to Steadfast Baptist Church coming to our evening service. If you please find your
seats and turn to page 140 in your hymn books. We have an anchor, page 140. We have an anchor.
I pray Lord that you would bless the service and thank you for all the soul winners who went out today
Thank you for all the fathers and in our church and that you would bless us and our families
Pray Lord that you would just fill passive Shelley up at the Holy Spirit and help them to preach boldly to us this evening
Out of your word in Jesus name. I pray amen
our second song this evening
153 how firm a foundation
page 153 How Firm a Foundation.
Thank you for coming to Steadfast.
If you didn't get a bulletin, you'd like one.
Lift your hand nice and high.
We are working on Jude one.
On the inside, we have our service and soul winning times.
Make sure you're updating our church group
for our soul winning stats.
Also the maps, if you work through them,
mark them as done and put them in our done bin.
We have our expecting ladies list.
Please be in prayer for them.
We had Father's Day's Floats.
This...
this afternoon but we still have so much that we're gonna do it again so we got
round two all right so it's a double double father's day float day all right
and so if you want to stick around and get another one no problem we have the
Shreveport Louisiana soul any marathon sign-up sheet out here in the four year
please sign up for that so we have an accurate count Springdale Arkansas is
another opportunity it's about five and a half hours
Lancaster is July 19th, Men's Retreat is August 14th to 16th.
We're gonna be going back to the same place
we've been doing it every year.
So it's gonna be easier just doing that.
And it honestly was really good last year
and they ended up adding a new sanctuary area.
That was really nice when we had one of our services there.
So hopefully we can have more services
in their nicer sanctuary area.
And so really appreciate them accommodating us.
And it's a lot of fun.
So if you can make it out.
Pastor Enrique Reyes is gonna be preaching for us that evening and so excited to have him join us
FBBF conference is August 27th to the 31st
We're gonna have a preacher every single evening
So it's gonna be literally every Wednesday every night Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday and Sunday twice on Sunday
And so we're gonna just toast you alright, and I'm just kidding
But it'll be a lot of fun obviously August is really hot
We probably prefer to have this conference more in October, but just because of the Bahamas this year,
I kind of wanted to not have those things on top of each other.
So this year we just shifted it up a little bit.
In the future, we'll probably have our conference be more that September, October timeline just gets a little bit nicer.
We do add teen events as well.
So July 26 is gonna be our bowling night for the teens and then August 9th is the adventure park and so
we had a really great turnout last night and it went really well and so
thanks to those who helped and participated it was a lot of fun
on the back we had the list for our prayers if you just continue to pray
for our church family the other thing that wasn't in here but I had
mentioned earlier was July 13th is a Sunday and so that evening service
will have our normal just six month or
and we'll kind of plan about or I'll talk about some of the future things for our church so
it's all good but we just like to have those meetings on a regular basis and so looking forward
to that that's pretty much all I have as far as announcements so go ahead and sing our special
song of the week holy holy holy and your special song binders if you could get that out song holy
past around. We can turn our Bibles to 2nd Corinthians 4, 2nd Corinthians 4.
Second Corinthians chapter number four the Bible reads therefore seeing we have this ministry as we have received mercy
We faint not but have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty
Not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully
But by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God
But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost, in whom the God of this world
hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ
to his image of God should shine unto 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 hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in
that the Excellency of the Power may be of God and not of us.
We are troubled on every side yet not distressed.
We are perplexed but not in despair, persecuted but not forsaken, cast down but not destroyed,
always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus that the life also of Jesus
might be made manifest in our body.
For we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also
of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.
So then death worketh in us, but life in you.
We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believed, and therefore
have I spoken.
We also believe and therefore speak, knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall
For all the things are for your sakes, that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving
of many redounds to the glory of God.
For which cause we faint not.
But though our outward man perish, yet in the inward man is renewed day by day.
For our light affliction, which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding
and eternal weight of glory.
While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen.
are eternal let us pray heavenly father thank you for the chapter of the bible thank you for
this church and thank you for the soul winning that was done lord and the salvations we've had
i just pray that you bless us bless pastor shelly as he preaches your word help us to
receive it lord and apply it to our lives to become better christians praise in jesus name amen
Men, the Bible says in verse 1 therefore saying we have this ministry as we receive mercy
we faint not, but have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness
nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commending
ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.
And so what I want to talk about is renouncing dishonesty, renouncing dishonesty.
being brought up here in the text.
In fact, we kind of have our three points
for tonight's sermon found right here in the text.
If you notice in verse two, he says number one,
that he's renounced the hidden things of dishonesty.
Number two, he says that they're not walking
in craftiness and number three,
they're not handling the word of God.
deceitfully and we see that many ministries today are not doing what the text says here but they're
being very dishonest about what they're trying to accomplish, their purpose, they twist scripture
to justify a lot of unbiblical things and what we need to do is we need to be going to a church
a ministry that cares about the truth,
a ministry that's dedicated to the truth
and that we like the truth,
no matter what its consequence is.
And so, you know, if we're not here for the truth,
why are we here?
Like, what are we even doing anymore?
And it's just sad to see so many ministries
to start handling the Word of God deceitfully,
or being dishonest, or being crafty.
And we should always be a ministry and a church
and an example of saying, hey,
we just are going to dedicate ourselves to the truth
no matter what that looks like.
And to kind of give a quick explanation of these points,
Hidden things of dishonesty. What does that look like? I think an easy way to think about this is just covering things up
hiding things. And one of the things that the
Pharisees did is they would often cover things up
like they're devouring widow's houses but
for pretense they're making long prayers. So nobody really knows that they're doing
these things
but in secret they're devouring widow's houses. They're doing these things that
are very dishonest.
