Now, in Psalm 95, I want to point out a certain phrase here in verse number 8.
The very first four words there, the Bible says,
Harden not your heart.
That's the title of the sermon tonight.
Harden not your heart.
But let me show you a few things about this chapter.
Look at verse number 3.
The Bible says, For the Lord is a great God.
Boy, isn't that the truth?
The Lord is a great God and a great King above all gods.
And then in verse number 7, the Bible says,
For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand.
Today, if you will hear His voice, comma.
Now, does it seem odd to you that that last phrase there,
you see how it says, Today, if you will hear His voice?
Starting a totally new thought.
You notice that?
And it's actually part of the sentence of the next verse.
And you say, why in the world is that part of verse 7 now?
I believe that everything in the Bible is there for a reason.
I believe God has put together the Bible.
I believe the chapters and verses and everything,
God has put together the Bible the way that He wants it to be.
And there's always a reason why.
And so there's a reason why it says, For He is our God,
and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand, period.
Today, if you will hear His voice, comma.
And then it starts a new verse.
Harden not your heart, as in the provocation
and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness.
You say, why?
Well, I see two reasons right away why the verses are divided that way.
Number one, God wants us to know here that the people that He's talking to,
when He says, Today, if you will hear His voice, Harden not your hearts,
He's talking to, say, born-again Christians.
See, it's made clear by the context because He says,
For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand.
That's what we're talking about.
And then He says, Today, if ye will hear His voice,
referring to the same group of people,
Today, if ye will hear His voice,
Harden not your heart.
So two reasons.
Number one, God's trying to show us that this admonition not to harden our heart here,
He's talking to God's people.
He's talking about a saved, born-again Christian.
And number two, I think He just wanted to emphasize those four words
by putting them at the beginning of verse 8 and saying,
Harden not your heart, as in the provocation,
as in the day of temptation in the wilderness.
This is talking about when the children of Israel stood at the brink of the Promised Land.
They stood at Kadesh Barnea, and they had the choice,
Are we going to go into the Promised Land by faith and fight this battle,
or are we going to be unbelieving,
and are we going to harden our hearts and not listen to God and say,
We can't do it.
Kind of like this morning, you know, can't do, but they said, We can't do.
And then they ended up being banished to wandering in the wilderness for 40 years.
That's what the Bible's talking about here in verse 9,
When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work.
I mean, they saw the Red Sea parted, they saw the man on the ground.
Forty years long was I grieved with this generation,
and said, It is a people that do err in their heart,
and they have not known my ways.
See, they harden their heart, and it says that they err in their heart,
unto whom I swear in my wrath that they should not enter into my rest.
See, all of us, as, say, born-again Christians,
are in danger of coming to a place where we harden our hearts.
Now, it starts when you don't realize how great God is.
That's why it started out, The Lord is a great God.
He says, Come and do His presence with singing, and enter His courts with praise.
Come and let us kneel and worship before God our Maker.
He says, Let's come to Him with thanksgiving.
Let's come to Him with an appreciative attitude for all the wonderful things He's done.
They, by the way, come to church and sing.
The singing that we do here is congregational singing for a reason.
It's not some kind of a show, it's not American Idol Baptist Church,
where everybody gets their little moment of glory.
What was the old show? Star Search.
Star Search. Now it's American Idol.
And sometimes we have American Idol Baptist Church,
where everybody gets to come up and show how talented they are,
and show off their stuff.
We can all clap.
Oh, so great, you're so talented.
No, it's congregational singing, because I'll tell you something,
your heart will be stirred the most when you're singing the songs,
when you come into His presence with singing,
when you open your mouth and sing the song with your mouth,
it's not even to be compared with listening to music.
That's the truth.
And these great songs in the hymnal, if you'll sing them out,
He says, I want it to be a loud noise.
Sing to the Lord, make a joyful noise unto the Lord.
Play skillfully with a loud noise, the Bible says.
Come in and sing with your heart.
Sing with some volume and some power behind.
You say, Pastor Anson, I don't have a good voice.
I don't have a good voice.
But I'm going to sing out.
I don't measure my musical ability in quality.
I measure it in volume.
So I sing as loud as I can.
And so that's what God wants.
He wants you to sing it out like you mean it.
And God will be blessed, and you'll be blessed,
by opening your mouth and singing these songs.
But when we don't realize who God is,
when we don't come to Him with thanksgiving,
when we don't praise the Lord,
there's a tendency for us to begin to harden our hearts and be hardened.
I want to show you several scriptures this evening,
and I'm kind of building a foundation,
and it may not make sense at first,
but you'll see how it all comes together in a theme throughout the Bible.
Look if you would at 2 Peter 1.
2 Peter 1, right toward the end of your Bible there,
not too far before the book of Revelation.
2 Peter 1.
Now, in the Bible, there's a lot of talk about the heart.
I was studying for this sermon, and I didn't know where to go,
because it was sending me everywhere.
I would read something, and it would quote something here,
and I'd think of another verse about the heart.
If you're preaching on the subject of your heart,
you could go on in a million different directions,
because the Bible speaks so much about how important it is to keep your heart right.
And here He's saying, don't harden your heart.
Now, the opposite of being hard-hearted
is having a heart that's filled with love and tenderness and compassion,
a soft heart.
Well, look if you would at this passage, 2 Peter 1.
The Bible reads,
Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ,
to them that have obtained like precious faith with us,
through the righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ.
Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God
and of Jesus our Lord.
According as His divine power hath given unto us
all things that pertain unto life and godliness,
through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue,
whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises,
that by these you might be partakers of the divine nature,
having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust,
and beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith, virtue.
Okay, so when we see this list here, we see the first step is faith.
I mean, that's how you get saved, by grace through faith.
Salvation by grace through faith, not of works, thus any man should boast.
So in order to be saved, the Bible says, without faith it is impossible to please Him.
For He that cometh to God must believe that He is,
and that He's a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.
So you start out with faith.
I mean, everybody who's saved has faith, or else they're not saved.
That's how you got saved, by putting your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
But secondly, he says, add to your faith virtue.
Now, what's virtue?
