Amen, Hebrews chapter number five, the part that I want to focus on is the end part there
beginning in verse 12 where the Bible reads, for when for the time ye ought to be teachers,
ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of
God and are become such as have need of milk and not of strong meat.
For ever when the use of milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness for he is a babe,
but strong meat belong it to them that are of full age even those who by reason of use
have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.
The title of my sermon this morning is use it or lose it, use it or lose it.
This is a concept that goes for a lot of areas of life.
We could think of a lot of examples.
For example, when it comes to a foreign language, if you learn a foreign language and I've learned
several foreign languages that I've almost completely forgotten just because if you don't
have anybody to practice with and you don't have any opportunity to use that language,
you will completely forget that language, even your native language.
I know a lot of people who were born speaking a certain language up until they're seven
years old, ten years old or even into their teenage years, but then they stop speaking
that language and now they can't speak it anymore.
Even their native tongue, even their mother tongue, they don't know that language.
Think about athletic ability, whether it be running or swimming or lifting weights.
If you were to not do any exercise for a year, two years, three years, you would lose
virtually all of that ability and you're not going to be able to run anymore or swim anymore
or lift anymore.
Lots of things are like this in life, whether it be knowledge, whether it be physical prowess.
If you don't use it, you lose it.
If you don't use your muscles, you lose them.
If you don't use information, you lose it.
I know that when I was in school, one of my favorite subjects was math and I excelled
at math and I went into pre-calculus and calculus one and calculus two in junior college,
but now I look at my son's algebra two book and I look at some of those problems, I wouldn't
even know where to begin with some of that stuff.
I look at pre-calculus and I wouldn't even know where to begin and it just looks so cryptic
to me, but there was a time when it would have just been second nature to do that, but
that was 20 years ago or 18 years ago.
If you don't use anything, you lose it.
When it comes to knowledge of the Bible, when it comes to spiritual growth, if you
don't use it, you lose it.
That's why the Bible says here that when for the time ye ought to be teachers.
Now if he's saying to someone that they ought to be a teacher, we're talking about somebody
who's been saved for a long time.
He says you ought to be teachers, but you have need that one teach you again which be
the first principles of the oracles of God.
I mean these are people who have been saved a long time, but they've even forgotten the
basics and it says you become such as have need of milk and not of strong meat.
For everyone that useth milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness, for he's a babe,
but strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of what?
Use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.
So in order to discern good and evil, in order to be skillful in the word of God, the Bible
saying that you have to use the word of God because use is what exercises, notice the
word exercise, use is what exercises your senses to be able to discern good or evil,
right or wrong, correct, incorrect.
And the Bible says bodily exercise profited little, exercise thyself rather unto godliness.
We must exercise our godliness.
We must exercise our knowledge of the Bible because if we don't use it, we will lose it.
The people who know the Bible the best and understand the Bible the best are the ones
who take their knowledge and put it into practice.
Not a theologian who locks himself up in a library all day or locks himself up in an
ivory tower of an office somewhere just pouring over the word of God.
I guarantee you the guy who's out there in the field being a worker for the Lord, being
a laborer for the Lord is going to understand the Bible better than that guy.
That's why we shouldn't listen to theologians.
We should listen to the Holy Ghost of God in our own reading and we should listen to
workers, hard workers, people that are doing the work.
They have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil through use.
Think about how many things you can't just learn from reading a book but you have to
actually get in there and do it.
To use a sports illustration, do you think you could learn how to play basketball from
reading a book and you just read it and read it and read it and then you're just going
to get out on the court and you're just like whoosh, you're just making three pointers
because you read up on it, your form is correct, your technique is correct.
You've never played but you've simulated it in your mind as you read and studied.
The same thing with almost any of the trades, whether that be carpentry, electrical, plumbing,
you have to get out there, you've got to get your hands dirty, you want to learn automotive,
you've got to get under the car and start working on it, you have to learn by doing
not just by studying it and it's the same thing with the Christian life.
You learn soul winning by getting out there and doing some soul winning.
You've got to get out there in the real world, you've got to talk to people, you've got to
preach the gospel and that's how you're going to learn.
The Bible says that it's by reason of use.
Let's go into chapter 6.
It rolls right into chapter 6 because chapter 6 verse 1 starts with the word therefore referring
back to what was just said.
He said, therefore, leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on into
perfection not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and a faith
toward God of the doctrine of baptisms and of laying on of hands and of resurrection
of the dead and of eternal judgment and this will we do if God permit.
And verses 4 through 8 talks about reprobates, we'll talk about that in another sermon.
Look at verse 9.
But beloved, we're persuaded better things of you and things that accompany salvation
though we thus speak.
For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labor of love which you have showed
toward his name and that you have ministered to the saints and do minister.
Okay, so at the end of chapter 5 we got the bad example, right, of people that are not
doing the work and they're back on the milk when they should be on the meat, they should
be a teacher, they need some teaching.
Then we have a bad example of reprobates and bad people in verses 4 through 8.
But then he says, we're persuaded better things of you, things that accompany the salvation
though we thus speak.
For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labor of love which you have showed
toward his name and that you've ministered to the saints and do minister.
Minister means to serve.
And we desire that every one of you do show the same diligence to the full assurance of
hope by the end, that you be not slothful but followers of them who through faith and
patience inherit the promises.
So in the good example we see work, we see labor, we see ministry, and we see not being
lazy, not being slothful.
Why?
Because if you're slothful you're not going to use it and then you're going to lose it.
