Good evening, welcome to our services tonight.
We're here at Faith Forward Baptist Church. It's good to see everyone here on this Sunday night service.
Let's all take our seats, please, as we take your song books. We'll begin with our congregational singing this evening.
It is on.
Once you find your place, if you would find your hymnals and turn to hymn number 55 tonight, we'll begin.
When the roll is called up yonder, hymn number 55 begins.
When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound and time shall be no more, hymn number 55, on this first verse together.
When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound and time shall be no more, and the morning breaks eternal, bright and fair.
When the sand of earth shall gather to their own beyond the skies, and the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
When the roll is called up yonder, the roll is called up yonder.
When the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
On that white cloud of storming rain, the dead and crushed of wine, tell the glory of this resurrection share.
When the stones will crush together to their own beyond the skies, and the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
When the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
Let us labor for the master from the darkness and the sun, let us talk with all his wonders of the care.
Then when all of life is over, and the world of earth is gone, and the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
When the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
Amen. I've asked for Charles Zakin to open this up in one prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you, Lord, for bringing us here this evening, Lord, to sing praises to you and to participate in the service.
We ask, Lord, that you will bless this service time and just be with each and every one of us in lifting us up and in praising you. In Jesus' name, Amen.
Amen. Up to hymn 411.
Before we sing this song, you'll need your Bibles for this.
When it gets to that chorus, it says, wave the answer back to heaven.
So when it says that, I want you to hold up your Bible and wave the answer back to heaven.
So 411, like everyone participate, please.
So 411, hold my comrades, see the signal still.
Hold my comrades, see the signal waving in the sky.
Reinforcements now appearing, victory is nigh.
Hold the four pariahs, coming, please the signal still.
Wave the answer back to heaven, by thy grace we fail.
See the mighty host advancing, Satan leaning on.
Mighty men around us falling, courage almost gone.
Hold the four pariah coming, Jesus signal still.
Wave the answer back to heaven, by thy grace we fail.
See the glorious banner waving in the tropic foam.
In our leader's name we'll triumph over every foe.
Hold the four pariah coming, Jesus signal still.
Wave the answer back to heaven, by thy grace we will.
Fierce them off the battle ranges, but our help is clear.
Onward comes our great commander, cheer, my comrades cheer.
Hold the four pariah coming, Jesus signal still.
Wave the answer back to heaven, by thy grace we will.
At this time we'll go through our announcements together.
If you don't have a Bible, slip up your hand nice and high, we'll get to you with one.
On the inside we have our service time, Sunday mornings at 1030 is our preaching service.
Sunday nights at 6, Wednesday nights at 7 is our Bible study.
This week we'll be in Ezekiel chapter number 12.
We've got the so many times listed there below as well as salvation and baptisms.
Across the page is the note about the chili potluck next Sunday and that's going to be at 5 o'clock.
So you'll probably end up cooking it the day before and just bringing it in a crockpot so that it can stay warm in the crockpot.
And the crockpot is usually good to serve the chili, although you probably didn't cook it in the crockpot.
And so we'll provide power strips and we'll really max out our circuit breakers and blow a few fuses and make sure that we can power up all those crockpots to keep the chili warm.
And then the church will be providing apple cider, corn muffins and bean dip.
So it's going to be a lot of good food and with all the chili that you bring, we'll be able to enjoy that instead of going out and worshipping Satan on that night, alright?
So if you're not here, we're going to assume that you're worshipping Satan. No, I'm just kidding. No, we're not. That was a joke.
We're not going to assume that, okay? We know that you have other godly things to do on Sunday nights.
So anyway, that's going to be October 31st, this coming Sunday at 5 o'clock and so our evening service will be pushed back till 7.
If you forget and show up at 6, it doesn't really matter because we'll stick a bullet chili in your hand, you might be forced to talk to someone for the first time ever.
So anyway, below that we've got the annual church picnic coming up on Saturday, November 20th.
It's going to be lunch this time. Usually it's dinner, this time it's lunch.
Which, you know, thinking about this, I believe we switched it to noon for a different reason than this.
There was some thought that went into it and I don't remember what the process was, but what was it?
Yeah, that's part of it, but here's the thing. This is good for another reason too because of the mosquito plague that we're being afflicted with right now.
That's another great reason. Has anybody been noticing this mosquito plague of biblical proportions that's been happening?
And we have the bug light in the front and the back. I almost want to buy bug lights for all my neighbors and say,
I'll buy this if you'll just hang it up so that we can just do a genocide of all the mosquitoes in this neighborhood.
But man alive, it's been bad. So it'll be nice to do it in the daytime for that reason as well.
So it's going to be at noon and then below that is the note about the yearbook portraits.
If you haven't gotten your portrait taken, please sign up right away because that door is closing fast.
Where's Brother Ramon? When is the final day for that?
Okay, so the final appointments are next Sunday. So, you know, you want to make sure that you get in on this.
It's the last chance next Sunday. So be sure you sign up for that.
And then you'll be in the yearbook and you'll get a really nice portrait for your family.
And look, they've been posted all over Facebook, all of these portraits and they're beautiful pictures.
And so the Ventura's are doing an excellent job with that. Let's give them a big hand on their work with that.
I mean, they made you look good. All right.
So they are good. They are talented. No, I'm just kidding.
So anyway, on the back, congratulations to the Casas family.
Moses was born. Baby Moses. And that was Friday, October 22nd at 2.55 p.m.
Nine pounds and 21 and a half inches. So congratulations to them.
And then below that is the note about the zip line tour. Those who missed out during the ladies retreat.
But I think even if you didn't miss out, you can sign up at this point.
Because of the fact that there are a lot of extra slots available.
So what happened is that they had paid for the zip lining and it fell through somehow.
Something went wrong. What went wrong with the zip lining?
Okay. The cable snapped. There were a few fatalities. And so they had to shut it down for the rest of the day.
No, I'm just kidding. No, no, no. What she actually said was that there was a storm that came in.
And so because of safety, they, you know, they were afraid of getting struck by lightning, I guess, on the zip line.
So the storm came in and canceled it. So they have to, they got a bunch of rain checks.
So now they have a whole bunch of free tickets for it. And so this is the makeup trip.
But even if you already did it, even if you weren't even on the ladies retreat, you know, you might as well sign up for this.
Because there are more rain checks than we can use because a lot of the ladies can't make it that day.
So just get with my wife and talk to her personally. You must sign up directly with Mrs. Anderson for that.
And then, even the dudes? Okay. She said that so far there are a lot of extra spots even with the ladies signed up.
So this might even get opened up to some dudes. All right. So again, you got to talk to her.
She, you know, she holds the keys to the zip lining kingdom. And so you got to talk to her.
And so I'll leave it at that. But if you're interested, go talk to her and see if you can get in on the action.
All right. And I believe that that's about it for announcements. So let's go ahead and count up the soul winning from the past few days.
So going back to Thursday. Anything to report from Thursday? Anything from Thursday? What about Friday?
Anything to report from Friday? Okay. Anything else from Friday? What about Saturday? Okay.
Anything else from Saturday? And then what about today? Sunday? Brother Scott?
Two for the main group with Brother Scott? Is that a four and a one? Okay. Got it.
Got it. Got it. I see there. Anything else from today? All right.
Very good. Keep up the great work on soul winning. And with that, let's sing our next song. Come lead us.
Oh, wait. Actually, before we not so fast.
Before we sing our next song, I've asked Brother Raymond Cooper to come and just give a little bit of a testimony about the Sierra Leone mission strip.
So I'll turn it over to him. All right. So we just got back from our Sierra Leone missions trip.
We've been very excited about it. You know, we've been talking about it for months now and we finally did it.