Well, virtuism, sometimes it's a word that's a little bit misunderstood
because it's changed in meaning.
It's used throughout the Bible.
Do you remember the story where Jesus is walking through the crowd,
and a woman touches Him and says,
if I may but touch the hem of His garment, I shall behold?
Well, when that woman touches Him, she's immediately healed.
And the Bible says that Jesus says, who touched me?
He says, I know that someone touched me, for virtue is gone out of me.
You remember that?
Well, the word virtue there, and Jesus uses it in that way three times.
Virtue means power.
That's what it means.
Now, virtue is a word that comes from the Latin word vir, means man.
And it also means strength, those two meanings.
And so it originally, in Middle English, meant power, strength, like manliness.
A virtuous man would be somebody who's very strong and tough and courageous.
But because of that meaning, the word has evolved,
and around the time the Bible was written,
and you can find this out just by looking up every time the Bible used the word virtue or virtuous,
it came to mean not only just power and strength and might,
but it also came to mean a person who has very strong and moral character.
You know, they live by a very strong set of standards.
They live by a very strict code of morality, so to speak.
And they're very righteous is a word that's associated with virtuous in the Bible.
Even women in the Old Testament are the virtuous woman of Proverbs 31.
So virtuous has come to mean not just manliness, but strength, not just physical strength,
not just power, like the power of God that can heal somebody,
but also the strength of resolve, saying I'm going to live a righteous life.
I'm going to have high standards of the way that I conduct myself.
And that's what virtue means.
So he says you start out with faith,
and then you transcend the society around you with all the loose living, so to speak,
the whatever I feel like doing,
and you say, no, I'm going to strengthen myself.
I'm going to live by strong principles of righteousness from the Word of God.
So that's step number two.
And then the Bible says that you add to your faith virtue and to virtue knowledge.
Now, you've been saved. You've got the faith.
He says don't just have faith, and that's it.
He says add to that some strength.
I mean, get some power.
Get some resolve that you're not going to live like everybody else.
And then he says that's not enough to just live the clean life and have faith,
but he says I want you to also add to virtue knowledge.
Learn the Bible.
Read the Bible incessantly.
Read it again and again and again and again.
Memorize the Bible and add some knowledge to your virtue, to your faith.
And then he says after that, he says to knowledge,
let's see, let me find my place here.
To knowledge, he says, you know, temperance is the next step.
What's temperance?
That's where you can control yourself.
You've heard of somebody having a bad temper where they just fly off the handle,
they have a short fuse and they just get out of control.
Well, temperance is where you have yourself under control
because you decide what you're going to do.
You decide what you're not going to do.
You decide how you're going to act.
You decide whether you're going to be angry.
You decide whether you're going to stay calm.
You decide whether you're going to be joyful.
And that's what temperance is.
It's being able to control yourself.
And then he says to temperance, he says patience is the next step.
Now, patience, of course, is that attitude where you say,
I don't need everything right now.
That's what patience is, obviously.
We just talked about it in Habakkuk chapter 2,
for you have need of patience that after you've done the will of God,
you might receive the promise.
It's kind of related to faith because it's a patience that says,
Hey, I know that God is going to bless me because I'm doing right.
And if he doesn't bless me today, that's fine.
But I know that down the road God will bless me
and so I'm just going to keep on doing what I know I should be doing
by faith, that's patience.
Patience is endurance, basically.
It's where you can just keep on going.
Things are up, things are down.
You just stay the course and say, I'm not going to change.
I'm going to keep going the way I'm going because I have patience.
So we saw faith, virtue.
And then we saw knowledge, where you learn what you need to learn.
Temperance, you get yourself under control.
Get your actions under control.
Control the flesh.
And then patience, where you're just going to keep on going no matter what.
And then he says add to patience, godliness.
Again, it's just more conformity to the image of Jesus Christ,
living like Jesus Christ.
And then to godliness, brotherly kindness.
That's where you care about and love your fellow Christian.
It's where you don't just think about yourself but you're thinking about others.
And you're kind to people.
I remember, again, talking about the virtuous woman.
The Bible says, in her tongue is the law of kindness.
I mean, she speaks to people in a kind, respectful way.
Not yelling and flying off the handle and abusive.
But she's kindly speaking to someone and treating them with courtesy and respect and politeness.
And then after brotherly kindness, the Bible says, brotherly kindness and to brotherly kindness, charity.
Period.
You know what, that's the last thing on the list, charity.
Because, you say, why is it the last thing on the list?
Because this is the pinnacle of your Christian growth.
You see that?
I mean, why do you think it's last?
It doesn't say, well you just got saved, well add charity.
He says, no, charity is the final pinnacle of your Christian growth.
He says, you've got the knowledge, you've got the power, you've got the strength, you've got the patience,
you're godly, you've got brotherly kindness, you treat people correctly, you control yourself.
You know what the Bible says, you're going to stay in it for the long haul.
You're not just here today, gone tomorrow, show up at church for a couple of years and then fall out
because things didn't go exactly the way that you thought they were going to go.
You have the patience to stay with it for a lifetime.
And he said, but you're not done yet.
He says, add to it the final step, the final stage, the pinnacle of Christian growth, charity.
You say, what is charity?
Well, charity, sometimes, you know, these modern Bibles, no modern Bible even contains the word charity.
Which to me is strange, I mean, God's saying it's so important.
I mean, he's saying, it's the final stage, charity.
I was thinking about Colossians 3.14, the Bible says, above all things, put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.
He says, above all things, the most important thing is that you have charity.
And he says, put it on, it's the bond of perfectness, it's the final finishing touch.
Like if you created a great masterpiece and you just put on that final finishing touch that just makes it perfect.
Exactly right, he says, that's what charity is.
You know, no modern Bible even contains the word charity.
Not the New King James Version, not the NIV, not the RSV, the ASP, the HIV, none of them contain the word charity.
Only the King James Bible talks about charity, only God's word talks about charity.
What is charity? Well, all these other Bibles substitute the word love.
Now that's part of it, but it's not love because God chose to use two different words here.
Charity in one case and love in the other case.
Well, but let's go back to the chapter, we'll see a little more what charity is.
