You
Baptist Church. You can all find your seats. We're going to get started. Happy
Father's Day. It's all the fathers in the room. We're gonna go ahead and get
started on song number 134. Got some very familiar songs this morning. Song
everybody. Let's go ahead and bow our heads for a word of prayer. Heavenly Father we thank you
this day for bringing everybody here. We thank you for all the fathers in the room. We thank you
for you Father and all the beautiful blessings that you shed on our church and on our congregation
Lord. We ask Lord that you fill Pastor Shelley with your Holy Spirit, help him to preach an
edifying sermon unto us. We can walk out better Christians we came in remembering always that
you are the Holy Father Lord. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. All right next up we have song number
God leads us along song number 96
song 96 God leads us along sing it out on the first
Thank you for being here on Sunday morning.
If you didn't get a bulletin and you need one,
lift your hand up nice and high.
Happy Father's Day to all of the fathers that are here today
and anybody listening online.
If you are in person, it's better, though,
because we're going to have Father's Day floats
immediately after the service today.
So now...
We are gonna serve the fathers first,
but we actually have enough for everybody.
So I know all the kids are wondering,
they're like, hey, I know I love dad,
but I still wanna float.
So we got some floats that we'll have
in our fellowship area after the service
to celebrate Father's Day.
Jude is our chapter that we're memorizing
and we're on verse nine for the week.
Any child 18 or under that can quote it
can get a special prize on our Wednesday service.
On the inside, we have our service times.
We have a Spanish service at Sunday mornings at 9 a.m.
We have an evening service at 4.30.
And then our Wednesday night services are at 7.
We're doing a Bible study through the book of Matthew.
Churchwide soul-winning meets here at the building.
So if you'd like to go soul-winning with us,
you can this afternoon at 2 p.m.
Also, Wednesdays, there's a church-wide time
before the service at 5.15.
We meet up.
Then, regional soul winning time, there's different times pretty much every day of the week throughout the city.
There's a ladies' time on Thursdays at 10.30 that my wife helps organize.
And I think there's actually another ladies' group that meets on another side of the city that's organized.
So if you are interested, you can participate. Lots of different opportunities in DFW.
Down below is our church stats for the year so far and we've been doing great and we want to continue.
Several to be in prayer for upcoming events like I mentioned today. We're having those father days floats
There is sign-up sheets for the next few events. There's a Shreveport Louisiana Louisiana marathon. It's gonna be
June 28th, there's a sign-up sheet out here.
There's also another event that's gonna happen
July 3rd through the 5th,
and so that is July 4th weekend.
Brother Sam Foley's gonna be leading that,
and there's a sign-up sheet if you'd like to go.
It's about five and a half hours from here specifically,
and he's gonna be targeting Marshallese people
that live over there,
and they kind of...
congregate for certain events.
I think there's supposed to be some events at some parks,
so they're gonna be doing that.
Also, Lancaster, Texas is going to be July 19th.
And so, if you'd like to participate in that Sony Marathon,
that's actually going to be just in our neck of the woods.
It's only about 20 minutes from here or so, 20, 25 minutes.
So, it's going to be pretty close,
but it looks like it'll be pretty receptive.
MIN's conference is going to be August 14th through the 16th,
and then the FBBF conference is going to be...
And again, I need to...
Update this in the bulletin. I guess it's August 27th through the 31st. This is actually gonna be that Wednesday
So we're gonna start off. We're gonna have a preacher every single night
of the conference. We're going to have one Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and then of course
both services on Sunday. And so we've got Pastor Corbyn Russell is going to be coming and preaching
for us, Pastor Aaron Thompson, Pastor Dylan Oz, Pastor Stephen Anderson, Pastor Enrique Reyes.
And so we've got a big lineup of lots of preachers, lots of events. And so we're really excited about
that this year's conference. One other thing I wanted to mention, it's not listed here, but July
and we're going to be having our semi-annual finance meeting.
July 13th. And I'm hoping people can attend that. And we'll just kind of be talking about
the future for our church. Down below is the note about the teen summer event. We had one
yesterday last evening. And it was honestly a lot of fun. I think the kids really enjoyed it.
They learned what's in the Bible and what's not in the Bible. And so that was a lot of fun.
And we're looking forward to July 26th. We're going to have another teen event,
On the back, we have the list of our prayer list.
So if you can be in prayer for our church family,
that's pretty much all I have about announcements.
We're gonna go ahead and sing our special song of the week,
and it's gonna be Where the Spirit Blows.
It's in our, I'm not, I'm sorry, Holy, Holy, Holy.
It's in our Psalm binders.
Holy, Holy, Holy.
All right, that's holy, holy, holy.
As the offering plates are going around would you please turn your bibles to Matthew chapter number 16 Matthew chapter number 16
Matthew 16 the Bible reads the Pharisees also with the Sadducees came and tempting desired him
that he would show them a sign from heaven he answered and said unto them when it is evening he
say it will be fair weather for the sky is red and in the morning it will be foul weather today
for the sky is red and lowering oh ye hypocrites you can discern the face of the sky but can you
a wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign,
and there shall no sign be given unto it but the sign of the prophet Jonas,
and he left them and departed.
And when his disciples were come to the other side, they had forgotten to take bread.
Then Jesus said unto them,
Take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees.
And they reasoned among themselves, saying,
It is because we have taken no bread.
which when Jesus perceived he said unto them, O ye of little faith,
why reason ye among yourselves, because he hath brought no bread?
Do he not yet understand, neither remember the five loaves of the five thousand and how many baskets he took up?
Neither the seven loaves of the 4,000 and how many baskets he took up?
How was it that you do not understand that I spake it not to you concerning bread,
that you should beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees?
Then understood they how that he bade them not beware of the leaven of bread,
but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees."
When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi,
he asked his disciples saying,
And they said, some say that thou art John the Baptist, some Elias, and others Jeremiah,
so are one of the prophets.
He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am?
And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.
And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar Jonah, for flesh and blood
hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father, which is in heaven.
And I say unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven,
and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Then charged he his disciples, that they should tell no man that he was Jesus the Christ.
From that time forth began Jesus to show unto his disciples how that he must go unto Jerusalem and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests
and scribes and be killed and be raised again the third day.
Then Peter took him and began to rebuke him saying,
Be it far from thee, Lord, this shall not be unto thee.
But he turned and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan, thou art an offense unto me.
for thou savorest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.
Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me,
let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
For whosoever will save his life shall lose it,
and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.
For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?
Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?
For the Son of Man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and then he shall reward every man according to his works.
Verily, I say unto you, there be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom."
Let's pray.
Father in heaven, I pray, Lord God, that you would bless the sermon this morning and fill Pastor Shelley with your spirit as he preaches to us.
And I pray, Lord, that you would give us ears to hear the message.
And enable us to apply it to our lives to the best of our ability. We love you and in Jesus name. I pray amen
Amen
I want to look back at verse 18,
a really famous verse in the Bible.
It says,
And I say also unto thee,
Thou art Peter, and upon this rock,
I will build my church,
and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
And there's three things that I kind of notice
about this particular verse
that I think is really important
to talk about this morning is,
number one, that God the Father wants there
to be a church on the earth.
and it's bringing up the importance of church.
And of course, you know, as we celebrate Father's Day,
the most important Father is God the Father.
And God the Father wants us to have a church.
Why would he want us to have a church?
He wants us to have a church because
that's the one institution dedicated
to actually worshiping and serving God the Father.
So, of course, it makes sense that that would be the most important institution that we
have is the one that's actually worshiping and honoring God the Father.
And those of us that are saved are to come together and gather together into the church
to worship and serve God.
And it doesn't matter if you're man, woman, boy, girl.
infant, suckling, married, not married.
It doesn't matter what nationality you are.
It doesn't matter any of those things.
We're all called to come to the house of God
and to worship God as the children of God.
And of course, that is the most important institution
we have is the church and all are to participate.
Another thing that we can see in this passage though,
and I'm just kind of giving you my points quickly,
is that God uses men
To run the church. He says thou art Peter and upon this rock
I will build my church and of course Peter is identified as one of the first early leaders of the church of the New Testament
Church and specifically without men we don't have a church men are to
Run the church, and I'm not just saying only men. It's mankind obviously men are the leaders of the church
But it takes the whole congregation for us to come together for a church to exist a church is not a building
It is not a corporation on paper. It is not an idea
It is a literal gathering of God's people the word church means to to congregate or a congregation
it's a synonym. In the Bible it'll talk about the congregation in the Old Testament. It's referenced
as the church and the New Testament in the same verse because the church is the congregating of
the saints. A church is a collection of the saints or a gathering of the saints. And so the Bible
referenced church in many different ways, the gathering or a congregation as congregating.
And even some churches call themselves a congregation specifically because it's the same
for there to be that church so without us making the church the church won't exist it takes men God
wants a church number one number two it takes men to enable for us to have that church and the third
thing that I kind of noticed in this particular verse
He's the fact that he doesn't want hell to prevail against the church, right?
