You
Good afternoon everybody and welcome to steadfast Baptist Church
It's great to see everybody here tonight. I'm gonna find our seats. We will go ahead and get started
Once you've found a seat grab a hymnal and for our first song we'll go to song number 17
Song number 17
One day
Song number 17, let's all sing it out together
to serve you and such a wonderful place to do it Lord thank you for all the
souls that were saved this afternoon and all our efforts here Lord we love you
we just ask you to bless this church and bless the service and it's just Jesus
name we pray amen all right for our next song let's go song number 60 song number
you
instead of as Baptist Church, if you did not already get a bulletin, you can lift your hand.
There was meant to be our Philippines...
Mission update letter this morning. I think we missed it. I apologize, but we do have it for this evening
So I was going to go over that real quick, but our evangelist Duncan or Bannock in the Philippines
Tries to give us a monthly update
And so he has this you can read through it and you can read through his prayer requests
I'm not going to read the entire thing, but he says that for the month of March. They were able to get
581 salvations which
is honestly incredible, especially considering that he'd been traveling and everything like that.
So I guess he took it seriously that we're competing with him.
And he's going hard. But you know what? I like that. I like that iron sharpens iron.
And if we can encourage our evangelists to do more work, then that's we're doing the right thing.
He has a lot of other information there. They're going to be starting a church plant
service over there. And we'll be probably just renting a small space doing just a not
All the time services, there's occasional services over there
and just kind of see what kind of receptivity we have to church services
and if people like it.
And, you know, when it comes to church planting...
I hope people have the right attitude and the right mindset
that in a lot of cases, you know, church planting is a trial and error process
and that not all church plants end up becoming successful, not all of them work, not all of them are great area.
And to me, like, we should always be willing to adapt and evolve and change
and so when we're doing church planting, we want to pray that it's successful,
but we want to have that attitude of we're just always sowing seed
and whatever the Lord blesses that ends up coming to fruition, if it doesn't.
Well, you know, we just want to be able to be willing to adapt and change.
Not all churches will live forever.
Churches come and go and, you know, that's just life.
it's not necessarily a big deal, and we can at least celebrate whatever work a church accomplishes
for whatever time being it has, and so we just need to have the right mentality that church plants,
pastors, churches, these things, they change, they ebb and flow, and we just want to be used of God
when we have those opportunities and, you know, bless the Lord. So we're looking at trying to do
some church work over there. We don't know what the Lord is going to do.
But, you know, you're never gonna accomplish anything
if you don't try.
And so, you know, we can appreciate the people
that are at least trying
and putting some effort and energy into it
because it's harder than it looks
and church planting is harder than it looks,
pastoring is harder than it looks,
being in advantage is harder than it looks.
And so we wanna make sure that we're encouraging people
and helping them and coming alongside of them
and doing good and whatever the Lord wills
will allow him to do that for us.
So just to give you an update.
He's got some prayer requests there on the back and continue to pray for their soul-winning efforts.
I know our brother James over there has been doing a lot of soul-winning too.
Pray for him and pray for the other people that are over there.
On the inside of our bulletin, we have announcements about service times, soul-winning times.
Down below is church stats.
On the right, we have a list of expecting ladies.
We have upcoming events.
Kids choir practice.
Looks like we're getting really close to this wrapping up
and we'll be able to enjoy the fruits
of our labor for Easter.
So I'm really looking forward to hearing our kids practicing.
My wife's been saying that they've been doing
a really good job and I appreciate you parents
for participating and being involved in that.
Spring Swap is April 13th, Mansfield Soaring 19th.
The Scott baby showers on the third.
There's some details on the back about that.
A Mother's Day brunch, May 10th.
And of course, you're welcome to invite your mother
or any other ladies in your family if they would like to attend.
We just want to make sure you do sign up for that
so that we can anticipate how many people to plan for.
And then down below, Church Reminders, Quiet Time
is from two to four every Sunday.
Of course, that first hour or so might be bumped right now
just because of kids' choir, but we still want to.
to try and observe that and respect that.
No running or rough playing in the church.
Children shouldn't be on our stage area or in the kitchens
area, the children should also not be
in our mother baby room areas.
The fellowship room is not a play area.
Children should be not using church supplies unnecessarily.
Make sure we're cleaning up after ourselves.
Water bottles are for soul winning.
Parents, please watch your kids, and then children, please obey the adults and the ushers in our services.
We also have on the back is the notes about the baby shower.
It's for the Scots and their baby boy, which is very exciting.
Please, if you'd like to bring a dessert or a side dish, let Ms. Milstead know.
You can RSVP to her, and then if you'd like to get them a gift, they are registered on Amazon.
We have several prayer requests down below. Please be in prayer for our church family.
If you have any updates or if you would like to modify that, please just email us and we'd love to update our bulletin on prayer requests.
That's all I have as far as evening.
We're going to go to our Psalm 119, which is in our Psalm Binders, Psalm 119.
If you can get those out.
All right, that was Psalm 119.
Psalm 119, let's all sing it out together.
Yeah, stay full.
Thank you, guys, thank you.
I'll test them all.
chapter number 17. That's the book of Luke chapter number 17.
Luke chapter 17 the Bible says then said he unto the disciples it is impossible but that
offenses will come but woe unto him through whom they come it were better for him that a millstone
were hanged about his neck and he cast into the sea than that he should offend one of these little
ones take heed to yourselves if thy brother trespass against thee rebuke him and if he repent forgive
And if he trespass against these seven times in a day,
and seven times in a day turn again to thee,
saying, I repent, thou shalt forgive him.
And the apostle said unto the Lord, increase our faith.
And the Lord said, if ye had faith
as a grain of mustard seed,
ye might say unto this sycamine tree,
be thou plucked up by the root
and be thou planted in the sea.
And it should obey you.
But which of you having a servant plowing or feeding cattle will say unto him by and by when he has come from the field
Go and sit down to meet and will not rather say unto him make ready wherewith I may sup and gird thyself and serve me till
I have eaten and drunken and
Afterward thou shalt eat and drink doth he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him. I trow not
So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, we are unprofitable servants, for we have done that which was our duty to do."
And it came to pass as he went to Jerusalem that he passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee, and as he entered into a certain village there met him ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off.
and they lifted up their voices and said Jesus master have mercy on us and when
he saw them he said unto them go show yourselves under the priests and it came
to pass that as they went they were cleansed and one of them when he saw
that he was healed turned back and with the loud voice glorified God and fell
down on his face at his feet giving him thanks and he was a Samaritan and Jesus
There are not found that return to give glory to God save this stranger and he said unto him arise go thy way thy faith
That's made thee whole and when he was demanded of the Pharisees when the kingdom of God should come
He answered them and said the kingdom of God cometh not with observation
Neither shall they say low here or low there for behold the kingdom of God is within you and when he said unto the disciples
The days will come
When ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of man and ye shall not see it and they shall say to you see here
Or see there go not after them nor follow them for as the lightning that lighteneth out of the one part under heaven
Shineth unto the other part under heaven so shall also the Son of man be in his day
But first he must suffer many things and be rejected of this generation and as it was in the days of Noe
So shall it be also in the days of the Son of Man they did eat they drank they married wives
They were given in marriage until the day that Noe entered into the Ark
and the flood came and destroyed them all.
Likewise, also as it was in the days of Lot,
they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold,
they planted, they built it.
But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom,
it rained fire and brimstone from heaven.
destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is
revealed. In that day he which shall be upon the house top and his stuff in the
house, let him not come down to take it away. And he that is in the field, let
him likewise not return back. Remember Lot's wife.
Whosoever shall seek to save his life shall lose it and whosoever shall lose his life shall preserve it
I tell you in that night there shall be two men in one bed
The one shall be taken and the other shall be left two women shall be grinding together
The one shall be taken and the other left two men shall be in the field
The one shall be taken and the other left and they answered and said unto him where Lord and he said unto them
Wheresoever the body is the other will the eagles be gathered together. Let's pray
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for steadfast Baptist Church.
