.
You don't really know, do you?
And when they tell you, oh, this is what the culture was like 2,000 years ago, they don't
really have a lot to go on.
There's a lot of speculation there, a lot of guessing whereas the Holy Spirit's guidance
is so much more powerful and so much more important to understanding the Bible and so
we speak the word of God not in the words which man's wisdom teaches but which the Holy
Ghost teaches comparing spiritual things with spiritual, right?
So not finding some pagan manuscript from a few thousand years ago and saying, hey,
let's compare the Bible with, you know, the Iliad and the Odyssey or something, right?
That's not the best way to understand the Bible.
The best way to understand the Bible is to compare the Bible with the Bible.
Compare the Old Testament to the New Testament, right?
Compare scripture with scripture.
Compare the gospels with the epistles and that's how you learn the most.
Verse 14, but the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God for they are
foolishness unto him, neither can he know them because they're spiritually discerned.
So again, the Bible's saying the natural man is totally incapable of understanding
the word of God.
It's spiritually discerned and he can't understand.
He can't know them.
Okay, if you would flip over to 1 Thessalonians chapter 1, 1 Thessalonians chapter 1.
Where do all these false doctrines come from?
Where does all this false religion come from?
It comes from people trying to understand the Bible without the Holy Spirit or listening
to people who don't have the Holy Spirit expound the Bible to them and not going and checking
it out on their own.
And remember what I said, even among saved Christians, the vast majority aren't reading
the Bible like they should.
So they could be susceptible to false teaching.
And they're just a sitting duck waiting for someone to come and lie to them and deceive
them and trick them, even if they're a sincere person.
Let alone, of course, unsaved people trying to deal with scripture.
They cannot understand scripture according to the Bible.
Without the Holy Ghost, the natural man cannot understand the things of the Spirit of God.
And so does it surprise you that they make up a bunch of crazy denominations, Jehovah's
Witnesses, Seventh-day Adventists, Mormons, Roman Catholics, right?
All of these bunch of weird perversions of the gospel, perversions of truth.
Why?
Because man's attempt to study the Bible without the Holy Spirit's aid, and in many cases,
with the aid of Satan.
You know, coming along and being transformed into an angel of light, transformed into a
minister of light, and guiding them into the darkness instead of guiding them into truth.
First Thessalonians chapter number one, verse five says, for our gospel came not unto you
in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Ghost, right?
So when the Apostle Paul preached the gospel, he's preaching it in the power of the Holy
Ghost.
That's how people were able to get saved.
In much assurance, as you know what manner of men we were among you for your sake, and
you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction
with joy of the Holy Ghost, right?
So when the word of God was being preached, it was being preached with the Holy Ghost,
right?
And the Holy Ghost was filling the speaker as he preached the word of God in this case.
And then the listeners also, they received the word of God with joy of the Holy Ghost,
right?
And so the Holy Spirit is very much involved in the teaching and the reception of God's
word, especially when it comes to the gospel, when it comes to getting saved.
But even beyond that, even after we've been saved for years, we still go to church, the
pastor is filled with the Spirit, he's preaching the word of God.
And then the Holy Spirit is applying it to your heart.
And so coming to church and listening to the word of God being preached is a spiritual
experience where it's not just like a math teacher getting up and giving a math lecture,
but rather I'm preaching the word of God as a spiritual activity and God's Spirit is teaching
you something and it's a supernatural process.
Go if you would to the book of 1 Peter.
Actually go straight to 1 John chapter 2 for the sake of time.
Let's go to 1 John chapter 2.
1 John chapter 2, and we're going to begin reading verse number 18 of 1 John chapter
2.
The Bible says, little children, it is the last time.
And as you have heard that antichrist, singular, right?
Antichrist shall come.
Even now are there many antichrists whereby we know that it is the last time.
They went out from us, but they were not of us.
For if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us, but they went
out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.
And so you have people who you think are Christians, you think they are believers, you count them
as a brother or a sister in Christ, but then they end up departing from the faith and going
into damnable heresy.
Even here in this passage, we're talking about them actually being antichrists, which John
defines here as being someone who does not believe that Jesus is the Messiah, right?
So these people are even going into Judaism, okay?