And we went over there at the beginning of October and we had 17 people participate all together who came out for the trip.
And over the course of one of the week that we were there,
we ended up preaching to eight school assemblies to a combined total of over 3000 students.
So that was a great opportunity for lots of us to get an opportunity to preach in front of a large group of kids.
We also did one on one soul winning to hundreds of other people and we ended up getting five hundred and two salvations by the end of it.
So that was a great trip. It was a great experience.
I had I had a wonderful time. Everybody that went had a great time as well.
And I'm just thankful that we can be a part of a church that puts on events like this, you know,
and I would and I know that a lot of people wanted to come that weren't able to come this time.
But, you know, try to sign up next time because I want to do more of these trips in the near future as well.
So thank you all.
Let's take our song books and turn to number two hundred and thirty one to thirty one.
Sunlight. Him number two hundred and thirty one.
I wondered in the shades of night. Number two thirty one.
I wondered in the shade of night until Jesus came to me.
And when the sunlight of his love in all my darkness came.
Sunlight, sunlight in my soul today.
Sunlight, sunlight all along the way.
Thanks to savior cloud he took away my sin.
I let the sunlight of his love within.
The wilds they gather in the sky and billows round me roll.
However dark the world may be, sunlight in my soul.
Sunlight, sunlight in my soul today.
Sunlight, sunlight all along the way.
Thanks to savior cloud he took away my sin.
I let the sunlight of his love within.
While walking in the light of God, I seek a new divine.
I press with holy prayer on and leave the world behind.
Sunlight, sunlight in my soul today.
Sunlight, sunlight all along the way.
Thanks to savior cloud he took away my sin.
I let the sunlight of his love within.
I cross the wide extended fields, I journey on the plain.
And in the sunlight of his love I reap the golden grain.
Sunlight, sunlight in my soul today.
Sunlight, sunlight all along the way.
Thanks to savior cloud he took away my sin.
I let the sunlight of his love within.
Since time has passed me and as he is the light that came to me.
Behold the brightness of his face throughout eternity.
Sunlight, sunlight in my soul today.
Sunlight, sunlight all along the way.
Thanks to savior cloud he took away my sin.
I let the sunlight of his love within.
Thank you for singing tonight.
I hope I didn't have a pass to offering plates around.
As the plates go around, let's turn in our Bibles to 1st Corinthians chapter number 5.
As we always do, we'll read the entire chapter beginning in verse number 1.
1st Corinthians chapter 5 beginning in verse 1.
Follow along silent with brother Dan as he reads.
1st Corinthians 5.
In 1st Corinthians chapter 5 the Bible reads,
It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you,
and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles,
that one should have his father's wife.
And ye are puffed up, and have not rather mourned,
that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you.
For I verily, as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already,
as though I were present, concerning him that hath so done this deed.
In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together,
and my spirit with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ,
to deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh,
that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
Your glorying is not good.
Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?
Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump,
as ye are unleavened.
For even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.
Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven,
neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness,
but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators,
yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world,
or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters,
for then must ye needs go out of the world.
But now I have written unto you not to keep company,
if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous,
or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner,
with such in one know not to eat.
For what have I to do to judge them also that are without?
Do not ye judge them that are within,
but them that are without, God judgeth.
Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.
Dear Father in Heaven, please fill the Passover spirit
and please give us all ears to hear and receive wisdom from this day.
In Jesus' name, Amen.
Man, the title of my sermon this evening is The Definition of Railing.
The Definition of Railing.
We've got this list of sins in 1 Corinthians chapter 5
that are very serious sins and in fact they are things
that need to be dealt with with church discipline.
You know, where the Bible even says that if someone's called a brother
and they're guilty of these things,
we need to put away from among ourselves that wicked person
with such a one know not to eat.
So these are very serious matters and the thing about railing
is that it's something that most people in 2021 America
would probably not be familiar with as far as being called by that name.
You know, typically we wouldn't really talk about railing
outside of a church setting.
It's one of those words like repentance or something
where we pretty much use it in a religious context,
but it's not a part of our everyday 2021 American vernacular.
And so a lot of people might not have any idea what that even means, railing.
Not only that, but if we were to look this up in the dictionary,
which is usually a pretty good place to start when there's a word
that we don't know, we could look it up in the dictionary,
that's not always going to give us an outline of the biblical usage
or how the Bible is using this word
or what the word of God is specifically referring to when it talks about railing.
Sometimes when you look up the word railing in a dictionary
or just a secular source, it might just say that someone who's name calling
or rebuking someone harshly or speaking out against someone
is railing on that person.
However, that cannot be what the Bible means here
because we have the example of our Lord Jesus Christ himself
speaking out against the Pharisees, lashing out at them,
calling them serpents and vipers and hypocrites.
And so that's name calling.
I mean, when you're calling someone a viper and a serpent
or calling the king of Israel a fox, that was not a compliment.
You know, he's referring to these people with these pejorative terms
and he's calling them names, he's yelling at them, he's rebuking them,
and we know Jesus Christ is not a railer.
He's not guilty of this grievous sin here.
Some people will sometimes look at the preaching of Jesus
or the actions of Jesus and say, well, he can get by with it because he's Jesus.
That's not how the Bible works, my friend.
Jesus left us an example that we should follow in his steps
and Jesus Christ was totally without sin.
Jesus is not somehow above the law where he can sort of just do whatever
and it's okay because he's Jesus.
No, he actually followed the law, he actually followed the Bible.
He is without sin.
And we could point to a guy like John the Baptist who's not Jesus
and what did John the Baptist do?
He called out the Pharisees and said, oh, generation of vipers,
who had warned you to flee from the wrath to come, bring forth therefore fruits, meet for repentance.
You know, people got offended when Jesus is ripping on the scribes and the Pharisees
and then the lawyers come to him and say, you know, well, thus saying, that reproaches us also.
We're offended too.
And he's like, okay, thanks for the sermon idea.
I'll owe it to you lawyers.
And he starts ripping on the lawyers.
And so the point is that it's not just calling someone out or preaching against someone harshly
or speaking harshly or calling names because these are all things that men of God in the Bible do,
including the Lord Jesus Christ himself.
So what does it mean to rail?
Well, the good news is that railing is mentioned in nine different scriptures.
So we have a lot of material to work with to understand this subject.
We're not dealing with a word that's only used once or twice and trying to figure out what it means.
We've got all kinds of scripture on this.
We've got nine examples.
So that's good news.
Let's go, first of all, to 2 Peter chapter 2 and understand what the definition of railing is
according to scripture.
Yes, it involves speaking harshly.
But it involves false accusations or saying harsh things that are illegitimate,
things that are not true or not right.
Look what the Bible says in 2 Peter chapter 2 verse 10.
The Bible reads,
But chiefly then that walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise government.
What this is saying is that they hate authority.
It's not that they despise a certain wicked government.
It's not somebody who looks at, you know, the government of the Soviet Union back in its heyday
with Joseph Stalin and despises that wicked mass murderer.
No, no, no.
We're talking about people who hate government in general because they just hate authority.
And so it says they despise government, presumptuous are they, self-willed, and notice this phrase,
they're not afraid to speak evil of dignities.
We'll come back to that.
Whereas angels, which are greater in power and might, bring not railing accusation against
them before the Lord.
But these as natural brute beasts, made to be taken and destroyed, speak evil of things
that they understand not and shall utterly perish in their own corruption.
So we see right away that the word railing is associated with an accusation, a railing accusation.
Now why is this a railing accusation?
Well, there are a couple of clues here.
First of all, it says they speak evil of the things that they understand not.
This is not legitimate criticism.
This is not a legitimate accusation.
