to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Josedech
the high priest, and to the residue of the people, saying, Who is left among you that
saw this house in her first glory? And how do you see it now? Is it not in your eyes
in comparison of it as nothing? Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the Lord, and
be strong, O Joshua, son of Josedech the high priest, and be strong all ye people of the
land, saith the Lord, and work. For I am with you, saith the Lord of hosts. According to
the word that I covenanted with you, when ye came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth
among you. Fear ye not. For thus saith the Lord of hosts, yet once, it is a little while,
and I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land, and I will shake
all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come. And I will fill this house with
glory, saith the Lord of hosts. The silver is mine and the gold is mine, saith the Lord
of hosts. The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the Lord
of hosts. And in this place will I give peace, saith the Lord of hosts.
In the fourth and twentieth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, came
the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet, saying, "Thus saith the Lord of hosts." Ask
now the priest concerning the law, saying, "If one bear holy flesh in the skirt of his
garment, and with his skirt he touch bread, or potage, or wine, or oil, or any meat, shall
it be holy?" And the priest answered and said, "No." Then said Haggai, "If one that is unclean
by a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean?" And the priest answered and
said, "It shall be unclean." Then answered Haggai and said, "So is this people, and so
is this nation before me," saith the Lord, "and so is every work of their hands, and
that which they offer there is unclean." And now I pray you, consider from this day
and upward, from before a stone was laid upon a stone in the temple of the Lord, since those
days were when one came to a heap of twenty measures, there were but ten. When one came
to the press to draw out fifty vessels out of the press, there were but twenty. I smote
you with blasting and with mildew and with hail in all the labors of your hands. Yet
ye turned not to me, saith the Lord. Consider now from this day and upward, from the four
and twentieth day of the ninth month, even from the day that the foundation of the Lord's
temple was laid, consider it. Is this seed yet in the barn? Yea, as yet the vine and
the fig tree and the pomegranate and the olive tree hath not brought forth. From this day
I will bless you. And again the word of the Lord came unto Haggai in the four and twentieth
day of the month, saying, Speak to the derubbable governor of Judah, saying, I will shake the
heavens and the earth, and I will overthrow the throne of kingdoms, and I will destroy
the strength of the kingdoms of the heathen, and I will overthrow the chariots and those
that ride in them, and the horses and the rider shall come down, every one by the sword
of his brother.
In that day, saith the Lord of hosts, will I take thee, o derubbable my servant, the
son of Shealtios, saith the Lord, and I will make thee as a signet, for I have chosen thee,
saith the Lord of hosts.
Let's pray.
Dear Lord God, I thank you for this opportunity to assemble here in your house, and I just
ask that you would bless the pastor from here with your Holy Spirit now.
Please bless the preaching to our edification, and in the name of Jesus, we pray Amen.
Amen.
Haggai chapter two, and look down at your Bibles at verse number 11.
It says, "Thus saith the Lord of hosts, ask now the priest concerning the law, saying,
if one bare holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt do touch bread
or pottage or wine or oil or any meat, shall it be holy?
And the priest answered and said, no.
Then said Haggai, if one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, shall it
be unclean?
And the priest answered and said, it shall be unclean."
And the title of my sermon this morning is, sin is caught, righteousness is not.
Sin is caught, righteousness is not.
Now what is being referred to here in Haggai chapter two?
Let me give you some context of what's taking place.
This would be considered what's called a post-exilic passage, meaning that this is the children
of Israel after they've gone into captivity and after they've returned from that 70 year
Babylonian captivity.
And so God has brought them back into the land.
They've been in Babylon for 70 years, and it's during this time that they're reconstructing
the temple.
They're trying to get things back together again.
They're trying to go back to the rudiments of their practices of worshipping the Lord.
But of course, being in Babylon for 70 years, you pick up on some bad habits, some bad practices,
and obviously they're not perfect.
And so what is being referred to here by Haggai, he's basically telling them, "Hey, let me
give you this illustration of the Levitical law."
And he says to them, or he talks to the priest and he asks them, "If someone who is pure,
ritually pure, and they're holy, they are clean, if their garment, if the hem of their
garment touches any type of substance, whether that's bread, pottage, wine, oil, or any kind
of meat, will that wholeness transmit to the actual food?
Will it have any effect on the substance?"
And the obvious answer is no.
That's not the way things work.
Something that is clean cannot make something else clean as well just by mere contact, right?
And then he says, "Well, what if a person is unclean?
They touch a dead body, they're contaminated.
What if they touch any of those substances?
Will it be unclean?"
And he said, "Of course it will be."
And what he's trying to get across here is the fact that just because the children of
Israel are brought back to the promised land, it doesn't mean that they're going to be good
people.
You understand?
Why?
Thankfully, they've been in Babylon for 70 years, they've probably been a little contaminated.
And so just because you put someone within the realms and the confines and the guidelines
of God's land, and now you're free to worship the Lord, you're free to read the Word of
God, and you're where God wants you to be, it doesn't necessarily mean that the righteousness
of that land will be transmitted to you, right?
Because changing a geographical location doesn't change the person.
And in fact, what's really being stated here is, because they're in Babylon, because they're
polluted and contaminated, at least some of them, when they come back, they can actually
pollute the land with idolatry and sinfulness and iniquity, because the principle is still
there.
Now, the way we can apply this today, you know, in a practical sense is that, you know,
a healthy person cannot make an unhealthy person healthy by mere contact, right?
You know, if I'm a healthy individual, if I eat right, if I exercise and I don't have
any diseases or any type of viruses or bacteria, you know, if I come into contact with someone
who isn't healthy, you know, just by mere contact to them, my health is not going to
transmit to them.
You know, just by merely touching them or being in contact with them, obviously I could
influence them and try to help them to become healthy, but at the end of the day, physical
contact with that person will not help that person at all.
You know, it's not health by osmosis.
If that were the case, you know, we'd all be healthy because all we have to do is just
touch people who are healthy and then we'd be fine, right?
And obviously the exception to this would be Jesus Christ, but no one's Jesus here.
And so we cannot touch the hem of his garment and have virtue be transmitted to us.
But let me say this, an unhealthy person who has some sort of contagious disease can contaminate
a healthy person, right?
You know, and it depends on what you have, but you know, if it's something contagious,
you know, if you have like the flu virus or you have a cold or something and you have
a tendency to just kind of shake everyone's hand and you're coughing in your hand, you're
hacking and all this stuff and you're not, you're not doing one of these, you're not
giving the fist bumps, you know, then yeah, you're going to contaminate other people because
diseases, viruses, they are contagious.
Okay.
And the basic principle is that sin is caught, diseases are caught, but righteousness is
not.
Now let me read to you from number chapter 19, just to kind of get a brief description
of the law here in this regard.
It says in verse, you don't have to turn there.
Numbers 19 11 says he that touches the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven days.
Verse 16 says, and whosoever touches one that is slain with a sword in the open fields or
a dead body or a bone of a man or a grave shall be unclean seven days.