We kind of notice here that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it and really what I kind of see in this
Is the idea of darkness when we talk about hell
You know hell is a real location. There is a real literal hell. It's in the center of the earth
It's where the damned go to be tormented day and night forever and ever and we as the same believers
We'll never go to hell.
We can never touch hell.
I'll never taste of death.
The Bible says that once you've been saved,
you can't see death.
We won't taste death.
We won't experience death.
I'll never go to hell.
Jesus Christ already died on the cross for all my sins,
descended into hell and rose again for me.
And so I can never go to hell.
So, in what way would this have meaning when it talks about the gates of hell not prevailing over the church,
would really just mean the forces of darkness that exist in this world,
them overcoming the church and causing the church to not exist or to not succeed in its mission as the church?
But the Bible is saying that God is never going to allow that to happen.
And isn't it interesting that after 2,000 years of Jesus Christ, the church is still here?
And we're still thriving and we're still succeeding and we're still praising God and you know what?
The church will still exist until Jesus Christ comes and raptures us up into the clouds
And then we will still exist and we'll have church in heaven
And then we'll bring church back down on earth,
but there will always be church.
But you know what, it takes us having the right attitude
and the right mindset saying, you know what,
God the Father wants there to be church,
and it takes men to build that church.
And you know what, we should never let darkness
win, we should overcome darkness.
That's the third point,
but it's really the title by Sermon this morning is this,
we need to overcome the darkness.
We must overcome the darkness, and church is that institution built to overcome that darkness.
The Bible tells us that the church is that one light.
Now I want you to go to John chapter 4, if you would, go to John chapter number 4.
The one institution on the earth designated for the true worship of God the Father is the church.
And we understand that in the Old Testament,
that if you were saved, if you wanted to worship God,
you would have to go to the nation of Israel.
More specifically, often you'd have to go to Jerusalem.
And the true worship of God was coming to Jerusalem,
performing certain sacrifices,
or being a part of the tabernacle or the temple.
And of course,
You know, that's just one particular point in time because obviously the tabernacle moved.
The Bible talks about the children of Israel going to Mount Sinai and then of course being given that
tabernacle and it going around the wilderness for a long period of time. And then of course
the tabernacle kind of moves, changes locations. So throughout history there's been different
places, different times where you would meet. Often it was a singular place where people would
come and they would have the true worship of God.
But it changed, it changed in the New Testament, the veil was rent in the temple and the temple was destroyed.
And the Bible tells us in John chapter 4, this is a prophecy of the New Testament, look at verse 21,
Jesus saith, and her woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father.
He's saying, hey, at some point in the future, the true worship's not going to be here anymore.
Right now, of course, it is right now at that time when Jesus Christ is there.
I mean, Jesus Christ himself is going to go into the temple.
Jesus Christ himself is going to preach in that temple, but it's going to be destroyed.
It says in verse 22, you worship, you know, not what.
We know what we worship for salvation is of the Jews.
But the hour cometh
And now is when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth,
and the Father seeketh such to worship Him, God is a spirit, and they that worship Him
must worship Him in spirit and in truth. So the Bible is telling us that God the Father wants people
to worship Him.
In the Old Testament we would have gone to the temple, we would have performed sacrifices in accordance with the Passover and other feasts if we wanted to worship God, but in the New Testament that has been done away with.
Yet God still seeks such to worship him, how must we worship him? In spirit and in truth, and it's built in the New Testament church.
It is the New Testament church where we worship Him, and of course salvation is of the Jews.
Those that were the spiritual Jews of the Old Testament were part of the nation of Israel
and congregated there and worshiped and served God there.
Now the spiritual Jews of today, they no longer meet in Israel, they no longer meet in that
part of the country, they're no longer bombing Iran.
They're simply meeting in a church this morning,
and they have a King James Bible in their hand,
and according to Romans chapter number two,
it's not Jews that are circumcised physically,
it's Jews that are circumcised in their heart
and by the spirit, which means they're a spiritual Jew.
And look, I am a Jew today.
And you know what salvation is of the Jews
in the sense that we are the ones that carry
the gospel message that get people saved today.
And this is where the true worship of God is
in spirit and in truth.
The spirit is inside of us because we've been saved.
We have that holy spirit inside of us.
And the truth is this King James Bible I hold in my hand
and yet we tell you something.
We're worshiping God in spirit and in truth this morning.
Whereas people in a synagogue or people in the Middle East today, they're not worshiping Jesus Christ in spirit because they're not saved.
They don't have the Holy Spirit.
They have another spirit and they don't have the truth because you know what they believe in the Babylonian Talmud, which is lies and garbage and trash.
And so we have the true worship of God the Father and it's in the church now
Go view to Matthew chapter 5 Matthew chapter number 5
Why is this important because we need to overcome the darkness and the whole world lies in darkness and the only
Institution of light today is the New Testament church
It's the New Testament church with a King James Bible in hand
That is the light of the world and in fact we are that light as well because what is a church again?
It's the people
And the only way for a church to be lit up is for us individually to be lights and we are lights according to the Bible
And when we come together all one united, it's even brighter light. In fact, most lights are a combination
many different bulbs or many different lights all come you know combined together into one big light and
So that's the same way the church is is that we're all these little lights all gathered together into one big spotlight
On the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ the Bible tells us in Matthew 5 verse 14. Ye are the light of the world
A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid, neither do men light a candle and put it under
a bushel, but on a candlestick and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.
Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works, and glorify your
Father which is in heaven.
What is one of the greatest ways to glorify God the Father is by letting your light shine.
Now, I want to take a journey through the New Testament for a second to help you understand this point.
We have to realize that the rest of this world,
the rest of the institutions of this world are darkness.
They do not provide the gospel message.
They do not provide salvation.
They do not explain to you how to go to heaven.
The public school today will not tell you how to go to heaven.
The federal government will not tell you how to go to heaven.
Macy's will not tell you how to go to heaven.
The bar will not tell you how to go to heaven.
The Dallas Cowboys will not tell you how to go to heaven.
Boy Scouts will not tell you how to go to heaven.
Salvation Army will not tell you how to go to heaven because they have a false gospel.
Let me tell you something, the New Testament church is the one institution
that has the light of the world and we are that light and if we hide that light,
you know what, the whole world is going to die and go to hell.
We are that one light. We are that one institution that is to proclaim the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ
And that's why we have the church is to overcome the darkness of false gospels today
It's overcome the darkness of sin taking people to hell today by sharing them the free gospel
Free salvation that comes only through Jesus Christ
And let me under let me explain something to you
The church is what God cares about because the New Testament is written to churches
It's not written to other people.
It's written to churches.
It's not written to Boy Scouts.
It's not written to department stores.
It's not written to sports teams.
It's not written to just random lone wolf rangers.
It's not written to YouTube ministries.
It's written to New Testament churches.
Now, go to Romans chapter 16 for a moment.
Go to Romans chapter number 16.
And you'll understand that the New Testament is...
comprised of four Gospels,
then you have the Acts of the Apostles,
then it's just a series of letters
written to churches.
This is how we got the New Testament and look the New Testament is focusing in on and geared towards the churches
Of course the acts of the apostles
We see them forming and setting up
churches
Throughout all of the world and the gospel being spread throughout all the world through the efforts and energies of churches
And of course we have epistles written to them
Romans chapter number 16
I want to just show you this common pattern of the Bible bringing up churches look at verse number one
I commend of you Phoebe, our sister, which is a servant of the church, which is at Tentria.
So we notice that Phoebe is commended.
Why is she commended?
Because she's of the church.
This woman is a great woman because she's of church.
Did you notice that?
Look at verse 4, who have, for my life, laid down their own necks talking about Priscilla
unto whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles.
Verse 5, likewise greet the church that is in their house,
slute my well-beloved Epinettus, who is the first roots of Akhia unto Christ.
So again, Priscilla and Achilla are well-known as great helpers of the gospel and, you know,
They have a church that they're associated with.
They have a church that they're in participation with.
It's a church that meets in their house.
They're willing to supply essentially the meeting place.
I don't think this means that they're the leaders
of the church necessarily.
That just means that they're supplying the location.
They're supplying the place for them to meet physically
at a location in their house.
They're the host look at verse 16 salute one another with a holy kiss the churches of Christ salute you
Notice again, who are we talking to the Romans?
Who's talking to them? Not just Paul, all the churches.
All the churches of Christ are saluting the other churches,
the churches that are at Rome, the saints that are at Rome, those that exist here.
And I'll show you later in the epistles that there's a church at Babylon
which Peter references and I think alludes probably to the churches at Rome.
Now it says in verse 23,
Gaius might own host, and of the whole church,
Saludithu, the rest of the Chamberlain of the city,
Saludithu and the court of his brother.
So again, the chapter 16 is a list of all these names,
but did you notice how all these names are tied to churches?
And now it's all about churches.
Now you're just on the right side of the page,
1 Corinthians 1, Ligaverse 2.
Under the church of God, which is at Corinth.