This is somebody just blowing off their mouth, going off half cocked, making accusations
about things that they don't understand.
They don't know the whole story.
They don't know the facts and they just blow off their mouth.
That's a railing accusation.
It's not based on actual principles of justice as found in scripture.
It's just speaking evil about something when you don't even have the facts, you don't even
understand the situation, you're speaking evil of the things that you understand not.
And not only that, it says at the end of verse 10, they're not afraid to speak evil of dignities.
You see, we should fear being wrong about an accusation.
We should just be ready to just throw accusations out there, railing accusations.
We're just firing all over the place, shooting from the hip with accusations with no fear
of being a false accuser.
You know, we should make accusations with fear and trembling, realizing the severity
of being a false accuser.
How wicked it is to be a false accuser, that should give us pause and cause us to be afraid
of repeating an accusation that's false or creating an accusation that's false.
And by the way, when the Bible says thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor,
what does bear mean?
I mean, bear means carry or bring.
So even if you're not the origin of the false witness, when you're carrying false testimony
and carrying false witness without facts, without being backed up with anything, you
end up being guilty as well when you just repeat things you've heard without evidence.
And let me tell you something, we need to make sure that we are not partial in judgment,
but that the same rules of justice apply whether we like someone or don't like someone.
Go if you would to the book of Jude, but while you turn there, let me explain to you as a
pastor that I have a little exercise that I go through when accusations are brought
to me.
Because as a pastor, and also my staff deals with this, but people will come to us sometimes
accusing other people of something.
Because obviously in a church with hundreds of people, there are going to be conflicts,
there are going to be strife and things that need to be dealt with.
And so when someone comes to me with an accusation, let's say it's about a person that I don't
particularly care for, and it's not really one of my favorite people.
What I do is I go through a mental exercise where I swap out that person in my mind with
someone that I do like a lot, and I pick some of my favorite people and put them in that
slot and say, how would I be reacting to this accusation, how would I be judging this particular
crime or whatever if it were this person that I like that did it?
And you know what, that's how I should judge that situation because it shouldn't be based
on whether I like someone or don't like someone.
It should be the same justice for everybody.
Just recently, within the last week or two, some guy called a Baptist pastor that I know
a false prophet.
And I said, I don't like that guy, I don't want anything to do with him, but I would
not go so far as to call him a false prophet.
And this guy got mad at me for not being willing to label this guy as a false prophet.
I said, you know, just because someone has done me wrong, just because someone has sinned
or even done something grievous, it doesn't just make them for sure a false prophet.
There would have to be some evidence of this guy being a false prophet in order to get
that particular label.
He could be an idiot, he could be prideful, he could be arrogant, he could be a railer,
but there's no evidence of him being some kind of a reprobate or a Judas or a false
prophet, so I'm not going to put that label on him.
And it doesn't matter how much I dislike him, I'm not going to put that label on him.
Also, you know, there are pastors out there that we would all agree are false prophets.
I mean, they are just teaching a wrong salvation, a workspace salvation, they're just teaching
full-blown lies.
But here's the thing, when someone comes at me with a wild accusation, even against a
preacher that I know is bad, I would still not accept that accusation without proper
evidence.
I wouldn't just say, oh yeah, we all know that guy's bogus, so let's just believe this
story that he committed adultery or whatever.
No, because justice is supposed to be the same for everyone.
We're supposed to observe the rules of justice without preferring one before another and
doing nothing by partiality.
So therefore, that's a good exercise for you too when you have people coming to you
telling you stuff about other people in the church that's negative and you didn't like
that person anyway, so you might just be tempted to just jump on board.
They kind of just have you at hello because you already didn't like that person.
You know what?
That's wickedness.
Substitute in your mind someone that you like.
How would you defend the person that you like?
Well then that's how we should defend everyone who has not been proven guilty.
Innocent until proven guilty should be the standard.
Don't just receive railing accusations or transmit railing accusations, but rather judge
righteous judgment and don't even receive an accusation against an elder except to be
before two or three witnesses.
And I don't care if it's the worst pastor in America, I'm not going to receive an accusation
against him but before two or three witnesses because of the fact that justice is justice.
Look at Jude verse 9.
Yet Michael the archangel when contending with the devil he disputed about the body
of Moses durst not bring against him a railing accusation but said the Lord rebuke thee but
these speak evil of those things which they know not but what they know naturally as brute
beasts and those things they corrupt themselves.
Again this railing accusation is someone speaking about things that they know not, speaking
about things that they understand not.
These are half-cocked accusations that are not based on real evidence and so we need
to understand that this sin of just throwing false accusations around is railing and is
a grievous sin that would get someone thrown out of a church.
Very serious.
Go to 1 Peter chapter 3 verse 9.
So we're looking up all the references of railing and understanding what does it mean
to be a railer.
The first thing that we've seen in 2 Peter and in Jude is this idea of just going off
half-cocked with an accusation, throwing accusations around, not being afraid to just make false
accusations or just repeat things and just say wicked things about other people.
So again the Bible's not saying that every accusation is railing.
There's a certain type of accusation that's a railing accusation.
You see when there's actually fact, when there's actually evidence, when it's actually confirmed
and you make a legitimate accusation, that's not railing.
That's a legitimate accusation.
You saw something with your own eyes and you report what you've seen.
That's not a railing accusation.
That's you giving your own personal testimony of what you know firsthand.
But how many times have I had people come to me talking smack about other people, talking
smack about other preachers and what do they do?
They come at me with something that's secondhand.
They come at me with something that's thirdhand.
And here's the thing, in a courtroom that wouldn't even be allowed.
It's an objection, your honor, hearsay.
That's not your testimony.
That's not what you have specifically seen and witnessed.
You're just repeating something that you heard from someone else.
You know, if we wanted to get something repeated from someone else, we'd get that person on
the stand, wouldn't we?
The actual eyewitness.
Why would we want to get information secondhand, thirdhand, fourthhand?
And too many people are basing accusations and judgments upon something that they didn't
even hear firsthand or see firsthand, just that they're just repeating stuff that's floating
around.
Or, well, everybody's saying so and so.
Oh, really?
Everybody's saying that?
Everybody's saying it.
Well, who's everybody?
Let's, you know, and then you start actually looking for the real source of the accusation
and you find that it's all circular.
It's all just one person quoting another and you can't actually get to anybody that has
an actual accusation with any meat on the bone.
Okay.
We need to be careful of railing.
What else is railing?
Well, let's look at 1 Peter chapter 3, verse number 9.
And it says, not rendering evil for evil or railing for railing, but contrary wise blessing,
knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing.
Now we look at this verse, we might just throw up our hands and say, well, we can't really
get a definition from this verse because it just says whatever railing is, if somebody
does it to you, don't do it to them.
You know, two wrongs don't make a right.
But actually, if we read the rest of the chapter, we can figure out what this is because jump
down to verse 16.
It says, having a good conscience, that whereas they speak evil of you as of evildoers, they
may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation in Christ.
So we see there that up here we've got don't do evil for evil or railing for railing, and
then just a few verses down he says, they speak evil of you, that's the evil for evil,
they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation of Christ.
That's the railing, the falsely accusing.
So again, this confirms what we saw in 2 Peter 2 and in Jude.
Those were sort of half-cocked accusations.
This is just full-blown a false accusation.
A false accusation is railing.
An accusation without evidence, half-cocked, just flying off and just making wild accusations
is railing.
Go if you would to 1 Timothy chapter 6, 1 Timothy chapter 6.
So as we study these, a picture begins to emerge, doesn't it, of what railing is.
As we look at these, you'll see that it's consistent, what railing is, and that we can
get a good picture just from looking up the nine mentions in scripture.
