What does it say? It's telling us that God will judge humanity based upon what they claim to believe, right?
"By thy words thou shall be justified, by thy words thou shall be condemned."
This is why it's important for us when we are preaching the gospel to help people believe the right gospel
but also to ask for salvation because they shall be justified by their words.
So we see here that the Lord Jesus Christ is essentially condemning the Pharisees
being the generation of vipers, these Jews who are essentially bringing forth evil things out of their heart.
They can't speak good things. Why? Because they're false prophets.
The Bible says in 1 John chapter 4, you don't have to turn there, 1 John chapter 4 verse 1 says,
"Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits," the Bible says, "whether they are of God."
Why? Because many false prophets are gone out into the world.
The Bible says that we need to try the spirits. This isn't like, you know, try the spirit.
This is like, listen to what the preacher is saying, listen to what the pastor is saying,
listen to see if it coincides with the Bible. That's how you try the spirits.
Try means to prove, to test, and the Bible says, "prove all things, hold fast, that which is good."
And why is it important for us to judge preaching, to try the preaching, to try the spirit?
Because there's a lot of false prophets out there that are seeking to deceive many.
And if we are just gullible Christians, who just believe everything that we hear, we don't
test anything, we can become easily deceived.
It goes on to say in 1 John chapter 4, "hereby know ye the Spirit of God."
Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God.
And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of
God.
This is that spirit of Antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come, and even
now already is in the world.
So this is telling us here that, you know, if you run into a pastor, a Christian, a church
that confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, it's going to put you in the good
ballpark there.
Right?
And obviously we know that there's a lot of even false prophets who will make this proclamation,
but in general, it's going to narrow down the churches that you should be going to.
Right?
You know, this obviously Buddhism goes out the window, Hinduism goes out the window,
Jehovah's Witnesses go out the window, Mormonism goes out the window, various sects of the
charismatic Pentecostal movements go out the window because they don't, they don't pass
the litmus test of confessing that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, meaning that they're
not upholding the deity of Jesus Christ, the sonship of Jesus Christ.
So this kind of puts you in the right ballpark when it comes to looking for the right doctrine.
The point that I'm making here is that the way we identify false prophets is based upon
what they say, okay?
So let me get into my first point here.
Turn with me, if you would, go to second Peter chapter number two, second Peter chapter number
two, and then we're going to go to first Kings chapter 13, second Peter chapter two.
And then we'll go to first Kings chapter 13, a false prophet.
Number one is identified by slight full preaching, slight full preaching.
What does that mean?
It means mixing lies with enough truth to mask the taste of deception.
You see, when you listen to a false prophet who is a wolf in wolf's clothing,
it's not very hard to identify them, right?
It's like this person's bad.
I don't even need a verse for this, right?
Like they're so blatant in their, you know, heresy or who they are.
Even unsafe people can identify them as a false prophet.
Doesn't take much to see that.
But there's other pastors, there's other false prophets that masquerade.
And how do they deceive even righteous people?
By mixing in enough truth with the lies so as to mask the deception, right?
To go under the radar.
And these are some of the most dangerous false prophets that exist today.
Why?
Because you and I would agree on the vast majority of false prophets that exist out
there.
But there might be mixed opinions about certain other pastors and preachers.
Why?
Because there's about 75 to 85% truth in what they're saying.
But it's that last percentage that can actually damn a soul that is actually heretical.
But let me say this, because they have so much truth involved in their preaching, it can
cause righteous people to make excuses for that last percentage, right?
Because they have 75% truth, it can cause righteous people to make excuses for that
25% of deception.
So this is dangerous, my friends, because that 25% deception could be damnable heresy.
This is slightful preaching, mixing lies with enough truth to mask the taste of deception,
using enough Christianese to gain credibility.
75% truth, 25% lie can often be destructive.
We need to learn, listen to this, to identify the 25% of deception and not excuse the 25%
based upon the 75% things that they say that were right, especially when it comes to the
matter of salvation.
And I'm not talking about secondary tertiary doctrines, right?
People can have various opinions about end times Bible prophecy, believe it or not even
about the Jews, and then they're not necessarily false prophets.
And look, I've been getting on the Jews a lot lately.
I don't know if you noticed that, but there's actually a lot of good people online that
are right on a lot of stuff except for the Jews.
That's a fact, right?
I mean, they're even right on salvation and they'll be wrong on the Jews.
And in fact, some of you at one point or another were wrong on the Jews, just like me, right?
At one point or another we were wrong and then we saw the light.
The point that I'm making here is that I'm not referring to people who are off on secondary
tertiary doctrines.
I'm talking about just like fundamental doctrines of the faith, okay?
They kind of propose themselves to be fundamental in their doctrine, but they're actually false
prophets, okay?
And so it may not seem that they're children of the devil, but based upon the biblical
standard they are.
And you know what?
Here's the thing is that I'm not sitting here telling you that we need to point out
every single false prophet.
I'm just telling you, you know, your, your ears should perk up when your favorite preacher,
whoever it may be, is off on some fundamental doctrine of the faith, the deity of Jesus
Christ, salvation, the Bible, and it should cause you to essentially avoid that person
as much as possible.
It warrants avoidance of that preacher, right?
Look at second Peter chapter two, verse number one, it says, but there were false prophets
also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you.
That's telling us it's promising us that false teachers exist today.
And may I say that false teachers are here in abundance in comparison to the first century
AD.
There's way more false prophets today.
I mean, have you been on Instagram?
I mean, false prophets are out there.
Social media is just saturated with false teachers and false prophets proclaiming false
gospels, just teaching nonsensical things.
I mean, this week alone people have been sending me videos of some guy who is like, literally
has made it his goal in ministry to discredit the apostle Paul and say that he's just a
false prophet.
His message is completely contrary to Jesus Christ.
He destroyed the church.