Notice who the epistle is written to, it's written to a church and it's the church of God and it exists in Corinth.
Look at chapter 4 verse 17.
For this cause have I sent unto you to Motheus, who is my beloved son and faithful in the Lord, who shall bring you into remembrance of my ways which be in Christ as I teach everywhere in every church.
Where did the apostle Paul go to teach?
He didn't go to the department store.
He didn't go to some random organization.
He didn't go to just some random dude's house.
He went to the church.
That's where he was teaching.
That's where you're meeting.
Hey, if you wanted to hear Paul preach,
if you wanted to hang out with Paul,
you know where you needed to go?
To church.
That's where Paul is at.
Paul is in the church because God wants
there to be a church in this world.
He wants to be a church on this planet.
Look at chapter 16, verse 19.
This institution is so important I get so mad when I talk to people and they're jaded and they say oh, I don't like church
Well, what a pistol of the Bible do you like
What do you mean you don't like church or I gave up on church or I don't think we need church or we're having church right now lies
No church is the gathering of the saints you and your family is not a church. It's a family
Okay
And you and a buddy is friends, okay?
That's not a church.
Us meeting together, this is the church.
This is the institution that God has assembled
and has called out.
Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 16, look at verse 19.
The churches of Asia salute you.
Achilla and Priscilla salute you much in the Lord
with the church that is in their house.
Again, notice that it's churches praising churches
and churches talking about churches
and churches helping churches.
Gov. 2, 2 Corinthians chapter one, verse one.
Now, again, I believe in the local autonomy of a church.
I believe that we should be independent
in the sense that every church is self-governing,
but we should not be so independent
that we don't care about other churches.
that we don't write to other churches,
that we don't know what's going on with other churches,
that we don't fellowship with other churches.
The New Testament is filled with churches,
fellowshiping with other churches,
praising other churches,
helping other churches,
giving money to other churches,
giving minister to other churches,
praying for other churches,
knowing the drama of other churches.
I mean, it's all about churches, knowing churches.
It sounds like they have their own little fellowship.
And, in fact, even the churches that are kind of screwed up and bad, they still fellowship
with them in a sense, because, you know, a true church should, you know, like another
true church, regardless of how screwed up they are.
Obviously, sometimes you have to separate because it gets too bad, but at the end of
the day, we should generally have an attitude of wanting to be friendly towards other churches
and having friends and having a fellowship and not isolating ourselves and not trying
You know, in the multitude of counselors, they're a safety.
It says in 2 Corinthians chapter 1 verse 1,
Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God,
and Timothy, our brother, under the church of God,
which is at Corinth, with all the saints,
which are in Alakaya.
So again, we notice that the 2 Corinthians, or epistle,
is also written to what?
The church which is at Corinth.
Look at chapter eight verse number one,
chapter eight verse number one.
Now we're not looking at every mention of church
in the New Testament, we're looking at a lot of them
because I wanna remind you of the importance
of the word church in your Bible.
God said that, hey, I'm gonna build my church.
He wasn't joking.
It's real.
Church is real.
It's the most important institution.
The Bible is writing epistles to churches and so when we read these, we have to have
the mindset of church because it's about church.
It's talking about church.
It's talking about issues with churches.
These are what real New Testament churches are like.
Second Corinthians, chapter number eight, look at verse one.
Moreover, brethren, we do you to wit of the grace of God bestowed on the churches of Macedonia.
And again, notice that a couple times it mentions church is of a particular region because,
of course, geographically speaking, it can be a large place and it needs lots of churches.
So there's nothing wrong with having multiple churches in a relatively smaller area.
Go to Galatians chapter number one.
What is a church? It's a congregation of believers.
And there's multiple church is.
Sometimes the Bible does use the word church to just loosely reference everybody that's saved but you know we can't meet with everybody today it's just not practical.
So in today we have churches there's many churches throughout the entire world and one day we'll all be gathered together in heaven so you could argue that there's a church service up in heaven we're all gathered together.
But then again, when we come back down on the earth,
I believe we're gonna be scattered again
throughout the world and we'll have probably
local congregations and assemblies again.
So there's nothing wrong with having churches.
And we have churches today.
Galatians, chapter number one, look at verse two.
And all the brethren which are with me
under the churches of Galatia.
So again, Galatia has multiple
Again, this is epistles written to the Galatians, not just a church, but all the churches of
Galatia because they're all kind of screwed up in this one area.
Look at verse 13.
If you have heard of my conversation in the time past and the Jews' religion, how that
beyond measure I persecuted the church of God.
and wasted it.
Again, notice here the word church
is in reference to just saved people.
So you could use the word church
to just reference the saved
because the apostle Paul is saying,
hey, I was just persecuting the church of God,
but it wasn't like a specific only this church.
It was just any saved people.
You could argue that it was primarily the Church of Jerusalem,
but even then he got letters to persecute people
far off from Jerusalem.
As far as Assyria, he got letters to go into Damascus
and to go and to persecute people
in all kinds of different regions and areas.
It wasn't targeting one church,
it was targeting just the Church of God,
meaning all the saints, all the believers.
But we understand that God wants us
to still have local assemblies,
and those local assemblies
is what we're primarily talking about.
totally undermine all the other passages bringing up churches.
Go to Ephesians, chapter number five, because this is what some people say,
oh, I'm the church. Not really.
You walking around, you're not like just a self-governing church walking around.
By yourself the church is still the gathering of God's people and when he said church here wasn't even just saying one individually saying all of us
Collectively we're just not assembled
But again being assembled is what the special institution is that God has as the church and first Corinthians
The Bible tells us in chapter number 11 that is the gathering of us together
That's basically what the church is just gathering together as that local assembly
Ephesians chapter 5, look at verse 24,
therefore as the church is subject unto Christ,
so let their wives be to their own husbands and everything.
Again, the church, we are to be subject unto Christ.
He is the chief shepherd of the flock,
and so that's why we say the King James Bible
or the Word of God of the Bible is our final authority.
And if you don't have this as a final authority,
well, then you don't have Jesus Christ
as the head of the church.
I would even argue when you don't have a particular version of the Bible
that you say this is the words of God, you often have a guru in charge of the
church
because the guru gets to decide well it's the NIV over here and it's the ESV over
here and it's the message over here
and then pretty soon it's just the guru is really in charge
as opposed to just saying hey here's our document.
Imagine if you had 50 versions of the Constitution that the Supreme Court got the pick and choose
which one they wanted to interpret from.
Well then you wouldn't say the Constitution is the supreme law of the land, you would
say that the governing body or the Supreme Court is the guru or the supreme leader and
they get the pick and choose which Constitution they're going to use.
But when you say, hey, this is our constitution, this is our written document, this is what goes,
this is Christ, and Christ is the head of the church, then we know who's really in charge.
And this institution is important because we are to subject ourselves,
we are to submit ourselves unto this and under the word of God.
We don't get to decide to do whatever we want. We have to do whatever this says.
And that's why church is important.
Go over to Philippians chapter 4, Philippians chapter 4, I mean, we're going through every epistle.
Don't we notice that the Bible keeps bringing up church, the importance of church, what church looks like, how church is
governed by the Lord Jesus Christ, and you know what?
He's building his church through the Word of God. Philippians 4 verse 1, therefore my dear, I'm sorry, my brethren,
dearly beloved and longed for.
My joy and crown, so stand fast and Lord my dearly beloved.
It says, I beseech thee,
you deus, and beseech sink to thee,
and they that be of the same mind in the Lord.
Now I want to skip down,
he says my dearly beloved,
skip down to verse 15.
Now you Philippians know also,
that in the beginning of the Gospel, when I departed from Macedonia,
no church communicated with me as concerning giving and receiving, but ye only.
So, I want you to notice that in verse 1, it's a group.
He's addressing a group, and then specifically in verse 15,
he's saying, hey, there was no church communicating with me, but ye only.
The word ye is plural.
You know, in a lot of modern versions, they just use the word you.
But you could be referred to singular or plural, you don't really know, whereas the King James
is a little bit more precise in that it uses ye and thee, thee being singular, ye being
plural, and of course that ye is the beloved, and he's saying, hey, there's a church that
didn't do this, but you did, meaning what?
They're a church.
So that's the whole context of Philippians chapter four.
Again, as he's talking to the church,
he's talking to the churches in Philippi.
And again, they are a church.
He's saying, hey, there's not churches helping me,
but you are, because you're what?
A church.
And again, it just makes sense practically speaking.
Go to Colossians chapter four,
go to Colossians chapter four.
It's a lot harder to accomplish things by yourself.
You know, two are better than one, as the Bible says.
And of course, when a church comes together,
it's gonna be easier for us to pool resources together.
And for those resources, then to be used
to the furtherance of the gospel,
like the Philippians pulling money together
to help evangelists, to help people go out.
You know, we have an evangelist in the Philippines right now.
And he's getting thousands of people saying he's almost doing as much as we are as an entire church almost single-handedly.
No, it's not single-handedly because there are other people helping him.
