about it for announcements. Let's go and count up the soul winning over the past few days
really quickly. Going back to Thursday the 27th. Anything from Thursday? Got it? Got
it? Okay. Okay. Anything else from Thursday? How about Friday? Okay. Got it. And then,
All right, and then how about Saturday?
Okay, got it, 14, all right, got it.
Very good, keep up the great work on, oh wait, we got to do Sunday.
Today, I know Brother Scott already told me that there were five with the main group.
What about outside of that group, other groups?
We got boom, boom, boom, okay.
Okay, got it, all right.
Three, okay.
Anybody else, very good.
Keep up the great work on soul winning with that.
Let's sing our next song, come lead us.
All right, you should find the answer in front of your hymnal
with the song entitled, for me to live as Christ.
If you don't have an answer, please raise your hand.
We'll get one to you and we'll sing it together.
For me to live as Christ, the die is gay.
Sings a will for me to live, his Christ and I his King.
Thank you.
Turn your hymns now to hymn number 325, hymn number 325.
Trust and obey.
Hymn number 325.
We walk with the Lord in the light of his word. What a glory he sheds on our way.
All we do is goodwill, he abides with us still.
Happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.
Not a shadow can rise, not a cloud in the skies, but a smile.
Are we happy in Jesus, but to trust Him?
Don't you just stand over here?
happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.
And in fellowship sweet, he will sit at his feet,
for we'll walk by his side in the way.
What he says we will do, there he says we will go,
Trust and obey, for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust in...
Let's turn our Bibles to 2nd Peter, chapter number 3.
2nd Peter, chapter number 3, as we always do,
we'll read the entire chapter, beginning in verse number 1.
Follow along silently with Brother Dan as he reads
2nd Peter 3, starting in verse number 1.
In 2 Peter 3 the Bible says,
For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old,
and the earth standing out of the water and in the water, whereby the world that then was,
being overflowed with water, perished. But the heavens and the earth which are now,
by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition
of ungodly men. But beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord
The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness,
but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to
repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in the which the heavens
shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. The earth also,
and all the works that are therein shall be burned up.
Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved what manner of persons ought you to be in all holy conversation and godliness?
Looking for and hasting under the coming of the day of God where in the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat
Nevertheless, we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwell with righteousness.
Wherefore, beloved, seeing that you look for such things, be diligent that you may be found of him in peace without spot and blameless.
An account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation, even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given unto him, hath written unto you.
As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable rest.
as they do also the other scriptures under their own destruction.
Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before,
beware lest ye also, being led away with the air of the wicked,
fall from your own steadfastness.
But grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
to him be glory both now and forever. Amen.
Dear Lord, thank you for salvation Lord, and thank you for faith. We're Baptist Church
I pray that you'd help us all to
Walk in the spirit that we can better love you and serve you Lord
And I pray that you would feel pasteurized with your Holy Spirit and do some pray man
Man, this evening we're continuing to talk about the fruit of the Spirit.
We've talked about love, joy, peace, and now we are on to the next one, which is long
suffering.
Now, like love, joy, and peace, long suffering is also an attribute of God, right?
Because God is love.
The Holy Spirit is called the oil of gladness.
Jesus is the prince of peace.
characterized by long suffering.
For example, back in the Old Testament,
Numbers 14 verse 18 says,
The Lord is long suffering and of great mercy
for giving iniquity and transgression,
and by no means clearing the guilty,
visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children
unto the third and fourth generation.
Now, what's interesting about this is that even in a verse about God's long suffering,
there's also a reference made to his justice, to his judgment.
And the main thing that I want you to see about this is that, yes, God is very long
suffering, but he is not forever suffering.
Does everybody understand what I mean by that?
You see, God is patient, God is slow to anger, but eventually that patience runs out and
eventually judgment falls and it falls hard.
And you know what I've noticed is that people that are the most long-suffering, the most
patient, the most gracious, when you finally push them too far, it usually isn't pretty.
2nd Peter chapter number 3 verse 9 where you just read says this the Lord is not slack concerning His promise as some men count slackness, but is long suffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, but the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also in the works that are therein shall be burned up.
And so, God is very long suffering until He's not, and then it's fire and brimstone, then
it's destruction.
And so we see that it's possible to have long suffering
and still to have judgment and justice
and eventually there does come a time
when wrath is appropriate.
Go if you would to Nahum, chapter one.
This is the Old Testament prophet of Nahum.
It's one of the minor prophets.
Major prophets are Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations,
Ezekiel, Daniel.
Minor prophets start with Hosea, right?
Joel, Amos, Obadiah.
Jonah, Micah, Nahum.
Nahum, chapter one, verse one, says this,
the burden of Nineveh, the book of the vision of Nahum,
the Elkoshite, God is jealous and the Lord revengeth,
the Lord revengeth and is furious.
The Lord will take vengeance on his adversaries
and he reserveth wrath for his enemies.
But then look at verse three, the Lord is slow to anger.
great in power. But then, this sounds a lot like Numbers 14-18, he will not at
all acquit the wicked.
The Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm,
and the clouds are the dust of his feet.
He rebuke at the sea and make it the dry,
and drieth up all the rivers.
Beishan languisheth, and Carmel,
and the flower of Lebanon languisheth.
The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt,
and the earth is burned at his presence.
Ye the world, and all that dwell therein.
Who can stand before his indignation?
And who can abide in the fierceness of his anger?
His fury is poured out like fire,
and the rocks are thrown down by him.
The Lord is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble.
And he knoweth them that trust in him.
Isn't it interesting how this beautiful statement
that is so famous, that is so important,
that's so intrinsic to God's character.
The Lord is slow to anger.
really sandwiched between statements about God's intense, furious anger. So it's
not saying God doesn't have anger. God's anger is minor. No, but the Bible is
saying that God is slow to anger.
That's what it means for God to be long suffering.
So that's sort of just a preface here because that's talking about God and his attribute
of being long suffering.
And now we need to apply this to our lives because the fruit of the Holy Spirit in our
lives is going to be long suffering, meaning that if we're filled with the Holy Spirit,
we're going to be long suffering, okay?
