started this evening. Welcome to Anchor Baptist Church. If you would at this time, take your
hymnals and turn to hymn number 143. Blessed Assurance. Hymn number 143. Start there right
on the first. Blessed Assurance is mine. Thank you for this church and thank you for the
souls that were saved this evening. I pray that you would bless the remainder of this
service at this time and fill us with your spirit as we sing praises unto you, Lord.
In Jesus' name I pray, Amen. For our next song, if you would turn in your hymnals to
hymn number 153, How Firm a Foundation, hymn number 153, and start there right on the first.
Do have there Bible memory verse of the week, Genesis chapter number 1 verse 16. Of course
if you could quote this perfectly after the service, if you are 18 or younger, you'll
get a ice cream after church. We do have on the inside our service times listed. Sunday
morning at 10.30, Sunday evening at 4.30, and our Wednesday evening Bible study at 7
o'clock. Also we have our soul winning times listed there below, and those meet here at
the church building. We did have four salvations this evening, so praise the Lord for that.
And below we have our year to date soul winning statistics. Everyone's doing great, but of
course we want to just keep our foot on the pedal for the rest of the year. So keep being
faithful to soul winning. Definitely love to see God blessing our soul winning efforts
this year. We do have our upcoming events, and this Saturday is going to be our family
fun day at the Orr Family Farm. The sign up sheet is back there, and I had asked everyone
to sign up by today. It's still today, so if you want to come to this, you're more than
welcome to sign up, and I'll make the order this evening. We have 42 people signed up
so far, and the more the merrier, so if anyone has any last minute desire to sign up, please
do, and we would be happy to have you. That's going to start at 10 o'clock, so we're going
to meet at the address listed in your bulletin at 10 a.m., and I think the farm stays open
until like 6 or 7 or something like that, so you're more than welcome to stay as long
as you want. Please let us know again how many people in your party are 2 years or older,
and of course, Pastor Aaron Thompson from Sher Foundation Baptist Church and his wife
Sherry will be here with us all weekend. He's flying in Friday, so he'll join us for the
Saturday events, and he'll be preaching both services for us on Sunday, so definitely
just a great weekend to be in church. You're not going to want to miss this great weekend.
We also have October 31st as our next event there is going to be our chili cook-off, and
the judges are sealed. We've got the judges picked already. Really looking forward to
having this event. Then November 22nd is going to be Oklahoma City Soul Winning Marathon.
That's going to be on a Saturday. We're going to meet here like our normal Soul Winning
Rally, but except we're going to go Soul Winning twice this Saturday. It's going to be a great
time. Of course, the reason we're doing that is because that's going to be our one-year
church anniversary, which I feel like I've just blinked my eyes. I cannot believe it's
already been a year, but we're really excited to celebrate that and have also Pastor Jonathan
Schille from Steadfast Baptist Church preaching that Sunday. I heard that he's bringing an
army with him, so we're going to be excited to see everyone from Steadfast. Of course,
we just got to spend a great week with them in the Bahamas, where we just got tons and
tons of people saved. It was a really great trip. If you've never been on a mission trip,
you should endeavor in your mind now to plan to go to the next one. Really, if you're going
to pick a missions trip, I have to tell you the Bahamas is a great one to pick, because
you're going to have so much fun and enjoy yourself so much that you'll want to keep
going to missions trips. Of course, we want to go throughout the whole world, but of course
not everyone is going to be a full-time evangelist in their life, where their whole life is
dedicated day in day out preaching the gospel. If you're just a church member and you want
to spend one week of your life preaching the gospel, Bahamas is where it's at. Someone
was criticizing us saying, "Why don't you go to the non-Christian areas?" Well, it's
like, I can go to the Bahamas and enjoy myself in paradise and get thousands of people saved,
or I can go to Iran and get beheaded and not even have people listen or people just hate
us. It doesn't make any sense. So we want to do common sense missions where we go to
places where they want the gospel. And I like Oklahoma City because this is a place that
wants the gospel. It's one of the reasons I chose to come pastor here. Also, the event
after that, November 26th, is the Pi Fellowship. We do have information about that fall family
fun day on the right, as well as a QR code on the back for your first time visitor and
you would like to just get emails about our upcoming events and sermons. Just scan that.
It will give us a record of your visit and we could send you those things. Also, we do
have a QR code for online giving for those who prefer to give via that method as well.
We do have a one addition to the prayer list, adding my brother for safety on his combat
deployment. I think he gets home in February. So if you can keep him in prayer, I'd appreciate
that. And before we go to our next song, let's go ahead and go to the Lord in prayer as a
church family. Lord, we just thank you for the opportunity to be in church this Wednesday
night and to sing praises to your name, to hear the word of God preached. I pray that
your spirit would just fill this place as we worship you and that you would just bless
the preaching of God's word tonight. I pray that you would be with all the requests that
we have and that different church members have, that you would bless Anchor Baptist
Church. I pray that you bless people's health and finances and marriages and child rearing,
Lord. I also want to pray a special prayer for my brother that you just keep him safe
overseas. I also want to pray for Brother Theodore's mother's cancer and her salvation as well as his
sister, Lord. We want to pray for the Houseburg family, for Brother Miles' health, that you bless
Miss Rhea as well. And also, Lord, we want to pray for church members that we have here whose
loved ones are not saved, that those people would just have soft hearts to hear the gospel, that
they would get many, many opportunities in their life to hear. And Lord, I pray that you would just
give us boldness as individuals to open our mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel.
We love you in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. All right, at this time we'll go ahead and go to our third
song. All right, for our third song, if you would at this time take your white handouts and turn to
Psalm chapter 149. Psalm chapter 149 in the white handouts. Psalm 149. And start there right on the
first. This evening as the offering plates are being passed around turn in your Bibles to Proverbs
chapter 27. Proverbs chapter 27. Proverbs 27. Proverbs 27 and the Bible reads, "Bost not thyself
of tomorrow, for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. Let another man praise thee and not
thine own mouth, a stranger and not thine own lips. A stone is heavy and the sand weighty,
but a fool's wrath is heavier than them both. Wrath is cruel and anger is outrageous,
but who is able to stand before envy? Open rebuke is better than secret love. Faithful are the wounds
of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. The full soul loatheth in honeycomb,
but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet. As a bird that wandereth from her nest,
so is a man that wandereth from his place. Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart,
so doth the sweetness of a man's friend by hearty counsel. Thine own friend and thy father's friend
forsake not, neither go into thy brother's house in the day of thy calamity, for better is a
neighbor that is near than a brother far off. My son, be wise and make my heart glad that I may
answer him that reproacheth me. A prudent man foreseeeth the evil and hideeth himself,
but the simple pass on and are punished. Take his garment that is shorty for a stranger,
and take a pledge of him for a strange woman. He that blesseth his friend with a loud voice,
rising early in the morning, it shall be counted a curse to him. A continual dropping in a very
rainy day, and a contentious woman are alike. Whosoever hideeth her, hideeth the wind and the
ointment of his right hand, which bereth itself. Iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the
countenance of his friend. Whoso keepeth the fig tree, shall eat the fruit thereof. So he that
waiteth on his master shall be honored. As in water, face answereth to face, so the heart of man
to man. Hell and destruction are never full, so the eyes of man are never satisfied. As the
finding pot for silver and the furnace for gold, so is a man to his praise. Though thou shouldest
beray a fool in a mortar among wheat with a pestle, yet will not his foolishness depart from him.
Be thou diligent to know the state of thy flocks, and to look well to thy herds. For riches are not
forever, and doth the crown endure to every generation. The hay appeareth, and the tender
grass showeth itself, and the herbs of the mountains are gathered. The lambs are for thy
clothing, and the goats are the price of the field. And thou shalt have goats' milk enough
for thy food, for the food of thy household, and for the maintenance for thy maidens.
Let's bow our heads for a prayer. Father in heaven, we thank you for this day in our church,
and we ask that you would bless our church and everyone in here. We ask that you fill
our past with your spirit and help us to learn from your word. We love you. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
In Proverbs chapter 27 verse 1, the Bible says, "Boast not thyself of tomorrow, for thou knowest not
what a day may bring forth." One of the most, you know, things, one of the things in life that
could just make us be humble is realizing that we could die at any moment. And we as God's people,
and really human beings in general, should not be the type of people that boast or brag about anything,
not to mention things that haven't even happened yet, things that you're just planning on doing.
You know, it's really important as Christians that yes, it's good to make plans for your life,
it's good that you're thinking about the future, but really you should be living the most you can
for now, because you're not even sure if you're going to have tomorrow. So like an example of
this is sometimes people will want to put, push pause on serving God. They'll say, you know,
I'll go to church later in life. I'll worry about serving God later. I'll read the Bible later.