But look at the chapter where we were, it says in verse 7 at the end there,
into brotherly kindness, charity, 2 Peter 1.8,
for if these things be in you, the things that we just listed, and abound,
they make you that you shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
He says it's great that you have knowledge, but you want your knowledge to cause you to not be barren,
but to be fruitful, to reproduce, to see people saved, to be a soul winner, to win people to Christ.
He says you must have these things abounding in you if you want to be sure that you're not barren or unfruitful.
Of course the Bible says, but he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see it far off,
and has forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.
He's saying he's forgotten that the whole point of being saved is to be saved from your sins,
not only the punishment of sin, that you won't go to hell but you'll go to heaven,
but to be saved from the power of your sins controlling you in your life.
He says if you don't have these things, you're going to forget that that was part of what salvation is about,
and you're going to go back to the old sins, is what he's saying, if you don't have these things.
Now what is charity? Well of course there's the great chapter on charity.
1 Corinthians 13, turn there, this is the charity chapter.
The first time charity is mentioned in the Bible is 1 Corinthians 8, this is mentioned briefly,
and then it's mentioned continually in this chapter, 1 Corinthians 13.
1 Corinthians 13, chapter, verse number 1, probably one of the most famous passages in the entire Bible.
It's on greeting cards, it's on things on the wall.
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity,
I am become as a sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal,
and though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge,
and have not charity, I am nothing.
Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and give my body to be burned,
and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
Charity suffereth long, and is kind, charity envieth not,
charity bondeth not itself, is not puffed up, does not behave itself unseemly,
seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil,
rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth,
beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things,
charity never faileth, but whether there be prophecies, they shall faileth,
whether there be tongues, they shall cease,
whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away,
for we know in part, and we prophesy in part,
but when that which is perfect is come,
then that which is in part shall be done away.
When I was a child, I spake as a child,
I understood as a child, I thought as a child,
but when I became a man, I put away childish things,
for now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face,
now I know in part, but then so I know, even as also I am known,
and now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three,
but the greatest of these is charity.
One of the most famous passages in the entire Bible,
dealing with the subject of charity,
he says it's time to grow up in your Christianity,
put away the childish things,
he says the bond of perfectness, the final step,
the crowning glory is what's called charity in your heart,
that you have charity for one another fervently in your heart,
the Bible says, and also in 1 Timothy 1-5 the Bible says,
now the end of the commandment, the end,
you've heard somebody say a means to an end,
an end is the goal, the destination,
he says the end of the commandment, the end of God's commandments,
the end of following God's word is charity,
out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience,
and of faith unfamed,
he says the goal is to have charity in your heart,
a pure heart, and faith unfamed,
he says that's the whole goal of obeying the commandments of God,
is where you have charity in your heart,
and where you have a good conscience,
and where you have faith unfamed.
What am I talking about?
I'm talking about not hardening your heart,
I'm talking about coming to a point in your life
where church just becomes a routine,
where you just come to church because that's just what you do,
and look, that's a great routine to have
because sometimes you will come to a point in your life
where that's the only reason that you come to church.
There are times in my life when that's the only reason I come to church,
is because it's Sunday morning, it's Sunday night, it's Wednesday night,
that's what I do because I made a decision a long time ago
that I'm going to be in church Sunday morning, Sunday night,
and Wednesday night because I love God,
and because I want to do what God wants me to do,
and I'm going to obey God and be in church.
But sometimes that's just the only reason that you come,
and you know what, that's the way life is,
all of us are going to go through times like that,
and we ought to come out of character,
but you know what, sometimes you can get to a point
where you're just continually going through the motions,
just coming to church, read the Bible because I have to,
and you get to the point where the songs don't move you,
the songs don't stir you up,
the songs don't convict you,
where the preaching doesn't convict you,
oh there's old Pastor Anderson up there again,
just rattling his cage, you know,
there he goes again, the same thing, you know,
ranting and raving, blah blah blah blah blah.
Look, maybe I am rattling my cage again,
maybe I am just blah blah blah,
but the Word of God that I'm preaching is not blah blah blah.
The Word of God that I'm preaching
has the power to change your life,
and you say, Pastor Anderson, you preach this sermon,
you're yelling and preaching the Word of God
at the top of your lungs, and to me I just don't,
it just doesn't do anything for me, I just don't feel it.
Look, you don't feel it because your heart is getting hard.
I mean, I'm not talking about a physical feeling, obviously,
I'm talking about where the Word of God is preached,
and it cuts into your heart, and you say,
I need to get right with God, I need to change something.
If you say, I come to church and I don't feel that way,
it's because your heart is getting hardened.
And God says, keep thy heart with all diligence,
for out of it are the issues of life.
I remember one time I was,
I don't know why I'm bringing this up,
but I was in a conversation with a family member,
we were sitting around talking,
and it was with my dad, and my dad was rebuking someone,
he was really just ripping into somebody
who had just been out of church and not living right,
and I remember my dad just got out the Bible and he said,
the Bible says, but seek ye first the kingdom of God
and his righteousness, and all these things
shall be added unto you.
Because somebody was making excuses
why they hadn't been in church, you know, for weeks.
And my dad was just ripping into him, he said,
but seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness,
and all these things shall be added unto you.
He said, seek first the kingdom of God.
And I remember just being cut to the heart,
I mean, he wasn't even talking to me.
But I mean, I'd been in church,
I was attending church three times a week,
but I remember I heard him say that,
and for some reason, God's word just cut into me.
And I just thought, man, that's just a powerful verse,
because, you know, my dad had been arguing with this guy
for a long time,
and it just wasn't really getting through to him.
But it's like when he said that verse out of the Bible,
because he was just talking.
But then he used the verse from the Bible,
and it was just, wow, the power of God's word.
I mean, God's word just has a way
of just cutting right to the heart
and just exposing the sin
and just showing you what you need to do
and what you need to do that's right.
And I was just thinking about that verse,
it just rang in my ears for weeks.
But seek ye first the kingdom of God
and his righteousness,
and all these things shall be added unto you.
And I thought about it every day.
I thought about it when I was going to work.
What's first on my agenda?
