Man, the title of my sermon this evening is Man of God.
Man of God, the Bible says here in verse 16,
all scripture is given by inspiration of God
and is profitable for doctrine,
for reproof, for correction,
for instruction and righteousness
that the man of God may be perfect,
throughly furnished unto all good works.
Now this term, man of God,
is used about 70 some odd times in the Bible,
but it's almost all in the Old Testament.
So it'll be used about people like Moses and Elisha,
other prophets and men of God that preach the word of God.
And in the New Testament, it's used here about Timothy.
And these are known as the pastoral epistles.
And so Paul is writing to his young protege
in the ministry, Pastor Timothy.
And in 1 Timothy chapter six,
he calls him, oh, man of God.
And then here he talks about some things
that the man of God should have in his life
as an example for Timothy.
Now in tonight's sermon, I really wanna focus in
on one particular man of God, which is Moses.
Because the first person of whom it is ever said
in the Bible, man of God is Moses.
And if you would flip over to Hebrews chapter number three,
and the Bible says in Deuteronomy 33, one,
this is the blessing where with Moses, the man of God,
blessed the children of Israel before his death.
So when Moses reaches the end of his life,
he's called Moses, the man of God, right?
Kind of summing him up sort of like Abraham
is the friend of God, Moses, the man of God.
What is it that made Moses such a great man of God?
And that's what I'm gonna talk about tonight.
What made him a great man of God?
Because these are lessons that all of us as Christians
can learn from man, woman, boy, and girl,
the same attributes that Moses had
that made him a great man of God.
You know, these are the type of things
that we need to have in our life.
Number one, Moses was faithful in God's house.
Look what the Bible says in Hebrews chapter three,
verse one.
It says, wherefore, holy brethren,
partakers of the heavenly calling,
consider the apostle and high priest of our profession,
Christ Jesus, who was faithful to him that appointed him
as also Moses was faithful in all his house.
Now, who is the his house referring to?
It is referring to the house of God, Jesus Christ's house.
And I'm going to prove that to you in a moment.
It says in verse number three, for this man,
talking about Jesus Christ,
was counted worthy of more glory than Moses
in as much as he who hath builded the house
hath more honor than the house.
For every house is builded by some man,
but he that built all things is God.
Now, don't let this just kind of blow past you here,
because this I think is one of the most powerful proofs
in the Bible to just really hammer down
the deity of Jesus Christ really prove
that Jesus Christ is God and that he is the creator.
Because it says that if you compare Jesus with Moses,
Jesus is worthy of more glory than Moses
in as much as you had builded the house
is having more honor than the house, right?
So Jesus is to Moses as the one who built the house
is to the house for every house is builded by some man,
but he that built all things is God.
So Jesus Christ is the one who built all things.
He is Moses creator.
So if you're gonna compare Jesus to Moses,
you're comparing the creator with the creation.
And without him, the Bible says,
was not anything made that was made.
Jesus Christ is the creator of the universe.
Jesus Christ is God.
Now, of course, Jesus is the son of God,
but this is because God eternally exists
as father, son, and Holy Ghost.
And so therefore, Jesus was in the beginning with God,
and he was God.
But that's not what we're here to talk about.
We're here to talk about Moses
being faithful in all his house.
It says in verse five,
and Moses verily or truly was faithful in all his house,
talking about Jesus Christ's house, as a servant, right?
So Moses is a faithful servant in the house of God
for a testimony of those things
which were to be spoken after,
but Christ as a son over his own house, right?
So Moses is faithful in the house of God,
Jesus is faithful in his own house,
'cause the house of God is the house of Christ,
'cause Christ is God.
And it says, but Christ as a son over his own house,
whose house are we if we hold fast the confidence
and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end.
So what does this mean that Moses was faithful
in God's house and also that Jesus Christ was faithful
in his own house?
Well, the Bible, actually, if we look this up
in the dictionary, if we just look up the word faithful,
it says true to one's word.
And we talked about that this morning, didn't we?
True to one's word, promise or vows.
Do what you say you will do.
Steady in allegiance or affection.
Loyal, constant, for example, faithful friends.
Here are some synonyms.
Staunch, devoted, true, reliable, trusted, believed.
And then another definition is strict or thorough
in the performance of duty, right?
So does this sound like the kind of guy
who just pops into church every once in a while
and you can't really count it?
No, this is someone that you can count on to be there.
And all of us as Christians should strive
to be faithful in God's house.
Reliable, true, loyal, constant, steady, diligent
to be in our place in the house of God.
Not just sort of popping in and eh, maybe we'll show up,
maybe we won't, maybe I'll participate,
maybe I won't, maybe I'll preach, maybe I won't.