Some people even say I'll get saved later, not even knowing if they're going to make it to the
next day. But really we as God's people should not be boasting ourselves of tomorrow. So sometimes
people say like, man, you know, I really got to focus on my career right now. Or, you know,
I've got some sort of personal issue that I'm dealing with. So I'm just going to take a break
from going to church. I'm just going to take a break from serving God. You know, that's a really
foolish thing to do because you don't know if you're going to get the opportunity to serve Him again.
And really, we should be looking at every single day we have from God as a gift from Him and using
the strength and the resources and the time and the breath that God has given us for His service,
not just boasting of tomorrow. Makes me think of James chapter number four, if you'll turn there,
James chapter number four. And in James four, it even brings up this idea of people bragging
or boasting about the money they're going to make, the businesses they're going to build. And this
is often what people do when they talk about the future. It says in verse 13, go to now ye that
say today or tomorrow, we will go into such a city and continue there a year and buy and sell
and get gain. Whereas you know not what shall be on the morrow for what is your life. It is even
a vapor that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away. So you have these individuals
where they're saying, hey, we are going to go into this city. We're going to start a business.
We're going to start turning the corner financially. We're going to start investing in ourselves.
And the Bible's saying, hey, go to now. What do you think this is talking about? Well, here's the
thing. It's not saying you can never make plans for the future, but I think what this is teaching
is don't put off for tomorrow what can be done today. You know, there's nothing wrong with being
a young teenager and saying, "Hey, someday I want to get married. Someday I want to have kids."
Obviously right now I hope you're not doing that. You know, I hope the teenagers are not like,
"You know, go to now. Today is the day I'm getting married. Today is the day I'm having kids."
No, but what you can do today, you should do today. You know, you want to get married today.
Okay, here's what you should do today is become a mature individual. What you should do today is
stop being a foolish child and actually wake up early and read your Bible and be mature and stop
saying stupid jokes and stop being a moronic child and actually do today something that'll prepare
you for marriage. That'll prepare you for having children someday. You know, maybe you do have an
idea to start a business. Well, what can you do today that could help you with that goal? And
don't just constantly be the type of person that procrastinates. This is an attribute in someone
that I just despise. Procrastination. It personally drives me crazy. Like, for example, even something
as simple as, like, my wife wants something for me to do at home. You know, she's got a list of
something she wants me to do. I want to do it as soon as I get home. Because I want to get on with
my life. And I want to get to the things that I'm doing and the stuff I'm reading and my work to do.
And I'm just like, all right, you want me to move this thing? As soon as I get home, I'm doing it.
I'm not going to, like, put it off or anything like it. Because I don't know about you. When I
have a long task list, it just drives me crazy. I just want to start checking that stuff off as
early as possible and do now what I can do now. And then notice verse 15, it says, "For that you
ought to say, 'If the Lord will, we shall live and do this or that.'" So if you do have plans for the
future, you ought to have this mentality and even express that in your verbiage that you use saying,
"Hey, God willing, next year I'm going to go on that Bahamas admissions trip." And that's a great
goal to have. But what can you do now to prepare for that? Well, you could be a weekly soul winner
now. You know, you can learn the soul winning verses now. You can memorize the soul winning
verses now. You can watch the soul winning instructional videos now and then say, "Lord
willing, I'm going to put all this to use in the Bahamas." That's great. Verse 16, "But now you
rejoice in your boasting. All such rejoicing is evil. Therefore, to him that knoweth to do good
and doeth it not, to him it is sin." You know, it's funny, people who aren't saved, especially
people that just don't read the Bible, they think that the only sins that exist are like these
super insanely wicked sins like murder, you know, blaspheming the Holy Ghost, rape, and look, those
are horrible sins, but notice God's standard of righteousness is that if you know to do something
good and you don't do it, that's a sin, right? So yeah, plan for the future, but you know, we got
enough worries today. You know, when it comes to the work day, it's like, I got enough things to do
in just this hour. You know, before I start thinking about what am I doing, you know, five hours from
now, just work on now what you can actually affect now. Go back to Proverbs chapter number 27. Verse
one talks about boasting yourself of tomorrow. Verse two says this, "Let another man praise thee
and not thine own mouth, a stranger and not thine own lips." So in verse one, we have someone boasting,
but it's not the type of boasting that we usually think about, boasting like, "I'm so great,
I'm so wonderful," though of course that's wrong too. It contrasts boasting about what you're going
to do in the future with saying, "Hey, don't praise yourself. Let another man praise you,
not your own mouth, a stranger and not your own lips." We should be people that are not tooting
our own horn, talking about how great we are. You know, this is why I personally despise job
interviews. Job interviews just rub me the wrong way. I feel really uncomfortable because it's
just the unfortunate reality that they're just going to say, "What are your skills? What are you
good at?" And like, I understand, obviously employers need to know that stuff, but you know,
if you go to a job interview as a Christian, it could kind of, it should kind of feel like you're
going against the grain a little bit when they ask you, you know, "What are your strengths? What
are you good at?" Because it just does not feel natural. It doesn't feel good to sit there and
praise yourself. But some people don't have any shame and are constantly just praising themselves
and it's a shame and an embarrassment. Who does this a lot? Children. Children constantly do this
and it's to be expected from a child, right? "Dad, I have the most beautiful singing voice.
Dad, did you see me do a front flip? Isn't that the best front flip you've ever seen in your life?
Dad, aren't I the best swimmer you've ever seen?" Kids do it and it's like, "Haha, you got to teach
them to get out of that." But then someone becomes a teenager, someone becomes an adult, and they're
praising themselves, and it's so awkward and embarrassing and cringe. Right? And like, why is
Donald Trump so funny? Because it's so stupid how much he praises himself and how he just talks
about, he knows that, "Nobody knows more about nuclear warfare than I do. I've had more nuclear
power." You know, it's just like, whatever the topic, "Nobody knows more about thermodynamics and trans-lunar
injection." And it's like, you know, name the topic and he'll just say like, "He knows more about it
than anyone." And you laugh because it's stupid. And it's like, you don't actually know more than
everyone. You probably know less than a lot of people, but here you are just bragging and boasting
about yourself. What does the Bible say? "Let another man praise thee, not a stranger, not your
own lips." I'm not saying we need to be self-deprecating. I don't think that's the
right attitude either, but you definitely shouldn't go around trying to toot your own horn,
bring a show to yourself, bring attention to yourself so that you could be seen of men and
get all this praise and glory from man. It's vain. It's embarrassing. Verse three says, "A stone is
heavy and the sand weighty, but a fool's wrath is heavier than them both." Wrath is cruel and anger
is outrageous, but who is able to stand before envy? So the Bible here is kind of comparing
two really bad things, anger and envy. Anger alone is bad. And you know what? Most of the time when
people are angry, it is a sin. Being angry in and of itself is not sinful. The Bible says, "Be ye
angry and sin not." You know, it's possible to be angry righteously. Jesus got so mad, he literally
built a whip and started whipping people out of the temple. He started whipping the animals out of
the temple. He was throwing over the tables is how mad Jesus got. I mean, God is so mad that he's
stoking the flames of hell for all of eternity. He sounds pretty mad. God was so mad, he poured
down fire and brimstone on Sodom and Gomorrah and killed every single faggot in existence basically.
I mean, God gets pretty mad, doesn't he? You know, we could be mad too, but here's the thing. Most of
the time when people get mad, it's unrighteous. Most of the time you get mad because someone cuts
you off in traffic, because someone gave you a mean look, because someone, you know, did you wrong
in some sort of way. And most of the time our anger is sinful and it's described as being heavy.
It's heavier than a stone. It's weightier than the sand. The Bible says wrath is cruel. You know,
when you're angry, you're at risk to start doing some pretty cruel things. You think about people's
fights in marriages or in relationships. When is it that cruel things are said? It's when you're angry,
you know. And when you're feeling that emotion of anger, that's a time you really got to check
yourself and say, "Hey, I'm emotional right now. I'm angry. I need to be careful what comes out
of my mouth. I need to be careful to restrain my lips." Because sometimes when you're angry,
that's when cruelty comes out of your mouth. That's when people say things that they end up
regretting. So we have to be careful about anger. It also says anger is outrageous. It just makes
you do outrageous things. You know, road rage shootings, just punching people for no reason,
just getting into fights, getting into all these strife and issues. Notice, but what's worse than
anger? It says, "But who is able to stand before envy?" You know, as bad as anger is and all the
horrible things that people do when they're angry, envy is even more dangerous. You think about some
of the worst sins that there are, for example, you know, adultery. What is adultery? You're
envying or you're coveting after another man's wife or a woman coveting after another woman's
husband. That's envy. Envy causes people to do all sorts of horrible stuff. You know, some people,
there's this weird thing where people get upset when their friends and family members succeed.