Just totally departing from the Christian faith and becoming Jews, for example.
But we could apply this to people departing from the faith and becoming an atheist, becoming
a Muslim, becoming a Mormon, becoming a Roman Catholic.
Anytime someone departs from the gospel of Jesus Christ, leaves the Christian faith,
and joins some bogus religion, or just says, well, I don't believe in Jesus anymore, I'm
an agnostic now, or I'm an atheist now, they went out from us, but they were not of us.
When a person does that, they are just exposing the fact that they were never saved in the
first place.
The Bible says they went out from us, but they were not of us.
It's not that they used to be of us, and now all of a sudden they're not.
They used to be one of us.
No, God's saying they were never of you.
Because if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us.
There's no doubt.
Those who are Christians will remain a Christian until the end.
Anyone who says I used to be a Christian was never a Christian in the first place.
It's that simple.
Now I did not say they're going to remain in church.
I didn't say they're going to keep serving God.
I didn't say the preachers are going to keep preaching.
I didn't say the soul winners are going to keep soul winning.
I didn't say the Bible readers are going to keep reading their Bible, but they will still
believe in Christ.
And look, I've had some good friends of mine that were saved Christians get super backslidden.
This one guy that I was friends with as a teenager, I truly believe this guy was saved.
We had shared a lot of great fellowship.
We'd gone soul winning together.
We'd read the Bible together.
We talked about the Bible for hours.
I don't have any doubt that this guy was saved.
Now if later he would have renounced Christ or something, then I would have said, well,
you know, he fooled me.
He apparently wasn't.
But he didn't.
This guy never renounced Christ.
But you know what he did do?
He fell into sin.
And I ended up going off on a trip to Europe for three months where I was doing ministry
and stuff as an 18-year-old.
And I was staying with different pastors and missionaries and getting training in the
ministry and learning things and learning the language and so forth.
And when I came back, this guy was gone.
Like this is the guy I was going to church with.
I'm gone for three months.
I get back.
He's gone.
I can't find him.
I go over to his parents' house.
Where is he?
They don't know.
They haven't heard from him.
He's out of church.
Can't find him.
Anyway, for the next many years, I tried to look him up at various times, tried to get
in touch with him through his parents, through other people.
You know, I finally met up with this guy.
And he was addicted to drugs.
And he was just living a worldly life.
But literally, as he's living this worldly life, living in some house with a bunch of
other teenagers who are taking drugs and everything, he literally had this backpack that he's carrying
with him everywhere.
And he pulls a New Testament out of the backpack and says, hey, I still have this New Testament.
I'm super backslidden.
I'm living in sin.
He's saying, but.
And I said, you know, what's the deal?
I mean, do you know that you're saved?
He said, oh, yeah, of course I'm saved.
I know I'm saved.
I'm just not serving God right now.
I'm backslidden.
I'm living a wrong life.
And I tried to help him get back on his feet, but it just didn't really work out.
I don't know if he ever got back right with God or not.
I know that several years after that, after I intervened, I said, look, I can help you
get a job.
Like, I can help you with a place to stay.
Because this guy was a close friend of mine.
I will do anything to help you get back on your feet.
What can I do for you?
What do you need?
What's it going to take to get you out of this lifestyle, get you back in church, get
you serving God?
It didn't really work out.
You can take the horse to the water, but you can't make him drink.
Years later, my mom and my sister were walking into a grocery store.
And they see him outside the grocery store.
And they said he just looked like a homeless bum.
He just looked like a total derelict, just drug addict, whatever.
Look, it's possible for a born-again saved Christian to get addicted to drugs.
And guess what?
Drugs are going to destroy your life.
Drugs can turn a Christian into a derelict by the side of the road just as much as they
could turn an unsaved person into a derelict by the side of the road.
Because even saved Christians still have the flesh.
But what he didn't say is, oh, I don't believe in Jesus anymore.
Oh, I'm a Mormon now.
Oh, I just joined the Roman Catholic Church.
No, he didn't.
Because I would have said, well, you were never saved to begin with.
So it is possible to go deep into sin.
But here's what's not possible.
What's not possible is for you to depart the Christian faith.
Because if you do, you are proving that you were never saved in the first place.
Once you have believed on Christ, you will continue to believe on Christ.