No, we need to be instant, in season, out of season.
Me as the preacher, you probably expect me to show up
on Sunday morning and show up on Sunday night
and show up on Wednesday night unless there's a good reason.
If I'm sick or gone or something,
and there's a legitimate reason,
do you just expect me to just willy nilly pop in here
and just preach when I feel like it?
No, there's something to be said
for consistency in our lives.
Your job is the same way, right?
You show up every day.
That's a big part of succeeding right there.
I mean, a lot of jobs just want you to just get up
in the morning and show up.
And it's the same thing with school or anything else.
Showing up is half the battle.
And showing up to church is pretty easy to do,
just to show up and warm a chair for an hour or so.
And it'll do wonders for your Christian life
to just be faithful to God's house,
meaning that you're reliable and steady in your attendance,
and then also faithful in God's house,
that when you get here, you know,
you're somebody that we can rely on to participate,
to not be a bozo, not be a backbiter,
not be a turncoat, not to be some kind of a saboteur
of the work of God,
but that you're actually participating
in moving God's work forward
and being a blessing to those around you.
So Moses is a man of God
because he's faithful in God's house.
The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 4,
"Let a man so account of us as the ministers of Christ
and stewards of the mysteries of God.
Moreover, it is required in stewards
that a man be found faithful," right?
So a steward is someone that you entrust your goods to
and we talked about this last Sunday night
with the unjust steward.
And the boss is relying on him to take care of the finances
and he's goofing it up and wasting the finances.
Well, here's the thing.
God has entrusted us with the mysteries,
the Bible says, of Christ, right?
The mysteries of God.
And we know the answers to these questions.
What do we have to do to go to heaven, right?
We know the answer to that question.
Why are we here?
What's our purpose in this world?
Where are we going after we die?
We know these things.
We've learned them from the word of God.
We've got the Bible to stand on.
And we need to be good stewards of the mysteries of God.
God has committed unto us, entrusted unto us.
He's relying on us to be good stewards of these things
that we would have been entrusted
with the ministry of reconciliation.
God has trusted us with the ministry of reconciliation
to go out there and say to the lost, unsaved people
in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God, right?
To go to the unsaved and preach them
the unsearchable riches of Christ.
He's relying on us to do that, it's our job.
And we wanna be faithful, reliable, steadfast, unmovable,
always abounding in the word of the Lord,
not just occasionally having a little burst
of activity for the Lord.
Occasionally we do a little binge Bible reading,
we occasionally show up to church a few times
and then fall out after a few services,
go to soul winning maybe once in a blue moon.
No man, we wanna be steady, wanna be reliable,
wanna be faithful.
It is required of stewards that a man be found faithful.
We're stewards of all the good things
that have been given to us, the knowledge,
the spirit that we've been given.
And so we wanna actually make something out of it
and not squander it and waste it.
But number two, not only was Moses faithful in God's house,
number two, he was a friend of God.
Now this is most notably said about Abraham.
Abraham was called the friend of God.
But I would submit to you that Moses
was also a friend of God.
Go if you would to Hebrews chapter 11.
And while you're turning to Hebrews chapter 11
toward the end of the Bible,
I'm gonna read for you from Exodus 33
where the Bible says the Lord spake unto Moses face to face
as a man speaketh unto his friend.
So the way that God spoke to Moses was different
than the way he communicated with most prophets
because he spoke unto him
the way that a man speaks to his friend.
And he turned again out of the camp,
excuse me, he turned again into the camp,
but his servant Joshua, the son of none,
a young man departed not out of the tabernacle.
James 2.23 is the verse that talks about Abraham
believed God and it was imputed unto him for righteousness
and he was called the friend of God.
And when I hear this term friend of God,
it makes me think of someone who has a close walk with God,
a good relationship with God.
And when I think of a friend,
I think of someone that I spend time with.
I mean, if I never spend time with someone,
if I never talk to them or hang out with them,
I wouldn't really consider them much of a friend.
They might be an associate, a colleague,
they might be someone that I admire or like,
but unless we're spending time together,
it's really hard to think of that person as a friend,
someone that you barely spend time.
So when I think of a friend,
I think of someone that you actually share life with
and spend time with and talk to and interact with.
And then I also think of someone
who's gonna be there for you when you need them, right?
The Bible says a friend loveth at all times
and a brother is born for adversity.
And so when I think about a friend,
I think of someone who you can rely on,
which kind of brings us back to point number one,
being faithful, faithful friend,
being reliable, being true, being steady.
And so in order to be a friend of God,
this is someone who spends time with God,
has a close walk with God.
Why is Abraham the friend of God?