He bastardized Christianity.
I mean, just nonsensical stuff.
I mean, Paul's been gone for a long time and bro still has enemies, you know, he's still
like causing controversy even long, I mean, Paul's in heaven.
He's enjoying his is, you know, he's enjoying heaven right now in the presence of God.
And here we are in 2025 and people are making literally like every video is about discrediting
the apostle Paul.
He's like, Oh, Paul's the one who came up with this whole believing on Jesus Christ.
Salvation is by grace through faith alone.
You know, that's contrary to what Jesus said, you know, that's funny, you know, for God
to love the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in
him should not perish, but have ever, isn't that Jesus?
And isn't that, no, that's not contradictory.
He's literally saying exactly what the apostle Paul is saying.
Apostle Paul is saying what Jesus is saying.
They coincide because they have the same spirit.
Look what it says in second Peter chapter two, verse one, but there were false prophets
also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you.
And here's the key.
Who privilege shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them and
bring upon themselves with destruction.
The Bible says that there's false teachers even in our midst, even today, that are privately
secretly under the radar, bringing in not just heresies.
The key there is what?
Damnable heresies.
There's heresies, meaning the things that are just contradictory to the Bible, but it
doesn't affect your salvation.
But then there's damnable heresies and a damnable heresies does damn a soul to hell.
And the Bible saying here that they are privately doing this, meaning that they are intentionally
being deceptive about their heresies, right?
These are devilish people.
And you say, well, you know, they just need to be taught the truth.
We need to pray for them.
We need to pray that they repent.
We need to pray that they get saved.
Well, I want you to notice the last half of this verse, it says even denying the Lord
God that bought them.
So the reason they're in this position of being a false prophet in the first place is
because they denied the gospel.
They deny salvation.
They deny the Lord.
They're not ignorant of Bible truths, they're not ignorant of the biblical matter of salvation.
They know full well what the Bible says about it and they denied it.
And then what do they do?
Intentionally pervert it, distort it and privily bring in a damnable heresy with the intention
to damn souls to hell.
Look, folks, let me give you a reality check.
There's a lot of evil people out there.
And I'm not talking about evil people like, you know, sexual perverts and deviants.
I'm talking about even individuals who will literally make it their goal to creep into
a church unaware in order to teach heresy and false doctrine that exists.
These are agents of Satan, right?
False apostles, false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the
apostles of Christ.
And you shouldn't marvel for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light in order
for them to deceive masses, to deceive Christians and churches.
They need to masquerade as the apostles of Christ in order to bring in their damnable
heresies.
But God wants us to identify that and not make excuses for it.
And look, if you find a pastor out there online, whatever, saying the right things about the
deity of Jesus Christ, maybe he's got a couple of debates against Muslims and he's winning.
Maybe he makes a couple of good apologetic arguments, but he's off on salvation.
That's a damnable heresy.
It's a fact.
You may have someone who is a good conservative who hates feminism.
Amen to that.
They hate sodomy.
Amen to that.
They hate perversion.
Amen to that.
They may say a lot of right things.
I would say maybe about 75% of what they say is right.
But then what?
They're off on salvation.
That's called the damnable heresy.
And here's the thing is that a lot of people are like, well, he's just off a little bit
on salvation.
Well, all you need to be is a little off on salvation to be damned to hell, right?
And often these people speak out of both sides of their mouth too.
Why?
Because they have people in their church who believe both.
One believes salvation is by grace of faith.
The other one believes you have to repent of your sins to be saved.
Repenting of your sins to be saved is false doctrine, is heresy.
Why?
Because sin is the transgression of the law.
And so in turn, in order for us to not sin, we have to keep the law.
We have to obey God's commandments in order to not sin, right?
Well, that's considered a work.
And so they often have both of these groups found within their churches.
So they have to try to appease both by saying, oh, it is by believing only by faith only.
And then it's just like, yeah, but you do have to repent of your sins if you're really
saved, you have to repent of your sins or whatever.
That's called privily bringing in damnable heresy.
And we need to identify that, you know, find a church where the pastor is very open about
salvation behind the pulpit in person.
And the statements never contradict, right?
Why?
Because it's important for us to identify when people are saying the 75% things that
are good, but we definitely need to identify the 25% that's completely wrong.
And this is why it's important folks to be in a Bible believing church where they're
actually opening up the scriptures and teaching the Bible.
The Bible says that we all come in the unity of the faith of the son of man.
It says that we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro, carried about with every
wind of doctrine by the what, slight of men.
That's slightful preaching, cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive.
So this is not referring to someone who's unintentionally teaching false doctrine.
It says that they're lying in wait to deceive, meaning they're trying to trap you.
They're trying to deceive you.
That is their goal.
That is their intention.
Don't be a gullible Christian and think that these people do not exist.
You know, people are like, oh, that was like a new testament, but not now.
No, it's even worse now because evil men, the Bible says this evil men and seducers
shall wax worse and worse.
Even now the Bible says there are many antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time.
And Paul wrote that 2000 years ago.
So if there is a bunch of false prophet roaches back then, how many do you think there are
now?
We need to make sure that we are able to identify this.
The Bible says in Ezekiel, go to first Kings chapter 13, if you would first Kings chapter
13.
We're talking about identifying the false prophet through their preaching.
And the first thing we need to look at is their slightful preaching, deceptive preaching
Ezekiel 22 verse 28, you don't have to turn there says in her prophets have daubed them
with untempered mortar, seeing vanity and divining lies unto them, saying thus state
the Lord when the Lord hath not spoken.
This is referring to the fact that the preachers in Ezekiel's day would untemper God's people
with untempered mortar, put them together with untempered mortar, meaning he would
mix it with truth and lies.
Something that cannot hold together, something that's essentially, it's a picture of truth
being mixed with lies.