What's the most important thing to me right now?
What is first?
It's just an example of how somebody
can just say something from the Bible.
And when it's God's word,
how it can just cut to the heart
and just move you so much.
And you say, I just,
I'm to the point where God's word just doesn't move me.
And you can get to that point
where your heart gets so hard
that you're just like,
seek ye first the kingdom of God, whatever.
What's that supposed to mean?
What does that have to do with my life?
Look, don't harden your heart.
Have a heart that's tender and soft toward God's word.
If you can look around this world,
if you can go to the store and look at people
and not see that that person's unsaved
and on their way to hell,
your heart is hardened.
I mean, do you walk down the street
and just look at people?
Do you drive around and see people
that are worldly and sinful?
Do you despise them in your heart?
Or do you look at them
and just sadness comes over you?
And you just say this poor, lost sinner
that needs to be saved.
And do you love people?
I mean, do you love the complete stranger
that you see that's on your way to hell?
I mean, do you love the people
that live in these neighborhoods
and these streets in Tempe
that you don't even know?
And you knock on their door
and they walk to the door,
whoever they are,
and you look at them,
do you love them and realize
this is somebody that Jesus died for?
This is somebody that's on their way to hell.
I mean, they're probably living
a more miserable life than you are.
I mean, you've got Jesus Christ in your heart.
You've got the Bible.
You've got these great songs.
They're listening to some stupid,
depressing music.
They're listening to music
that's all about death and sadness
and sorrow or some stupid,
fake phony façade of how wonderful
and la-di-da-da.
And it's a lie.
And they're living a miserable,
stupid life and then they die
and burn in hell.
Does that make you sad?
Does that bother you?
I mean, it bothers me.
And see, you get to a place
where you're hard in your heart
and it just like,
it just becomes like numbers.
Like, you know, you look at the bulletin
and you say, you know,
oh, seven people saved, you know,
and, you know, 16 people baptized.
You just say, oh, cool, whatever.
Let's see if we can hit 200.
Let's see if we can hit 20.
Hey, those numbers are real human beings.
They're people.
They're a who.
Not a what.
Not a number.
A who.
And you think about the Bible says,
for God so loved the world
that He gave His only begotten Son
that whosoever believeth in Him
should not perish in that everlasting life.
Every single person on this earth
is a real human being
that's just as important as you are,
just as important as I am.
And sometimes we get so hard-hearted
that we don't have charity in our hearts
where we want to reach out
and help somebody and love somebody
and care about somebody besides ourself.
That's what charity is.
Charity is not just love.
Charity is a love that says
I'm going to do something for you.
I'm going to help you.
I'm going to help the poor, lost sinner be saved.
I'm going to teach him the gospel.
I'm going to go out to people
that I don't know,
that maybe they even hate me
for knocking on their door.
Maybe they even look at me and say,
oh, great, you know, here comes
some religious freak, some wacko,
and they may not even appreciate me being there.
But charity in my heart
is what's going to motivate me
to, with a tear in the eye,
take the Bible and show that person
how they can be saved
and go through the gospel with them
and show them about the death
and the burial and the resurrection
of Jesus Christ,
how they can be saved and go to heaven.
But see, when you get hard-hearted,
you can harden your heart to the point
where it just becomes
just a bunch of people.
Who cares about them?
Nuts to them.
What about me?
What about my life?
And it just becomes like a number
on the bulletin.
It doesn't become like a real soul
that got saved.
I mean, every single person
on that bulletin,
if our church,
if we just existed
and that's all we did
was just win one of those people, Lord,
I mean, it would justify
the whole existence of this church.
It would justify you being here
Sunday morning, Sunday night,
and Wednesday night.
It would justify you showing up
for soul winning for a year.
I mean, we've been here for,
what, 11 months now?
It would justify you being here
every service for the last 11 months
and being soul winning every week
for 11 months
and reading your Bible every day
for 11 months
and praying every day
for 11 months
and putting your money
in the offering plate,
you know, your tithe check
that you throw in the offering plate.
If you did that for 11 months
and one person got saved,
it would all be worth it.
I'm going to tell you that right now
because there's one soul
is worth more than all the money
in the entire world.
But see, when you're hard-hearted,
you don't see that.
You see somebody get saved
and somebody is,
big deal, who cares?
Don't ever get to the point
where it doesn't stir your heart
when somebody gets saved.
Don't ever get to the point
where your heart doesn't tug at you
when you're at the grocery store,
when you're with your friends,
when you're at work
and you see people that are going to hell
that are not saved.
Don't ever get to the point
where it doesn't bother you.
Don't ever get to the point
where you don't have enough love
in your heart for that person
to just want to give them the gospel
and open your mouth
and tell them how they can be saved.
Don't get a hard heart.
Have a tender-hearted,
charity-filled heart
that says,
I want to live my life for others,
not for myself.
See, charity is what motivates you
and drives you to be a soul winner.
You know, you think about these religions
that the Jehovah's Witnesses,
you know, the Mormons,
they're religions that keep work salvation.
You know, you've got to follow their guidelines,
you've got to follow their rules
if you want to be saved.
You've got to live right.
And so they go out
and they knock the doors.
I mean, think about the Mormons, for example.
Think about how stupid this is.
They spent two years out-soul winning of their life.
Never again.
Isn't that amazing?
Wow.
You know why?
Because they're just checking it off
that they did it.
You know, they're fulfilling
their little requirement.
God says,
I don't want you to serve me
because of fear of going to hell
or fear of not being saved.
And by the way,
do you know that the Mormon religion
has the highest suicide rate in the world?
The biggest suicide rate in the United States
is in Utah.
Out of the 50 states,
there are more suicides in Utah
because of people being taught
a false religion that expects,
you know, morals and righteousness
and they can't live up to it
because they're not saved
and they're not born again
and they're in the flesh
and they cannot do the things
that they would.
And so a bunch of them
are just hypocrites
just pretending like they're doing it
and pretending like they're righteous
and the rest of them
that realize what a failure they are
and they try so hard
to live up to the Mormonism
and the code of conduct
and they end up just killing themselves
because they just can't measure up
because they're not saved
they're not born again
and they don't have any hope
and so they kill themselves.