You ever had that friend where something good happened to you and their countenance has changed?
You could tell they're like visibly upset that something good happened to you. You know,
that's a terrible friend. That person's just consumed with envy and it, you know, ends up
leading them to becoming a bitter person. It harms them. It harms people that are around them.
Look, do not be an envious person. There's no reason for you to be envious. Look, you're saved.
You have the Spirit of God. You are a son or a daughter of God. You have a calling in this life.
God has a purpose for your life. Why are we sitting here envying other people? You know,
you think about, for example, sometimes in life there could be opportunities that are just shut
to you, but that doesn't mean that other opportunities don't exist, right? For example,
the qualifications of a pastor says you have to be the husband of one wife. You know, it doesn't
make sense for women to be all envious of the position of the pastorate when it's blocked to
you. Women cannot be pastors. That's not God's will for your life. But you know, how wicked would
it be for some woman to just be all angry and bitter that she can't be a pastor? Well, here's
the thing. You could be many other wonderful things. You could be a great mother. You could
be a great wife. You could be a great friend. You could be a great church member. You could be a
great soul winner. You could be a great evangelist to the Bahamas. But no, you can't be a pastor.
Let it go and focus on what you can do. Same thing for some men. Maybe they've gotten divorced
before. And you know what? That opportunity to be a pastor is closed. It says you have to be the
husband of one wife. Look, that doesn't mean God can't use you greatly. That doesn't mean that you
can't win multitudes to Christ in your life. But don't sit here and allow envy to be the root for
the next sin in your life. Right? People get envious and they're like, "No, I'm just going
to break God's commandments anyways because I'm envious." You know, who is able to stand
before envy? Verse 5, the Bible says, "Open rebuke is better than secret as being wrong."
Even in just secular workplaces nowadays, it seems rare where bosses will just rebuke
their employees and rebuke bad behavior, rebuke bad work ethic or work production. But the
Bible says that open rebuke is better than secret love. You know, if you have some sort
of secret admirer, first of all it's kind of weird. And second of all, that doesn't
benefit you whatsoever. You know, if you have a friendship, it's beneficial because later
on in the chapter it talks about how iron sharpeneth iron, right? So you having a godly
friend, you're going to be able to be a blessing to that person and they are going to be able
to be a blessing to you. You know, friendship is a two-way street. Friendships that are
just totally one-sided, you know, those are weird friendships. Those friendships usually
don't last. The type of friendships you want is where you're pouring love into someone,
you're investing in someone, you're being a blessing to someone, and they're being a
blessing to you. You know, don't be one of these like one-sided friends. That's just
not good. But notice, open rebuke is better than secret love. So if you do have a friend
and they rebuke you, that's not necessarily a bad thing. Open rebuke can be a great thing.
I mean, the Bible says that thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, thou shalt not suffer
sin upon him, but rather you should rebuke him. You know, rebuke is loving. Jesus said,
"As many as I love, I rebuke and chase him." But today we just kind of have this soft society
where anytime someone rebuke them, they get defensive. They get on the defense, they change
their countenance, they change their attitude toward you. But you need to realize that someone
who's willing to rebuke you actually loves you because it's an uncomfortable thing to
do. It's uncomfortable to reprove someone. It's uncomfortable to rebuke someone. But
you have to realize, wow, this person actually cared enough about me to overcome that social
pressure and just that mental blockage to tell me something that they know I probably
don't want to hear. You have to appreciate that. And you know, I've said this so many
times and some people just never understand this. You'd rather have more rebuke in your
life than less. You'd rather have too much rebuke, if that's even possible, than not
enough. Because people just freak out when they get rebuked and they'll say, "Well this
part wasn't true." Here's the thing, when you get rebuked, you should always be considering
if you're wrong, first of all. Because you probably are, okay? You should be considering
if you're wrong, you should be thankful this person's rebuking you. And if they're wrong
about something, guess what? Just let it go. Let them be wrong. You're not gonna die because
someone said something negative about you. Sometimes people have this attitude where
it's just like, "Every time someone points something out in my life and it's not a thousand
percent accurate, I'm gonna go on a campaign and just right every wrong and fix every issue."
It's like, you're not gonna die. Just let it go if you can. You're just gonna have more
peace in your life that way. Verse 6 says, "Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but
the kisses of an enemy are deceitful." It's so funny to me how people will come to church
where they supposedly want to hear the Word of God. They supposedly are saying, "Hey,
you know, I want to know the truth. I want to know what the Bible says. Just give it
to me straight, whatever the Bible says." And then they say, "Oh man, I think the preacher
was preaching about me." Well hey, dumb dumb, maybe that means he's your friend. You know,
people are constantly like, "Oh man, I think this person was preaching against me." Look,
if you ever think that I'm preaching against you, I am. This is a philosophy that my sending
pastor taught me, and I agree with it 100%. You know, if you feel like the sermon is about
you, it's because it is. Because guess what? The Bible is for all of us. The Bible is for
me. Jesus is rebuking me when I read the Bible. And you know what I should think? Faithful
are the wounds of a friend. You know, we have a great friend in Jesus Christ that's not
going to just scratch our ears and make us feel good about ourselves, but he's going
to tell us the truth even when it hurts. And it just blows my mind how sensitive people
are where they want to stop being your friend or they want to stop liking you because they
perceive that some of the preaching was about them. What you should be thinking is, wow,
this is a great friend. Wow, you know, he made the sermon about me. That's wonderful.
That's great. And of course, in reality, 99% of the time, you're not even the person I
had in mind anyways. And you know, contrary to your own narcissistic mind, I don't sit
down to write a sermon and think, man, I'm just thinking all about this person. I just
every day, all day long, I'm going to write a sermon about this person. Look, that's
usually not how it works. Usually how it works. I'm just thinking, what do God's people need
right now? What are some issues going on in society right now? What are some bad trends
I'm seeing Christians, you know, follow or believe? What are some dark paths I'm seeing
people go down? And that's what I preach on. And if you feel like, you know, that's applying
to you, well, congratulations, it is about you. And you know what you should do? You
should listen to that rebuke. You should take the correction and you should make a change.
Don't be all sheepish that you got rebuked. Say, thank you. Can I have another? You know,
that's the attitude that you should have. I've told this story before and I will always tell
it. I had a pastor once, Pastor Thompson, who told me to my face, do not skip church
tomorrow because the sermon is about you. You know what that means? It means he actually
did, right? All right, I'm writing a sermon. And you know who he had in mind? Me. And the
whole sermon was about me. And you know what? I needed it. I needed it. And I fixed the
issue and I'm like, thank you. I apologize. Thank you so much. And me and Pastor Thompson
are great friends. And he's a pastor that I greatly respect. And you know, I like people
in my life that are willing to tell me that I'm wrong. Look, you cannot work for Pastor
Shelley if you are not willing to get corrected. You will fail week one. And it's funny, it's
funny how people just cannot take correction whatsoever. And it's like, dude, you've never
had a real job. You're the one that's never had a real job. You're the one that's never
had a real boss. Because you know what? A godly person and someone who actually loves
you and cares about you is going to correct you. Faithful are the wounds of a friend,
but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. So someone who's willing to spare the truth
just to make you feel good, that's not your real friend. That's an enemy. And just like
Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss, on the surface it's like, oh, what a nice thing to do. No,
that was a betrayal. That was him betraying the Lord Jesus Christ. Look what it says in
verse 7, "The full soul loatheth in honeycomb, but to the hungry soul every bitter thing
is sweet." We've seen in previous Proverbs how the Bible says, "Eat thou honey because
it is good." The Bible speaks positively of honey. It's something that's sweet. It's
a treat. It's something to be enjoyed. But it says, "The full soul loatheth in honeycomb."
If you're just too full, it doesn't matter what food is put in front of you. You're not
going to want to eat that. When you go into a restaurant when you're hungry, everything
smells amazing, and you're ready to just devour. But if you sat down and had this huge meal,
you go to one of those Brazilian steak houses where they just keep bringing the meat over
and over, and you just eat, and you're like, "All right, I'm done eating," and I just
put a Thanksgiving meal in front of your plate, you're not going to want that. You're not
going to like that because you're too full. Sometimes people can be too full, even on
good things, or just too full in general, to where good things, righteous things, the
things of God, aren't that appealing to them. And the contrast between the United States
and places like the Bahamas, it's very clear when you go there. When you compare the attitude
people have towards the Word of God here, which in Oklahoma, this is a pretty big Christian
culture, this is still a Christian place, but even just comparing Oklahoma, which is
like the buckle of the Bible belt, to a place like the Bahamas, is night and day in the
hunger that people have for the Word of God. For example, I was preaching the Gospel to
a young man named Kent, and we had a distraction. This man came up and interrupted the Gospel
presentation, and I kind of had to deal with this distraction for a bit, and Kent was afraid
that I wouldn't keep preaching him the Gospel, and he's like, "Sir, can you please keep
enlightening me with the Bible?" Those were his exact words, "Can you just please enlighten
me more with the Word of God?" It's like you never hear someone say something like that
in the US. And if they did, you'd kind of think they're mocking you or being tongue
in cheek. But he was being completely sincere. Why? Because he's not full on the things of
this world. And you know what? Riches can be a blessing, and it can also be a curse.