Walking and craftiness would be
simply doing things that look good
as the outward appearance, but in fact, it's actually done with the wrong motive
or the wrong mentality. So you can see this where the Pharisees are
giving alms to the poor, but then they're sounding a trumpet about it,
or they're praying these long prayers to be seen of men,
or they're fasting out in the open. And again, that's kind of walking in a
craftiness because it appears like it's right
but actually their hearts aren't right and they're not even doing it for the right reasons.
And then handling the word of God deceitfully would just be simply twisting the scripture
so as to justify either their false doctrine or their behavior.
You know, the Pharisees also did this where
They twisted what the Sabbath really meant or how to observe the Sabbath so that they wouldn't actually have to help people.
You know, Jesus is very angry that they were upset that someone be healed on the Sabbath and he's kind of rebuking them,
but they were twisting the Sabbath into something that it wasn't so people couldn't be healed on the Sabbath day.
They were twisting what it meant to honor thy father and mother so that all you'd have to say is rockah, and then you wouldn't,
not rockah, I'm sorry, what's the word?
Corbin, sorry, Corbin, and then they wouldn't have to
honor their father and mother because they say it's a gift.
And so, essentially, Raqqah's like to say it out full.
I'm sorry, I misspoke on that, but it's Corbin.
So again, another way where they twist basically
the word of God so as to not have to do what it's saying.
So those are just some quick explanations
so we kind of have an idea of what we're talking about.
Let's dive into hidden things of dishonesty
a little bit more, though.
Go over to 2 Timothy 3, if you would, 2 Timothy 3.
You know, we as a church, we shouldn't cover things up.
We don't believe in covering things up.
We don't want to cover things up.
And a lot of churches today are covering things up
and they're not exposing their true motivations
of what they're even doing.
2 Timothy 3, we see the apostle Paul talking about himself.
Look at verse 10.
But that was fully known, my doctrine, manner of life, purpose.
So, not only did the Apostle Paul basically have a doctrinal statement that everybody
could read, and not only did he preach everything he believed openly, but also notice his manner
of life was made known, fully known.
It wasn't like Paul had this secret life or a double life, or he was doing something
behind closed doors that would shock and horrify everybody.
No, he's pretty much just an open book.
What you see is what you get with the Apostle Paul.
And unfortunately, we have a lot of people in the ministry living double lives.
We have a lot of Christians living double lives.
In fact, didn't it come out recently,
one of the singers for DC Talk got caught for being like a faggot
and being some like pedophile or something like that?
Who knows what I'm talking about? Does anybody know? Yeah.
This like DC Talk guy got...
caught for just being like a sodomite, pedophile, all kinds of weird stuff,
abuse coming out.
And he basically just admitted to it. I read some statement where he just said,
not all the details are exactly accurate, but yes,
I did do this. Yes, it was with men.
Yes, it was unwanted. Yes, blah, blah, blah. And it was so sickening to see all
these Christians being like,
Because I just said burn it with fire or something like that, you know that was my response or whatever and they're just like
How dare you and you're not Christian and blah blah blah and and I'm just sitting here think like
How about this guy who claims to be a Christian,
sings all this music about Jesus,
and then he's just a total, like, total hypocrite,
total rep or bait behind closed doors,
predator, and just taking advantage of God's people,
doing all this for money, so he's a hireling.
I mean, how come we're not mad at this guy?
You know, it's fake Christianity and you know what?
We should renounce the hidden things of dishonesty.
We shouldn't sit here and embrace them
or act like they're somehow good.
We should rebuke them and have nothing to do with them
and want nothing to do with them.
You know, I think that ministers, unfortunately,
some of us have to kind of live in a glass house.
But that's okay because, you know what?
If you're not a hypocrite,
Again, if you come around and follow me around, you won't be impressed with my lifestyle or anything like that.
Don't hear me wrong. In fact, just be like, wow, you're pretty sinful, you're pretty carnal, you make mistakes, you're not that great,
you won't like all my food choices, I guarantee it. I'm really picky about food.
unlimited food, because then you just get fat, all right? So I have to be very
picky in what I get to choose to eat, so that's why I'm really picky, right? I
don't want to just get calories for calories, so I got to pick something that
I really want to eat, right? But at the end of the day, if you follow me around,
yeah, you're gonna not necessarily be impressed, but at the end of the day, you
know, I'm not over here being a faggot, I'm not being a giant hypocrite like a lot
of these other people, and you know what? For the most part, we shouldn't live
Contrary to what the Bible says, or we were one thing
behind the pulpit and a completely different thing
from outside the pulpit.
In fact, I would bet most people that know me
would say I'm about the same.
Maybe I say a little bit more, let's go Brandon's around here or something. I don't know, but at the end of the day
It's like it's not really much different because why we shouldn't be hiding who we truly are we should be
Who we are and this church should be open and honest now of course we should be the best version of ourselves
We should always put our best foot forward. We should try to carry ourselves with respect
But at the end of the day the ministry should not be something that's hidden
We're not Mormons where we go out and pretend to be nice
Mormons are faking it.
Mormons aren't really actually that nice,
and they don't really actually like you that much,
and they're not really like who they are.
They're just hiding who they really are,
and they're hiding what they really believe in their temple,
and they're hiding what they really do behind closed doors,
because they don't want you to know.
Jews, they pretend to be something that they're not.