That's an attribute that we should want to have in our lives and we will have in our
Now why was God long-suffering according to 2nd Peter chapter 3 is that he was actually giving people a chance to get right
You know in 2nd Peter chapter 3 it said he's long suffering to usward if you go back there
Flip back there if you would actually because I want to show you a few other verses in 2nd Peter 3
It says he's long suffering to usward not willing that any should perish
But that all should come to repentance right so the reason that he's long suffering is he's giving people a chance to do better
to make things right.
Look, if you would, at verse 14, it says,
Wherefore, beloved, seeing that you look for such things,
be diligent that you be found of him in peace
without spot and blameless,
and account that the long suffering of our Lord
is salvation.
right? So the fact that he is long suffering is good news for unsaved people who aren't saved yet
that God is patiently giving them more time to be saved and they can be saved this month or you
know maybe they'll be saved next month but here's the thing eventually time runs out and so if anybody
is not saved the best thing to do is to get saved right now now is the accepted time now is the day
But thankfully God's long suffering because he's giving people a chance to get saved
He's getting Christians a chance to get right with God as well so that they can be blessed in their lives
He is slow to anger and so long suffering is not about
Putting up with anything and everything that's not what long suffering is. Hey the fruit of the Spirit's long suffering
So you're just gonna put up with anything and everything. That's not what the Bible is saying
But what long suffering is about is being slow to anger, being patient and gracious and merciful and slow to anger
and giving people a chance and being kind and not flying off the handle at the drop of hat, right?
And there are so many people, they go through life angry.
And because they go through life angrier, they have all this anger in their bosom
that they just harbor from day to day, and they let the sun go down on their wrath,
then what these people do, who are just filled with anger on a deep level,
they just blow up at the smallest thing, right?
So they're just going along the slightest thing
you do to bother them and just, boom, they blow up.
And these are the kind of people
that have road rage out on the highway, right?
Because here's the thing, if you're walking in the spirit
and you got love, joy, and peace in your heart
and you're driving down the road,
let's say somebody does something really stupid,
cuts you off, they're 100% in the wrong,
but you got love, joy, peace in your heart,
you're probably not gonna blow up
because you're probably already in a good mood,
you're rejoicing in the Lord,
like, ah, what a bozo, who cares, whatever,
and go on with your life.
But when you see these people just absolutely lose it
and melt down and flip out and flip something else,
and they're just super upset and screaming,
and then they feel like they have to keep punishing you
or punishing someone else by like, you know,
hurrying up and getting in front of you
and slamming on the brakes
and doing all these crazy things,
I would almost be willing to bet
that that person was already mad about something else.
Or they're just what the Bible talks about, an angry person who just goes through life with sort of just a baseline level of anger,
which is why every little thing sets them up.
And you know what? I guarantee you that there are probably people that are listening to this sermon that struggle with this or that are like this,
where they go through life mad and it doesn't take much to get them to blow up.
And you know what? If that's you, you've got to work on this.
Work on being filled with the Spirit because if you're filled with the Spirit, you're going to be long-suffering.
You're not going to blow up at every little thing.
You're not going to be quick to anger. You're going to be like the Lord, slow to anger.
Let me give you some scriptures on this. If you would, turn to James chapter 1.
While you're turning to James chapter 1, Proverbs 14-29 says,
He that is slow to wrath is of great understanding.
but he that is hasty of spirit exalteth folly.
What's the Bible saying?
That if you're slow to anger, you're being smart.
It's a lot smarter to go through life as someone who's slow to anger,
and the person who's hasty in spirit, who just blows up at the top of a hat,
that's a foolish way to live your life.
It's going to get you into trouble.
You need to be cool.
You need to be calm.
You need to be slow to anger.
Again, not saying that you never get angry, not saying that you put up with anything and
everything, but you put up with a lot.
You let things go.
You drop it.
You move on.
You don't have to fight every battle.
You don't have to die on every hill.
You don't have to right every wrong.
You don't have to re-educate everybody what their parents failed to teach them or whatever.
Instead, you just go through life and just don't sweat the small stuff and be long suffering.
He that is slow to wrath is of great understanding,
but he that is hasty of spirit exalted folly.
Proverbs 15-18, a wrathful man stireth up strife, but he that is slow to anger appeaseth strife, right?
And so you get in a situation with someone, a lot of times you have the choice to either escalate that situation or de-escalate that situation, right?
And the Bible is saying that if you're a wrathful man, you'll tend to stir up strife and stoke that fire and you could turn a small argument, a small disagreement into something huge.
Right? And think about how often in marriage, some of the knock-down drag-out fights in marriage start as something just really small,
and then they just kind of get blown out of proportion.
Right because instead of appeasing strife instead of calming things down you get somebody who's
Blowing up or just blowing things out of proportion making it worse
Okay, so another verse that would come to mind is a soft answer turn of the way wrath
But grievous words stir up
Anger and so you need to be slow to wrath if you're slow to wrath the Bible says you'll appease strife
You're able to de-escalate and diffuse situations
You know you'll have people try to pick fights with you or be angry with you and
You know you're able to de-escalate, you know
I was I was thinking about my trip to the nut house
Because of the fact that the guy who put me in the nut house also put his wife in the nut house
And she's in the nut house right now
the sick French faggot.
And I'm telling you something.
You know, what goes around comes around
and these wicked people who get thrown out of the church,
well, their life is a you-know-what show
and it's a mess and it's only going to get
weirder and worse for these kind of people.
But let me tell you something,
I was thinking about my time in the nut house,
which was only 24 hours, thank God.
And when I was in there,
there's all these weird scary people in there.
There's all these violent people in there, and I mean I saw
multiple times
people get in just violent fist fights in this place because you're just in a room with 50 other people
most of whom are crazy on some level and
These violent fights break out
And I mean, I'm talking just knock down, drag out, just giving it everything they got, being dragged apart by the staff and then no one's punished, no one's removed.
After these violent fights break out, they're just like, okay, you go over there, you go over there and just like nothing happened.
And it's just par for the course in these places.