If you don't work, if you don't labor, if you don't serve, if you don't minister, you
will lose the knowledge that you have.
Go to James chapter 1.
It's a few pages to the right in your Bible, James chapter 1.
It's a famous passage, James 1.22, I'll start reading while you get there.
But be ye doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.
Self-deception.
Those who hear the word of God but they don't do it.
It says, for if any be a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding
his natural face in a glass.
For he beholdeth himself and goeth his way and straightway forgetteth what manner of
man he was.
But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty and continueth therein, he being not
a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.
Two types of people.
The forgetful hearer, the one who hears the word of God and immediately forgets what they've
heard, and then there's the doer of the work.
That's the one who hears it, he retains it, he remembers it, he learns it, he understands
it.
See, if I'd been using high level math in my job on a weekly basis, I would still remember
all of it.
But because the jobs that I did only required certain types of math, those are the types
of math that I'm still good at.
And then a lot of other high level math that I never used, I've completely forgotten.
So it's the same way with the word of God.
Go to Luke chapter 8, Luke chapter number 8, be a doer of the word, not a hearer only.
You're deceiving yourself, thinking that you know the Bible if you're not a doer of the
word, if you're not a doer of the work, if you're not serving in the local church, if
you're not laboring, if you're slothful.
Look what the Bible says in Luke chapter 8 verse 5, the Bible reads, but that on the
good ground, this is the parable of the sower, and I'm not going to take time to preach through
the whole parable, but this is the good example in the parable of the sower, that on the good
ground are they which in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it and
bring forth fruit with patience.
And the word patience here, it's used throughout the Bible, someone who continues working,
they patiently, diligently put their hand to the plow and they don't look back, they
keep on working, and so the Bible is saying here that these people, they don't just hear
the word but they keep the word, meaning that they obey it, and they bring forth fruit with
patience which takes work, which takes effort to bring forth fruit, to reproduce oneself,
to make increase by reproducing, by winning someone to Christ, you know, what does the
orange bring forth, oranges, apples reproduce, they bring forth apples, the Christian reproduces
by bringing forth other Christians.
That's the fruitfulness that God speaks of, but look at verse number 16, it says, no man
when he hath lighted a candle, covereth it with a vessel, or putteth it under a bed,
but seteth it on a candlestick, that they which enter in may see the light, for nothing
is secret that shall not be made manifest, neither anything hid that shall not be known
and come abroad, take heed therefore how ye hear, what does that mean, be careful how
you hear, for whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and whosoever hath not, from him
shall be taken, even that which he seemeth to have.
So the Bible is saying here that you could hear the wrong way and you'll lose what you've
heard, you'll lose that knowledge, you'll be a forgetful hearer.
How?
If you're one who doesn't bring forth fruit with patience, back to verse 15, if you're
not one who keeps the Word, if you're not a doer of the Word, if you take the light
of the Gospel and you hide it under the bed, you hide it under a bushel, and expect to
know the Bible well, you're not going to, you're going to be a babe in Christ forever,
because you're not using the Word of God, and that which you seem to have, the knowledge
of the Word of God that you think you have or seem to have, you're going to lose that
as well, it's going to be taken away from you.
Go to 1 Timothy chapter number 1, 1 Timothy chapter number 1, use it or lose it, 1 Timothy
chapter number 1, 1 Timothy chapter number 1, and not only could we use the illustration
of language skills, not only could we use other types of knowledge, we could use skill
with a musical instrument, we could use athletic skill or strength or speed or agility or prowess,
not only could we use those type of examples, but even inanimate objects, if they're not
used, they fall into decay and disrepair.
For example, if you have a perfectly good car, and you just park that car outside, and
you don't drive it for a few months, and you put the key in and start it up, you're very
likely to have problems, it's very likely that the car won't even start, that the battery
will be dead, even though you haven't used any of the power, it just sat there, but a
car sitting for 2-3 months at a time is going to go bad.
A house that's vacant for 6 months or a year, you go into that house, it's filled with all
kinds of creatures who've taken over, strange bugs and animals will take over, things don't
work right, machines such as air conditioners, heaters, when do they always have problems?
Then you turn them on after they've sat for 6 months, and that's when they have a problem.
Things are meant to run and be used.
It's the same with our bodies.
The more we sit around, the more unhealthy we become.
The more we use our bodies and the systems of our body, then the healthier we will be.
So this goes for all areas of life.
Look at 1 Timothy 1 verse 4, the Bible reads, neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies
which minister questions rather than godly edifying which is in faith, so do.
Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart and of a good conscience
and of faith unfeigned, from which some having swerved have turned aside unto vain, jangling,
desiring to be teachers of the law, understanding neither what they say nor whereof they affirm.
These are people who've looked into the perfect law of liberty, but they don't understand
what they say.
They don't know what they affirm.
They desire to be teachers of the law, but what they're actually doing is vain jangling.
Now what does jangling mean?
This is jangling, right?
This is jangling your keys.
Vain jangling is just blabbering, and the word vain means that it has no profit.
There's no benefit.
There's no point.
It doesn't help anything.
It doesn't improve anything.
It doesn't get any work done.
It's like the Bible says that in all labor there is profit, but the talk of the lips
tendeth only to penury.
It's the kind of just blabbering and talking that has no profit.
The Bible says in verse 4, don't give heed to fables and endless genealogies.
Why not?
Because genealogies are unprofitable and vain.
That's why.
They don't matter.
They don't accomplish anything.
They don't do anything for anybody.
