Job 13, 1, the Bible reads, Lo, mine eye hath seen all this, mine ear hath heard and understood
it.
What ye know, the same do I know also.
I am not inferior unto you.
Surely I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to reason with God, but ye are forgers
of lies, ye are all physicians of no value.
Job starts out, chapter 13, in a very similar way that he started out, chapter 12.
Look at chapter 12, verse 3, he said, But I have understanding as well as you.
I am not inferior to you, yea, who with knoweth not such things as these?
He's bringing to attention the fact that a lot of the things that they're saying, they're
just stating the obvious.
And Job's three friends have this overly simplistic view of just, if you do good, good things
are going to happen to you, and if you do bad, then bad things are going to happen to
you.
Although that's obvious and true, there's more to it than that.
We don't always reap what we sow immediately.
A lot of times there's a delayed reaction where a lot of wicked people are prospering
and doing well in the short term, but we know what their end shall be.
And the same thing with godly people who are suffering, we see the latter end of Job, that
he's blessed more in the end than he is at the beginning.
And so these guys are just really simplistic, they sound like a bunch of prosperity preachers,
and they're just attacking Job, kicking him while he's down, and they keep repeating a
lot of the same things, and Job is feeling like they're insulting his intelligence with
some of the things that they're saying to him.
But I want to focus right now on verse 4 of chapter 13 where it says, but ye are forgers
of lies, ye are all physicians of no value.
And I want to park it on that verse for a little while because this is a key verse in
the day that we live.
We today are surrounded by not metaphorical forgers of lies and physicians of no value,
but literal forgers of lies and physicians of no value.
Job is comparing his three friends to physicians of no value and forgers of lies.
What would a forger of lies be?
A con man, right?
Someone who devises lies and trickery in order to deceive, in order to defraud.
And why would a physician commit fraud?
Why would a physician forge lies?
Well for financial gain.
And there are a lot of doctors today who do a lot of dishonest things in order to get
financial gain.
Not only that, but there are also huge pharmaceutical corporations that forge a lot of lies and
do a lot of dishonest things in order to make many billions and billions of dollars off
the pain and suffering and even death of innocent people.
And they are not even ashamed of the fact that they litter, I mean the people who are
behind this, I'm not saying that every doctor and every nurse who participates in it is,
but the people who forge these lies, the people who are behind this stuff, many of them know
that they're killing people and they don't even care.
All the children and people that are dying means nothing because they are gaining wealth.
And the love of money is the root of all evil.
I read a book a year or two ago that was from the perspective of a pharmaceutical company
salesman.
Here's a guy who just gets a job, he's just trying to make a living.
He gets a job selling drugs for a pharmaceutical company, he was some kind of a subsidiary
of Johnson & Johnson I believe that he worked for.
And the drug that he was selling was EPO, the stuff that all the Tour de France cyclists
were abusing and people were using it as a performance enhancing drug.
Well this drug, EPO, was actually designed for kidney dialysis patients and it would
increase their red blood cell count.
So athletes would use this in order to increase their red blood cell count to help with their
cardiovascular endurance.
Well this EPO drug that was supposed to only be sold to dialysis patients, they started
marketing it with an off-label usage, not really marketing as in putting commercials
on TV because that would have been illegal, but just the doctors were starting to prescribe
this to cancer patients.
And the salesmen were really pushing this, you know, we've got to get you on this for
the cancer patients because the dialysis market was only so much money, the cancer market
was a bigger market.
You know, forget the fact that they hadn't really tested it on cancer patients or even
proven that it was good for cancer patients, hey this is just more people that we can sell
this to.
So without doing the research, without getting it approved by the FDA, they just start pushing
it to these doctors that are giving it to cancer and they're making all kinds of money.
And reading this book, it's just amazing how much fraud there is.
What these doctors will do often, they'll get massive amounts of free samples from the
salesmen, he'll give them a huge amount of free samples in order to get them giving out
this drug and then they'll turn around and take that free sample and sell it.
And the main person that they're selling it to is the US government because how it works
is that people come in who are on Medicare, Medicaid, they just bill Medicaid for free
samples that they're giving out.
So they're giving out a lot of free samples, billing Medicaid full price and making a fortune
because they're selling something that they didn't even pay for.
And of course free samples are supposed to be not for resale but of course they're selling.
Not only that but these doctors, if they were a doctor who prescribed a lot of EPO and if
they would go and make speeches about how great EPO was, they'd pay them, for a one
hour speech they'll pay the guy six grand and also give him an all expense paid trip
for him and his wife and hotels and wining and dining.
So these guys are making a fortune, they're making a killing of prescribing a drug illegally
because it's only supposed to be for dialysis patients but they're just using it for all
these other usages because the more they prescribe the more money they make.
And the salesmen are giving them incentives, man just prescribe more EPO, you'll go on
more vacations, you're going to give more speeches for 45 minutes, make thousands of
dollars for 45 minutes of speaking, you're going to get all kinds of free samples, I'm
going to hook you up, they're making millions of dollars.
Okay it turned out later that it was found out that this drug was described as miracle
grow for cancer.
I mean this stuff just, if you give this to people who have cancer it just makes their
cancer thrive and it's killing all kinds of people.
And even after it started to become apparent that this EPO was killing a lot of cancer
patients, you know there were still salesmen and still doctors that just kept doing it.
And man just reading this book just blew me away, just the fraud of Medicare because whenever
the government is paying for things they don't care how much they spend because they print
their own money.
So you wonder why the medical system is so messed up, I mean this book, the book was
called Blood Feud because it's a blood drug, you know it's a drug that increases the blood
cell count and you know athletes abuse it and everything like that.
But anyway, that's just one example of just the kind of dishonesty and fraud and just
we don't really know if this prescription is going to help you but I know I'm going
to make a lot of money if I prescribe a lot of EPO to just anybody and everybody and so
they just prescribe it.
What a wicked thing to do.
You know when you're claiming to be a healer, you're claiming to be somebody that's there
to help people and to love people, but there is all kind of fraud and abuse in the medical
industry today and money is at the heart of it today.
We have a whole culture in our country of just people using a lot of prescription drugs
and going to doctors for things that aren't even really problems.
And the Bible gives us the answer that we need when it comes to how we should view the
medical industry or how we should view doctors or how we should look at medicine in general.
And I think that the most important thing is what Jesus himself said, they that be whole
need not a physician but they that are sick.
You know that tells me that a physician is not somebody that I need when I'm well.
Only when I have a problem.
If I'm whole, if I'm well, I don't need a doctor.
Only those that are sick.
Some people have misunderstood me and think that I'm just completely against doctors,
against medicine, I would never go to the hospital.
But that's not really true because Jesus did say that those that are sick could need a
physician.
And I believe that there is a time and a place for medical treatment.
But here's a general rule of thumb.
If you have a problem that is a chronic, ongoing type of a problem, usually doctors are not
going to help you.
They're going to make it worse.
I'm not saying this is just across the board, I'm kind of oversimplifying it.
Just a general rule of thumb though for you.
If you have an acute catastrophic event, that's usually where the doctor can help you.
For example, if you get a finger chopped off or something, just an acute catastrophic,
they're good at fixing that.
If you get sliced open, you get hit by a car, something like that happens to you, they are
really good at just trauma, just fixing you and keeping you alive and thank God for advancements
in medicine and science that allow them to be able to fix stuff like that.