Now let me give you this morning two principles in this regard that I've already essentially
covered, but we're going to cover them a little more extensively in the sermon.
Principle number one is that righteousness is not contagious.
And of course we drew the parallel here that the children of Israel were placed in the
promised land, but the promised land is not going to make them righteous.
The land itself will not make them godly.
You cannot possess righteousness by merely being in close proximity to it.
Now, how can we apply this?
Well, let's, let's look at the most basic of principles.
How about salvation, right?
Placing an unsafe person into spiritual locations cannot make them eternally clean, but yet
you have people all around the world today who are literally meeting in spiritual locations.
They're going to churches or they're, you know, trying to place themselves around spiritual
people and they literally think by doing that, that's going to make them saved.
That's going to make them clean.
If they just go to church faithfully, if they're just devoted to a certain religion, but somehow
that will add for their, you know, salvation or whatever, but that's not the way it works.
This cannot be transmitted to you just by you being in a spiritual place.
Go with me if you would, hold your place there in Haggai.
Go to Romans chapter number four, if you would, Romans chapter number four, righteousness is
not contagious.
Hey, growing up in a Christian home does not mean that you're going to be a safe person.
Now obviously these spiritual locations, whether that be a church, a Christian home, things
of that nature will give you, you know, the biggest probability of getting saved, right?
If you're growing up with a Christian mom and a Christian dad,
and they are very much devoted believers, they know what the Bible says.
It's very likely you're going to get saved because if that's a household that is
holding the Bible and the things of God as being preeminent in their lives,
their lives revolve around the Lord Jesus Christ and the Bible and doctrine and
things of that nature,
then you're more likely to get saved rather than someone who doesn't grow up in
a Christian home. They're in a Godless home. They're in a Buddhist home.
They are in a Catholic home. They're in a Mormon household.
Obviously, you know, that person is probably not going to get saved. I mean,
they can, you know, if someone gives them the gospel outside of that household,
but the probability is far more higher.
If you're actually growing up in a Christian home where you have parents who are
saved, they're soul winners. They know what the Bible says. Well, in like manner,
you know, an unsafe person coming to a church building,
the church building is not going to do anything for them.
And we never want to have this superstitious view of church, right?
Or somehow, Ooh, this building somehow, when you,
I just came in and I just felt the presence of God in here.
That's not the way it works. You know, you're like, well,
don't you feel the presence of God all the time by faith? But my, my, you know,
like my body doesn't feel any different. You know, I don't, I don't get like a,
like, I don't know. What is it? I don't get, okay. Apparently you get,
I don't get butterflies in my stomach or anything like that. Apparently Cody,
you know, he comes from Babylon. So he's,
it'll be to contaminating our congregation brother. No, I'm just kidding. Yeah.
You know, the, the butterflies in the stomach or you just like, man,
I just get these good vibes here or something, you know,
where it's just like they all base it off of feelings. Folks,
this is just a regular building. We're just, we rent this place in order to meet,
you know, and the reality is this,
is they coming within this building will do nothing to you spiritually. Now,
obviously it'll increase your chances of getting saved because of the fact that
there's a ton of soul winners in here. They can actually give you the gospel.
You are in close proximity to the truth. You're hearing it from the pulpit.
You can hear from other people.
It's an environment conducive to getting people saved. There's no there. I mean,
there's probably a couple of people here who are not ready to get the gospel,
but the vast majority of people here can give you the gospel at the drop of a
hat and not even break a sweat. You know what I mean?
They can just open up the Bible, get you saved because they know the truth.
But here's the thing being in close contact with them just by merely being here
will do nothing for you. Why?
Cause righteousness is not contagious like that. Romans four verse three says,
for what saved the scripture Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him
for righteousness. Now to him that worketh is the reward not working of grace,
but of debt, but to him that worketh not,
but believeth on him to justify the ungodly his faith is counted for
righteousness. I love this passage here. Verse six says,
even as David also described it,
the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputed righteousness
without works. Now that's a big word there imputed, right?
The doctrine of imputation is essentially referring to the fact that God
transmits his righteousness to you by your faith in Jesus Christ,
not by your works, not by your church attendance,
not by you repenting of your sin, doing good works,
trying to keep God's commands.
Righteousness can only be transmitted to you imputed to you by your faith in
Jesus. And you can do all kinds of works,
but righteousness is not contagious in that manner.
You can live the rest of your life, calling yourself a Christian.
You can live the rest of your life, going to church three days a week,
reading the Bible every single day and praying every single day and trying to
read the Bible every single day.
None of that will get you saved because righteousness can never be transmitted in
that way. It's not contagious like that.
You have to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And of course,
this is referring to salvation.
The reason we know that it's because verse seven says saying blessed are they
whose iniquities are forgiven. So what does the righteousness of God being
imputed upon you? What does it result in? The forgiveness of passions.
Then it says whose sins are covered, present sins. Verse eight,
blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sins. That's future sins.
So he's basically covering the entire scope of your sin and your iniquity,
your transgressions. He's paying for it all. You know, God doesn't go 50 50
with you, right? Well, let's just go 50 50. You know, you pay for your half.
I'll pay for my half. No, the blood of Jesus pays it in full. Okay.
Pays for past, present and future sins.
And obviously you have people out there that have this misconception that the
blood of Jesus only pays for our past sins,
but you're responsible for your future since folks,
all our sins are future relative to where Jesus Christ died on the cross.
All our sins are he died 2000 years ago on this earth.
So everything's future there after to him.
So he died paying for your entire life scope of sins.
Understand.
And so obviously there's various ways that the Bible describes salvation,
giving it, you know, God given to us eternal life, to live forever,
to resurrect, to never die.
But one great way that he describes it as, as having the forgiveness of sins.
And the reason that's a great way to describe it is because of the fact that,
you know, the wages of sin is death.
And so it's these past, present and future sins.
They're going to make you split hell wide open if you're not saved.
And so we need to be exonerated of those sins.
We need those sins to be completely wiped away.
And it doesn't happen by coming into close contact with spiritual things,
you know, relics and icons and idols coming into close getting baptized,
come in close contact with water and calling in a baptism,
pouring water over your head or whatever.
None of that stuff saves you because righteousness is not contagious.
You have to believe on Jesus Christ.
Go to John, Chapter four, if you would.
John, Chapter four, sin is caught.
Righteousness is not.
And in the context of salvation, you can live the most devoted,
quote unquote, godly life, a life of religious practice.
And that still will not transmit righteousness
to your account because that's just not the way it works.
That's not how God's economy works.
I look at John, Chapter four.
This, of course, is a story of the Samaritan woman.
She ends up getting saved by Jesus Christ.
Of course, Jesus is the one who wins her
himself, is what I'm saying, and she's excited.
And of course, she ends up going back to her city, to her town,
to proclaim the fact that this man is not only a prophet, but he's the Messiah.