Because look,
everybody who's honest,
who's an unsaved person
knows that they're a wretched sinner.
I mean, they know that inside
their thoughts and heart is wrong.
The Bible says the heart is deceitful
above all things and desperately wicked.
Who can know it?
And so they know the wickedness
that's in their heart
and they realize that their work,
salvation, is not going to get them to heaven
so they just,
they get so scared
and just so depressed about it
they just kill themselves.
And it's a fact that Utah
has the highest suicide rate in America.
My great-grandpa was a Mormon,
committed suicide.
I mean, that's my own relative.
My great-grandfather on my dad's side
actually killed himself with a shotgun.
He shot himself in the chest
with a double-barreled shotgun.
He had no hope in his life.
And see,
we could sometimes say,
well, here they are,
they're out knocking doors
and two years and then they're done.
Why?
Because they're not motivated by love.
They're not motivated by charity.
See, charity is what will push you
and drive you to be a soul winner
for your entire life.
Whether you feel like it,
whether you don't feel like it,
whether you tingle
or whether you don't tingle,
whether it's exciting
or whether it's not exciting,
you say,
I'm a soul winner.
Why?
Because I love people.
I'm a soul winner for two reasons.
Because I love God.
Because I love Jesus Christ
and I want to do what he wants me to do
and I want to please him.
But number two,
I'm a soul winner
because I love people.
I love people that I don't even know.
I love the people that live in the city of Tempe
and so I want them saved.
I love the complete stranger
that I see when I'm out and about
and say,
I love this person.
I don't want him to go to hell.
I want him to be saved.
Is that what motivates you
to be a soul winner?
Because if it is,
that's what will keep you in it
for the long haul.
That's what will drive you.
That's the motivating force.
It's more powerful than anything else.
He says in 1 Corinthians 13,
So I speak with the tongues
of men and of angels
and have not charity.
He says,
I'm to come as a sounding brass
or a tinkling cymbal.
He's saying a preacher
who doesn't have charity,
he can be the most eloquent preacher
in the world.
He can stand up
and give all the illustrations
and be a silver-tongued orator,
but if he's not a soul winner,
if he doesn't love his fellow man enough
to go across the street
and give him the gospel,
he says it's like you're listening
to somebody just beating on a cymbal.
Bong, bong, bong, bong, bong.
It doesn't make any sense.
It's stupid.
That's rattling your cage, my friend.
The guy who's rattling his cage
is the guy who is not a soul winner.
He says if you don't have charity
in your heart,
he says you're like a sounding brass
or a tinkling cymbal.
It means nothing.
He says,
No, I have to get to prophecy.
Prophecy is talking about preaching
in the Bible.
No, I have to get to prophecy
and understand all mysteries
and all knowledge
and understand a complete Bible
and have not charity.
I'm nothing.
He said you can understand
everything about the Bible.
You can know everything about the Bible,
but if you don't have love
in your heart that motivates you
to do something for others,
to win people to Christ,
to care about somebody else,
he says you're nothing.
He says in the next verse,
And though I bestow all my goods
to feed the poor,
and though I give my body
to be burned and have not charity,
it profiteth me nothing.
He says it's worthless.
It's pointless.
He says you can give all the money,
put all your money in the offering plate.
God says it's not going to profit you anything.
Contrary to all these televangelists,
you put in one dollar,
you get three dollars out.
It makes me sick when I hear this
in independent Baptist churches
all the time where they preach
that if you put in money,
you're going to get money back.
It's like I don't understand
how they can have such a warped view
other than the fact that
they're just trying to extort money
out of people.
They just want money in the plate,
so they're going to tell you
that if you put the money in,
you're going to get the money back.
Put it in.
Get it back.
If you put in one dollar,
you get three dollars back.
Look, if that were true,
we'd all be rich by now.
It's ridiculous.
We've been putting it in
because it would just keep multiplying.
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
It's not true.
It's a lie.
God is not some kind of a slot machine
where you put enough nickels in
and then ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.
You know, the big jackpot,
all the money comes pouring out.
Look, he says you can give all your money.
Put all your money.
Full paycheck Sunday,
but he says you don't have charity.
It's not going to profit you anything.
You won't get a dime back.
And he says,
and he says,
and though I give my body to be burned
and have not charity,
he says,
profit of me nothing.
He says,
you know, you could die
for your religion,
but he says,
that's not what I'm looking for necessarily.
He says,
if you don't have charity in your heart,
he says you're nothing.
You're nobody.
You're nobody
unless you have the bond of perfectness
which is charity in your heart,
a tender heart that says
I love people.
And that's what's motivating.
That's what's motivating.
What motivates you to be in church?
Is it all just because you want God to bless you?
I mean, that's good.
That's important.
But is it also because you want to be used by God
to help somebody else?
I mean, if you're going to follow
in the footsteps of Jesus Christ,
he said,
you know, they said of him,
he saved others.
Himself, he cannot save.
I mean, he sacrificed himself.
He says,
this is my body
which is broken for you.
He says,
I'm going to destroy myself
to provide you with salvation,
to make you succeed in life.
Hey, what's more important tonight?
Is it that I succeed as a pastor
or is it that you succeed
as the people who come to this church?
I want you to succeed.
And if I have to fail
so that you can succeed,
I'll fail.
If I have to preach harder
than maybe the world wants me to preach
and say things that are not popular,
but if it's going to help you grow as a Christian,
I'll go ahead and say it.
And if it makes me fail in the ministry
and this church fail,
which this church will not fail, of course.
This church will succeed greatly.
But if it did mean
that this church would fail,
but if it would make you a success
in your personal life
as a Christian and a soul winner,
I will make this church fail
so that you can succeed.
Because the whole point
is that I'm not trying to build something for myself.
I'm trying to build you up
edifying the saints in this church
so that you can be the person that you need to be.
And you need me to get up here
and to preach the whole counsel of God.
You need me to preach everything that that book says
without toning it down or trimming.
Oh, you know, visitors here tonight, you know,
we're going to have to trim it down a little bit.
We've got to ease them in.
No, I don't care about the visitors.