Thank you for the souls that were saved today.
I ask you to bless Evangelist Urbanik
and the church plant that he's doing.
Please bless the sermon now.
Fill Pastor Shelley with your Holy Spirit
and remove distractions so we can attend to your word.
Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
I want to look at an interesting part of scripture here.
Look at verse number seven.
The Bible says, but which of you having a servant plowing
or feeding cattle will say unto him by and by
when he has come from the field?
Go and sit down to meet.
And will not rather say in Him,
Make ready, wherewith I may sup,
And gird thyself, and serve me,
Till I have eaten and drinking, or drunken,
And afterward thou shalt eat and drink.
Doth he thank that servant, because he did the things
That were commanded him?
I tro not.
Now,
Here in verse number nine, I'm kind of getting the essence of the idea for my sermon this evening
but you see that this servant is almost expecting to be thanked for the work that he does and
Jesus says clearly, I tro not now tro's kind of a
Word that we don't use normally. It just means think so it's like I think not is what he's saying
He's just saying like no
He does not deserve a thank you.
And really what you kind of see in essence
is that Jesus is getting at a particular attitude
and I'm kind of continuing my bad attitudes series again
tonight, but I want to talk about the attitude
of being entitled, of being entitled.
Now I want to caution you, okay?
First of all, you said you liked hard preaching.
We're gonna test that theory.
Now I want to say this some of the things I'm gonna say tonight
I guarantee everyone in here will like some of the things I say
Like you there's gonna be part of the sermon that you're thinking like yes, that person needs to hear that
But there also will most likely be parts that you might think is he talking about me
And I just want to tell you right now, yes I am, okay?
And I want you to challenge yourself to say,
hey, maybe I might be having an attitude of entitlement
in certain areas of my life and I need to work on that.
And we all need to work on it.
We can all become entitled about certain things.
And I think we need to challenge ourselves
to not have this attitude,
but rather have a humble attitude
and not allow entitlement to spoil us.
And I'll just be honest with you,
I love spoiling people, and I'm not saying it in the sense that I want them to actually be spoiled.
I'm just simply saying like, that's just kind of a phrase we use.
What I'm trying to say is like, people that I really like and people I really care about,
I like to do a lot of good things for them.
I like to, you know, give them things that they don't necessarily need, do extras for.
can happen as a result of that is people become spoiled.
People become entitled when someone
that they're hanging around with is very generous,
very kind, does a lot of good things for them,
that they end up becoming very entitled.
And because God is so good
and because God does so many good things for us,
it's very easy for us to be entitled.
As Americans, because God has blessed our nation
in so many ways,
easily in comparison to other parts of the world. And because we live in Texas we could
become very entitled. It's almost like the more prosperous you are, the more blessings
you've had, the more good things you receive. It just makes it easier for you to be entitled.
If you are raised where your parents made good money, you're well off.
or you had maybe just a lot of privileges,
it could cause you to be entitled.
If you got to go to a preppy school,
you know this is the idea of the preppy school
or you went to a preppy college,
you can get this entitlement attitude.
If your parents gave you a lot of handouts as a kid,
or you're a trust fund baby,
you can get to become very entitled.
But here's another thing.
You could have this happen spiritually.
Maybe someone's greatly blessed you spiritually
and given you a lot of wonderful things spiritually
and then become spiritually entitled.
Or perhaps you go to a really awesome church
that spoils you in a lot of ways.
and then you become really entitled
from a lot of the things that you've received.
So we'll talk about a lot of these concepts here,
but let's dig in this passage for a moment.
Hopefully you're not too offended yet, all right?
Look at verse seven again.
But which of you having a servant plowing or feeding cattle
will say in him,
buy and buy when he's come from the field,
go and sit down to meet?
So he's basically saying,
why would I have a servant and then basically serve him?
You know, like, hey, I know you're hungry.
You go ahead and eat.
I'm not gonna eat.
No, no, no, he's basically saying the servant
is there to serve the master.
And so in a sense, the servant is gonna be the one
that prepares the meal for the master first, right?
That's why he says in verse eight,
and will not rather say in him,
make ready wherewith I may sup,
and gird thyself and serve me
till I have eaten in drunken,
and afterward thou shalt.
eat and drink. So again, the servant should be doing his job, serving the master. This is just what
makes sense. Verse 9, Dutty, thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him.
I think not, or I tro not. So are you entitled to being thanked for doing what's expected of you?
Biblically, the answer is no.
You know like how many people go to work and feel like they should just be thanked by their boss for just going to work
But you made an agreement with them to be paid. That was that was what you agreed to
So you are entitled to the paycheck that you've agreed to
But you're not entitled to a thank you for just doing exactly what you're agreed to be paid to do
And you know our culture has destroyed this today
And I'm thinking like, you just did your job.
Why do I have to give you a tip because you did your job?
Now again, I know that in the restaurant culture in America,
we have tipping as a thing,
and it's just kind of becoming grain in the culture.
I'm not gonna fight that too much,
but it's almost like they're extending this
to every service, every business, every idea.
It's like you gotta tip everyone for every reason.
And I'm thinking, I don't even have to say thank you.
I paid for my goods, you gave me my goods.
You know, biblically speaking,
I don't even owe you a thank you.
Now look, I think we should be nice
and we should be kind and we should say thank you.
I almost always say thank you
unless it's like a reprobate or something
and then I might just kind of grab it
and move on with my life.
But at the end of the day, I am trying to say thank you.
I am trying to be courteous and we should be like that.
You know, we shouldn't have this attitude
of feeling like I deserve a thank you.
I deserve a tip for doing my job.
You know, that's the wrong mindset and the wrong attitude.
And you know what, it's a bad idea for our culture.
Our culture is making a mistake in this tip over tipping culture.
Overtipping culture basically makes people feel entitled.
And so many people today feel very entitled to tips or all kinds of extras or bonuses.
This is the wrong attitude.
If you go to work and you do your job, if you do everything your boss says, you are
not entitled to a bonus.
If your company gives you a Christmas bonus, that is not something you're entitled to.
That is to their discretion and if you got a Christmas bonus last year and you do your job this year
And they don't give you a Christmas bonus. You are not entitled to the Christmas bonus
You are not entitled to any bonus or any extra or any gift card or anything that if they did extras
You should recognize as an extra and not demand or feel entitled to certain extras
Now I've seen this ugliness in my family before
because there was a period in our life
where our parents were just giving us extra money
for no reason, like just all of a sudden
they just gave us gifts on Christmas
and then just giant checks with money.
And it was like every year we got like a bigger check.
And obviously human nature, everybody's going to kind of think like,
hey, I wonder if that's going to happen this year, right?
But what would be a bad attitude is to say, hey, I deserve this,
or I'm entitled to this, or I'm expecting this.
And the checks didn't just keep getting bigger, OK?
Otherwise, I'd be a wealthy man at this point, all right?
You know, they had a lot of extra income for those few years.
They blessed us.
It was super great.
But you know, one year we show up and it doesn't happen, right?
And then it's like siblings of mine are complaining about it
and it in fact already spent the money
that they were expecting to get.
And then they were mad at our parents for not giving them that and I'm thinking like you already get tons of presents
And I mean our family my parents spoiled us on Christmas
I mean we got more gifts than most families and then on top of that just get a check with a bunch of money
I mean that is just over the top, but it's just like you can get this entitlement attitude
Look being a child you don't even deserve a gift from your parents
Your parents are not obligated to give you any present on your birthday to give you any present on Christmas
To do anything nice for you if they do anything. It's because they love you and it's extra
I'm not against holidays, and I'm not against extra days in our calendar
But let me tell you something we should never have an entitled attitude
You know if my family decided to never celebrate Father's Day, that's their decision. I
If I get a Father's Day celebration, that's nice.