Why is Moses, you know, having this talk with God,
like a man talks to his friend?
Because of the fact that they are
spending the time with God, okay?
So if you're praying, if you're reading your Bible, right?
That's time with the Lord.
Showing up to church, you're spending time with God,
because where two or three are gathered together
in his name, there he is in the midst.
And so you're here hearing what the spirit
sayeth unto the churches.
The Holy Spirit is hopefully speaking to you
through the sermon, through the word of God tonight.
And so you're spending time communing with God in church.
You're spending time in communion with God
when you read your Bible, when you pray.
So if you wanna be the friend of God,
you wanna have that close walk with God.
But it doesn't end there, because also,
when I think of a friend, I don't think of someone
who's allied with my enemies.
I mean, think about it, if there's someone who just hates me
and is trying to destroy me,
and then my so-called friend is praising that person,
buddies with that person, hanging out with that person,
you'd think, wait a minute, why would you be teamed up with
or allied with someone who hates me
if supposedly you're my friend?
Why are you cheerleading the enemy?
And here's the thing, you'd say,
hey, you're gonna have to choose here.
Do you wanna be friends with me
or do you wanna be friends with that person over there
that hates my ever-loving guts?
Well, you know what, God says the same thing,
because here's what he says in the book of James.
He says, "Ye adulterers and adulteresses,
"know ye not that the friendship of the world
"is enmity with God?
"Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world
"is the enemy of God."
Now look, the opposite of being God's friend
is being God's enemy.
Last thing I wanna do is to be at enmity with God.
I wanna be a friend of God.
I wanna be faithful in God's house.
I wanna be someone that he can rely on.
I would hate for God to look down and say,
"Well, you're a friend of the world."
And let me tell you something,
contrary to what some people think,
you can't "have it all" and have both sides
and play both sides and say,
"Well, I'm gonna have my cake and eat it too.
"I'm gonna be loved and respected
"and lifted up by this world,
"and I'm also going to be a friend of God."
It doesn't work that way,
because the friendship of the world is enmity with God.
Whosoever therefore will, that means wants to,
whoever wants to be a friend of the world
is the enemy of God.
And what do we mean by the world?
Obviously, we're not talking about
every single person in the world.
We're talking about the world in general,
just people who don't believe in Jesus Christ,
non-Christians, just kind of the secular environment
that we live in.
What I mean by that is that if you are serving God
and you are a man of God or a woman of God
and you're out there doing great things for God,
you are not going to be the most popular person in town.
You are not gonna be the big man on campus
if you're bringing your Bible and preaching the word of God
and soul-winning and showing your friends the gospel,
that is not gonna make you voted as the prom king
or the prom queen or most popular or what have you.
It just isn't.
Now look, obviously we should all strive
to get along with people and as much as is possible,
we should try to live at peace with all men
and at work we should try to get along with people
be a peacemaker, at school, in the neighborhood,
wherever we find ourselves.
We wanna try to get along with people
but here's the bottom line.
This isn't a maybe, ye and all that will live godly
in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.
This isn't just only in the end times
there'll be persecution or only in an extreme situation
maybe this will happen to you.
No, no, no, this is a guarantee.
All that will live godly in Christ Jesus
shall suffer persecution.
We're not out looking for it.
We're trying to get along.
But you know, as David said, I'm for peace.
But when I speak, they're for war.
Now here's the thing about this.
Of course, when we go to our job
and when we go to school
and when we go to the, you know,
community functions and things,
yeah, people should like us 'cause we're nice people.
But here's the thing, that's probably
because we're not talking about the Bible
or preaching the Bible.
You know, it's pretty easy for me to get on an airplane
and hang out with just liberal Democrats
and just as long as we don't talk about the Bible.
We're gonna be fine.
But you know what, if we turn to Romans one,
the conversation's gonna go sideways pretty quick.
So then is the answer just,
oh, just don't go to Romans one.
Oh, we're going to Romans one.
I'm just saying, look, and obviously,
don't get me wrong, when it comes to the unsaved,
when unsaved people, I determine not to know anything
among them except Jesus Christ and him crucified.
Unsaved people need the gospel and that's it.
But anybody who's saved, we can show them
any doctrine out of the Bible.
I don't care if they got saved five minutes ago,
we're teaching the whole Bible.
We're showing them what we got.
We're showing them all the doctrine.
By the way, there's no secret doctrine
at Faithful Word Baptist Church.
It's all, cards are all out on the table.
Everything's out in the open.
Check the statement of faith, listen to the sermons.
There's no secret meeting where we're gonna lay out
the hidden esoteric doctrines.