Now, that's not to say that you won't have doubts.
I think every single Christian has had doubts.
I've had doubts.
I think if you're honest, you would probably admit that you've had doubts.
John the Baptist even doubted Jesus at one point.
We're human.
So we're going to have doubts.
But there's a big difference between doubting and just not believing in Christ.
There are two kinds of people in this world, my friend.
There are those who believe on the Son, and there are those who have not believed on the
name of the only begotten Son of God.
Because once you have believed on him, you're saved forever.
And now you have the Holy Spirit living inside of you, and you're not just going to totally
stop believing in Christ because you have the Holy Spirit inside of you.
And that's why my friend who was living that backslidden sinful life, I guarantee you that
he felt super guilty about it.
He was convicted about it.
He felt bad.
And God wasn't blessing him because he's looking like a derelict in front of that grocery store.
He's not being blessed.
God's chastening him.
God's chastising him.
And I don't know, hopefully he's back on track nowadays.
Maybe I'll hear from him someday if he's not dead in a ditch somewhere.
Because that's what happens when you get addicted to drugs.
You end up dead very young.
First John chapter 2, where did we leave off there?
They went out from us.
They were not all of us.
For if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us.
But they went out that they might even manifest that they were not all of us.
But ye, on the other hand, right?
But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and you know all things.
Unction is just a fancy word for anointing, right?
You have an unction from the Holy One, and you know all things.
I've not written unto you because you know not the truth.
I'm not writing unto you because you don't know the truth.
But because you know it.
And that no lie is of the truth.
Now what does that mean?
No lie is of the truth.
That means that anything that you believe that's a false doctrine, anything that you
believe that's a lie, did not come from the Bible.
And it certainly did not come from the Holy Spirit.
That's why when the Apostle Paul wrote to the Galatians who were being influenced by
the Judaizers that were trying to get them to live as do the Jews, he said, this persuasion
cometh not of him that calleth you.
He said, look, this is not coming from the Holy Spirit.
This is not coming from the Word of God.
So therefore, if we approach the Word of God with a sincere heart, truly wanting to learn,
truly receptive to what God is telling us, having an ear to hear what God is saying to
us, and if we pray and say, God, please show me what the Bible means.
Please guide me into all truth.
And then we approach the Bible and we read the Bible with that attitude.
God is going to answer that prayer.
He's going to guide us into all truth.
If we ask, we will receive.
If we seek, we will find.
If we knock, it will be opened unto us.
And the Bible says, if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that giveth to all men
liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him.
How do you know, Pastor Anderson, that your interpretation of the Bible is right?
Because I got it from the Holy Spirit.
You may not know what's inside my heart.
I may not know what's inside your heart.
But I know what's inside my heart.
And I know that I approach the Bible with a heart that says, God, I just want the truth.
Show me the truth.
I put in the hours of reading.
I begged God to show me the truth.
I was sincere.
I was willing to believe whatever he told me to believe.
I know that that's how I approached it.
And I know that that's how I ended up with the truth.
You say, well, am I supposed to take your word for it?
Nope.
What you're supposed to do is do the same thing I did and pray to God to be led into
all truth.
Pray for God to guide you into all truth and approach the word of God.
Go to the Bible.
Study the Bible with a sincere and an honest heart, wanting to know the truth, believing
that the Bible is God's word, and asking the Holy Spirit to guide you.
And you know what?
You and I are going to end up at the same place.
In fact, here we are.
Good to see you tonight.
Because some of you could even maybe talk about your journey and think about how, you
know, hey, you know, first I was in this religion.
And then I got a little closer to the truth.
Got closer to the truth.
You know, I was seeking.
I was seeking.
I'm going to end up where we are today.
Okay.
I'm not expecting you to take my word for it.
I know that what I'm saying is true.
But you've got to take your own journey where you study the Bible and you ask God to show
you the truth.
And you will end up, and if you end up, you say, well, I did that and I'm Mormon now.
You're a liar.
You're lying.
I don't believe you because I don't think that there are three Holy Spirits or five
Holy Spirits.
There's one Holy Spirit.
There's one Lord, one faith, one baptism.
There's only one right way.
Every religion isn't right.
Every denomination is right.