They minister questions.
What does that mean?
It means they confuse people.
They minister questions, meaning that they cause doubt and confusion rather than godly
edifying, building people up in faith.
He says the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart and of a good conscience
and of faith on faith.
Look, charity and love that helps your neighbor, not just a bunch of navel gazing and vain
jangling.
He says some have swerved.
They've jerked the steering wheel.
They've grabbed the steering wheel and swerved out of the right path.
They've gone off the road, and they've gone off into the weeds of vain jangling.
They're on a smooth path.
They're on the asphalt.
They're going somewhere.
There's a destination.
I mean, think about it.
You're in the car, and you're on I-10, and you're going to Los Angeles.
You've got a purpose.
You've got a mission.
You've got a destination.
You know where you're going.
You're getting there.
You're making progress, and then all of a sudden, you just swerve off into the dirt,
and you're ... and you're going nowhere now.
You're just going off into the wilderness.
You're going off into the weeds, and it's totally vain because there's nothing there.
Have you ever driven to LA?
If you turn off anywhere between here and there, there's nothing there.
It's a desolate wilderness.
You're just out in the middle of nowhere, out in the desert, and you're going to die
because there's no services for another 37 miles.
Go to 1 Timothy Chapter 6, and people have died, by the way, because they turned off
on some gas station, and then instead of getting back onto the freeway, they accidentally just
zoned out and started driving down a highway that's not the interstate.
They got deep down that highway, and their car broke down.
I've read stories about people who died out there because I have a desert survival handbook.
It's kind of cool because every chapter tells you a story, and in some of the stories, the
people survive, and in some of them, they don't.
You don't really know because if they always died, it'd be a little predictable or if they
always survived, but you don't really know because the stories can go either way, and
so you read about the people, the mistakes that they made versus the people that did
it right, and it was talking about people dying between here and LA.
They pulled off.
They went down a different route.
They're taking a shortcut, or they got turned around, and it was summer, of course, and
it's 110 out or whatever, and just by walking out there with no water, they only had to
go five or six miles, but that was enough for them to just fall over dead because they
didn't have the water.
They didn't have the electrolytes, and they didn't have any shade, and they weren't
acclimated to it, and so they just literally fell over dead, and it was just saying how
if they would have just waited until nighttime, just lay in the shade, wait till nighttime,
then head for the freeway at night, then they could have survived, but they made that mistake,
and it was just explaining these things.
This is the picture that you get here where people have swerved into vain jangling.
They're on a profitable path.
They're on a route to a destination for something that matters, but then they just get off on
the weeds and into the wilderness of false doctrine or whatever because they want to
be a teacher of the law.
They want to come out with some new thing, or they want to get all creative, and I'm
going to find a new way to LA.
The path to LA has already been paved a long time ago, and there's only one way to get
there.
It's I-10, okay, and if you try to find some other, I mean, okay, you could take I-8 if
you want to go roundabout, but if you try to just make a whole new path, you're going
to get a flat tire.
You know, it doesn't make any sense.
You know, it would have made sense to find a new path from Phoenix to LA maybe like a
few hundred years ago, but here we are in 2017.
It's a well-traveled route.
First Timothy chapter 6 verse 1, let as many servants as are under the yoke count their
own masters worthy of all honor that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed.
Now, what we have here is a picture of a servant or what we would call today an employee under
the yoke, and obviously they're not literally getting under a yoke, right?
That would be really hard work.
They're not actually getting under a yoke, but under the yoke is a metaphor here for
a beast of burden, somebody who's working really hard.
They're getting under the yoke, and there was a man in the Bible who literally did get
under a yoke, which was Elisha, and he plowed with the oxen under a yoke just because he
was that strong and that hard of a worker, but the point is it's talking about people
who work hard, servants that are under the yoke.
They're doing hard work, and it's just talking about how they shouldn't have a bad attitude
toward their boss, and it talks about that in verses 1 and 2.
But then in verse 3 it says this, if any man teach otherwise and consent not to wholesome
words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the doctrine which is according to
godliness, he's proud, knowing nothing but doting about questions and strifes of words.
Now, isn't that kind of similar to what we saw in chapter 1, the ministering questions,
doting about strifes and strifes of words, questions, doting, prating, jangling.
He says that they're doting about questions, strifes of words, whereof, cometh envy, strife,
railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of
the truth, supposing that gain is godliness from such withdraw thyself.
So we have in contrast here the diligent hard worker, the doer of the word, the one who
uses the word, is contrasted with the one who just does a lot of striving, questioning,
vain jangling, disputing, and things that don't profit, things that do not have any
value.
Second Timothy chapter 2, second Timothy chapter number 2.
Second Timothy chapter number 2, and you know when it talks about the questions and the
questioning, see we've been taught our whole lives in the United States of America, at
least this is the way I grew up, hey question everything.
I don't know if this is like a baby boomer thing or a 1960s thing or something, but just
question everything, and a lot of, even a lot of Christians will say things like that
or even Bible teachers will say things like that.
Now I think that that's a bad philosophy.
Now I do think that there's a lot of things that we should question, but this attitude
that just questions everything is over the top, it's overboard, and I can understand
why they made Socrates drink poison, because he was asking way too many questions.
I mean the guy, if you've ever read, and I don't recommend it, but if you've ever read
any of his works, you know the works of Plato and Socrates, they just, every word, it's
like what does that word mean though, does that really mean that, is that really that,
and they question everything to the point of stupidity and ridiculousness, and it's
like the Bible says avoid foolish questions.