Let's look at an actual example of this in the Old Testament.
First Kings 13 verse 11, it says, "Now there dwelt an old prophet in Bethel, and his sons
came and told him all the works that the man of God had done that day in Bethel, the words
which he had spoken into the king, then they told also to their father."
So this is referring to a prophet who's doing great works, he's preaching the word of God.
But then this old prophet in Bethel catches wind of the exploits of this younger prophet.
And he said in verse 12, "And their father said unto them, What way went he?
For his sons had seen what way the man of God went, which came from Judah.
And he said unto his sons, Saddle me the ass.
So they saddled him the ass, and he rode thereon, and went after the man of God and found him
sitting under an oak.
And he said unto him, Art thou the man of God that came as from Judah?
And he said, I am.
Then he said unto them, Come home with me and eat bread.
And he said, I may not return with thee, nor go in with thee, neither will I eat bread
nor drink water with thee in this place.
For it was said to me by the word of the Lord, thou shalt eat no bread nor drink water there
nor turn again to go by the way that thou camest.
So we see here that this young prophet is on a good trajectory, right?
He's obeying the word of the Lord.
Someone tells them, Hey, come eat with me.
And he's like, I can't because God told me to stay right here.
I need to obey what God says.
This is what the Bible clearly states.
This is what the word of the Lord is clearly saying, therefore I need to obey that.
Right?
Good stuff.
Verse 18 says, he said to him, I am a prophet also as thou art.
I'm a fundamental Baptist too.
I'm a Christian too.
I'm a Republican too.
I'm a conservative too.
And an angel spanked to me by the word of the Lord.
Now too bad Galatians 1 didn't exist at this point.
Right?
Because then he could have been like, we are an angel from heaven.
Preaching the other gospelers is like, I don't know about this.
You know, how is it that an angel came to you?
I didn't get the memo.
God told me one thing.
He's telling you something else.
Right?
He said, saying, bring him back with thee into thine house that he may eat bread and
drink water, but he lied unto him.
Now obviously there's some truth to what he's saying because it probably was an angel.
It just wasn't an angel of the Lord.
It was a lying spirit who essentially lied to him so that he could disobey the word of
the Lord.
So, you know, there's a little bit of truth here that he is a prophet.
There's a little bit of truth here that yeah, an angel did send him.
But the lie is that God did not send him.
The lie is that it wasn't an angel of the Lord.
And the lie is that he's causing him to try to disobey the word of God.
He says, go with me if you would to let's skip a couple of verses here because I'm almost
out of time.
Go to Deuteronomy 18.
Deuteronomy 18.
What do we see here?
We see that the old prophet deceived the young prophet by slightful preaching.
And what is the what is the result of the story?
The young prophet, the man of God ends up dying.
God ends up destroying him because he disobeyed the word of the Lord and he believed the old
prophet.
And let me just say say this is that just because someone is older doesn't mean that
they're more biblically sound.
It's a fact.
And look, age should come with wisdom or wisdom should come with age, right?
Someone who's been in the Lord for a long period of time and they've been reading the
word of God, they should have accumulated a lot of biblical knowledge, wisdom, knowledge,
prudence, godliness.
They should be righteous people.
And quite frankly, I know a lot of righteous older people and thank God for that.
I want to be an older righteous person when I get older.
So do you.
You should have that goal to be so.
But quite frankly, there are also older people who are extremely wicked, who are evil.
And look, in general, our default setting towards the elderly or someone who's older
is that we should honor the hoary head, right?
That's what the Bible teaches us.
We should honor them, give them the benefit of the doubt, but hold on a second.
If they're teaching false doctrine, it doesn't matter how old they are, they're a false prophet.
And a lot of times people are like, "Well, you can't say that.
You're younger."
Well, I'm sorry, but the Bible's older than them, so what's what?
I'm coming in the authority of God's word, and the authority of God's word trumps any
person.
And if they're teaching false doctrine, then they're a heretic.
It's important, folks, the Bible tells us in 2 Corinthians 11 verse 4, "For if he that
cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit,
which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might bear
with him."
That's a sad statement.
Paul is saying like, you know, you Corinthians are just kind of, you know, kind of not that
doctrinally sound.
You kind of make excuses for all these preachers out there.
They're preaching another Jesus, another gospel, but because they're saying 75% right, all
of a sudden, you know, you're bearing with them.
We need to make sure we don't bear with evil, okay?
Just because they have all the talking points, they may say a couple of things right, doesn't
make them right.
And look, folks, I know that especially amongst conservative crowds, Christians have a tendency
to just justify every politician that says Jesus, that says God, you know, oh man, I
think he mentioned the Bible.
I think he accidentally said the Bible and all of a sudden they're like a saved saint.
They're a righteous person.
Folks, we ought not to be a respecter of people.
And I know, you know, we want to think the best in everyone, but let's just be realistic
here.
Why?
There are many false prophets that have gone out, there's many false prophets, and we need
to be able to judge them based upon what they're saying, because they're slightful preaching
out there.
This is an important thing for us to do.
Okay.
So what's another thing that we need to look for to identify false prophets?
Well, we said we need to identify them by their slightful preaching.
They're mixing in the truth with the lies.
And look, let me, before I get off on this point, let me say this, you know, there's
a lot of social media content out there of pastors and preachers who stand for biblical
truths, things that we would agree with.
But if they're preaching a false gospel in the trash, in the trash, it doesn't matter
how long their ministry has existed, doesn't matter how many followers they have, doesn't
matter how many people testify of a great difference that they made in their life.
If it's a false gospel, they go in the trash.
That's a fact, folks.
And we need to get back to the rudiments of just a steaming a proper gospel presentation,
a proper explanation of salvation and justification, because that is the most important thing,
my friends, and stop making excuses for pastors who are off on that and right on everything
else.