I'm not against celebrating Father's Day,
but you know what, I'm not entitled to that.
Just like Mother's Day should not be an entitlement.
Now that's a little spicier, okay?
Especially in our culture.
Now look, I'm not saying marriage advice tip,
celebrate Mother's Day, okay?
Ladies, if your husband doesn't meet your expectations,
don't feel entitled and be entitled on Mother's Day.
Okay, so we should have both opinions, right? We should do good things. We should go across the aisle
We should do extras, but you know, we don't want to then
Have all these extras in our life and not realize they're an extra and start becoming entitled and start thinking
This is just obligatory. They have to do it because then it kind of ruins the whole point anyways
You know Valentine's Day is obligatory then I feel like it's less special anyways
Like, to me, it's almost more special if you don't always do the exact same thing or have
high expectations.
And so some years, you had a special Valentine's Day, some years you don't, some years you
haven't.
And look, if you go all out, go for it.
I'm not going to fight you.
But I'm just saying that it seems a little more healthy if it's not always exactly the
same or always expected because then you don't become spoiled rotten and you have to just
actually spoiled.
Because what'll happen is you go big on Valentine's Day,
then they have an expectation.
They feel entitled to that.
So in order to actually feel special,
you have to go beyond.
And then you go beyond that and they have to keep going beyond.
And then pretty much you just can't even compete.
And then it's just like, there's no point.
So we don't want to get this attitude of just feeling like
we deserve things or expected to receive things.
This is a bad attitude.
That's why he says in verse 10,
so likewise ye, when ye should have done
all those things which are commanded you,
say, we're unprofitable servants,
we have done that which is our duty to do.
So again, there could be this attitude of like,
I deserve things or you should praise me
for doing exactly what I'm expected to do.
Now, go if you would to Matthew seven,
and I wanna talk about this in a marriage context
here in a minute, but.
Let's play it to a Salvation Context first.
Oh, I went to church, I read my Bible,
therefore God owes me eternal life.
Wrong, wrong.
Well, I did what I was expected to do,
therefore God owes me heaven,
or God is obligated to give me heaven, wrong.
God doesn't owe us anything.
You know, we're expected to keep
His commandments just period.
But that doesn't give us eternal life.
That doesn't give us salvation, okay?
Now, you kind of see this little bit of entitlement attitude.
I believe in Matthew 7, look at verse 21.
Not everyone that sayeth in me,
Lord, Lord shall enter the kingdom of heaven,
but he that doeth the will of my Father, which is in heaven.
Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord,
have we not prophesied in the name,
and in the name have cast out devils,
and in the name have done many wonderful works?
And then while I professed in them,
I never knew you, depart from me ye that work in equity.
They anticipate,
that the works that they did should cause them to have a spot in heaven.
They feel like they're entitled to be in heaven because of the things that they did for the Lord.
But you know what? You don't get into heaven by your works.
salvation is a free gift purchased by the blood of Jesus Christ and he gives it
to us by grace. I don't deserve heaven, I deserve hell for my sins. But then they
think well but look I did all these things I should then get heaven wrong,
no one gets to heaven by their works, no one gets to heaven by what they did and
no one's entitled to heaven.
No one's entitled to anything in this context.
You know, we see salvation by a free gift, it's grace,
and at the end of the day, you know, many people feel
like they deserve heaven and they're going to go to hell.
He's going to say, I never knew you,
depart from me, that work in equity.
Now, that's one application.
There's another way we could look at this,
this entitlement attitude.
Here's one in marriage, and I think that this is
really important, is to recognize that in marriage
Love is much more than just fulfilling your duty.
Like, if you think I'm gonna have a successful marriage
as a husband because I pay the bills,
I tell my wife what to do,
and I drag her to a good church, and I go soul-winning.
That is not something that your wife's gonna be like,
extra saying thank you for.
That's what you're expected to do.
Like you're just expected to do these things.
And on the flip side, as a wife,
let's go the other side, this is a little bit spicier.
If you make the meals, if you take care of the kids
and you clean the house, did you know
you're not even entitled to a thank you?
You're expected to do those things.
So then why would you sit here and think,
I deserve extra if I just do my duty,
if I just do my job?
Doing your job is not something to be thanked.
It's what you're expected to do.
Go to 1st Timothy chapter 5.
I want to go there for a moment.
Same with your boss at work, if you just do your job.
Hey, you're not entitled to thank you.
Now, of course, we live in a society
that's very courteous and very nice.
I think it makes sense to say thank you.
Hey, if I come home and my wife spent all day
cleaning the house, I'll often tell her thank you.
I'm not trying to say be a jerk, don't say these things.
What I am saying is that even if I didn't,
my wife is not entitled to a thank you.
It's expected.
I don't pay the water bill and my wife's like,
thank you so much.
I don't pay the gas bill and she's like,
oh man, that was awesome.
I like how you paid the gas bill, right?
If I pay the credit card that we went over on budget,
hey, I don't even get to thank you for that.
But you know what?
How is it that then wives feel like they should be thanked
for every little thing they do?
That's an entitlement attitude.
We shouldn't be entitled to these things.
And again, I'm not sitting here demanding my wife,
praise me and thank me for my job,
because you know what?
I do my part, she does her part,
but that's not a marriage that's going to be that successful.
If that's all we do is just do our duties.
You know, we also need to do things above our duties.
Okay, what think have you if you just do your duty?
You know, you're just expected to do certain things
in marriage.
If you really want to have a successful marriage,
you need to go beyond your duties.
You want to be a successful Christian, you need to go beyond your duties.
You want to be a successful employee, you need to go beyond your duties, okay?
But at the same time, we also don't want to get this entitlement attitude when we just
do what's expected of us.
Now first to me, the chapter number five gives us the expectations for a man in marriage
and it's making it abundantly clear that men are supposed to be the provider for the family.
Look at verse number seven.
And these things give in charge
that they may be blameless.
But if any provide not for his own,
and especially for those of his own house,
he had denied the faith
and is worse than an infidel.
So if you don't pay your bills,
the Bible says you're basically a scumbag.
I mean, I honestly think infidel's a worse word.
You like think scumbags about word?
Infidel's worse.
I mean, it's saying like an unbeliever.
It's saying just like someone that's completely rebelled
against the faith of Christianity.
How could you tell me you're a Christian
when you won't even pay your own bills?
The Bible says when you won't pay your own bills,
it's like you're not even a Christian.
It's like you have a false religion.
It's like you have a bad religion, you know, you need to be able to pay your own bills
and not only just your bills, your wife's bills, your children's bills,
pay for your whole family's bills, that's what the Bible says to be blameless.
Men need to pay for their family.
And look, you talk about getting respect in the household. Boy, when you pay all the bills,
you often get a little bit more respect than the guy that's making his wife go out there and earn a paycheck.
If you're gonna put your wife in a pair of pants
and have her go work in the workforce,
well, it's gonna be a little bit harder for her
to come home and respect you.
There's this viral video that's going online.
I think it just got like millions and millions of views online.
And it's some wife complaining about her husband
not doing enough chores around the house.
And saying, not only was she mad
that she had to tell her husband what to do,
Which, there's so much to address about this video, but she was saying, like, if you want to have a successful marriage,
you husbands need to just do these chores without asking.
You need to just read your wife's mind or whatever.
And I'm just sitting there thinking like, wow, there's just so much wrong with this video, okay?
Number one, never go online and complain about your husband!
It's wicked!
It's just wicked, period, okay?
Number two, her husband should just say,
all right, honey, you're gonna stay home
and do all the chores and I'll pay all the bills.