But when you have an ongoing issue, that's where you just end up getting milked for all
that you're worth.
And by the way, most ongoing type chronic problems are lifestyle induced.
Nobody wants to hear that.
Nobody wants to hear that it's your fault that you're sick and I'm not saying that it's
always your fault, but a lot of times it's your fault.
I mean that's just the hard truth.
If you're going to go out and eat a bunch of junk food and you're going to live a sedentary
life of sitting around, watching TV or whatever and then you expect to be healthy, you're
wrong.
You will pay the piper eventually for abusing your body with drinking alcohol, with taking
drugs, with eating a bunch of junk food and fast food and smoking and then you're not
doing any exercise, you're sitting around, you become a sluggard and slothful, you will
pay for that someday.
Now I'm all for being frugal.
I think it's great to be very thrifty and to not be spending money like a drunken sailor
and that is a virtue when you can save money and the Bible talks a lot about the virtuous
woman in Proverbs 31, how she seeketh wool and flax and worketh willingly with her hands.
She bringeth her food from afar.
There are a lot of things in that passage that indicate that she's making a lot of homemade
stuff and she knows where to buy stuff for the best prices.
You can tell that she's a very thrifty, frugal type of a wife and I think that's great.
That's a wonderful thing for a wife to be frugal and thrifty and it's great for us as
men also to not be wasteful of our money.
But one area where you don't want to scrimp and scrape and save is you don't want to go
too cheap on your food.
Now if you can get quality food and get it for really cheap, well great.
But a lot of people think that they're saving money by buying cheap food and when I say
cheap I mean it's low in price and low in quality.
They think, well I just can't afford to buy healthy food.
All I can afford is junk food, just the cheap stuff and so that's what I'm going to buy.
But that's very foolish because you will spend more money in the long run buying junk food.
You might feel like right now I'm saving money by buying the cheapest eggs and the cheapest
this and the cheapest that.
But what about when you go to the hospital?
One trip to the hospital can buy you a lot of good, healthy, clean food and a lot of
clean water because you go to the hospital one time and you can be shelling out tens
of thousands of dollars.
Say, well I have health insurance.
Right, but still there's the copay, even if you do have health insurance, there's the
missed work, there's the loss of productivity, there's bad health.
In the end it's better and more frugal to buy the right food.
So you say, oh it's just so cheap to buy whatever processed, ready-made food, whatever junk,
low quality, you're buying your meat at the Dollar Tree or whatever.
You're going to pay for that someday and it's not wise to poison your body in order to save
money.
It's a bad idea and I'm not trying to be the food police up here.
I'm trying to tell you what to do and honestly, leave this room and do whatever you like.
I mean I'm not going to judge you when I see you with a bag of McDonald's and a diet soda
after the service.
You know what, you do what you want but you are destroying yourself with that garbage
that you're eating.
It is bad, okay, and maybe you don't know that it's bad but it is not the food that
God made and said it was very good.
This is man-made, chemical, genetically modified junk that people in the food industry, because
of the love of money, are producing to maximize profits and sell you trash.
Because they know that when you go to the store and you see all the food on the shelf
and you see all the different types of eggs, you know, you're going to say, hey 99 cents
a dozen, let's do it.
But if you knew where those eggs are coming from, you might think twice about that.
Because those eggs are coming from chickens and look, I'm not crying myself to sleep at
night about how these chickens are being treated, you know, even though the conditions they
live in are awful.
They live in complete darkness 24 hours a day.
They never see the sun and they are piled on top of each other.
If you looked at them, they look like they're sick and dying.
Their feathers are all falling off their bodies.
They're crammed on top of each other, living in their own excrement, eating genetically
modified corn feed.
They're not out eating greens and plants and bugs and everything like a chicken would do
naturally that's just being raised free range.
They're just eating a genetically modified, nutritionally bankrupt corn feed and they
are just living in the most disgusting, filthy conditions and producing eggs that have much
lower nutritional value and contain toxic substances in them.
And you are literally, when you go to McDonald's and get your diet soda, okay, first of all,
the artificial sweeteners in the diet soda are poisonous, okay.
They're bad for you and news flash, they cause you to get fat.
That's why every overweight person that you know drinks a ton of diet soda and they keep
drinking that diet soda but they stay fat.
Why?
Because it makes you fat.
Because it does things to your metabolism.
Look, you're tricking your body.
When your mouth tastes something sweet, you know what your brain thinks?
I'm getting sugar right now.
I'm getting carbohydrates.
But it isn't there.
You're fooling your body, you're confusing the body and the body's not going to operate
properly.
And everybody's always the new craze with the sweeteners, right?
Because it's always changing.
You know, it's nutra-sweet and then it's aspartame.
And now they're coming out with these ones that they claim are natural and good for you.
But let me tell you something, I don't trust any of them.
The best thing to sweeten your food or drink with is what the Bible says is healthy, which
is honey.
And I'm not talking about that plastic bear from the grocery store.
In fact, that is by definition zero percent honey.
It is sugar, sugar syrup.
Because it's been so processed and refined that it no longer contains any pollen in it.
It isn't honey by definition, it's just sugar.
It's pure sugar.
But if you actually get raw, real honey, local honey, that's a good thing to sweeten your
food with.
Even the Bible mentions the sweet cane, at least it mentions sugar as we know it.
But this other stuff that's the trendy stuff that's always coming out, you can't trust
it.
For example, one of the ones that's the big craze right now is stevia.
Who's heard of this?
Stevia.
Oh, hands all over the belly going out.
It's very common.
And they have sodas that are based on it and there are little packets of it and people
buy it.
And this is pretty popular.
But did you know that if you're a woman of childbearing age, you should stay away from
stevia because it can cause miscarriage and it can cause infertility and there's all kinds
of evidence like that that points to the sterilizing effects of it.
We need to be careful what kind of new, trendy sweetener we put in our bodies because there's
a lot of stuff out there that's toxic, that's hazardous for you.
So it's great to be frugal and save money, but I think that your food is not a good place
to cut corners because there's so much out there that is bad for you.
And in the long run you're going to end up paying a lot more when you end up in the doctor.
But the Bible says here in verse 4, but ye are forgers of lies, ye are all physicians
of no value.
Now doctors today, they take what's called the Hippocratic Oath.
Who's ever heard of that before?
The Hippocratic Oath comes from a guy by the name of Hippocrates from around 400 BC.
He was a Greek physician and he's known as the father of Western medicine.
Now today, even though it's not a legal requirement to become a doctor, still 98% of doctors today
when they graduate from medical school take some kind of an oath.
Most of them are taking some version of the Hippocratic Oath.
And a lot of it is a watered down version or a changed version.
And I'm not saying that Hippocrates is a Bible believing Christian, of course, because he
believed in all kinds of pagan gods, he's this ancient Greek guy.
But I will say this, the Bible teaches that if you make an oath and swear an oath, you
must keep that oath if you've sworn that oath.
And it really should be called the Hippocratic Oath because one of the things, in fact I
pulled it up on my phone before the service, I'll read it for you.
One of the things in the Hippocratic Oath is, I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody
if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect.
Similarly, I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy.
In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art.
And also they swear to do no harm to anyone.