There's one right way.
There's one right salvation.
It's Jesus.
There's one right method.
It's by faith.
Okay.
There's one right doctrine on who God is.
It's the Trinity.
Okay.
There is one right doctrine when it comes to eternal security.
And that is the doctrine that we cannot lose our salvation.
There is one right Bible.
It's the traditional text of scripture, not the Bible of the month club with all their
archeological discoveries.
It's the traditional received text.
Okay.
That is the Bible.
And in English, it's the King James Bible.
Okay.
It's not all of these other different versions that are out there that make dramatic changes
to the test that totally change the meaning in so many places.
We don't even have time to go through them all.
You know, there's only one right way to be baptized and it's being dunked under water
in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.
You say, well, I know a person and he's saved and he, you know, he does sprinkling.
Well, you know what?
Here's the thing.
If A, he's not saved or B, if he is saved, then basically he is stubbornly rejecting
what he deep down knows to be true because he just wants to be part of some denomination
or he wants to just follow man's tradition.
You know, there's some people that are just enamored by man's tradition and they want
to be a part of some historical faith community or something.
And so there are all kinds of reasons why people could be wrong about something.
But when somebody is wrong on something as big as baptism, something major like that,
you know what, it's either that they're not saved or it is that they are not being sincere
about that topic.
They're willfully ignorant.
You know, because you're never just going to read the Bible and just sprinkling.
The Holy Ghost didn't reveal sprinkling or pouring.
The Holy Ghost didn't reveal infant baptism.
And what's funny is that the proponents of infant baptism, you know what, they have all
these rationales from the Bible and they've got all this logic from the Bible, but here's
what they don't have.
They don't have a verse that actually says to baptize babies.
That's the one thing they can never find.
Well, you know, there's a household baptism.
You know, this guy got baptized and his household, so we can just kind of assume that, you know,
we're just assume that there were babies in that household.
No, I'm not going to assume that.
Because if God wanted us to baptize babies, you think there'd be one verse in this book
that actually said that, but there isn't, because it's a lie, because it's of the devil,
because it's from paganism, because it's from the whore called the Roman Catholic Church.
That's what it's from.
It's not from the Bible.
It's not from the Holy Spirit.
It's not from saved, Spirit-filled Christians.
It's from a bunch of unsaved Catholics.
And then you got the Protestant Reformation coming along saying, well, you know, the Catholic
Church is full of baloney, but let's keep like 70% of what they teach and just fix a
few things.
Now, throw the whole thing in the trash and start over, because the Catholic Church is
unsalvageable.
It's a pagan idolatrous cult.
It's unsalvageable.
It's trash.
I don't care what they say.
I don't care what they do.
We need to be guided into all truth by the Holy Spirit.
Infant baptism didn't come from the Bible, and it certainly didn't come from the Holy
Spirit.
It just didn't.
Now, you know, look, the pre-trib rapture is a false doctrine, but here's the thing
about the pre-trib rapture.
That's a complicated subject when it comes to end times, and so a lot of people just
don't understand all the nuances of that, and so they get sucked into a pre-trib rapture
doctrine.
But if a pastor really studies the Bible and really cares about truth and is really
sincere and actually tries to learn about Bible prophecy and quits listening to a bunch
of human beings putting a bunch of ideas in his head and just reads the Bible, there's
no way he's going to walk away saying it's a pre-trib rapture.
And you say, well, there are a lot of saved men of God who believe that.
Yeah, but here's the thing.
They're just being stubborn on that subject.
They're just refusing to see what's right in front of their face.
Why was I wrong on Israel until I was 24 years old?
Even when I started Faith Forward Baptist Church, I was still wrong on Israel for the
first, like, six months of pastoring the church.
Thankfully, I figured it out early on.
Why was I wrong about that?
Is it because I was insincere?
Is it because I didn't get – no, no, no.
It was just because of the fact that I'd been taught wrong and I was on a journey of
Christian growth.
I was on a journey and I wasn't at the destination.
And guess what?
None of us is really at the destination when it comes to studying the Bible.
And so I was wrong about Israel because of the fact that I had been brainwashed with
a false doctrine about Israel my whole life.
And then guess what?