But at least he single-handedly is getting that work started and then gathering other people and now he's kind of forming a church over there.
But if we individually were just all doing our own thing, we wouldn't be able to have the money or the finances just send somebody over there and pay his whole way.
but by us all pulling together all of our resources
and taking those resources and then giving them all to
evangelist or manic, then we can employ him and he can go out there and do this
great work.
And so some people don't realize that hey when we come together and work together
we can accomplish great works like that whereas if we're just all lone rangers
well that's not going to be accomplished. That kind of work isn't going to happen.
That's why church is just so important and what we're doing is
Also, we're not getting all of our money and pooling it all together and then handing
out $25 a month to 150 missionaries.
I just find that it's just kind of ineffective.
It's not as efficient.
And you know, evangelist or bannock, he never went on this two-year hibernation that they
call deputation where he went around with this little PowerPoint presentation to go
And he has to go do that to hundreds of different churches
for several years before he can accomplish anything.
And then go out to this country that doesn't speak English
and learn the language for seven years
and accomplish nothing.
All the while constantly coming back here
and then begging more churches for money.
And then eventually quitting because it's just lame
and boring and he didn't really have the gumption.
And then it's like, why do we spend nine years of money
accomplishing almost nothing?
And this is the missions of many independent Baptist today.
Hey, you know what, I just don't like that program very much.
Now, am I saying every missionary is bad?
Am I saying everyone's never accomplished anything?
No, but I see a lot of inefficiencies.
I see a lot of kind of a joke newsletters.
If you read our newsletter, it's not a joke.
It's real.
It's not like, hey, Rafael, I talked to him,
and he might get saved next week.
And I just want to oh my wife she cleaned the house again this week, and we swept and you know
Johnny's birthday is coming up in a month and a half. We're counting down the timer 45 days from his birthday
He's turning three. We're he's learning how to tie his shoes now
Pray for us that you know
We got a window busted by a storm the other day pray for us that we get the funds to replace this window
I'm not exaggerating. This is exactly what newsletters are like
And you know what?
You read our newsletter, it's like 100 saved,
went to this school and got them saved,
we preach this sermon, we got this person baptized,
this person's a soul winner, other newsletter,
windows sweeping, my wife cried the other day.
I mean, she's like, what is this?
And of course there's just not a lot of accountability
there, okay?
And so you know what?
Yeah, I like our missions program.
I think it's superior.
I think it's a better product.
I think it's yielding better results.
We're not wasting all this hibernation time called deputation.
And of course, being in the DFW area, I kid you not, it's probably at least once a week.
I get a newsletter or email or someone begging me to come present at our church.
So if we wanted to, we could give $25 a month, probably hundreds,
hundreds of missionaries if we really wanted to.
But then it's like, how do you even monitor that?
How do you even track that?
We don't even know what's going on.
And in the end of the day, they're not really responsible to a church.
They're responsible to all these random churches.
And it's just kind of weird.
It's just kind of awkward.
I like our method.
I like our style.
And you know what?
Our church is going to take full responsibility
for the work that's going on with a vengeance or bennock.
And we're not just all these random individuals.
You know a lot of other missionaries?
They get a lot of money just from private individuals and go out but again
there's not a lot of accountability there's not a lot of
Instruction there, and I don't see them accomplishing a lot of the same great works
We need to have a church that's unified in doctrine, and here's the thing
Avengers or Bannock has to agree with us on doctrine or we'll pull them off the field
Whereas some of these evangelists they'll teach who knows what
And yet people have to fund them and do their thing.
You know, we want to have a local body that is committed to the Bible.
This is our head. This is our responsibility.
We're all subject to this and we're going to fund him.
But at the end of the day, you know, we need churches to do that.
And I hope that churches will follow our model
and we'll start pulling all the missionaries off the field
and keeping only the real ones out there on the missions field doing the real work.
Now, Colossians chapter 4, look at verse number 15, that was a little rant I went on.
Let's go back to the importance of church.
Colossians chapter 4, look at verse 15,
salute the brethren which are in laya decia and nymphis and the church which is in his house.
Notice a lot of these people are having churches in their house.
Of course, probably when you start out, that's how a lot of churches are.
Steadfast Baptist church was started in a house.
Of course, I guarantee you that church at Jerusalem,
once they're running 3,000,
are probably not meeting at the house anymore.
So obviously, some people are like,
we need to go back to the axe movement
where they're meeting in a house.
Well, why would we do that?
Well, I said, okay, we need to go back to the way
steadfast started and start meeting in a house.
Well, who's got a house for all of us?
If you do, I mean, that's impressive, that's great.
But you know what, most of us probably don't have
a living room for 200 people to sit in.
And even if we did, you don't want us over anyways, okay?
I remember Pastor Anderson was saying,
because he's one of my friends,
he started a church in his house,
and he said people would just come
and they would pee all over the walls,
and they would come super early,
they would stay so late,
and he's trying to figure out like,
how do I just tell you to leave?
And you know what, house church is a little bit rough, okay?
And you know, if you think your wife doesn't like everybody that much,
just imagine them peeing on your walls and then think your wife,
how she's gonna like them.
You know what I mean?
So it's a little bit different when we come here and we gather here
and you spill stuff here.
We're not as offended as when you did it on our new rug.
You know what I mean?
And in the day, hey, I'm not against a church meeting in a house.
There's nothing wrong with a church meeting in a house.
But practically speaking, as the church grows, it's probably going to grow beyond the capabilities
of a house to meet in, and so they're going to need a bigger spot.
Obviously, there was a furnishing for the last sub of 120 people.
That's impressive.
But even then, that's probably stretching it.
Probably couldn't meet much more than that.
And, you know, maybe some houses could accommodate 120.
I met in Manly Perry's living room with 120 people,
and boy, it was crammed.
It was packed we see you know and sometimes in the Old Testament or sorry in the Gospels the meeting and houses of stuff
They're packed out the doors and out the windows and whatever
You know, it's nice to have a place so we can meet we have air conditioning
It's Texas and of course we get together and of course we're busting at the seams
You know God willing he'll provide us a new place at some point, but it's nice to have this
It's better than my living room and it's better than your living room and it's better than outside. You know what I mean?
So you know some people then they get confused though and they think that the church is the building again the church
It doesn't matter where we met we could meet out in a field
As long as we're gathered together, it's church
We could meet in your living room and it would still be church
But at the end of the day, you know you meeting in your living room is not church
That's your family just hanging out right you meeting at the dinner table is not church
Church is a special called-out assembly. We're meeting together and we're and we're having church according to what the Bible is saying
Now, go if you went to 1 Thessalonians chapter number one, go to 1 Thessalonians chapter
number one.
I'm taking a long journey here, but this is an important doctrine that the Bible is establishing
is the church.
It's hard to say that there's really much more important things to talk about.
I mean, the entire New Testament is written to churches here, and we have to understand
that we are a church and church is the institution that God wants us to have so that we can worship
You can worship God the father as a family you can worship God the father as an individual
But let me tell you something worship as a congregation is the best
You can sing a hymn by yourself. You can sing a hymn as a family, but us congregational singing to him is the best
Hey, you can go so winning as an individual you can go so winning as a family but going so winning as an army is the best
Hey, you can do a missions trip on your own you can do missions trip as a family
But a missions trip with our fleet of soul winning, you know commanders
We're gonna go out and tear up the Bahamas. I'm just tell you what
We're gonna see a lot of people say then let me tell you something
We're not trying to worship God as minimally as we can we're trying to worship God the best that we can
Hey, you might play the piano, okay, you know we have a whole orchestra going on up here
We have a song leader going on up here.
We have microphones in a sound system and we're trying to actually praise God
to the fullest here, to the best of our abilities,
because we don't want to, we don't serve a God that gets the bare minimum.
We serve an awesome God.
We serve a God that's worthy of all praise and all honor and all glory and we should do it with all of our might
And so that's where our meeting here in church today is the worship God with all of our might with all of our strength
With our mind with our hearts with our with our money with our efforts with their body with everything that God has given us
Because we have to otherwise we would let the darkness win
We can't let the darkness win in this world the church has to win
The church has to be the institution that we care about in this world.
The church has to be an institution that we put as priority in this world,
not the other institutions of this world.
1 Thessalonians chapter 1 verse 1,
Paul and Sylvainus and Tumotheus under the church of the Thessalonians.
Look at 2 Thessalonians chapter 1, same deal.
2 Thessalonians chapter 1, Paul and Sylvainus and Tumotheus under the church of the Thessalonians.
Go to 1 Timothy, chapter one.
I'm sorry, go to chapter three, go to chapter three.
1 Timothy, chapter three, look at verse five.
The Bible says this,
for of a man know not how to rule his own house,
house only take care of the church of God.
Now, most of the epistles we've already written
were written to just groups of people, to churches.
Timothy's obviously written to Timothy.
That's why it's called Timothy.