You know these kind of nonsensical questions, can God make a rock so big that he can't pick
it up, and all this dumb jangling and foolishness, and you know when you read the world's philosophers
of ancient Greece, that's what they do, they're just asking questions, but they're questioning
things that we already all know the answer to, and so this whole thing of just questioning
everything is foolishness, you know, we shouldn't question whether two plus two is four.
We should believe what the Bible says, we should believe what we're being taught and
preached to unless there's a compelling reason to think that we're being taught wrong because
it contradicts something in the Bible, but we shouldn't just go into every teaching and
every doctrine and every sermon just ready to just question everything.
You know the Bible talks about the Bereans in Acts chapter 17, how they search the scriptures
daily whether those things were so.
They were in their Bibles, they didn't just blindly listen to preaching, but rather they
search the scriptures daily to see whether those things were so, but what we often forget
about the Bereans is the first half of the verse where it says that they received the
word of God with all readiness of mind and searched the scriptures daily whether those
things are so.
So they didn't go into it like this, you know, trying to just question it all, pick it all
apart, find the flaw in it, find the error, find some new thing.
They went into it ready to learn, readiness of mind.
They went in ready to believe the preaching, but then they just checked it with the Bible
just to make sure, but there are a lot of people who just go into it ready to question
everything.
Now look, you shouldn't be questioning the fundamentals of the faith.
Now things that are more secondary or, you know, the finer points of Bible prophecy,
you know, okay, question things that you can't find any scripture on.
Question things that you can't find in the Bible.
Question things that you can't find any evidence for.
But we've created a generation that questions everything, so this is the kind of stuff they
question.
Well, maybe it's not wrong to fornicate before I get married.
And I've sat in youth groups where they said, well, let's go to the Bible and let's figure
out is it really wrong to fornicate?
Are you sure fornication is not okay?
Because they say, well, maybe fornication means something else.
Maybe I can sleep with my girlfriend before I get married.
I mean, this is the kind of stupidity of just question everything, you know, and they want
to question whether or not Jesus is God, or they want to question the Trinity, or they
want to question salvation by faith, or they even want to question whether the world is
round.
That's what we've created.
You think I'm not making any sense right now?
Okay, then explain the flat earth to me.
It's a movement of people who've been taught to question everything.
I mean, next thing, if you're going to question everything and you're going to question whether
the earth is round, even though that's something that's been long established and proved a
million different ways, then the next thing you could say is, well, maybe we're not even
really here.
Maybe we're in a simulator, and look, I see that kind of stuff on the internet all the
time.
I saw it on infowars.com that supposedly, you know, there was some article where, hey,
this might all be a simulator.
The universe shows all this evidence that we're all in a simulator, and, you know, we
might just be laying in some warehouse somewhere plugged into a virtual reality, and none of
this is real.
We're not even here.
We're all part of someone else's dream, and we're all going to wake up, or they're going
to wake up, and we just disappear and cease to exist.
I mean, this is the kind of stupidity and foolishness of just question everything.
Look, you're never going to make it to algebra one, algebra two, precalculus, and calculus
and beyond unless you stop questioning basic arithmetic.
You need to just get that multiplication table and get it settled.
Get your arithmetic and subtraction and division facts, get them settled, and then move on,
and then leave the principles of the doctrine of Christ and go on into perfection, but some
of you, you're hung up on questioning the basics.
You're going to go nowhere.
Can't just question everything, and then we have children who just question their parents
on everything.
Their parents tell them, hey, go do it.
Why?
Hey, children, you can't do that.
You can't wear that.
You can't go there.
Why?
Why not?
Why?
Because I said so.
Here's why.
Children, obey your parents and the Lord, for this is right.
Questioning whether the Bible is the word of God, questioning whether these 66 books
are all legitimate, questioning whether we need to add some other book that was dug up
somewhere, questioning these basic teachings.
Look, get that stuff settled and move on, and look, if you're such a babe.
If you're so ignorant that you don't have these things settled, go debate them with
someone else.
I'm not interested in talking about the flat earth.
I'm not interested in debating you on the Trinity.
I'm not interested in debating you on the deity of Christ.
I'm not interested in debating you on these.
These things are settled, proven things.
They're not on the table.
They're non-negotiable.
They're not up for discussion.
They're basics.
But we have here a lot of people who will, not here in church, but here in the Bible,
we see lots of examples here of people who get off course and they get into all this
mange angle.
Look at 2 Timothy 2.
I started it in verse 15 in my notes, but I think we need to back up a little more.
Let me turn there myself.
We really should back up to verse number 14 because the Bible says, of these things
put them in remembrance, charging them before the Lord that they strive not about words.
What's strive mean?
Argue.
That they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers.
So these are unprofitable arguments.
They're not actually talking about something that's productive or something that is going
to help us be a better Christian or edify us or help us to gain something, but their
goal is just to subvert the hearers.
They strive about words to no profit, to no benefit to anyone except for the fact that
they are using that to manipulate people or subvert the hearers.
Verse 15, study to show thyself approved unto God.
A workman.
Now again, what do we see connected?
Work and study.
Work and knowing the Bible.
Work and not being a babe in Christ.
Work and not being tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine.
Why?
Because if you don't use it, you lose it.
So it's the worker that doesn't get off course.
See, you know why he doesn't drive off into the weeds?
Because he has an appointment in Los Angeles.
That's why he's even going there.
He actually has a job to do.
He's got a customer waiting for him.