Their religion teaches them it's okay to lie and be deceitful and not be honest about what you are the the Masonic Lodge
Has covers over their windows because they don't want you to know what's really going on inside
There's all kinds of ministries today where they say we have to fake it or we have to pretend like we're something that we're not
Because we don't want to act like we're real or something
You have people that'll get up ministers and preachers. They'll get up and they'll say this they'll say me and my wife never fight and
The behind closed doors they fight like cats and dogs and it's it's dishonest
It's dishonest how they pretend like their life is perfect and ideal and so amazing and they put on this facade
You know what? That's not the way we should be we should just be open and honest with what we're like. We should be real
We should be genuine
and we should renounce the hidden things of dishonesty.
We should not put forth a product that is not real,
that is not sincere, that is not genuine.
And of course, the people that draw close to you
will always see through the facade.
They will always see through the hypocrisy and the insincerity.
And you know what? Don't be like this in your family either.
Because your children know the difference.
Your children know what you're really like.
Do not be fake.
And you know what, don't, this drives me insane
to think about, but I'm just like,
I can't understand these people
that would come to a church like ours and hate our church
and talk trash on our church the whole time.
I'm thinking like, what do your kids think about you?
And I just can't imagine like thinking like,
why does my dad go to this church that he hates
and mocks and ridicules and trolls and just like,
you think like my dad's a loser and a troll.
And you know what, they're gonna resent Christianity
when they see their parents just being a total hypocrite,
being a total fake, not being sincere.
Like you should go to a church that you love,
you should be around people that you actually love,
you should be sincere, you should be genuine.
You know, you ladies, don't be fake.
You know, don't be like this type of lady that walks up to someone and just so I like your dress and then when you get in the car
You're trashing her you're talking about how she's a whore and you don't like her and gossiping about her and
Tearing her up and down in front of your children. I mean that's gross
Don't be fake don't be insincere don't be one of these people that's you have all these hidden things of dishonesty about who you
Really are be sincere be real be genuine and you know what the Apostle Paul says hey
You know my manner of life and my purpose. I don't have a hidden motive here
My motives are out on the table.
You know exactly why I'm doing these things.
I love the Lord.
I want to see people say,
I'm preaching the gospel.
And he's a sincere Christian.
It's really frustrating
when you see pastors or preachers or whatever
get up and say something
and they're not really clear about what's going on.
Yeah.
I even don't like it at the workplace.
You know, I've seen it in lots of places
where they're like, oh, so-and-so is quitting.
And then like you find out the real story and it's like they're not quitting they got they got caught stealing or they're like
Doing something shady or there was this big conflict between them and the insiders and it's just like you know
They're just trying to whitewash everything and they're trying to just make it seem like there's not a big deal churches do this all the time
Except for churches are the worst about it because many times they won't even tell you that it's just so-and-so. It's just gone
I've seen it so many times growing up where there would be a our main pastor who's preaching every single week all of a sudden
gone
But you didn't realize he's gone
Because essentially just a person came in there. I'm just guest preaching and then the next week another guest preacher
And then the next week another random person then all of a sudden just a new guy just starts preaching really and you're like after
Why kind of thing like are they ever gonna dress the fact that that one guy's just not here anymore and they just wouldn't
And he was just kind of like, what happened?
And it's just like, okay, well,
he did all this crazy horrible stuff
and weird stuff's going on behind the scenes
and you just don't know what's really going on.
And for some people, I guess they just like it
because they don't want the quote drama.
But let me tell you something, drama exists.
There's the people that are just honest about the drama
and then there's the people that just pretend
like there's no drama and they just hide everything.
Everything's behind closed doors.
You know what? The Apostle Paul didn't hide the drama.
It's all here in the Bible.
And we get to read about all the drama that they went through.
But we know his purpose.
You know what? I'd rather go to a church where they're just honest with you.
Where they just say, hey, this is going on.
This is why I'm making these decisions.
The worst thing is when you just get someone to get up here
and just say, we're going to make a total different,
total change and I'm not even going to tell you why.
We're taking Baptist off the sign. Why?
I'm not going to tell you.
Hey, we're just now we're Calvinist. I just decided right. I mean like there's churches doing this kind of stuff
There's church saying hey now we're gonna go to the modern versions now. It's the NIV now
We're just not Baptist anymore now. We're just doing this. I mean don't you expect at least have an explanation
Don't you expect for someone to reason with you and say this is why we're making these changes?
Hey, we're not gonna do this anymore. We're not gonna be like this anymore. It's it's really frustrating when they're not giving you the
actual purpose. They're not actually telling you what's really going on and I don't like it and the Bible doesn't say
We should be like that. It says we should renounce the hidden things of dishonesty
You know why many times they won't tell you why they're making those decisions because if they told you the congregation wouldn't like it
Congregation wouldn't agree the congregation would say well that doesn't actually jive that doesn't match up that doesn't make sense
You know if a pastor got up and said well, I'm switching because of money then everybody be like that's the wrong decision
Hey, I'm not gonna preach this anymore because of money. I'm not gonna do this anymore because of money
Well, that doesn't come up doesn't roll off the tongue very well
So then they have to just basically pretend like there's some other real reason there
You know what? We should just be really open and honest about what we're doing
Go to John chapter number three go to John chapter three. Why do people not tell you what's going on?
Why do people hide things? Why do people?
Not allow you to know the truth. Well, the Bible is gonna tell us John chapter three look at verse number 19
And this is the condemnation that light has come in the world and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.
Some people want things to be in the dark because they don't want you to know about it because their deeds are evil.
Look, the guy that's doing right has no problem with the spotlight being there.