Look, I do think you're kind of begging
for your wife to get mad at you
if you're gonna make her get a job
and then being the wife and the mother
and do all the chores.
But let me tell you something,
if your husband made you do that,
you still just shut your stupid mouth and do the chores.
Sorry you married him, that's not my problem.
And you know what, I can't stand all the women out there
just being like, amen, you go girl, oh yeah, that's right,
oh yeah, you telling them what to do.
You know what, that's wickedness.
It's wickedness and it's wrong.
And look, I'm not for women working
and having to pay their bills.
What does the Bible say?
The man should pay.
And again, that'll make it easier.
But, look, if a woman had a job or a husband had her doing some kind of work, hey, that's
between them.
You know, obviously the Proverbs 31 woman has some side hustles, you know, and as long
as a wife is not neglecting her duties at home, there's technically nothing wrong with
her making money on the side doing whatever she wants, okay?
But at the end of the day, you know, you're not really going to have a successful marriage
when you're putting her out there working for the man and working for you.
and doing all your other tasks.
Then you might start becoming a house husband.
You don't want that, it doesn't work well.
And you know what?
Wives are not in control of their husbands.
Wives are not telling their husbands what to do.
Wives are not the ones giving him the chores lists
and all this other stuff.
You know what?
That is for the husband to be in charge.
The husband's in charge, the wife is subject under a husband, and at the end of the day,
the husband's supposed to pay all the bills, so he makes all the rules.
He decides what he's going to do.
Now, look, in a happy, healthy marriage, I believe that there's going to always be crossover.
Okay?
There's technically nothing wrong with a wife making $0 a year.
If a wife makes literally no income, that is totally fine and it's even biblical for
the husband to be the sole provider, 100% all the incomes coming from him, okay?
But if a wife ends up making money, you know, that's in her, in my mind, coming across the
aisle, that's her doing some extra.
But as a husband, I don't think it's right to put expectation on your wife for her to
And in the same way though,
since the husband is paying all the bills
and making all the money,
you know what, it's not right for the wife then
to expect her husband to have to do any of her job.
You know, my wife doesn't have to do any of my job.
You know, my boss says, hey, we're behind on this project.
I'm not like, all right, honey, get in there.
Get some C sharp going, you know, get that sequel server
Spun spinning up, you know pulling all nighter and get that server, you know back in shape or something like that
You know my wife's never done my job. She doesn't ever have to do my job. She's never expected to do my job
I'm not asking her to do my job. I don't want her to do my job
She doesn't know how to do my job. And so, you know, it's isn't a little silly though
How the opposite most of our society expects
It's like, no, no, no, the husband has to do all of my job, though.
That's a feminist culture that we live in.
And you know what?
It's an entitlement attitude.
We live in an entitlement era where women feel like they can tell their husbands what
to do and do their job for them.
And tell them, hey, you need to come and do my job and my chores and my stuff.
You know what?
That's not the right attitude.
Now, look, as a loving husband, I do come across the aisle often.
Okay, I do do a lot of things for my wife, but let it let me make it clear
You know, it's not because I'm expected to and you know what?
I don't want it to cause an entitlement attitude in any of my family or in my relationship
And we need wives to understand. Hey, if your husband's coming across the aisle, that's something to think
Hey, me paying all the bills?
I technically don't even deserve a thank you on that.
You should say thank you, but you don't have to, all right?
But if you come across the aisle,
that should be a thank you, not, hey, I'm entitled to this.
You're entitled to do my job for me.
You know, that's wrong.
Just like if I needed, let's just say my wife did have a job
or bring in some extra income.
You know, I shouldn't get this entitlement attitude towards her and say like, oh, yeah,
well, I expect that or that has to come in or you better be making this extra money.
We should be looking at his gravy cherry on the top.
Okay.
And the same way, if I'm doing her stuff, and again, all of us men have different skills,
you know, different things we can help with.
If you come across the aisle and you're helping her with certain things, that should not become
an entitlement area in your marriage.
Now there's some areas that I don't even give her a chance to be entitled in because like laundry
You don't want me to help. All right. I don't help. I've never helped if anything. I'm the opposite of help
Okay, like I think that the laundry basket is every section of my house
I mean, a table, a chair, over here, you know,
it's just like, hey, the clothes can go wherever, you know?
And again, I'm not even saying that's right.
I'm just saying that I have this bad habit, okay,
of just everything is the laundry basket for some reason.
And...
you know, but there are areas that I do help.
You know, I'm learned how to cook at a young age
and I'm not the best,
but there's some things that I'm very good at making.
I enjoy cooking.
So a lot of times I'll make dinner.
You know, I kind of have a routine
where I make dinner once a night, usually, most of the time.
And, you know, or at least I take care of dinner.
Maybe I don't always make it, but I'm helping.
That's not something that I have to do.
That's just me coming across the aisle, but you know what could happen is let's say you get in a pattern where you do that for your spouse
What if you took that away?
What would that be like? Well, you know what it would be an entitlement attitude if the person expected that
Even though you're doing it
And so we don't want to make sure
that we're getting this expectation of like,
oh, this has to happen.
No, no, no, that's coming across the aisle, isn't it?
You know, helping out with the kids,
helping out with the house,
all this stuff that's just their job.
You know what?
We don't want to allow people to get the wrong attitude.
Now, of course, as a husband and as a father,
I have to do things around the house.
I have to take care of the kids too.
I have to be a husband.
So I'm not saying that the woman's job is like,
always taking care of the kids and whatever.
But whatever arrangements you have as a married couple,
you know, whatever is her job, duties,
whatever is your job, duties,
and then when we come across the aisle,
we need to recognize that it's coming across the aisle
so that we don't get entitled about those things, okay?
And that's, you know,
gonna be a little bit different for each couple,
each marriage.
Go over to Luke chapter number six,
go to Luke chapter number six.
So I'm just trying to help you just to apply some of these things.
Is there an area in your life where you feel a little bit entitled about things in your relationship?
And again, some things are duties.
Hey, the Bible says in 1 Corinthians chapter number seven, there's a part of marriage that's the duty.
That's not something that's coming across the aisle.
That's just, you say I do and it's done deal,
consent's given, bam.
Hey, paying the bills, that was on day one.
I do, you basically said I will pay all bills, period.
Okay, so there's lots of aspects of marriage. They're just the duty, you know
As the man you're the provider you're the leader you're the protector you're gonna do a lot of different things as the wife
You're subject. You're submissive. You're gonna do things for him that he wants. That's why he got married to you
Okay, and we don't want to put those on the table as these are nice to haves or coming across the aisle
Coming across the aisle is doing extras that you're not expected to do and again
You know, here would be an extra.
You know, I think that wives should make
their husbands lunch, because at the end of the day,
or make them dinner, or make them whatever, right?
What would be an extra?
What if she writes a little love note
and slips it in the lunchbox?
Well, that's not a duty.
That's just an extra, right?
And those type of things is where you build a relationship.
You know, you don't build a relationship
on just a checklist of, hey, I showed up
and I paid the bills, love me.
You know how you get your wife to love you?
Spend time with her, talk nice to her, hang out with her,
take her on romantic dates, buy her jewelry.
You know, these are the things that, you know, nice to have.
Is she entitled to jewelry?
No.
But at the end of the day, it's nice when you do things that are nice for her.
Is she entitled to romantic getaways? No, but that would be a nice thing to do every once in a while.
So again, we want to make sure that we're balancing these items, getting them in the right place.
Tithing, duty, free will offering, bonus.
Okay, so when it comes to church, you coming to church, obligatory.
Don't think you don't deserve a thank you to show up at church
You don't deserve a thank you for going so winning
That's obligatory
That's your duty. That's your reasonable service. You're expected to do that
Okay, so if you think that you deserve everyone here to thank you for that you have the wrong attitude
Okay, you're expected to serve God and so don't think that that is something to be praised
or for us to go around and clap for you or something. Luke chapter 6, look at verse 31.