How did I get it right was I read the Bible, read the Bible, read the Bible, read the Bible,
was praying for illumination, and then finally, you know, I was preaching one time and I started
to say something about Israel being God's chosen people.
And it, you know, all of a sudden I just thought to myself, as I was preaching, I had, like,
an out-of-body experience.
No, I didn't.
It was a joke.
But, you know, like, sometimes when you're in the middle of something, you kind of step
back and look at what you're doing.
Not saying literally now.
Don't freak out or anything.
But while I was preaching, like, I was preaching away and this other part of my brain that
wasn't preaching – I kind of put the preaching on autopilot for a second.
And I was like, wait a minute.
Is what I'm saying even true?
Or am I just repeating stuff that I've heard?
And I was like, man, I feel like I'm just repeating stuff I've heard my whole life,
but I don't think any of this is really true.
And then I went home and started just flipping through the New Testament and all these verses
just flooded into my mind.
Verses just flooded into my mind about Israel and about the Jews.
And I remember just thinking, wow, like, what – how could I have not seen this?
It's on every page.
So look, ultimately, the Holy Spirit did guide me into all truth on that particular subject.
Ultimately, he did bring to my remembrance all the verses that I needed to get that right.
And so I'm not saying that somebody who is wrong about something minor like the preacher
of rapture – because that is a minor thing to be wrong about, folks.
Being wrong about salvation is big.
Being wrong – that's just – in fact, that's just everything.
That's in a class all on its own.
Being wrong about who God is, yeah, that's just huge.
You know, being wrong about baptism is a big – a big oopsie right there, okay?
Being wrong about the preacher of rapture is minor, okay?
But are there good, godly, sincere men who are wrong about the timing of the rapture
and that believe in a preacher of rapture?
Absolutely.
They're not bad.
They're not necessarily insincere.
Maybe they just haven't gotten to that point in their spiritual journey.
But I believe that if they're explained to this subject, if they're taught the subject,
if they actually go and say, I spent, you know, the last three months studying this
issue and I came to the conclusion that the preacher of rapture is right.
They're either lying, not saved, a functioning idiot, or they're just stubborn.
You know, maybe they're just stubborn.
They just don't want to let go of tradition.
They don't want to get in trouble with their friends.
They want to keep following the big Bible course.
Just like the Presbyterian wants to keep being a Presbyterian and they want to keep
being a, you know, follower of this Bible college or that Bible college or whatever.
Whatever their reasoning, something's broken there.
I've heard these sermons where these pastors get up and say, you know, I went to the Lord
and I prayed.
You know, somebody sent me this video, this guy.
I don't remember who it was, but it was like this huge preacher, okay?
I'm just talking about his girth.
He was just a big, he was a big boy.
And this guy said, he's like, I prayed and I told God, hey, if it's not pre-trib, show
me that it's not pre-trib.
I'm willing to change.
If it's not pre-trib, I'll change.
And I just thought to myself, you are a big fat liar is what you are.
That's what you are.
Because you know what?
You literally went to the Bible and prayed and you spent months studying the Bible and
praying and begging God to show you the truth and he's going to show you something as stupid
as the pre-trib rapture.
No, that's false.
It isn't true.
You're wrong.
That's not what the Bible says.
The plain reading of the text doesn't teach that.
And so I'm just thinking to myself, like, you can sit there and say that.
People can say that, but it isn't necessarily true, is it?
You know, one of Joseph Smith's favorite Bible verses to bring up, the founder of Mormonism.
The founder of Mormonism, the verse, and if you read any kind of Latter-day Satan materials
about Mormonism, they'll always talk about how Joseph Smith's quest for truth started
with James 1-8.
If any of you lack wisdom, let them ask of God, they give it to all men liberally and
upbraid not.
And he asked God for wisdom and God, you know, showed him that every church is wrong,
every denomination's wrong, and so go baptize yourself and go get a bunch of golden plates
that are way too heavy to carry and carry them and translate them and then they're going
to disappear and self-destruct in 10 seconds.
Folks, Joseph Smith's just a bold-faced liar.
He's a liar if he says, oh, I asked for wisdom and, you know, this is what I got at the Book
of Mormon.