He's on his way there.
He doesn't have time to go explore this new route through Salome.
Like that's going to get you there faster.
That's going to slow you down.
I've done it.
And it takes a long time.
Maybe I might be, is that on I-10?
Yeah, that turn off to Salome.
Yeah, don't mess with that.
I did it to avoid a checkpoint though, but that's another story.
So 2 Timothy chapter 2, verse 15 says, study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman
that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word.
Look, the only person who's going to rightly divide the word of truth is a workman.
The only one who truly studies and shows themself approved is a workman.
Verse 16, but shun profane and vain babblings.
Another word, prating, jangling, babbling, disputings, vain disputings, perverse disputings,
for they will increase unto more ungodliness and their word will eat as doth a canker.
Now that word canker comes from the same root word as another word.
What happens when you change the K to a C?
It's like a cancer.
Why?
Because these are things that spread, right?
Their words will eat as doth a canker, of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus, who concerning
the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is past already and overthrow the faith of
some.
This is a dumb doctrine that they came out with.
Hey, the resurrection already happened.
You know, this is totally unprofitable, totally vain, questioning a fundamental of the faith,
just crazy doctrine, and they're overthrowing people's faith.
They're subverting the hearers.
They're saying the resurrection is past already.
Nevertheless, the foundation of God standeth sure, verse 19, having the seal.
The Lord knoweth them that are his, and let everyone that nameth the name of Christ depart
from iniquity.
But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and
of earth, and some to honor and some to dishonor.
If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified,
and meet for the master's use.
Watch this, and prepared unto every good work.
Meet for the master's what?
Juice.
Prepared unto every good what?
Work.
And so why is it that every time the Bible talks about people going off into false doctrine,
there's the admonition of, hey, you need to get to work for the Lord on things that actually
profit, things that actually matter, things that aren't in vain.
Why is it that every time God talks about people not knowing the Bible well, it's followed
up by a statement about how they need to work harder and quit being lazy?
Why are those things put together in the scriptures that we've looked at, whether it was Hebrews
5 and 6, James 1, Luke chapter 8, 1 Timothy 1, 1 Timothy 6, and now 2 Timothy chapter
2?
The Bible's pretty consistent, isn't it?
Go to Ephesians chapter 4.
Ephesians chapter 4.
Why?
Because if you don't use it, you lose it.
That's why.
You got to stay working.
You've got to stay busy on the right route to the right destination and not get off on
these weird questions, vain disputings, and you know, a lot of people are looking to just
be different for the sake of being different.
Not because there's a compelling reason to do so, and I remember when I got my first
fire alarm job, the first day, this is what one of the supervisors said to me.
He said, if you have a different way of doing things, we don't want to hear about it.
He said, if you have a better way of doing things, tell us about it, but if your way
is the same good as our way but just different, shut up.
That's what he said because he said it's vain.
We're not going to conform to you.
You're going to conform to us, and he looked at the tool that I was using to strip wires,
and he said, you're not going to use that tool anymore.
This is the tool you're going to use because that's the way we do it, and your way is not
better.
Therefore, you're going to do it our way.
What was he saying?
Don't just be different for the sake of being different.
He said, be different if it's better.
Be different if we're doing it wrong.
Come tell us if we're making a mistake, but don't just try to change us for the sake of
changing.
The Bible says, meddle not with them that are given to change.
What does it mean to be given to change?
What does it mean to be given to wine?
It means you have a tendency to drink wine.
What does it mean to be given to hospitality?
You have a tendency to be hospitable.
When the Bible says you're given to change, it's the type of people who just change for
the sake of changing, just to be different.
It's one of the works of the flesh in Galatians chapter 5, the opposite of the works of the
Spirit, one of the works of the flesh is variance, variance, just varying, just being different
for the sake of being different.
Not because there's any profit, not because there's any benefit, but just different for
the sake of being different.
This is why people dye their hair green, and this is why people, they do all these things
to stand out and be different.
You know how you can really stand out though, and listen up you young people who go to public
school.
I know there are students here that go to public school.
If you really want to stand out at your school, because it doesn't seem like teenagers love
to stand out, just young people in general, they love to stand out, they love to be different.
If you actually live the life of a Bible believing Christian at your public school, you will
stand out.
Way more than if you get a Mohawk and get a bunch of piercings and dye your hair and
do all this stuff.
If you want to stand out, start preaching the word of God, start teaching the Bible,
start winning souls to Christ, live a clean life, dress modestly, dress appropriately,
dress maturely, you'll stand out like a sore thumb.
But that's going to take some work though.
That's going to be hard.
It's a lot easier to just go spray a bunch of green stuff into your hair, or go down
to the piercing pagoda and get some piercing.
That's way harder than actually excelling at virtue.
It's a lot easier for women to do the broided hair and pearls and costly array than it is
for them to actually have the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit and have godliness
and good works be their attire.
Why?
Because that takes a lot of work, that's why.
And if you want to excel at your job, you've got to work hard.
You want to stand out and be different and do well, you've got to work at it.
It's going to take effort.
Look at Ephesians chapter 4 verse 11, the Bible says he gave some apostles and some
prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers, why?
For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of
the body of Christ, and all three of those things are very profitable, none of them are
in vain.
They have to do with actually getting work done.
They have to do with taking the saints and believers and the body of Christ and building
them up and making them better Christians and better workers and better servants.
