Every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God is sitting in a book in front of me, dear God,
and I can read it whenever I want, I can preach it,
and I don't have to come up with some kind of a cunningly devised fable,
or some kind of a teaching that comes from man's wisdom,
but I can speak in the words that the Holy Ghost teaches, because I have the Bible right here, Father.
I can read a sermon and feel like Jesus Christ is preaching to me.
And Father, I just pray that you would speak to our hearts in the message tonight,
and in Jesus' name I pray, Amen.
Now, Matthew 23, of course, we're getting into Jesus' last two sermons here in the book of Matthew.
Matthew 23, and then Matthew 24, commonly known as the Olivet Discourse,
where Jesus preaches about the end times, he preaches about the end of the world and so forth.
And then we're going to get into the final events of his life, into the crucifixion, the death, burial, and resurrection.
Now, this chapter, Matthew 23, kind of ends a phase of the book of Matthew, and we move into a new phase.
Matthew chapter 23 is the culmination of what we've seen almost every week,
and it might have even seemed a little bit repetitive to you as you came on Wednesday nights
and heard me preaching about these things,
but it's only because the Bible is so repetitive of this face-off in the book of Matthew between Jesus and the Pharisees.
Almost every single chapter, you'll see them coming to him, challenging him, and him rebuking them.
And I hope you remember, what is it that he always rebukes him with?
Have you not read?
How is it that you've not read? How read is thou?
He's constantly, almost every chapter in the book of Matthew,
it took me aback how many times he rebukes them for not knowing the Bible.
Hey, know the Bible.
We need to get back to a day where people know the Bible for the sake of knowing the Bible,
not just something that is so practical teaching.
That's the buzzword that you'll see in the Yellow Pages ads of churches,
they'll want to say it's relevant teaching.
It's relevant to your life.
Look, there's nothing in this book that's not relevant to your life.
So to get up and say, we preach relevant messages because it's something that you can use today.
Look, I don't want just something I can use today.
I want to know every law that God has in this book so that I don't break it,
so that I can keep God's laws.
Because Jesus said, if you love me, keep my commandments.
And so I want to study this book.
I want to pour over it with a fine-tooth comb.
I want to find in it everything that God told me to do,
and everything that God told me not to do,
because I don't want Jesus to rebuke me and say,
have you not read, Pastor Anderson, that you're not supposed to be doing that?
Have you not read that it's my will for you to do thus and so, and you're not doing it?
Now, this is the culmination.
This is where Jesus just groups every argument that he's ever had with them throughout the book of Matthew.
He just puts it into one sermon that's directed at the Pharisees.
I mean, he's preaching this right to them.
He calls them every time, one word, hypocrites.
I mean, did you notice the repetition?
I've never seen that kind of repetition anywhere in Jesus' preaching
and the words that came out of his mouth as in this chapter.
There's more repetition here, and I think repetition means emphasis.
He's trying to show us something.
And so let's begin in verse number one.
The Bible says, then spake Jesus to the multitude and to his disciples.
Now, at this point, he's not really addressing the disciples.
Now, at this point, he's not really addressing the Pharisees.
He's addressing the multitudes of people that are following him
and his closest disciples that have given up everything to follow him.
Look what he says in verse two, saying,
The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat.
All therefore, whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do.
But do not ye after their works, for they say and do not.
Now listen to me.
Does it sound like he's telling you that the Pharisees are too strict?
You know, like people will try to tell you, like people that are really strict
and they try to follow God's laws to the letter?
Oh, you're following the letter of the law?
You're like a Pharisee.
What?
Okay, it says that they don't follow the law.
They say and do not.
That's what the Pharisee is.
The Pharisee is the person who says, but they don't do.
That's what a hypocrite is.
It's somebody who teaches that you should do something.
It's somebody that preaches that you should do something,
but they themselves don't do it.
Or they have inconsistent standards
that somehow everybody else just happens to be on the wrong side,
but whatever they do that's really the same thing happens to be okay.
That's what the Pharisees were about.
Now look, I'm going to illustrate this to you.
Now, first of all, I want you to see Jesus is saying
that everything that the Pharisees taught,
he said you should be doing it.
And that doesn't say that or not.
He says, all therefore, whatsoever they bid you,
observe, that observe and do.
So he's saying they're not too strict.
He says, live the holy life that they're preaching.
Just don't look at what they're doing
because they're not living the holy life that they're preaching.
But if they would, it'd be great.
Now look at the next verse.
It says, for they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne
and lay them on men's shoulders,
but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers,
but all their works they do for to be seen of men.
Look at verse 23, if you would,
and I'll show you something a little later.
Look at verse 23.
I'm willing to use scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
for you pay tithe of mint and anise and cumin
and have omitted the weightier matters of the law,
judgment, mercy, and faith.
What was the Pharisee's problem?
The Pharisee's problem is that he's not keeping the law.
You see, I'm just trying to end this fallacy
once and for all of what a Pharisee is.
Boy, these people who are just so strict
and they have all these rules, such Pharisees.
Look, the Pharisee's problem is that he's not keeping the law.
Do you see that?
It says that he has omitted the most important matters of the heart.
Just the heart.
No, it says of the law.
It says he's not following the rules that are found in the Bible.
And so back toward the beginning of the chapter where we were,
and you'll see that these hypocritical Pharisees,
and you'll see this throughout the chapter,
they preach a very righteous holy life,
but they don't live a righteous holy life.
They have inconsistent standards.
What's okay for one person is not okay for another person.
For example, you think about churches that I've grown up in.
I remember when I was a teenager,
I was just talking to Brother Smoot about this,
and they kind of had a rule in our church.
Not a rule, but this is what was preached.
Don't go to the movie theater.
It's wrong.
It's a sin to go to the movie theater.
And I remember sitting there thinking to myself,
I've been to these people's houses
that are so vehemently against the movie theater,
you know, blockbuster videos stacked up at the ceiling.
And I'm thinking to myself, it's the same movie.