Nope, all the doctrine is out there for everybody to hear
and the grandma can handle it.
New believers can handle it, everybody can handle it.
As long as they're saved,
they're gonna be able to handle it.
The world though, we're talking about the people out there
outside of the church.
I'm sorry, but the world is not gonna love Christians.
They're just not.
The preachers and the churches who wanna be loved
of the world are going down a dark path
because whoever wants to be a friend of the world
ends up being the enemy of God
and that's not where we wanna be.
So yeah, we wanna try to get along with people.
We wanna try to bring people over to our side.
We wanna show them the love of Christ
but we're gonna also preach the word of God uncensored,
unfiltered and you know what?
Sometimes people are gonna freak out about it.
Well, nuts to 'em because we're not changing
what we believe and we're not gonna say it quieter.
We're gonna say it louder
and we're gonna put it on the internet
and we're not gonna stop.
And so the Bible says that if you wanna be a friend of God
you kinda have to pick a side here
'cause if you're trying to be a friend of the world
you're the enemy of God.
Isn't that what the Bible says?
So let's look at this in the life of Moses
'cause we said Moses is the quintessential man of God
in the word of God, right?
He is number one, faithful,
but number two, he's a friend of God.
Look what he did.
Look at Hebrews chapter 11 verse 24.
By faith, Moses, when he was come to years,
refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.
So in Hebrews 11, 24,
Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter,
choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God.
Affliction is another word for tribulation, persecution, right?
Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God
than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season.
Esteeming the reproach of Christ,
what is the reproach of Christ?
This is being ridiculed for believing in Christ,
being criticized for believing in Christ,
being attacked for being a Christian
and made fun of and persecuted.
He says he chose the reproach of Christ
because he esteemed that to be greater riches
than the treasures in Egypt.
All the gold and silver and precious stones
is nothing compared to the honor of suffering reproach
for the cause of Christ, being ridiculed.
That's why the Bible says when people persecute you
and hate you and say all manner of evil against you
falsely for my name's sake, rejoice and be exceeding glad.
For great is your reward in heaven.
A bigger reward than the treasures of Egypt.
And you know, Egypt is famous for all of the treasures.
You know, digging up King Tut's tomb or whatever, right?
All of these rich, wealthy, I mean if that's the stuff
that they're burying, they must have had a lot of stuff.
And Moses looked at all that the world had to offer
and said nope, rewards in heaven are better.
And here's the thing, salvation's a free gift.
We don't have to earn our way to heaven.
We are saved because we believe in Jesus.
And we don't have to do any works to get saved,
we don't have to do any works to stay saved
or to prove that we're saved.
Nope, it's just by grace through faith,
plus nothing, minus nothing.
So when we do work for Christ, after we're saved,
we're earning rewards, right?
And the Bible says, lay not up for yourselves
treasures upon earth, where moth and rust
doth corrupt and where thieves break through in steel,
but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, right?
Where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt
and where thieves do not break through nor steal,
for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
And so Moses, he made the right choice of saying,
you know what, I'm not trying to be considered
the best guy in Egypt, and I wanna be just loved by Egypt,
and Mr. Egypt, and oh, I'm the son of Pharaoh's daughter.
He said, man, I don't even want that title.
I'm ashamed of that title.
In fact, I refuse to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter
'cause you know what, to me, it's more important
that I be an Israelite.
You know, it's more important
that I be of the tribe of Levi.
That's who I wanna claim, the people of God.
And obviously, the analogy for us today would be,
hey, more important even than being American
is being Christian.
Being Christian is the most important identity that we have.
And so he said that he had respect
to the recompense of the reward.
He understood that the reward up in heaven
is better than whatever's down here.
And it says, by faith he forsook Egypt,
not fearing the wrath of the king,
for he endured as seeing him who is invisible.
The idea here is that we as Christians
should not seek to be big successes on this earth,
first and foremost.
Obviously we want to do our best at our job,
or anything that we put our hand to,
we should do it heartily, do our best, give it our best,
but at the end of the day,
real success is spiritual success in the eyes of God.
Okay, and look, I want you to do the best you can
as an electrician, plumber, carpenter, computer programmer,
whatever it is you do, I want you to give it your best.
But you know, here's a really good reason
to give it your best,
because you're doing it as unto Christ.
You represent Christ, you're doing it as unto the Lord,
okay, and not unto men.
Now me personally, my job is to be the pastor of the church.
So I really better make sure
that my goal is to please God and not to please the world.
You know, some politician,
some House of Representatives or Senate guy or whatever
sent me a voicemail or an email or something recently
inviting me to this breakfast of faith leaders.
This guy clearly doesn't know who I am,
'cause otherwise I wouldn't be invited.