It's a blessing that we live in the greatest country on earth, and after being in another
country for a week, everywhere I've gone this week, I'm just like, "This is so amazing.
This is so beautiful. Look at how clean the store is. Look at the abundance we have here.
The homeless camps don't even look that bad here compared to the regular areas of the
Bahamas and of Mexico." And I'm just like, "Man, thank God we live in such a wonderful
place." But you know what? The bad side of that is people are so full on the things of
this world. You know, I went to Dick's Sporting Goods today, and I'm just like, "Man, this
place is awesome." But you know what people are obsessed with today? Sports. You want
to know why a lot of people would never even dream of going soul winning on a Saturday?
Well, because college football is on. And people will skip church and not worship God
on a Sunday because they're worshiping the Dallas Cowboys or the Green Bay Packers. Watching
a bunch of whores in skirts dance around on the sidelines. A bunch of overgrown millionaires
in tights tackle each other. And you're going to get so excited and cheer. And look, I like
sports. I like watching games. But you know what? I'm never going to put sports before
the things of God. And if you put sports before the things of God, or just insert your hobby
here, maybe you're just a little too full. You know, it's nice to enjoy nice things.
It's nice to have a nice meal. It's nice to enjoy good fellowship. But it's also good
that when it ends, you're left wanting it with a little bit more. Right? So for example
in the Bahamas, several of the evenings, we just kind of threw a party at our Airbnb and
everyone's coming over to the pool and everyone's coming over to the hot tub. And we're having
a good time together, sweet fellowship with God's people in paradise. We've got the sparkling
cider, the biblical wine, not the alcoholic wine, the sparkling cider. We're just having
a great time and I left wanting a little bit more because I just really enjoyed the time
with my brothers and sisters in Christ. I really enjoyed the soul winning and it just
left me a little bit hungry. And I came back here just with a renewed zeal for reading
my Bible, a renewed zeal for preaching the gospel. Anyone else feel that way after that
trip? You just enjoy it because you aren't just completely full on luxury all the time.
You enjoy a trip like the Bahamas because it's not your everyday life. You enjoy hanging
out with your brothers and sisters at the pool because you don't do that every single
day, right? So sometimes you got to realize that you need to do some things in moderation.
Notice what it says, "But to the hungry soul, every bitter thing is sweet." That's why
you got guys like Brother Theodore that says, "The Philippines is exactly the same as the
U.S. because to the hungry soul, every bitter thing is sweet." But if you're just growing
up in mansions in Los Angeles, California, and you're used to just this high American
life of money and fast cars and parties, and we just drop you off in the middle of Bahamas
or in the middle of the Philippines, you think that person's going to have the same attitude?
Absolutely not. So we need to check ourselves, especially in a place like America, and not
allow all the blessings that we have here to actually be a stumbling block for us to
serve God. Sometimes it's good for us to go a little hungry to appreciate the things
that we have. Sometimes it's good to have some really crappy Bahamian coffee so that
I can appreciate my espresso maker at home. Sometimes it's nice to go to a third world
country so I could appreciate the beauty of Oklahoma living in America, living in the
Bible Belt. Don't get too full. Verse 8 is a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is
a man that wandereth from his place. Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart, so doth the
sweetness of a man's friend by hearty counsel. So the Bible is using this carnal truth to
illustrate another truth, saying how ointment and perfume rejoice the heart. Most people,
they like the perfumes, they like the ointment. I used to be okay with that kind of stuff,
but ever since my lungs crapped out on me last year, anytime I smell that stuff, I feel
horrible for like a day. So don't spray too much in church, please, it bothers me. But
for most people, that's great for them, they like it, but notice what it says, verse 9,
so doth the sweetness of a man's friend by hearty counsel. You know, what is it to truly
have a friend? You know, it's someone that you could actually have hearty counsel with.
Someone that you're not just on surface level with and oh, did you see the game? And oh,
how's the weather? And oh, you know, what's your kid's name again? You know, the sweetness
of friendship is when you could share hearty counsel together. And a lot of people really
struggle with making friends. And I'll tell you why. It's because you just simply don't
spend enough time around people. You know, there's some people I've seen this my whole
life where they'll come to church. And as soon as the sermon over, they bolt out and
like, Hey, praise the Lord, they came to church. But you can't really expect yourself to get
close with people and to have sweet fellowship and a sweet friendship with someone unless
you're actually willing to spend some time getting to know them. One of the greatest
ways you could do this is to simply go out soul winning with us. Because when you go
out soul winning, we're going to pair you up with a partner and you're going to spend
the next hour with that person, and this is going to teach you how to talk to people.
A lot of the younger generation, they can't really socially interact, they can't talk
to people. What I've noticed is that soul winners, young soul winners, are just night
and day above the world in quality because they're so used to talking to people. You
meet a lot of teenagers, a lot of young people, and they can't even look you in the eye.
The Gen Z stare. Everyone's seen the Gen Z stare when you go out to the service industry,
coffee shop, or something like that. It's just like it pains their soul to speak to
another human being. People don't talk to each other anymore. People don't say hi to
their neighbors anymore. In the Bahamas, everyone says hi to you. You walk by them in the grocery
store and they're like, "Good day, good day, good day." Every single time, they all say
hi to you. That's a good thing for sure. You want to get to know people. You want to have
hearty counsel. If you already kind of have a friend and you want that friend to become
a more deep friendship, you should try to talk about things that actually matter. Talk
about some deeper things. Talk about the things of God. Talk about things in life that matter.
This is a good dating tip as well. You know, when you're dating someone, if you have a
desire to progress that relationship, to maybe marry that person, you know, when you're having
a date, don't just sit there and talk about what's your favorite color, what's your favorite
Call of Duty video game, you know, what's your whatever favorite food. You know, talk
about some things that matter, because when you get married, you want to be equally yoked
with someone. You don't want to get married and just be like, oh wait, you don't want
to homeschool your kids? Oh, you don't believe in spanking your kids? Oh, you're not King
James only? You don't want to go soul winning? You don't like Anchor Baptist Church? You
know, you wouldn't want to marry someone like that. You actually want to get to know them
on a deeper level. That takes talking. Verse 10, "Thine own friend and thy father's friend
forsake not." Look, the Bible does put an emphasis on friendship. A lot of people today,
they don't value friendship. They're kind of that lone ranger, just living life by themselves.
They're not really interested in being social, being around other people. You know, if that's
you, you're really introverted. You need to change that about your life. You need to work
on being more of a people person because guess what? Ministry is all about serving God and
serving others. You have to become more of a people person and you have to put friendship
as something in your life that you actually value. And God is telling us we should value
friendship so highly that in fact he just says just don't forsake your friend. The
Bible says that a friend loveth at all times. He says don't even just not forsake your
friend. Don't even forsake your father's friend. You know, honor your father's friendships.
If there's a man that your dad loves and respects, you know, you love and respect that man. You
get to know him too. Don't forsake your father's friends. And I think part of this also is
the fact that Solomon's a king. He's a leader and he's making alliances and stuff like that.
And he probably wants his son to follow suit and keep the same alliances that he has. But
you know, think about this. If you're the son of a leader, you should pay attention
to who your dad likes. You should pay attention to who your dad's friends with and not forsake
those friends. And the thing is, people will say, "Well, you know, I had to forsake my
friend because they did something wrong or because something bad happened in our relationship."
But here's the thing, the Bible says that a friend loveth at all times. And so you know
what that means? It means all times. And you know, the Bible says, "Forsake not thy friend."
Here's the thing, no one forsakes someone when things are good. You realize that? Like
no one gets divorced because they just aren't so happy with their marriage. But guess what?