Look at 1 Timothy chapter 6 verse 3.
If any man teach otherwise and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our
Lord Jesus Christ and the doctrine which is according to godliness, he is proud knowing
nothing but doting about questions and strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings,
evil surmising, perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth,
supposing that gain is godliness from such withdraw thyself.
Now here again, we don't have a clear definition of railing, but we can see what it's right
next to in the verse and see if that's consistent with the definitions that we got elsewhere.
What is railing right next to?
Well it's right next to evil surmising.
Railings, evil surmising.
Both of those are plural, they're both right next to each other, and what is evil surmising?
Well if you look up surmise in the dictionary, here's what it means.
To think or infer without certain or strong evidence, conjecture or guess.
So this is somebody who's conjecturing, guessing, they don't have certain evidence, they don't
have strong evidence.
Evil surmising would be basically assuming that someone's guilty without evidence.
That's the evil surmising, just I'll bet this person's also doing this.
You know, I'll bet they're even guilty of this.
Just conjecturing, guessing, no evidence.
Another definition of surmise that I found is just to conjecture or guess.
So evil surmising are when we just assume the worst about people without actually having
the facts.
Wouldn't that be perfect to go right next to railings?
Railings, evil surmising.
Why?
Because it has to do with falsely accusing or accusing without evidence, without a reason.
You know the Bible says of course in Matthew chapter 5 that we should not even be angry
with our brother without a cause.
There are reasons that are legitimate for getting angry.
There are reasons that are legitimate to accuse someone or to criticize someone or to call
someone out.
But then there's being angry with your brother without a cause.
Then there's accusations that are just based on surmisings and not on actual fact.
Go if you would to Mark chapter 15.
Mark chapter 15.
Now I saw one guy bring this up as an example to say that railing is still railing even
if what you're saying is accurate or legitimate or true.
Now again the problem with that foolish definition is that you'd be calling Jesus a railer, John
the Baptist a railer, the Apostle Paul a railer because they're calling people out by name,
they're calling them names and they're using a harsh and abusive quote unquote language
to chew out these false prophets and false teachers.
So sorry that doesn't work, okay.
But this is a really bad example if somebody wants to make the case that well sometimes
it can be true and it's still railing, it's legitimate, it's still railing.
Well let's see what the Bible says.
Look at Mark chapter 15 verse 29, and they that pass by railed on him, wagging their
heads and saying, oh thou that destroyest the temple and buildest it in three days,
save thyself and come down from the cross.
And the statement could be made, well you know Jesus really did say that, hold on, no
he didn't.
Now it is true that Jesus said something similar to this, but this is a twisting of truth.
And a twisting of truth can be railing, but something that's actually true in context
and legitimate is not railing.
Railing is a false accusation, railing is a half-cocked accusation, railing is not legitimately
calling something out that's actually true.
Now let's see what the Bible itself says about this statement, oh thou that destroyest the
temple and buildest it in three days, save thyself and come down from the cross.
Go to Mark 14 56.
Let's compare scripture with scripture and we're going to see that this is a really bad
example for someone who wants to make the case that well no railing is just being abusive
and even if it's true, even if what you said is true.
Look at Mark 14 56, for many bear what?
Many bear what?
False witness against him, but their witness agreed not together.
And there arose certain and bare false witness against him saying we heard him say I will
destroy this temple that is made with hands and within three days I will build another
made without hands.
But neither did their, neither so did their witness agree together.
So let me ask this, is saying that Jesus claimed that he would destroy the temple and build
it again in three days, the Bible says that's a false accusation.
Three times in Mark 14 it says it's false witness, false witness, false witness.
So then you can't turn around and look at Mark 15 and say they railed on him and said
thou that destroys the temple and in three days build.
Well what they said is true, is it though?
Three times the Bible says it's false witness.
Now of course it is based on a kernel of truth, it is a twisting of truth because what did
Jesus actually say?
Jesus said if you destroy this temple in three days I will raise it up.
And he spake of the temple of his body, but did he say I'm going to destroy this temple
and I'm going to rebuild it again in three days?
No he did not.
So what they've done is they've changed what he said, they've also taken it out of context.
He's talking about the temple of his body, but either way he never said that he was going
to be the one to destroy the temple.
He said you destroy the temple and in three days I'll build it because they're going to
destroy his body.
They're going to crucify the Lord Jesus Christ and in three days later he's going to rise
again from the dead.
He's going to raise up the temple of his body.
So it's very clear that Mark 15 is false witness because we got three mentions in chapter 14
telling us it's false witness.
There's no mystery here that they're bearing false witness in chapter 15.
So if you were to Luke 23, Luke 23, here's another one that is labeled as railing in
the Bible.
While you're turning there I'll read for you from Matthew 27 verse 38, then were there
two thieves crucified with him, one on the right hand and another on the left and they
that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads, this is a similar word in the Bible,
they reviled him and said, thou that destroyest the temple and buildest it in three days,
save thyself if thou be the son of God, come down from the cross.
So we see that there are multiple false accusations here.
First of all they're claiming that he said he's going to destroy the temple, which he
never said, and then secondly they say well if you're the son of God, come down from the
cross.
This is accusing him implicitly of what?
Of claiming to be the son of God when he's not.
This is like when the devil said to Jesus, the great accuser himself said to Jesus, well
if you're the son of God, then command that these stones be made bread.
That's what you're saying when you say that.
Look at Luke 23 verse 39, and one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him saying, if
thou be Christ, save thyself, oh you're Christ, huh?
Well if you're Christ, then save yourself and us.
What is he saying?
If you don't save yourself and us, you're not Christ, is what he's saying.
This is railing because of the fact that he's making the implication here that you're saying
that you're Christ and you're not.
So he's calling Jesus basically a fake, a fraud, a false messiah, an imposter of Christ.
And that's why in the other gospels these two accusations go side by side where it's
oh you know you're going to destroy the temple and build it in three days.
Well if you are the son of God, if you are Christ, then save yourself and come down from
the cross.
So that's the railing.
They are accusing him, they are attacking him, they are mocking him in a way that is
not legitimate.
And again some people would just say any mocking is railing.
I heard one of these preachers say that if you make memes, that's the 2021 equivalent
of railing, you know, memeing.
You know if any be a drunkard or a fornicator or a memer, you know because they said you're
mocking and criticizing and ridiculing.
But hold on a minute, we see great men of God including the Lord Jesus Christ himself
sometimes ridiculing false teaching or false prophets.
And so it's biblical.
We see the Bible says that God is going to mock these people in their hour of destruction.
We see of course Elijah the prophet on Mount Carmel making fun of polytheism and making
fun of the idea that their God is not even really the creator, he's not even omnipresent,
he's not omniscient, he's not all powerful.
So he says well maybe your God's on a journey.
Maybe you just need to get louder so that he can hear you.
You know you guys aren't yelling loud, is that all you got?
You know get louder, cut yourselves more.
Maybe he's on a trip, maybe he's asleep, you've got to wake him up.
But this is what polytheists believe.
They think you know go to India, they have to ring a little bell to get the God's attention,
they have to go to certain geographies, they have to make a pilgrimage to a certain place
because that's where that God hangs out and he's not necessarily going to hear you if
you attempt to make contact in the wrong location.
Elijah is mocking that.
That's a legitimate criticism of polytheism and false gods and really demons that they're
worshipping.
And so it's not the fact that they're ridiculing Jesus that makes it railing, it's the fact
that they are ridiculing him illegitimately, falsely accusing him of saying that he would
destroy the temple, falsely accusing him of being a fake son of God or a fake Christ when
of course he was the real deal.
Go if you would to 2 Chronicles chapter 32, 2 Chronicles chapter 32.