And it says in verse thirty nine and many
of the Samaritans of that city believed on him for the saying of the woman which
testified, he told me all that I ever did.
So when the Samaritans were coming to him,
they besought him that he would tarry with them and he abode there two days.
And I want you to notice verse 41 and many more believed because of his own
word and said unto the woman, now we believe not because of thy saying,
for we have heard him ourselves and know that this is indeed the Christ,
the savior of the world.
This is a good example of the fact that even the people that we get saved or we
lead to Christ at the end of the day, they have to choose to believe on Jesus Christ.
They have to hear him for themselves.
And obviously we are the conduit by which they hear the gospel.
But it doesn't remove the importance
of them making the conscientious decision to believe on Jesus Christ.
They have to make that choice.
And, you know, that provides a level of comfort for us as soul winners,
because sometimes people don't get saved when we preach the gospel to them.
And we think, oh, man, is there something wrong with my gospel presentation?
Am I not eloquent enough?
Am I not given the right illustration?
But at the end of the day,
what it is, is that sometimes people just reject the truth.
And a great example of this particular principle is Judas, is it not?
Because was not Judas in close proximity to the truth for three and a half years?
And we don't know what was going through his mind.
We don't know if he literally thought
that righteousness was contagious, like just being with Jesus would just like
save him. But we do know that in Matthew seven, it gives a description of a man
who possibly, like Judas, will say to the Lord, Lord, Lord,
have we not prophesied in thy name and in thy name have cast out devils and in
thy name have done many wonderful works because we can say that Judas did all
those because he was an apostle and now a professor to them,
I never knew you'd depart from me. You either work in equity.
So doing those works, you know, participating in exorcisms,
doing many wonderful works. This guy thinks highly of himself. He's like,
I don't, I not only did works, I did many wonderful works, you know,
there's high quality stuff here. Okay. And I prophesied in your name, you know,
I was on the corner preaching with, uh, with the, uh,
a megaphone and I tried to proselytize and I did all these things and God's like,
my righteousness was never transmitted to you. I don't know.
And so we see that there. And of course,
Judas is a prime example of that being close to the Lord physically.
I mean like he has,
he could literally just grab salvation right there and he just never got saved.
Why? Because righteousness is not contagious like that.
Cause even as close as he was to Jesus Christ, I mean,
Jesus Christ ordained him to be an apostle. You know,
he basically was with him for three and a half years. He selected him.
Yet in spite of that, he still didn't get saved. He's burning in hell today. Why?
Because the Bible says in John chapter six,
he didn't believe from the beginning.
So that's showing us that in order for righteousness to be transmitted to
another person, you can literally be in the presence of Jesus Christ.
And that won't do anything to you. You have to believe on him.
And the proof of that is the fact that he was here 2000 years ago,
physically on this earth. And a lot of the Israelites did not get saved.
They read that he came into his own, his own received them.
Not showing us full well that many of them, you know,
rejected him, even though they're in close proximity to the Messiah, to the Christ.
Okay. And so salvation is not contagious.
People have to believe on Jesus Christ in order to be saved. And you know,
you have millions of people meeting together today and different congregations
and different buildings. And many of them, they're thinking to themselves this,
you know, I'm racking it up, racking up my righteousness right here. You know,
they, they think that just being there in that church,
being there in that particular place is going to somehow earn them some sort of
merit and favor with God. And it's just really what it's doing is making their
hell even hotter. So why would you say that? Well,
because of the fact that God does not take lightly when a person places
themselves in close proximity to the truth and does nothing with it or rejects
it. You understand what I'm saying?
If you're willingly placing yourself in a,
a geographical location of spiritual activity and you're still rejecting the
truth. You know, God doesn't take that lightly. He doesn't like that.
And so righteousness is not contagious, but let's talk to Christians. You know,
righteous living is not contagious either. So I'm with me, if you would go to
numbers, chapter 19 numbers, chapter 19, if you would placing Christians in an
optimal spiritual environment does not guarantee righteousness.
I hope you don't think that just because you're here at first works Baptist
church is somehow you're going to be like a super Christian now.
Now, everything in here is optimal for your spiritual growth, but I can't make
you do nothing.
I can't make you read your Bible.
I can't make you pray.
I can't make you soul in.
I can't make you come to church three times a week.
I can't make you like repent of sin.
Like you have to do those things.
I can yell at you for three hours a week and just be like, it says it right
here, listen, you know, and I can convey these truths.
Week in week out, but at the end of the day, righteousness is not contagious.
You know, I mean, I wish I can just throw a Bible at you.
That's it. That's how I wish I, I wish I could just throw a Bible at you.
And then it's just like the righteous living is just imputed, right?
I mean, wouldn't it be great if spirituality and righteousness was just
by osmosis, if every morning you just go, you know, I saw this video of this
Chinese kid and he was like studying and he was, he had a book and he was going,
he like flipped the page and he's like, he's like putting the knowledge into,
I don't know if it's an exercise he does. He probably did pass the class though.
I'll be honest with you. But you know, we, it doesn't work that way, right?
You know, it's not like, okay, I have the Bible.
Let me just sleep with the Bible under my pillow.
And somehow the knowledge of the Bible will be transmitted into my brain.
Doesn't work that way. Sin or righteousness is not contagious.
It's not going to be given to you just by coming into mere contact with it.
And you can have the right Bible. You can have the right church.
King James only fundamental Baptist church with the right doctrines,
optimal for spiritual growth.
It doesn't guarantee that you're going to be a righteous person because at the
end of the day you have to decide that this is how you're going to live.
And it's just like, Oh man, you know, new IFB churches are the best.
They're better than the old IFB churches, but hold on a second.
There might be some members in old IPP churches that are far more faithful than
you are to your new IPP church.
There might be some old IFB members working in very primitive conditions,
spiritually speaking, who actually read the Bible more than you do. Is that,
I guarantee you that is a very strong possibility and it might even be a reality
for many people. You know,
there's probably some old IPP church members that go to an old IPP church where
the preaching is just very watered down.
They probably get like a 20 minute sermon or something,
but they might apply more of that 20 minute sermon than you do to the hour
sermon. Why? Because righteousness is not contagious.
Placing you in an optimal environment does not make you an optimal Christian.
It's just, it's just conducive to your spiritual growth.
It may not be said that some old IPP members has more discipline than you do,
of course. That's, that's another challenge for another day, right? Like, well,
yeah, but they believe wrong. But you know what the things that did,
they do believe right. They're actually doing good with it.
You know what I mean?
The right environment will increase your chances of being a godly Christian.
Absolutely. And it's good to be in an optimal spiritual environment.
But at the end of the day, the pastor, the church member, you know,
we can only do so much to help you to be,
or to get to that destination of being pleasing in the eyes of God,
living a righteous life. Look at numbers 19.
This is the same passage in regards to cleanliness here.
Verse 18 says,
and a clean person shall take his up and dip it in the water and sprinkle it
upon the tent and upon all the vessels and upon the persons that were there.