The visitors can never come.
I don't know.
They're never going to come back.
Of course, there's no visitors here tonight,
you know, so that's all I can say.
These people aren't coming back.
They didn't know what they were getting into.
Good night.
They just saw the phone book.
They just, they're faithful.
We're a Baptist church.
It sounds good.
This isn't what they expected, you know.
But I'm serious.
When visitors walk in the door,
I thought to myself, boy, this is like,
this is not a visitor-friendly sermon, you know,
sometimes when visitors walk in.
I mean, I've thought that before.
Man, you know, this is...
But I don't care.
I'm not going to change my sermon.
Why?
Because I'm preaching to the people that have been here,
that are here all the time.
That's who I'm tailoring the message to.
Because I'm not trying to see how successful we can be,
how big our church can be,
how much Stephen Anderson can succeed as a pastor
and show everybody how great he is.
No, my goal is for you to succeed.
And I know that what you need to succeed
is to hear everything that this Bible says,
with no trimming, no watering down.
You need the truth from God's Word,
the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
And so help me God,
that's where I'm going to preach to you,
because it's more important that you succeed than I succeed.
I mean, think about how silly it is
for me to tailor my message towards some visitor.
And this is what's ridiculous about churches
who preach the gospel, you know, every Sunday morning.
And some churches even three times a week.
They just preach on salvation every Sunday morning,
just the salvation message,
hoping that some visitor that came will get saved.
Look, I want somebody to Lord after the service this morning,
after the service, after the service.
Because in the service, nuts to the visitor,
I'm preaching to the Christians that are here,
they come every week.
Who do you think I'm going to be more loyal to?
Amanda, who's been here since the second week
that the church started?
Virginia, who I remember the days
when it was just us and Virginia and Amanda for a while.
I mean, we were just starting out in those early days.
Hey, you think I'm ever going to forget that?
Do you think I'm going to forget that and say,
oh, well, you know, we got all these people coming in,
all these visitors, we got to tailor the message to them.
No, I'm going to tailor the message to the people
who come to this church faithfully,
the people who love God,
the people who want to grow in the Lord,
the people who want to add to their faith virtue,
people who want to add to their virtue knowledge,
people who want to add to their knowledge temperance,
they want to add to their temperance patience
and godliness and brotherly kindness and charity.
That's who I'm preaching to.
I'm preaching to the people who want to have
all eight pieces of the puzzle
because they're not going to be barren or unfruitful
and they'll win hundreds and thousands
to Christ in a lifetime
because they're going to stay with it.
And so I'm not going to tailor my message
toward some visitor.
I'm going to tailor my message toward the people
who I care about who've been here.
Why?
Because I want them to succeed
and if it means me failing, then so be it.
And of course we're not going to fail
because God always gives us the victory through Jesus Christ
as our memory verse is this week.
And so we will succeed together
but we succeed when we don't care about ourselves.
Don't worry about ourselves.
We get somebody else saved.
Get somebody else right with God.
Make somebody else a soul winner.
Get the emphasis off yourself
and get the emphasis off others.
That's what charity is.
Loving others more important than yourself.
That's what charity means.
You see, if you get to the point where your heart
begins to become hardened
and where you're not so thankful to God anymore,
you just don't want to sing the songs
when you walk in the door of church
and you just don't want to sing out and praise God
and thank Him because you just feel like you got a raw deal.
You know what it always is.
It's always a lack of charity
because charity is the tender-hearted loving of other people
and hardening of your heart
comes from not realizing how good God is
as we saw in Psalm 95.
But the reason that you don't realize how good God is
and the reason you're not thankful to God
is because it's all about you.
You see how these two things go hand in hand.
When you're so emphasized on yourself
and my problems and how hard I have it,
that's when you start being unthankful to God.
But when you put your emphasis on other people
and you say, well, that's all right if I fail.
It's all right if I go under financially.
Hey, it's all right if I'm a miserable failure in life.
It's all right if I get sick and die.
But as long as I can take care of somebody else,
as long as I can win them to Christ,
as long as I can raise my children
to turn out for the glory of God,
hey, as long as I can make somebody else rich,
as long as I can love somebody else,
hey, that's all I care about.
As long as you succeed and then when I die,
you can keep on going after me, children and others.
That's what's important.
And you get the emphasis off yourself and you say,
man, God's so good.
You say, why is God so good, Pastor Anderson?
Is it because you just purchased a new minivan for your family?
Is that why God's good?
No, God's good because somebody got saved the day after the service,
Sunday morning.
That's why God's good.
God's good because when I get to heaven,
there's one person that I know is going to be there
and that's going to be more exciting to me than any minivan,
any stupid house, any pay raise.
It's going to be more exciting when I walk through the gates of heaven
and that one person is there
who got saved this morning after the service.
Just an example of the many people that get saved in this church every week.
And when we get to heaven, nobody,
the Bible says, no man taketh away thy crown.
Nobody can take away your reward when you win somebody.
When you win somebody to the Lord, when you get somebody saved,
you're never going to lose that.
See, live your life for others.
Fill your heart with charity
where you're thinking about others
and nuts to yourself
because, hey, we're going to be glorified with Jesus Christ before you know it.
We're going to be walking the streets of gold
but there's people here on this earth that need us
to be more focused on them and care about them
than on ourselves.
Not to hurry, but look if you would at
Hebrews chapter 3, kind of
full circle where we started.
We looked at Psalm 95 to begin the message
and in Hebrews chapter 3
Hebrews chapter 3 is a quotation
of what we saw in Psalm 95.
So Psalm 95 is quoted in Hebrews chapter 3
and that's what we're going to look at.
Hebrews chapter 3 verse number 7
Wherefore, Hebrews 3.7
Wherefore, as the Holy Ghost saith,
today if you will hear his voice
and of course we know who he's talking to from Psalm 95
he's talking about saved, born again Christians.
Wherefore, as the Holy Ghost saith,
today if you will hear his voice,
harden not your hearts
as in the provocation in the day of temptation in the wilderness
when your fathers tempted me, proved me
and saw my works forty years.