Because if you really were sincere and really did ask God for wisdom, you know, and if Slim
would have really asked God to show him the truth about the Pre-Trib Rapture and would
have actually spent months studying the Bible, praying every day, maybe a little fasting,
okay, then guess what?
He would have been guided into all truth and the fact that he is just stubbornly hanging
on to that false doctrine and then gets up and claims that he did all this soul-searching
about it.
He's just lying, just like Joseph Smith is lying.
But here's what we need to be careful of.
Just because the Joseph Smiths of this world could lie about being on a quest for truth,
just because even independent Baptist pastors could lie about being on a quest for truth,
just because the Mormons would say, oh, you know, we know Mormonism's true because we
fell to burning in the bosom, okay?
Just because people lie about that, what we don't want to do is throw out the baby with
the bathwater and say, oh, well, you can't trust the Holy Spirit's guidance.
You can't trust James 1-8.
You can't trust your heart burning within you.
Yes, you can.
Those people are just lying.
If you personally, who, nuts to them, forget them, forget about them, you, I'm not, I'm
talking thou, okay, singular.
I'm talking you, singular, thou, if you are actually sincere about wanting truth and you
actually want to know what the truth is about Jesus, about God, about and times, whatever.
If you go to the Bible and you pray and ask God for illumination, you know, the Holy Spirit
is going to guide you into all truth.
I'm not saying you're going to be right about everything tomorrow.
I'm not saying you're going to be right about everything even by the end of 2024, but you
will be on a journey where if we talk to you in 2025, you're going to be right about more
things than you were in 2024, and if we talk to you in 2027, you're going to be right about
more than you were in 2023, and if we meet you in 2035, you are right about more things
than you were in 2033.
You're on a quest for truth.
You're being guided into truth.
The Holy Ghost is going to teach you line upon line, precept upon precept.
You're going to learn one thing after another, and ultimately, you're going to be heading
to the same destination that I'm heading toward.
God's not the author of confusion.
There's one Bible and one Holy Spirit.
We should all ultimately end up at the same salvation, the same baptism, the same basic
doctrines.
And so therefore, as we're all heading toward truth, we're going to get closer to each other
as far as what we believe.
We're not going to get further and further apart.
Five years from now, you're like, oh man, I used to go to Faithful Word, but now I'm
going a totally different direction now.
I used to be one of those independent fundamentalist Baptists, but now I'm kind of going a different
direction and whatever.
One of us is not on the path for truth then.
You know what I mean?
Because if I'm supposedly learning, because I'm not done learning, my friend, and you
say, well, I want to come back in 10 years and find Faithful Word exactly the same, and
I want Pastor Anderson to be preaching exactly the same, it's not going to happen, my friend.
I'm going to be a little bit smarter 10 years from now, and I'm going to be preaching more
accurate sermons 10 years from now, and I'm going to know more about the Bible 10 years
from now than I do today.
Because I'm not just frozen in time, my friend.
I'm not just going to be ... I like the old Pastor Anderson better.
Well, you're just saying that you're a little bit immature like I was immature in those
areas, and you need to kind of grow up a little bit and get on the 2023 Pastor Anderson train,
if anything.
It always cracks me up when people are like, oh, you changed ... I want the old Pastor.
Oh, you want a 24-year-old man who knew everything.
Guess what?
I didn't know everything when I was 24, so all of my preaching is not going to be the
same as when I was 24 or 25.
People just expect me, well, you said this when you were 25, and now you're 42.
Well, which one is it?
It's the one that I'm saying when I'm 42.
Why?
Because I'm not out there neglecting my Bible, getting backslidden.
I'm out there every day, still now, today, tomorrow, reading my Bible and asking God
to illuminate me every day, and you know what I'm going to be doing all through January?
I'm going to be reading and reading and reading and praying and asking God to show me what
the Bible says, and I sure hope at the end of January to know some things that I don't
know right now, and if five years from now you're like, oh, yeah, I went a totally different
direction.
Well, then you know what?
One of us didn't do what we're supposed to be doing, and this is why I'm not afraid to
tell you.
Go search the Scriptures.
Ask God to guide you into all truth.
Don't bring me into your private devotional.
Shut the door on me and spend time with just you and the Holy Spirit.