You said, "Till death do us part." Now look, I don't think friendship is as ironclad
as marriage, of course. But you know what? You should have a good amount of commitment
and a good amount of loyalty and faithfulness to your friends. The Bible's saying just don't
forsake your friends. It says, "Neither go into thy brother's house in the day of thy
calamity, for better is a neighbor that is near than a brother far off." And just while
this came to my mind, one more thing about not forsaking your friends. I try to be the
type of person where I am really not going to walk away from people. I'll let people
walk away from me. You know, and that's what I've noticed throughout my life is that when
you strive for peace, when you strive to follow the Bible, when you strive not to forsake
your friends, people will often forsake you. It's not really you forsaking them. At least
that's how it should be. Don't be the person where like you're always burning people. You're
burning your parents. You're burning relatives. You're burning your friends. You know, it
should be kind of a surprise where it's like they left me. You know, I've had people falsely
accuse me of turning on people that have been my friend, that I've been friends with. And
let me tell you what, I have never forsaken a friend. I just haven't. And you know what?
The mentality that you should have is that if someone does forsake you, you never really
lost a friend anyways. That's kind of a tough pill to swallow sometimes. But when someone
just forsakes you and just trashes you and just betrays you, there's really no sense
in just being all crybaby about it forever and just not being able to move on with your
life because it should just reveal to you the fact that this person wasn't really your
friend. So you're kind of mourning a ghost. You're mourning something that wasn't even
real, something that wasn't even true. It's best just to move on to a different friend.
And also don't be the type of person where you get burned by a friend and you're just
done with people. I'm done investing in people. No, keep loving others. Let people walk away
from you but don't walk away from them. Man, this is why sometimes I wish I had notes
because there's something else I wanted to say on this. If I think about it, we'll go
back to it. But it says, "Neither go into thy brother's house in the day of thy calamity
for better is a neighbor that is near than a brother far off." So, you know, even your
friends can be people at times that are closer than your relatives. There's a friend that
sticketh closer than a brother. Now, obviously your goal should be to be very close to your
family, very close with your siblings, very close with your parents. God willing, that
would be the case. That's a blessing when that happens. But realize that's not always
going to happen. And you know, you could have better friends and mothers and fathers and
brothers in life than even your relatives. This is another reason why it's great to come
to church because I found that the strongest relationships in my life I've ever built have
been in church, whether that's friend. Hey, I met my wife in church. Church is a great
place to find great people. And thankfully I have this with my family too. I love all
my brothers. I love my parents. I'm very close even with my in-laws, which that's
an anomaly. Usually people are like, "Oh, the in-laws." I have like the coolest in-laws
ever. My in-law is preaching this Sunday here, Pastor Aaron Thompson. I'm not one of these
guys who's just like, "Oh, my wretched in-laws are coming in town." I'm like, "Sweet, I
get to spend some time with my in-laws." Praise God when that happens, but realize that's
not always going to be the case. All right, it came back into my mind. I remember now.
If you forsake your friend, if you've been the person where you've done wrong in this
area of your life before, do not think that it's something you could never come back from.
And if someone has turned on you, don't think that it's something that they could never
come back from, because think about, for example, the apostle Peter. What did he do? He denied
Christ. Now, would you say that that was being a good friend at that moment or a bad friend?
I mean, Jesus is going through the worst trial that anyone's ever gone through. He's about
to be crucified. And then some woman walks up to Peter's like, do you know Jesus? I know
not the man. He starts cursing and swearing, you know, saying, I swear to God, I don't
know that man. May I be struck dead if I know Jesus? I mean, that's a pretty vehement, you
know, betrayal, if you will, denial of Christ that he was being a bad friend in that moment.
And you know what? What Peter had to do before he could move on in his Christian life, before
he could go on to be a great pastor, before he could go on to do such great works for
God. You know, Jesus confronted him about it and he was like, "Simon, son of Jonas,
lovest thou me?" He's like, "Lord, I know that you love me." And then he asked him
two more times. You know, he's saying like, "You're going to get this right. You're going
to realize you were wrong for forsaking me. You were wrong for denying me." And Peter's
just like, "Lord, you know that I love you." You know, and he obviously got right with
that. He was sorry. The Bible says that he wept bitterly. You know, I could have more
respect for someone that does something terrible. They forsake their friend, their bad friend,
but then they just simply are sorry and repent. You know, I could have respect for that person,
and when people repent it should be just totally forgotten. It should be just totally forgiven.
It should be like it never even happened. But you know, why people choose to just be
such terrible friends and turn on people and instead of apologizing, you know, they just
dig in, you know, that's not a godly attitude. And here's the thing, when you do someone
wrong publicly, you should apologize publicly. You know, I think about, I won't even say
his name is not even worth it, but there is this guy, I think you all know, who was ordained
by Pastor Shelley, who as soon as he got ordained as a pastor, he just turned on Pastor Shelley.
He just started trashing him. He just started railing against him, saying that he's a lover
of money, saying that he's enabling wife beating and enabling child abuse and he's doing, you
know, bad stuff with the church money. Just all these horrible accusations. Look, okay,
it doesn't matter if in your heart you're sorry for that and if in your heart you realize
you did wrong, you know, you need to publicly make those type of things right. And when
someone does you wrong publicly and then they apologize privately, that's not good enough.
You actually have to make restitution for the wrong that you've done. And look, if you
do that, then we move on, it's a clean slate, it's forgiven, it's forgotten, it's never
mentioned again. But realize that if you've been the person that have forsaken your friend,
you're wrong. You're in sin. It's against what the Bible says. And look, you can just
try to move on with your life, but God does not bless people with unconfessed sin in their
heart and unconfessed sin in their life. You know, you need to get that right in your life,
then move on. Be wise and make my heart glad that I may answer him that reproacheth me.
A prudent man foreseeeth the evil and hideeth himself, but the simple pass on and are punished.
So the simple, that's a synonym for someone who is stupid, someone who is lacking of understanding.
The simple, they don't hide themselves, they don't prepare themselves for evil that is
coming. And what does a wise person do? They foresee the evil and they hide themselves.
Right? You know, if you're living in New Orleans in what, 2005 or whenever that is, and the
government says, hey, the worst hurricane ever is coming through here, here's a mandatory
evacuation, you need to leave the town. What all the prudent people did is they left New
Orleans. But you know what the simple did is they stayed and they were destroyed. And
so if we want to be wise, what's a good application we can make here? We should be constantly
reading the Bible and listening to the Bible's warnings against sin and listen to the Bible
how it says we're going to destroy our life when we go down the dark path of sin and we
should be prudent and hide ourselves from that sin and not go down that dark road. That's
what a wise person does. What does a fool do? They know it's coming, they hear the preaching,
they know it's wrong, and they just do it anyways. And look, fools get destroyed. People
that grow up in church, they hear hard preaching, and they're like, "Nah, I'm just going to
go out and fornicate anyways. I'm just going to go get drunk anyways. I'm just going to
get behind the wheel while I'm drunk anyways." Boy, that is the person that you're going
to see completely destroyed. That's the person you're going to see God come down on really
hard. Be a prudent person. Verse 13, "Take his garment that is surety for a stranger
and take a pledge of him for a strange woman." Verse 14, back to friendship. It says, "He
that blessed his friend with a loud voice, rising early in the morning, it shall be counted
a curse to him." Go back to verse 7. Let's read verse 7 again. "The full soul loatheth
in honeycomb, but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet." So what is friendship?
It's something that's sweet. It's something that is good. But again, you can even over
indulge in areas that are good. And there is such a thing as spending too much time
with someone to where, yeah, hardy counsel with your friend is great. Yeah, iron sharpened
with iron is great. But you know, you could have too much of a good thing where you can
kind of sour that friendship and your friendship could start to deteriorate as a result. You
know, the picture gives here is imagine you're in bed, you know, it's four a.m. He that blessed
his friend with a loud voice, rising early in the morning, it shall be counted a curse
to him. Look, if your friend came outside your window at four a.m. just good morning,
are you going to be happy to hear that? You're like, bro, what is wrong with you? Get away.
Go back home, bro. Go home. What's wrong with you? Right. You're not going to enjoy that.
And same thing with staying too late at people's house. Withdraw thy foot from thy brother's
house, lest he's weary of thee and so hate thee. You know, don't be the person that's
just like, it's obvious, you know, the kids are like screaming and dying. Everything's
going, you know, crazy and you're just staying super, super late. Hey, you can kind of make
people mad when you do those type of things. Have some manners, like Brother Alex preached
about. Don't be the type, be mindful, have discretion about when you're contacting someone.
Now, look, I'm your pastor. If you have a need, if there's an emergency, you can call
me or text me anytime of day or night. I'll do my best to answer. I'm not going to ghost
you. But, you know, it shouldn't just be like calling me at 3 a.m. and be like, "Hey, I
had this Bible question about Romans chapter number 7." Yeah, I don't want to hear that
at that time. If it's like, "Hey, my wife is in the hospital. She just got hit by a
car." Okay, I got you. Call me. No problem. But don't even call me to bless me. Don't
even... 3 a.m. "Hey, I really enjoyed your sermon on..." I don't want to hear this, right?