Wherefore, I was grieved with that generation and said,
they do all way or in their heart
and they have not known my ways
so I swear in my wrath
they shall not enter into my rest.
That was the quote from Psalm 95
now let's hear the interpretation that God gives on it.
Take heed, brethren
again we're talking to saved Christians
Take heed, brethren
lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief
and departing from the living God
but exhort one another daily
while it is called today
and watch this last phrase
lest any of you be hardened
through the deceitfulness of sin
for we are made partakers of Christ
if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast under the end
while it is said today if you will hear his voice
harden not your hearts as in the provocation
for someone they had heard did provoke
howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses
but with whom was he grieved forty years
was it not with them that had sinned
you see that word
was it not with them that had sinned
whose carcasses fell in the wilderness
and to whom swear he that they should not enter into his rest
but to them that believe not
so we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief
now look
he's saying in two different places here
he says exhort one another daily
he says take heed, brethren
watch out
it could happen to you
you could harden your heart
he says take heed, brethren
lest any of you be hardened
through the deceitfulness of sin
he says the thing that hardens you is sin
and then later he says
who was he grieved
who was it that provoked God
he says was it not them that had sinned
he said when your life is filled with sin
that's what hardens you
now there was one verse that drew that parallel
that I'm going to find here in my notes quickly
but well we remember of course
1 Timothy 1.5 I'll just read it for you
now the end of the commandment
is charity out of a pure heart
and of a good conscience
and of faith unfeigned
so he's saying here
that charity in your heart
is the goal of keeping God's commandments
and he says if you don't keep God's commandments
if you live a life of sin
he says that's what hardens you
so you see you're not going to have charity
and sin both dominating in your life
so how do you keep from having a hard time
you say pastor Anderson I don't want to be hardened
I don't want to come to church and hear the preaching
and just say blah blah blah blah blah
shut up
I'm tired of listening to pastor Anderson again
just yelling
it's like shut up
I don't want to be hardened like that
see I don't want to be hardened where I go soul-wetting
and I see somebody and just think
how you doing you know
faithful word Baptist Church
you know for sure if you die today you go to heaven
can I show you
oh you don't want to hear it great
I'll see you later
hey how am I going to get hardened
where I don't just look around and just see a bunch of faces
and just say
a bunch of weirdos
a bunch of perverts
how can I stay away from this thing of just being hardened
where I just don't care about anybody else
all I can seem to see is my problems
and my struggles
and I can't seem to see how good God is
and it's just going through the motions
coming to church
because that's what I do
how can I get to where I can be excited to get
how can I get to where
my heart is tender again
where God speaks to me
and where I can just hear a simple verse like
Matthew 6.33
seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness
and all these things shall be added unto you
how can I get to the point where a verse like that stirs me
and convicts me for weeks
how can I get to a point
that when I hear God's word preached
it fires me up
it makes me excited
it makes me want to be a soul winner
it makes me want to have virtue and knowledge
and it makes me want to do what's right
and live a life of godliness for others
and care about others
I don't feel that way
how can I be that way
He says, prolong sinning
where you just sin and sin
and sin and sin and sin
He says, we'll just harden you
because at first when you sin
you're convicted about it
oh man, I shouldn't be doing this
but then you do it the next time, it's a little bit easier
you do it the next time, and if you continue in sin long enough
you'll get totally hardened
to what won't even bother you
and when sin hardens you
it just kind of hardens you all the way around
and that's why sin is so dangerous
anybody, any preacher
any pastor, I don't care if it's a pastor, a preacher
not a pastor, a man, woman, boy, girl
who just sits down and just watches this primetime television
and don't get me wrong, because I'm against all television
but I mean, these people who can actually just sit down and watch these sitcoms
you know, they can sit down and watch Frasier and Friends and Seinfeld
and whatever the shows are now
any pastor who can just sit down and watch that
and it doesn't bother him, he's hardened
I mean, any Christian who can sit down and just watch these movies
and the Hollywood and all these whores and whoremongers
and the Brad Pitt movie and Angelina Jolie
you know, who are refusing to get married
until the queers can get married across the board in America
they said, we'll get married as soon as every filthy sodomite
they don't use those words, I wish they did
as soon as every filthy faggot in America can get married
then we'll get married
until then we're going to continue to live in sin and fornication
and you say, oh, I watched this movie
and it's rated G
it's G rated and there's no cussing in it
and so I can watch it
and I'm a pastor of a Baptist church and I can watch it
hey, why are you watching these perverts that hate America?
who cares if it's rated G?
who cares if there's cussing?
who cares what's bad in it?
who are you letting entertain your children?
who's the voice for your stupid favorite Disney movie?
it's going to be Brad Pitt, it's going to be Robin Williams
it's going to be Whoopi Goldberg
the people who hate God and hate America
and love the queers
and love everything that's wrong
but you get so hardened when you just say
well, you know, no cussing
and you watch it again and again and again
but you're going to get hardened
to where some pastor gets up and preaches on that
you're not convicted at all
you don't even care
you're going to go home and just turn it on again
look, that kind of a hardening in your heart
will cause you to eventually not be a soul winner
period
and that's why the churches that are the loosest
in fact, the churches that are the loosest
on God's commandments
same churches that are not zealous
about soul winning
I mean, if you show me the most red hot
soul winning church in America
you show me churches across America
and they're out there
and you show me these red hot soul winning churches
where people are just zealously out soul winning
I'll show you a pulpit
that thunders out
keep God's commandments
I'll show you, they both go right together
don't tell me
that there's some church that's out winning hundreds
and thousands of people to the Lord and knocking doors
and out in mass forces
of winning people to Christ
where the pastor gets up and
oh, let me tell you
like I heard that
it was that CD that you loaned me
from that liberal church
she was showing me just because
a family member of hers that was involved
I listened to it and he said
boy, I was watching on HBO this week
was it Tommy Barnett?