Come listen to me, please, on Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night, but hey,
on Monday morning, Tuesday morning, Wednesday morning, Thursday morning, I hope you're just
by yourself with the Holy Spirit reading the Bible, and I'm not afraid that you're going
to get something wrong during that time, and that you're going to get corrupted by
that alone time with the Holy Spirit.
It's stupid, right?
Folks, if you are on the same path that I'm on, if I'm saying, hey, man, in 2024 I'm going
to be reading my Bible every day.
I'm going to be praying for God to guide me into all truth.
I'm saved.
You're saved.
We both got the Holy Spirit.
If we're both reading the Bible, if we're both asking God to illuminate us, and if we're
both sincere and just want to know the truth, and we're willing to change what we believe
to what the Bible actually teaches if we're wrong about something, then at the end of
the year you and I are going to be closer together, not further apart.
It's just that simple, and five years from now you'll still be here, and I'm not saying
you'll necessarily be physically here or geographically here, but we'll both still be on the same
page spiritually, even if you're geographically somewhere else.
God's not leading some people to be Presbyterians, and some people to be Baptists, and some people
to be Charismatic.
No, he's not.
People that are not Baptists are not right with God, unless they just go to a church
that doesn't have Baptists in the name.
Now, look, you could go to a church that doesn't have Baptists in the name, but is still Baptist
in its doctrine and be right with God, but, sorry, if you don't go to a church that teaches
Baptist doctrine, I'm talking Bible doctrine.
What do I mean by Baptist doctrine?
I'm talking salvation by faith, eternal security, infallible scripture, Baptism by immersion
in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost after you're saved, right?
These are the basic tenets of the Baptist faith, okay?
Folks, that's the only right way.
Ah, you sound narrow-minded, you think you're the only one that's right.
Yes, yes, I do, yes, I believe there's one right doctrine about salvation.
Well, how do you know you're right?
Because the Holy Spirit told me I'm right.
Well, am I supposed to take your word for it?
No!
Because, guess what, the Holy Spirit's going to tell you you're right, too, when you believe
in Jesus, when you believe it's by faith alone, when you believe in eternal security to the
believer, when you actually believe in the Trinity, when you believe that salvation is
by faith, by grace, through faith, not of works, and when you believe in getting baptized
after you're saved, not as any part of your salvation, but just as a picture, by immersion,
not by pouring, or sprinkling, or spritzing, or hosing, or any other weird way to distribute
water.
I mean, you know, maybe we could get, like, a rain bird in the congregation that's like
ch-ch-ch-ch, because it'd be more biblical, because it couldn't be any less biblical than
the birdbath baptism of the sprinklers.
Buried with him by baptism into his death.
When Jesus was baptized, they came, they went down, both of them, into the water.
Philip and the eunuch, and he was baptized.
Jesus came up out of the water when he was baptized.
John baptized in Jordan because there was much water there.
Why didn't he just pull out of smart water from the gas station and baptize people?
Because he went somewhere where there's much water because he's dunking them under the
water.
Well, I don't know.
I'm out of time, and I've got a lot more to say, but let me just say one last important
thing.
This is why, as the Bible says, we should not be carried about with divers and strange
doctrines.
I'm preaching till midnight, by the way.
We're going to do the New Year.
No, just kidding.
I'll be done in five minutes.
I'm just kidding.
Look, divers and strange doctrines.
The Bible says, be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines.
Why?
Because some weird new doctrine that nobody's ever heard of isn't true.
And you want to know why it's not true?
Because you had millions and millions of Holy Spirit-filled Christians who've been reading
the Bible.
If nobody ever has come up with that, if nobody has ever believed that, if no one else in
the world believes it, it's because it's not true.
Does everybody understand what I'm saying?
Because God isn't just talking to one person.
He's not just talking to Joseph Smith or something.
He's talking to all of us as believers.
And that's why we shouldn't be carried about with divers and strange doctrines.
And again, I'm not going to go off on this, but I already went off on Sunday, this new
thing of Yahweh.
Well, isn't that funny that the Holy Spirit hasn't revealed that for the last 500 years?
Here we are, 500 years of the modern English language.
Nobody is using that word.
Nobody's saying that word.
Who did that word come from?
A bunch of scholars using man's wisdom, they're not relying on the Holy Spirit.