The guy doing wrong is the one that doesn't want anybody to know what's really going on.
They don't want accountability.
Verse 20, for everyone that doeth evil hateeth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.
The guy that's sincere wants the exposure, wants the accountability, wants the light, because he wants to make sure that what he's doing is wrought in God,
meaning that God is with him, that God is endorsing it, that God is behind him.
The guy that's doing shady stuff doesn't want anybody to know,
wants it to be in the dark, doesn't want there to be accountability.
Why? Well, what does the Bible say? Lest his deeds should be
reproved. We'll be examples of this.
We have examples for days. Alright? Here's one. How about like when
St. Vasbaba's church, it found out that their pastor is doing a bunch of shady
stuff?
Now, we could have just pretended like,
And I'm preaching now, I mean, couldn't we have done that?
Is that what happened?
No.
You know, it's funny when I asked Adam Fanon,
hey, can you give me all the finances?
And it's like, there is none.
What do you mean there's none?
There's no paperwork?
Okay, give me your receipts, no receipts.
Give me any paperwork, zero paperwork.
I wonder why you have zero paperwork.
What does the Bible say less disease should be approved? They don't want any light. They don't want any accountability
They don't want any exposure. I mean, how can you run a church? Think about this if I said hey
I'm gonna have you move to Florida and run a church
You keep zero financial records of any ties any donations any expenditures for years
How does that sound like somebody that's renouncing the hidden things of dishonesty
Oh, and by the way, the pastor said,
hey, I kind of suspect that you might be stealing stuff,
so I need you to actually make all these documents
and send them to me.
And then he still didn't have any of them.
Cause Romero was suspecting him of cheating.
And he knows what that looks like, all right?
He knows what a person acts like
when they do that kind of thing.
But you know what, we shouldn't be a church like that.
We should have accountability.
And look, their tithing system over there in Jacksonville
was atrocious.
It was basically like a bunch of guys just got the money put it in a bag and just hand it to Fannin
How does that work all cash, how do you even know what's going on there?
I mean, here we have double sheets, counted text messages with a picture of exactly how
much was there.
We have different people taking to the bank.
We get a receipt that has the exact same amount on it that matches the image.
I mean, you could physically steal it, but you can't get away with it.
At least we would know what happened.
We track you down.
We'd hunt you down.
Okay?
And even if we didn't catch you, God could catch you with the one in 17 trillion chance skin disease, all right?
So, you know, there's no point in even doing that kind of stuff
But we're not gonna just make it easy to steal from God to steal from the house of the Lord because we we don't want that
Why would we want that the person that's making it shady is is basically wanting there to be shade for a reason
wanting it to be dark for a reason.
You know, if you were sincere, you'd want to have records,
you'd want to have receipts, you'd want people to count,
you'd want people to double the check,
and you know what?
You want to abstain from all appearance of evil.
Even if you were a godly person that did nothing wrong,
I would never want to be that person that says,
like, look, there was no receipts,
there was no accountability, nobody was counting it.
There was nothing to prove my innocence.
Just trust me, bro.
That's not that's not Christianity Christianity is saying we're renouncing the hidden things of dishonesty
You've fully known my manner of life. Hey, we don't want to have shade in the ministry
We want to have accountability
We want you to know all of the things that are going on here and of course we've tried to clean up a lot of stuff
We have multiple people review all of our finances. We present it to the church twice a year
Why because we don't want anybody to lose confidence in the things that we're doing what people want to provide things on
And you know why we do that?
Because we're not doing anything weird.
We're not doing anything shady, so we don't need any shade.
But you know what?
You should be leery of a church if all of a sudden,
they start putting shade in those areas,
or they start wanting shade,
or they don't want you to ask questions,
or whatever, that's a scary place to be in.
Go to Psalm 94, go to Psalm 94.
You know, a church should be something
that is not hiding things.
And you know what, as an individual,
you can apply this to any area of your life.
at work or at a business, you should not have anything shady.
You should not cover things up. You should have accountability.
You should be honest with the things that you do and your family.
You should be honest about the things you're doing as a leader, as a husband.
You should be honest with your family and telling them what you're doing and giving them their purpose and giving them your manner of life
and allowing them to see these things. You know what? Just being sincere and being genuine goes a long way.
And we're not saying being perfect, being sincere and genuine.
I am the farthest thing from perfect.
But I will say this, I am sincere.
I make mistakes, but at the end of the day, I know I'm not fake.
And I know I want things to be done right.
And we should have a church and we should have a ministry that's doing this.
And when you start seeing a ministry go in a different direction,
you need to raise the flag. You need to ask questions.
You don't want to go down that rabbit hole.
If the guy's saying, only give in cash, that's weird.
I was told by multiple people at this church before I came here, it was like cash only, cash only,
and I'm thinking like cash is like the worst way to die.
In my opinion, I think check's the best because there is no money being handled.
It's about as safe as it can possibly get.
You know, it's weird. But you know, you can't really steal a check.
The check's not even written to me.
I can't do anything weirder than the check.
The guys that come here, the count can't do anything weirder than the check.
But you know what, you can do weird stuff with cash.
And you can pretend like, oh, it's because we're conspiracy theorists or whatever.
But you know what, not all conspiracies are good, all right?
And, you know, we don't want to do weird things.
We're not into all that.
And look, if you tithe and cash, I'm not trying to put shade on you.
I'm not saying you're doing anything weird.
I'm just saying it's weird when the minister is like begging that
or like demanding that of its congregation, it's real, real shady.