You need to have some discretion in your life. There's some manners, some common sense. You
don't just show up at someone's house unannounced and just, you know, "Hey, you know, I'm just
going to decide to have dinner here tonight." Unless you're the Lord Jesus Christ and you're,
you know, telling Zacchaeus, "Hey, I'm coming over and I'm going to dine at thy house tonight."
Okay, if it's Jesus, that's one thing. But I'm sorry, I'm not as good of a person, I
guess. And if you do that to me, I might be a little bit annoyed. I think you might be
as well. Notice what it says in verse 15, "A continual dropping in a very rainy day,
and a contentious woman are alike." One of Solomon's favorite subjects is to warn us
about bad, evil women. And you know, just a continual dropping of a rainy day, I don't
know about you, I get real tired of rain real fast. I like really intense storms because
it's just kind of fun, but no one likes it when it's like raining for 48 hours straight.
72 hours straight. When I lived in Vancouver, Washington, I mean, it's just a continual
drizzle just sometimes for months on end. And you know what, it's annoying. You know
what it makes you want to do makes you want to go to Arizona makes you want to go to Mexico
makes you want to, you know, go somewhere else. Well, it's like a contentious woman
and this continual rainy day. It's alike in the sense that it drives you crazy. And I
think this is something that ladies constantly need to hear because the average woman, just
the average American woman today, she's just kind of been brainwashed by feminism and she's
kind of seen all these examples of loud mouth bossy women on the sitcoms and bossy, loud
mouth women's and all the TV shows and movies. And when she's upset, she's going to let
you know how mad she is and she's going to yell at her husband and she's going to complain
and she's going to say, you did this, this, this, this, this, this, this, and you think
in your mind that you're somehow going to fix your problems by being a loud and contentious
woman.
All you're doing is making your husband want to crawl in a hole and die.
That's all you're doing.
You know, and, and even sometimes like moms can be like this, so they're just constantly
just angry and contentious and look, that's not the way to get what you want.
You know, it's like by much persuading, uh, by much, I'm going to misquote it, but it
talks about how like by a soft tongue, the bone is broken saying like a soft answer,
you know, a soft answer turn at the way wrath, a soft tongue, the bone is broken.
You know, kindness, sweetness, humility is actually very powerful for a woman.
Whereas you think maybe getting loud and yelling and getting angry that that's somehow going
to be powerful.
No, you're just sabotaging yourself and I'm saying this to help you ladies.
I'm not trying to just, you know, be against women here.
This is in the King James Bible.
This is the inspired words of God.
The Bible saying here, no one likes to be around a loud mouth, contentious woman.
No one likes to come home to an angry woman.
Before your husband comes home, check your spirit.
Be happy.
Smile, you poor little house slave.
Remember how good you have it in America.
Go outside and look at your Amazon packages and remind yourself how good your life is.
Call your door dash to bring you your $20 coffee.
Look down at your nails.
I didn't see that in the Bahamas.
Look at your hair.
Look at your makeup.
Remind yourself what a poor little oppressed house slave you are and be happy when your
husband comes home.
That's going to make a happy life because you know what?
Happy husband, happy life.
That's the anchor baptist church way.
That's the new IFB church way.
If you want feminism, please join the ex new IFB.
You'll be told that your wife can leave.
If you don't mind your P's and Q's and you know what 1 Corinthians 7 is saying is that
she can leave.
Yeah, no.
You're not getting that here.
You're going to get what the Bible actually says, which is that loud mouth, contentious
women are just irking your soul and you just hate it.
You despise it.
No one likes the continual dropping of rain.
Notice verse 16, "Whosoever hideth her, hideth the wind."
What is this saying?
Okay, Oklahoma.
You guys know about wind.
We know about wind in Oklahoma.
Go ahead and just hide the wind.
Go ahead and just try to gather the wind and stop.
You can't.
Right?
And so what I think this is saying is it's warning you, do not marry this type of person
because chances are this is just going to be a problem that you're going to deal with
your whole life.
Now, look, if your wife is loud and contentious, I'm sorry, I'll pray for you, God have mercy
on your soul, but still the Bible says love your wife, so still love her no matter what.
I'm not saying that you have an excuse to not love your wife because she's loud and
obnoxious.
You still have to love your wife.
And I'm dead sure not saying you could divorce your wife because she's loud and obnoxious.
No, you said till death do us part.
You said for better or for worse, you know, you might as well say for meek and obedient
or, you know, loud and contentious, whatever, you're signing up for life.
But here's the thing, if you're not yet married, don't be an idiot.
Be the prudent man that foresees the evil and hideeth himself, right?
You see the tornado coming.
When you see the tornado, you know what people do?
They hide themselves underground.
And it's like when you see the loud and contentious woman, just dive into bomb shelters.
Just start running away from her and just diving into bomb shelters.
Don't marry that type of woman.
You will regret it.
Marriage could be such a beautiful thing, it could be the best relationship in your
life, or it could be like running from a tornado in Oklahoma.
Good luck catching the wind, says, "Whosoever hideeth her hideeth the wind," and the ointment
of his right hand, which bereth itself.
This one's a little tougher, but you know, people put on cologne, they kind of put it
on their wrists, and you know, you might not know it's there, but eventually you're going
to find out.
Eventually you're going to smell that and be like, "Okay, I see that for what, I smell
that for what it is.
I see that for what it is," you know, a loud and contentious woman.
Verse 17, "Iron sharpeneth iron."
So a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.
So notice that in the Christian life, we are better with each other.
We are greater than the sum of our individual parts.
You know, there's this phenomenon about, I believe it's called synergy is the term for
it, how, for example, you know, one horse could pull a certain amount of weight and
another horse could pull a certain amount of weight.
But yet, when you combine those two horses, the sum of those two parts is somehow greater
with them working together.
And it's the same thing in the Christian life that when we get around other Christians,
when we go to church, when we have good fellowship with people, you will become a better person
than you would being alone.
And today there's an epidemic of people that think that church is their house, or they
say I'm in church right now, or I'm in church when I'm walking in the wilderness, or I'm
in church when I'm fishing.
That's a bunch of garbage.
We need to be around God's people.
We need to be in the house of God, and iron sharpening iron is going to make you a better
person.
You know what?
Church is going to keep you normal.
Why?
Because you're going to get rebuked from the word of God of all the stupid things that
you believe and do.
And all the stupid things that I believe and do, it's like how to prevent someone from
being a flat earther, spend any amount of time at Anchor Baptist Church, and you're
either going to get so uncomfortable at your own retardation that you're going to leave,
or you're just going to wake up and say like oh I was stupid, you know, iron sharpened
iron and you get better, and look there's been people who've been flat earthers and
woke up and praise God for that, it just goes to show that church makes you normal.
You know what makes you not normal, spending all day on X, that will make you not normal.
It's so funny how like both white supremacists and like racist black people both absolutely
hate my guts.
I was like I must be doing something right.
It's like I post a picture of me and Kenton that I just got saved in the Bahamas and some
retard comments, "Goat and sheep, God will divide us in the end."
It's like bro's mad that I got a black guy saved, right?
But then I'll preach against white supremacy and all like the white supremacy idiots will
be like, "You hate white people."
And it's like bro, what are you talking about?
I'm whiter than you.
You know what?
I'm whiter than anyone.
I'm the whitest of them all, the chief of the white people, you know?
But yet people, you just got all these crazy people on X.
You want to make those people normal, going to church, and then you realize, like, hey,
there's all sorts of different people here from all sorts of different backgrounds, all
sorts of different upbringings, and you know what we share in common is the Lord Jesus
Christ, the King James Bible.
That'll make you normal.
Verse number 18, "Who so keepeth the fig tree shall eat the fruit thereof, so he that
waiteth on his master shall be honored."
What's this teaching?
It's just teaching the principle that you reap what you sow.
Let's think about this again when it comes to friendship.
He that, man, this is why I need notes sometimes.
He that hath friends must show himself friendly, right?
So it's like, hey, you know, you want to reap or you want to sow, reap a great friend, you
need to sow into great friends.
You need to be a good friend to someone.
You need to go to church.
You need to love people.
You're going to reap the fruit of that fig tree.
So he that waiteth on his master shall be honored.
As in water, face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man.
When you think about water, face answering to face, have you ever been around really
still water, maybe a lake early in the morning, a river early in the morning, and the water
is pretty still, and you could see like a perfect reflection off of that?