And I asked them, I said, okay,
and I was a rebellious teenager, granted.
I wasn't right in my thinking
because I thought it was okay to go to the movies.
And I said to them, I said, you know,
if I go to the movies, and I shouldn't have said this,
but I said if I go to the movies,
at least I'm not seeing the commercials.
I could go watch something that's rated PG or G,
and I'm not condoning it because trust me, I'm against all of it
if you've been around me.
You know that.
But I said, you know, I can go there.
I wouldn't see all the filthy commercials
and all the beer ads and everything.
And I said, what's the difference if you bring it into your home?
And they said, well, if you go to the theater,
you're supporting the Hollywood industry.
I said, are you supporting the Hollywood industry
when you buy the video and take it home?
Are you supporting the industry
when you send your money to cable TV every month
to bring hell into your house,
to bring soft pornography into your house?
Yes, that's what's on television.
Yes, that's what cable TV is.
It's soft pornography, my friend.
You say, it's not pornography.
That's because your mind has been so warped by the world
that you don't understand what God says is nudity
and what God says is pornography.
You see, the pharisaical attitude
makes rules that are not based on the Bible.
They're based on man's wisdom and man's interpretation.
They're based on being seen of men.
Look at that verse right there in verse 5.
But all their works they do for to be seen of men.
See, here's the problem.
When you go down to the movie theater,
you're seen of men.
So we don't want to do that, do we?
Because I only do my good works to be seen of men.
So if I'm going to abstain from Hollywood,
it's only going to be when I'm outside
when everybody can see me.
But when I'm down in my den, I can turn on whatever I want
because nobody's around except just me and God,
and I don't care what God thinks.
See, that's Pharisaism.
That's hypocrisy, my friend.
That is being a Pharisee when you have inconsistent standards
that have everything to do with the outward show,
but when it comes to actually right and wrong,
they just don't hold up with the Bible.
You say, well, Pastor Anderson,
I don't agree with some of your standards.
I don't agree with some of the things that you preach.
Hey, fine, that's okay.
Keep on coming to the church here.
If you never agree with me, that's fine.
And I'm glad that you're here.
And nobody's ever going to agree on everything, right?
And that's fine.
But I'm going to tell you something.
If you don't agree with me,
I hope it's because of something in the Bible,
and I hope that you don't have some standard
that some church taught you somewhere back
that's different than mine.
Because I'll tell you something.
My standards are based on the Bible.
You want to know where do I draw the line for a woman's skirt?
I draw it at the knee where God draws it
because he said that a woman should not uncover her thigh
in Isaiah 47.3.
Isaiah 47.3, look it up.
And I say, where should a man's pants go down to?
To his knees, because in Exodus 28.42,
it says that his pants should go from his loins to his thighs
to cover his nakedness.
And so twice in the Bible,
God indicates that your thigh is nakedness if it's exposed.
And you say, well, if a woman wears a bikini, that's obscene.
But fingertip-length shorts is okay,
you know, halfway up the thigh.
You Pharisee.
Anybody who teaches that fingertip-length shorts are okay
but that a bikini is wrong is a Pharisee.
Did you hear me?
Because you cannot find that in the Bible.
Amen.
You want to talk about some more Pharisees?
See, I kind of like Jesus' style of preaching
because here's what he did.
He looked at the religious crowd of his day
and he just went through and pointed out their hypocrisy.
Let me stop the sermon a little bit
and point out some hypocrisy.
Why? Because I'm preaching like Jesus, that's why.
Because I want to preach like Jesus preached in Matthew 23.
I'm thinking about the hypocrisy of music standards.
You say, well, if the rhythm is more prevalent than the melody
and if there's a drumbeat, you know, that's wrong music.
Okay, show me that in the Bible.
But I'll show you in the Bible where the Bible says
that all the things that are in the world are not of the Father
and that we shouldn't love the world.
For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh
and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life
is not of the Father but is of the world.
And I see in Psalm 40 where the Bible says
He had put a new song in my mouth, even praise to my God.
And so that's what I'm going to be singing.
Not because some fundamental preacher, you know,
taught me somewhere in some nine-week course
where he had to explain to me the nuances of wrong music
and he had to have, you know, five lines up here
and show me notes and rests and stuff.
No, no, no, I'll make it real simple for you.
I'll boil it right down for you.
Is it of the Father or is it of the world?
That's the acid test, my friend.
Look, you think I'm going to listen to classical music
by Tchaikovsky, who's a sodomite,
and say, well, that's good music because it doesn't have a rock beat.
No, it's not. It's trash. It's garbage.
I'm going to sing, to God be the glory, great things He had done.
Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine.
Hey, these are the songs that came from the Father.
And then there's the other songs that came from the world.
And I don't want the songs that came from the world.
And I will say to you tonight that if you listen to the songs
that if you listen to worldly music
and if you listen to music from the charismatic movement,
if you listen to movement from the southern gospel,
beer drinking, adulterating, all-for-money singers that make that stuff,
and I'll name them Bill Gaither.
Yes, Bill Gaither is one of them.
And I don't even know the names.
But if you listen to that stuff and say it's okay
because it doesn't have drums in it, you're a Pharisee
because you can't find in the Bible where it says that drums
is the deciding factor between right and wrong music.
Now, I'm against all the music with drums because it's worldly as all get-out.
And I don't listen to any music with drums. I listen to any music, period.
But I don't involve myself in music with drums
because never does God's music in the Bible have drums.
But nowhere in the Bible are you going to find that if it doesn't have drums, it's okay.
Anything goes. That's garbage.
Because it's pharisaical.
Because the Bible talks about worldly music and God's music.
And that's the dividing line right there.
Where's the source of your music?
Can a man take a clean thing out of an unclean?
Not one, the Book of Job says.
And so I'm against all secular music.
I'm against all of it because it all came from the world
and it's not of the Father, it's of the world.
And we could go on and on and it would be fun to do it
just to go through all the hypocrisy and to just lay it out for you.