And a famous quote from Hippocrates is that when the physician can do no good, he must
be kept from doing harm.
And also another famous quote from Hippocrates is, our food should be our medicine and our
medicine should be our food, but to feed him who is sick is to feed the sickness.
And again I'm not saying that these are Gospel truths or Biblical truths, but I'm saying
this, that today's modern medicine is in violation of this oath that they swear unto because
much of it is financially motivated.
There are a lot of fraudulent things that go on in the name of medicine and it's not
about the well-being of the patient.
It becomes about liability, it becomes about financial gain.
For example, if you look at the way childbirth is in our country, there's the C-section rate
which sometimes can be 30-40% in many areas.
I mean that's just bizarre.
God designed the human body to operate and to function properly.
Our bodies, the Bible says, are fearfully and wonderfully made.
God created us and he made us perfect, he made us good and obviously we're under the
curse of sin and so our bodies do have problems, but you have to understand that modern science
and medicine come from a philosophy that there is no God.
If you look at mainstream science and what comes out of the university where these guys
are being trained, they don't believe that in the beginning God created the heaven and
the earth.
They believe that we evolved.
They believe that we are just animals and that a lot of things about our bodies are
just accidents of evolution and I guess the people think just that the next step in evolution
is just that babies will just be cut out of their mother's womb with a knife.
Now are there times when a C-section could be warranted?
Sure.
And in the beginning when C-sections were introduced, you know, the rate of C-section
was like 3% or less.
You know, if you look at the midwife that we use and that our last few children have
been born with this midwife, her C-section rate is like 3% or less.
That's situations where, yeah, okay, this is something that can save somebody's life.
This is something that can help.
So I'm not saying that modern medicine is bad, but when you're cutting 30% of babies
out of their mother's womb or 20% or 40%, I mean that's just bizarre.
It's crazy.
But it all has to do with money and it has to do with liability because they get paid
twice as much when they do a C-section.
Plus they might want to just kind of get home in time for dinner, you know, and just cut
it out and be done with it.
They might want to just, you know, be home in time for the weekend.
So these doctors, it's like an assembly line, they want to have as many mothers as possible
giving birth because it's just money in their pocket.
The more patients they have, the more births they can go to.
So it's just like an assembly line, just boom, cut it out, cut out another one, cut them
out, cut them out, cut them out.
And it's a fraud.
It's a scam.
I'm not saying a C-section is bad, I'm not saying that it isn't warranted sometimes,
but the vast majority of times it's just totally uncalled for.
And a lot of times the doctor will just flat out lie to you.
They'll just look at you, oh yeah, your hips aren't wide enough, you're not going to be
able to give birth.
What in the world?
You know, they'll just, they look at you with x-ray vision and they just know that.
Or they'll just tell you, oh yeah, it's not going to work.
And you know, we had our first child born at the hospital and we just had a horrible
experience.
And that's what even made us look into alternatives, which is why, you know, the other six of my
children were born at home.
Just because the hospital birth was so horrendous and they were just so quick to pull out the
knives and start cutting.
And a lot of it's financially motivated.
A lot of it's just liability because we live in a culture today that is not a culture that
as Jesus said, you know, they the behold need not a physician, but they that are sick.
We live in a culture today that's just a very medicalized culture.
So basically if someone has a c-section, we just think that nothing can go wrong.
Even though there are a lot of things that can go wrong with c-sections, c-section has
its own dangers.
Just like natural birth has its own dangers and it has its own fatalities.
Just like a natural childbirth has its fatalities.
But if somebody has a c-section and something goes wrong, people say, well, there's nothing
you could do.
They did everything they could.
But if you have a natural birth and something goes wrong, it's like, well, why didn't you
do a c-section?
You know, so that's just our mentality.
It's like a guy that I know who went to the doctor and he was told, you know, you have
high blood pressure.
You can either change your diet or take this drug.
He said, give me the drug.
And continued to eat at Wienerschnitzel, Jack in the Box, Taco Bell, McDonald's.
You know, because we just want to take a drug and if we, you know, and just get on drugs
and just take all these medicines and take all these prescription pills.
Look, are medicines sometimes warranted?
Yeah, but why is every old person on drugs?
Why are just huge percent, almost everybody you know who's middle age is on all kinds
of prescription drugs and it's just, it's to the point of ridiculousness, my friend.
And we need to get a more biblical approach and understand that the worldview of the medical
industry today is not a biblical worldview.
It's an atheistic, godless, evolution-based worldview that says we need to fix everything
that isn't even broken.
And we need to just go to the Bible and get a biblical view.
And also we need to just take care of ourselves too.
That would avoid a lot of problems.
If we would just eat right and get some exercise.
You know, those of you who work a job that's a physical job, at least you got that going
for you.
You know, but if you work a job where you're sitting in front of a computer all day, you
need to get out and go soul winning.
You know, at least that'll get you, at least, you know, go soul winning an apartment complex
with a lot of stairs.
That'll be your stair master workout.
But anyway, let's go back to the passage here in Job chapter 13.
Just wanted to point that out to you about that scripture.
But it says in verse 5, oh that ye would altogether hold your peace and it should be
your wisdom.
This is Job 13 5.
Oh that ye would altogether hold your peace and it should be your wisdom.
Now this scripture brought to mind a bunch of other scriptures.
Keep your finger in Job 13, flip over to Proverbs 17.
Proverbs 17, just a few pages to the right in your Bible, Job, Psalms, Proverbs.
The Bible says here that if you'd hold your peace it should be your wisdom.
The Bible says in Proverbs 17 28, even a fool when he holdeth his peace is counted wise
and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding.
And what that's basically saying is that even if you're not that smart of a person, sometimes
the less you talk, the smarter you will seem.
Go to Proverbs 10 19, Proverbs 10 19.
And while you're turning to Proverbs 10 19 I'm going to read for you from Ecclesiastes
5 verse 3.
In Ecclesiastes 5 3 it says, for a dream cometh through the multitude of business, watch this,
and a fool's voice is known by a multitude of words.
Meaning you can recognize who's talking just by how many words they're saying, a fool's
voice is known by a multitude of words.
People that are foolish often just run their mouth and they say way too much.
And often it would be better if we just kept our mouth shut and said little.
Look at the scripture I had you turn to in Proverbs 10 verse 19.
It says in the multitude of words there wanteth not sin, meaning there does not lack sin.
Meaning that if you say enough, eventually you're going to say something sinful.
Eventually you're going to say something that's wrong.
In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin, but he that refraineth his lips is wise.
Obviously there's a time to speak and a time to keep silence, but we need to be careful
not to just blow off our mouths and run our mouths.
Look everything that you think you don't have to say out loud.
Some people just say too much.
Sometimes the best thing is just to not say anything.
And again, I'm not saying that we need to just all go around and be really stoic and
mute and not say much, but we need to just be careful that we don't just run our mouths.
And if you're ever in a situation, because remember the Bible said that even a fool when
he shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding.
When you're in a situation where you don't know much about what's going on around you,
that's when you need to keep your mouth shut.
There's a time to speak and a time not to speak.
When you're out soul winning, that's a time to speak.
You got the Bible, you're bringing the gospel to people, you have the truth, you're explaining
them how to be saved.
That's a great time to do most of the talking.