There's no way he's like, hey, who's that guy?
It's Steve Anderson, you know, I've seen his stuff.
I've seen some of his reels pop up in my feed.
It's Steven Anderson down here.
Let's see what he has to say about policy.
That's not what happened, right?
This guy must be inviting everybody if I got invited.
He's just inviting pastors or whatever, right?
So I don't know, maybe I should show up to this thing
and hobnob with some of these powerful people
and some of these movers and shakers
politically and religiously.
And maybe I can become like a respected pillar
in the community and maybe I can sit at the faith breakfast.
Maybe I can sit between like a rabbi and an imam
and a guru and we can just, you know,
we can all just kind of just put aside our differences
and just kind of, you know, help the community
and then maybe people will like me
and I can win over this Democrat senator
or whoever that invited me to this thing.
And I can show him what a nice guy I am.
Here's the thing, that's just a fool's errand.
You know, I remember when I was in Bible college,
they actually, you know, they taught us
to schmooze politicians.
And they taught us to, you know,
become buddies with the police chief,
become buddies with the fire chief
and take him out for coffee and take him out for lunch.
And, you know, you gotta get these people on your side
and get to know the mayor and get to know these people.
And, you know, what's funny is that doesn't work anyway.
So I'm not gonna spend any time on it
because once they hear the word of God preach,
they're not gonna like it anyway.
And the problem is if I start making all these
unsaved worldly people, my counselors and my advisors
and my friends, then the next thing I know is like,
well, I don't wanna lose my standing in the community.
I mean, you know, they gave me the key to the city.
I don't want them to take it back.
So I guess I gotta trim the message,
be careful what I preach.
You know, I'd rather just say, you know,
let's just keep that separate.
Let the government do their thing, that's their problem.
I'm just gonna preach the word of God.
I already know they don't like it, like it.
You and I both know they're not gonna like it.
They're not gonna like it.
If it's unfiltered, they're not gonna like it.
They want to be prophesied smooth things.
You know, here's a perfect example.
There's a pastor in Northern California, Jack Treber,
always schmoozing the politicians
and he's got this congressman buddy.
He literally did fly to Washington DC
and open Congress in prayer.
You know, this independent fundamental Baptist pastor
and he's opening Congress in prayer
and he's buddies with the fire chief
and the congressman and the police chief.
All these buddies, right, spends all this time
kissing up to politicians.
And then what happens when COVID hit,
they said that he can't meet
'cause he has this big church
and they're saying it's too many people,
it's gonna be a super spreader service
and so we don't want to allow you to gather.
And so here's the thing, he's having church anyway
and they're just fining him like every day,
thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars
for having church services in spite of being ordered not to
and they're just fining him with like,
I don't remember how much it was
but we're talking like 50,000, 100,000,
it was huge numbers and he's like in tears,
like please stop fining me,
like why are you guys doing this to me?
I thought we were friends.
Guess what?
The rulers of the darkness of this world,
they're not gonna return the favor.
Yeah, I just thought it was ironic
that you're gonna sit there and try to be buddies
with all of these wicked politicians.
And I mean, a lot of these politicians
that he was buddying up to are wicked.
You know, he's buddying up to this congressman
who's a liberal Democrat, he's for sodomites,
he's for abortion and he's like,
oh this is my dear friend, you know,
Representative Ro Khanna is my friend and he's my buddy
and you know, we take sweet counsel together
and it's like, hold up, can two walk together
except they be agreed?
What fellowship has righteousness with unrighteousness?
You know, come out from among them and be separate,
sayeth the Lord.
And so, did it work for him?
I don't think it worked for him
because he just got nailed with fines,
no mercy, no quarter, 'cause at the end of the day,
you know, God's gonna bless you more
just doing the right thing and just kind of blowing off.
You know, I don't know if anybody uses
this expression anymore, but you know,
if the city civic leaders wanna hang out with me,
I'm gonna shine 'em on.
I don't know if anybody says that anymore,
that's super old school.
My dad would always say, hey, just shine that guy on.
Who knows what I'm talking about?
All right, 10 people know the archaic slang.
So, number one, we said, be faithful in God's house.
And look, am I making this up tonight?
Did I make these points straight out of the Bible, right?
Be faithful in God's house.
Number two, don't be a friend of the world.
You can't have it all.
If you wanna be a friend of the world,
you're gonna end up being the enemy of God.
Who do you wanna be buddies with?
Worldly, wicked, ungodly people,
the rulers of the darkness of this world,
wicked people promoting filth and degeneracy in our world?
Or you wanna be a friend of God?
'Cause it's not gonna be both.