Well during the book of Proverbs, they probably don't have these really nice mirrors that
we have in our homes, and so I'm sure maybe they had some handheld, you know, glasses,
shiny objects, but really like if you're looking down in the water, you're seeing a super clear
picture of yourself, and it's using that carnal illustration to say, "As in water face answereth
to face, so the heart of man to man."
What is it that's really going to make you be great friends with someone?
It's when you have things in common, and it's weird to me, for example, this phenomenon,
people will quit church, they'll leave church, they're like, "Your church isn't good enough
for me, I don't like your pastor, I don't like your guys' program, I don't like your
guys' preaching, I don't like your guys' culture, we're not on the same page anymore."
They leave church, but they're like, "But I still want to be friends with everyone."
It's like, how does that work?
How do you have something, face answers to face, you have deep friendships with someone
because you have stuff in common.
I like how Paul's like, "Greet the friends by name."
He's like, "Greet those that love us in the truth."
He's like, "Hey, say hi to all the real ones out there."
You know who I want to be friends with?
The real ones.
You know who I want to be friends with?
People that actually have things in common with, like a hatred for feminism, like a fear
of godly authority, a fear of God, a love of the King James Bible, a love of soul winning,
a love of hard preaching.
These are my friends.
And when someone doesn't want to share those things in common, well, I'm not really going
to be close friends with that person.
Your closest friends should be people where it's like face answering to face.
And people, you know, will kind of shame you or be down on you like, oh, you're not friends
of other religions.
Yeah, I'm not because guess what?
I'm saved.
I'm going to heaven when I die.
I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and Muslims worship a pedophile named Muhammad.
How am I going to be friends with that?
How am I going to be friends with a Mormon that believe in millions of gods that believe
they'll become gods someday, that believe that God the Father was a man once, that Jesus
Christ is the brother of Satan?
How am I supposed to be friends with someone like that?
I don't want to be friends with someone that I don't have things in common with.
You know, I want to be the best friends with Jesus.
And the people that I want, you know, human beings in my life that people I want to be
friends with are people who also want to have Jesus as their best friend.
You want to have a good relationship with your spouse?
Marry someone that loves Jesus as much as you do, if not more so.
Ladies, you should marry a man who loves Jesus even more, because he's going to lead you.
The Bible says in verse number 20, "Hell and destruction are never full, so the eyes of
man are never satisfied."
It's a very interesting phenomena about us as human beings, is just like the eyes of
man are never satisfied.
So when it comes to like the full soul loatheth in honeycomb, you ought to just know this
about yourself that if you go to indulge in some sort of pleasure, and of course I'm talking
about non-sinful pleasures, realize that you're just never going to be fully satisfied with
that.
You're never going to like, for example, when it comes to watching a movie or watching a
show, people will just binge watch this stuff all day and all night because you know the
last episode did not fully scratch their itch, and you know the last soda you drank is not
going to satisfy you for the rest of your life, and the last whatever the pleasure it
is in your life it's not going to fully satisfy you, and so you got to realize that because
of that I shouldn't go after the sinful pleasures in this world because at the end of the day
it's not going to satisfy you anyways, think about it, you know at least you can indulge
in godly things and have godly pleasure, godly satisfaction in life, and you're still
right with God, you haven't sinned against him, yeah it's not going to fully satisfy
you with it, but you can keep coming back to that over and over again, right, the marriage
bed is honorable in all, right, the bible says that that is something that's godly,
the relationship between husband and wife, but you know what's wicked is fornication,
you know what's wicked is adultery, and people that do this are so stupid, because people
who go and commit adultery, people who go and commit fornication, they don't come to
the end of that event and think like, I never need this again, I'm never going to seek this
ever again, I'm just a hundred percent satisfied, that's not how it works, the eyes of man are
never satisfied, so realize that about yourself and say, you know it's not even worth drinking
that beer, because you know what the person in Proverbs 23 does, he awakes and he seeks
it yet again, just insanity, destroying your life with alcohol and you're still going to
want to drink more. Cigarette smokers, they're going to smoke that cigarette, they're going
to feel a little bit better at the end and you know what, an hour later, two hours later,
some people it's like 15 minutes later, they're just immediately going to want another cigarette.
So look, don't even go down the road of sinful pleasure because it's not going to truly satisfy
you.
The eyes of man are never satisfied.
Verse 21, "As the finding pot for silver and the furnace for gold, so is a man to his
praise."
Again, this is a little bit of a tricky proverb, but I think this is saying is how the finding
pot and the furnace, when it's heated up, when it's treating that metal, it's purifying
it, it's releasing those impurities to the top, you scrape off the drops, it reveals
the character of that metal.
When someone is praised, I think how they respond to that praise can tell you a lot
about that person's character.
For example, here's some wrong ways to accept praise, someone says, "Hey, you did a good
job on this."
Yeah, I really did, didn't I?
Man, I really just knocked it out of the park with that one.
Did you see the slow motion version of that?
I looked so cool doing that.
That's the wrong way to receive praise.
Also, I think this false humility of self-deprecation is also a bad way to receive praise because
it's almost like you're fishing for even more compliments.
You know, a lady tells you, "Oh, I like this dress."
No, I'm fat and ugly and hideous and the world's most disgusting woman who's ever lived.
No, honey, you're so great, you're so hot, you're so wonderful.
That's what you're hoping for when you have that type of reaction, right?
Just a proper way to receive praise is, thank you, appreciate it.
You know?
Oh, praise the Lord, I'm glad you like that sermon.
Yeah, this is some powerful truths in God's word, you know?
That's like how a normal person receives praise.
You know, you do something good in sports, hey, it was a team effort, hey, the team showed
up today.
Hey, you know, our coaches really invested in us this season.
This is, again, why I prefer sports like baseball.
You know, the championship series is happening right now and I saw some plays last night
and this first baseman just made a crazy epic play, snags this ball that was hit at like
110 miles an hour and he just snags it and he's just like, throw it to the next guy.
He wasn't like doing backflips and, you know, jumping up and down like a monkey like you
see in some other sports and it's like, you know, there's an issue there.
It's called pride and when you praise, you know, a prideful person, you know, you'll
see them chimp out a little bit and really just, you know, enjoy and receive all that
praise and it kind of results or shows the result of their character.
It says in verse number 22, "Though thou shouldest bray a fool in a mortar among wheat
with a pestle, yet will not his foolishness depart from him."
There's some people that unfortunately are just a lost cause and you just have to pray
for them.
You just have to hope that they kind of hit rock bottom or something happens in their
life to wake them up because a really foolish person, I mean, you could bray that person
in a mortar among wheat with a pestle.
You ever seen these like Stanley girl, white girls, they have to have all the really trendy
things in their kitchen and they've got like the Native American stone bowl mashers they
can make there, whatever.
Look, I'm not against you if you have that, but imagine just like beating someone with
that thing, right?
You're just grinding that stuff in and to a fool, it doesn't matter what you do, it
doesn't matter how many stripes, it doesn't matter how many whippings, they'll just never
get the message.
They'll never change and this is the most infuriating person in the world and the only
response is the Bible says just go from the presence of the foolish man when thou perceivest
not in him the lips of knowledge.
Look after the first and second admonition, reject.
Do not sit here soul winning and waste your time with the black Hebrew Israelites and
with the Mormons and with the atheists and with all these really foolish people.
First and second admonition, go away.
Don't sit here and try to spend your life, even this for example, I do not believe that
it is a wise investment of Christian's time to dedicate their life to Christian apologetics,
creation apologetics.
You have all these ministries where the whole ministry is just dedicated to trying to convince
people that God created the world and to get them to convince people that Noah's flood
was real and to get them to just believe the creation story.
But you know what's funny?
In Romans chapter one, the Bible says that the things of God are clearly seen being understood
by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead.
Everyone is born with an instinct to believe that God is real.
Everyone with a brain in their head can look outside, look at the stars and realize that
God made this world.
It does not take a genius to look at a deer and look at a slug and realize these do not
have the common ancestor of this microbial soup or whatever that came from the Big Bang
theory.
It's garbage, it's stupid.
Imagine just dedicating your whole life to convincing people to believe something that
the Bible says is obvious.
What if I just went knocking on people's door, "Did you know that the sky is blue?"
I just wanted to make sure that you believe that the sky is blue.
I'm just checking, not salvations, we're just checking to make sure you believe that
the sky is blue.
If someone disagrees with me, I'm just going to spend all my time helping them.
What a waste of life.
Let me just say the name, Kent Hoeven, it's a stupid ministry.
Whatever you want to believe about him, saved, unsaved, it's a stupid ministry.
Matt Powell, it's a stupid ministry.
Matt Powell was at Faithful Word Baptist Church, a church that's doing amazing exploits for
the gospel of Jesus Christ and left it to go live on some weird compound in Alabama
with a four times divorced man, five times, how many wives has this guy had now?