After church and you're fellowshipping with God's people and you're talking about the
Word, that's a great time to open your mouth and talk about the Bible and talk about good
things, but sometimes there are things that are just over your head when it's time for
you to just keep silence, when people are talking about things that you don't understand.
Let me give you some examples.
If you're a child and your parents are talking, they don't need you to just butt in all the
time and just jump into every conversation that your parents are having, because they're
talking about things that are above your level.
Or let's say you walk up to a conversation where people are talking about something that
you know nothing about.
You don't need to just show that you know something and get into conversation.
You hear a couple guys talking computers or something.
You know, don't just walk in there and just start dropping words like RAM and gigahertz.
Don't be the type of person that just wants to show how much you know and just get into
every conversation.
And you hear this sometimes when people who don't know much about the Bible, they just
want to pipe up when you start talking Bible and you're just kind of going, oh man, this
person has never read the Bible.
This person doesn't have a clue about what's going on.
But you know, we all have subjects that we know nothing about.
It's best to just not talk about those things and just let other people talk and listen
to what they have to say.
You know, when you're at work and the bosses are talking and everything, sometimes it's
better to just keep silence and not just, well, I think we're, you know.
I'm just showing you some scripture today that the Bible says that sometimes when you're
maybe just not a foolish person in general, but maybe you're just foolish in certain areas.
Maybe it's just a subject that you don't know much about.
It's better to just not talk about it, not to say anything.
You know, for example, sometimes even when I'm preaching, and obviously I've studied
the Bible a lot, obviously I've read the Bible many scores of times and I've memorized a
lot of Bible.
But a lot of times I'll be preaching on a chapter and I'll come to something in that
chapter that I don't understand.
I don't understand everything.
You don't understand everything.
I don't just make something up.
You know, because I have to, I got to preach through, you know, the whole book of Job.
So I get to a verse in Job that I don't understand, well, I'm just going to make something up
that sounds good or I'm just going to say something or I'm just going to Google it and
just whatever I find, that's what I'm going to say.
Sometimes I'll just hold my peace on things and sometimes I'll finish a sermon and people
will come up to me and say, man, you know, I was really hoping you were going to touch
on such and such the verse because I've wondered about that my whole life.
I was hoping you were going to cover that verse and I'm thinking like, well, you know
why you wondered about it?
Because I wondered about it too because it's just a really difficult verse and I don't
like to talk about things that I don't understand and talk about things that I don't know about.
And I remember a pastor friend of mine had called me a long time ago and he asked me,
he said, you know, what did you do when you preached this, you know, in this chapter?
He's like, I know you preached on that chapter but, you know, you don't have it recorded.
What did you do when you preached on that?
And I said, you know what, I skipped that verse.
He said, oh man, because I don't know how to interpret this verse.
I said, well, guess what, neither did I. I just skipped that verse.
I said, just preach the part in the chapter that you do know, that you do understand because
it's better to just pass over the things that are maybe a little too high for you.
And there are a lot of things that in the past were too high for me and I didn't understand
and then down the road you understand them and then you preach it at that time.
And young preachers sometimes who know very little about the Bible, you know, they're
afraid to get up and preach, I always just tell young preachers who want to just get
some experience preaching, just preach what you know.
Preach the part that you know very well.
And the parts that you don't know so well, hold off on that.
Don't talk about things that you don't understand.
Don't talk about things that are too high for you.
Children should be very careful not to talk about things that they don't understand.
Sometimes children just repeat things that they hear.
I remember one time I was sitting in the car with my mother as a child and there were all
these trains passing by.
And I was sitting in the car and the train was passing by and I just learned how to read.
I think I was like, you know, three, four years old or whatever.
And I'm sitting there, I learned how to read really young believe it or not.
And I'm sitting there, I'm like three or four years old, I just learned how to read and
I'm reading everything on this train.
And I'm, you know, Union Pacific, Southern Pacific, Railroad, you know, I'm reading all
these printed words, all of a sudden I just said the most obscene thing to my mother.
And she, you know, she's kind of zoned out.
She's not listening to me read Southern Pacific, Southern Pacific, you know.
And all of a sudden this caught her attention, what in the world?
What did you just say?
I said, I am reading the train.
But it was graffiti, you know, somebody had graffitied some filthy statement on the side
of the train and I just read it off, you know.
And she said, no, and she said, never read anything that is not printed.
Never read anything that is handwritten or, okay, you know.
So then after that, you know, I didn't make that mistake again.
But why did I say something obscene?
Because of the fact that I was just talking about things I didn't understand, you know,
just reading.
So what I'm saying is we need to be careful, especially as children, that we don't just
hear things and repeat expressions and things that we hear, you know.
Somebody used the saying to me recently, snafu, you know, and they said something was a snafu.
And the person that was saying to me, I was thinking to myself, I don't think that this
is a person who usually drops a lot of F bombs, you know.
And I said to this person, I said, you know what that stands for?
It actually contains the F word.
That's what the F in snafu stands for.
I said, that doesn't seem like the type of word that you normally use.
But I use that to illustrate that a lot of times people just kind of repeat things and
say things and talk about things that they don't understand and that they don't know
anything about.
And we should just be careful before we say things and talk about things.
A lot of times people just start talking about politics and they don't know anything about
politics, you know.
They haven't actually studied.
They just repeat something that they heard from some, one of these talk show, you know,
Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh.
They just, well, you know, and then they just repeat it.
And then you call them on the carpet and say, wait a minute, is that really right?
Can you explain that to me?
How is that biblical?
And then all of a sudden it's like, oh, whoa, I guess you're right.
Oh, wow, you know.
Well, I just heard that on Glenn Beck.
What I'm saying is that we should be careful not to run our mouths about things that we
don't understand.
It's good to talk about things that we do know.
It's good to teach people things that we're good at and things that we're expert in or
at least have a good understanding.
It's great to talk about things that we read in the Bible and things that we learn in the
Bible.
Those are all good, but we shouldn't talk about things that we don't know anything about.
We should talk about things that we do know something about.
And let other people talk about other subjects and just sit back and listen.
And obviously we should be more ready to hear than to, you know, give the sacrifice of fools
and just, you know, throw in our two cents about things that we don't know anything about.
And that's how a lot of false information and false doctrine and just bad info gets
passed around is just people repeating stuff.
You know, and I mean just preachers will just repeat things that they heard in Bible
college or they heard it from another preacher and they just repeat stuff without even thinking
about it.
You know, it's better to just hold your peace about stuff that you don't know about.
And you know, a lot of people are confused about the rapture and the tribulation and
end times Bible prophecy.
There's a lot of confusion reigning today on that subject because of all the lies and
disinformation that Hollywood and others are putting out with Left Behind and all this
other stuff.
So there's a lot of disinformation out there.
You know, I would say that it'd be best for these guys who don't know anything about these
pastors who don't know the subject to just keep your mouth shut about that subject.
In fact, why don't we get a new pastor that does know about the subject would be even
better.
You know, or maybe you should stay to show yourself approved unto God or workmen that
need not to be ashamed, meaning that if you don't stay to show yourself approved, you
ought to be ashamed.
Right.
Okay.
But here's the thing.
I've heard pastors get up and huff and puff and blow the house down about, ah, we're pre-trib
and blah, blah, blah, you know, and then you confront them about it after the service and
then they're like, oh, well, I haven't really studied it.
I'm not really an expert.