You know, let me give you an example.
You know, who's a false prophet?
It's Candace Owens.
That's a false prophet.
You know why?
Because she's a Catholic.
And let me just, let me just give you the harsh truth about this.
And it's not very harsh for us.
You know, Catholics aren't saved.
They're going to split hell wide open.
And I'm mainly talking to the ladies in our church this morning, because I know you like
Candice Owens.
I know how she's supposedly against feminism and all this stuff.
She's a Catholic.
How are you going to say that about Catholics?
This is a Baptist church.
What do you mean?
You think we're holding mass today or something?
We didn't take the Eucharist today.
What is that?
This is a fundamental Baptist church where you preach the Bible, the Bible that they
don't want us to read, the Bible that they put people to death for, for translating.
And you know what?
Just because Candice Owens says a couple of good things, which in my opinion she doesn't,
she's a major grifter.
That's a fact.
I know I'm stepping on some toes today, but hopefully you decide to delete your Candice
Owens podcast.
And instead of trying to learn your biblical worldview from unsafe Catholics, why don't
you just stick to the Bible, stick to the word of God, stick to biblical preachers.
I know that's offensive to you because you're like, Oh man, but she's like, she says so
many good things.
You know what?
The, the, the, the weatherman says a lot of good things too.
Does that make them a righteous person?
Yeah.
But she says a lot of good things about the Jews, but, but hold on a second.
Pretty much the world is just already waking up to, you can go to an unsafe person and
ask them what they think about the Jews.
They'll probably give you the right answer nowadays.
You got to base it on what is it that they believe?
Not if they're conservative, not if they're Republican, not if they even named the name
of Christ.
Why?
Because the fact of the matter is there's a lot of deceitful workers, slightful preaching.
And I know that's not popular and you can apply that to, you know, your favorite podcasters
or whatever.
You need to make sure that they're saying the right things, the biblical things and trash
everything else.
All right.
Let's move on here because I offended half the church.
Identifying false prophets by their slightful preaching, but also presumptuous preaching.
I'm not going to spend too much time on this because everyone pretty much knows this.
What am I talking about?
I'm talking about those who preach beyond the boundaries of the Bible, right?
They teach for doctrines, the commandments of men.
And here's an extreme example of this in Deuteronomy 18 verse 22.
It says, when a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the things follow not, meaning
if they predict something and it doesn't come to pass, nor come to pass, that is the thing
which the Lord has not spoken, but the prophet had spoken it presumptuously, thou shall not
be afraid of him.
So pretty much everyone here knows this, but it's important to cover it because the Bible
talks about this.
You know, you got to be aware of people online that are always date setting the second coming
of Christ.
And it typically happens every year, either in March or like in September.
I don't know what's up with those months.
It's just, it's just the time for false prophets to just put out their fake date.
But they're always like, Oh, he's coming March 22nd, September, whatever.
And it's just, and you think to yourself like, Oh, this is so stupid.
How can anybody believe this?
But people believe it.
I mean, as much as these people exist, their followers exist too.
They're getting ready.
And I think to myself, like, what did you do on September 23rd when he didn't come?
You know, I hope you didn't sell your house.
And look, that was a thing back in, I think it was like 2010, 2013.
There's a guy who was date setting and he had billboards everywhere.
He was on the radio.
What was his name?
Harold Camping.
How many remember the Harold Camping thing?
I think he's like the original OG in our era of like date setting and people were literally
selling their houses, all their possessions.
I mean, they basically went broke and then the day came and went and they're just broke
now.
They're on the curb.
You know that?
What do you?
I mean, but that's what you get for not listening to Deuteronomy 18.
Okay.
And so when people try to surpass the boundaries of what the Bible actually says, the Bible
labels them as a false prophet.
And look, and I'm not just talking about, you know, the second coming of Christ, you
know, there's a, there's a guy on social media who, when, uh, you know, the elections were
taking place before this election, the previous election, when Biden was elected, there's
a guy who went up and said, God told me that Trump's going to be the president.
It's going to happen.
He's going to win.
And of course, Biden ended up winning.
What's the guy's name?
He was a black guy.
Does anyone remember his name?
Marcus.
There he goes.
Marcus Rogers.
That's the guy, man.
That was pretty quick.
I don't know, man.
I was pretty fast there.
Marcus Rogers predicted.
He said that God told him that Trump was going to be president.
And then of course that didn't happen.
It's like, Oh, Oh, you're a false prophet.
Now he's a false prophet for various other reasons because he preaches a false gospel
and all that.
Trump is a very presumptuous preacher as well.
And the Bible says in second Peter chapter two, which is the profile of a false prophet,
that they are presumptuous, self-willed, they're not under the authority of God's word.
They're always preaching things that are beyond the boundaries of God's word.
So they need to be avoided and disregarded because they're false teachers.
Go to Jeremiah, if you would, chapter 23, Jeremiah chapter 23, if you would, Jeremiah
chapter 23, we're talking about identifying false prophets.
How do we do it?
We do it by judging their preaching.
Is it slightful?
Is it presumptuous?
And here's a big one.
Is it light?
Now this particular point here doesn't necessarily have anything to do with doctrine.
It doesn't necessarily have to do anything with like damnable heresy.
It's actually having to do with the style of preaching, believe it or not.
So God actually categorizes preachings between hard preaching and light preaching.
Okay, now let's look at, let's look at in Jeremiah 23 verse 25.
It says, I have heard what the prophets said that prophesy lies in my name saying I have dreamed, I have dreamed.
These are the presumptuous preachers, right?
How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets that prophesy lies?
Yea, there are prophets of the deceit of their own heart, which think to cause my people to forget my name by their dreams,
which they tell every man to his neighbor as their fathers have forgotten my name for bail.
The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream.
And he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully.
What is the chaff to the wheat, saith the Lord?