But I'm going to tell you something.
You get the idea of what a Pharisee really is.
A Pharisee is somebody who's got all their rules all laid out
and their big rule book and it's a hundred pages long
and all the rules that their church stands for.
But it's not based on the Word of God.
It's based on arbitrary standards of men.
And it's usually based on outward appearances that they're trying to keep up.
But anyway, we'll move on from that.
The Bible says in verse number 5,
But all their works they do for to be seen of men.
They make broad their phylacteries and enlarge the borders of their garments.
Again, it's talking about an outward show.
Even the way that they dress in these religious garments
the Pharisees and the scribes did.
It says they love the uppermost rooms at feasts
and the chief seats in the synagogues.
They like to have people honor and extol them
and greetings in the markets
and to be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi.
But be not ye called Rabbi
for one is your master even Christ and all ye are brethren.
And call no man your father upon the earth
for one is your father which is in heaven.
You know, I was reading this. I was thinking about it. I was in the airport the other day.
And I saw this Catholic priest
and he's got his black jacket on.
You know, he's wearing like a business suit kind of thing, black jacket.
But he's got his collar turned around backwards.
And he's got this pious smile on his face.
And he just walks in.
And he's just like, look at me.
You know, I'm a man of God.
You know, and I want everybody to know that I'm a man of God.
So I got my little collar turned around backwards
so that everybody will know that I'm righteous and holy before God.
You know, and just that's what it's about.
That's what their little special clothes.
Look, am I dressed in some kind of a robe tonight?
Some kind of a dress? Some kind of a skirt on like a girl?
Like a transvestite? No.
Because I don't need to put on some kind of a religious garb
to try to elevate myself among the common man.
Hey, all we are brethren is what the Bible says.
I'm not daddy up here with the family.
I'm not Father Anderson tonight.
I'm just a brother in Christ.
I'm just up here preaching tonight.
But I'm not going to go around wearing something
to just draw attention to myself.
I'm not going to go around calling myself by some fancy title,
you know, Dr. Anderson and Father Anderson
and, oh, Master and all this stuff.
Hey, look, I don't need some title
because I'd rather humble myself
and have Jesus Christ exalt me in due time, as the Bible says.
And I think about the blasphemy
of calling a Catholic priest Father
when our Father's in heaven
and saying, oh, forgive me, Father.
You know, I've seen this on TV, you know,
back when I used to, before I was enlightened
and I used to watch TV as a teenager.
And, you know, they go in the little confessional booth
and do their little ritual and say,
forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.
That's so blasphemous.
I mean, putting a man on the level of God himself
is insanity. It's ridiculous.
It's so blasphemous.
Have you seen when the pope has these big meetings
and people bow down and worship him?
People bow down and worship a man.
Look in the Bible when they tried to worship Peter and Paul.
They said, get up.
They were angry.
I mean, they said, get up, we're men like you.
Don't worship us.
But no, the pope just receives the worship.
You know, he just stands up there and just takes it all in.
Why? Because he's an anti-Christ on earth, that's why.
He's trying to be a substitute for Jesus Christ
and suck up all that worship and praise of men.
But he says after that, he says,
neither be ye called masters,
for one is your master, even Christ.
And, you know, so we have three titles that Jesus is saying,
look, these titles are reserved for God.
He says one of them's rabbi,
because apparently from reading this,
rabbi seems to be the Jewish word for master,
is the way it sounds.
And then father, he says, no, that's God the Father.
That's Jesus Christ.
It's called the everlasting Father in Isaiah 9-6.
And then he says, another one is master.
Don't call yourself master.
And I was thinking to myself
how we have these Bible colleges in our day, you know.
And let's face it, they're patterned after worldly colleges.
I mean, it's like they took a university college
and they just added Jesus.
They poured out a little Jesus, and now they got a Bible college.
And so because of their conformity to the world,
they actually hand out a master's degree.
And when you get that degree on your wall,
it'll say, let's say I went to Bible college
and I got a master's degree.
This is what it'll say.
Stephen Anderson, master of theology.
And you know what theology means?
It's the study of God.
Master of theology.
Everybody, did you hear that?
I'm the master of theology.
Master of divinity.
Master of pastoral theology.
Look, be not ye called master,
but one is your master, even Christ.
You know, maybe that rubs you the wrong way a little bit
when I say that, but it just shows a mentality
that's not so much concerned with what the Bible says
as looking as much like a worldly university as you can
so that you can have like, I don't know, accreditation
or like have people recognize you and think like,
oh, this is a legitimate degree because, you know,
yeah, they got the bachelor degree and the master degree.
And I'm just saying to myself, praise God,
I never went to college for six years
and called myself master because it's blasphemy.
And you say, why are you so nitpicky?
You know, why are you splitting hairs?
Hey, look, I'm not splitting hairs.
I'm obeying Matthew 23, 10.
I don't think that's splitting hairs.
I think it's a biblical term that God says,
don't call yourself master.
And don't call yourself master of anything.
Don't call yourself father.
Don't call yourself rabbi.
He says it's blasphemy.
It's wrong.
And so you can say, well, it's a little thing.
It doesn't matter.
Well, Jesus said,
whosoever shall break one of these least commandments
and shall teach men so,
he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven.
But whosoever shall do and teach them,
the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
So your greatness in the kingdom of heaven is based on
whether you have an attitude that says,
you know these little things, I don't have to obey them.
I don't have to worry about them.
I don't have to mess with them.
Or whether you have an attitude that says,
man, I want to do every little thing I can
that God wants me to do.
And see, it's a mentality where you,
if you excuse something in the Bible,
a command to God here,
what's the other one that you're going to excuse?
You know, when else are you going to break God's laws?
Because the problem is you have iniquity in your heart
that's telling you that it's okay to not obey this
when God said you must obey it.
But anyway, let's move on.
That didn't seem very popular either.
So I'm trying to hit as many things as I can.
Here's what I do.