Then what are you doing talking about it?
Why don't you leave it to the big kids to talk about it?
You know, if you don't know about it, if you're not an expert on it enough to be able to defend
your position, then you need to just quit talking about it, but you know what?
Not talking about the second coming of Christ isn't a very good option as a Bible-believing
New Testament preacher.
So maybe it's time for you to learn about it and figure out the truth and quit repeating
lies that you heard in Bible college or from some movie somewhere and actually learn the
truth from the Word of God yourself and say to show thyself approved unto God.
And by the way, while I'm on that subject, let me just say this, you know, a lot of people
say, well, I don't go to church because, you know, all the churches in my area are pre-trib,
so I'm just not going to go to church.
Number one, that's not an option.
The Bible commands you to be in church.
Christ died for the church, he says, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the
manner of some is, but exhorting one another and so much the more as we see the day approaching.
And if everybody who is right on the rapture and is right on end times prophecy says, well,
I'm not going to go to church because it's pre-trib, well then the churches are never
going to change because everybody in the pews pre-trib and the pastors pre-trib and it's
just one big pre-trib.
You know what people ought to do if their church and their pastor is preaching this
fraud of the pre-trib rapture and if all the churches in their area are preaching, you
know what they ought to do is they ought to go to church and they ought to confront their
pastor, not rebuking an elder, because the Bible says rebuke not an elder, but entreat
him as a father.
So the Bible does not say, don't say anything to your pastor when he's in error.
Is that what the Bible says?
Does the Bible just say, hey, if your pastor's in error, don't say anything?
No, it says entreat him as a father, but what it tells you not to do is rebuke him.
What is the difference between a rebuke and an entreaty?
The difference is in the attitude and the respect.
See when you go to your pastor and start just telling him off and you're wrong and you don't
know, you know, that becomes a rebuke when it's a stern, harsh criticism.
An entreaty is when you come to him lovingly and kindly and say, look, you know, I want
to show you some scripture in the Bible.
There's something about our church's doctrine that I'm concerned about.
I don't see it in scripture.
You know, I believe the Bible says something different.
Can I just show you a few verses from the Bible and just go over this with you or whatever,
however you choose to approach it, but you know, instead of everybody just using it as
an excuse not to go to church, wouldn't it be great if at least every pastor in America
who's been sucked into this, many of them just unknowingly in the, in the sincerity
of their heart would be confronted by someone who would lovingly or several someones who
would lovingly explain to them why that doctrine is not biblical.
And at least they could have a chance to think about it.
And here's the thing, if a bunch of people are coming up to them and saying it, then
they'd probably take it seriously.
And at least then they'd realize, okay, if I do make the switch on this and switch to
what the Bible actually teaches, you know, at least I've got people in the church that
are on my side instead of just thinking, oh man, this is just going to blow everybody
out of the water because everybody who believes right on is sitting at home.
But I mean, good night, how simple is that?
But people just would rather just not go to church and just have that.
How are you going to be a good influence?
And I'm not saying to go in there guns a blazing and rude and rebuke.
We need to treat pastors with respect, but you can still tell them that they have an
error.
You know, you can't just sit there and say, well, I'm just never going to say anything
to my pastor because you know what?
He just can do no wrong and he's God's man.
No, that's not true because pastors do need to be held accountable for what they preach
and teach, but it needs to be done with love and respect and not someone trying to supplant
them or being a korah type of an attitude.
So let's keep reading here.
It says in verse 5, oh, that ye would altogether hold your peace and it should be your wisdom.
Hear now my reasoning and hearken to the pleadings of my lips.
Will ye speak wickedly for God and talk deceitfully for him?
Will ye accept his person?
Will ye contend for God?
Is it good that he should search you out?
Or as one man mocketh another, do you so mock him?
So Job's getting very upset at his three friends now.
He's saying, you're lying.
You're putting words in God's mouth that God didn't really say and he says you're also
mocking God.
Now let me just address both of those things because it says in verse 7, will ye speak
wickedly for God and talk deceitfully for him?
Say what does it mean to speak wickedly for God or to talk deceitfully for him?
Any time you're saying God said this and he didn't really say it.
And people do this all the time.
Sometimes people will say, you know, God told me, and then they'll just say something and
it's nothing in the word of God, it's not in the Bible.
And a lot of times people's own imagination becomes God told me.
And by the way, I don't like these signs where they'll put a sign up by the road with some
made up man-made quote and then they'll just put God.
Like God said that.
I mean that is, the Bible says this, the words of the Lord are pure words.
As silver tried in the furnace of earth, purified seven times, thou shall keep them, O Lord.
Thou shall preserve them from this generation forever.
And that's not the verse that I wanted to quote.
That's a different verse.
It's a good verse anyway.
The verse that I wanted to quote is every word of God is pure.
He's a shield unto them that put their trust in him.
Had thou not unto his words lest he reprove thee and thou be found a liar.
And people will always say to me, well, you know, Jesus said, hate the sin, love the sinner.
And I just, okay, where did Jesus say that?
No, that was Mahatma Gandhi that said that, who is an unbeliever who's in hell right now
because he did not believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as his savior.
That they'll say, well, Jesus said, and then they'll just put in all this made up stuff
that they like.
Well, didn't Jesus say it?
It's just some saying, just some expression, just something that man has made up.
Well, I thought that Jesus said that we should never judge anybody and we should love everybody
and that we, you know, we should, you're like, what in the world, what are you quoting?
What scripture is this?
I mean, it all sounds good, but is it biblical?
Is it what Jesus said?
Or, you know, these little corny, I don't believe God is corny, because this book has
no corn in it.
I mean, like, if you read this book, it's a very serious, powerful book.
It's not a corny, silly book.
But yet they put these corny little silly things on the billboard and say it's from
God.
You know, oh, if I'd intended you to fly, I would have given you wings, you know, stop
speeding, God.
It's this corny, dumb stuff.
If you must swear, use your own name, not mine, God.
You know, it's just like, what are you talking about?
God didn't say that.
And you say, oh, you're being nitpicky.
No, God cares about people putting words in his mouth and speaking wickedly for God and
God said that we should hold his name and his word in reverence.
And if we have proper respect for God's name, it means we don't throw it around and take
God's name in vain.
It means we don't say, oh, my God and say Jesus as an expletive and say, oh, Lord.
And when we're not talking to God or about God, we're just throwing his name around and
then we just start making up quotes and just saying stuff that we believe and just saying,
oh, this is what God said.
By the way, this is what Jesus said.
And it's nothing that Jesus said.
That's wicked.
Before you ever say God said or Jesus said or thus saith the Lord, you better make sure
that it came from this book, the Holy Bible, or you should not say it.
You know, God told me, go over and talk to, no, he didn't.
He said, go preach the gospel to every creature, yes.
He said, go ye therefore and teach all nations, yes, he said to open your mouth boldly to
make known the mystery of the gospel, but he did not say to you, go talk to that guy
in the black jacket.
No, he didn't say that to you.
You need to stop just saying God said and Jesus said unless it's a direct quote from
the Bible because otherwise you're just making things up.
And the Bible calls that speaking wickedly for God or talking deceitfully for him.
Just putting words in his mouth that he never said.
Add thou not unto his words lest he reprove thee and thou be found a liar.
But it also says in verse 9 that God is not mocked.