And as you would that men should do to you, do you also to them likewise? For if you love them
which love you, what think of you? For sinners also love those who love them and if you do good to
them which do good to you, what think of you? For sinners also do even the same. Hey, you do good
Expecting the same in return?
It's not even worthy of being thanked.
You know, hey, you're just nice to people
that are nice to you.
There's nothing even special about that.
But then how many people feel like
they're entitled to this?
Oh, well, I invited someone over,
so now I'm entitled to them being nice to me
or doing good, no, no, wrong attitude.
You're even doing it for the wrong purpose.
Go over to 1 Corinthians 6. Let's just go to a lot of verses here, and then I'm going to make some more application. All right
People get a very wrong attitude about life
1 Corinthians number six look at the last part of this verse 19. What know you not that your body is the temple of the
Holy Ghost which is in you
Which of ye which ye have of God and you're not your own
for you're bought with a price therefore glorify God in your body and your spirit which are God's you know I
Have a duty just to serve God because he bought me
Just like you know if a husband pays for you to marry him because that's kind of the picture
You know, they pay this dowry in the Old Testament.
Even today's, in a lot of ways,
when you get married, you have to pay for a lot of things.
You're agreeing to pay for them for the rest of your life.
So in a sense, you're kind of like bought, in a sense.
And it's the same picture of the husband and wife
as kind of like Christ and the church.
The church was bought and paid for by Jesus Christ.
He laid down his life for them.
Husbands are laying down their lives
for their wives, in a sense,
and basically agreeing to take care of them.
And in a sense, when you're bought and paid for,
You're expected to then be their servant.
You're expected to then be, you know, good under them
and do right under them.
And look, Christ has purchased us,
so we are expected to serve Him.
He's not obligated to say thank you to us
for just doing the things that He expects us to do.
Go to Romans chapter number 12.
Let's go to another verse on this.
Romans chapter number 12.
We are to serve God because we're expected.
But you can go above what's expected of you.
You can go beyond just what's obligatory, okay?
Romans chapter number 12, look at verse 1,
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God,
that you present your bodies a living sacrifice,
holy, acceptable in the God, which is your reasonable service.
And be not conformed to this world,
but be transformed by the renewing of your mind
that you may prove what is that good
and acceptable and perfect will of God.
So we're supposed to be a, quote, living sacrifice.
Now, you know, the sacrifice in the Old Testament,
you would go, you would take some kind of an animal,
a lamb, if you were kind of poor, it might be a bird,
a turtle dove or something that you would offer.
And you'd do this on a somewhat regular basis.
You would offer some sacrifices of the Lord.
Now, it wasn't your whole life.
It wasn't all of your income.
What was it?
It was the tithe, in a sense, and in many cases, it was a trespass or a sin offering.
So you know, just kind of out of just a basic expectation, God basically just expects us
to just go to church, pay our tithes, and not sin.
And that's kind of if you look at the sacrificial system,
that's basically what it was.
You would go to church, you would pay your tithe,
you would pay, you know, trespass offerings or whatever.
And again, in the New Testament, praise God,
we don't pay money for that.
We just, you know, it's not the Catholic church.
We're not paying indulgences here,
but you should at least in the New Testament,
if you sin, say, God, I'm sorry, and try to not sin.
Look, this is the basic Christian life.
Doing those things is not some extra special thing.
And you shouldn't act like God's over here just trying to just extra bless you and give
you these special thank you's just because you're trying to not send, you go to church
and pay your time.
There's a lot more to loving God, serving God than just doing the reasonable service.
And you shouldn't have this entitlement attitude like, well, I show up at church, pay my tithes,
and I'm trying not to send, therefore God just owes me all this stuff.
You were bought with a price you just you're just expected to do these things
Okay, and yet a lot of people they almost feel like God's just gonna give them all of this extra
For just doing what's reasonable good if we went to James chapter number four go to James chapter number four and they have an entitlement attitude
Here's a here's the just one aspect that we could all get entitled to just deserving another day of life
We're not even we're not even promised another day of life. We're not guaranteed another day of life
You know, the Bible tells us to redeem the days
because the days are evil.
Redeeming the time because the days are evil.
And we need to take advantage of the time
that God has given us because we have no idea
how much time we get.
None of us know.
And some people have this entitlement attitude
about their life like, I'm entitled to 70 years of life
or 80 years of life or however much, you don't know that.
No one here deserves 70 years.
No one here deserves 80 years of life.
In fact, you know what we deserve?
Death and hell.
That's what we deserve.
Look at James chapter number four towards the end of this.
He says in verse 13,
Go to now,
E that say today or tomorrow we will go into such a city
and continue there a year and buy and sell and gain,
whereas you know not what shall be on the moral
for what is your life.
It is even a vapor that appeared for a little time
and then vanished with the way.
For that you ought to say if the Lord will we shall do that we shall live and do this or that
But now you rejoice in your boastings all such rejoicing is evil
Do not presume
Anything in the future don't feel entitled about anything in the future. Don't feel like God owes you something
Look, you are the one that was in debt and he paid your debt
And I see this entitlement attitude
creeping into the youth of America, especially,
where they feel like they're entitled to,
not just live, not just have a long life, everything.
They feel like they're entitled to get a high-paying job.
Like the youth today just thinks like,
you know what, I just deserve a high-paying job.
You know, I put in my dues, I went to college
and played beer pong for four years.
Where's my high-paying job?
It's like, that's not how the real world works, honey.
You know you need to actually have some skills to offer to the marketplace because we still live in a capitalist society praise God
Where people are actually trying to make money, and you know how they make money people work
They don't make money by you just showing up and then feeling entitled to a paycheck
You know people go to work today even feeling entitled to a paycheck when they're not even producing for the company
Especially people that start out, most people that start out at a company are probably a loss for the company.
They're actually training, investing a lot of money into the individual hoping they'll become productive in the long run.
Or just frankly they just don't want to do the job themselves or they can't do the job themselves
so they have to just farm it out at the lowest cost they can.
But you're not even actually productive for the company, you're just basically giving time back to the management.
And so people then they think they're entitled to a paycheck, but you know what this entitlement attitude does?
Is it causes you to get replaced pretty soon?
Replaced by other workers or replaced by technology because if you're not actually adding to the company you work for if you're not
Bringing value to the company they'll try to find a way to replace you and let me tell you something AI is coming for jobs
I work in the software industry
and I know how AI is working
and I know how fast it's growing.
And boy, companies wanna get rid of you entitled brats.
There's a lot of entitled brats today
that think they're special.
And boy, I'm telling you, AI can do your job better,
faster and complains a lot less.
Boy, it was a shock to me the other day.
I mean, this was a while back,
but I drove through Panda Express
and they had an AI bot take my order.
Who's who's had this? Okay?
Look
Everything I said the AI got right now. I'm sure it can make mistakes. Who would say they did it right too?
Yeah, I mean for the most part they did pretty good. I mean like let's think of who we're competing against a
Meth junkie that just got out of prison that usually gets it wrong like their competition was so low already
that man, you know, they kind of nailed it.
This is just the early infant stages.
They can get to a point where virtually
all the fast food restaurants could be unmanned.
Or maybe they just have one person on site
that's just a security guard, more or less.
Not even someone that's actually
manning any of the food stations.
Especially the garbage food they're making.
I mean, it's just like, you would think it'd be pretty easy.
They just have machines do a lot of these things,
have one maintenance worker and have one security guard.
And look, the maintenance worker guy,
he's gonna have to be smart
because he's gonna have to know how to program AI.
So all those junkies are gone.
All those drug addicts, they're completely replaced.
And a lot of these people have an entitled attitude.
They feel like they're entitled to paychecks.
They're entitled for the government to take care of them.