And again, the statement about the temple is based on a kernel of truth but it's a twisting
of the truth and here's the thing about that.
Most lies are based on a kernel of truth, aren't they?
Very few lies just spring out of thin air.
They're usually based on some kernel of truth that's being twisted, exaggerated, blown out
of proportion, taken out of context or whatever and then you know what it becomes?
A lie.
It's a lie.
If you take something that's true, let's say one person did something and then you say
three people did it.
You just lied.
If you, you know, you hear about one person doing something and you make it two, you make
it three, you're lying.
You've turned it into a lie.
Or you know, let's say somebody did something and then you just basically change it to something
more extreme, you're lying, right?
I mean, it could be an exaggeration but usually criticisms are based on a kernel of truth
even when they're lies, okay?
So think about some of the false accusations that have been made against me or against
our church.
You know, there's usually some kernel of truth that's being twisted or blown out of proportion
and it, but it becomes a lie.
There's no excuse for it.
Like, just because it's based on a kernel of truth doesn't make it any less false witness.
Just because Jesus said something similar, the author of scripture three times says it's
false witness, false witness, false witness, even though they only change a word or two
of what Jesus said, okay?
So you know, for example, one of the wild accusations about myself was that, that I
was a secret Mormon, okay?
I mean, that's pretty wild and you say like, how could that be based on any kernel of truth?
Okay, but what it was, was that there was a website that I had built and I used a template
to build the website and the template was built by a company and the company was Mormon
and the owner of the Mormon owned company played an organ at Brigham Young University
and there's a photograph of the guy who owned a programming company who created the template
that I just bought like a generic template to build a website.
I didn't, I didn't like look at the genealogy of this template and made sure that it was
made by God-fearing people, okay?
It's just a template.
It's a web template.
So then I literally had people coming to me saying, well, it's true, is it true that there's
a picture of you floating around on the internet, a picture of you playing an organ at Brigham
Young University, you know?
So think about how this thing evolved from being this guy used a template from a company
and the programmer was Mormon and here's a picture of that programmer playing an organ
at Brigham University because he's Mormon, okay, to Steven Anderson is playing the organ
at Brigham Young University.
That's pretty wild but I'm telling you that's how rumors get started, don't they?
And things just go crazy or get blown out of proportion.
Or for example, you know, I'll get up and preach the Bible and I'll use Bible words
that offend the tipper-gores of this world, okay?
So I'll use the words that God uses, words like bastard, piss, damn, you know, no I
do not have Tourette's Syndrome.
These are actual Bible words, okay?
So you know, I'll get up and basically just use these words freely in my preaching whereas
some other preachers will literally censor the King James Version as a preaching.
I refuse to do that.
There's nothing wrong with the King James Bible.
The King James Bible is the perfect, pure, preserved word of God and to me, it's an insult
to the King James if you act like, oh, some of these words they use are inappropriate.
Okay, well then go get an NIV then and it'll twist up all the doctrine and it, believe
me, it won't use any of these harsh words.
It'll also tone down other harsh words like hell, damnation, and things like that as well
because it's just going to water everything down.
So yes, it's true that I get up and preach and use these words freely, what the Bible
would use, hell, ass, damnation, piss, bastard, but then this becomes Pastor Anderson just
freely cusses from the pulpit, you know, Pastor Anderson just, just cusses from the pulpit
and in fact, someone said that I used God's name in vain from the pulpit and when asked
for evidence, they showed me using the word hell in a way that they didn't like.
Now, folks, last time I checked, hell is not a name of God.
God's name isn't hell unless you're a pagan Greek or something, right?
Worshipping Hades or something.
Hell is not a name of God.
But what kind of an absurd interpretation of scripture is it that says if you use hell
wrong, you took God's name in vain, what?
You know what taking God's name in vain is, is when you throw around God's name and you're
not talking to God or about God.
So people who just yell, oh my God, that's God's name in vain.
If people just yelled Jesus Christ as, as just an exclamation, that's taking God's name
in vain.
And you know what?
If I had actually done that, then you know what, then I deserve to be rebuked for that.
I deserve to be called out and you know what I should do?
At that point, it would be to apologize and say, hey, that was wicked of me.
That was wrong.
I should not have made that utterance.
But guess what?
It never happened.
But that's the kind of false accusations that you'll hear where they're based on a kernel
of truth, okay?
But then it gets twisted and blown out of proportion, exaggerated or taken out of context
or whatever to where, or, or, you know, how about these kind of false accusations?
You know, one of the members of Faithful Word Baptist Church walked up and just wanted
to ask Pastor Anderson for prayer.
And he just screamed at them and threw them out of the building because no one's allowed
to question anything and nobody's allowed to get prayer and no, you know, but, but,
but here's the thing.
That's a railing accusation by people who have, they didn't actually look at the evidence
nor did they actually know the context or the situation.
So they're going off half cocked, aren't they?
Without facts.
Because what actually happened was that a literal insane person who believed that he
was Michael the Archangel told us in the parking lot he was Michael the Archangel and for weeks
after on YouTube in the comments section talked about that was me, you know, because he was
real excited about being a YouTube celebrity getting thrown out.
That was me and I'm Michael the Archangel and blah, blah, blah.
You know, a guy who was suffering from a religious grandeur delusion, probably a drug-induced
psychosis thought that he was Michael the Archangel and came up and did not ask for
prayer.
He did not ask for me to pray for him.
What he did was he said, I would like to read this prayer.
I would like to have this prayer read.
Something along those lines.
You have to go back and listen to the video yourself.
It was something along the lines of I'd like to have this prayer read and he unfolds a
piece of paper.
In the video, it's clear that he says he wants this prayer read.
I look at the paper and say, get out of here.
This is bizarre.
Are you bozo?
Drag this bozo out.
Because he was an insane person bringing up some insane gobbledygook that he wants read.
First of all, let me just say this.
We don't read prayers around here.
Yeah.
So Brother Dickett, did you, you read that prayer earlier, right?
When you pray for the, no, we don't read prayers.
You know what?
We pray from our heart.
Politicians read prayers.
Politicians pray from their heart, okay?
We pray because we're talking to God, not because we're just, you know, hail Mary, full
of grace, swing those beads all over the place.
Swing them high, swing them low, swing them Mary, go, go, go.
That's not prayer.
That's a vain repetition and that's not what we do as Christians.
We don't read prayers.
We actually pray from the heart because we mean it because we're talking to God, okay?
But you see how that's someone who doesn't know the situation.
Also another thing, you know, it's easy to misread situations.
In that video where Michael the Archangel gets thrown out of Faithful Word, okay?
In that video, Brother Segura throws this guy out in kind of a dramatic fashion because
he shows up and he's wearing a black suit and he's got sunglasses on, maybe even black
gloves on, and I mean he has that kind of military efficiency that Brother Segura has.
And so here's the thing, you know, it can be blown out of proportion and made into something
it's not.
The true story for people who actually go to our church, who are actually there, was
that Brother Segura had been drilling a hole and got debris in his eye and had damaged
his eye and got to the hospital and got it removed or whatever, but his eye looked horrible.
It was like all bloodshot and messed up and he was wearing sunglasses because of the fact
that his eye was healing.
He didn't want to freak people out, walking around with his eye all bloodshot and damaged.
And so it wasn't like what people made it out to be.
But you know, I have to admit, I'm kind of glad it happened on that day with those sunglasses
because it was kind of a cool video, you know what I mean?
But again, it could give people the wrong impression about our church or something.
You know, like we've just got this really radical security protocol or something.
But hey, let people think that, amen.
And we're all armed to the teeth around here.
So watch out!
All right.
But anyway, you see what I mean, sometimes people just, they make judgments without having
the facts.