It says, is it good that he should search you out or as one man mocketh another do you
so mock him?
Now this brings to mind Galatians when the Bible says be not deceived, God is not mocked
for whatsoever man soweth that shall he also reap.
Go to verse 10 though.
The Bible says he will surely reprove you if you do secretly accept persons.
Now to be reproved means to be told that you're wrong.
He's saying God's going to tell you you're wrong or God's going to correct you.
God's going to rebuke you is another word for reprove if you do secretly accept persons.
Go to James chapter 2 because James 2 is the chapter that most covers respect of persons
because you say what does that mean respect persons?
Whatever it is we don't want to do it because the Bible says if we respect persons God's
going to reprove us.
God's going to rebuke us.
God's going to be upset with us.
So look at James chapter 2 and let's see what it means to accept someone's person.
It says in James 2 verse 1, my brethren have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ the
Lord of glory with respect of persons.
So he's saying don't be a respecter of persons.
Don't have respect of persons.
He's going to explain an example scenario of what this would look like.
Verse 2, for if there come unto your assembly a man with a gold ring in goodly apparel and
there come in also a poor man in vile raiment and you have respect him that weareth the
gay clothing and say unto him sit thou here in a good place and say to the poor stand
out there or sit here under my footstool are you not then partial in yourselves and become
judges of evil thoughts?
So he says you're a respecter of persons when you respect someone more because they're wealthy
or wear nice clothes.
You're a respecter of persons.
God doesn't respect that.
God does not have more respect for someone who has money and wears nice clothes than
someone who is poor and wears vile raiment because the man that Jesus Christ said was
the greatest man who ever lived was who?
John the Baptist and what was he wearing?
Camel's hair and leather belt.
He was not wearing soft raiment.
Jesus said those that wear soft raiment are in king's palaces, but John the Baptist was
in the wilderness.
He was poor and he wore rough clothing.
He wore a rough garment and most of the prophets of the Old Testament wore a rough garment,
meaning that they weren't wearing silky smooth nice clothes.
They wore handmade rough clothes that were durable clothing.
They weren't to impress man, it was just to keep them warm.
That's the kind of clothing that they wore, a rough garment.
And the Bible here is saying when it says the gay clothing, it's not talking about Abercrombie
and Fitch or Urban Outfitters.
It's not talking about your queer little skinny jeans or something.
When it says gay clothing, the word gay used to just mean like happy or lively.
And when you think of gay clothing, for example the song Dawn We Now Are Gay Apparel, it's
only recently that the word gay has come to be used about people who are perverted, people
who are sodomites.
But in the past, gay has just meant happy, cheerful, or lively.
So if the Bible says gay clothing, you could probably take that to mean like bright colors.
Why?
Because throughout history, dying fabric, I mean today bright clothes are cheap, right?
But back throughout history, if you had cheap clothes, they would be really dull, right?
Pretty much you're wearing gray and brown, kind of like I'm dressed tonight.
I'm in some vile raiment tonight, gray shirt, brown pants.
But throughout history, if you wanted to wear purple and scarlet and all these brighter,
fancier colors, you had to pay some serious money because dying those fabrics before modern
technology was expensive and difficult.
And so the Bible here is saying we ought not treat people differently based upon how much
money they have and how they dress.
So if somebody comes in here and they're dirt poor, or if some wealthy person comes in,
they should be treated the same.
They should be seated in the same place.
We should not look at people and respect them differently and apply rules differently based
on who they are.
You know, we should have one law for the stranger and one law for him that is born in the land.
We should treat people the same, red and yellow, black and white, they're precious in his sight,
people who are wealthy, people who are poor, somebody who has a high-end, white collar
job or whatever, versus somebody who does an unskilled type of a manual labor type job.
We should have the same respect and people should be judged on their spiritual condition,
not just, you know, well, we're going to treat you better and have more respect for you because
you're wealthy.
Some politician comes in and we roll out the red carpet, I'll bolt the door before they
get in.
A lot of people, a lot of churches, it's like some politician will come in, some fancy high-rolling
politician guy, you know, with his gold ring and goodly apparel, he'll come in, he's not
even saved, he doesn't even believe the gospel of Christ, they'll put him behind the pulpit
and let him speak, his little campaign speak and kiss all the babies and they'll treat
him right and roll out the red carpet and treat him well.
No, we should treat everybody well and the poorest person should be treated like the
richest person and we should never have more respect for someone in the church who's wealthy
than someone who's poor.
We do have people in our church that are poorer than others and wealthier than others and
they should be treated the same.
And the Bible says, let's keep reading, it says, harken my beloved brethren, hath not
God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith?
See that's what it's about, it's about being rich in faith, not about having a bunch of
money.
And it says, do not rich men, or let's keep reading verse 5, it says, rich in faith and
heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him, but ye have despised
the poor.
Do not rich men oppress you and draw you before the judgment seats?
Do not they blaspheme that worthy name by which ye are called?
If ye fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, thou shalt love thy neighbor as
thyself you do well, but if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin and are convinced
the law as transgressors.
So is it a sin to treat a wealthy person better than you treat a poor person?
It's a sin.
It's not just, well it's not the best way to live, no it's sin.
It's like sin like stealing is a sin.
Like adultery is a sin, like lying is a sin.
It is also a sin when we have respect to persons.
You know what that means?
When it matters to us how much money somebody makes.
That's sin.
That's kind of what I was touching on on Sunday night about the idolatry where we lift up
Hollywood stars and the celebrities and we think that they're wonderful and when one
of them throws Jesus a bone we get so excited about it because we respect their person.
Or those people can sometimes do wrong and we'll look the other way.
For example, let's say we had a guy in our church who is a wealthy guy, let's say he's
putting a lot of money in the offering plate.
And let's say that guy is offended by something that's preached and it's biblical but he's
offended by it and the pastor says well I better back off on that because it offended
so and so.
Whereas some poor person comes up and says hey I didn't appreciate that, you're like
drop dead.
Because it's just a different level of respect that's shown to the one versus the other.
That's wicked, that's sinful.
And the world does judge people based on how much money they make.
And when you pull up in a nice car, they have more respect for you.
And when you come in in nice clothes, they have more respect for you.
You walk into a restaurant, you might be treated better if you're dressed nice and have a nice
vehicle.
You walk into any store, you walk into any group of worldly, unsaved, sinful type people,
they are going to treat you better if you're dressed nice and have money and if you have
chosen a job that's a high paying job, you know, doctor, lawyer, whatever.
Versus if you're just a tradesman.
Versus if you're a painter, a carpenter, plumber, electrician, landscaper, whatever.
You know just doing an honest living, blue collar type job.
They'll treat you differently but you know what, it ought never be so in God's house.
We should always treat people the same and not give preference unto the one that is wealthy
here.
And not even in our heart, I'm not even just saying in your actions, I'm saying not even
in your heart.
Oh, you know, so and so doesn't even have a car.
I don't even have a car anymore.
We do have our van that's my wife's van.
We used to have my wife's van and then I had my own car.
My car broke down and I just never even replaced it.
My car is a bicycle or I walk or I drive my wife's van but obviously that van is really
my van.
Okay, obviously I'm the man of the house, it all belongs to me.
But you know what I'm saying, I'm just saying you know we don't have a bunch of fancy cars.