I go through a chapter
and I preach everything I have written down
and I wait until I get somebody to smile at me
or I get some kind of a reaction
and then I just hit on that for a while
to get all the excitement.
And none of this is working at all tonight.
None of this is catching on.
So I better move fast here.
Verse number 11.
And verse number 12, of course,
is talking about the whole thing.
We just talked about people exalting themselves
with lofty titles.
And God says, now humble yourself
in the sight of the Lord.
He'll exalt you in due time.
You don't have to lift yourself up.
But look at verse 13.
We enter a new phase.
Now He's done talking to His disciples
and He's done talking to the multitude.
Now He directs everything to the Pharisees.
He just warned them about the Pharisees.
He said, I want you to obey
the strictness of the Pharisees.
He said, I like that.
But unfortunately, they don't do any of it.
And He said, don't be like them.
Don't call yourself the titles they call themselves.
They call themselves rabbi, father, and master.
I don't want you to do that.
I want you to humble yourself.
I want you to be a servant.
I want you to approach people with meekness
like you're their brother,
not like you're some kind of authority over them,
some kind of a lord over the flock.
And then He directs it toward them
and directly rebukes them and says,
but woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
for you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men,
for you neither go in yourselves,
neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in.
He's saying that you're making it hard
for people to get saved.
Do you catch that?
He says, you're not saved.
You're not going to heaven.
But not only that, but you're making it difficult
for other people to be saved.
Have you ever known people who make salvation difficult?
I mean, they make it complicated.
And they make it real hard for people.
And they go to them.
My wife's laughing because I got this goofy DVD in the mail.
This DVD comes in the mail
from some Bible college asking me for money.
I mean, they're like, watch this DVD
and then send us a bunch of money.
Just literally.
And I'm just thinking to myself,
these people have no shame.
It reminds me of when I'm in the inner city in Phoenix
and somebody walks up to me and says,
hey, you know, you got a quarter?
You got 50 cents?
It's wrong.
You should just go up and ask people for money
and just send me it.
Watch this DVD and send us a bunch of money.
And I went to their plan of salvation.
I went to their doctrinal statement, right?
And man, I should have printed it out on Reddit.
I wish I had it right now.
I'm trying to give it from memory.
But it said something about how like you cordially
and man, I'm trying to remember what it was.
It was saying like you're just with all this sincerity
and cordiality at the same time
you're penitently confessing your sin to God.
And then it says at the same time,
it said at the same time three times,
how many do all these things at the same time?
It's like, and you're receiving Jesus Christ as savior
and you're openly confessing him before men.
And at the same time, you're sorry for your sins in this way.
And at the same time, you're turning from this.
And I'm thinking to myself,
how can anybody even do this at the same time?
It's like you got to give the whole list and say,
okay, you got to be sorry.
You got to say you're sorry.
You got to be penitent and cordial.
I mean cordial, I thought that's like when you give somebody
a handshake and say how you're doing or something.
I don't even understand what they meant by cordial.
And then they're saying you got to confess it with your mouth
and you also have to receive Jesus and turn from this sin
and it's like ready, set, go.
You got to do it all at once.
And these people, they go soul winning.
They don't go soul winning, but the ones who do go soul winning
and they come up to people and it's like,
you're living with your girlfriend?
Can't get saved until you repent of that.
Oh, you're smoking a cigarette?
You got to take that cigarette out of your mouth
and repent of that in order to get saved.
That's a lie out of hell for him.
Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord
shall be saved.
That's what the Bible says.
Whosoever believeth in him should not perish
but have everlasting life.
Hey, when I go out and preach the gospel,
I'm preaching the good news.
The good news is Jesus paid it all.
All to him I owe.
Sin had left a crimson stain.
He washed it white as snow.
That's the good news.
Hey, the good news is believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved.
The good news is you just confess with your mouth
the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart,
God raised him from the dead.
Thou shalt be saved.
Hey, that's the good news.
What kind of a good news is it that if you stand on your head
and you're sorry for every sin you've done
in the past five years, you might, you know,
we won't know if you meant it.
We'll have to watch it for a year
and see if you really meant it.
And then we might baptize you
if you go through our six-week class.
Look, you're shutting up the kingdom of heaven against men
for you're neither entering yourselves,
neither you're suffering them that are entering to go in.
Hey, make it easy for salvation.
I was thinking to myself after I preached on Sunday night,
you know, I was preaching step by step
and I wouldn't be able to Christ.
When I was done, I said to my wife, I just said,
man, I hope I didn't make it too complicated.
You know, that's the way I felt like
I was making it too complicated
because I don't want it to be,
and I don't want you to think because, you know,
because I preached about it for an hour, you know,
and I was given all different tips
and trying to give you all different things that I've learned,
but at the same time I don't want it to seem complicated
because it's not.
Amen.
This is how simple it is.
I'm going to make it simple for you tonight.
Look, see this right here?
This is going to be the dividing line.
Everybody on this side of the line goes to heaven
and everybody on this side of the line goes to hell.
Okay, you know what this side of the line represents?
Jesus paid it all.
It represents whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ
is born of God, 1 John 5.1.
See, that's what this side represents.
And then this side represents everything else
that people are adding to the gospel,
whether it's turn away from this sin
that you're living with your girlfriend,
and look, look, my friend,
I don't have to forsake sin in order to be saved
or else I'd be on my way to hell tonight.
And on this side is you must be saved and baptized
to go to heaven.
On this side is you must be saved and circumcised
to go to heaven.
On this side is you must be saved
and keep the Ten Commandments to go to heaven.
On this side you must be saved and keep the Sabbath
to go to heaven.
On this side is you must be saved and endure to the end
and stay faithful and don't quit in order to be saved.
And on this side is saved, done, over,
past tense, saved.
And that's the difference, my friend.
Now, there's nothing hard to understand about that.
Now, you know, you want to show, you know,
yeah, go through the Scriptures.
Show them they're a sinner.
You know, they need to understand
what they're being saved from.
Hey, show them that sinners deserve to go to hell.