But Timothy is known as a bishop.
of the church and then he's telling him the qualifications of a pastor of a bishop and notice
what the bishop is supposed to do. He's supposed to do something specific. He's supposed to take
care of the church of God. So we notice someone's in charge of the church. It's a man. It's Timothy.
He is to take charge and care of the church. But notice it doesn't say take care of your family.
It doesn't say take care of your house. It doesn't say take care of your business. It doesn't say
And you know what, it says you have to first get your house in order and get your family
in order before you can then take care of the church.
But let me tell you something, someone is supposed to take care of the church.
Someone is supposed to care for the church, and this epistle is written to a man to take
care of church because church is the important institution.
What does it say in verse 15?
But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou artest to behave thyself in the
house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.
It's not the building. It's us congregating together and God living inside of us. This is the house of God
We are the house of God God is dwelling among us
And we ought to behave ourselves in the house of God and there is a man that is supposed to take care of the house
Of God of the church of God. His name is Timothy and he is a bishop. He is a pastor. He is an elder
Look at second Timothy chapter
for
Second Timothy chapter number four, the Bible says in verse three,
for the time will come when they will not endure a sound doctrine,
but after their own lust shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears.
Now, it doesn't say explicitly church here, but we understand there's groups of people
and they're heaping what? A teacher to themselves.
This sounds like a church, doesn't it?
But it's saying, hey, in the end times and the latter times,
there's going to be a lot of bad churches.
And let me tell you something, in 2025 America there's a lot of bad teachers
where congregations have heaped to themselves false teachers, bad teachers.
People like Robert Morris has been heaped to themselves for Gateway.
People like Craig Rochelle heaped under themselves for Life Church.
TD Jakes and Kenneth Copeland and I mean let me tell you some of the Dallas, Fort Worth area is filled with churches
Where they've heaped under themselves?
Teachers having itching ears where they don't want to hear the Bible
You know what they want to hear a story and let me tell you something go to the non nom church today
And you know you'll hear a story
They'll start off their sermon and it'll be a story
It'll be a joke and then a story and they'll sprinkle a random verse from a random
Translation and then it'll be another story and then you'll go home
And it might even in the summer. It's the summer so they might even actually just have a movie
I'm not even joking. I am not joking because the church that I grew up in
Started this thing and spread it to everybody else because they're in charge the church I grew up in it's called Trinity Fellowship Church
They have a thing called T-FAC,
Trinity Fellowship Association of Churches.
It's where you pay money to Trinity
and they basically tell you how to run your church.
And so basically they like almost are the pattern that almost every non-the-none church is copying from
and they're in fellowship with Life Church and all these other ones and they taught them all this stuff.
And so this little special movies thing and their little dream team and their little life groups
and all this stuff, it doesn't matter what non-the-none church you go to, it's all the same package and the same deal.
It's just a cult, it's a cult of Trinity and let me tell you something, you go to the churches in the summer and it's a movie.
Iron Man, it's going to be Despicable Me, it's going to be whatever.
The little minions running around, they'll have popcorn, they'll throw popcorn around.
You can take your picture with the movie star, poster, at whatever.
You know what? That is itching ears, if I've ever heard it in my life.
It's embarrassing. And you know, many
people that at least want to be conservative or want to be traditional
They mock at that and they look at that and they say,
well, I guess I'm going to join the Catholic Church.
I'm going to join the Orthodox Church.
I'm going to join one of these mainline Protestant denominations
because of look at the mockery and foolishness
that these churches are doing.
And it's embarrassing.
And you know what?
We're letting darkness win when the options are,
go watch a Hollywood movie,
or go watch some faggot in a dress,
tell you to drink Jesus's blood.
and tell you work salvation. One will just be open about work salvation.
The other one will just say, except Jesus in your heart, and you ask him what that means and say, I don't know.
You know, we need to have a real church somewhere
where someone's just thundering forth the Word of God. We don't have any fancy movie theater tickets here.
We don't have some fancy screen. We don't have some gimmick here.
We just have an old-fashioned King James Bible. We're just preaching the Word of God.
And that's what we need today is we need churches like that and we need a minute of God like that
They're gonna actually be in a real church doing this
But you know what it takes people to have a pastor
And if you say you know I don't like that kind of preaching I want to go hear the other stuff
Well, you're the problem
You know what? We need people that actually want a real preacher in this world.
And you know what? It's important for you to go to a church where there's a real preacher.
And yeah, maybe your feelings get hurt every once in a while, but you know what?
You need a real preacher again.
Because if you never get your feelings hurt, what does it sound like?
It sounds like this. It sounds, they shall turn away their ears from the truth
and shall be turned into fables.
You have itching ears.
Your itching ears just, I want to hear something comfortable.
I want to hear something nice.
Create something smooth under me today.
Tell me how wonderful I am today the problem is you're not wonderful. I
Mean if you're wonderful, I have no problem telling you you're wonderful, but here's the problem. You're just not
For all of cynic I'm sure the glory of God. There's none that do good. No, not one
There's not a just man upon the earth that sin. It's not you do with goodness and it's not
I mean, all our righteousness are just filthy rags.
The Bible says we sin every day.
The Bible says the thought of foolishness is sin.
The Bible says, hey, if you look upon a woman to lust
after you've committed adultery with her in her heart,
the Bible says, hey, if you're angry with your brother,
you've committed adultery, you've committed murder
in your heart.
Hey, the Bible says, him that knows the good
and do it not to him in his sin.
The Bible is not sitting here and saying,
you guys are so wonderful.
So if you want me to preach the Bible,
well then you know what, get rid of your itching ears.
And get ready to hear the word of God being preached.
Not one that has itching ears itching ear Baptist called the southern Baptist
All right, and you want to know where non the nomination churches come from southern Baptist
You want to know what the difference between a southern Baptist and a non-nominational church today this
One took the Baptist off the sign the other hasn't yet
That's it. I mean you go to the southern Baptist Church, and it's just grace Baptist or whatever pretty soon. It'll just be grace
Pretty soon. It'll be experience
Pretty soon. It'll just be whatever they just oasis
There was a church, I literally watched the transition.
It was this huge sign, Oasis Baptist Church.
And then pretty soon the sign just said Oasis.
And then pretty soon you went on the doctor's statement,
they're like, we're not Baptist anymore, whatever.
And then pretty soon it's just like a woman preacher.
You know, once you go down that track, it gets bad fast.
The woman probably took the Baptist off the sign.
Because you know what, you show up at a Baptist church
and a woman gets up, you're like, ah, what in the world?
What is this?
But it's like Oasis, it's like, I don't even know what that is.
What is an Oasis?
Isn't most Oasis like an illusion?
It's a mirage.
You're out in the desert and you see this quote Oasis
and then it's fake, that's what that church is.
And as you're in this desert of life, and you saw, oh, it's a hoasis.
It was fake.
It was a mirage.
It wasn't real.
We have a lot of fake churches today.
Look at Titus chapter one, verse five, for this cause left ID and creed, that thou should
have set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders in every city as I had appointed
thee.
Hey, we need elders.
We need bishops.
We need pastors in every city.
You know what that means?
And you know what? The church is the important institution that we need in this world.
Of course, you know, I want to be realistic though.
Even though this says every city, I don't think there was ever a time where there's probably a church in every city.
I mean, you gotta understand that Paul's primarily going to Asia and Europe.
He's not going to like every single Asian continent and every single South African continent and every single place.
You know, there's always been dark places in this world and there probably always will be dark places in this world.
But you know what? We should constantly be the light putting new churches everywhere too.
and trying to get new churches.
And you know what, if you're in a dark area
where there is no church,
maybe you should just go to one where there is.
Which is way easier than the Old Testament.
The Old Testament, you had to go to Jerusalem.
Now, you have many options.
You don't have to go to Jerusalem.
But you know what, find a good church
and go to a good church.
I mean, I think Jesus Christ came down from heaven to here.
That was a pretty big move.
That cost him a little bit of money, didn't it?
Oh, yeah, all the riches of the world to come down here to die for you.
The least you can do is just go to a good church somewhere.
Well, that's 25 minutes from my house.
You're lame.
You don't deserve to worship the God of heaven if you think that's an excuse to not go to a good church.
Go to Philemon chapter one, Philemon chapter one.
I mean, he had to carry his cross up Mount Calvary and you're complaining about riding in an air conditioning car?
I mean, it's just sad how much of a spoiled and titled brat Americans are.
Men are soft today, and especially American men, we become so soft today.
Isn't it back in the day, our grandfather walked to school 20 miles uphill both ways?
And you can't even drive to church?
Isn't it that grandpa, when he mailed off to dad, he got taken to the woodshed?
He didn't get taken to CPS or something like that.
He got taken to the woodshed!
And boy, grandpa's a cool dude!
Grandpa's a man!
Grandpa is real, you know, it's sad, the new generations are just so soft and so entitled
and so pathetic today.
You know, we don't worship a pathetic God, we worship an awesome God that came down from
heaven to earth and died on the cross and went into hell and rose again for us.
I think the least we could do is just go to a good church, right?