And upon him that touched a bone or a slain or a debt or excuse me,
or one dead or a grave and the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean on
the third day and on the seventh day and on the seventh day he shall purify
himself and wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and shall be clean at
even. So what does it say? You know,
if an unclean person wants to be made clean,
he does require the aid of a priest, right?
Of the old Testament to aid him in being clean. And in fact,
the person who's clean has to go through like this entire list of things,
right? He has to sprinkle the tent, the vessels,
he's got to sprinkle the persons who are there. You know, he's got a,
whoever touched a bone or slain,
he's got to sprinkle it on the third day and then on the seventh day. I mean,
this guy's got to put a lot of work in. Look at verse 20,
but the man depth shall be unclean and shall not purify himself.
That soul shall be cut off from among the congregation because he had to file
the sanctuary of the Lord. The water of separation has not been sprinkled upon
him. He is unclean. You know, at the end of the day,
the unclean person has to make the decision to go to the clean person and be
sprinkled. Now, what is this a picture of? What's a picture of somebody,
whether that's the pastor or the member that exhorts you sprinkling you with
the word of God washing you by the water of the word on the third day, right?
This is like three services on Sunday.
I'm just like super soaking you guys with the word of God.
You come back Thursday night. I'm spraying you again. You come Thursday.
We pull out the book of Isaiah. I'm spraying you then.
But here's the thing is that at the end of the day you have to like actually
apply what's being said or first of all you have to just be here to get sprayed.
And so yeah, you know, it does require the aid of another person.
But at the end of the day, you know,
you have to recognize that you have to do your part to come to the priest.
You have to do your part to come to church. You have to do your part,
to just obey the Bible in order for that righteousness to be given to you or
for you to grow in righteousness. Look at verse 22 and whatsoever,
the unclean person touches shall be unclean and the soul, excuse me,
and the soul that toucheth it shall be unclean until even.
Let me read to you from Ephesians chapter five. This is of course,
in context to marriage, but it could be applied even to a church. It says,
husbands love your wives,
even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it that he may
sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word that he might
present it to himself, a glorious church,
not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing,
but that it should be holy and without blemish. Go to James chapter one,
if you would James chapter one. So what is the principle here?
The principle is this is that righteousness is not contagious,
even when it comes to a safe person. You know,
if you are going to benefit from the principles that are being put forth,
if you're going to benefit from the cleansing,
from the cleansing power of the Bible, you have to read it. You know,
it's just like, Oh man, this is such great water on Sunday,
but you got to like also pour that water on yourself even on Monday and then on
Tuesday and then on Wednesday,
you got to actually get up and read the Bible yourself,
put in the word to actually read through the Bible.
And let me just put this out there. You know,
every Christian in this building should be reading the Bible Genesis to
Revelation.
There should be no excuse why anybody in this building is not reading the
Bible. It's just like, well, I'm just too busy.
Then you're too busy because reading the Bible is one of the most highest
priorities of a Christian. Man should not live by bread alone,
but by every word that proceed out of the mouth of God.
And we need to steam the words of his mouth more than our necessary foods.
Well, you don't understand. I'm just going through a lot. Well, you know,
God can actually aid you through that trial if you read the Bible though.
And this is one of the greatest disciplines that you can adopt in the Christian
life is the discipline of reading the Bible every single day and stop putting it
off. He's like, well, I'm just tired. Then you know what?
Read it when you're not tired because you're not tired all day.
And if you are tired all day, then you know,
you need to get some exercise in or stop drinking so many energy drinks or I don't
know what you got to do, but you know, it should be a priority,
a priority that you give yourself the energy necessary to read the Bible,
put away the video games, close the social media, you know,
outlets and platforms.
If that's taking away a time from your Bible reading and read the Bible tomorrow,
wake up and make it a priority. Think about reading the Bible,
go home tonight and say tomorrow. I mean, tonight,
I'm going to think about reading the Bible tomorrow.
I'm going to think about the chapter that I'm going to be in tomorrow.
Are you making such a big deal about it? Yeah, because it is a big deal.
Cause in order for you to stop struggling with that particular sin or that
particular mindset or that conflict that you keep having,
probably it's because you're not reading the Bible enough.
The Bible is the answer to all of our life's problems, folks.
It gives a solution for everything. And so we need to be a church. Listen to me,
we need to be a church. Oh yeah, we're King James only, but, but you like,
can you read the King James though? I'm King James only.
I don't mess with that NIV ESV.
It sounds like you don't even mess with the KJV though,
because you don't even read it. Think about that.
And so renew yourself tomorrow and say, you know, I'm going to read them.
And even if it's like a chapter and if you're not even accustomed to reading a
chapter to read half a chapter,
do something and accumulate the discipline of reading the Bible every single day
because that is a way that righteousness can be transmitted unto you is by the
washing of the water of the word. Jesus said, sanctify them through thy truth.
Thy word is truth. You know, if you're struggling with your thoughts,
if you're struggling with fear, depression, discouragement,
it's often because you're putting too much trash in here and not enough
cleanliness in here. And this is, this is the cure. My friends,
this is what you need.
This is the food that your soul needs in order to function properly as a
Christian. You need to put the word of God in. And I understand, you know,
people get busy schedules, but sometimes we just need to be creative.
And then the day and age in which we live with the technology that we have,
you can be as creative as you want. You know, read, read,
read one chapter and then listen to another two chapters through audio,
Alexander score B. That's still, that's still counts.
Listening to the Bible counts. And it's just like, yeah,
but if I listen to the Bible, I'm not going to, you know,
I just have a hard time paying attention. Then pay attention.
See you come to church for good advice. That's good advice. Hey,
just pay attention. I just, my mind, my mind wanders. Don't let it wander.
Like you got to exercise those brain cells to do that.
Bring your body in subjection. Amen. And say, no, I'm going to pay attention.
I'm going to listen. And let's just be honest.
A lot of times people just get distracted because you just allow yourself to be
surrounded by distractions, social media, you know, music or whatever.
And so you need to be creative. Get in the Bible.
Look at James chapter one and verse 21 says here, wherefore lay apart,
all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness and receive with meekness,
the engrafted word, which is able to save your soul. So this is the exchange.
We need to make sure we cleanse ourselves from filthiness and super,
superfluity of naughtiness.
And we need to allow the word of God to be engrafted into us.
As we read it in here, it says in verse 22,
but be doers of the word and not hearers only deceiving your own selves.
For if any be a hearer of the word and not a doer,
he is likened to a man beholding his natural face in a glass.
We would say today like looking into a mirror, right?
For he beholdeth himself and goeth his way
and straightway forgetteth with manner of man he was.
But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty and continue with therein,
he be not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the word.
This man shall be blessed in his deeds.
Now, there's two ways to interpret verse 24 because we could say a person who
looks into the perfect law of liberty, excuse me, verse 23.
He's beholding his natural face in a glass, meaning that, you know,
he sees all his flaws when he reads the Bible. Right.