There's just an entitlement attitude
that's decaying our youth today.
You know, rather you should do,
instead of thinking like, where's my high paying job?
Is you should think, how can I be a highly skilled employee
that someone needs?
Then when you actually work for the company and you do everything you're expected to do
You're not even thinking you should get a bonus or time off or whatever
I mean like we don't even deserve paid time off, but isn't it weird? I mean companies give us paid time off
There's just so many things that our companies do for us and we live in America and we just get this entitled attitude
I mean how much PTO do you think the children of Israel got in the wilderness or in Egypt?
I got how many times you they're like, Hey, Faro, I need a little bit of PTO.
Hey, Faro, where's the HR department?
You know, it's just like he needs a few more whips, like get him, you know, that's the
HR department.
Anytime you complain, that's who and then people don't complain.
But isn't it just people just have this attitude about everything.
Go to Matthew 20.
Let's look at two more verses and then I'm giving you a little bit more.
I'll finish all the applications I wanted to make.
And look, young people also,
I feel like there's also this attitude,
I've seen young single guys,
feel like they're entitled to a wife.
Like, there should just be a woman
that's just ready to just line up for me to marry.
Cause I'm so awesome, I'm Mr. Wonderful,
I've arrived, where are all the ladies
that are ready just for me to come rescue them?
You know, and look, this is a bad attitude.
It's a bad attitude to feel like you're entitled to anything and you know you just existing as a man you don't deserve a wife
You know
Where where's the romance in that anyways like you know
We should bring back some of the chivalry today, you know rescue the princess from the dragon or something
You know just label the dragon feminism and go rescue her from it or something, you know
But don't think that you're gonna just find this perfect little princess just sitting over here
Just mind your own business and then you walk by and she's just like marry me
You know because you walked by or something like that, you know young people they feel like they're entitled to a house
You are not entitled to a house.
You're not entitled to a new truck.
You're not entitled to anything.
And you know what?
You spoiled rotten American.
You stop thinking that you just deserve all these things
and just put your head down and work hard
and allow God to bless you.
And whatever God gives you, you know what?
You should thank Him for it.
Instead of sitting here thinking like, where's my extras?
When did God say, you're going to get a truck?
You're going to get a car?
He didn't even promise you a wife.
You have to go ahead and find one,
and then if you get one, you obtain favor of the Lord.
That's a blessing of the Lord.
And you know, it's a blessing for keeping his commandments.
I think the more you keep his commandments,
hey, if you are strong, you're smart.
If you make good money, you're probably more likely
for God to give you that favor to get a wife.
But if you're lazy, a jerk, you don't have any money,
you have nowhere to live, God may not give you the favor
and give a wife.
It applies to everything in life.
You know, I thought about this a lot as pastors.
It's like, hey, pastors that have smaller churches
or younger churches, it's like instead of worrying about
like, why is God not giving me a big church?
It's like, how are you doing with the small church
that you have?
And if you're not a good shepherd with what you do have,
why would God want to give you more?
If you're not a good steward of what you do have,
why would God want to give you more?
And if you know what, you're not a good leader,
why would God want to give you a wife to lead around?
If you're not going to be someone
that God wants to entrust with a wife
or entrust with a sister or entrust with children,
you know, if you look down on women,
if you look down on children,
why would God want to give you them
to entrust under their safety?
You know we should be we should be people that actually have great love and affection and care for people
Hey, you want to be a pastor? Well, why don't you love on people and do good to people when you're not a pastor?
Yeah, and then maybe God will say like wow, I really like how this guy treats people
Maybe he's someone that could lead them or guide them. Hey, you want to be successful in the business world, you know
Do good with your master's goods, you know be a good steward of his goods so that God will bless you with your own
And we should stop having this just entitlement
that's just spoiling all of us about everything.
Look at Matthew chapter 20, verse number one.
For the kingdom of heaven is likened to a man
that is a householder which went out early
in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard.
And when he had agreed with the laborers
for a penny a day, he sent them in his vineyard.
Now I'm not gonna read the whole parable for a second time,
but you have this parable,
a guy is agreeing with people to work in his yard.
He's just saying, hey, I'll give you a penny.
And they say, great.
So they go do the work.
Well, in the story, he hires people over time.
So some people work all day, some people work a half day,
some people work an hour.
And then when they was paying them,
the guy that only worked an hour,
he starts with them first and he gives them a whole penny.
Now, the guys that worked the whole day,
they start thinking in their mind,
well, if they worked an hour and got a penny,
and I worked the whole day,
I should get more than the penny that he agreed with me.
But then he ends up just giving them the penny.
And then they get mad. Why?
Entitled.
They got entitled, didn't they?
Now, let's skip to that point.
It says in verse number 12,
saying...
Let's look at verse 10.
But when the first came,
they supposed
that they should have received more,
and they likewise received every man of penny.
That's supposed that they should have been more.
That's entitlement creeping up into their brain.
Okay?
And it says,
and when they had received it,
they murmured against the good men of the house.
How did the mermen do them any bad?
Hey, you work in my yard, I'll give you a penny.
They worked in the yard, they got the penny.
How was he bad?
He gave them a job.
He gave them money.
But they supposed it should have gotten more.
And how many people go to jobs
and they do their job and they don't get a bonus
or they don't get some extra
and then they get mad at their boss
for giving them exactly what they were looking for.
That's a bad attitude.
Hey, if you agree you get it
You should accept that you don't need to get this entitlement attitude or allow it to creep in
Then he said in verse 13, but he answered one of them and said friend. I
Do thee no wrong?
Did us not thou agree with me for a penny take that thine is and go thy way
I will give unto this last even as unto thee is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own is
thine I evil
because I am good.
Now, again, he defends himself.
He says, how am I bad?
I'm actually good.
You're the bad guy.
Let's apply this to a lot of situations, okay?
Go over to the first of these six, too.
We'll get there in a minute.
If you come to this church
and you get a lot of extras coming to this church,
you know what, that is extras.
There is nothing in the Bible that says that I am supposed to give you just free material
to hand out for soul winning.
There's nothing.
There's nothing in the Bible requiring me to have free waters for you to go out soul winning.
There's nothing in the Bible requiring us to give out free ice cream every single Wednesday
They should just memorize the Bible
But then it's like that's not the ice cream that I wanted you brat
Oh, I like Evian water. Where's the Evian water at the store
Well, you know at at faithful word they have this one DVD can what can we get those?
Look, I had someone complain that we weren't handing out every single DVD that was sold
on Framing the World.
They were like, hey, why don't we buy these other DVDs because I don't like the ones
you give us to hand out.
I want these ones.
And I'm like, well, you know what?
The person that has the rights to those wants me to pay $8 a DVD to hand them out.
And I'm just not that interested in taking $8 of the church money per DVD to hand out
to a bunch of people in the ghetto that will never watch it and probably throw it around
like a Chinese star or something, right?
I mean like why would I then want to do that?
Like that doesn't even make sense, but people just get this super over-the-top
Entitled attitude or they say like hey, why don't you just pay for everyone to have a free breakfast for every soul-winning time?
and then I say
No, and
Then they get mad at me and then act like I'm bad because I don't want to do that
But you know what your eye is evil and I'm good because I'm still even giving you free things for the soul-winning time
That you even have to do.
I mean, what in the world is wrong with you?
There's just people that just get this entitlement attitude
where they feel like they're expected all these extras.
We have a soul winning marathon,
and we show up and it's like free food,
free sandwiches, free beverages, free cokes,
free power aids, free invites, free everything.
Where's the juice for my kid?
It's at the store, that's where it's at.
You know what, I didn't even say that.
You know what I said, I just said,
hey, sorry, I didn't think about that.
Do you want me to go get you one?
But maybe that was the wrong attitude.
You know what the wrong attitude is?