And these places are so sick and messed up.
Somebody's just making a bunch of money off this place.
They're not helping anybody.
Again, you can listen to my whole sermon I did about it.
I'm not gonna spend too much time on it right now.
But I do wanna say this though,
is that one of the things that happened in there
is I had weird people come and try to pick fights with me
just for absolutely no reason.
I mean, I'm not trying to talk to anybody.
I'm not trying to hang out with anybody.
I was just doing my time.
in this place. Okay? I'm just trying to just get through it and I was spending most of my time
reading my Bible or trying to sleep which was a fool's errand but I was just trying to get through
it and what happened was you know people would come up to me and try to pick but you know what I
You know and so I wasn't scared while I was in there simply because of the fact that I didn't feel like I was gonna get in a fight with
Anybody because I knew well if anybody tries to pick a fight with me
I'm just gonna de-escalate it if anybody tries to you know pick a fight with me and starts yelling to me
I'm probably just gonna smile and give them a soft answer to turn away their wrath because I'm not interested in
You know getting in some kind of a brawl in this place or in any place
And for the last 25 years, I have never been in a fist fight
because people have tried to pick fights with me
and I'm just not gonna take the bait.
I'm not gonna get physical, I'm not gonna get in a fight.
And you know, I'm all for studying martial arts
and everything, and I think martial arts
is a great pastime, sport, whatever you wanna call it.
You know, I'm 100% for it, but some of the people
will make fun of certain martial arts and be like,
hey, this isn't really gonna work in real life,
this isn't gonna be really practical in real life, right?
You've probably heard people talk about that,
and you know, it's kind of a valid criticism,
but at the same time, I'm thinking to myself,
you know, if you enjoy those martial arts,
you just keep doing them because hopefully
in real life anyway. If you're a person who appeases strife, if you're a person who gives
a soft answer to turn away wrath, if you're not out there looking to get in fights anyway,
you know, whether you did Taekwondo or Muay Thai, you know, either way, hopefully you should be
Because let's face it, if you are actually walking with God filled with the Spirit, love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness, temperance, faith, you know, you're probably not getting in any fistfights at all for your whole natural life.
And you know, obviously it does happen, but it's probably pretty rare among people who are reading Proverbs every day that they get in fistfights.
And so that's why I wasn't really worried about it because I wasn't like, well, I'm not scared because I can take any of these guys, you know.
No, that wasn't the, it was like, I'm not scared because I'm not gonna get in a fight even though these guys are angry, even though I had a couple of people try to start stuff with me.
I was just, I just smiled and said, oh, hey, you know, it's all good, man, no problem, sorry.
Just deescalate, okay, that's a smart thing to do.
Give the soft answer turn away breath now one point
I did stand my ground this guy came up to me and said you're sitting in my chair and I was I wasn't
willing to give up the chair because it was like I had kind of like there weren't any other chairs and
I was sick of standing up and I told him I said this is my chair now, buddy
You know because you know, but I wasn't I wasn't rude about it or anything
But I you know so I'm not saying to never stand your ground
But if the guy would have said like oh, yeah, we'll fight before I would have said like okay you win. Here's a chair. Oh
You're a wimp. Oh your baby. Hey time to grow up 12 year old
Okay
We should not be brawlers
Strikers we should not be getting in fights with people, okay?
Try to appease stripe and look dumb little disagreements between you and your wife or you and your husband just say hey
Let's not worry about it. You're you're right you win if it's something done now look if it's something important
Yes, stand your ground
But we don't necessarily need to die on every hill do we?
You know and so I think it's better to just be long-suffering be cool
Don't let every little thing get you super mad and get you blowing up and freaking out and whatever
The Bible says in James chapter 1 verse 19, if you're there, it says,
Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear,
slow to speak, slow to wrath, for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.
Right?
So the Bible is saying, be slow to speak and slow to wrath, right?
Swift to hear, pay attention, listen to what people are saying.
And think before you talk, and think before you lose your temper, be slow to wrath.
Why? Because the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God, right?
The main tool for accomplishing the will of God in this world is not your personal anger.
Okay, and so most of the time our anger ends up being sinful. It's not always sinful
There's a righteous anger. There's a righteous indignation, but this kind of petty anger be an angry with your brother without a cause
that is sinful and
Being an angry person from day to day is foolishness
Okay, turn if you would a cloch in chapter 3 1 Corinthians 13 is the famous passage on charity
And in 1 Corinthians 13, one of the most beloved passages of the entire New Testament,
favorite chapter of many people.
You know, one of the favorite chapters of probably almost every Christian loves it.
And it says in verse 4, the very first attribute is,
charity suffereth long.
That's the first attribute given.
Charity suffereth long and is kind.
Charity envyeth not.
Charity vaunteth not itself.
is not puffed up. So just right out of the gate, he says, look, charity is about being patient and slow to anger.
Right? Charity is about suffering long. Charity is kind. Charity envious not.
And we talked about that this morning.
how the enemy of peace is envy, right?
Envy is what causes wars to break out,
even on the macro level.
Hey, I want that piece of land that belongs to you,
so I'm gonna come take it,
or I want those resources, I'm gonna take them, whatever.
So envy causes wars on the macro level.
Envy in our hearts is gonna cause us to have strife
and evil works with the people around us.
And, you know, envy is one of the worst sins because it is so destructive, you know,
you know, a wrath is cruel and anger is outrageous, you know, I hope I'm quoting that right,
but who can stand before envy?
And so, it's just saying, like, man, envy is even worse than being quick to anger.
Look at Colossians chapter 3 the Bible says in verse 5 mortify
Therefore your members which are upon the earth now. What does mortify mean?
Mortify means render them as dead
Okay, think about a mortician right a mortician is somebody who I
Guess makes dead people look nice for the open casket funeral
I don't know why anyone would ever want to have an open casket funeral,
but that's what some people do, and so the mortician goes in and makes them look good.
Whatever.
And then they, you know, oversee all the bearing and everything.
You know, because they're personally dealing with dead people.
So, mortify.
If you said, oh, I was mortified, it means, like, I was so scared, I was just, like, dead with fear.