Like you read the Bible and you're like, man,
I need to work on this and you work on this and you see all the flaws.
But another way you can interpret this is that when you look into the perfect
law of liberty, you see the new man and you see that which is most important.
You see the spiritual matters are important.
You see that soul winning is important. You recognize that, you know,
everything here is temporal and we need to be living for the eternal.
But the problem is, is that once you walk away from that mirror,
you forget what manner of man you were. You just kind of go about your business.
So it sounds like God wants us to remember what we read.
And here's the best way to do it. Be a doer of the word, not a hero only.
One thing you'll notice is that when you actually do the things that you're
reading, it actually becomes a part of your life and you just don't forget it.
You know, that's why it's good to talk about the Bible. When you're in church,
just like just spark up a conversation about the Bible.
Don't be all weird about it. You know,
don't be giving me no weird interpretations of the Bible. You know,
some I don't want, you know,
if every interpretation is about end times, then you know,
you need to go to read like, you know, uh, Leviticus or something, you know,
get into a different genre of the Bible, you know, but Hey,
talk about the Bible though. Talk about the principles of the Bible. Why?
Because it actually helps you to engraft the word into your heart when you
actually talk about it.
Notice that the things that people more naturally talk about are the things or
the, the,
that they know are things that they most naturally talk about all the time.
You know, what if I just brought you up here and just talked about your favorite
hobby, you probably just be able to like rough about your job, a hobby that you
have, you know, whatever it is,
you can just speak out of the abundance of your heart. Cause it's there.
Well in like manner, God wants the word of God to be in your heart.
He wants you to be able to talk about it because the more we talk about it,
the more we realize that we can live in accordance to it. It's in your mind.
You make it a part of your household. You make a part of your life.
And this is how righteousness, righteous living can be transmitted to you.
Okay. And this is why, you know,
the Bible tells us not to allow filthy communication to come out of our mouths.
You know,
you need to replace some of your conversations with godly conversations.
And I'm not saying you have to be this hyper spiritual person,
but all you talk about is the Bible because after a while you just start running
out of things to talk about when it comes to the Bible, you know,
I'm not saying to talk about your job or hobbies are wrong.
I'm just saying that in order for you to allow for righteousness to be
transmitted to you, the best way to do it is to talk about it and take advantage
that you're in a church where that's like a normal thing.
Cause there's churches out there that that's not normal. They don't like that.
I've been in churches. If I talk about the most, you know, easiest passage,
it's just like, Oh man, you know, they're kind of like repelled by that.
They're just like, you know,
it's like taboo to talk about the Bible in church or something. You know,
you start talking about doctrine, you mentioned the word doctrine and it's just
like, Oh, you've been listening to the new IV, huh? It's just like, what?
And so righteous living needs to be transmitted via reading the Bible,
not just having a Bible, obeying the preaching,
not just listening to the preaching, you know, spiritual maturity.
How about spiritual maturity?
You can't be spiritually mature in this church just by coming here.
Will things rub off on you every once in a while? Yeah. But at the end of the day,
you have to actually implement the principles that are being put forth.
The Bible tells us in Proverbs 13 verse one,
a wise son heareth his father's instruction,
but a scorner heareth not rebuke. Proverbs 21 11 says,
when the scorner is punished, the simple is made wise.
And when the wise is instructed, he receiveth knowledge.
Let me ask you a question.
Would you consider yourself to be a wise person in that regard?
When you hear instruction, do you seek to obey that instruction?
Or do you think you know more than the instruction than those who are older than
you spiritually are given to you? Bible tells us in Proverbs 25 verse 12,
as an earring of gold and an ornament of fine gold.
So as a wise reprover upon an obedient ear.
It's a great passage there.
It's essentially saying that the wise reprover and the obedient ear kind of go
hand to kind of compliment each other to go hand in hand.
And when an obedient ear is willing to
listen to the instruction of a wise reprover, that wise reprover almost looks
like the ornament of gold on their ear, it just makes them look better.
And you know what's very attractive in a Christian?
Someone who is humble, takes correction,
takes instruction and is willing to keep growing.
What's unattractive is the prideful,
arrogant individual who can't learn anything.
You know, they need an ornament of gold, an ornament of fine gold.
A person who is humble, who takes instruction, who listens,
who is willing to keep learning.
That person, the Bible says, is like adorned with that ornament of fine gold
because they haven't attained perfect knowledge yet.
And they understand that.
Let me say this is that, you know,
being in a loving church will not make you more loving and friendly.
Oh, I love that other church because they were just so unloving.
What about you, though?
I mean, do you have to be in a loving church to be loving?
That's like your choice.
You know, and here's the thing.
I would consider our church to be very friendly and loving.
OK, I mean, that's what I think.
That's how I feel when I when I come here and when I observe others,
I feel like they're very kind and loving to other people.
But, you know, at the end of the day,
a man to have friends must show them so friendly, the Bible says.
So you can have a different perception of that.
But at the end of the day, it's because maybe you're not exercising and exerting
friendliness, being loving to others and kind to others.
Understand, because being in that type of environment doesn't really change you.
So the point that I'm making here is
the fact that, you know, righteousness is not contagious.
Don't think that just because you're
in the optimal environment for spiritual growth that somehow that's going to change
you, it can aid you, it can assist you, but it can't make things happen for you.
And the reason that's important is
because sometimes people leave church because they're like, oh, man, this church
is just not loving enough. I've had people say that.
I'm just not learning anything here.
Well, that's funny because there's a ton of other people that are.
And there's a ton of other people that feel loved.
Well, I just left that church because I'm just not making any friends.
Well, that's funny because there's a ton of people here to make friends with other people.
That's conflicting data.
So, you know, who's lying here?
Well, I just I'm just going to leave here
because I just feel like people don't really care for me or something.
Well, here's the thing is that Christian
life is not about being cared for, but by caring for others, really.
So you have your your Christian philosophy kind of mixed up there because here's
the thing, you know, obviously we want to be cared for.
Obviously, we want people to love us.
But the Bible does not say go to church to be loved by others.
The Bible does not say go to church expecting for others to love you.
Now, that's what the modern church will tell you.
You know, select your congregation based upon all these.
You know, what do they have to offer your kids?
What ministries are there for the kids?
What kind of activities do you have to offer?
Well, do you have a Christian school?
How well, how are the cell groups?
All these things that the Bible doesn't even talk about.
And I'm not saying they can't be used for good, but let's just be honest here.
You know, people put that as a priority
and they don't put enough priority in what they can do for the church.
Because really what the way it should be viewed is like, I'm going to come to church
and see who I can be a blessing to not look for someone to bless me.
Right. Like come to church and say, all right, let's see.
Maybe you can bless me a little bit.
But he kind of failed last week, so I don't know.
Oh, there's Miss Courtney.
Maybe I can talk to her.
And she kind of offended me last time.
Like, you just come here.