Show them that Jesus Christ died on the cross
for their sins.
Show them that he rose again from the dead,
triumphing over death,
and show them that whosoever believeth
shall be saved,
but who need to believeth not shall be damned,
as it says in Mark 16, 16.
And so that's how simple it is.
Don't ever get complicated.
You say, you know what?
I'm just not a good soul winner.
I don't have all the verses memorized.
Hey, memorize John 3.16.
You can win somebody a cross with John 3.16.
Just explain it to them in your own words,
but use that John 3.16,
and that one verse will have enough power
to get somebody saved.
Now, don't try to get them saved with no verses,
but get one verse and hang onto it,
and that seed of the Word of God
can quicken their soul,
and they can be saved and born again
if they would just understand that great truth
that's found in John 3.16.
Amen.
Or Romans 6.23,
or 1 John 5.13,
or 1 John 5.1.
I mean, whatever you want to show them, my friend.
But make it simple.
Make it plain.
Don't make it hard for people to get saved.
Make it easy.
Don't shut up the kingdom of heaven against men.
And I'll tell you something.
There's a lot of people
who make it real difficult to get saved,
and then they make it real difficult to get baptized,
and then they make it really difficult,
fill in the blank.
And look, God wants people to be saved.
God wants people to be baptized.
God wants people to live for God.
Hey, just because somebody's not perfect or something,
doesn't mean you should just say,
wow, come back when you're perfect.
Come back when you're as righteous as I am,
you piece of trash.
Hey, look, no.
You've got to realize
that everybody's at a different stage in their life,
and there have been times
when all of us were far from the Lord
and far from God.
Hey, receive anybody who comes through the door
or that you meet out and about
like you'd received Jesus Christ Himself.
Because He said,
if you receive one of the least of these,
He said, you receive Me.
He says, did you clothe the naked?
Did you feed the poor?
He said, if you did it to them,
you did it to Me.
And so you've got to treat anybody like they're Jesus.
And if you rebuff somebody who you think is maybe poor
or they're in a bad economic class
or maybe you think they're sinful and ungodly and wicked,
and you just rebuff them and push them aside
and push them aside,
they come to church with a desire to do right,
that you're just disgusted or despiteful toward them.
Hey, look, Jesus feels like you're treating Him that way.
Because Jesus said that a church is the body of Christ.
And so you're really directing it toward Him
when you direct it toward one of His children.
I mean, if you criticize my children tonight,
that's probably going to hurt me a little bit, isn't it?
Same thing with God.
And so don't make it hard for people to get saved,
and people that are saved,
don't make it hard for them to serve the Lord.
Make it easy for them.
Help them out and be patient with them.
Look at the next verse, verse 14.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
for ye devour widows' houses,
and for a pretense make long prayer.
Therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation.
See, here's a crowd who thinks that they can do something
that's ungodly and just include Jesus in it,
and somehow that makes it okay.
They're stealing somebody's money.
They're devouring widows' houses.
I think it's talking about taking away their finances,
taking away what they have.
And then they pray openly about it,
or they make some kind of a religious show about it,
and somehow that makes it okay.
You know, if you add Jesus to something,
you're dragging Jesus' name in the mud,
you're not exalting something.
I mean, you know, Christian rock.
Why don't you have Christian beer?
Why don't you have Christian cigarettes?
Why don't you have a Christian pornography?
Why don't you have a Christian...
And by the way, you say, that's crazy.
You're nuts.
Hey, I know there's a church in Sacramento, California,
where I'm from, that sells beer after the service
in a Christian church.
And they have it set up in moderation, of course.
Give them some credit.
Give them a little credit, okay?
They literally have a beer garden after church.
No, but wait a minute.
You don't understand.
They're doing it in Jesus' name.
It's okay.
And they say, well, you know,
as long as the Holy Spirit hasn't spoken to you about it,
it's okay.
You know, if the Holy Spirit convicted you about it,
then don't do it.
But if the Holy Spirit hasn't spoken to you about that,
then just, you know, let's just knock back a couple of brewskies
in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior.
Hey, look, I'm going to tell you something.
The Holy Ghost spoke it, and you haven't read it.
That's the problem.
And so these people say, well, I'm sorry,
the Holy Spirit just hasn't spoken to me about that yet.
Well, you know what?
Why don't you pick up the Holy Spirit and read him?
Because he's right here to speak to you
about everything that he's ever commanded in the world under the sun.
And if you read it and read it and read it and read it and read it
and read it and read it, he might speak to you a little more.
And pretty soon you're not going to be allowed to do anything anymore.
You're going to be like me.
No, I'm just kidding.
I'm kidding, of course.
But, you know, the Holy Spirit's right here, friend.
It's in my hand.
It's not some little wind that blows around.
Hey, look, the Holy Ghost, Jesus said,
the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life.
You know what the Holy Spirit says?
Be not ye called master, for one is your master, even Christ.
That's the Holy Spirit.
That's him talking to you right now because I just read the Bible.
But the next verse says in verse 15,
woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
for you can pass sea and land to make one proselyte,
and when he is made, you make him twofold more
the child of hell than yourselves.
Now, this is talking about, and if you think about this,
we're all born, a lot of people think that everybody on this earth is God's children.
But according to the Bible, you know, the Bible says that,
behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us
that we should be called the sons of God.
Well, where did we get that?
Well, in John 1-12 it says,
but as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God,
even to them that believe on his name.
Those that are on this side of the line that believe on his name,
not on the works of the law,
they have the privilege of being called the sons of God.
Now, all of us are related, no doubt, because we all come from Adam.
And the Bible says he's made all the nations of the earth of one blood.
Every single person, I mean, these people that Brother Smoot is preaching to in Alaska
that are of a different race, hey, they're his brothers.
Not in the spiritual sense, but they are related back to Adam with them.
They're of the same bloodline of Adam.
They're part of the human race.
Now, there's the human race, the children of Adam,
and then there are the children of God, or those that are saved.