It was like, where is the juice for my kid, though?
It wasn't even like, hey, did you have juice?
It was just like, where is the juice for my kid?
That is such a brat attitude.
And you know what, the new IFB is great,
but because we do so many good things
and so many free things and so many nice things,
it causes people to get entitled.
It causes people to have the wrong attitude
and start thinking like, hey, this is expected.
No, it's extra.
It's not expected it's extra and you know you go to a really nice church where they give you all kinds of free meals and free
Extras and free things don't allow it to go to your head
Don't allow I mean, you know
So many I mean we just like free men's conferences
Just free conferences all kinds of just specials and extras and look I never want to take that away
I don't want to stop doing that.
And a lot of people are appreciative, okay?
But at the same time,
can we please not get entitled about that stuff?
Because, you know, when you start getting entitled,
it makes people want to take things away.
It doesn't make them want to do more.
It makes them want to do less.
It makes them get upset about this
and say, why is thine eye evil because I am good?
First to me, chapter number six,
the Bible brings up
when we can be upset about things.
At what level can we complain?
Well, there's not a lot that we can complain about.
It says in verse six,
but Godliness with contentment is a great gain.
If we brought nothing into this world
and this certain we can carry nothing out,
having food and raiment let us be there with content.
Hey, what can I say?
God, I'm not pleased, give me this now.
Food and clothing.
Everything else, we start getting entitled about, don't we?
Super nice housing, super nice clothing,
vehicles, jobs, having awesome churches.
I mean, you know how many people would just die
to have an old IFB church in their area?
There's a lot of people in the world today
that would love to have a non-King James only
Baptist church in their area.
Let alone an old IFB church, let alone a new IFB church.
Let alone a new IVB church filled with hundreds of people.
Hey, there's like dozens of new IVB churches.
Not all of them have a church this big with their own building,
with lots of cool people in it.
Let me tell you something, this church is super awesome.
And you know what a church is?
It's people.
Don't ever get confused about the word church.
When I'm talking about church, I'm talking about people.
It is hard to find hundreds of people that are like this,
that are this cool, this generous, this nice,
and you know, you could come to here
and you could start feeling entitled,
like I'm entitled to awesome friends.
No, you're not.
No one is obligated to be your friend.
No one is obligated to be nice to you.
No one is obligated to take your wife out on coffee dates.
No one is obligated like no one is allowed to come to you and say hey you and you you and your wife
Need to take my family out
That's Adam Fannin I
Had a couple tell me that Adam Fannin said you know what churches are supposed to take their pastor or their leader out to dinner
And he's like I want to go here
There's other people they say hey
You ladies you're required anytime y'all hang out to invite me. I'm required to get to hang out with y'all, too
What planet are you living on and look and then and then people say like no one wants to be my wife's friend
Well, when you're demanding people to be her friend, they don't want to be your friend
Look, I have a lot of friends in here, but it's not because I demanded them
I'm sure they would feel awkward if I just said Diego you have to be my friend tonight
He he would be like weirded out, but if I said like hey, yeah, you want to hang out you want to do something fun
He might be a little bit more enticed, but he's gonna feel a little awkward when it's just like you're hanging out with me tonight
You have no other option
You know, that's weird
It's weird to demand things of other people and to feel entitled about stuff. You know, we should never have that attitude
Go over to Proverbs 18
Hey, no matter how long you've been at this church,
let me tell you something, you, I don't owe you anything.
If you've been a member for a decade here,
you're not more special than the new members.
And you don't deserve things that they,
that they don't deserve or whatever.
There's not like the special privilege.
Hey, you,
Do a lot of things at this church. You're in service here. I don't owe you a thank you because you know what?
You're doing it for God. And if you think that I owe you a thank you for you serving God, you have the wrong attitude.
You're not even doing it for God at that point.
Don't think it don't think you're doing anything here for me.
Don't try to get brownie points for me because I don't really give you anything in return usually.
Like, there's not a token, like the Pasha Shelley token,
like you put in the machine
and you're gonna get something out of it.
I'm just like Vegas, baby.
You just keep putting the money in
and it's just like nothing.
You just keep pulling.
Like, there's nothing there.
I'm just saying like sweet, you know, like, okay.
Hey, if you wanna keep putting tokens in the machine,
I'm fine.
But if you think you're gonna hit 777, you're wrong.
Okay, there's no like hidden door like oh you gave enough money to me. Here's Pastor Shelley's special open door
Or hey now you get to be his friend or something like that, you know people that try to buy friendships
I'm usually kind of leery of
I'm kind of like afraid like why
Or, you know, if somebody wants to do something special,
I'm kind of thinking like, I don't know, you know,
is this person trying to be, is a flatterer,
or like, what's going on?
You know, friendships should be organic,
they should be normal, they should be natural,
you work together.
You know, I want to be friends with people
that I work together on stuff.
You know, that's usually how we become friends with people,
is you work on things with people,
you do things together, that's how you become friends.
Not just this, like, hey, I gave a bunch of money,
or you're supposed to be my friend
because I do these things, you know?
That's just not how it works.
And as pastor, you know, I'm not obligated
to be anybody's friend either.
You do not get to be my friend
just because you show up at this church, okay?
You want to be my friend, be friendly to me.
and I'll be friendly to you,
and maybe we'll blossom into the greatest friendship ever.
You know, I'm not saying I can't be friends with you.
I'm not saying I won't be friends with you,
but let me tell you something, it's not expected.
No one is entitled to be my wife's friend.
No one's entitled to be my children's friend.
Nobody's entitled to be anybody in here's friend.
Nobody's entitled to be here
to get any extra special privileges.
You know, we need to make sure that we're careful
about our attitude and about church.
Here's here's some other, you know things that we do at our church. We do a lot of cool stuff. I mean look at our bulletin
We have all these service times, you know, we have a Spanish service
No one is entitled to serve in that Spanish service
If you get to serve into it, it's a blessing and an opportunity for you
And if you start thinking like well, of course, I'm the one I get to do this, you know what that'll be taken away like this
No one's entitled to play in our music department.
No one's entitled to be a song leader.
No one's entitled to do anything.
You're also not entitled to get to preach a sermon
when I'm not here.
You know, you could give this attitude like,
well, I've been here for a while,
or I've always preached, so then I get to preach.
Nope.
Hey, you know, in fact, many times I evaluate
how people do in the preaching class
to determine who I want to preach next.
And that may even happen once every blue moon.
But you know what, if you do a good job in that,
you might get an opportunity.
But someone that's entitled,
boy, I'd love to strip that away from you.
I'd love to take that away.
We have all kinds of soul winning times.
No one is entitled to lead a soul winning time.
That is a special opportunity to get to do that.
Okay, no one is entitled to be an evangelist
or go do missions work for the church.
Hey, no one's entitled to get to do any of these things.
Events, here's another one, how about quiet time?
You know, quiet time is an extra.
You know, our church is kind of far away
for a lot of people,
so it's difficult for them to come here
and then go back to their house.
And again, it's hard when you have little kids
because they just have to nap.
They're going to nap somewhere.
And if they don't, they're cranky.
It's difficult.
So just out of just trying to be nice,
our church has offered a quiet time option to say, hey,
some parents, they kind of need a space where their kids
can just lay down and sleep.
So we wanted to offer that.
But you know, the church is not obligated
to offer the sanctuary for anybody for any reason.
But you know we do that so that some people could enjoy that little bit of time. It can be quiet
But if everybody comes in here and just loud the kids are just running around they're screaming
They're getting food. They're breaking stuff. Then no one gets to enjoy it
Well, you know what I get I'm a member here. So I just get to do this. No, you don't
You know, I've never been to a church where I get to hang out in the sanctuary after the service
In fact, if you hang out a little too long, they'll come by and say you have to leave
We don't even kick y'all out early enough.