So he's saying, look, there's two types of prophets.
One that preaches lies, what he equates with the dream, what he equates with not preaching the Bible.
And then you have the real prophet who just sticks to what the Bible actually says, right?
And he says one is chaff and one is wheat.
Did my mic go off? It's okay, I'm loud enough.
What is the chaff to the wheat saith the Lord?
Look at verse 29, is not fire saith the Lord, that breaketh the rock in pieces?
So what is he telling?
What is Jeremiah telling the nation of Judah here?
He's saying the way you identify the right preaching is if it's fiery and if it's like a hammer.
He says in verse 30, therefore, behold, I am against the prophet,
saith the Lord, that steal my words, everyone from his neighbor.
Behold, I'm against the prophet, saith the Lord, that use their tongues and say, he sayeth.
Behold, I'm against them that prophesy false dreams, saith the Lord, and do tell them and cause my people to err by their lies.
And I want you to notice this and by their lightness.
Yet I sent them not nor commanded them.
Therefore, they shall not profit this people at all, saith the Lord.
Now, this is important, folks, OK, because here is essentially where the rubber meets the road for a lot of Christians.
Because, you know, Christians who heard the first two points are like, oh, yeah, for sure.
If there's like heresy, absolutely, right.
If there is like a false gospel, yeah, that's that's for sure.
And there's, you know, date setting out the window, right.
Is this what you're using right here, Brother Ulysses?
Which one are you using, my mic or this one? My mic, OK.
But here's another way to identify false prophets that God regards as being a major indicator.
And that is how light is their preaching.
What does that refer to? Just how nice they are, right.
How sweet they are, sugary because according to the Bible, that's actually not representative of biblical preaching.
Biblical preaching is fiery. Biblical preaching burns. Biblical preaching bothers you.
Biblical preaching is like a hammer that is just breaking false doctrine, false ideologies.
It's breaking bad habits. That's what real preaching does.
Fiery preaching burns false prophets. It burns heresy. It purifies the church.
That's what Biblical preaching is. Light preaching is when the preacher tells you
everything that you want to hear and doesn't want to offend you.
So here's a good one. Biblical preaching is offensive. That's what it is. It's offensive.
Everyone here, if you've been coming since the beginning of our church story,
you've been offended by my preaching at one time or another. That's a fact.
Ready? Ready to get offended? Why? Because that's exactly how weak preaching is.
The chaff is the preaching that's light. It doesn't want to offend you.
And therefore it abstains from telling you the truth.
It abstains from hitting on controversial verses of the Bible.
It tickles your ears. Why? Because they don't really care about you.
They don't really love you. They have fame words.
They're trying to make merchandise off of you.
This is like the Joel Olsteen's of today.
And look, again, you may think, well, you know, Joel Olsteen doesn't really preach
like a false doctrine. Although this point is not about the doctrine.
This is literally about the style of preaching, light preaching.
And look, I'm not talking about extra tate of preaching either,
because the Bible tells us preach the word to be instant in season, out of season,
reprove, rebuke, exhort, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine.
What does it mean to exhort? It means to build you up. But you know,
you can get built up by being yelled at too. And quite frankly,
sometimes we have to tear down before we build up. Right? Now,
let me just say this.
A lot of Christians don't have the stomach or the appetite for this type of
preaching. You know why? Because they're too used to the light preaching.
They've been inoculated with light preaching, non-offensive preaching,
Ted talk, preaching, encouraging preaching, and not enough hard preaching folks.
We need hard preaching. And in fact,
that is a major test in the Bible to distinguish the right prophet from the bad
prophet is are, are they filled with light preaching? When you go to a church,
do they only say just nice things? Do they only,
do they tell you, do they talk about sin? Did they talk about your sin?
Do they highlight false doctrine? Does the pastor even like yell? He said,
well, how, you know, this is really hard preaching.
Does it characterize by yelling, you know,
lift up thy voice like a trumpet cry out loud and spare not and show my people
their transgression. Yeah.
Biologists were supposed to lift up our voice like a trumpet because if I don't
lift up my voice when I'm talking about sin, how are you going to know?
How are you going to take me serious? Right?
If I don't yell and scream about fornication, adultery, divorce,
sodomy, feminism, how are you going to know if I'm being serious about this or
not? I can't get up here and be like, don't fornicate. Fornication is bad.
I mean, if you think it's bad, what's in for me is not necessarily for you.
We need a standard a man talk about the wickedness of fornication and how it's
going to just destroy your life, fill you with disease. And yes,
even give you bastard children to hearing that you're like, Oh wow.
Yeah. You know what? Fornication is bad. I didn't think about that. That's true.
Why? Cause preaching makes sin look exceeding sinful. And that is it. Oh yeah.
But if you preach like that, you're going to scare people away. Hold on a second.
First of all, we don't change our preaching to keep or to make people leave.
We keep our preaching the same because that's how God told us to preach.
And we need to have faith that no matter how the word of God is preached,
if it's preached in a biblical manner,
it's going to keep the right people and scare away the wrong people. You know,
people were like, well, I don't really like this style. He just kind of mean.
He just says it in a, in a not so nice. Yeah. But he'd tell you the truth though.
Did he tell you the truth? Hey, the apostle Paul said,
though I be rude in speech, yet not in knowledge, right?
Though I be rude in speech, yet not in knowledge. Meaning,
yeah, you can criticize the volume of my voice. You know,
the fact that I was a little crass about it,
but you cannot criticize the knowledge that I gave you.
Meaning that you have to adapt to hard preaching.
You have to learn how to like hard preaching because that's biblical preaching.
Stay away from light preaching. False prophets are filled with light preaching.
That's what the Bible teaches. False prophets are the ones that go to chapter six,
if you would have Jeremiah.