But number three, why was Moses a great man of God?
Because he was a humble man.
Moses was a humble man.
Go if you would to Numbers, chapter 12.
This is the fourth book in the Bible,
toward the beginning of the Bible.
Numbers, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers.
Now here's the thing.
Some people would say like,
well, so-and-so's not humble because he's just so awesome,
he has the right to brag.
You know, I've pointed out before,
hey, I don't think you should listen to this guy
'cause he's so prideful.
And then I've had people say like,
well, he should be prideful.
Look at his achievements.
It's like, well, hold up.
Nobody has the right to be prideful.
I don't care how many achievements you have,
you shouldn't be huffed up, arrogant, prideful,
or think of yourself more highly than you ought to think.
Because if anybody could have been prideful, it'd be Moses.
'Cause Moses is a great man of God.
And not only that, not only was Moses
spiritually a great man of God,
the Bible says that Moses was learned
in all the wisdom of the Egyptians
and was mighty in words and deeds.
So not only is Moses a spiritual giant,
he's an academic giant.
He's a giant when it comes to even just
the knowledge of this world, the wisdom of the Egyptians.
But does that give him the right to be a prideful man?
No, because I'm telling you right now,
if Moses were prideful,
he would not have been greatly used by God.
God does not greatly use prideful people
'cause he doesn't wanna share his glory
with some guy that's got a big head
and wants to take all the credit.
So he's not gonna share his glory with prideful people.
Prideful people will not make it in the ministry.
They're not gonna make it serving God.
They will crash and burn.
This is a deal breaker when it comes to serving God.
Because here's the thing, at the end of the day,
our success as pastors or even just your success
as a Christian out there
in whatever walk of life you're in,
our success is in God's hand.
If God doesn't want you to succeed,
you're not gonna succeed.
And I don't care how hard you work,
I don't care how smart you are,
if God doesn't bless, you're not going anywhere, okay?
Look, when I first got married,
I've been reminiscing lately, 'cause I was kind of
putting together a story of my life.
And so I've been reminiscing lately,
and you know, I think about the early days of being married
and starting out in my career,
before I became a pastor, doing electrical work.
And there were many years when I worked very hard,
and I was not being lazy, and I wasn't stupid,
but I just could not make it financially.
You know what I mean?
Like I was just struggling, and just barely scraping by,
and just putting stuff on credit cards sometimes,
'cause I was just destitute of finances.
And you know what, I know what that's like.
I've been there in that situation where you're working hard,
you're doing what you're supposed to be doing,
and it's just still hard to make it.
Why?
Because you don't have the right opportunity.
And here's the thing, if you get put
in the right opportunity where your talents
and abilities match the job that you're given,
and you're in the right place at the right time,
then yeah, you can make a ton of money at your job
and be real successful.
But here's the thing, without that opportunity though,
sometimes you can be in a job that's a dead end job,
and the opportunities aren't there.
But God's the one who actually works out events
where you either have those opportunities or you don't.
And you know, after I'd been married for several years,
I ended up getting a job that paid me really well
and was really flexible.
But here's the thing, the only reason that I got that job
was because I had previously worked a job
that I hated for years, but behind the scenes,
what was happening is I was learning all the stuff
I was gonna need for this other job later.
So at the end of the day,
it's only because God was looking out for me
where he allowed me to get a job
that I didn't really want and that I didn't like,
that I didn't enjoy, but God knew that later
that's gonna lead to this job that I need,
that's gonna pay me well down the road.
All I'm saying is this, you know,
the steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord,
in all thy ways acknowledge him
and he shall direct thy paths.
The point is that God can make or break you financially.
I don't care how smart you are
or how hard of a worker you are,
if God just puts up roadblocks,
you'll just never get the opportunity
and you'll just keep on failing financially
and struggling, right?
Whereas God could open doors for you
and put you in the right place.
And we all know those people that aren't that smart,
not that talented, not that hardworking,
and they just make a lot of money
'cause they're just kind of in the right job.
They kind of just got the right place, right time, whatever.
Hey, at the end of the day,
God is the one who's gonna determine
how events in life come at you.
And I don't know about you,
but I want God to be blessing me
and working things out for my favor
so that even when things are bad,
it's 'cause he's preparing me for something good.
And at least I know God's looking out for me,
and in the end, he's gonna bless,
he's gonna take care of me.
Listen to me.
You can be smart and hardworking
and still struggle financially, okay?
And you name the situation
where you think that you've got it all together,
you think, oh, I'm such a great speaker,
and I know the Bible so well,
or I'm gonna be able to just, you know,
take the world by storm as a pastor.
Here's the bottom line.