Okay.
And so, I was rendered as dead.
So, mortify your members.
Okay, what are members?
Members are body parts.
We can think of this English word, dismemberment.
Right that's when body parts are ripped off of your body and so it says mortify there for your members
Which are upon the earth?
Fornication uncleanness inordinate affection evil concupiscence and covetousness which is idolatry
And what he's saying when he says mortify your members is he saying you know to let the flesh be dead
and walk in the Spirit.
Put off the works of the flesh,
put on the new man.
Put on the Spirit.
Don't fulfill the lust of the flesh
or do the works of the flesh.
Walk in the Spirit is what he's saying.
And so this is very similar to Galatians chapter 5
where he gives the fruit of the Spirit.
It's just using different wording.
mortify your members upon earth,
lists all these sinful things,
and then it says in verse 6,
for which things sake the wrath of God
cometh on the children of disobedience.
He's like, look, this is why
unsafe people are going to hell.
Unsafe people are going to hell
because of all the sins that they've done.
We've done a lot of sins as well.
Thankfully, we've believed on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and so our sins are forgiven.
That's the difference between us and them.
But just because we're saved doesn't mean that we don't still have the capacity to sin and in fact
I submit to you tonight that if you walk in the flesh you will be exactly the same as you were before you got saved
You know because the old Stephen Anderson is always gonna be the old Stephen Anderson and you can't change him
All you can do is let the old Stephen Anderson die and let the new man take over that's it
So if I'm walking in the flesh, I'm gonna be like unsaved people
I'm gonna be like I was before I was saved
Whereas if I put on the spirit if I put on the new man if I walk in newness of life
Then you're gonna see a big change and this is the thing a lot of people will look at people
who've been saved and not see a big change in their life
and then automatically assume, well, they didn't really get saved
because they're living the same way.
But here's the thing, everyone who gets saved
is going to inevitably live the same way
unless they put on the new man, unless they walk and swim.
Why would they be different?
If they're still walking in the flesh, the flesh can't change.
You cannot change the old man.
You cannot reform the old man.
The carnal mind is enmity against God.
The carnal mind cannot be brought into subjection to the laws of God.
You can't fix the carnal man.
All you can do is just mortify the old man.
Not try to fix him. You got to put on the new man walk in the spirit
And then you're gonna be a different person because now you're gonna have love now
You're gonna have joy now you're gonna have peace and you're gonna find yourself living a lot differently
But you got to make that effort as a Christian to be filled with the spirit. How do you do that? Well, let's keep reading
it says
You know these things sake cometh the wrath of God on the children of disobedience in the which he also walked some time
When you lived in them, but now you also put off all these
Anger right because what are we talking about with being long suffering being slow to anger slow to wrath you put off anger wrath
Malice blasphemy filthy communication out of your mouth
lie not one to another, seeing that you have put off the old man with his deeds and have
put on the new man which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him, where
there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, Bonn
or free, but Christ is all and in all, put on therefore as the elect of God, holy and
kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, and what's the last word there? Long suffering.
Now look, if this were automatic, why is he telling you, you got to put this on. Put off
this other stuff. Mortify your members. He's not saying, oh, you're saved. Your members
are automatically mortified. Automatically you're in the new man. No, my friend.
You've got to make the effort to put off the new man and put on the new, put off the old man, put on the new man.
And what's funny is that you have these people that will quote the verse,
if any man be in Christ, he's a new creature.
Old things are passed away, behold, all things have become new.
And they'll say, see, you know, anybody who's saved is going to be a totally different person.
But here's the thing about that, is that...
It says, if any man be in Christ, he's a new creature.
Old things are passed away. Behold, all things are become new.
If that meant that you were always going to be automatically walking as the new man,
walking in the new man, walking in the newness of life,
then why would this passage exist telling you,
hey, you've got to put on the new man.
You've got to put off the old man.
Why did Paul say, I die daily?
You've got to mortify the members of your uncleanness daily.
You can't just say, oh, you're saved, you're automatically a new man.
And here's what I hear most people saying about that verse.
Most fundamental Baptists, this is what they'll say, well, there's got to be some change.
Did, did, did 1 Corinthians 521 say some change?
It said all things have become new.
Old things are passed away, all things are become new.
So if that's about your lifestyle, you would have to believe that every person who gets
saved, everything about their life changes and now they are living a sinless life.
And we all know that that's absurd and that that's not the reality of the world we live
in and that's not what the Bible teaches.
The change that we say, you know certain stuff you stop doing like cigarettes and cussing and beer
You know they just pick like an arbitrary list, but here's the thing. Let's face it
We all every day have a battle between the flesh and the spirit
And so, when the Bible says, old things are passed away, if any man be in Christ, he's
a new creature, old things are passed away, all things have become new.
Let me tell you something, the new man, the new creature in Christ is literally sinless.
Literally perfect, literally sinless.
And it didn't say some things have become new, it said all things have become new.
So the new man is a totally different person, he's the best version of you,
the best possible version of you that doesn't sin.
And the thing is, you've got to draw an eye to God, you've got to walk in the Spirit,
you've got to be speaking to yourselves in Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs,
you've got to be reading your Bible and praying.
And then the more you do that, the more you'll be walking in the new man,
and the less you're going to be walking in the old man.
And that's where you're going to see a gradual change.
And, you know, over time, you're walking in the Spirit more and more.
Your life is characterized by the fruit of the Spirit more and more as you go on.
But here's the thing, a lot of people that we went unto Christ, they are truly saved.
They truly believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that He died for their sins, that
He's the only way to heaven.
But because they never mortify the members of their uncleanness, because they're not
reading their Bibles, going to church, they're just walking in the flesh, they're going
we've known so many people and we could give so many examples and maybe some of
you even in this room have a testimony similar to this where people get saved
and for many years they have no growth like virtually zero growth so they'll
get saved and then four five six ten fifteen years go by where they're
pretty much living the way that they were before they were saved
Now, obviously, there's been a change inside their heart
because now the Holy Spirit lives there.
And so they're probably going to have an increased
conscience about things.