False prophets are the ones telling you that nothing bad is going to happen to
you. Everything's going to be a okay. You can be involved in sin.
There's no consequences to your actions. That's what false preaching does.
Hard preaching says, if you do that, you're going to die.
God's going to destroy you. Sin will destroy your life.
Fornication will destroy your life. Drunkenness will destroy your life. Right?
Look at Jeremiah chapter six, verse 14, it says, for from the least of them,
even to the greatest of them, everyone is given to covetousness.
And from the prophet, even into the priest, everyone dealeth falsely.
They have healed also the hurt of my daughter, of my people slightly.
What does this mean when it says slightly? It means only halfway.
So the preachers and the prophets of this day only heal the people,
the hurt of their people slightly. Why?
Because they're only giving them encouraging sermons and no hard sermons.
How do we know? He says same peace, peace when there is no peace.
Now we want to hear peace. Amen. I peace, I give into you.
Not as the world give it, give I unto you. Right? We have, you know,
the Bible talks about be careful for nothing,
but in all things by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving,
let your requests be made known into God and the peace of God,
the passeth understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ,
our Lord, that will keep him in perfect peace with mind and state on the,
we need to hear about that, but we also need to hear,
you're going to be judged though, if you don't get right with God.
And here it says that the prophets were preaching peace when God said,
what do you mean? The nation is about to be judged. There's no peace, right?
We need to be told we're wrong when we're wrong and not be enabled in our sin
and disobedience and rebellion. The profit, the false profit will tell you peace though.
Even if you're on the road to destruction. Why?
Because they don't have your, your best interest in mind.
They're not trying to benefit you. They're trying to benefit from you.
They want something from you.
So they're always going to tell you exactly what you want to hear.
You need to be in a church where a pastor is willing to get up and be bold enough
to correct you, correct your behavior, your ideologies,
your doctrine to challenge you. Why?
Because that's the only way you're going to grow. And the Bible says,
this essentially distinguishes the false prophet from the real prophet.
He says in verse 15, were they ashamed when they have committed abomination?
They were not at all ashamed. Neither could they blush.
Therefore they shall fall among them that fall at the time that I visit them.
They shall be cast down, say the Lord. So he's saying the nation of Judah,
they weren't able to blush. They weren't ashamed. Why?
Because they were never put to shame. You know what heart preaching does?
It puts people to shame. You know,
if we had enough preachers over the last two decades preaching hard against
sodomy, we wouldn't have so much filth and perversion walking up and down the
street all the time. It'd be ashamed of it, right?
We wouldn't have transvestites just openly walking around trying to pervert
children. Why? Because they'd be ashamed of it.
But because there's so many pastors out there that are only screaming peace,
peace. And God's like, there's no peace. There's transvestites.
There's no peace. Look at all this feminism. There's no peace.
Look at all this perversion.
So that's why it's important to have the right type of preaching and not light
preaching. That makes the distinction between the two.
How do we identify false prophets? It's by what they say.
It's by their slightful preaching, deceptive preaching,
that mixes the truth with lies.
It's by their presumptuous preaching when they go beyond the boundaries of what
the Bible says, but it's also by their Ted talk light preaching.
You need to develop an appetite for hard preaching,
hearing the hard truths and what the Bible actually says.
Go to first Kings chapter 22, first Kings chapter 22.
Let's look at an example of this first Kings chapter 22.
If you would, most of us are familiar with this story.
It's a great story.
Ahab is wanting to go to war and he wants Jehoshaphat to join him.
And Jehoshaphat is the even killed King here.
He's the one who, though he likes Ahab, which obviously we don't know why he
likes Ahab, Ahab is such a wicked person, but he's fellowshiping with Ahab.
He's going to aid Ahab in his war.
And Jehoshaphat says, you know, maybe we should inquire or get some advice from
like a pastor or prophet and see what they say, right?
Verse seven says, Jehoshaphat said, is there not here a prophet of the Lord
besides that we may inquire of him?
Now, the reason he's even asking that is because of the fact that they have all
these prophets that are coming to Ahab and Jehoshaphat, and all these prophets
are saying the same exact thing.
They're saying, go for it Ahab, you'll succeed.
You're going to do good.
God's with you.
And they're all saying the same thing.
They're all encouraging him.
They're telling him it's going to be okay.
He's going to win.
And then Jehoshaphat is like, can we get another pastor here?
What are, what's that one pastor who has all those videos on the Jews?
Let's get him here.
Let's see what he has to say about this.
And the king of Israel said unto Jehoshaphat, there is yet one man,
Kiah, son of Imla, by whom we may inquire of the Lord.
Gatem.
At least Ahab is honest, right?
He's like this one guy that I didn't invite, but I hate this guy.
For he does not prophesy good concerning me, but evil.
What is he saying?
He's like wheat.
The other guy, these other guys are like chaff.
He's like, I want these other guys because they preach good concerning me.
This guy doesn't preach good concerning me, but evil.
I'll tell you why I have because you're evil.
That's why.
So stop being evil.
Maybe he won't say stuff about you.
He says in Jehoshaphat said, let not the king say so.
And the king of Israel called an officer
and said to hasten hither Micaiah, the son of Imla, the king of Israel.
And Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah sat each on his throne, having put on their
robes and avoid placing the entrance to the gate of Samaria and all the prophets
prophesied before them. And Zedekiah, the son of Chanaena, made him horns of
iron. And he said, "Thus saith the Lord, with thee shalt thou push the Syrians
until thou hast consumed them." And all the prophets prophesied so saying, "Go up to
Ramoth, Gilead, and prosper, for the Lord shall deliver it into the king's hand." So
you got all these prophets, right? And this one guy, Zedekiah, he makes
this illustration of these horns. And he's like, you're gonna be like this, you
know, you're just gonna get them all. And Ahab's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Now, if you know the story, you know this is just not true. Because God wants to
destroy Ahab, and he does. And look, let me just say this is a side note. If you're
not right with God, God will get you no matter what. Because, you know, Ahab is
trying to get Jehoshaphat, which is, this is just crazy that Jehoshaphat even
agreed to this. But he has Jehoshaphat dress up like Ahab. So then in case
they're coming after Ahab, they mistake Jehoshaphat for Ahab. And Jehoshaphat
doesn't. He doesn't love you. He doesn't care for you. And then, you know,
when they, when they finally find Jehoshaphat, he's like, I'm not Ahab.