You know we don't have necessarily all the nicest things.
I'm not trying to impress people and show off.
You know what, if somebody doesn't have a car and they ride a bike, so what?
They're probably smarter in a lot of ways.
They're probably going to live longer because they're getting all that cardio workout whether
they want it or not.
Every time they go somewhere they're getting a cardio workout.
They're getting all kinds of fresh air.
They're living healthy.
They're saving money on a lot of different things.
You know, don't just sit there, oh yeah, so and so.
That's a wicked worldly mentality that you got from TV and movies.
You didn't get that from the Word of God.
And so we need to be careful that we don't get this covetous respecter of person lifting
up of the rich, lifting up of Hollywood and celebrities and politicians.
And the Bible says a lot of those people blaspheme Christ.
And you like them anyway.
You don't like the guy who loves Christ but he's poor, but you love this person who blasphemes
Christ because they're so good looking and wealthy and have fancy clothes that is on
TV.
So it's an ungodly mentality, my friend.
And so the Bible said in Job 13 10, he will surely reprove you if you do secretly accept
persons, Job 13 10.
Is that your actions or your heart?
Heart.
Secretly.
Even in your heart look down on somebody for being poor.
And even in your heart look up and highly upon someone who's wealthy and rich because
of their possessions and materially.
We should be dressed in modest apparel.
And I'm not saying, it's good to dress nice, I mean I'm wearing a shirt and tie, but it's
a shirt and tie from the thrift store.
And I have some fancy looking suits, they're all used.
And I'm not saying it's wrong to dress, I think that you should wear your best to church
just to show respect and just because you dress up for things that are important.
But if you come straight from work, you come straight from work, but I like to put on nice
clothes to church, but you know what, I'm not putting on stuff that's overly fancy just
to try to show you, hey look everybody, look at all the gold, look at all the jewels, look
at all the precious stones, and look upon my fancy Italian made suit and my fancy shoes.
We need to be careful that we don't go overboard on stuff like that.
The Bible warns us about gold and precious stones and pearls, that that should not be
something that women even adorn themselves with, that rather they should wear modest
apparel.
So that is biblical.
That we should wear durable, good clothing, and Jesus had decent clothes.
I mean Jesus' clothes weren't trash because they were fighting over him when he died.
They're gambling for him.
Quite a decent raiment, but I don't think he was looking like a televangelist either.
So anyway, it says in verse 11, shall not his excellency make you afraid and his dread
fall upon you?
So notice verse 10 and 11 combined.
He'll surely reprove you if you do secretly accept persons.
Shall not his excellency make you afraid and his dread fall upon you?
Meaning we need to have respect for God, not the celebrities of the world, not the wealthy
people of this world.
God's fear, God's dread should cause us to respect him so much that we would dare not
respect man's person when he's commanded us repeatedly not to.
And by the way, the word dread there is used in conjunction with the word fear.
A lot of people try to water down the Bible's word fear.
You know when the Bible says fear God, they'll say well fear doesn't really mean fear.
Okay why did it say fear and trembling?
Well fear is not fear, it's just respect.
Okay you just tremble out of respect?
No you tremble because you're afraid.
And by the way dread is an even stronger word of fear and the Bible says the Lord should
be our dread.
The Lord should be our fear.
We should fear him and dread him.
It doesn't mean that we don't love him, it doesn't mean that we don't know that we're
his children and that he'll never leave us or forsake us, but we should have a healthy
fear of God where we realize that God controls our destiny and he can either make us or break
us anytime he wants.
It says in verse 12, your remembrances are like unto ashes your bodies to bodies of clay.
You know you respect man so much but man is just dirt, man is just clay, he's of the dust
of the earth.
It's God that should be our fear and dread.
We should respect God and not respect man based upon carnal things like wealth and clothing.
It says in verse 13, hold your peace, let me alone that I may speak and let come on
me what will.
Therefore do I take my flesh and my teeth and put my life in mine hand.
Though he slay me, yet will I trust him.
But I will maintain mine own ways before him.
He also shall be my salvation for a hypocrite shall not come before him.
Now let me park it at that verse momentarily here, verse 16.
He also shall be my salvation for a hypocrite shall not come before him.
Now what's another word for the word for there?
Because right?
He's saying God's going to be my salvation because a hypocrite shall not come before
him.
You know what that means?
If anything is your salvation besides God and the Lord being your salvation, you're
a hypocrite.
Jonah said in chapter 2 verse 10, salvation is of the Lord.
It's not by works of righteousness that we have done but according to his mercy he saved
us.
The Bible teaches that our salvation is in Jesus not in our own works.
The Bible says, for by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves it
is the gift of God, not of works lest any man should boast.
Because if salvation were by works we would boast.
And that's why a lot of people you ask them, how do you know you're going to go to heaven
and they start telling you how good they are.
What are they doing?
Boasting.
Oh yeah, I go to church, I read the Bible, I've been baptized, I'm a good person, good
works, good deeds.
If you're relying on that you're a hypocrite because there's none doing good but one and
that's God.
And the Bible here is saying, he shall be my salvation.
Christ is our salvation.
The death, burial, and resurrection is our salvation.
It's by faith alone.
Why?
Because a hypocrite shall not come before him.
Now it's interesting because if you look at the parable that Jesus gives about the servants
that are left behind at the vineyard when the Lord goes away into a far country, it
talks about how when he returns and he finds the servants eating and drinking and being
drunk and beating their fellow servants, and he asks the Pharisee what's he going to do
to those servants when he finds them so doing, I believe it's the end of Matthew 24, and
he says he's going to cut him in sunder and give him his portion.
This parable is found in two different places, Matthew and Luke.
One of them says he'll give him his portion with the unbelievers, and the other place
it says give him his portion with the hypocrites.
So it's funny that he gives the exact same parable and quotation.
One place he calls them the unbelievers, one place he calls them the hypocrites, but he's
talking about the same people.
That tells us that unbelievers are hypocrites.
And unbelievers will constantly say, oh I'm not going to go to church, there's too many
hypocrites.
You know who the biggest hypocrites are?
The unbelievers.
See, believers aren't hypocrites, because we don't go around preaching, we're great,
we're going to heaven, and we're great, so be like us.
Well if we said that we would be hypocrites, because none of us is great, because there's
none good but one, and that's God, and the Bible says as it is written there's none righteous,
no not one.
But if we say to people, I'm a sinner, I am not worthy of salvation, but I'm going to
heaven because I have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you are not saved, you're
a sinner, you're ungodly, but if you believe on Christ you'll be saved too, just like I'm
saved through faith.
Not by works of righteousness we've done, we're not bragging, our righteousnesses are
as filthy rags.
But it's through Christ, there's nothing hypocritical about that.
But when you believe in salvation by works, you're a hypocrite.
And how many people do you know who say, oh well I'm going to heaven because I'm this
and I'm that, and then they live a sinful life, and then it's like well you're a hypocrite.
Here you are boasting about your righteousness as you live an ungodly life.
But all unbelievers are hypocrites, the Bible teaches.
When our faith is not in Christ, as it says in Job here, when He's not our salvation,
when Jesus isn't our salvation, you're a hypocrite.
And hypocrites aren't going to stand before Him.
And anybody who boasts of their own works and their own goodness is a hypocrite in the
sight of God sees right through that, and no flesh will glory in His presence.