I mean, some of y'all are staying here for a long time.
And I'm not trying to stop you,
but I'm just saying, you're not entitled
to get to just hang out at the church building
for all hours.
I heard of a church, there was a pastor
that was confiding in me.
He said that there was this one church member
that demanded him.
He said, I want the sanctuary to be open whenever I want
because I feel like I get to go pray there
whenever I want.
So therefore at any hour at any time they're supposed to open up the church building allow this guy to come into sanctuary to pray
Let me tell you what I would have said no
You're weird
What does the Bible say how about going your closet and pray?
There's your special. That's your special place, okay?
And look, it's not like praying here in this
This vicinity is gonna somehow make your prayers more special or something, you know church is again not the building. It's the people
Yeah, when we come together as a group, and we pray as a group, that's special.
That's a special prayer at church.
But you know what?
You being in this building by yourself and praying is no more or less special than in
your closet just praying to God in your heart.
It's not any more special than praying in the water closet for all you Canadians, okay?
I don't know if you know what that is, but there's nothing more special about where you're
Okay, and we shouldn't get this entitlement attitude like well I've been a member here,
I pay ties, therefore I get to use the church however and whenever I want, wrong.
Nope, you're not entitled to that, you don't get to just dictate what to do.
And you know what, it's like you try to offer something nice like quiet time or something,
but if everybody just ruins it, we can take that away.
You just say hey, at 1205, everybody's out of the building.
As soon as the last song is, we just usher everybody out.
But you know what, that wouldn't be fun.
That wouldn't be nice.
People wouldn't like that.
But you know, if you just abuse things,
well, then they get taken away.
You don't want to treat the church with care,
we'll take it away.
You want to take church material nicely,
we'll put it in the glass cases.
Isn't that what companies are doing now?
Because people are just stealing and doing trash.
They have to put everything behind a locked cage.
because they're afraid of how you treat it.
Like, is that what really church has to come down to?
Do you have to put everything in a locked cage
because people just can't be respectful of things?
I mean, are you just entitled to everything
and just acting however you want?
I mean, is the house of God have no reverence anymore?
Do you just trash it?
I mean, how would you feel if people,
if I came to your house and I just spilled coffee
all over your sofa,
if I just let my kids just run around your kitchen
getting into anything and everything they want,
taking anything and everything they want,
spilling anything and everything that they want,
yelling and screaming and I won't say anything to them,
how would you feel if I came to your house
during your nap time and allow my kids
to just run around and scream
and don't let your kids get a nap?
How would you feel if I just come around and bother you at your work or your place of business or when your wife
Is trying to get something? I mean how disrespectful and how entitled you have to be to act like that I?
Love hard-preaching well do you?
You know
We need to sometimes look at ourselves and say hey, what if everybody was like me?
Did that be a good thing would that be a bad thing?
Are we treating things with respect?
If you treat the church worse than your house,
you're causing, you're just, you're just a problem.
You should be better behaved at the house of God
than you are at your own house.
And if you're so well, if you're not very well behaved
at church, maybe you just need to fix your life.
We need to be well behaved.
We need to be respectful of things.
And look.
I'm the type of person that I love to spoil people rotten,
but please, please, you know, can we just...
we don't have to become spoiled.
You know, my parents spoiled me,
but I didn't allow that to get to me in a lot of ways.
But I could have.
God spoils me in a lot of ways.
I don't have to let it get to me.
We need to make sure that we're humbling ourselves so that God doesn't have to humble us
We need to humble ourselves so our parents don't humble us. You know my my siblings
Would would always criticize me and my parents because they would say oh John gets to do whatever he wants
John gets nice cars and John gets to have extra money
and John gets to do whatever.
You know what my parents would say to me?
This is what my parents would say.
You know what, it doesn't matter if we ever watch you
or pay attention, you always just do what's right anyways.
You're making meals for us, you never get in trouble,
you're not wrecking the car,
you're not going out and getting drunk,
you're not committing crimes.
And then it's like, hey, I wonder why one child
is getting more privileges than the other child.
It's like, hey, it's not fair.
Well, you know, it's also not fair to commit crimes
and trash the car that your parents gave you
and cause all these issues and problems at home.
You know, maybe there's a reason why
you get to do whatever you want.
Think about it at your job.
Many times, some employees,
they get to do whatever they want.
And other employees, they're micromanaged to death.
You want to know why?
Because the one that's left alone,
he just does right every time.
And the guy, when he's micromanaged,
can't even do his job right.
Hey, you kids at home,
you want your parents to get off your back?
Be a good kid.
You don't want your parents constantly on your case,
constantly disciplining you,
constantly giving you rules?
Well, behave.
And you know what?
The same applies to church.
Hey, you wanna have less rules at church?
How about need less rules?
I mean, doesn't that just make sense?
Whereas it's like, hey, we want signs on everything.
We want just constant rules and enforcement,
bring out the whip and everything.
It's just like, you know, if you act like children,
you get treated like children.
If you act like responsible adults like Joseph,
His boss doesn't even know what's going on.
And you know what, that's a great way
to handle ourselves in church.
That's a great testimony.
Wouldn't it be nice, a great testimony
when people visit the church,
they're like, man, everybody's so mature.
Everybody's really respectful.
They take care of their stuff.
They don't seem entitled.
As opposed to coming to a place
where everybody's disrespectful, trashy.
They feel like they deserve everything.
They're asking for all these extras
that no one even promised them whatsoever.
You know, that's a bad testimony.
And then you act like that, well then God will put you at an old IBE church where we have to pay for everything.
Let me think about it. You get to go to a church where you get all these extras and all these nice things.
You complain about it enough, you rail about it enough, God will put you at a church where he'll never give you a nice thing again.
Be careful what you want.
And before honor is humility.
We need to not be entitled,
we need to have humility in our lives.
And what is the opposite of entitlement, humility?
I don't deserve these things.
Don't have this attitude of you deserve things.
Say I don't deserve these things.
And when you get extras in your life,
be thankful to the person that gives you the extras.
Your boss gives you a bonus at work, thank you.
Gives you extra day off, thank you.
Hey, your husband does something for you ladies that is not part of his job, say thank you.
Hey, your wives do something that's not part of their job, you say thank you.
Hey, you get stuff at church that's not just found explicitly in the Bible,
you should have an appreciative attitude and not getting an entitlement attitude.
And look, if we behave ourselves well and we don't have an entitlement attitude,
we're humble, what does God give us? Honor.
Hey, we want to have honor from God.
We want God to look at our church and to lift us up and to praise us.
We better be humble about what we have and be thanking God for what we have.
And if we don't, what will happen? Destruction.
I don't want to be destroyed as a church.
I want God to honor us as a church,
but we have to first humble ourselves
and be appreciative of what God's given us
and be content with what we have
and not start becoming entitled and thinking
that God owes us a favor or something
or owes us something special.
We need to say, hey, we're here to serve you
and we're going to not only do our duty,
we're going to go above and beyond,
but at the end of the day,
I'm not expecting God to just give me all these things.
I'm not entitled to these things.
You know what? I'm just going to humbly serve and let the chips fall where they may.
Let's close in prayer.
Thank you Heavenly Father so much for what you've given us.
Thank you for your free gift of salvation.
And we understand that we've been bought with a hefty price.
I pray that we would not only just do our duty,
but be willing to go above and beyond.
That we would treat the house of God with respect.
That we would treat the institution of marriage with respect.
We treat our spouse with respect.
We treat our employers with respect.
And I pray that we would have a humble attitude.
We wouldn't just expect things that we would try our best to just do what's right and expect
nothing in return.
And I pray that you would help us to humble ourselves.
I pray that there's something that we need to fix that we'd be willing to fix it.
In Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.
Song number 449, Dwelling in Bula Land.
Song number 449, let's all sing it out.
Thank you.