And they're like, Oh, this isn't the guy. So, you know, he's trying to, you know,
do all these things to avoid getting killed in the war.
But then the Bible says that a certain man draws a bow at a venture.
He just like, Lord lead this arrow and he just throws it and it just lands
right on Ahab and kills him. Right. He's wounded. He's bleeding out.
He ends up dying, meaning that, you know what? You can hide from,
you can try to run from God, but you cannot hide the arrow is going to hit you.
You know what? Be sure your sin will find you out. And you know what?
You can look left, you can look right, but everyone always forgets to look up.
And when you try to run to the East, to the West,
it doesn't matter where you go. Someone's going to draw a bow at a venture,
a venture and find you and you will be punished by God for your sin.
That's what the Bible teaches, right? It's not the sermon, but it's a good sermon.
So he ends up dying. So, you know, Zedekiah, what is he?
He's a light preacher. He's like,
you're going to be able to like destroy them and all the prophets are like,
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what's going to happen. That's good. Yeah.
But it's false. It doesn't happen. And of course, you know, he asked Micaiah.
Micaiah is like, yeah, you're going to succeed.
But obviously he said it in such a way that Ahab didn't believe him.
He's like, tell me the truth. And he's like, well, you're going to die.
He's like, see, I told you, he never preached anything good about me.
And then he imprisons him and threatens him or whatever.
But of course we know that he ends up dying.
The point that I'm making here is that we need Micaiah preaching, not Zedekiah preaching.
It doesn't matter how good the illustration is, how big the platforms are,
how grand the screens are.
It doesn't matter what kind of lighting they use or smoke or whatever, you know,
illustrations they have at their church. If it's false, it's false.
We need Micaiah preaching, not Zedekiah preaching.
Go to first Kings chapter 18, first Kings chapter 18, if you would first Kings
chapter 18, we're talking about identifying false prophets by what they say.
Slyful preaching, mixing the truth with lies.
We talk about presumptuous preaching,
preaching beyond the boundaries of what the Bible actually says.
We're talking about light preaching, which is in contrast to hard preaching,
fiery preaching, preaching that's like a hammer.
Avoid this type of preaching because it's characterized by false prophets.
This is what false prophets do. Okay.
And here's the last point that I have this morning and that is that we identify
false prophets by their sponsored preaching,
meaning pastors who are being paid to say something. Right.
And this is a real thing today. Look, let me just explain something real quick.
Tithers are not paying their pastor to preach. Right. You're like, well,
do people tithe in your church? Of course. You know who? Nope.
So aren't you afraid they're going to stop tithing? Nope.
What if everyone stops tithing? Doesn't matter. I'll keep preaching.
Cause at the end of the day, I work for God. So I don't need to check the records.
I don't need to see who's giving.
I don't need to see who's the most generous person because at the end of the
day, God provides for all my needs. And you know what the pastor who's
constantly focused on who's tithing, who's giving,
who's doing this and that and the other is probably because he's trying to
determine what to preach based upon that. I think it's a biblical concept,
but we're talking about a different type of sponsor preaching.
We're talking about pastors who are being paid off by political agents,
by other nations to put forth an agenda, to push Zionism.
This is a thing, my friends. And look, people are like, Oh yeah.
Social media people don't get paid $7,000. How do you know? You know that?
Maybe it's more. And you know what?
Some of the stuff that I've been hearing recently makes me think like, Oh yeah,
these people, I mean have to be paid off to be saying some stuff like this,
to just turn a blind eye to Israel, to Jews. And look folks,
it should never be said like we should expect this amongst political realms.
Cause politicians don't really have a whole lot of ethics and morality at
times, right? But not in God's house.
You should never be sponsored by some outside entity that's against the word of
God to preach the word of God. And more specifically, we're talking about,
you know, these people who seem to be sponsored by Israel.
Look at first Kings 18, you say, is this even a thing though?
Aren't you preaching beyond the boundaries?
You're doing exactly what the Bible says you shouldn't do.
You're talking about presumptuous purity.
Can you even point to a verse in the Bible where outside entities are influencing
prophets to preach something? Yeah.
Look at first Kings 18 verse 17.
And it came to pass when Ahab saw Elijah that Ahab said to him, are thou he that
troubled Israel? Now, by the way, this is a lie.
You know, he's like, he goes to Elijah.
He's like, you're the one troubling Israel.
Who's the one really troubling Israel?
It's Ahab. Elijah is the one who's aiding Israel,
helping Israel to turn back to God, right?
And he answered, I have not troubled Israel,
but thou and thy father's house and that ye have forsaken the commandments
of the Lord and thou has followed Balaam.
Now, therefore, send and gather to me all
Israel unto Mount Carmel and the prophets of Baal, four hundred and fifty,
and the prophets of the groves, four hundred.
And I want you to notice this, which eat at Jezebel's table.
That's called sponsored preaching.
Jezebel sponsoring these prophets to be on her side to preach her heresy,
to lead Israel astray.
That's a thing even back then.
And look, folks, these prophets of Baal, these aren't pagans.
These are people who are in Israel who became prophets of Baal.
Right. These are Israelites.
These aren't people that they just,
you know, bust in from different areas and, you know, of the world or whatever.
These are prophets who literally come from Israel who are preaching false
doctrine and they're being paid by Jezebel herself in order to do this.