And obviously, God's going to be chastising them,
which maybe before that was not the case.
But now that they're saved, they're getting more
chastisement.
And there are things going on in their heart.
But I've talked to people who had very little growth
for many years.
And the people around them...
would have said, well, this guy is exactly the same, even though there's something that
changed inside, they'd be like, you know, this guy's pretty much the same.
And I don't know if this guy's even saved, because why is he still acting exactly the
same way?
But then what'll happen is, years later, years after getting saved, then all of a sudden
that person gets in a good church.
Then all of a sudden that person starts reading the Bible.
Then all of a sudden that person actually starts walking in the Spirit
and then all of a sudden there's just this dramatic change in their life
and everybody's like, whoa, what happened to you?
Now, some people would look at it and say, well, that's when they got saved.
But honestly, if you talk to that person, a lot of them would tell you,
no, I got saved years ago.
It's just that I wasn't growing.
because I wasn't walking in the spirit because and this is I also touched on this this morning in my sermon when I said this morning that
You know, it's possible for uns for saved Christians to do some really rotten things
You know, it's not like oh this guy did something horrible. Therefore. He must not be saved
You know people who are saved can still be capable of very grievous sin
And some people could be a super rotten person and you're like,
yeah, but he's saved.
It's like, well, okay, he's saved, but doesn't mean that he's a good guy or that he's doing well.
And so, you know, we need to understand the dichotomy there.
It's not the same thing.
So back to where we left off, it said in verse 12,
put on therefore as the elect of God.
And then it has this list.
The last thing on the list is long suffering.
So what do we need to do?
Put on long suffering.
So that tells me that if you're a hothead, if you are soon to be angry, if you are quick to anger,
if you are a bitter, angry person, you need to put on long suffering.
Put that on. It's part of your spiritual growth. And if you are just going to continue
blowing up at everyone for the littlest thing, being impatient,
and not giving people grace,
well then that tells me that you are not growing spiritually,
you're not walking in the Spirit,
because part of that spiritual growth of walking in the new man
is putting on long suffering.
That's one of the things that we're going to see.
Verse 13,
for bearing one another.
And look, for bearing one another
is another way of saying long suffering.
Isn't that kind of the same thing?
right? Forbearance is another word for long suffering. Bear. Bearing. What does bear mean?
To put up with. Right? If I said, hey, bear with me. What am I saying? Hey, be patient.
Hear what I have to say. Put up with what I'm saying. Put up with what I'm telling you. Bear
with me. Have some forbearance. Long suffering. Be patient.
for bearing one another and
Forgiving one another right instead of being angry about stuff that happened a month ago
Three months ago six months ago a year ago five years ago
forgive one another
So first of all put up with things and don't even get mad in the first place
Second of all stuff that you were mad about let that stuff go
forgive
for bear one another, forgive one other.
If any man have a quarrel against thee, why should I?
Why should I for bear?
Why should I put up with stuff?
Why should I be long suffering?
Why should I forgive people?
Even as Christ forgave you, it says.
So also do ye.
I mean, look, we have offended God
and yet he forgives us over and over again.
He is patient with us. He is long suffering with us. He is for bear. He for bears with us. He gives us grace
He gives us mercy. We need to do the same thing with other people
We don't want to be like that servant where he gets forgiven this mega debt
And then he finds somebody who owes him a couple bucks and grabs him by the throat
Right. We want to be someone who forgives as we are forgiven
Now again, does God put up with anything and everything? No, he doesn't
Does God finally get to a point where he's done
and he washes his hands of somebody
and says, I'm done with this person?
He does.
If we read scripture, we'll find lots of examples of God
coming to a point where you cross a line with him
and he's like, that's it, I'm done with you.
And look, sometimes in life,
there are people that we just need to be done with.
Wash our hands of certain people and just say,
hey, this person is a toxic person.
This person is a bad influence.
This person is rotten.
This person is harmful.
I don't want this person in my life and it's time to let it go.
But where long suffering comes in is when people are just doing minor things that we
don't like or even if people get into sin, we give them a chance to repent, right?
What did God say in Revelation?
I gave her space to repent of her fornication and she repented not.
You know, God is even looking down at a very sinful situation
where there's fornication in the church which is obviously totally unacceptable
and this woman is seducing God's servants
to commit fornication and eat things sacrificed unto idols.
Super sinful but yet God says I gave her space to repent of her fornication.
He's having long suffering. He's given people a chance to get right
Behold, I will cast her into a bed and then they commit adultery with her into great tribulation
except they repent of their deeds and I will kill her children with death.
And all the churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts and
I will give it to every one of you according to your works.
So eventually it's too much with God.
That's it.
And so again, we're not teaching that you have to put up with anything and everything
and you never cut anyone loose.
We should be long suffering.
We should forbear and put up with a lot, right?
Love will cover a multitude of sins, right?
And so we need to make sure that we have love, joy,
and peace so that when someone does something
that we don't like, they cut us off in traffic.
Your spouse says something that you don't like.
You know, whatever, you don't just lose it
and go ballistic right out of the gate.
Now look, there are some times when God really clouds up and rains, there were some times
when Jesus on this earth got very angry and there was even that one famous outburst where
he goes into the temple with a whip of cords and drives out the money changers, flips over
the tables, dump out the money.
But what's interesting about that story is that it says that he made that whip of cords.
He fashioned that scourge of cords.
That's time right because Jesus before he went into the temple
He didn't just already just carry a whip around with them like he's Indiana Jones or something and just you know
Just pull that out
He actually had to go and
Make a scourge out of cords
Now, I don't know how long that took but I feel like that had to have at least taken
You know several minutes maybe even a few hours
Right. I mean, I don't I don't know about these things. I'm a city slicker and I don't really know how to make stuff with my
Hands or anything like that
I know how to type on a computer keyboard and I know how to solder wires and put wire nuts on
Wires and screw things into walls and stuff, but I don't know anything about you know those kind of handicrafts
But I don't know I feel like making a whip of cords or a scourge out of cords. I feel like it would take a couple hours
But I don't think it took
Two minutes, I mean it had to take time and this shows that Jesus is putting thought into what he's doing
He's not just having a violent outburst where he's ah, you know
Just blowing up and flying off the handle he sat down and he thought about it and it was a righteous anger
It was a righteous indignation and he went in there and yeah, it was a pretty big blow-up
But it was premeditated. It wasn't just losing his temper
And we should not lose our temper, and there is a time to be angry, but it shouldn't be at the drop of a hat.