It wasn't revealed by the Holy Spirit.
Why did the Holy Spirit not guide anyone to that until now?
Why has every mainstream Bible for the last 500 years said the Lord, and now all of a
sudden you have a brand new Bible version, hot off the presses, legacy standard Bible
that says Yahweh is my shepherd, I shall not want?
Something that we've never seen in the history of the English language.
Yahweh is my shepherd, I shall not want.
Folks, that, it's wrong, because otherwise, why has that never been revealed?
Why is it, that's a diverse and strange doctrine is what that is.
Now on the opposite extreme is that people will say, well, you know, that's why we got
to go back to historical Christianity, and then they want to dig up a bunch of Roman
Catholic stuff.
Let me explain something to you.
Roman Catholics burned everything that wasn't Catholic.
The only thing that survived that's not Catholic is the Bible because God's word can't be destroyed.
It's impossible to destroy it.
But guess what?
You can't say, well, we got to go with the historical Christian faith.
No, because it's too censored, it's too redacted.
No one believed this in the 13th century, Pastor Anderson, what you're teaching.
You don't know what was taught in the 13th century because you don't have enough data.
Because 99.9% of what was in the 13th century no longer exists.
99% of books and papers and teachings and preaching is God.
How are you going to base anything on what survived when, guess who kept it for you?
The Catholic church kept it for you.
Here we go.
Here's all the historical stuff you need.
Because guess what?
Some 13th century Pastor Anderson foaming at the mouth preaching against Catholics,
they're like, that's going into the fire.
We might even throw him into the fire with it.
But his book is certainly going in the fire.
Folks, what I would listen to is born again, saved Christians right now.
And how about our parents?
How about our grandparents that were saved?
Right?
We're talking about people over the last 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years that we can actually
evaluate and say, hey, every saved actual Christian is saying the Lord is my shepherd
I shall not want.
Maybe that's the word of God.
And this thing that just came out two years ago, maybe it's not.
Maybe it's bogus.
Maybe this new we need to be saying Yahweh teaching is bogus.
Maybe it's a divers and strange doctrine, right?
So we don't want to go to either extreme.
We don't want to get new, we don't want to get carried away with brand new stuff.
But at the same time, we don't want to say, hey, let's go back to the 1500s because we
don't know what life was like in the 1500s because everything we have has been redacted
and censored and edited.
And you're getting like 1% of the picture.
Because guess what?
When a history book is written about Christianity in Arizona, guess who's not going to be in
it?
Faith Lord Baptist Church.
Christianity in America in the 21st century, there's going to be no mention of Faith Lord
except maybe a little footnote like, can you believe this, this crazy wild man, this cult,
and they would lie about what I believe and move on to the next page, praising the real
heroes of the 21st century, John MacArthur and Billy and Billy Graham and you know, Rick
Warren and you know, that's what it would be.
Beth Moore and, uh, the, the joker lady, what's the joker woman, Joyce Meyer, folks, the Holy
Spirit will guide us into all truth and I pray that in this coming year you say, I don't
like your sermon.
Well, here's the thing.
I'm not going to be there tomorrow.
I'm going to leave you alone all day tomorrow.
Okay.
And, and you're going to get in the Bible yourself with the Holy Spirit.
Okay.
And if the Holy Spirit takes you in some radically different direction, well then I know that
you're bogus, but maybe you'll decide that I'm bogus.
But either way.
See you sucker.
All right.
Let's borrow that word of prayer.
Lord, we thank you so much for your word, Lord, and we thank you for not just giving
us the Bible, but Lord, thank you also for giving us the Holy Spirit as our teacher to
guide us and direct us into all truth.
Lord, please Lord, help us to take advantage of these two precious gifts.
The Bible accurately 100% translated into our language, preserved, inspired the infallible
word of God, Lord, help us to take advantage of this precious gift of our King James Bible.
And on the other hand, Lord, help us to take advantage of the Holy Spirit as our teacher.
Help us to pray every single time we read Lord and ask for guidance and Lord help us
to be sincere and open to that guidance and Lord God, I pray that all of us would be guided
into all truth.
As you said, you would guide us and I believe that you will.
And it's in Christ's name we pray, Amen.