She didn't, by the way.
How's that rocket?
I'm just joking.
She knows I'm playing.
You know, you come here looking for someone to help you.
What we should do is come here looking to help someone.
And if everyone just cares that attitude, then we get we get to help and be helped.
We get to bless and be blessed.
We get to love and be loved.
Why? Because the selfless attitude is what God wants us to have.
And so in order in order for you to view this church as a loving church,
why don't you do it first?
Be the change that you want to see in this world.
Can't believe I just said that one time it actually applies.
Righteousness is not contagious.
You know, having a godly marriage is not contagious.
Just because you come to a church that maybe you see some marriages that are
godly doesn't mean that yours is going to be this way because you have to put in
the work to do that. You have to put in the work to actually love your wife and,
you know, love your husband and reverence your husband.
You actually have to apply the principles that those successful couples did apply.
And that's why they have a successful marriage.
You know, being here and the optimal environment will help you,
but it cannot make you to have a godly marriage or raise godly kids. You're like,
yeah, but you don't understand my marriage. Folks, let me just say this.
All marriages are the same. Okay. With various levels of degrees,
but most part they all experienced somewhat the same problems.
Maybe some change based upon how violent it gets. I don't know. You know,
that's a possibility. But to you, I say duck. It's just like, yeah,
but you don't know my husband. He says all these things getting in line.
Cause you know what?
I can point to a bunch of other wives who say things to their husbands and I
can point to a bunch of husbands say things to their wives. And you know what?
That's how marriage is. I'm not saying that that's right to do.
I'm just saying that's how marriage is. We don't have,
we're not in heaven right now. You guys understand that? Like, this is like,
you know, this is spiritual warfare here, you know, sometimes.
So never have this unrealistic expectation of marriage that you're not going to
have any conflict, you know, oh man, my wife cussed me out.
16 stones may break my bones, but cuss words will never hurt me,
but she's a Christian and all. I mean, I'm just telling you,
I'm not saying that my wife cusses me out cause I don't even know.
I don't even know if she knows cuss word, but you know, but the thing is,
you know, we've gotten in some tips, you know,
she hasn't swung at me yet or anything cause I'll just, I'm just joking.
I'm joking. Okay. Put her down real quick. I'm kidding.
But you know what? We've had some trials. Yeah, of course.
We've had some hard trials.
We've had some extremely hard trials where it just kind of brought us down to
our knees and it was very difficult and we felt like the world was falling apart
around us where I felt like, you know, it's just like,
is this what marriage is? Like this is so hard. And so that's, you say,
but you're the pastor. Yeah. You know what? And you're the church member.
And guess what? We both have conflicts in marriage and I'm not saying my wife's
leaving me anytime soon or anything like that. We, we have a great marriage.
My wife loves me and I love her. And you know, we're best friends.
I'm just saying that, you know,
even a godly marriage doesn't come without its fights physical or not.
You know what I mean? I'm just, you're going to have some conflicts in marriage.
And you know what? Just being in church with, you know,
a good example of a pastor and his pastor's wives and they have a great
marriage doesn't mean that you're going to have that because of the fact that
you actually have to put in the work to make it work. Okay.
Don't look at my grass and be like, wow, that grass is nice. Yeah.
But you know what? I've had to like mow it. I've had to, you know, take,
I don't know anything about landscaping.
You gotta do the things that like Margo's does and stuff, you know,
like you gotta take it and Jacob, you know, you gotta take care of it.
I do all that stuff. Gotta, gotta fertilize it, put in work, blood, sweat,
tears. You gotta do all those things to make it look like that.
And then you just look over the fence. You're like, man, must be nice. No,
it's not nice all the time because it takes work.
You just didn't see when I was putting work and when my wife was putting work
to make it work.
You just happen to look over the fence and see all the green grass,
but you can have that green grass. And in fact,
you can have it even greener if you actually put in the work for it.
What I'm saying is looking over the fence and looking at my green grass will
not make your grass greener either. You have to fertilize it, work on it. And,
and you know, because righteousness, godly living, godly marriage is not contagious.
You actually have to put in the work for it. And don't look, let's listen to me.
Cause we've got a lot of young couples here, you know,
cut out the word quit from your mouth and from the dictionary, from your marriage.
There is no quit. Stop acting like it's the apocalypse or something.
Every time you go through some trial with your spouse, folks look,
I'm in a household with five kids.
It feels like every night I come home with the apocalypse.
It's like the great tribulation every single time. It's like war with the saints.
Get used to it. Don't quit. It's just like, I don't know if this is going to work.
Oh really? What's the alternative then? Is there all the alternative?
Are you implying that you want to leave each other or something?
Cause that's not an option. If thou faint in the day of adversity,
thy strength is small. That's what the Bible says. And you know what?
When I read that it kind of like pokes in my ego a little bit to maybe not want
to quit. I don't want to say it. I don't want my strength to be small. You know?
So you just push through it. So you know,
when you're going through a hard time in your marriage,
that's not an indicator that you picked the wrong person because you guys are
married and now it's the right person and you guys are God's will for each
other now. But just because you go through a hard time, it's not an indicator.
Oh yeah, this is, this is it. I'm going to quit.
She threw a frying pan at me or something. No, it's just an indicator of one.
Do you need to work things out? And two, you need to duck or hide the frying pan.
You just need better solutions, but it should never be.
We need to reconsider this. Never use the D word in your marriage. Amen.
Divorce and say, Oh man, you know,
I think I'm just going to get divorced or something. That's nonsense.
That's stupid. You're allowing the world to influence your mind.
You're being weak is what you are. Can I just be honest with you?
You're just being weak. You're weak minded. Your soul is being weak.
Your flesh is weak and you need to strengthen yourself.
You need to gird up the loins of your mind and get with the program.
And you know what?
Start applying biblical principles to your marriage because success
does not happen overnight. You need to work at it. And I promise you,
if you just work at it, you'll look five years, five years. Yeah, five years.
I mean, aren't you planning to be married for like more than that?
You'll look five years from now and say, you know,
I'm so glad that I actually applied these principles and now we have a godly
successful marriage. And now when we fight, I know it's coming.
So I hide the frying pans and all the sharp objects.
And now I don't have to take a trip to the hospital after, you know,
what I'm saying is that godly marriages are not contagious.
You have to actually put in the work. Raising godly kids is not contagious.
You got to put in the work. All right, go back to Haggai chapter two.
So principle number one is that righteousness is not contagious.
Principle number two is the most obvious. And that is that sin is contagious.
Sin can contaminate you by simply coming into contact with it.
Children of Israel could bring the uncleanliness from Babylon and contaminate
the land. You know, the, the, the saying is true.
One bad apple can spoil the whole bunch.
This is why the Bible is very strict on church discipline.
Then when someone is involved in the particular sins highlighted in first
Corinthians chapter five, according to the Bible,
it's like little leaven that's going to live in the whole lump.
It's going to contaminate the church,
which is why God wants us to extract that person from the congregation.