No flesh will boast in His presence.
And those who brag about their works, Lord, Lord, we prophesied in Thy name and in Thy
name of cast out devils, in Thy name we've done many wonderful works.
He says, I never knew you.
Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity.
So hypocrisy is embodied in work salvation.
Those who are unbelievers, those who do not have their faith in Christ, anyone who can't
say he's my salvation is a hypocrite when they're trusting their works and their religion
and their actions to save them.
I'm out of time, I've got to just quickly hurry.
We already read the whole chapter at the beginning of the sermon, so I'm just going to jump down
to verse 26, something else I wanted to point out in Job 13.
It says, for thou rightest, he's talking about his friends, for thou rightest bitter things
against me, and makest me to possess the iniquities of my youth.
Now, who here wants to be held responsible for the iniquities of your youth?
I mean, who here wants people, and what does it mean to possess something?
What's another word for to possess it?
To own it.
To take ownership.
Who here wants to possess and have somebody make you own the sins of your youth?
Call you on the carpet for the sins of your youth.
And there's a scripture like this, and I don't have this in my notes, but I want to say it's
Psalm 25.
I'm going to flip over there and see if I can find it real quickly.
Yeah, Psalm 25 verse 7, you don't have to turn there, but it says, remember not the
sins of my youth.
This is what David prayed.
Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions according to thy mercy.
Remember thou me for thy goodness sake, O Lord.
So David said, forget the sins of my youth, God.
Here he said, Job is saying, look guys, are you trying to make me own or possess the sins
of my youth?
You want to make me possess the iniquities of my youth?
Now, here's the great thing about God.
He's a forgiving God.
And the Bible says that if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us
our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
And we all have done stupid things in our life, and some people have done things worse
than others.
Some people have gone just way into the depths of a really sinful and debauched life, and
they've gotten into major sin in their life.
Other people have gone into less extremes of sin.
I grew up in a Christian home.
I never just went off the deep end or anything.
I've been in church my whole life.
But does that mean that I haven't done a lot of sins in my life?
Of course I've sinned, of course, especially in my youth.
The Bible says foolishness is bound in the heart of a child.
But the rod of correction will drive it far from me.
And there are so many stupid and embarrassing things that I've done as a teenager and as
a young adult in my youth.
A lot of things that I would be ashamed of and embarrassed and would not want people
to know that I did something stupid or said something stupid or committed some sin in
my youth.
And I guarantee that every person in this room would say the same thing.
You know, that there's stuff that's just bad stuff.
Now there's a doctrine out there that says that when you get to heaven, God's going to
bring all that stuff up.
Have you heard this doctrine though?
They say, oh yeah, when you get to heaven, God's going to put it on a big screen and
everybody's going to see what you've done.
And I remember hearing that preaching when I was a kid and it scared me to death.
I was thinking like, oh man, you know.
And it's funny because the sins that I had when you're a little tiny kid, they seem so
minor looking back.
You know, just playground infractions, you know.
And you're just thinking to yourself, oh man, what am I going to say?
What am I, you know, it's going to be humiliating when God brings this out.
But thank God, as far as the east is from the west, God has separated us from our sins.
And by the way, if someone is a born again child of God, if somebody's saved, and if
somebody is living for God now and serving God now and loves God, we should not go trying
to dig up things about their past to throw in their face.
It's wicked, it's ungodly.
And I know some people who do have a pretty bad past who are doing great things for God
now and wicked people would be the ones who would try to bring up bad stuff from their
past, to try to discourage them, to try to give them a bad name.
And even in the past few years I've seen it, of people that are serving God and doing great
things for God, where people went and dug up stuff about their past and finding anything
from their past.
And it's ungodly.
I mean, it's of the devil.
Because when people are sorry and they've repented of it and they've moved on and then
you're just going to keep bringing it up, you know, that's not forgiving.
That's not a Christian attitude.
When someone has lived a life of sin and left that behind, we should let them move on and
let them live that down.
And we should not be one that brings the sins of their youth unto remembrance.
It's ungodly.
It's wicked.
Now it's one thing if somebody's persisting in sin or denying that they've committed sin
or lying about it and trying to cover up and hide it.
You know, sometimes there are things that need to be exposed and brought to light.
But you know what?
People who just a long time ago lived a sinful life and now they're living for God, let
the past lie.
You're wicked if you bring out some sinful past of some preacher or some godly church
member that they did in the past just to try to bring them down when it was something a
long time ago that's repented of and forgiven and forgotten of the Father.
You know, and you're bringing it back up.
You know, people have really tried hard to dig stuff up about my past.
And you know, trying to dig up something to attack me about is pretty easy.
But it's all recent.
And I'm not saying it's sinful stuff.
I'm just saying, you know, there's a lot of stuff that I've preached and a lot of stuff
that I've said that makes a lot of people mad and that makes for a good headline, you
know, to try to attack me.
And you know, people who didn't like the After the Tribulation film, you know, they're looking
for stuff to attack about me.
You know, they try to dig up stuff from my past.
My past is squeaky clean, but you know what?
You know, they're finding stuff from one, two, three, four years ago.
But guess what?
I'm not ashamed of it.
You know, and I'm not a perfect person.
And if people want to find fault with me and find sin in me, they're going to find it because
I do have sin and I do have faults and I'm a human being and I'm not a unicorn and I'm
not a God man and I'm not perfect, okay?
I have my faults and my flaws, of course, and if you want to go digging around to find
stuff about me, you know, it's probably going to be current things that you don't like about
me.
And people, you know, they dig up about me, oh, this is what he said about homos, this
is what he said about Obama, and it's funny because they think that they're like exposing
me and it's like, yeah, I uploaded that video, you know what I mean?
They think that they dug up, oh, but have you seen this?
It's like, well, yeah, I uploaded it, you know, of course they've seen it.
You know, but I'm telling you, you know what?
Not everybody had the privilege of growing up in a Christian home, you know, and I thank
God that I did grow up in a Christian home and even though I wasn't perfect, even though
I did a lot of stupid things as a teenager, you know, I thank God that at least I grew
up in a Christian home.
But you know what?
Somebody who didn't grow up in a Christian home, somebody who grew up in a really wicked
and sinful home and has come out of that and been delivered from that and has fought that
uphill battle, an upstream battle of breaking a cycle of all the sin in their family and
all the wrong things that they grew up doing, you know what?
That person, if they're living for God now, leave the past behind and don't ever use someone's
sinful past to throw in their face lest ye be like the devil, bringing up people's past
to them and rubbing their nose in it and making them to possess the sins of their youth.
You know, let's just forget those things which are behind and reach forth unto those things
which are before.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Lord, we thank you so much for this chapter.
There's a lot that we could learn and this chapter is really packed with a lot of good
things and we didn't really have time to really do it full justice, but Lord I just pray that
something in the sermon tonight would be helpful to those that have heard and that we would
grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Please just help us to be like Job, to be a great man of God.
Help us not to be like these friends who, they speak wickedly for God, they put words
in your mouth and they also made Job to possess the sins of his youth.
Help us to be kind to one another and to forgive and forget the past with people and we love
you Lord and we thank you for the people that were saved out soul winning today and we thank
you for our church and for our friends that we have here in Christ and we just thank you
for the fellowship that we have and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.