Go if you would or we're still there. Let's let's read just a little more here
It says as Christ forgave you so also do ye verse 14 and above all these things put on charity
Which is the bond of perfectness charities, of course another word for love and let the peace of God rule in your hearts
To the which also you're called in one body and be ye thankful
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom and this is how you get filled with the Spirit
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom,
teaching and admonishing one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
Go to Romans chapter 2.
Romans chapter 2.
And the next lesson to learn tonight is this.
Do not take advantage of God's long suffering.
Do not take advantage of God's long suffering
and do not take advantage of other people's long suffering.
Don't punish people for being long-suffering, right?
Just because somebody is patient and for bears with you,
and shows you grace, and shows you mercy,
and is patient, do not take advantage of this.
And this is one of the things that irritates me more than anything.
is people who, when you're nice to them,
they mistake it for the fact that you're just gonna
let them get away with anything and everything.
So, you know, you'd be nice to someone,
you extend kindness, grace, mercy, long suffering,
and then they mistake your meekness for weakness.
And they think, oh, I'm never gonna get in trouble.
I'm never gonna find a boundary here.
And it's so irritating because I wanna be nice to everybody.
I just wanna be nice to people, you know?
I'm actually a nice guy, believe it or not.
I want to be nice to people.
And I want to be kind, I want to be loving,
I don't want to have to come down on people,
I don't want to fight with people,
I want to get along with everybody
and be super nice and friendly and kind.
And then the sad thing is that I found out
when I was running a secular business,
I found out that if you're really nice to your employees
and you're friendly to them and treat them really well,
that a lot of times they stop respecting you.
And it's just, it's such a tragedy.
because I just enjoy my work day so much
when I can be friendly and down to earth
with my workers or with my coworkers
and with customers and everybody.
I'm the type of person, I just like to go through life,
having a good time and being friendly,
we're all enjoying our day
and maybe joke around a little, talk, be nice.
But then I found that a lot of my employees,
They would stop respecting me because I was too casual with them, I was too friendly with them.
So finally I just realized, you know, man, I'm not really good at this management thing,
and so what I'm going to need to do is I'm going to need to put somebody between me and them.
Because I'm too friendly, and then they mistake my friendliness for just,
yeah, I'm just one of the guys, and they can just say whatever, do whatever.
And then I put someone else between me and them
so that anything I had to say to them,
I would send the message through an intermediary, okay?
And then I would only talk to my workers
like once a week or once every two weeks,
because usually everything's going through an intermediary.
Then I just noticed that they were super respectful to me.
When I put like a little distance between me and them then they saw it as like oh, I'm talking to the owner of the company
You know, I'm talking to the boss and it was like a big deal
Whereas when they're talking to me every day and I'm being friendly and hey when I'm in town
Let's go out to eat. Let's hang out. You know, sorry
I like to go out and hang out and have a good time
But it's like some people you just can't hang out with them
And you don't notice about church members is the same thing like some church members if I hang out with them
They just lose respect for me
And then I stopped being Pastor Anderson to them,
I just become Steve, you know?
And it's kind of funny because the two names
that I've gone through in my life are Steven and Steve.
You know, those are the names I've,
and I feel like those are two like really different names.
You know what I mean?
Because Steven sounds like kind of a serious guy.
Whereas Steve is kind of a guy that you hang out with,
you know?
when you want to have a good time,
Stephen is a little more cerebral.
And so, you know, but then there's a third guy,
Pastor Anderson.
There's Steve, there's Stephen,
and then there's Pastor Anderson, you know?
And here's the thing,
I've noticed that there are church members
that I can hang out with.
I can go on trips with, we can take a cruise together and go soul winning together, we
can do missions trips together, we can go running together, we can go swimming together, we can
play sports together and they still treat me with respect and they still consider me pastor
Anderson even if I let my hair down and be casual and be friendly. But then there are other church
members as soon as I get casual friendly with them then what they end up doing is just losing all
Because now they just think I'm one of the guys and so I've kind of learned over the years that you know
There's only certain people that I can be casual with and it really breaks my heart
You know because don't you just wish that you could just kind of be cool with everybody and not only that but as a parent
You know don't you wish you could be your kids buddy all the time?
You know we want to be our kids buddy, but guess what a lot of times our kids don't need a buddy. They need a parent
And if I have to choose between being a buddy and a parent, I'm going to be a parent, you
know?
And I'm going to give them what they need sometimes, not necessarily what they want.
And I just wish I could just always be their buddy.
I wish I could always be your buddy.
You know, I wish I could be everybody's buddy.
That's just the way that I feel, that's the way that I think.
But look, it's a tragedy today that human nature is such that when our superiors are
nice to us, and I don't mean superior like better than, I mean like your superior at
work, your manager, your supervisor, the owner of the company, when he's nice to you, all
of a sudden they give you a finger you want to take the whole hand.
They give you an inch, you take a mile.
It's a tragedy.
Don't be that guy.
When your boss at work is friendly and nice to you continue to treat him with respect
Continue to see him as the boss enjoy those social times together, but continue to realize he's still the boss
You know and hey hang out with your pastor, but continue to realize he's the pastor
You know and just kind of keep that in your mind
You know hey have fun with your parents enjoy fellowship with your parents play around with your parents have a good time
But realize this is my parent
need to have respect here. I need to honor my parents. And ultimately a lot of
people will take advantage of God's long suffering and they'll take advantage of
other people's long suffering or how about this people will sometimes do
something rude to you and you overlook it because you're a cool guy and you're
doing what I said earlier in the sermon where you're passing over a
Wear charities covering a multitude of sins. You're not sweating the small stuff. You're letting things go
Hey, that's great. You know what the sad thing is you you let things go
You don't worry about it. You let things slide and then you know what happens pretty soon
People just they do more and they push it more and they keep pushing to see where the boundary is
It's just it's a tragedy. Don't do that
Don't call me Steve but Romans chapter 2 verse 1 says this it says therefore thou art inexcusable
O man
Whosoever thou art the judges for wearing thou judges to another thou condemn us thyself for thou that judges do is the same
Things and the context here is Romans chapter 1 was talking about these horrible evil reprobates
and then it listed all their wicked, sinful attributes.