They don't even take the time to slow down and actually listen to the video where the
guy says he wants the prayer read, where he unfolds a piece of paper, I look at it, and
say drag this bozo out.
The guy wasn't a member.
The guy had never been here before.
And it was on a day that we were already dealing with horrible false doctrine.
And here's what I've learned about the ministry.
When it rains, it pours.
Whenever we're in one fight, it seems like the devil just sends people to pile on us.
So that kind of thing doesn't usually happen.
But it's a day when we're already dealing with major church discipline issues of people
that had been secretly denying the Trinity and teaching that the Trinity is a false doctrine
and we threw these people out of the church.
That guy picked the wrong day to mess with us.
You know, if you're going to come to Faithful Word pretending to be Michael the Archangel
because you're on drugs, you know what, do it on a day that we're not already dealing
with people who deny the Trinity because we're already fired up, alright?
But you see how these accusations, they do have a kernel of truth, all of them, don't
they?
But we can go down the list of accusations that yeah, they're going to have a kernel
of truth, but the thing about that is that they're still lies.
They're still false accusations.
They're still railing because they're not true.
Because when you change key details in a story, that story stops being true at that point.
When you change key facts and key details, you're lying now.
And the truth and a lie are sometimes only separated by a word or two.
You can't just be like, well, so, you know, I was kind of right.
No, you're a liar.
You're a false accuser.
You know, like the preacher that I called out a few weeks ago.
You know, yeah, that story that he told was based on a kernel of truth, but if anyone
actually heard the actual story, they would all be totally in agreement with what was
going on.
But once it's been twisted, exaggerated, and modified, now all of a sudden it's a railing
accusation against the new IFB and against our pastor friends.
Because it's not even true what happened.
You know, like for, you know, oh, these people are, but hey, here's the thing.
Let me just go on the record, my friend, remember the button on the pulpit?
Push it again.
Yeah.
Leviticus 2013 is what the Bible says.
Leviticus 2013 is what I believe, right?
You know, I believe that sodomites should be punished by the death penalty.
But then what's the railing accusation that will come?
Oh, you guys are saying that we should go out and kill sodomites.
I've never said that.
Pastor Jimenez never said that.
Pastor Shelley never said that.
Pastor Burson's never said that.
You know, and these guys have all been attacked in the media and online with the accusation
that, you know, they said that we should be killing sodomites, like that we should be
just going out and killing.
Folks, we've never said that.
We've always taught that it's a spiritual battle.
We wrestle not against flesh and blood.
What we said is that historically they've received the death penalty.
And that biblically under Moses in the Old Testament, they received the death penalty
and that we believe that that punishment was appropriate and that God was right when he
instituted that and Moses was right when he instituted that and that the governments of
America and elsewhere were right when that was the law.
That's what we said.
We said God was right, Leviticus was right, Moses was right, America was right.
That's what we said.
But then it's like, no, Pastor Anderson is saying, or these other pastors are saying
this.
Is that a false accusation based on a kernel of truth?
Absolutely.
But does that mean that what they're saying is true?
Does that make it any less of a false accusation when we have consistently been against violence
in general and we've even specifically said, do not go out and try this at home, kids.
We specifically said that many times.
We're teaching the word of God.
We're teaching principles of the Bible.
We're not telling people to go out and start instituting biblical law and just enforcing
biblical laws.
That's not what has ever been taught behind this pulpit or any of my friends' pulpits.
But isn't that the accusation?
Is it based on a kernel of truth?
Yeah.
So again, the kernel of truth does not justify the lie.
You know, when Satan, the first liar in the Bible shows up in Genesis three, everything
he says is based on a kernel of truth.
But he's a liar.
What did he say?
Well, you shall not surely die.
God knows that in the day that you eat thereof, you shall be as God's knowing good and evil.
Now here's the thing.
It's true that they would be as God's knowing good and evil because once they did eat of
the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, God says to them, behold, you know, the man
has become like unto one of us.
So you know, in that sense, there was a kernel of truth there about man's understanding of
good and evil making him like unto God by knowing good and evil and by having that moral
free agency of making that choice.
But hold on a second though.
What about when he said you shall not surely die?
What did God say?
God said you shall surely die.
So the devil is lying, right?
Because God said you shall surely die and the devil said you shall not surely die.
But here's the thing.
The devil's lie is again based on a kernel of truth because they did not physically die
in the day that they ate of the fruit.
They died spiritually in the day that they ate of the fruit and not only did they spiritually
die because he said in the day you eat thereof, you'll surely die.
The spirit died and that's why we need salvation when we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
our dead spirit is quickened or brought to life.
So the spirit died.
The day they ate thereof, they died but because it wasn't a physical death that happened that
day, then there's a kernel of truth in what the devil's saying but here's why the devil's
also lying because they also set in motion their own physical death that would take place
at a later date.
So the day that they ate of the forbidden fruit, they died spiritually and because of
eating of the forbidden fruit, they ended up dying physically because God specifically
barred their access to the tree of life because they had eaten of the tree of knowledge of
good and evil.
Now they get thrown out of the garden and God says we will not allow man to put forth
his hand and take up the tree of life also and live forever.
So man is going to be removed from the garden of Eden.
He's not going to have access to the tree of life and he's eventually going to die.
So when the devil said you should not surely die, guess what they did?
They surely died.
Adam's not around right now still walking the earth living, is he?
You know why?
He died.
He's dead.
So who was telling the truth, God or the devil?
God was telling the truth.
But you can see how the things that the devil said had some truth mixed in.
But here's the thing, when you mix truth and lies, it's all lies.
Because even though the devil mixes the truth and the lie, what does Jesus say about him?
There's no truth in him.
So when you take the kernel of truth and wrap it in lies, you know what?
God looks at that and says there's no truth in that.
When the devil quotes scripture and just changes it a little and uses it a little out of context
and twists the meaning a little, Jesus looks at that and says there's no truth in him.
The kernel of truth surrounded in lies is lies, period, okay.
So don't take the kernel of truth as evidence.
You know, here's the accusation, here's the railing accusation and here's the evidence
and they show you a little kernel of truth, it's like, well, hold on a second.
That's not what I asked for.
That's not for evidence of what you're actually accusing.
Pastor Anderson, use god damn it.
Here's him saying hell in a way we don't like.
That's not evidence.
And we could go down, I could go down the list.
I gave a few examples of false accusations.
I could give hundreds, right, of just wild accusations against me.
I could explain the kernel of truth that they're based on and why they are lies because of
the fact that it's been twisted, exaggerated, blown out of proportion or taken out of context.
It's that simple.
Where did I have you turn?
Second Chronicles?
Second Chronicles 32, 16.
And his servants spake yet more against the Lord God and against his servant Hezekiah.
He wrote also letters to rail on the Lord God of Israel.
So you know, even God can be railed against.
Not just humans, not just angels, but the Lord could be railed against.
And to speak against him saying, and again I've heard some of these bozo preachers say
well rail means speak against.
See they said to rail against him and to speak against him, so rail means speak against.
Okay so we can never speak against anyone.
So how do you explain the book of Matthew?
Jesus is speaking against, look at Matthew 23 and explain to me.
So how do you explain the book of Mark?
How do you explain Luke?
How do you explain John?
How do you explain Acts?
And in my mind right now I know I'm not saying them, I'm thinking of all the people speaking
against people in these books.
You know, we could go down all the epistles of Paul and in each epistle we're going to
find Paul speaking against somebody.
So again, this is a foolish definition of railing to just say well it's just speaking
against someone.
Okay well then we can never speak out against anything.
We can never talk about, it's ridiculous, it's absurd.
They are railing against him and they're speaking against him.