Isn't that our reasonable service considering what he's done for us?
Philemon chapter one verse two and our beloved Athea and archipis our fellow soldier and did the church in my house
Hey, I like these people because you know having church in your house is a big sacrifice
These people are willing to put in a big sacrifice of having church in their house. Oh
I don't want people to find out where I live. They're having church in their house
I mean some people are afraid to allow people to know they even come to this church
These people like hey churches in my house
That person's not afraid, are they?
They're steadfast.
Go to Hebrews chapter 12.
Go to Hebrews chapter number 12.
Some people are embarrassed of church today.
They're embarrassed to go to a church like ours.
I mean, it's funny to me.
I have people that are like, hey, don't take our picture.
Don't let anybody know we go there, or whatever.
And I'm just thinking, like, why?
Isn't that a little embarrassing?
I mean, imagine if you said that to your girlfriend
or your wife.
Hey, honey, don't tag me in any pictures
What would she think like what why are you so embarrassed, you know
Hey, don't don't update your profile and say hey, we're married or something or tag me or we're dating or whatever
You know what that sounds like you're embarrassed. How could you be embarrassed of going to a good church?
And if it's not a good church then go to one
Right. I'm not if you if in your mind, it's embarrassing then don't come
We don't want you. We want we don't have room for you. Okay. We don't have room for the people that are embarrassed of this church
We only have room for people that like it Hebrews chapter 12 verse 23
to the general assembly and church of the firstborn which are written in heaven
And to the God, the Judge of all.
Have you noticed a pattern here?
I mean, whether it's Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians,
to Timothy, to Titus, to Hebrew, I mean, just church, church, church, church, church, church,
Philemon Church, Hebrews Church, let's go to James, chapter number five.
James, chapter number five.
It seems like the Bible's written to the church.
And yet so many people are down on church today.
Hey, if we're going to overcome the darkness, we have to have church, church is the institution.
Hebrews chapter 12 tells us about church, James chapter 5, look at verse 14, I've got to speed up.
Is any sick among you, let him call for the elders of the church, there we go.
First Peter chapter 5, look at verse 13.
First, Peter chapter 5 verse 13, the church that is at Babylon, elected together with
you, saluted you.
And so does Marcus, my son.
Notice that a lot of these epistles are coming, not even just from a single person, they're
coming from a whole group of people at the church, is how the church feels about things.
Second, Peter chapter 2, look at verse 1.
But there were false prophets also among the people,
even as there shall be false teachers among you.
Again, talking about the congregation,
and talking about how there's going to be infiltrators,
and what?
The church.
First John chapter two.
Now, here's the thing.
First John chapter two is probably
the most broadly written epistle.
But even then, he addresses everyone.
So, I believe that's an obvious connection to the church, verse 12 of chapter 2.
I write in you little children, because your sins are forgiven you for his namesake.
I write in you fathers, because you have known him that is from the beginning.
I write in you young men, because you have overcome that wicked one.
I write in you little children, because you have known the Father.
I have written in you fathers, because you have known him that is from the beginning.
I have written in you young men, because you are strong,
and the Word of God abideth in you, and you have overcome
the wicked. Notice, he's writing to the little children, he's writing to the young men, he's
writing to the men, he's writing to everyone because he's writing to the church. I want to go to a
few more places. Go to 2 John chapter 1 verse 1. We'll notice the elder under the elect lady. So
this is the pastor writing to a woman and her children in the church. Chapter 3, 3 John, I'm
Which have borne witness of thy charity before the church whom if thou bring forward on their journey after a godly sort thou shalt do
Well verse 9 I wrote unto the church
But deotrophies who loveth to have the preeminence among them receive it. It's not wherefore if I come I will remember his deeds
Would you do it?
Prating against us with malicious words and not content therewith neither doth he
Himself receive the brethren and forbiddeth them that would and casteth them out of the church
Notice we have people hijacking the church, attacking the church, false teachers in the church,
people itching up to themselves, bad people in the church, and boy, that's reminiscent of what we see
in America today, we see in the world today, infiltrators, deotrophies, false teachers,
people that are being just heaped up to themselves, teachers to itch the ears of these people,
and that's why church is so important. We have to overcome this darkness.
Someone has to have a good church.
Someone has to prevent this stuff from happening.
Revelation chapter 1 verse 4,
we'll notice that the last epistle of the Bible
is not written to one church.
It's written to the seven churches which are in Asia.
Verse 4, John did the seven churches
which are in Asia.
And of course, they're all in varying degrees of difference.
Go to 2 Corinthians chapter 4 now.
Go back if you would.
That point was a long point, but here's the thing.
It's it's what matters
Jesus Christ said I'll build my church and then what do we see him do he built his church
He built his church in Rome. He built his church in Corinth. He built his church in Galatia
He built his church in Ephesus. He built his church in Philippi and Colossae. He built it in Thessalonica
and then yay to the seven churches in Asia,
yay the whole world.
And we have a church right now in the Douseforth area
in Cedar Hill, Texas, Steadfast Baptist Church,
and it is the church of the Lord Jesus Christ,
it is the church of the firstborn,
and you know what, it is overcoming the darkness.
We are here to overcome the darkness of false religion
and false gospels and get people saved,
and if we don't, people will go to hell.
Second Corinthians chapter four is three, but if our gospel be hid, it's hid to them
that are lost, and whom the God of this world have blinded the minds of them, which believe
not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should
shine under them, for we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves your
servants for Jesus' sake.
For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts
to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
But we have this treasure in earthen vessels
that the excellency of the power may be of God
and not of us.
So notice that in order to overcome the darkness
we need the light of the glorious gospel to shine.
The light shines and it overcomes the darkness
but if we hide our light,
if we don't allow our light to shine
well then people are gonna remain in darkness.
In order to overcome the darkness
we must go out there and preach the gospel.
And that's why in Revelation Jesus Christ warns the churches that stop the first love,
that stop going out and preaching the gospel, that he'll take away their candlestick.
The whole point of the candlestick is to put lights on and to light up a room or light up an area.
And we are, as a church, kind of like that candlestick with lots of lights plugged in there.
But if we turn out our own lights, well then he's going to use that candlestick for something else.
He's gonna give that candlestick to someone else to put lights in and so you know what if we want to have a successful church
We have to continue to be that light and of course notice that this treasure is in earth and vessels
We need men to take on that mission
Jesus is not gonna come down yet and
Just make church happen
Church has to happen because we have to be willing to make church happen
The reason why this church exists right now is because of men
And I'm saying mankind, but obviously men lead and men are the leaders, but you know if it wasn't for the
sacrifice of many men this church wouldn't exist.
The sacrifice of people driving hours. I mean the Milsteads were some of the first members of this church and they were driving from Waco.
So you know what? If you drive further than Waco, I might give you an excuse to not come to this church.
They're driving from Waco into a house.
They're not coming to a nice building.
They're not coming to tons of people.
They're coming to the beginning formation of a church.
That's a big sacrifice.
That's a huge sacrifice that they made.
And other people have sacrificed.
We have a plaque out here to people that have been here for 10 years, Brother Alberto's
been here for 10 years, Ms. Lucy's been here for 10 years.
We have a lot of people that have been here for 9, 8, 7 that are very close to that.
People that have sacrificially given to this church.
People have given tens of thousands of dollars, yea, even more than that, so that this church
could exist.
People staying up late, working on stuff.
try to patch our roof area.
We have people do all kinds of different things
to help this church grow
and to help this church sacrifice.
You know, we need men to say,
hey, you know, church is important.
People to put on events, people to show up,
people to be friendly, people to be kind.
I've seen so many people,
and I'm not gonna tell you and I'm not gonna tell you,
but yes, I've seen so many people
just do really nice things for other people.
Give them money, help them out,
go do things for them.
You know what, that was helping build this church.
I've seen so many people drive all kinds of distances
to do things for this church.
I've seen people kind of make meals for people,
visit people when they're sick,
pray for people, help people.
You know what, we need men to take church seriously
and do something.
And you know what, the treasure of the gospel is hidden
in earth and vessels, that's us.
Why?
So the excellency of the power could be in God.
Because think about it, we as mankind, we're just dust.
Sometimes we get impressed with ourselves.
You know we go watch the sporting event and we feel like we're impressed with ourselves or something like that
But you know in my mind it'd be like the W MBA thinking that they're awesome or something
Because when I watch it, I'm like I'm not impressed
But even worse than that would be how we really are a comparison to the universe folks
We really are nothing but then special things are accomplished because the excellencies of God
Mankind rolled up to the Red Sea like a little baby that can't take care of itself and God had to part the Red Sea.
You know, we show up stumbling and fumbling and with stammering lips and another tongue and yet somehow we can overcome 20 years of Catholicism.
Because the Excellency is not of us. It's of God. It's of the Word of God. It's of the power of God.
But we need a man to go out there and to open his mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel
He ought to speak boldly as he ought to speak is what the Bible says.
We need some man to go do it.
And you know what?