Verse 13, till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son
of God unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,
that we be henceforth no more children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind
of doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive,
but speaking the truth and love may grow up unto him in all things, which is the head
even Christ, from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which
every joint supplieth according to the effectual, working, effectual, effective, working in
the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in
love, work, edification, perfection, increase, growth.
That's what we're talking about here, things that actually profit.
And isn't it interesting that this ties in perfectly with Hebrews chapter 5 when it talked
about people needing the milk of the word and not being able to handle the strong meat
of the word, and it said that they hadn't used it to be able to discern between good
and evil, and he said that they're like babes, everyone that uses milk is a babe.
Well, what does he say here?
That we henceforth be no more, verse 14, children.
Don't be a babe.
A babe is tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine.
So there are two kinds of people that we see in this verse.
First of all, there are the people who use sleight of hand, which is deception, right?
Cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive.
Everybody got that crowd?
There's a group of people that are cunning, and they're crafty, and they're hiding, and
they are waiting to deceive you.
They are lying in wait for you.
They are lurking privily to deceive you.
So they are the deceivers.
But then we have the deceives.
I don't think that's a word.
The people who are deceived are the who?
Who's deceived in this verse?
The babes.
Right?
The babes in Christ, the children, the ones who don't know the word of God, they're stuck
on the milk.
They're not a doer of the word.
They're on the milk of the word so they can get sucked into this stuff because a babe
by nature is gullible.
I mean, you could tell a one or a two or a three-year-old pretty much anything, and
they're going to believe you.
You could tell them, hey, we're going to go get in a spaceship, and we're going to fly
to the moon tonight, and they'll say, okay, what should I bring?
It's true.
A little tiny babe will believe just about anything.
So we have the babes in Christ that are tossed to and fro, and then we have the deceivers
that are ready to prey upon those people.
Those are their victims.
Now do the false teachers and deceivers come to you and say, hey, everybody, let's deny
the deity of Christ.
Hey, everybody, I'm here to teach a works-based salvation.
Hey, everybody, I'm here to get you out of Christianity and into Judaism.
Is that what they're going to say?
No way.
Because even a child would see through that.
I mean, if somebody came over to my two-year-old wearing a monster mask, they're going to run
away screaming.
But if they come to the two-year-old, hey, kid, would you like some candy?
That's how they're going to deceive, right?
That's how the real monsters are going to come.
Because the Bible is saying here that they use what?
Slight.
What do they use?
Cunning craftiness.
What do they use?
Deception.
Yeah.
Look at all the cults and all the phonies out there.
You go out soul-witting and you knock their doors and they lie to you.
You try to win the Mormons to Christ, and what do the Mormons tell you?
Who's been soul-witting and had a Mormon time?
I'm looking at the Gilbert group.
Who's been soul-witting and had a Mormon time?
You don't even know what it is yet.
You've already got your hand up because you've heard it all from the Mormons.
Who's heard a Mormon tell you, oh, we believe just like you guys?
Put up your hand.
Look around.
These are the people that have heard a Mormon say, we believe just like you guys.
You'll sit there and give them the gospel and they'll be like, yup, that's exactly what
we believe.
It's frustrating because you wish they'd say that they don't believe it because then if
they admit that they have a problem, then you can fix the problem.
But they the behold need not a physician, but they that are sick.
If they don't know that they're sick, the great physician can't help them.
I get more frustrated giving the gospel to Mormons than any other religion.
I would rather give the gospel to any religion than the Mormons.
Obviously they need the gospel.
Amen.
We should preach the gospel to every creature.
I personally don't think that that's my ministry.
Every man has this proper gift of God.
I struggle with just keeping the flesh under control when I talk to these Mormons because
the way they just lie to you, they smile real big and tell you, oh, that's exactly what
we believe.
We only believe that there's only one God and we only believe that salvation is just
by faith.
I'm just like, and I have to work on self-control.
I'm just saying, all right, have a good day.
I just have to tell them to have a good day and just walk away because it's frustrating.
But they're deceivers.
They're liars.
They don't believe like us.
They don't believe the gospel.
They're lying.
And look, false prophets, false teachers, they're of their father, the devil, and he's
a liar from the beginning.
He's a liar and the father of it.
And so they use deception.
Now the mature in Christ should get to a point where they're not tossed to and fro, back
and forth, back and forth, back and forth, where they're believing the truth, believing
that which is wrong, believing the truth, believing that which is wrong.
They don't get carried about with every wind of doctrine.
This is the trendy doctrines that pop up from time to time, divers and strange doctrines.
One of the biggest ones that I think is one of the best examples of this is this thing
of Jesus being named Yeshua.
And the reason I say that is because I'd never heard of that my whole life until like the
last 10, 15 years.
And I think if you asked most Christians, they'd never heard of that.
And I know a lot of you, or maybe you've only been saved in the last 10 years, so you've
always heard that junk.
But I'm telling you, that stuff was nonexistent.
And now it's everywhere.
The Judaizing is just in full swing.
I mean, I was just walking yesterday and saw a guy with some Judaizing t-shirt about
how Jesus made him kosher and all this stuff, and I was just like, what in the world?
It used to be that that was restricted to just a few cults, and I never heard the Yeshua
part.
But even the abstaining from pork and everything was very limited.
But it's something that kind of got really popular, a movement that came out.
And it's always something that's coming out, some new doctrine, some wild new doctrine,
some wild new teaching.
And one of the big ones, the Torah observing, the Judaizing type of a religion is a big
one.
But it's always going to be something that pops up, that comes up, and if you're a babe
in Christ, you're susceptible to get caught up in a lot of this stuff and to get confused
on a lot of these things.