And in fact, you know, the previous minister of our church
There was zero deposits for six months leading up to when I took over. I
Don't know if that was how the church. I don't know if the church all simultaneously stopped tithing for six straight months
I'm gonna guess no
It you know, this is what's so funny to me is it's like okay, you have a guy who?
Was doing things dishonest with the money from day one from day one of the finances shady things
Committing rampant adultery lying about it
Doing all kinds of drugs lying about it being completely fake the entire time for years for years and
Then now you have people that used to be like
Friendly towards the new IV and they're like no no I like Donnie Romero. I don't like the new IV right now
And I'm thinking like the guy that was fake for years
and just ripped everybody off and lied about it
and completely insincere, and even when he got caught,
he still tried to steal like $40,000 from the church
and got caught with that again,
lied to the congregation about why he was even stepping down,
total fake, then got divorced,
but now he's amazing.
It's like, what in the world?
Like, if he could lie for years and years and years,
why is he now trustworthy?
You know what? Trashing us, and he trashes us because he said Pastor Anderson never gave him a hug.
And I'm like, you know what? I've never gotten a hug from Pastor Anderson either.
In fact, I don't even think I've hugged a single guy in this room.
And I'm not planning on changing that.
Okay?
Now, I'm not saying that it's wrong to give somebody a hug, but you know what? I don't have to give every guy in here a hug to love him.
You know what I mean?
And in fact, some people might leave the church
if I tried to insist.
They wouldn't think like, you know, that's weird.
And of course, think about it, it's like,
hey, the new IP is bad because, bro, they don't give hugs.
But I'm not bad when I steal money from churches,
sleep with endless horrors, commit divorce, do drugs,
do all this shady stuff.
I'm not bad, the non-hugging guy is bad.
I'll give you a hug though.
Will you also give you a hug and a kiss? Absalom.
Oh man, what a great guy he is.
It's a shameful that these people just talk trash on these things,
and it's like, look in the mirror bro.
Psalm 94, look at verse 1.
O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth,
O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, show thyself,
lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth, render a ward to the proud.
Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?
How long shall they utter and speak hard things,
and all the workers of iniquity boast themselves?
in pieces by people, O Lord, and afflict thine heritage.
They slay the widow and the stranger
and murder the fatherless.
Yet they say, the Lord shall not see.
Neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.
You notice that the wicked, it's like they hide things
and they think somehow they're gonna get away with it.
They think God will never see.
And notice what they do.
They slay the widow and the stranger
and murder the fatherless.
And of course, the Pharisees did a lot of that, right?
They're devouring widows' houses.
slaying them. You see TV preachers just taking so much money from widows and all
kinds of people that are poor just to line their pockets, murdering the
fatherless. I mean that's just the black community wrapped up in a short phrase.
I mean how much abortion is being committed in our country and in our
society?
Because, let's just be honest, a lot of women, they get pregnant,
the dad just immediately runs, deserts them, want nothing to do with them.
They don't want to have to just raise this bastard child.
They don't want to have to raise a child and be a single mother.
So they just slay it and they just murder the fatherless.
They just want nothing to do with them.
How many children are raised in the father's home,
go into the gangs, and they're just slain by
the product of their environment.
And they live in just such a barbarous way.
There's so many people in America
living in a barbarous way today.
Living in a tribal way.
It's like they don't even care about civilization.
And it's just sad to see what's really going on.
And we shouldn't be a ministry that's hiding things
and covering things up.
And we should realize the Lord sees.
You know, when you see people being dishonest, you kind of think like, do you not, do you not believe in God?
I mean, do you really think you can just do all this shady stuff and you're going to get away with it?
God will see. God will take care of it.
I hear this one preacher say, it's like, oh man,
you know, when pastors are doing something wrong,
the church has to hold him accountable.
And I'm like, look, I'm not against churches
having a brain in their head.
I'm not against churches asking questions
and all that kind of stuff.
But at the end of the day, like, you may be sheep
and you may not really know what's going on,
but you know what, God always knows what's going on
and God can always take care of it.
And we've seen that, and God can take care of things.
I mean, even Robert Morris got ousted from his little flock
for being the pedophile that he is.
You know, God can take care of things whenever he wants to,
and we need to just trust in him.
But again, the wicked, just for some reason,
it's like they have no fear of God.
Skip down to verse 12,
for the wicked you know sometimes we just have to trust in the Lord's timing
We don't want to be dishonest
We want to be honest because we actually fear God and we realize you reap what you sow and God is not mocked
and God will bring vengeance and God will judge in the earth and God will deal with situations and
Sometimes you just have to wait for the pit to be dig
Sometimes you just have to wait for the wickedness to come to its fullest extent.
Sometimes you just have to wait for God to collect all the trash that he needs to collect
before he comes and he does his thing.
But be sure God will find you.
God will find your sin.
Your sin will find you out and you will be punished.
They will fall into that pit.
And we need to be people that realize God is real.
That's why I'm honest.
I don't want to have these hidden things because I can't hide from God.
You cannot hide from God even your most inward thought, God knows.
Even the secrets of your heart, God knows.
That's why it's so important to be genuine.
There's no point in hiding.
Hiding is a fool's errand.
Go to Malachi 2.
The Bible says,
We're all sinners. We all screw up. We all have wrong
Don't sit here and try to cover everything up. Just confess it and forsake it and move on
We all have mistakes, we all have problems.
We just don't want to be the type of people that walk in dishonesty.
Of course we understand there's discretion.
Obviously, we don't need for everyone to tell everybody their problems all the time.
But at the end of the day, we don't want to be walking in dishonesty.