They're eating at her table. And this is the thing, folks, you know,
and here's the thing, you know, I thank God that people are with,
and I know I talk about Israel a lot, but it needs to be talked about.
And I know people get tired of it. They're just like, oh, here we go again.
It's just, you're constantly talking about, well,
until we can get churches to like stop being this way,
then I'm probably just going to have to keep talking about it because it's the
thing. And look, folks, we're,
we've gotten visitors from churches like this virtually every week and they all
say the same thing. They're like, you're right about this. This is like,
for some reason, this is all they talk about at this church.
And all of a sudden it's just like a turning point where they just doubled down
on it. It's like, they won't really like this before.
And maybe they were a little bit,
but now there's just like doubling down on it probably because they're,
they're doubling down on the money that they're getting.
They're eating at Jezebel's table. They're eating at Israel's table.
That's sponsored preaching. You know, when you have sponsored preaching,
preachers are essentially hindered from saying what they are supposed to say
from the Bible. And that's an extreme version,
but there's other versions of this where, you know,
certain churches will avoid preaching certain doctrines because of the crowds
that they run with the Bible colleges that they're associated with. Right.
But we need to be able to preach the truth no matter what the consequences,
let the chips fall where they may. And that's why we believe in independent
churches. Right. And so, uh, beware of the sponsored preacher.
Yes. Like Jack Hibbs, Jack Hibbs, who was just doubling down and just leading
people straight. And look, I'm not just picking on him.
His own members have told me explicitly, people who've been here,
people who have messaged me, they're just like, it's really weird.
I just felt like he wasn't like this before. And all of a sudden now he's bringing in people.
He's bringing in Amir.
He's bringing in these Israelis who are literally saying that if you don't
support Israel, you're not saved. That's called heresy. I'm sorry.
That's called damnable heresy. Well, Jack, it should have done.
It's just like, just, and you say, I'm sorry about that. Right.
But obviously he's not because he's a sponsored preacher. He's a light preacher.
He's a presumptuous preacher. Okay. He, and he is a slight for preacher.
And he's the inspiration for the sermon. Okay. Go to second Peter, chapter two,
second Peter, chapter two, second Peter, chapter two, the work of God,
obviously has to be funded. But folks,
the pastor should never change his message to fund the ministry, right?
Just preach whatever the Bible says.
There's enough people out there who love the truth.
They love what the Bible actually says. You don't have to change the message.
You don't have to be like, well, what about you? You know,
all you're doing is talk about Israel. Yeah.
You think that's gaining a lot of support from Israel or any other country?
I mean our own country loves Israel, right?
You think this makes me popular with them at the end of the day? And by the way,
it's mostly boomers who are being sponsored, right? Let's just be honest.
You boomers out there, don't be offended, but it's true. It's mostly boomers.
Okay. Who are, who are pushing this and thank God for a new generation.
That's rising up and just kind of saying like, we're kind of tired of this.
Can we take the star rem fan down? Can we just not keep talking about praying for
his, Hey, can you please Christ? Can you please, can we,
can you mention Jesus at least look at second Peter two verse 15, it says,
which have forsaken the right way and are gone astray following the way of
Balaam, the son of Bozor who loved the wages of unrighteousness,
but was rebuked for his iniquity. The dumb ass speaking with man's voice,
forbade the madness of the prophet.
You see Balaam was a prophet for hire. He was a sponsored preacher.
He was hired to curse the children of Israel in order to
receive wages. It's he didn't want to preach this out of conviction.
He just wanted it because he wanted the money. Now today,
it's like the exact opposite, right? Like the false prophets back then,
we're trying to, uh, or should I say the rulers back then,
we're trying to pay the false prophets to curse Israel.
Now it's just like the plain false prophets to bless Israel,
but it's the same concept. He says verse 17, these are wells without water,
clouds that are carried with the tempest to whom the midst of darkness is
reserved forever. For when they speak great swelling words of vanity,
they allure through the lust of the flesh, through much wantonness,
those that were clean escape from them who live in error.
While they promised them liberty,
they themselves are the servants of corruption for of whom a man is
overcome of the same is he brought in bondage.
Go to Galatians one. We're almost we're done there. Galatians chapter one,
Revelation two talks about Balaam. I'm sorry.
Talks about the churches and how they have the doctrine of Balaam, right?
And I feel like today there's a lot of churches who have the doctrine of Balaam,
people who are preaching things based upon other people sponsoring them to say
those things. But here's the attitude that we need to have.
Look at Galatians chapter one, verse 10, for do I now persuade men or God,
or do I seek to please men? For if I yet pleased men,
I should not be the servant of Christ. You know, at the end of the day,
what we need to do is just say,
I don't care how much popularity this gives me or how much popularity doesn't
give me. I just need to please Christ.
The way we please Christ is just by simply saying what the Bible actually says,
right? That's what we need to do there. And so what's the sermon today?
The sermon is simply this, beware of false prophets.
They exist and we need to make sure that we identify them based upon what they
say. Obviously there's a variety of false prophets out there,
but we're talking about today, identifying them through the type of preaching,
through their style of preaching. And we need to mark and avoid them. Amen.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for your word.
Thank you for the clarity of the scriptures.
Help us as your people to identify the false prophet, mark and avoid them,
and recognize that false teachers exist today.
Help us not to be attracted to any of this preaching,
to not be deceived by this preaching, uh,
to not be carried away with their winds of doctrine.
And I pray that Lord you'd help us to be able to have discernment,
to be able to distinguish the right kind of preaching from the wrong.
And I pray you bless us as we go on our way. Lord bless our evening service.
In Jesus name, we pray. Amen.
Song books is song number 29 song number 29 at the cross.
Song number 29 all together. Nice and strong on that first verse.
Are dismissed.