And then it said,
who knowing the judgment of God
that they which commit such things are worthy of death,
not only do the same,
but have pleasure in them to do them.
And so in this chapter,
he's starting to kind of bring up the hypocrisy
of condemning reprobates on the one hand,
but then doing the same things that they do
or even taking pleasure in reprobates.
And he said, why would anyone take pleasure in reprobates?
obsess over and worship Hollywood actors and actresses that are literal sodomites,
haters of God, or people that are super into musicians that are haters of God. You know,
I don't want to listen to music from a sodomite. I don't want to watch a sodomite do anything,
say anything, right? Because those are not people that we should ever be taking pleasure in.
You know, we should see them for what they are, enemies of the cross of Christ, haters
of God, and yet you see people delighting in the sodomites of this world.
You know, one of these people told me, you know, love the music, hate the sin.
You know because that you know the the old adage from Gandhi or who some other person who's burning in hell
Who said like you know love the sinner hate the sin this person took it a step further and said love the music hate the sin
You know now man, you know, we don't want to hear Elton John singing about anything
Because he's a gross pervert
And so he's saying, look, don't be a hypocrite where you condemn the homos, but then you're over here loving homos, you know, don't be over and listen loving their music, you know, following their lives and oh, I got to go on and see their latest movie or whatever.
But then he's also saying don't be a hypocrite by committing a bunch of these other sins.
and live in a lifestyle, not obviously not being homo,
but homos do all this other stuff, right?
Where they're filled with all unrighteousness,
fornication, uncleanness, and disobedient to parents,
unthankful, unholy, implacable, unmerciful,
all those things on that list.
He's saying, don't do that stuff.
But he says in verse two,
but we are sure that the judgment of God
is according to truth against them,
which commits such things.
And think as thou this, oh man,
that judges them which do such things.
And do us the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God,
or despiseest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering,"
here's our word,
not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance,
but after thy hardness and impenitent heart
treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath
and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.
Now I know that's a lot of big words there.
Let's slow down and look at this.
Do you really think that if you do the same things as the people you're judging that you're going to escape the judgment of God?
You're judging people then you're doing the same stuff that they do
Guess who's gonna judge you God's gonna judge your judge and someone else for stuff
You do then God's gonna judge you for doing those same things verse four or
Do you despise the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-suffering,
not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?
He says, look, are you misunderstanding God being nice to you,
God being long-suffering toward you, God having patience with you?
Do you actually not realize that he's doing that to give you a chance to get right?
He's not doing that so that you can just continue down the same dark path as he just lets it go
No, he's giving you time. He's giving you space so you can fix it
And what we have to understand is that a lot of times in life
We will start to go down a dark path start committing sins
Start doing something wicked and the punishment doesn't come right away. Don't let that embolden you
Hey, I committed fornication and nothing bad happened
So I guess I'll just go do it again and do it again and again. Hey, nothing's bad's happening. Look see hey
Here I am dishonoring my parents. Nothing bad's happening. Hey, I'm drinking and driving nothing bad's happening
Hey, I took drugs and everything's fine. Well, give it a few months
Give it a few years because God is being long suffering
God is being patient with you, and you know, it's so sad when people despise as it says here in verse 4.
They despise the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-suffering, and they look at his riches of forbearance and goodness and long-suffering,
and they mistake it for God just not punishing, and they don't know that the goodness of God is leading them to repentance.
And sometimes when people are living a sinful life as a Christian,
then something small will happen bad in their life.
Something small will happen.
And what it is, it's like a warning shot.
It's like a shot across the bow, like,
hey, God's trying to get your attention here,
but then people will just stupidly interpret that as,
oh, is that all the punishment?
I can handle that.
Let me just keep on sinning over here.
No, man, that was just a little warning shot, little shot across the bow.
Do not despise God's goodness and longsuffering.
Another way of saying that is, don't take advantage of his longsuffering.
And he says, if you do, you know, you're just, you're just hardening your heart, you're impenitent,
you're unrepentant, and you're just treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath, meaning
You're just treasuring up. You're just building it up to where when it hits
It's gonna be just that much worse because the more sins you do
The worst the punishment is gonna be when it comes
and it's the same way with people.
It's not just God that's like this.
Obviously God's the most important person
that we want to please.
But even just in our lives,
you just keep pushing your husband,
pushing your husband, pushing your husband,
irritating him, bugging him, bugging him,
and he's just totally cool, super chill,
super relaxed while you nag him,
fuss at him, criticize him.
disrespect him, disobey him, and he's being cool about it,
and then eventually he's gonna stop being cool about it.
You know what I'm saying? Why are you taking advantage of bro?
Because he's being patient because he's kind because he's long suffering because he's loving
Why don't you just be thankful and say man?
I'm so thankful that my husband has been patient with me over the last couple days when I was being a pain in the butt
Because now I'm realizing that I need to do better
And I'm glad that he was patient because we had no fight. We had no blow-up because he was being cool
Instead of just thinking, oh, he's cool with this.
I'm just going to keep acting this way.
Because guess what?
Everybody's patience eventually runs out, even God's.
Does everybody understand what I'm saying?
You can push someone, and push someone, and push someone,
and push someone, and push someone.
Eventually, they're going to snap.
Now, the difference between people who are spiritual people, godly people, and people
who are fleshly, carnal people, is that the spiritual godly people have to be pushed further
before they blow up at you.
And the carnal people, they'll blow up at you at the drop of a hat.
The spiritual guy, it takes more to make him mad.
It takes more to get him angry, it takes more to get him to lash out, but make no mistake
about it, everyone will eventually lash out, including Jesus, including God.