We want to be walking in honesty and we want to be sincere and we want to be real and even
our church, hey, we're not perfect, but we want to be real.
We want to be sincere. We want to be honest about the things that we do here and you know for the most part
I feel like this is one of the realist churches you'll ever find
We definitely have had fake people here
But they're the exception they're not the common they're not the common person and
You know, I want to keep it that way. I hate
Just be honest. I've been a lot of churches and there's a lot of churches where everybody's fake
Everybody's got a facade everybody everybody's just like praying for you. They're not praying for me
If you ever need anything, let me know. Oh, yeah, I need this. Well, sorry
They come up to you. I like your tie and then they make fun of it later
They're talking trash on you behind your back. They're saying they don't like you. You know, they're just not very sincere
And you know what? I hate it. God hates it. Let's not be like that. They get up and they say yep
We're about the gospel. Oh, okay, pastor. When can I go so many with you? Well, I don't go so many
I remember, I went to a church and the youth passed her.
I was trying to talk to him about soul winning
and I was like trying to encourage him.
I'm like, hey, I like going soul winning.
I go on Saturdays.
Do you want to go with me?
And he's like, yeah, I'm like, sweet.
Two minutes before, like we were supposed to be
on Saturday at 10 a.m.
Two minutes before, he's like, oh, I can't make it.
So I just go by myself.
I'm like, no problem, next week.
Yeah, let's do it.
Next week, like 10 minutes later,
after the time we're supposed to go,
he's like, yeah, sorry, I couldn't make it.
Then like a third time and I'm like after like four or five times of trying and just quit asking him
But I'm like just be honest with me. Don't keep telling me you're gonna show up or want to go soul winning or whatever
And then just never do it
You know, don't get up here and preach about soul winning then not go soul winning. Don't get up and preach about being
Hey, we're gonna be honest here. Hey, we like hard preaching and then it's like okay preach this. Well, that's too offensive
But is it the Bible is the truth?
We like hard preaching. That's something that people don't really understand and they don't they don't really like hard preaching
They don't they're not even a hard preacher
Look at what it says in verse 1 of Malachi 2 and now oh you priests this commandment is for you
If you will not hear and if you will not lay it to heart to give glory unto my name say the Lord of Hosts
I will even send a curse upon you and I will curse your blessings. Yeah, I have cursed them already
Because you do not lay it to heart
Behold, I will corrupt your seed and spread dung upon your faces,
even the dung of your solemn feasts, and one shall take you away with it."
I don't think he likes these priests. I'm just going to say it, right?
And ye shall know that I have sent this commandment unto you
that my covenant might be with Levi, sayeth the Lord of hosts.
My covenant was with him of life and peace,
and I gave them to him for the fear wherewith he feared me
Notice, he's saying, hey, I don't like you, priests,
but I like Levi.
Why? Because he was afraid of me,
and I gave him laws so that he could what?
Be afraid of me, so he could fear me.
As we keep reading, he says in verse six,
the law of truth was in his mouth,
and iniquity was not found in his lips.
He walked with me in peace and equity,
and did turn many away from iniquity.
What should a priest do?
Turn people away from iniquity.
What should a pastor do turn people away from iniquity?
Well, why is a preacher always getting on my sin because he's trying to turn you away from iniquity
Why did you show up to be turned away from iniquity? It doesn't say pat them on the back
Tell them that they're good. Tell them that they're right. We are here for one reason is to clean up
Soap is not gonna get you dirty. It's gonna clean you up
And especially that like really gritty soap or whatever
that you're supposed to get on, it kind of even hurts.
It probably never even feels good.
But the point is just to clean you up.
And you know what?
Preaching should be to clean you up.
It should not be to feel good.
Have the right attitude.
It's like medicine.
You know, the kids get screwed up on this
because they think like the kids' medicine tastes good.
Medicine is not supposed to taste good.
It's supposed to just make you be better.
Right and a lot of times preaching is supposed to make you feel better now
Of course, we try to put it, you know great flavoring in there
All right, we try to put the strawberry the cherry or whatever and some people kind of even can like the medicine a little bit
But you know what preaching in general should be medicine
It shouldn't be something that you're doing it shouldn't be lollipops and sugar and candy canes and rainbows
It should be medicine
And it's there to cure.
And you know what, the priest should be there
to turn people away from sin.
People are sinners.
People need to get their sin rebuked.
Not be told, oh, you're already sanctified and good.
No, no, no, you're, you've got iniquity.
You need to get away from it.
Verse seven, for the priest's lips should keep knowledge
and they should seek the law at his mouth.
For he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts.
You know, it's not my
Roll to decide what gets preached. It's already been decided. I
Am supposed to be I'm just supposed to be a messenger of God. I'm just supposed to tell you what God said
That is my primary role and that's what every preacher's role is just tell you what God said whether it's good bad ugly or anything like that
But you know the hidden things of dishonesty, you know, they're not being honest with the text
They're not telling you what's really going on with the text. They're not really telling you what's really going on, you know
Everything should be out in the open.
Everything should be honest.
The priest's lips should be seeking the law at God's mouth.
He says, I just love this whole chapter.
We're just going to keep reading.
He says,
If you won't preach the Bible, God will make you look stupid,
is what he's saying.
Notice what he said I'll make you contemptible and base before all the people meaning we're gonna make fun of you
Because you just you're kind of a fool because you look like a hypocrite you look like an idiot in a sense
I mean dung on your face is pretty bad
Have we not all one father?
Have not one God created us?
Why do we deal treacherously every man
against his brother by profanning the covenant of our fathers?