But what happens when a child of Adam begins to follow a religion
apart from the true gospel of Jesus Christ?
What happens when a child of Adam, not a child of God,
but the natural seed, so to speak,
takes on a religion that excludes by grace, through faith,
through revelation, through Jesus Christ, giving Jesus Christ the glory?
Well, then that person becomes, according to the Bible, a child of the devil.
That's what he calls them.
That's why Jesus said to the Pharisees in John 7,
he said, ye are of your father the devil.
They said, God's our father. Abraham's our father.
He said, no.
He said, if Abraham was your father, you'd do the works of Abraham.
But you don't.
He said, you do the works of your father.
And they say, we're not born of fornication.
What do you mean?
We don't have any father except Abraham.
We don't have any father except God.
And he said, you're of your father the devil and his works you do.
Because the moment that somebody takes on a religion that says,
I'm going to work my own way to heaven.
I'm Jesus Christ.
See, that's exactly the devil's plan.
And they become a child of the devil.
Now, is it too late for them? No.
The children of the devil and the children of Adam,
that's who we're trying to reach.
Now, who do you think is easier to reach?
The child of Adam or the child of the devil?
The child of Adam is easier to reach.
Because the child of the devil is steeped in a false religion.
He has a form of godliness.
And that's the problem.
You want to know who the hardest person that you'll ever find to win to the Lord is?
An unsaved Baptist.
Because they're so close to the truth, they feel like they're saved.
And especially, boy, if you run into an older person sometimes,
and they've been in church their whole life, tell them that they're unsaved.
To them, it's unthinkable.
But see, they've been worshipping God, but they've been worshipping the wrong God.
They've been worshipping the God of this world who exalts human beings
and says that they can make their own way to Heaven.
It's called humanism.
And so the way that you reach a child of Adam
and the way that you reach a child of the devil is the same,
but you're going to have a much easier time reaching somebody who's not already seen.
You know, if you think about it, I'd rather go soul-winning,
like Brother Dave and I were out soul-winning on Saturday.
And I said, you know, the people in this area where we're knocking doors,
I said, they're not churchgoers.
I mean, pretty much almost every door we knocked on, they said,
I don't go to church at all.
And maybe it might be a little harder to start up the conversation,
or maybe it might be a little harder to get them to talk about the things of God,
but that person is going to be easier to win to the Lord
than the die-hard seven-day Adventist, you know,
the die-hard Baptist who's like a Southern Baptist and doesn't believe the Gospel,
or the die-hard Nazarene.
You're going to have a tough time, my friend,
and with God all things are possible,
but you're going to have a tough time because they've been influenced by the devil.
Because every false religion in this world,
especially the ones that associate themselves with Jesus Christ,
but deny the Gospel, are the devil's religions.
Let's face it, they are.
And the Bible says the devil is transformed as a minister of light.
And so we've got to be able to really pray and fast to get those kind of people saved.
It's going to take a lot more work, but it's possible, my friend.
But, boy, the children of Adam in this world, that's like Brother Spoon.
I mean, he's going to people who've never heard of Jesus Christ.
And at least the one thing that you've got going for you
is that you're not going to have to straighten them out on what they believe about the Bible.
You can just teach them the Bible from scratch, and they're going to see it right away.
And, boy, what a potential he has there of taking some of these kids,
and you say, well, you know, he's telling a story about ten kids got saved and one adult.
Well, look, if you would, at verse number 37 of the chapter here.
See what Jesus says about children.
He says, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets and stonest them which are sent unto thee,
how often would I have gathered thy children together?
Do you see that?
He says, I wanted the children of Jerusalem to be saved.
He says, but, I'm sorry, how often would I have gathered thy children together,
even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not.
He said, you would not allow me to reach your children.
And look at the next verse.
Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.
He says, are you happy with the generation that you've produced
by not allowing your children to come to Christ?
And so when Brother Smoot wins these ten children to the Lord,
and they've never even heard of Jesus Christ, probably.
I'm sure I'm right in saying that, right?
I mean, they've probably never even heard the name of Jesus Christ.
And he can teach them the Gospel and the Bible.
He can teach them just straight down the line.
And, boy, one of those young men that's been pulled out of the darkness of evil
that he's living in in that village,
he can get a King James Bible in his hand and study it and meditate on it day and night.
And he has Brother Smoot leading him and teaching him just the things of God straight down the line.
Boy, he could grow up and become a powerful man of God.
But what happens is when we don't reach the children,
when we don't reach our own children,
when we don't reach the children around us,
one day our house is going to be left unto us desolate.
Hey, America, your house is left unto you desolate
because you haven't taught your children the things of God.
You haven't taught the children the Word of God.
And now they've grown up and they rebel.
They hate you.
They hate God.
They hate everybody in authority.
They want nothing to do with right and godliness.
They want pornography and sin and filth and ungodliness.
Why?
Because we've neglected to reach the children.
Amen.
Our own children.
Other people's children.
We pushed them aside and said they're not important.
Oh, wow, one adult?
One adult?
Wow.
Hey, get excited about the other ten people they got saved.
Amen.
Because they're just as important.
They might even be more important because they haven't been corrupted yet.
And he can take that clean slate, that blank piece of paper,
and he can just fill it with the things of God.
And I guarantee you that one of these backward young boys from that village
could grow up and be a powerful man of God like a Moses
that could bring his whole nation out of the captivity
and the slavery of being a child of the devil.
Don't ever discount children.
The most important three people in the service, as far as I'm concerned,
are sitting in the front row.
You want to ask if I'm partial toward anybody?
Yeah, right here.
It's the most important people in the service.
No, they're not playing in the other room with toys.
Amen.
No, they're not coloring a coloring sheet during the service.
They're sitting here listening to preaching because this is the future.
I don't want my house to be left unto me desolate.
Amen.
And so it's so important.
If you have children, invest in your children.
I mean, that's the biggest investment you have.
Don't get so busy serving God that you're not investing in your children
because you're going to end up with a desolate house
because you labored in somebody else's vineyard,
but your own vineyard have you not kept.