It's stupid, folks.
These creation ministries, look, you know what is the power of God unto salvation?
The gospel of Jesus Christ.
It's revealed from faith to faith, the Bible says.
You know what was powerful?
The message that I heard in my life that caused me to put my trust in Jesus Christ.
It was the message of hell.
It was the message that I'm a sinner.
It's the message that Jesus died for me and that I have to just receive that free gift.
That's what was convincing me.
It wasn't realizing that evolution is a lie.
It wasn't realizing that the Big Bang is a lie.
Because did you know that Muslims believe that a God created this world too?
You know, how is that going to convince them of the gospel though?
They already believe that that part of it's true.
They need to believe the gospel or those people will go to hell.
It says in verse 23, "Be thou diligent, know the state of thy flocks, and look well to
thy herds."
And I believe, primarily, this is talking about being a good steward of your finances
because the next verse says, "For riches are not forever."
Right?
So, your flock, your herds, that's your assets, especially in ancient times, and for many,
many people today, it still is.
The Bible's saying, "Be diligent to know the state of those things."
You know, it's good for us as Christians not to just be totally careless and flippant
with our finances, but to be good stewards of the things that God has given us, giving
the tenth back to the Lord, you know, living within our means, being generous to other
people, providing for our family, knowing the state of our flocks is for the riches
are not forever, and doth the crown endure to every generation.
So sometimes you see generational wealth and what does it take for people to have generational
wealth?
It takes every generation to keep being diligent, to keep being a prudent man, to keep having
wisdom.
And you know, what stops generational wealth is one fool, one person that's just going
to blow it all, waste it all, live a super extravagant life, not care about the next
generation.
You know, that's what happens when that's how generational wealth gets destroyed.
Okay, what about kingdoms?
It says, does the crown endure to every generation in this time?
What happened?
King gives the kingdom to his son, and Solomon's saying like, does this always happen?
This is how things should be, but does this always happen?
No, kingdoms rise and kingdoms fall.
Kingdoms get overtaken.
Kingdoms get destroyed.
So, whatever it is that God has put you over, it's very important that you give good diligence
and are vigilant about the state of those things so that God can keep blessing those
things, that those things can still endure.
God's entrusted us with a lot.
One of the biggest things I think God has entrusted us with is with the gospel of Jesus
Christ, of course.
We want to make sure that we're doing a good job being a steward of the gospel, preaching
to every creature.
And, you know, as a parent, I think of my children.
This is a major responsibility, a major blessing that God has given us.
We ought to be diligent to know the state of our children, and to actually care about
their physical growth, their mental growth, their spiritual growth, and not be iPad parents.
Right?
What's the iPad parent?
It doesn't matter the situation.
Kids are at home, iPad.
Every restaurant, iPad.
Sometimes church services, which, man, if I see that, I'm just going to call that out.
That's garbage.
Sometimes church services, iPad, and it's like, that's a parent that doesn't really
care about their kids.
That's a parent that's not really giving diligence to know the state of their flocks.
They're kind of just being lazy and slothful and hope for the best, kids.
That's not the way we should be.
The Bible says in verse 25, "The hay appeareth, and the tender grass showeth itself, and herbs
of the mountains are gathered.
The lambs are for thy clothing, and the goats are the price of the field.
And thou shalt have goat's milk enough for thy food, for the food of thy household, and
for the maintenance of thy maidens.
Last thought I want to talk about is this stupid philosophy of teaching that the Bible
is like a vegetarian book, and like the Bible is against us eating meat, or using animals
for food, or even using animals for clothing.
Notice how God's blessing, when you're diligent about things, it says that the lambs are for
thy clothing.
What I was saying, you could use these creatures for clothing.
You know what it takes to use lamb and use a lot of animals?
It takes that animal's life oftentimes.
Yeah, I understand you could shear certain other types of animals and get the wool from
them, but a lot of times that animal has to die.
You could use that for clothing, and it says, "Now shalt have goat's milk enough for thy
food, for the food of thy household."
In the book of Acts, Peter's having a vision, and Jesus shows him all these different beasts
that were deemed as unclean in the Old Testament, and Jesus just says, "Hey Peter, rise, kill,
and eat."
And Peter's like, "Oh no Lord, there's never been any unclean thing that's entered into
my mouth."
And Jesus is saying, "Hey, what I've cleansed, call not thou common."
Of course he was using a physical truth to illustrate the fact that the Gentiles are
not some unclean people that were supposed to get the gospel to the Gentiles, bring
them into the fold.
Now God's people are those of all nations who believe in Christ.
Well, guess what?
All meat, it's sanctified by prayer and thanksgiving.
And you know what?
Rise, kill, and eat.
I saw this just hilariously stupid comment on one of my sermons yesterday when they
were like, "Please, just think back to when you were a child and you could have never
even imagined killing an animal and using it for its food."
I'm just like, "Bro, I've killed so many animals in my childhood, you have no idea.
You know, my uncle had a ranch in Montana and he was friends with a bunch of other ranchers
and we used to go every summer and just absolutely exterminate their prairie dog population.
And we would sit with our rifles and we would shoot those things all day.
You know we have attendance counters in church?
I had one of those for kills.
And I remember as a kid, my favorite number was 45, baseball jersey is number 45 all the
way, and I was sitting like, "My goal for the day is to get over 45 kills."
And I hit it every single day, all the time, not to mention the antelope, not to mention
all the fish, not to mention all the dove hunting, and we had these dumb birds in Idaho
that I call rock chucks.
I don't even know what they are, but you call them rock chucks because they're so stupid
you can just throw rocks at them and they'll never move.
So you have as much ammo as you need, you hit one, you cook it up for lunch, and I'm
just like, "Bro, you don't know my childhood, okay?"
I could have never imagined killing an animal.
No, my family's constantly killing and eating animals.
And guess what, that's biblical.
God has made man to have dominion over the earth.
God has put the fear of man into beasts of this earth, and even though there are animals
that can attack us, most animals are just afraid of you.
Even if, like, in a head-to-head combat you would lose, you know, animals just run away.
We were, you know, snorkeling in the Bahamas, and that shark came right in front of us,
and it just darted away as fast as it could.
Even though, you know, a shark is a dangerous animal, it has that fear of us.
You know, God has allowed us to have dominion over the earth, and I'm okay if someone's
personal preference is to be a vegetarian, but I will never personally cater to someone's
weird, vegetarian, vegan lifestyle that isn't biblical.
Because last time I checked, the Bible says honey's good.
Last time I checked, Jesus ate fish.
The Bible talks about bread being good, the Bible talks about milk being good, the Bible
talks about butter being good, goat's milk, clothing from animals, all these things are
good.
Don't sit here and tell me, you know, that eating meat is not good for you.
That's not biblical.
And dead sure don't tell me that the Bible condemns eating meat because that's doctrines
of devils and that will not be tolerated.
Look, I'll tolerate a weird, weak person that just wants to have their weird diet of not
eating meat.
Look, you could go suffer over by yourself.
I'm going to eat steak and we're going to order food for the church that has meat.
And look, I'm just, I'm just not going to cater to that because it's just weird.
It's really annoying to me.
It's like personally annoying when someone is a militant vegetarian because they just
pulled it out of thin air.
It's not in the Bible Bible saying here, you're going to have these things for the maintenance
of your household, for your maidens, for all these things, you know, we ought to use the
things of this world, not abuse them.
I'm not saying go abuse animals.
Well, then why did you kill those prairie dogs because they create holes that break
the legs of horses and cattle and harm the other important animals.
So that's why we did that.
It's not like we're just like, ha, ha, we're going to kill all these animals for fun.
No, look, don't abuse animals.
I'm against animal abuse.
Use the things that you kill.
If you kill a beast, you know, use every part of it that you can.
Don't be super wasteful.
Be mindful of the environment.
But at the end of the day, God wants us to use those things.
And you know what, God wants us to enjoy those things and part of the reason why vegetarians
are such uptight, miserable, sad people is just because they're not eating steak.
If you eat steak, if you eat a cheeseburger, you'll feel better.
Let's pray.
Lord, thank you so much for your word.
Thank you for the book of Proverbs.
I pray that you just continue to reveal truth to us throughout this series and help us to
make changes in our lives in the places that we need to.
I pray that you would just bring us to our homes safely this evening, that you bless
Pastor Thompson and his wife as they travel to preach for us and hang out with us this
weekend.
I just pray that your house would be full this Sunday.
We love you in Jesus' name we pray.
Dad, we'll go ahead and sing one last song to conclude the service.
If you would at this time, take your hymnals, turn to hymn number 40, "No Disappointment
in Heaven," hymn number 40, hymn 4-0.