Judah dealt treacherously and an abomination
is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem,
for Judah hath profaned the holiness of the Lord,
which he loved, and hath married the daughter
of a strange God.
Now it gets into some explanation here.
He's saying, look, you guys have married.
foreign and strange women of false gods and false religion.
It's caused you to break away from me.
And it's like a spiritual adultery,
in a sense that he's bringing up.
This is like a spiritual adultery
where you're transgressing against me.
You're transgressing against your brothers too,
because you're telling them this is okay,
even though it's contrary to the law.
You're permitting them to do things
that are contrary to the law.
And by doing so, you're bringing a curse on your people
and you're bringing a curse on our nation.
And I'm really mad about it.
You're doing treacherously.
Now, he says again, in verse 11, or in verse 12,
the Lord will cut off the man that doeth this,
the master and the scholar, out of the tabernacles of Jacob,
and him that offereth an offering unto the Lord of hosts.
And this have ye done again, covering the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping,
and with crying out, in so much that he regarded not the offering anymore,
or receiveth it with good will at your hand.
Yet ye say, wherefore?
because the Lord hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth
against whom thou hast dealt treacherously,
yet is she thy companion and the wife of thy covenant.
And did not he make one?
Yet had he the residue of the Spirit
and wherefore, one, that he might seek a godly seed,
therefore take heed to your Spirit
and let none of you deal treacherously
against the wife of his youth.
For the Lord, the God of his, you'll say it, that he hatheth putting away.
So, you kind of have this picture, God has the children of Israel.
He wants them to get married young to women of their own tribe and produce a godly seed.
But instead, they're divorcing their wives, they're putting away their wives, and they're
marrying strange wives, strange women, that are causing them to seek false religion, to
draw themselves away from the Lord.
And as a result, they're not going to have a godly seed.
They're going to have a bastard seed.
And he's saying, I hate putting away.
I hate how you're dealing treacherously against your wife.
I hate how you're breaking this covenant.
You're breaking this vow.
You're dishonoring your wife.
You're putting away your companion.
And then he compares it in verse 16.
He says, for the Lord the God of Israel,
say that he hates putting away for one cover,
violence with his garment.
Say, Lord of hosts,
therefore take heed to your spirit
that you deal not treacherously.
So, you know, in this context, he brings up this idea of covering violence with his garment.
We have to understand, look, in verse 15,
let none of you deal treacherously against the wipe of his youth.
Why? He hates putting away.
And then at the end of verse 16, that you deal not treacherously.
We haven't changed context.
It's all about divorce, the entire passage.
But he just likens it unto an example of one covering violence with his garment.
Now, what would be covering violence with a garment?
This could have a lot of different contexts, a lot of different ways to interpret it,
but it's just, it's a parallel, it's an analog.
It's not literal.
Divorce is not literal violence in some way.
But at the same time, there's a story in the Bible that kind of is like this.
Keep your finger here because we might come back.
We'll go to 2 Samuel chapter 20.
You go to 2 Samuel chapter 20.
In other words, violence in your Bible often refers to physical violence.
injuring somebody, but violence can be more broadly understood than just simply physical
harm or bodily injury. Violence can be done that's not actually even physical harm.
The word violence also has a root word like violate, and if you think about it's just a
Typically, violence is a physical transgression,
where you're physically assaulting someone,
physically violating them in a bodily injury way.
And we're gonna discover that definition a little bit more,
but what would be covering up violence?
Well, here's a story where we cover up violence,
second Samuel chapter 20, verse nine.
And Job said to Amesa,
art thou and health, my brother,
and Job took Amesa by the beard
with the right hand to kiss him.
But Amesa took no heed to the sword that was in Job's hand,
so he smote him therewith, in the fifth rib,
and shed out his bowels to the ground,
and struck him not again.
And he died.
So Job and Amesa, or Abishai, I'm sorry,
his brother pursued after Sheba the son of Bikrai.
And one of Job's men stood by him and said,
he that favoreth Joab, and he that is for David,
let him go after Joab.
And Amesa wallowed in blood in the midst of the highway.
And when the man saw that all the people stood still,
he removed Amesa out of the highway into the field
and cast a cloth upon him
when he saw that everyone that came by him stood still.
So basically, you have this guy in the middle of the road.
He gets stabbed.
He's just bleeding out and he's dying.
And everybody's walking by.
They're just kind of like horrified when they see it.
They're just like,
what just happened to this guy?
Because there was no just cause to kill him.
It was wrong. What Joab did was bad.
It's not legitimate.
He gets punished later for having done this.
The Bible even tells us that the guy he killed was better than him.
He was a more righteous person than him.
But because it's just causing all this problem,
everybody's horrified by this horrible thing Joab did.
They're like, okay, let's just move them out into the field
and then we'll just cover it up.
And then when they're walking by, there's nothing to see anymore.
Because everybody's just kind of what we call rubber necking, you know, and you get into the road and the highway and there's all this traffic
And they're like what's going on? There's an accident and everybody just kind of rubber neck
This is what it's called rubber necking. All right, you're all looking over to the side and everybody's driving slow
So in the same way, they're like they can't really make progress because everybody's rubber necking
So this is what you would literally call covering it up. This is covering violence with the garment
And again, why is this being brought up in Malachi chapter number two?
Well, I believe it's just because it's a parallel to divorce in the sense that God's saying,
look, you're just kind of covering up the fact that you divorced this woman and you're
just putting her away as if it never happened and then just marrying someone else.
And we see this happening in the world all the time.
Now go, I want to just prove the point that I made a little bit.
Go to Zephaniah chapter 3, I'll just show you one verse there.