and he said, oh yeah
and he was using it as a sermon illustration
I watched this movie on HBO this week
and he's telling all about the movie
how it related to the things that God
there's a guy that's hard
and he's not even saved, he's going to go to hell when he dies
because he's a Pentecostal who doesn't believe
in eternal security, he believes you can lose your salvation
but I'm going to tell you something
the church that's a soul winner
soul winning church, the person that's a soul winner
the Christian who's a soul winner
is not the person who just continues
in sin, week after week
day after day, month after month
the same sin and just doesn't care
you're preaching on it
doesn't matter
doesn't care, that's not the person
who's the zealous soul winner that's going to win
a bunch of people to Christ
and if they are a zealous soul winner
they're probably
beginning a hardening process
that will eventually take them out of
being a soul winner
and stop them from having that fervent charity in their heart
you see there's a direct correlation
it's like a balance
as charity increases
the sin in the life goes down
as soon as that sin
starts to come back up and rear up its ugly head
your charity is going to decrease
because you're going to be hardened through the deceitfulness
of sin, the Bible says
the deceitfulness of sin is what hardens you
all throughout the Bible you see people hardening their hearts
it's heartless heart
why? because sin
is beginning to become a dominant part in their life
and it just got harder and harder and harder
and the charity went away
to where it's all about them
only care about themselves
don't love people
don't love each other in the church here
we don't love the brotherhood
we don't love the unsaved that's on their way to hell
we don't love our children enough to sacrifice
some things for ourselves
so that they can succeed
I don't love my fellow church member here enough
to get up and preach what needs to be preached
for their benefit
even if it means that I'm less successful
it doesn't matter
because what matters is if somebody else is successful
and that's the way you live your life
with a heart filled with charity
you know, you've got to go through those seven steps
you've got to do everything you can
to live a life devoid of
as much sin as you can
because charity is not something that you're just
going to have overnight
and charity is not easy to have
it's something that comes from cleaning up the sin
getting the virtue, the patience, the godliness
you've got to get it all together
and get to the point where your heart is
dominated and filled with charity
where your heart is totally soft
then you walk in the door
you sing out the praises of God as loud as you can
and your heart is stirred on the inside
and you're moved by the songs
you hear the preaching of God's word
you're convicted of the sin that's in your life
you're stirred up, you're excited
you're zealous, you see people as a soul
you see the mailman, a soul
you know, you see the grocery store
people as a soul
you see people walking down the street, it's a soul
that needs to be saved because your heart is that tender
is that where you want to be in your Christian life?
you want to have a heart that just
pulsates with love for God
that just beats soul winning
that just beats
how can I make my fellow brother and sister in Christ
succeed? How can I make sure that my
children succeed? How can I make sure
that other people succeed if it means
me being killed and persecuted
and beaten and nailed to a cross?
he says, forgive them father
for they know not what they do
he says I'm willing to lay down my life
greater love hath no man
than this and that a man lay down
his life for his friends?
that's what I'm talking about, that kind of a heart that says
if I have to
fail that's fine, if I have to die on
a cross Jesus is
saying he's fine, he says
not my will but
thine be done, he says I'm going to
lay down my life for the sheep
the good shepherd gives his life for the sheep
and so let's
all of us make sure
let's exhort one another daily
let's daily hear his voice
and harden out your hearts, remember he said that today
if you will hear his voice, harden out your hearts
everyday do just a self check
and say is my heart getting hard?
am I starting to just get
callous to the things of God?
am I starting to get to where the preaching doesn't affect me?
am I starting to get to where
the Bible reading does not affect me?
does not do anything for me?
am I starting to get to where
soul winning is not
a who, it's not about who
it's about like
59 minutes and 59 seconds, it's not about
who are we talking to?
and you say
that is how I'm giving, well I have one question
for you, what sin is it
that's dominating your life, that's hardening you?
because that's always the answer
you say I'm getting hardened
ok, what's the sin problem?
no no no, that's not what I'm talking about
I read my Bible, I don't get anything out of it
ok, what sin is dominating your life?
what sin is it that you're not getting rid of?
that's what it is
what are you lacking in that list of seven things there?
because it's your choice
and this is the end of the sermon
it's your choice whether you want to have a hard heart
or whether you want to have charity in your heart
and a tender heart, it's your choice
because God gives you the formula to do these seven things
and then he takes you to Hebrews 3
and he says get the sin out of your life
and he says you'll have a heart
that's in tune with my heart
when you have knowledge, virtue
when you have patience
when you have godliness, when you start being a little kinder
the way you deal with people, brotherly kindness
and he says and when you get the sin out of your heart
because that's what's hardening
the hardening agent is the sin
and the softening agent is the seven things in the list
he says here's the formula, do it
you decide how much you enjoy church
you decide how much you enjoy Bible reading
you decide how many people you win to Christ
you decide whether you live for yourself
or whether you live for other people
dominated by charity
now should we take a Bible and throw out the word charity?
no
don't throw out the word charity
it's a specific word
that's telling you, we're not just talking about love
love's a very broad word
love is a word throughout the Bible
it's as broad of a word as God
I mean God is love
that's how infinite that word is, love
now I'm talking about charity
charity where it's about others
that's why they call it a charitable organization
our modern day word charity
it's doing something for somebody else
caring about somebody else
the word care
C-H-A-R, charity
comes from the word care
C-A-R, care, it comes from the same
etymological root word in the English language
do you care about other people?
that's what charity is, give your body to be burned
give all your money to the poor, get up and preach the grace of the Lord
know the whole Bible, but do you care
about other people?
do you care about the people in this church?
do you care about lost souls?
you decide whether you're going to care
whether you're going to have charity
or whether you're going to harden your heart
let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer
God, I thank you so much for the Bible
and I thank you so much for
the King James Bible, that we have a Bible
that has such great depth of truth
and teaches us of this great concept of charity
dear God
I just pray that you help me never to harden my heart
it's so easy for us to
get a hard heart, dear God
some sin creeps in and just
kind of sets itself up in our life
and just gets a hold
in there and pretty soon we get to the point
where we don't even feel guilty about it
because it's just been hardened
and God, it's so easy sometimes
to also just turn the emphasis
to ourselves and just care about ourselves
all the time and just love ourselves
and not really realize that it's not
about us, it's about a much bigger
picture of others
that you died for, that you care about, dear God
and that we need to focus and live
our lives for others
God, please help none of us
to be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin
but help us all, Father, to
love