Everybody has a limit.
What am I asking you to do tonight?
I'm not asking you to never be mad.
I'm not asking you to never cut someone out of your life.
Blow up at someone what I'm telling you is that you should be very slow to do those things
Now obviously if
Something huge happens
Then it could be an immediate you could immediately get fired from your job or something
You could literally just do one thing that's so heinous that it's just over for you
Right take a gun to work and shoot up the place. It's they're not gonna say like okay. That's your first write up
You know what I mean, and if you get ridden up three times you're out of here, buddy. All right now go back to working in the post office
You know, obviously
There are people you know
You might you might find out something about someone that's so evil or so damning that you just immediately say I'm done with this person
But slow to anger long suffering means that it has to be something big
Or, you're giving people a lot of time to straighten up and fly right, you know?
And so we need to understand how that works.
And the biggest takeaway from tonight's sermon is this, number one, be long suffering.
Put on the new man, walk in the spirit, be patient and long suffer.
If you have a short fuse, get right with God, because that is wrong for you to have a short
fuse.
The other takeaway from tonight's sermon, besides the fact that we should not have a short fuse,
is that even people with a long fuse have a fuse.
God doesn't just not have a fuse.
I got a fuse. You got a fuse. Everybody's got a fuse.
Do not take advantage of people's long suffering, because that is not right.
And when they do finally blow up at you, it's going to be a bigger explosion.
The long suffering the more long suffering somebody is the more patient someone is the more someone gives you grace
Once you cross that line with them. It's gonna be a big explosion
because you just wouldn't let it go, you just wouldn't stop, and you've got to realize that the long suffering of God is meant to give you a chance to get right.
We saw that at the very beginning of the sermon, 2 Peter 3, we've seen it throughout these scriptures.
The purpose of the long suffering is to give people a chance to fix it.
Not for them to just keep doing it until finally you just can't take it anymore or God just can't take it anymore.
And so do not take advantage of God's long-suffering. Do not take advantage of your parents' long-suffering.
Don't take advantage of your husband's long-suffering. Don't take advantage of your boss at work's long-suffering.
Don't take advantage of your friend's long-suffering. Just take that as a chance to do better.
So the conclusion is this Ephesians 4 and we'll be done Ephesians chapter number 4
We must be long suffering verse 1
I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation
We're with your called with all lowliness and meekness with long suffering for bearing one another in love
endeavoring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace look if we're gonna have unity in the local church it takes effort
And if we're going to get along with people for not just a few weeks or months,
we want to get along for years, right?
And you know what?
There are people in our church right now that have been here for more than a decade.
Right?
There are people who have been here for more than 15 years.
You know, there are people who have been here for more than five years, right?
The people who are in this for the long haul,
we don't just get along with them for three months.
We're getting along with them 10 years later.
That takes effort.
Right and and we don't want to be married to our spouse for two years or seven years. We want to be married for life and
So we've got to endeavor to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace
Well, it takes effort to get along and to keep the peace and one of the elements of that effort is
Long suffering it says with all lowliness and meekness meaning we got to be humble and
We got to be long suffering because lungs long suffering will cause us to forbear
One another in love, right? And what is forbearance? Putting up with stuff
Putting up with little things. So look put up with people at church people at church are sometimes going to be a little rude to you
Say something out of line do something you don't like put up with it
Let it go
But don't just keep pushing people until you get a reaction. That's called taking advantage of their long suffering
Look we've had people where like my wife said something to them that they didn't like and like years later
They're still talking about it
You know they're like people who've left our church and they're just like yeah, yeah, Mrs. Anderson
You know offended me a year and a half ago, and I'm having trouble letting it go
You know, where's the forbearance?
Where's the long stuff and I'm not and it's not like my wife said anything crazy to him
My wife just told them like hey, you need to get your kids under control running around the building or something
She told them something about you know what their kids how their kid was acting or something
She didn't blow up at anybody or anything. She just tell them look
I don't like the way you're doing this or hey
I'm concerned that one of your kids is hanging around with the wrong crowd, you know, and whatever just just giving someone look
Let it go
Get over it for Barrett's long suffering
Not just oh, I don't like the way she looked at me
You know she didn't say hi to me
She said hi to those people and just walked right by me and didn't say hi to me
You know what you got if you can't let that go if you can't just just ignore
Little tiny infractions like that. How are we gonna have unity?
How are we gonna have peace if we got a bunch of women mad at each other and a bunch of men mad at each other?
Because of all these dumb little offenses
You know, everybody's going to have to put aside their feelings a little bit, endure a little bit of wrong, endure a little criticism.
Look, somebody might walk up to me and say something critical or negative to me, and I just need to just kind of just not worry about it.
I'm not just going to be like six months later, oh yeah, you're that church member who criticized me six months ago.
It's absurd. Let it go.
But at the same time, you know, you don't want to just be needling people week after week and needling people needling people week after week
And then and then until they blow up
Okay, be cool
It's gonna take humility and long-suffering in order for us to keep having a good atmosphere and we have a great atmosphere at our church and
Honestly, the last several months has been the best ever atmosphere at our church and it's a great spirit
Everybody's happy, everybody's cool, but you know, we want to keep it that way.
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, so somebody says something that you don't like,
somebody offends you, just let it go. Don't sweat the small stuff.
Don't trip about every little thing. For bear one another, have some long suffering.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for your word and we thank you so much for the Holy Spirit Lord because I would hate to go through life
Be in a hot head that gets mad about every stupid little thing and just constantly blowing up because that's no way to live life
And so thank you Lord for giving me the Holy Spirit
to help me have long-suffering Lord and help all of us to take advantage of the power of the Holy Ghost and
Put on that new man put on long-suffering put on
Forbearance help us all to let this attribute of long suffering and slowness to anger characterize our lives and in Jesus name
We pray amen
Hey man the right ladies gentlemen take your hymnals, please go to hymn 317 hymn 317
I'll live for him.
Him number 317 will begin on that first verse now.
My life, my love, I give to thee.
Him number 300 and 17.
Look it up together now.
My life.