If they're not willing to go to the cleansing process, right?
Then you got to remove them because then they'll contaminate other people.
This is why you have churches where fornication is rampant because the pastor
is not sprinkling the word. He's not exercising church discipline.
He's making empty threats. There's no empty threats here.
You either get it right or you got to go.
It says in Haggai 2 13 then said Haggai have one that is uncleaned by a dead
body. Touch any of these.
Shall it be unclean to the priest answered and said it shall be on clean.
Now, how do we apply this for the next 10 minutes?
Let me give you some applications here.
Contamination when it comes to the company you keep.
It's important to have Christian friends, people that you're close to that are
Christian. You know,
obviously you're going to associate with people who are unsaved.
We live in an unsafe world. That's just how it is.
But the close company that you keep,
I believe the Bible teaches that they should be Christians. Why?
Because you have a job to do as a Christian.
And part of that job is that you need to be clean, right?
You need to be righteous.
And if you're constantly around the wrong type of people that are going to
tempt you to do the wrong type of things, then guess what?
That person is going to end up contaminating you.
The Bible tells us he that walketh with wise men shall be wise,
but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.
If you're constantly around short tempered people,
you're going to be a short tempered person.
The Bible tells us make no friendship with an angry man and with a furious man
thou shalt not go, lest thou learn his ways, the Bible says,
and get a snare to thy souls. Hey, if you are around mukbang people,
the older people don't even know what I'm talking about. They're just like,
excuse that a gang, you know,
mukbang are the people like who just like eat a lot. You know, those,
those videos or they're just, it's typically Asians. Let's just be honest.
You know, you know, they're just eating. They're really skinny Asians too.
You know, it's like, where does it all go?
But they're eating just an inordinate amount.
If you're constantly watching that stuff, you're going to be a mukbanger.
Cause it says be not among winebibbers among righteous eaters of flesh for the
drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty and drowsiness shall clothe the
man with rice. Hey, if you, if your closest friends are lazy,
you're going to be lazy. If your closest people are just apathetic,
lazy, drowsy,
they just want to play video games all day and do just vain things.
That's how you're going to be. My father-in-law used to tell me,
I know the kind of person you will be based upon in five years,
based upon the people that you're with and the books that you read.
And that's true. You show me your close friends.
I'll tell you what kind of person you're going to be in the next five years.
Why? Because they're bad habits will contaminate you.
Turn with me if you would to Acts chapter 14, Acts chapter 14.
Let me read to you from Proverbs 1 verse 10. It says,
"My son of sinners enticed thee, consent thou not. If they say,
come with us, let us lay wait for blood.
Let us lurk privily for the innocent without cause.
Let us swallow them up alive as the grave and whole as those that go down into
the pit. We shall find all precious substance.
We shall fill our houses with spoil. Cast in thy lot among us.
Let us all have one purse. My son, walk not thou in the way with them,
refrain thy foot from their path for their feet run to evil and make haste to
shed blood." The Bible says in Acts chapter 14, look what it says,
"But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles and made their minds evil.
Evil affected against the brethren." Let me say this in this regard,
you know, gossiping is contagious and we need to make sure I didn't hear anything
by the way, cause you know, I don't listen to gossip. I'm just kidding.
You know,
we need to make sure that gossip doesn't become a practice in our church where
people talk bad about other people. Why?
Because you can make someone's mind evil affected against someone else.
And as a pastor, I've seen it in our church, not recently,
but in the life I'll just say in the lifespan of our church,
since our church has started, I've seen this where literally, listen to me,
literally you have like a little click, right?
You have a little click forming in the church and these people are just always
around each other. They're just kind of always, they're just, that's their,
that's their, you know, mukbang, you know,
and you know what happens is that they become,
they start to get critical about other people in the church.
You start to get critical about the leadership and about the pastor and I
literally see people getting like recruited into that group and then they come
out just as bad as those other people.
And I've literally seen like the countenance of people change.
The longer they're around a particular person or it's just like, and then they're,
they're, they're fire dies out.
They don't have a desire for the things of God.
They don't even walk around with a smile on their face anymore in our church.
That's happened before. And in my mind, I'm like, Oh,
this person has been contaminated because they're around this group of people
who are just constantly criticizing and are negative towards the stances of the
church. My stances, what I teach, they're negative against others.
They think like they're the superior model of Christians in the church or
something. And they contaminate others.
And I've seen some people in our church is just like, Oh,
they've been contaminated because they,
their countenance is not as they were before. Like they just kind of seem sad now,
critical, angry, sad.
But what's funny is that once that contaminated group leaves,
now the people are back to normal again. They're actually pleasant to be around.
And I've seen the transition how just like you remove the uncleanness from that
person's, the, the, the, the, that company. And then that person begins to change.
And now, you know what? Now they come to church. Now they're like happy.
I see their teeth now because they smile. They have like joy in their life.
They it's like, it's like they're like a Christian or something. You know,
they shake hands, they get involved in the conversations, you know,
cause you ever notice that people have like a brightness about their face when
they talk to you? Like you see them, they're just like,
you guys know what I'm talking about or you guys, are you guys all just miserable?
You know, obviously there's people who just have that, that face, right?
It's just like, I don't want to say, you know, you know what I'm talking about.
You know what, you know, you know the phrase I'm trying to say,
but I cannot say cause it's a pulpit person in our church taught me what that
was one time. And I was just like, that's a great way to describe it.
I shall add that to my repertoire of things, of definitions, you know,
it's just like, but there's other people who are just like, they're bright eyed,
they're happy. They're just kind of like filled with joy. Well,
now they're back to that again. And if I could say like,
what was the determining factor? It's people,
the company that they keep because you end up adopting the bad disposition
and attitudes of the people that you're around every single time.
They're constantly critical. They're downers. They're just always angry,
upset, bitter. You're going to be like that person. Why?
Cause bitterness springs up and troubles the people around them.
So if you're around a bitter person, you will be a bitter person.
You will be just angry and sad and depressed and just like you come to
church and you're just like, you know, anyway, in my opinion, it's just like,
I kind of want to tell them to just stay home. I don't want to look at your face.
Look at your bitter face and just stay home or wear a mask or something because
we want to be around happy people. Why don't we be around people who enjoy
themselves? Right. And luckily we don't have people like that anymore.
We did in times past and now people seem to be happy once again. Why?