Sometimes and can separate two things that are the same thing and sometimes and can separate
two things that are different things, right?
Cats and dogs, those are different things, right?
Cats and lions, you know, would be like that, you know, they're actually lions that we're
talking about.
They're not just cats, they're also lions.
The point is I could say God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and guess what?
God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ are the same person.
But if I said, you know, God and the devil, you know, it's two different entities there.
So the point is that you can't just always take the word and and just assume that the
things on both sides of that and are the same.
Sometimes they're the same, sometimes they're different.
Lunch and dinner, okay?
But I could also say, you know, dinner and supper are the same thing or something like
that.
And now the and is referring to two things that are the same.
So the point is they're railing on God and what do they say when they rail on God?
As the gods of the nations of other lands have not delivered their people out of my
hand, so shall not the God of Hezekiah deliver his people out of my hand.
Is that a legitimate criticism of God?
If the gods of Sifar Vam can't do it, Jehovah can't do it either.
If the gods of Arpad can't do it, the Lord God of Israel can't do it either.
Is that a legitimate criticism of God?
Or is this a railing accusation or criticism that God is deceiving them, that God is lying
them?
And if you read the context of this, that's what they say.
They say, don't let Hezekiah deceive you.
Don't let God deceive you.
Don't let the prophets of God deceive you saying that they have more power than these
other gods of the heathen.
They don't.
Well guess what?
They do.
These guys are railing on God by saying that he can't deliver, that he's just like the
gods of the heathen, he's equivalent to the idolatry of the surrounding nations.
That's a railing accusation.
Go to 1 Samuel chapter 25.
I'm almost done.
In fact, this is the last instance of railing to turn to.
I believe, uh, to my knowledge, turn to everything.
You know, we went to the nine instances and I don't know about you, but I feel like it's
a very consistent picture of railing that's presented in the Bible.
It's that which is either false or twisted.
It's that which is half cocked or based on no evidence or based on weak evidence.
It's not based on strong evidence or clear evidence.
It's just a wild accusation.
It's false accusation.
It's lies.
It's uh, illegitimate criticism.
It's not a legitimate criticism.
Okay.
Look at 1 Samuel 25, 10 and Nabal answered David's servants and said, who is David and
who is the son of Jesse?
Now he's not saying that he doesn't know who he is.
You know, when he says who's David, he's not just like, well, who's David?
That's not what he's saying here.
You know, who is David is basically insulting him like he's nobody basically.
Okay.
It's not that he doesn't know who David is because in the next breath he's going to prove
that he does know who David is because look what he says next.
Who is David and who is the son of Jesse?
There be many servants nowadays that break away every man from his master.
What is he accusing David of doing?
He's accusing David of rebelling against Saul.
It's sort of like where Pharaoh says, well, who is the Lord that I should let the people
go?
Like, well, who's he to me?
When he says, well, who's David?
There are lots of servants that break away from their master.
So who's David?
He's just another one of these servants that break away from their master.
You got all kinds of rebellious, wicked people breaking away from their master and David
is no different.
Who's David?
He's just one of these many people that break away from their master.
There be many servants nowadays that break away every man from his master.
Now is that true?
Is that how the story of David and Saul went?
No.
The true story is that David was the most loyal, faithful, righteous servant that Saul
had.
He was nothing but nice to him.
He did nothing but good unto him.
He was very obedient, very good in the loyalty department.
Even when Saul is attacking him, lying about him, and trying to kill him, David still won't
stretch forth his hand against Saul.
He still won't kill the Lord's anointed.
He is loyal even to someone who is disloyal to him.
He's extremely loyal.
In fact, if I asked a preacher, hey, preach a sermon on being loyal, you know, you'd go
to David, you know, or preach a sermon on doing good unto those who do evil unto you.
It's like, well, okay, turn to 1 Samuel.
That's where a lot of preachers would go with that because it's such an excellent example.
This is a complete railing false accusation.
He doesn't apparently know anything about the story or he's just lying through his teeth
or whatever, but he is accusing David of just somehow going rogue and just being this renegade
who breaks off from Saul and that is absolutely not true.
Saul started attacking David, completely unprovoked, and all David did was just flee
for his life and just get out of there and say, I don't want to fight against the Lord's
anointed.
I don't want to fight against the king of Israel because he's chosen by God.
He did everything right and yet this guy's railing on him and saying this.
Shall I then take my bread and my water and my flesh that I've killed from my shears and
given unto men whom I know not whence they be?
Jump down to verse 14.
But one of the young men told Abigail, Nabal's wife, saying, behold, David sent messengers
out of the wilderness to salute our master and he railed on them.
Now this definition is again consistent with what we've seen blowing off his mouth, falsely
accusing David of something that he didn't do.
Okay, so for the conclusion, let's go to Matthew chapter 5 and while you're turning to Matthew
5, let me just bring up some things that are not railing.
So now everybody knows what railing is from scripture.
What are some things that are not railing?
Well, it's not railing when there's legitimate criticism, legitimate accusations, legitimate
name calling, but we already talked about that.
I want to bring up one more thing that is not railing.
When we both have the same facts and we all agree on the facts but come to two different
conclusions about the facts and one of us is right and one of us is wrong, neither of
us is a railer.
That's not a false accusation.
Okay, let me give you an example.
Let's say in a courtroom the prosecutor is prosecuting an innocent man.
Is he a railer?
Not necessarily.
Now if in the course of prosecuting an innocent man, he lies and distorts facts and goes off
half-cocked without evidence, then he's a railer at that point.
But what if there really is a lot of compelling evidence that makes this person seem guilty
and so the prosecutor in the integrity of his heart believes that the evidence points
to this guy's guilt and gets up and prevents that, excuse me, presents that evidence and
then in his closing argument says, look, we've all seen the evidence and I believe that this
evidence proves beyond a reasonable doubt that this man is guilty.
And let's say later the guy turns out to be innocent.
Was the prosecutor a false accuser or a railer?
The answer is no.
Because the prosecutor is not inventing facts or inventing evidence or distorting things
or twisting things, he's just presenting the evidence and coming to a conclusion.
So if I think someone is guilty who turns out to be innocent, that doesn't necessarily
make me a false accuser as long as I operated on principles of justice and I actually went
with the facts.
And different people are going to have different opinions about things and you can't just say
that somebody's a railer because they have a different opinion than you, okay?
You know, for example, we've often been accused of putting saved men in hell.
They're putting people in hell.
They're reprobating people over there at Faithful Word.
First of all, I don't have the power to reprobate it.
First of all, reprobate's not a verb.
Let's just start there, okay?
Reprobate's an adjective or a noun.
It's not a verb, okay?
If it were a verb, I wouldn't be the one doing it as God who would do it.
I don't have the power to put people in hell either.
You know, I'm not some kind of a death angel that when unsaved people die, I carry their
soul into hell for the Lord and I still make it back on Sunday morning to preach or something,
but this accusation is made of, you know, they're putting good men in hell.
They're reprobating people.
They're falsely accusing people of being unsaved or whatever, but here's the thing.
When a preacher gets up and preaches something that clearly sounds like works-based salvation,
it's very clear what they've said, and I look at that and I say, this preacher said X, Y
and Z the quote.
I don't believe this man is saved because of this quote that he said and then another
guy says, well, I still think he's saved in spite of that quote.
I think he just communicated poorly.
I think he's saved and I say, well, I think he's not saved.
Well, you're a railer.
No, if I, this is what a railer would do.
A railer would claim that that preacher said things that he didn't actually say.
A railer would take this guy's damning quote and change it a little to make it even more
damning.
That'd be a railer, right?