And so look at verse number 16.
I've got to blow through some of this because I'm running out of time.
Actually, let's skip down here.
Yeah, look at verse 16.
Woe unto you, ye blind guides, which say,
Whosoever shall swear by the template is nothing,
but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple, he is a debtor.
Fools and blind.
For whether is greater the gold or the temple that sanctified the gold.
See, another characteristic of the Pharisees, they emphasized money.
Do you see that?
More than the spiritual aspect of the temple being a place,
a house of prayer, the house of God,
they were more emphasizing the material that it was made out of, the gold.
And they said the most important thing about church is the money.
You know, if you cuss out the temple of God, you know, hey, no, don't worry.
But don't say anything bad about the gold that's overlaying it
because that's blasphemous, my friends.
I mean, isn't it silly? Isn't it ridiculous?
But see, the Pharisees always emphasized money.
Money is what God paved the street with in heaven.
It's paved with gold. That's how important it is to him.
It means nothing to him.
And to God it would mean nothing to us when it comes to church.
I mean, you know, good night.
This is not exactly the fancy auditorium.
This is not exactly the temple of Jerusalem.
But the people that are here is the house of God.
And, boy, that's the emphasis.
That's what's important.
You know, every time I talk to anybody, they say,
Pastor Anderson, did you get a building yet?
Did you get a building yet?
It's like, who cares?
Why do I want a building? You got to pay for it.
And, well, big deal.
Why? So I can sweep another floor and wipe down another window?
Hey, the house of God is these people right here.
And, you know, one day we're going to need a bigger building.
But, you know what? Who cares?
I don't care at all.
We'll just build a bigger house, right?
Let's get a big, huge house that's filled up with people.
Because the building is meaningless.
Show me the building in the Book of Acts.
Show me the building in the New Testament.
Now, you know, you need buildings to put people in
to protect from the weather and so forth.
Emphasize what God emphasizes.
Emphasize the people that are in this room
and the individual that's in this room
that loves God, that's a soul winner.
Hey, that's what's important.
Not some building, not some fancy staircase somewhere
or some plaque on the wall.
But anyway, I've got to blow through that part
because I'm running out of time.
Look at verse number 23.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
for you pay tithe of mint and anise and cumin.
See, again, the money is one thing that they don't miss.
And have omitted the weightier matters of the law,
judgment, mercy, and faith.
So are there things that are more important than money?
Oh, yeah, a lot more important than money.
Judgment, mercy, faith.
These are all you two have done.
He says you're right.
You should tithe on anise and cumin.
He's talking about even like a spice,
like let's say somebody gave...
Here's an example.
This is what he's talking about.
This is what Brother Smoot brought me from Alaska.
You know, smoked salmon, these jams.
Hey, I'm supposed to tithe on this.
That's what he's saying.
I mean, they tithe on like mint, anise, and cumin.
These are spices.
These are like somebody cuts a piece of basil
and gives it to them.
And they say, I got to tithe on that.
And you say, well, how do you tithe on this?
Well, if you study the Bible,
the Bible says that you can turn things into money and tithe on.
Like, you could look at it and say what the value is
and then take the money and get 10% of it.
You know, it's not like I'm going to put a spoonful
of that jelly into the oven and say,
10th of it's for you, you know.
But what you do is you turn it into money.
And God's not saying, again, that the Pharisees are wrong
or that they shouldn't be so nitpicky.
He says these ought you two have done
and not to leave the other undone.
He says you're missing the most important parts
of the Bible and the Gospel.
He says faith, that's important.
That's salvation.
Amen.
Judgment, that's what's right and wrong.
Knowing what's right and wrong.
Knowing what the Bible says is right
and what the Bible says is wrong.
Mercy, that's where you love people.
That's where you reach out to that lost soul that's unsafe
and you bring them into the family.
That's where you reach out to your brother and sister in Christ
that are down on their luck and you help them out
and you do what they need for them.
That's what it's talking about.
He says that's way more important than money.
He's saying don't quit tithing, but he says
emphasize what God emphasized, emphasize what's important
because God doesn't need money at all.
And so that's why he says in verse 24,
you blind guides which strain it and that and swallow a camel.
Woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
for you may clean the outside of the cup and of the platter,
but within there full of extortion and excess,
thou blind Pharisee.
Cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter,
that the outside of them may be clean also.
See, the Pharisees' problem was they had totally cleaned up the outside,
but they had no personal walk with God.
They had no personal love for the Bible.
They had no personal love for people.
Now here's what Jesus is saying.
Get the inside right.
Fill your mind with the Word of God.
Cleanse yourself from the wickedness of the world and the sinful life
and get yourself right with God, where you love God,
where you love the Lord thy God with all thy heart
and with all thy soul and with all thy might,
where you love your neighbor as yourself.
And he says that the outside of them may be clean also.
He says the goal is that you purify your inside
so that your outside will be clean.
He's not saying that the outside doesn't matter.
He's not saying go ahead and be a long-haired hippie
and be dirty and have long hair and wear sandals
and don't take a bath and be all scruffy and dirty
and be a Jesus freak, you know, like they had in the 70s,
the Jesus freaks, because the outside doesn't matter.
If you say the outside matters, you're a Pharisee.
That's not what he's saying at all.
He's saying no.
He says cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter,
that the outside of them may be clean also.
He says the end result is a clean outside, praise God.
And so get the outside clean, but don't emphasize the outside
because the outside will never get the inside clean,
but the inside will get the outside clean.
And so if I look at somebody who has a dirty outside,
the inside's not clean.
Okay, let's face it.
If I look at somebody whose outside is dirty,
the inside is not clean.
But if I look at somebody whose outside is clean,
the inside is not necessarily clean.
The inside could still be dirty.
Does that make sense?
So you got to get the inside right
and you will have the outside right as a result.
So you just got to get the order right, that's all.
And you got to see the emphasis again is what God sees on the inside,
not what man sees.