Because of the fact that you know sin is contagious. That's why. A bad attitude is
contagious. Gossip is contagious. Having a negative disposition and a critical
attitude towards the church, towards leadership, towards others is very much
contagious. Now obviously we should have a negative attitude towards false
prophets, false religion, wicked individuals. God wants us to have a
negative disposition towards them but not towards God's people and God's
church. Don't allow your mind to be evil affected by others and the way you can
do this stay away from those people. Okay I'm gonna skip some things here. Two
minutes. Go to Esther chapter 1. Hey covetousness is contagious. If
you're constantly around people who talk about money, talk about possessions,
that's all you're gonna think about and you're gonna end up being a covetous
person. You're gonna have the love of money. The Bible tells us that. Fear is
contagious. If you are constantly listening to a bunch of
fear-mongering podcasts, YouTube videos, or even people in our church you will
become a fearful person. I have no interest in that. You know, God did not
give us a spirit of fear but a power love and a sound mind and we need to
make sure we stay away from that. In fact, let me read to you from Deuteronomy 20
before we get into Esther. Deuteronomy 20 verse 8 says, "And the officer shall
speak further unto the people and they shall say, 'What man is there that is
fearful and faint-hearted? Let him go and return into his house, lest his
brethren's heart faint as well as his heart.'" So whenever they go to war it's
just like, all right, let's see a raise of hands. Who's afraid? And everyone raises, a bunch of
people raise their hands like, are you guys going home? You guys can't go to war with
us because you are a liability. Because if we're on the battlefield and you're
being a wuss, you're gonna make your the guy on the left and on the right as
afraid as afraid as you are because fear is contagious. And so stay away from
fearful talk. Stay away from fear-mongering, especially this year. Some
of you need to go on a fast of politics. Fast all that stuff. Well then I'm not
gonna know what's going on. Yeah good. Because you can't change your life
whether you know about it or not. You're still gonna be like the same person. The
only difference is if you pay attention to that stuff you're just gonna be a
fearful person and it's gonna be annoying. All right here's the last one. Is
feminism is contagious? It is. Being effeminate is contagious too but having
feministic characteristics is contagious. And this is why we have to teach what
the Bible says about the roles of a man and a woman. And you know what you may
not agree with this but this is a Christian Church. We do believe the Bible
here so you should not be surprised that you're gonna hear something like this.
Feminism is a disease. You know and a lot of people in the world are kind of
waking up to that. You have some guy give a speech at a college or something
everyone's like "wow you said that women should stay home and you know and
be mothers and all that" and they're all like happy about that and it's just like
dude we've been saying that for years. You're late. But you know why people are
saying that now? It's because of the fact that they know how poisonous feminism
really is. Look what the Bible says. Let me just give you a couple verses here.
Esther 1.16 says, "And Mamukin answered before the kings and the princes, Vashti
the queen hath not done wrong to the king only, but also to all the princes
and to all the people that are in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus. For this
deed of the queen shall come abroad unto all women, so that they shall despise
their husbands in their eyes when it shall be reported. The king Ahasuerus
commanded Vashti the queen to be brought in before him but she came not. Likewise
shall the ladies of Persia and Media say this day unto all the king's princes
which have heard of the deed of the queen thus shall there arise too much
contempt and wrath. It's basically saying like Vashti is gonna cause the women of
the land to essentially try to usurp the authority of their husbands because of
her actions. Why? Because feminism is contagious. Rebellion is contagious and
you know what we need to make sure regardless of what the world is
promoting even if the world is promoting traditional trad wives make the Bible
your standard of what that means not what they're saying and and look you
need to take credit too by the way and be like this guy's late these women are
late don't let them be your teacher you already knew this if you believe the
Bible your standard is higher than that if you believe the word of God you know
the world is gonna take credit for as though it's like a new thing happening
new things been happening for thousands of years what are you talking about new
thing Christians have always done this we're instant in season out of season it
just so happens that it's popular now we did it before it was popular there's
certain trends it's like don't you feel good when you're like I did that before
it was popular you know I don't know what's a trend out there that's like now
it's popular but you've like always done it can someone think of one fishing is
fishing popular now well you know what Jesus Jesus fished and so did the
disciples so yeah well what was another one carnivore diet oh man you're treading
on everyone's just like yeah what else I said I said popular no yeah hey hiking
yeah all right there's certain things that just become trendy to do and you
think to yourself like I've been doing this for years well you know what the
world can promote biblical concepts as though like it's a novel new thing but
you know what that's gonna die out with them and we're gonna continue to do it
because we do things not because they're popular but because they're
Biblical that's the bottom line and so you know what if they are out there
Promoting trad wives and traditional families or whatever just know we got it first
So the Bible always promoted but the point that I'm making here is that feminism is contagious?
And so it's important for us to continue to promote what a godly marriage is what the role of a man is
What the role of a woman is what the role of the children are and maintain that?
Unit as the way the Bible puts it right maintain those principles and not waiver on it
Because you know what these people are gonna do in the world. They're gonna take that trick
I guarantee you anybody who's pushing the trad family trad wife thing. There's loopholes in what they're doing
I guarantee they make all kinds of exceptions. I guarantee you. It's not even it probably doesn't even line up to what the Bible says
They would look at us and be like, oh you guys are just radicalists
Yeah, I saw some guy on YouTube and he's just like he's promoting orthodoxy to this to this Christian guy
He claims to be a Christian
I don't even know if he's safe, but he the guy responded or he said, you know Protestants typically
They're just like Sola Scriptura, you know, but we're we're about Sola Scriptura and traditions, right?
and then the Christian was just like I don't know anybody who wouldn't agree with that like obviously it's Sola Scriptura
But it's also traditions as well and only the only people who I know he said that are like all about only the Bible or like
Fundamentalists or something like yeah, you got it, right?
You got it, right? So he even understands because he's a Protestant talking to an Orthodox, which is basically, you know
devil and devil light
They're both undermining the Word of God. He said well, they believe in both. No, no, if they're adding traditions
That means they're undermining the Word of God. That's code for
Traditions are more important than the Word of God bottom line, but I'm thankful that this guy recognizes the only people I know they
Believe in that solar scriptural where they only believe in the Bible or like these radical fundamentalists. That's what he said
I'm like right on we're that probably a man. What's the sermon today?
The sermon is simply this is that righteousness is not contagious. Make sure that you're working on yourself and
You're placed in an optimal environment
With the Word of God with the best type of people that can help you grow take advantage of that
and also be aware
Beware of the fact that sin is contagious
Watch the company you keep watch the things you listen to watch the things you listen
Do you watch and that you listen to why because all that stuff can just latch on to you like a bedbug
Master hitchhikers of this world and you know what? That's how sin is too. Amen. Let's pray father
we thank you so much for your word and
Thank you for the principles thereof Lord pray help us as your people to
Take things to heart and recognize that we cannot just be good Christians by osmosis just because we grew up in a Christian home
Doesn't mean that salvation will be granted to us just by transmission
We you know people need to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ individually and not only that but just righteous living in general Lord
Help us as your people to recognize that we cannot ride on the coattails of a church or of other godly people
we need to put in the work to become godly ourselves and may you help us to be vigilant and aware of
the pitfalls of sin and recognize that even the
Smallest of sins can destroy us as the foxes that spoil the vine Lord
I pray you bless us as we go on our way bless the fellowship the soul winning and all there is we love you
We thank you pray these things in Jesus name. Amen
Songbooks is song number 288. I am resolved song number 288