If some preacher said something false and I took it and twisted it and changed it to
be way worse or something, then okay, now I've distorted the facts, but if I just look
at the same facts as someone else and they think the guy's saved and I think he's not
saved, you know, that's my opinion.
Now at the end of the day, we don't really know for a fact who is saved and who's not
saved and if I get to heaven and I find out that turns out God was a lot more lenient
on doctrine than I thought and that a bunch of people that I thought were unsaved actually
turn out to be saved, praise the Lord.
You know, I would love to get to heaven and be pleasantly surprised that there's way more
people there than I thought.
Like, hey, cool, you know, it wasn't quite as narrow as I thought.
Amen.
None of us is going to get there and be like, what are these people doing here?
Shouldn't these people be in hell because of that stupid doctrine?
But if we get there and we find out that we were wrong where we drew the line because
some doctrines, you know, you draw a line and say, you know, hey, these people have
transgressed and gone outside of the doctrine of Christ.
These people aren't saved.
You know, that's what we believe.
You know, we're studying scripture and basing our judgments on what the person truly said
and what the Bible says and the Bible says, by thy words, thou shalt be justified.
By thy words, thou shalt be condemned.
That's not railing.
Even if someone said this guy's not saved and they turn out to actually be saved, it's
still not railing if it's actually based on facts and real statements and real evidence
and they're judging it based on their understanding of the word of God.
They're just wrong.
It's possible to be wrong without being a railer.
Sometimes people can actually do due diligence and look, obviously we know that there are
corrupt cops out there that plant evidence and there are corrupt prosecutors and corrupt
judges and so forth, but don't you think that also there are cops with integrity, judges
with integrity, prosecutors with integrity that accidentally condemn an innocent person?
Don't you think that that happens?
Even though everybody involved has integrity, mistakes are made.
That doesn't make them railers.
It doesn't make them malicious, evil people.
It's just people who made a mistake.
So therefore, if someone gets up and declares someone unsaved because of actual facts that
would point to that person not being saved and someone has a different opinion, fine,
but don't call someone a railer for giving their biblical judgment based on actual facts.
And you know, here's the thing about that.
Let's say I think that somebody's not saved and they turn out to be saved.
Did you know that they still end up going to heaven even if I don't think so?
And you know, my mom taught me this when I was a little child.
My mom told me, she said, you know what, if you think that somebody's not saved based
on your judgment of that person and you decide that you think that person's not saved, you're
not going to send them to hell.
You're not hurting them by thinking that or checking their salvation or doubting their
salvation or doing due diligence on their salvation.
You're not harming them at all.
But my mom told me, but you know what, when you go around just assuming everybody's saved,
you will be harming people in many cases because then you might not witness to them
or you might give them a false sense of security by just telling everybody they're saved and
making everybody happy by acting like everybody's saved.
She said, you know, that could be harmful, but you're not going to send people to hell
by doubting their salvation or questioning their salvation or even wrongfully thinking
that they're saved.
You know, my mom was right about that.
It's a legitimate point.
You know what I've noticed too?
I've noticed that people who turn out to be bozos, people who are phonies and weirdos,
they get really sensitive about this accusation of not being saved.
It's weird because, because to me, like if somebody said that I wasn't saved, I would
just kind of just laugh it off because it's, it's a wild accusation.
It means nothing.
Now if somebody said I have crooked teeth, I'm like, hey, whoa buddy, you know, that
hurts.
All right.
Why?
Because there's some truth in that.
Only a little kernel of truth, but there is some truth in that.
But the thing is, if somebody says some wild thing about me that's just so, but like you're
a Mormon, you're, you know, you work for NASA, you're a Jesuit, you're the CIA or something.
You know, people come at me with these wild things.
It's just funny.
When somebody says, Pastor Anderson's not saved, look, think about this.
Remember that series, Pastor Steven Anderson exposed?
And you know, several of those guys said he's not saved and we're, you know, if you watch
those videos, you know what you'll, you'll notice is that I don't even spend any time
on those accusations.
I don't pause the video.
How can he say I'm not saved?
I mean, he's saying that I'm not saved.
Like notice that the stuff that I addressed is stuff that's actually relevant that should
be addressed or that, you know, has an explanation warranted.
But when some guys, I don't even believe he's saved, usually it's just kind of like, that's
where it's just like I just eat a spoonful of Cinnamon Toast Crunch and just, and just
move on with the video because it doesn't matter.
But I'm telling you, you, you should see, because I've been doing this for a long time,
my friend.
I've been a pastor for 16 years and it's like people will obsess over this.
If you doubt their salvation or express to them that you don't believe that they're saved
or it's just like, you don't, so you don't think I'm saved.
You saying I'm not saved.
Why do you think I'm not saved?
Why?
You know what that, to me it just seems like they're insecure about their own salvation.
Like they're worried about it.
And I'm not saying that they're not saved, but they definitely sound worried.
Why would you say, I mean, what would make you think that I'm not saved?
I mean, really?
So I'm not saved.
It's funny.
I was talking to some people of another religion and it's just like, well, what about us?
Are we saved?
Are we?
And I'm, and I'm just like, well, you know, I don't believe so.
I hope so, but it's, I should say another denomination of Christianity, not another
religion, I guess I should say.
You know, I said, you know, what, you know, I said this, I said, well, here's what it
takes to be saved.
And I have my doubts that this is where your faith is.
And here's what the Bible said.
You know, it's not being tactful and being nice, but it's like people sometimes when
they're not saved or insecure about their salvation, they really want you to like put
a stamp on their salvation for them.
But you know, here's the stamp I have on my salvation.
Romans 816.
The spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we're the children of God.
That's the only stamp I need.
I have the Holy Spirit bearing witness with my spirit that I'm saved.
So I don't have this insecurity of like, well, why are you saying I'm not saved?
How dare he say that I'm not saved?
Can you believe he said that I'm not even saved?
It's like, so what?
Who cares?
It's dumb.
It's so, it's crazy.
So I've noticed that about these people.
So saying that someone's not saved because of their doctrine and you're actually characterizing
their doctrine based on what they actually said, you know, maybe you're wrong, but you're
not a railer.
A railer would be fabricating the quotes, distorting the quotes, and distorting facts.
Does everybody understand the difference?
I think it's important to have that distinction and I hope that this sermon has been helpful
to you to understand what railing is and what it isn't.
Okay, how do we handle it?
Well, if someone is guilty of this and they're unrepentant of this, they'd be thrown out
of the church.
How else do we handle it?
Matthew 5 verse 11, blessed are ye when men shall revile you, again, similar word, and
persecute you and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, there's your railing,
for my sake rejoice and be exceeding glad.
So therefore, I'm not worried about it.
If people rail on me, amen, it's just more rewards in heaven.
We'll discipline people that obviously, you know, would try to bring in, uh, this type
of spirit into the church and commit these sins in the church that are grievous.
But at the end of the day, you know what, we're going to smile and be happy and praise
the Lord because, you know, people are going to lie about us.
It's just the way life is.
Let's pray.
Let's have a word of prayer.
Father, thank you so much for your word and Lord God.
I pray that every person here would have a good grasp and understanding of what it means
to be a railer and Lord, that we would abstain from this wicked sin and in Jesus' name we
pray.
Amen.
Take your song books please and turn to hymn number one hundred and sixty seven.
One sixty seven, all hail the power of Jesus' name.
Hymn number one hundred and sixty seven.
Hymn number one sixty seven, all hail the power of Jesus' name.
Let angels prostrate fall in number one sixty seven, let's sing it out all together on this
first verse.
All hail the power of Jesus' name.
Let angels prostrate fall.
Hymn number one sixty seven, all hail the power of Jesus' name.
All hail the power of Jesus' name.
Hymn number one sixty seven.