What God sees on your television that you're watching
versus what man sees when you go to the theater.
That's what I'm saying.
That's what matters, the inside.
Get the TV out of your house and throw it out the window
and beat it with a baseball bat.
I don't think you'll be at the movie theater anytime soon.
Amen.
You know, right?
I don't think I'll see you there.
You see, because if you got the inside right,
you'll have the outside right.
I'm just trying to bring it down onto the level
where everybody can understand what I'm saying.
But he says in verse number 26
that the outside of them may be clean also.
Will unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
for you are like unto white and sepulchres
which indeed appear beautiful outward,
but within full of dead men's bones and of all excess.
Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men,
but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
And he goes on to say these different attacks on them.
He says your fathers are the ones that killed the prophets.
He says you serpents, you generation of vipers,
how can you escape the damnation of hell?
He says I've sent to you prophets,
and I've sent you wise men,
I've sent you scribes.
He says some of them he shall kill and crucify,
and some of them shall you scourge in your synagogues
and persecute them from cities.
He says you've abused the prophets that I've sent to you.
I've given you every chance. I love you.
He says that upon you may come, in verse number 35,
all the righteous blood shed upon the earth
from the blood of righteous Abel
unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias.
See, it's funny how it's A to Z.
Did you notice that?
It's A to Z, from Abel to Zacharias.
And Zacharias' death is recorded in the Old Testament.
He says whom you slew between the temple and the altar,
verily I say unto you,
all these things shall come upon this generation.
And what he's talking about is the judgment of God that's coming.
We're going to see in chapter number 24.
But you see, it's not that God hated the Pharisees.
This is what I want to close with because we're out of time.
Jesus didn't hate the Pharisees.
You say, man, he's really ripping their face off.
I mean, he's really preaching hard.
Why does he have such a hatred for the Pharisees?
Look, he didn't hate the Pharisees.
He says, I'm sending to you prophets and righteous men.
He says, I wanted to gather you like chickens under a wing of a mother hen.
He says, I loved you.
He says, I've given you every opportunity in the world.
I've preached to you the truth.
I've argued with you.
I've debated with you from the Bible.
I've sent all these people to you.
You've abused them, and I still gave you another chance,
and I sent you another servant, and I sent other servants.
And finally, I'm here in the flesh preaching to you the truth,
preaching to you the Word of God.
And he says, you've rejected it for the last time.
And in the last verse he says, you shall not see me henceforth.
He says, it's too late.
You've blown it.
You've blown your last opportunity.
And I think his heart's broken at this point.
I think he's sad about the fact that he couldn't reach the Pharisees.
And he says, you shall not see me henceforth till you shall say,
blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.
He says, I'm sorry, but this is my last sermon to you.
He said, I've poured out my heart to you.
I've begged you to be saved.
In John, in the book of John, he says to the Pharisees, he says,
but you will not come to me that you might have life.
He says, why don't you just give up all your pride
and give up all your man-made religion, give up all your rules?
Why won't you just come to me and be saved?
He says, you will not come to me.
And he says, I'm sorry.
I've done everything I could.
And boy, that's the way it is sometimes with people.
You do everything you can for them, but he just says, I'm sorry, it's over.
And so this ends a phase in the book of Matthew
where he's dealing with the Pharisees.
He's through it.
And in chapter number 24, he's going to preach to us that great sermon
known as the Olivet Discourse, where he tells us the inside
of what's going to happen at the end of the world.
It actually gives a chronological outline of the events
in the book of Revelation.
You can take all the events in the book of Revelation,
put them chronologically into Matthew 24
and see the exact order that they happen,
because he goes step by step through this in Matthew 24.
We're going to see that next week.
But here's the moral of the story here.
Don't be a hypocrite.
Be real.
Be real before God on the inside.
Don't worry about what people think.
Don't worry about what Pastor Anderson thinks.
Don't worry about what the other people in this room think.
Don't worry about what your friends and coworkers think.
Worry about what God thinks.
And you get the inside right, the outside will follow.
Maybe your outside's not 100% clean tonight.
Hey, focus on the inside.
Get the outside right, of course.
But are you reading the Bible every day?
Hey, you're on the right track.
Are you winning souls?
You're on the right track.
Are you praying fervently to God?
You are on the right track.
That outside will get cleaned up.
If it doesn't, then you must not be telling me the truth
if you say that you're reading the Bible, praying, and soul winning.
Because if you get that inside right,
the stuff that only God sees,
then you don't have to worry about what other people think
because He'll exalt you.
People will know in the end
that you were living for God and you were righteous.
Not because you have to promote yourself
and put a bunch of papers on the wall that say how wonderful you are
and call yourself blasphemous titles,
but because you've cleansed the inside of the cup.
And eventually the outside is going to be clean also.
And once the outside is clean,
and once you are living for God,
then you can reach out to that child, as he says here.
You can reach out to the Pharisee at your work.
You can reach out to the child of the devil.
You can reach out to every single person that's breathing air
and try to get them saved
because you can be a clean vessel that God can use.
And God can take the vessel of your body
and the vessel of your spirit
and He can pour His Holy Spirit into that vessel.
And He can use you to do more than you ever thought possible for God.
But He can't use it when it's all full of junk.
You've got to clean that thing up
and God will use you in a mighty way
to see multitudes saved,
to see great things happen,
to see big things happen for God.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, I thank you so much for the Bible.
I put my sermon next to the Scripture reading
where I read Matthew 23
and my sermon is just garbage
compared to Jesus Christ's great preaching.
And so Father, I just pray that you would please
just use both messages,
the one that we read in Matthew 23
and the one that I preached tonight
just to bring somebody closer to God,
to get them cleaned up,
to get them more zealous about soul winning,
to help them love people more,
to be patient with people,
to have their heart right before God
that loves God, that loves people,
that loves the Word of God,
that searches to find out how to obey every command of God
because they love you
and because they want to be clean
so that they can be eventually used by God.
Father, please just bless...