The head-covering Baptists, the Torah observing, the modalist, oneness Pentecostalism, whatever.
There's weird doctrines, strange doctrines that come up, and people get caught up in
it if they're a babe in Christ.
And they need to repent of that junk and get back on track and get back nose to the grindstone
working hard to study the Word and working hard to use the Word of God.
Go to Luke chapter 16.
Luke chapter number 16.
I'm almost done.
Luke chapter 16.
And some people would say, well Pastor Anderson, you're different.
You stand out.
You're not a run-of-the-mill independent Baptist.
Yeah, but here's the thing, I never set out to be different.
I never set out to stand out.
I just set out to just pastor the church here and yeah, did I end up standing out in a lot
of ways?
Sure, but I didn't set out to stand out.
I set out to do my job.
And the way that you stand out properly is just by working.
And when you do a lot of work and you produce a lot of output, you're going to get people's
attention.
Not by just taking the shortcut of just coming out with a gimmick.
There are two ways to make money or two ways to achieve something financially in the business
world.
You can work hard or you can use gimmicks and fraud to get ahead financially in business.
And there are all kinds of people who've made a lot of money with stupid gimmicks but everybody
purchased it and it didn't work and you know, but they're liars, they're deceivers, they're
fraud.
The infomercials, right?
Oh, this mop or whatever and then this Hercules hook or the ShamWow or whatever and everything.
Look, that guy, he could have started a real company and made some real good products and
some real, but instead he used gimmicks, deception, look at this, it's amazing, you know.
But there are a lot of preachers that do the same thing.
They just use a lot of gimmicks and just, wow, look at this brand new thing that I came
up with.
Instead of just working hard and just faithfully teaching the Bible.
Look at Luke 16 verse 1, he said unto his disciples, there was a certain rich man which
had a steward and the same was accused unto him that he'd wasted his goods.
So here's a worker, here's an employee that's wasting his master's goods and he called him
and said unto him, how is it that I hear this of thee?
Give an account of thy stewardship for thou mayest no longer be steward.
What's a steward?
It's somebody who's responsible for things, takes care of things, watches over things.
Then the steward said within himself, what shall I do for my Lord taketh away from me
the stewardship?
What am I going to do?
But look at these two last statements because this shows you a little bit about this guy.
I cannot dig.
What's that tell you about the guy?
He's lazy.
I mean, I can't actually do any real work.
You know, God forbid I would actually break a sweat and work.
Now does it make, does it surprise you this guy's a crook?
Does it surprise you this guy's getting fired from his job for being a crook, for wasting
his boss's goods because what does that tell you about his character?
Well, I can't dig.
Well, you know, I can dig.
Can you dig?
Can you dig it?
You know, we can dig, man.
I cannot dig.
And then look at the next thing.
To beg, I am ashamed.
Now look, I'm not for people skipping digging to go beg.
Let me just make that real clear.
I'm against these beggars by the side of the road when they're able-bodied young men, there's
plenty of jobs.
I'm not saying, well, I can't dig so let's go beg.
But here's the thing.
He doesn't say, well, I can't dig and to beg would be wrong.
He doesn't say begging would be wrong or begging would be lazy.
What he says is to beg, I'm ashamed.
So it's not that he has any moral issue about begging.
It's just that he's ashamed to do it because another attribute that he has is pride.
So the two attributes we see here in this guy are what?
Laziness and pride.
He can't dig and he's ashamed to beg, not that he has any moral problem with begging.
Later in the chapter, he's praised for having one good attribute, cunning.
Right?
He's smart.
He's cunning.
He's good at deception.
I mean, we already knew that because he's been wasting this guy's goods for who knows
how long.
So yeah, okay, he's a sharp guy.
He's cunning, cunning craftiness.
And then in the end, he ends up ripping off his boss more by going around stealing all
his customers and taking more money from the boss, robbing the boss of even more of
his goods so that he can make buddies with the customers because he cooks the books in
this chapter.
So what do we know about this guy?
He's lazy and he's prideful and he won't work and he's getting fired and he's crafty.
Go to 1 Corinthians Chapter 4 and we'll see the right kind of a steward and I'll close
on this, 1 Corinthians Chapter 4.
What's the title of the sermon?
Use it or lose it.
That's true in all areas of life.
If you want your body to last, if you want to live to be 70, 80, 90 years old and you
don't want to be a physical wreck, you got to use your body.
If you're sedentary, if you're idle, your body's going to decay.
And look, if you want to become 70, 80, 90 years old and still be able to think and be
sharp, you got to use your brain.
Look, I know people that are in their 90s that are as sharp as a tack.
I mean I talk, you know, I'm thinking of my grandma down in Tucson, Arizona, 95 years
old.
She is as sharp as when I was a little kid.
She's as sharp as a tack and then I think of also Dr. Roland Rasmussen, the narrator
at the beginning of After the Tribulation.
He's got to be about 90 by now.
I talk to him on the phone from time to time and the man is as sharp as a tack.
But when I talk to him on the phone, you know, he tells me about all the new things he's
been learning from the Bible, all the studying he's doing in the Word of God.
Okay.
Why?
Because if you use your mind and you keep challenging your mind all the time, it's like
a muscle that you keep in use.
You don't want to lose your mind, then use your mind.
And it's been proven that people who stimulate their brain do not have as high of a rate
of Alzheimer's, dementia, and I'm not saying that people who get those things necessarily
didn't use their brain.