There's nothing special about us here today, but you know what special is the church of
God and is the King James Bible?
And you know what?
When we just submit ourselves to the Word of God, special things happen.
And let me tell you something.
This church is special because church is special, because our God is special, because the King
James Bible is special, and the Gospel is special, and when we show up special things
happen, that the Excellency may be of God.
And God is building his church through broken people,
but you know what?
He needs man to do it.
Man is dust, man is frail,
but it's so that we don't think highly of ourselves.
I think that's why when you start aging,
you start feeling it quick.
You know, I used to think like maybe when I'm like 60, 70,
I'll start feeling it.
No, it's like 25, it's like 30.
By the time you get 35, I'm like, I told my wife this.
I was like, I already feel like I'm 70.
I'm just like, man, what in the world?
We just deteriorate so quickly.
I was looking this up, by the time you get age 40 or so,
we all experience this condition
where your eyes basically can't read very well anymore
and you pretty much all have to get reading glasses.
It's like, what in the world?
I was like, how do you avoid this?
It's like, sorry, buddy.
I mean, it's like some like high percent is like 90 some percent of the population will have to have reading glasses after the age of 40
I mean, it's just it's just we deteriorate we age
I mean, I know Aaron Rodgers is signed with the Pittsburgh Steelers talk about a loser
Talk about needing to retire. Don't play for the Steelers. Man
He's the oldest player in the NFL
Didn't you already fail with the Jets? I mean like why are you still in the league?
But I mean even at 40, you know, you're a lot different than 25
And I don't think he can compete probably. I don't know but at the end of the day
I mean at some point he can't at some point
You'll have to hang it up at some point
He'll deteriorate because man can't just keep going because we're frail
Why? So the excellency of everything can be of God, it's not of us.
In fact, many of the great men of God in the Bible did really awesome stuff when they were old.
When they were like 80, 85, 100.
Why? To prove that it's not about man's strength, it's about God.
The Apostle Paul was contemptible in the flesh, yet the greatest Christian never lived.
Why? So that the excellency could be of God.
And again, this church will be great not because of man's strength,
but because of God's power and God's might and God's wisdom.
Go if you want to do Ezekiel 22,
but you know what? Some men has to stand up and do it.
You know, there's this phrase out there that I've always heard.
One of my bosses loved to say this and
I think it's biblical, but you can make your own opinion.
But here's this quote I've heard.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph
is for good men to do nothing.
And I was really thinking about that, like,
does the Bible teach that?
But you know, here's a verse that I think
does kind of allude to this same concept.
Look at Ezekiel 22 verse 30.
And I sought for a man among them
that should make up the hedge
and stand in the gap before me for the land
that I should not destroy it, but I found none.
God saying, I was just trying to find a good man. I was just trying to find somebody to stand the gap
I was just trying to find someone to do something and I couldn't find one so therefore I destroyed it
And you know what there's so many places that don't have a good church today because there's not one man
That would just stand up and stand in the gap and stand in the hedge and do something for God and
It's not because we need some special man. We just need a man. Did you read anything special about this guy?
I sought for a man.
It didn't say like an awesome guy, a tall guy, a strong guy,
a rich guy, a fun guy, a cool guy.
It just said a man.
Is there at least a man somewhere?
I couldn't find one.
How sad it is that we don't have good churches today
because of this, we don't have a man.
We don't have a man.
And you know what sometimes that man's it's not even just a pastor
It's just a man that just says hey, I'm gonna I'm gonna dedicate myself to a church and I'm gonna help a church grow
I'm gonna show up
I'm gonna drive two hours to church and I'm just gonna plug in and I'm gonna do whatever I need to do
And you know what God builds around that person and builds around that man because you know what?
We need men to take the mission on that church is important and we just can't let darkness win
We have to overcome the darkness.
We have to say there's going to be a church
and I'm going to be that man that's going to help that church.
I'm going to make sure that church happens, no matter what.
I don't have to be the pastor. I just, I'm a Christian.
I'm saved. I've got the Holy Spirit.
And you know what? We need somebody to fight for God, the Father, and the Heaven
and to fight for church.
Kofi would to...
For a second time, I'm not going to be able to go all the verses I want to do, but...
Kofi to Romans 8.
We'll get there eventually.
Here's the last one I want to make is not only do we need church and not only need men to do that church
But here's the fourth or the third point. We just can't let darkness win
Can't let darkness overtake us and darkness is trying to come at us from every angle
This point could be expanded to anything and everything you want because frankly speaking
We have darkness attacking us from all angles right now
We have bad churches, we have false prophets,
we have false gospels, we have false religion,
we have all kinds of censorship, we have attackers,
we have haters, we have all this kind of stuff
just constantly coming at us,
let alone just our own struggle.
And for most of us, our biggest enemy is yourself.
Your second biggest enemy is your family.
And it's like, we often wanna worry about
all the other enemies, but it's like,
you don't even realize you're your worst enemy
And then your families are second worst enemy.
And of course, you know the Bible warns in Proverbs 31,
give not thy strength unto women,
nor thy ways that that would destroy the kings.
How many men today are giving all their strength
unto whores and to whoredom today?
They're giving all their strength unto alcohol today,
and they're allowing that to destroy them,
and they're allowing the darkness to win.
They're not actually caring about the church.
Because let me tell you something, men that are obsessed with whores and men that are
obsessed with alcohol are not going to accomplish great things for God.
They're not obsessed with church, they don't like church and they would never want to come
to a church like ours because they'd probably get thrown out.
And you know what, we need men to say no to whores and no to alcohol and give that stuff
up and actually dedicate themselves to the God in heaven that gave them life, God the
Father.
and say, hey, I'm not going to let the bottle overtake me.
I'm not going to let women overtake me.
You know, we always, I'm not a feminist.
Yeah, but you can even just let a whore overtake you.
Let alone some loud mouth, Karen.
Maybe you're letting some young whore take you down.
I mean, the Bible says for she have cast down many wounded,
yea, many strong men have been slain by her.
The Bible tells us that we're supposed to open our mouths to judge.
The Bible says that we're supposed to judge righteously.
They're supposed to plead the cause of the poor and needy.
And you know what?
We need a good church and the sea of bad churches today.
We need men that are going to say, I'm not going to allow myself to be overcome by darkness,
but I am going to overcome them.
And we can't let the gates of hell prevail against our church.
We can't let alcohol destroy this church.
We can't let Hortom destroy this church.
We can't let bad modern versions come in and destroy this church.
We need the King James Bible.
We need the preserved Bible.
We must champion salvation by faith alone.
We can't let false Gospels come in here.
You know, the Bible says,
Help, Lord, for the godly man seeseth.
For the faithful fail from among the children of men.
How many men are failing today?
How many men are giving up the day?
How many men are just not gonna do what's necessary?
The Bible says, most men will proclaim everyone
his own goodness, but a faithful man who can find.
We need to find some.
We need somebody that says, you know what?
Church is more important than all this other stuff.
I'm gonna just make church a priority.
And I'm gonna be that man and you know I'm not gonna let darkness win not gonna let darkness win
You know and I'm not saying you have to be perfect. No one's perfect. None of us are perfect
But you know what the just man fall seven times and rise it up again
Hey, when you fall get back up
Hey, when you do something wrong just quit it and get back in here
Because God uses earth and vessels use broken vessels. He uses sinners saved by grace to accomplish his work
But you know what he doesn't use quitters
He can't use quitters
You have to rise up again. You have to get up and say here my Lord send me and you know what?
He'll put that hot coal on your tongue and he'll cleanse you again
And he'll purify you again and he'll make you white as snow again, and he'll put you back in the game
He'll put you back in the fight. Just don't give up. Don't quit
Don't be like so many men today that just quit and give up and just allow their wife to drag them to some non-denominational church
Men that quit and give up and they just drink alcohol and watch NASCAR on Sunday morning rather than going to church.
Men that quit and give up and stop reading a King's Day's Bible and they get a message on Father's Day with their name on it.
They get a pink tie for Father's Day and let their wife tell them what they're gonna do on Father's Day.
They are gonna let Jack Daniels tell them what they're gonna do on Father's Day.
Captain Morgan, they're going to let some woman tell them what to do.
They're going to go to the bar and some whore is going to drag them around by the nose.
You know what?
As long as we have Christ in our hearts, and in our heads, and in our hands, nothing can
defeat us.
Let's read some Romans 8 here for a second.
8. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are the called according to his purpose.
For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son that he might be the first born among many brethren.
Moreover, whom he did predestinate, then he also called, and whom he called, then he also justified, and whom he justified, then he also glorified.
What shall we say to these things?
If God be for us, who can be against us?
He that spared not his own son, but delivered him up.
for us all. How shall he not with him also freely give us all things?
Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God
that justifies. Who is he that condemns? It is Christ that died,
ye rather that has risen again. Who is even at the right end of God who
also make the intercession for us. Who shall separate us
from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress
or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril
As it is written, for thy sake, we are killed all the day long.
We are counted as sheep for the slaughter,
nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.