You're never gonna succeed as a pastor
unless God is blessing you.
Because what did Jesus say?
He said, "Without me, you can do nothing."
Did he say, "Without me, you can do a little bit?"
He said, "Without me, you can do nothing."
The more a pastor abides in the vine,
the more that he is abiding in Christ
and communing with Christ,
the more he's gonna be able to accomplish.
Because it's not by might or by power,
but by my spirit, say, the Lord.
At the end of the day, it is God's spirit.
Look, even in your secular life,
God's blessing can make or break you.
As I mentioned earlier, the opportunity has to be there,
and you have to be in the right.
But here's the, how much more as a pastor,
how much more when it comes to your soul winning
or your mission's success or whatever.
You know, God has to bless or we're getting nothing done.
It ain't happening.
And you know, there've been a lot of pastors over the years,
a lot of posers, okay, who come along and they think,
oh, I'm gonna preach the stuff
that Pastor Anderson preaches
and I'm gonna have the same results.
The problem, and here's the thing,
it's not that they're not good at it,
because you know what?
I'm not necessarily gonna name names,
but like, I'm thinking about a particular guy
who came along and kinda hitched his wagon to us
and jumped on our bandwagon
and started preaching the stuff that I preach.
And you know, I felt like this guy was really good at it.
I felt like he was more dynamic than I was.
I felt like he was preaching better than me at times.
So I mean, like, this guy is doing
the same thing that I'm doing.
But you know what?
This guy was also prideful,
and that's why if we go to this guy's YouTube channel,
he's not getting any views.
If we go to his church, it's not growing.
Why?
Because of the fact that the guy's prideful,
and God can't use prideful people.
What they don't understand
is that it's not about just following a formula of,
oh, if I preach this, do this, do the work, boom,
push the button, the light bulb comes on.
No, it's a spiritual fight, spiritual work,
and it's gotta be blessed by God,
and God is not gonna bless the prideful man.
It's just not gonna happen, okay?
Why not?
Because he doesn't wanna share the glory with that,
and plus, here's the thing.
Look, God knows that if he allows me to have success,
I'm not gonna start thinking I'm awesome.
I'm still gonna get on my knees and tell God,
God, I'm so sorry that I'm not what I should be.
I'm sorry that I did this sin.
I'm sorry for that sin, you know?
I'm like, God, help me to get better in this area.
He knows that I'm still gonna feel bad about myself
and think I need to do better,
and not start thinking, I'm the Christ.
He's gonna know that I'm still gonna look at myself
and think, man, I got a lot of work to do.
I got a lot to fix.
Man, I don't even deserve the blessings I've been given.
I don't even deserve the success that I'm having.
You know what I mean?
God knows that about moi, Stephen Anderson.
And then that's why God willing,
hopefully God can keep blessing me.
'Cause he knows that when he blesses me,
I'm still gonna feel like,
man, I'm not a very good Christian.
And man, I need to fix things
and I need to work on this and whatever.
I'm not just gonna start thinking
that I'm better than someone else
or getting competitive with other people
who are on the same team, right?
I mean, here's the thing.
Steadfast Baptist Church is on the same team.
You know what?
Steadfast Baptist Church had more people saved
than Faithful Word Baptist Church.
Amen.
Praise the Lord.
You know, I would love to see all of my friends churches
to be twice as big as Faithful Word.
To dwarf Faithful Word in attendance,
to dwarf Faithful Word in soul winning,
to dwarf Faithful Word in missions.
Praise God.
Why?
'Cause we're all on the same team.
And you know what?
Here's the thing.
Even people that we're not friends with.
You know, just other soul winning churches.
You know, Valley Baptist Church out in Mesa.
You know, I'm not friends with Pastor Cowling,
but I respect Pastor Cowling.
I respect the work that he's doing.
And you know what?
Here's the thing.
I want them to get the most people saved possible.
And I hope that, I hope right now,
and I'll pray, I'm gonna pray today
that God doubles the size of Valley Baptist Church
in Mesa, Arizona.
Not, why?
Because they're doing work for God.
I'm not gonna sit there and be in competition
with people that are on the same team.
But you know what?
Prideful, arrogant people,
they are in competition with their own friends.
They're in competition with their own team
because they have to be number one.
They have to have the preeminence.
They have to be in the spotlight.
And it drives them insane
if anyone else is succeeding or thriving
or outdoing them when in reality we should just be glad.
Look, not only that, but guess what?
There are people in this room
who get more people saved than I do.
They do more soul winning than I do.
They get more salvations than me.
Keep going, keep going.
I wish that every member of the church
would get more people saved than me, right?
'Cause we're not in competition.