There could be other reasons.
But the point is that there is evidence of prevention of mental disorders and prevention
of Alzheimer's, dementia, and so forth by using your brain.
And this is why elderly people often love to do crossword puzzles and Sudoku and other
games and stuff.
They're not just killing time because they're old.
They're trying to stimulate their brain and use their brain because they want to be sharp
because you talk to other people that get older and they slow way down.
And talking to them is similar to using a computer that is way behind on its RAM update.
It's like using a really old, slow computer and you're trying to do some really sophisticated
task and there's a lot of waiting.
And you're typing letters and nothing's coming on the screen and then a couple letters come
on the screen, a couple more letters come on the screen.
And sometimes that's how elderly people can get, sadly, because of the fact that their
brain's getting old.
Now look, all of our brains are going to get old someday.
We're all going to slow down like that.
So I'm not making fun or anything, but what I am saying is that I'd rather that that happens
to me when I'm in my 90s than when I'm in my 50s because I sat in front of the idiot
box rotting my brain, sat in front of a video game rotting my brain, TV, video games, and
all the conversation I had was light and idle conversation, nothing intelligent.
You know, I don't want to go to an early grave.
I don't want to go to early senility.
I don't want to have early atrophy of my body and be out of commission physically at an
early age.
So I want to use my body.
I want to use my brain.
I want to use my mind.
But you know what?
Far more important than bodily exercise or mental exercise is a spiritual exercise.
I don't want to be one who gets old and backslidden.
And we see that a lot in the Bible, old men who no longer stand for the Lord.
You can't rest on past achievements.
Oh, man, 30 years ago, I used to be so strong.
I was so athletic.
Let me show you the trophies 30 years ago.
Oh, man, look, here's my degree.
Look how smart I was back in college.
Here's the master's degree in math or whatever.
But wait a minute.
What are you doing now?
You better whip out a crossword puzzle or something because you're going to lose your
mind.
You need to do something, you know.
And look, spiritually, though, you know what we need?
We need to be reading our Bibles, but that's not enough.
We need to be using the Word of God.
To do what?
You say you keep talking about using the Word of God.
To do what?
Okay, here's what you do with it.
You win somebody to Christ.
That's a great way to use it.
And here's what else you do.
You teach people doctrine that edifies them and helps them.
And you teach the Bible, you disciple people, you get people saved, you use the Word of
God, and you obey the commandments, you do what God tells you to do.
That's how you use the Word of God.
Winning people to Christ and teaching them to observe all things that Christ commanded.
This will keep you spiritually sharp, spiritually on track, and it will keep you on that road
to the destination and not getting swerved off the road into vain jangling.
Verse 1 of 1 Corinthians 4, let a man so account of us as of the ministers of Christ and stewards
of the mysteries of God.
Now, what's a steward?
It's someone who's in charge of something, someone who's trusted to take care of something
or oversee something or administer something.
It says that we are stewards of the mysteries of God.
Now, what does that mean?
That means that we understand the mysteries of God.
Jesus told the disciples, unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven,
but to them it is not given.
So is understanding the mysteries of God a privilege?
Yeah, not everybody understands.
What does it mean to understand the mysteries of God?
You have deep biblical knowledge.
That's a privilege.
It's a blessing.
We are stewards of the mysteries of God, but it's required, the Bible says, moreover it
is required in stewards that a man be found faithful.
If we are like the unjust steward from Luke 16 where we're what?
Lazy, prideful, and deceptive, God's going to take away the stewardship from us.
He's not going to take away your salvation, but he's not going to open your eyes to the
mysteries of the kingdom of God.
And that's why you see a lot of has-been preachers who are backslidden, compromising,
and their sermons, they don't have any meat on the bone anymore.
Like they used to preach sermons that actually had some content, and they made sense, and
they helped people, and they edified people, and they helped people grow.
But a lot of these guys are on the decline, why?
They're not hearing from God.
And I'm not even saying that they don't read their Bibles, but when they read their Bible,
they're not getting anything out of it.
Why?
Because it's not given unto them to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, because they've
been an unfaithful steward.
They're not a doer of the work.
They've gotten lazy.
They've gotten relaxed.
They've gotten compromised.
God told them to preach a certain way.
They preached a different way.
God stops revealing things to them.
And they become like King Saul who wants to hear from God, but he can't.
He was saved.
He wants to hear from God.
And God's not talking to me anymore.
And he's horrified, and he wants to hear what God wants him to do.
He wants to hear.
He can't hear it.
He doesn't hear anything.
Why?
Because he was a bad steward.
Because God told him to do something, he disobeyed.
God told him to do something else, he disobeyed.
Now he's like, why won't God talk to me?
Because you didn't obey.
You weren't a doer of the work.
If you don't use it, you lose it.
So then what does he do?
He turns to the witch at Endor, because he's not hearing from God.
And that's what you see with a lot of these preachers, these old-timers who've compromised
and gotten away from the Word of God.
They turn to the witch of Sam Gipp or whatever.
I'm losing this battle against the pre-trip rapture.
God won't talk to me.
I'm trying to find it in the Bible, I can't find it.
They go to the witch at Endor.
They bring in some totally just satanic, off-the-wall, radical weirdo, hardcore, hyper-dispensational
ruckmanite weirdo.
And then it's like, you know, the witch at Endor comes in.
And then Samuel has to come in and tell him, you're going to die, buddy.
Tomorrow shalt thou and thy sons be with me.
Spout our heads and we'll have a word of prayer.