For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers,
nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature
shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
This guy sounds like a man.
This guy sounds like a man that cares about church this guy sounds like a guy
That's not gonna let darkness overcome, but he's gonna overcome darkness through the love of Jesus Christ
Hey, you may not be perfect, but you know what the love of Christ can overcome at all
How can they condemn us when Christ didn't condemn us go forward to 2nd Corinthians 6 and we'll finish there
We need to make sure that we realize God is on our side and he can help us overcome our sins
He can help us overcome Hortom. He can help us overcome being backslidden
He can help us overcome all the railers. He can help us overcome all the haters
He can help us overcome all the thieves that take money from our church. He can help us from all the
Judices we can overcome all the false brethren. We can overcome all the faggots that are in our country
Let me tell you something faggots are not stronger than God people
Faggots shouldn't be stronger than hairy-legged men.
Yeah, that's right.
They have a little lisp.
They're not manly.
They're not somebody that should win.
How in the world are churches today letting faggots win?
And you know what, someone needs to stand up to them.
Someone needs to say, hey, I'm not going to lay down.
I'm not going to just let my landlord terminate the lease.
We're going to fight.
And let me tell you something.
We are going to fight, and this church is going to fight.
And I don't care if people like what I said
or didn't say in the past, nuts to you,
because you know what, I'm going to say it,
and I'm going to keep saying it, and I'm going to fight.
Because at the end of the day, if you can't say fag or fag it
or put them to death or Leviticus 2013,
pretty soon the next thing you won't be able to say
is just being a fag to sin or something.
Someone's got to fight and you say, oh, well, what if you lose that battle? Well, you know what? That's America's fault. Not my fault
That's their problem. Not my problem. It's not my problem of Bible. Leave the Bible. I
Don't have a problem believe in the Bible's right
People that condemn me for breathing preaching the Bible or believing the Bible
They're the ones that are wrong and they have to stand it and account for it
You know what? How many churches today are afraid to say what the Bible says because of the consequences?
You know who's at fault then they are
We need somebody to say, hey, church matters.
Hey, you know what?
By us standing up to the fight, we enable other people to actually do what they're doing.
They may not realize it.
We need some real churches with some real men of God that'll say, hey, let's put the
faggot to death.
I can't believe you said that.
Well, I don't really care.
You know, all the Jews in their censorship can go back to hell because you know what?
I'm not...
Yeah, I can't be on YouTube. Ooh, okay. Well, because of the algorithm, it's like meaningless to be on YouTube anyways
It's all ads anyways. It's all just promos for some filth or debauchery that they want to permit anyways
YouTube is not what built this church
God has built this church and God will continue building this church and I did not sign up to be a YouTube pastor
I signed up to be a pastor of a real local New Testament church
And I will use the words that the Bible says and I will expand on them and I will say what the Bible says
And you know what someone needs to put these facts back in the closet and frankly speaking six feet under and that's the government
I'm not gonna do it unless they hire me and I will do it for free
Not only that we need to stand against Catholicism and say Catholics aren't saved. They're gonna go to hell
We can't let the Catholic Church win in this country. This this country was not built on Catholicism
It was built on separating from Catholicism and God forbid we would allow our country to go back to just being Catholic again
When our forefathers died to not be Catholic when our forefathers William Tyndale died at the stake for believing in faith alone
When our forefathers, William Tyndale,
died to give us this book we have in our hand,
when the Catholic Church said,
take the Bible out of their hands.
You know, someone needs to stand up for the church,
someone needs to stand up for God's people.
I don't want to sit here and partner with the Lutherans
or the United Methodists, a bunch of faggots,
with the Church of Christ,
with their baptismal regeneration,
or the special underwearing Mormons.
They can go back to their temple of Satan,
the depressed Jovas, witnesses that walk up and down
with a false gospel of depression.
All the atheists and the apathetic and the Calvinists and Islam and Hinduism and Judaism and look, we're not Judeo-Christian. We're just Christian
And you know what we're not gonna let work salvation prevail in this church
We're not gonna let baptism or regeneration lordship salvation repent of your sins
You know, we're also not gonna let bitterness win in this church either
We're gonna forgive one another and we're gonna let things go and we're gonna move on aren't we?
We're not gonna let depression run this church.
We're not gonna let divorce run this church.
We're not gonna let finances run this church.
We're not gonna let fear run this church.
We're not gonna let threats run this church.
We're not gonna let Israel nuking Iran or vice versa
or any of that crap.
I don't care.
Hey, if Satan kills Satan, I'm just thinking like, okay.
And people are freaking out about that.
It's like, look, when your enemy is destroying itself,
don't get in the way.
And let's not give them money or resources or our troops.
And you know what?
That sounds anti-Semitic, but I don't really care what it is
because I don't want to see actual Americans go and die
in a war they don't need to.
And if you actually loved your brethren,
you wouldn't allow them to.
You wouldn't say it's cool or,
I stand with Israel no matter what.
That's a bad policy.
I stand with Israel of God no matter what.
You know what through Christ we will prevail we cannot let the gates of hell prevail
We must be the salt we must be the light and you know what?
We're gonna find grace to help in time of need second Corinthians chapter number six its last place. We're gonna turn
Say this is a long sermon. Well, it's Father's Day. I can do whatever I want. I
Don't think the dads will complain
2 Corinthians chapter 6 says we then as workers together with them beseech you also that you receive not the grace of God in vain
Hey, just because you're saved doesn't mean you should do nothing
Don't be one of these Christians. It just barely gets to heaven
You we will I mean you could do literally nothing get to heaven, but don't be like that
Don't do it. Don't just do nothing
And he says in verse 3 giving no offense in anything that the ministry be not blamed but in all things approving ourselves as the ministry has gotten much patience and afflictions and necessities and distresses and stripes and imprisonments and tumults and labors and watchings and fastings by pureness, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfamed, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honor and dishonor.
by evil report and good report as it's evers and yet true.
As unknown and yet well-known, as dying, and behold, we live as chastened and not killed,
as sorrowful, yet all-way rejoicing, as poor, yet making many rich, as having nothing,
and yet possessing all things. O Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you, our heart is enlarged.
You're not straightened in us, but you're straightened in your own bowels.
Now for a recompense in the same I speak, as unto my children, be also enlarged.
Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers, for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness,
at what communion hath light with darkness, at what concord hath Christ with beelial,
or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel.
And what agreement at the temple of God with idols?
For you are the temple of the living God,
as God has said, I will dwell in them and walk in them,
and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Wherefore, come out from among them, and be ye separate,
sayeth the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing,
and I will receive you, and will be a father unto you,
and ye should be my sons and daughters,
sayeth the Lord almighty.
You know what he's saying?
We need to separate ourselves
and come together as the church.
The church of Jesus Christ, the church that was purchased with his blood,
the church that's going to overcome the darkness today,
and we see all the darkness here.
The imprisonments and the tumults and the laborings and the watchings and the fastings
and the evil reports.
But you know what?
We're more than conquerors through all these things.
You have God before us who can be against us.
Let us overcome the darkness.
No one else will.
This is the one institution we will not let the devil take our strength without a fight
We won't let the devil get our emotions and get the better of us
We won't let our failures get the better of us. We won't let our pride to isolate us
We won't allow bitterness to erode our love
We won't let unforgiveness wedge its ugly head between our fellowship.
We won't let the devil take our wives without a fight.
We won't let the devil take our children without a fight.
And we will never let the devil take this church without a fight.
The gates of hell shall not prevail, but we're going to continue to work with God
as he builds this church. Let's close in prayer.
Thank you Heavenly Father so much for giving us this institution,
Thank you for giving us the gospel of your Son,
the freeness of salvation that we could be saved.
I pray that we would not use that in vain,
but we would come alongside you and work together
to build this church,
and that you would allow us to overcome the darkness
in our lives and our family's lives in this world.
We wouldn't get knocked down by all the enemies
and the attacks and all the weird stuff that's happening.
We understand the devil is not gonna just lay down,
he's gonna attack us, but we're ready.
We're willing.
We are accounted for the slaughter every day.
And I pray that you would help give us strength,
that you'd give us faith, that you'd give us boldness,
that you'd give us courage,
that no matter what we face in the future,
we would not let church go by the wayside.
I pray that you would give men a heart and a mind
and a desire to see the church flourish
and that you would bless the work of our hands
in Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.
Amen for our last song we're gonna go to a fan favorite song number 145 it is well with my soul
On the last verse we're gonna change keys so just be aware of that song 145 it is well with my soul
my soul singing out nice and loud on the first.
When he
Great singing. Just as a reminder, we have Father's Day floats. I'm going to ask...
That you children first serve your father's first. You want to get all the fathers served first
Then after that then you can come back and you can also get one
There should be coke dr. Pepper and root beer. They should be kind of in different sections
So you can just go up there
Get one of the cups that are ready and you can serve your dad
So thanks for coming to steadfast. God bless you guys have a great father's day
You kiddos one of you go serve your father. All right. Have a good day