Is this a soul winning competition?
No, it's a team.
And you know what?
I want other people to get beaucoup salvations.
Why?
'Cause I want people to go to heaven.
It's not like, oh man, this guy's outdoing me or whatever.
Better take him down a notch.
It's wicked.
And I hope you never feel that way about each other,
where you'd feel like you need to put somebody
in their place 'cause they're just achieving too much.
Folks, we all should just wanna achieve more.
And when we see people being saved,
it's like when they tried to make John the Baptist
jealous of Jesus.
You remember that?
And they're telling, hey, John the Baptist,
did you know that Jesus has got more disciples than you?
More people are being saved.
More people are being baptized.
And you know what John the Baptist said?
Great, he must increase, I must decrease.
I'm just, you know, and he said, look, you know,
the bridegroom and the bride are the main event.
I'm just the friend of the bridegroom.
I don't have to be the center of attention.
I don't have to be the groom.
I'm just happy to be the best man.
I'm just happy to be a bridesmaid.
I'm just happy to be the ring bearer.
I'm just happy to be, you know, just an usher.
Folks, a real man of God is always willing
to play second fiddle.
A real man of God's always willing to play second fiddle
and doesn't have to be number one.
And here's the thing, was Moses just, I have to be the boss?
No, when God came to Moses and he's just living his life,
just enjoying life with Jethro and his wife, Zipporah,
out in the backside of the desert and God says,
all right, buddy, you're going back to Egypt.
You're going to deliver the people.
He's like, send someone else.
Moses didn't even want to lead.
He didn't even want to do this job.
God had to tell him, you're doing it.
And then he's like, send somebody else.
And God got angry at him and says, you're going.
And what does the Bible say about Moses?
Well, let's see what it says.
Look at chapter 12, verse one.
And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses
because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married,
for he had married an Ethiopian woman.
So they're offended that he marries an Ethiopian,
which obviously there's nothing wrong
with him marrying an Ethiopian woman.
And they said, hath the Lord indeed spoken only by Moses?
Hath he not spoken also by us and the Lord heard?
Notice how they're in competition here,
trying to lift themselves up and drag Moses down.
It's really not about the Ethiopian woman, is it?
Because at the end of the day,
that's just kind of maybe an excuse.
The real issue here is like, well, you know,
didn't he speak by us too?
Aren't we just as good as Moses or whatever?
But look what the Bible says about Moses in verse three.
Now the man Moses was very meek above all the men,
which were upon the face of the earth.
The Bible says that the most humble,
meek man on the face of the earth.
And so they're sitting there acting like
he's trying to be Mr. Big Stuff.
What did God only speak by Moses?
You know?
And really Moses isn't the one who's driving that
because Moses is meek and humble.
And then God comes and answers them
and God basically tells them,
hey look, yeah there are other people
preaching the word of God.
Yeah, there are other people doing great works for God,
but Moses is special.
And so I'm using him greatly
and so why does that bother you?
And of course God ends up punishing Miriam.
It says in verse number nine,
the anger of the Lord was kindled against them
and he departed.
Verse 10, and the cloud departed from off the tabernacle,
and behold Miriam became leprous white as snow.
And Aaron looked upon Miriam and behold she was leprous.
And Aaron said unto Moses, alas my Lord,
I beseech thee, lay not the sin upon us
wherein we have done foolishly
and wherein we have sinned.
Now here's the thing,
is that Miriam and Aaron are good people, right?
Are these like horrible, wicked people?
No, these are good people who just did something bad.
Good people can be wrong, can make mistakes, can sin.
And so Miriam and Aaron are in general good people,
but what did they do?
They lashed out at Moses the man of God,
they criticized him, they falsely accused him
because he's actually humble
and they're accusing him of being prideful.
Like that God only spoke by him.
Where are you?
What you think you're the only one who does soul winning?
You think you're the only one who preaches, you know,
the truth on the rapture or Israel
or any of these other stuff?
No, I don't.
I've never thought that, never said that.
But here's the thing, because these are sensible people,
because these are good people, Miriam and Aaron,
when one of them gets struck
with a severe punishment from God,
the other one gets their act together.
I mean, isn't this the logical thing to do?
And I think I just preached about this a few times
'cause I preached about the handwriting on the wall,
about, you know, when you see somebody around you
getting smoked, you should stop and think,
oh right, we're on the wrong side here, we need to fix this.
I mean, when Aaron sees that Miriam is struck with leprosy,
he says, okay, we're clearly wrong here.
We need to just shut up and get things right.
And he's begging God for mercy,
and he's apologizing and making things right.
That's the smart thing to do.
And so, you know, God is right.