In Ezekiel 22 verse 26, the Bible says,
Her precept violated my law and profane my holy things.
Violated the law, you can't really physically hurt the law.
In Zephaniah chapter 3, if you look at verse 4, it says this,
her prophets are light and treacherous persons.
Her priests have polluted the sanctuary.
They have done violence to the law.
Again, you can't physically harm the law.
What is it saying?
They've transgressed the law.
And so covering violence with the garment,
We could apply this in two ways. It could possibly be interpreted two ways. Let's just take it the most literal way violence
Okay, some people just cover up violence with the garment like we saw with Joab and it's just basically pretending like it didn't happen
Some way when people just divorce and then pretend like it didn't really happen
Or you could say this violence is not even talking about a physical thing. He's just talking about violating
God's law and look just divorcing your spouse
is a violation of the law.
There was one provision, there was one exception
the Bible brought up, but that's not what's being in view here.
So it's clearly a violation of the law,
it's doing violence to the law,
how the priests are just constantly permitting
the children of Israel to just put away
their wives of their youth for no legitimate reason
and just marry some strange woman.
Now, again, the law only provision was basically like you found out she had lied about fornication
prior to, and you put them ways more like an annulment.
But again, putting that aside, this isn't a clear violation, it's violence to the law.
So I don't care how you interpret it, either way, we interpret it, it's a transgression,
and that transgression is being covered up, and a lot of people are covering up divorce
And look, it's the hidden things of dishonesty, in my opinion.
People are just divorcing or marrying
and just pretending like it didn't really happen.
One really popular example that I like to think of
is Greg Locke.
Greg Locke was a Baptist pastor
and he divorced his first wife, Melissa Locke, in 2018.
They had been married for 20 years.
So this is the wife of his youth that he just put away.
And the divorce was pretty controversial.
He was claiming that she was like mentally unstable.
She filed a divorce citing irreconcilable differences,
which is meaningless.
But they got divorced in 2018.
In August 2nd of 2018,
same year,
just a few months after the ink is dried,
he married Taisha Kohanmugi, his administrative assistant.
and his wife's former best friend.
Wow.
And of course, you know, now he's no longer a Baptist,
now he's just some non-the-nom, Pentecostal,
slappy happy guy or something like that.
But again, I mean, you've been married for 20 years,
and then it's just like, put a garment over it,
nope, now, secretary.
Just months later, just move on,
pretend like it didn't happen.
You know, that is extremely wicked.
and think about how dishonest that is.
Think about how these people are just going up.
They have no idea what this guy just did to his wife
and they just covered up, pretend like it didn't happen,
this is my wife, and now they're both apostles
or something like that.
It's like Apostle Locke and his secretary now wife.
Homewrecker, homewrecker, homewrecker, I mean,
how do you take your best friend's husband?
What a home wrecking whore is what she is. She's not an apostle
She's a home wrecking whore is what she is
And you know what that is dishonest
It's just honest you go to their website apostle. No home wrecking whore is what she should be called
And you know what?
Churches, they cover things up the day, and they pretend like they're not happening.
And you know what?
It's not just them.
Look, the Southern Baptist Convention has been caught for just covering up all kinds
of weird scandals that have happened in their churches, weird scandals happening in their
youth department, and their university ministers, and their assistant pastors, and their pastors.
Just dozens and dozens and dozens of people just caught doing all kinds of shady, weird
Fire them all they they're shuffling them around moving around covering it up pretending like it didn't happen
Catholic Church same thing
just shuffling all kinds of priests and pastors around.
And look, I've heard reports, can't verify any of this,
but I've heard reports that the old FB does a lot of this.
Shuffling people around, shuffling guys around,
getting caught doing all kinds of weird stuff, shady stuff.
You know what, that is not us.
We're not gonna sit here and be like,
oh, now Romero's starting a church somewhere else.
Just gonna move on, just go somewhere, no, no.
You're done.
And if you try again, we'll call you out, we'll call you on the carpet, we'll preach
against you, we'll expose you again.
We're not going to sit here and just pretend like it didn't happen.
We're not going to just cover it all up with a garment and act like nothing happened.
Now, look, when someone's in your pants, we can move on, we don't have to keep dragging
their name through the mud.
But at the end of the day, we're not going to cover stuff up.
We are not going to be a church with the hidden things of dishonesty, hey, we're going to
And you know what, I believe God has blessed our church for that.
We've seen our church change and get better and do a lot of works.
And you know what, God, I believe honors being honest, not going around covering everything
up.
A lot of churches have shady things like this and they cover it up and then their ministry
just fails, tanks, sinks, and goes down the drain later because you know what, you can't
hide from God.
Where are the bodies?
Go to go to Matthew chapter 6 a second thing that we had seen and I'm just gonna spend a few minutes on these last ones
But walking and craftiness what is walking and craftiness? Well, I believe it's when you're doing things deceptively
You're not sincere about them. It may be a good thing on the outward appearance, but you're it's crafty how you're doing it
You're skilled in deception look at Matthew 6 verse 1 take heed that you do not your arms before men to be seen of them
Otherwise, you have no reward of your Father which is in heaven.
There's nothing wrong with giving alms.
But some people are doing it purposefully so that they can get attention, so that people
think that they're godly.
They'll think that they're a good person.
There's a lot of people that do this, in fact.
Many people have charities and all kinds of soup kitchens and homeless ministries and
all these things.
They love to talk about how much money they give away.
People that are known for their charitable giving.
I looked up top philanthropists,
people that give the most money away,
the most charitable people.
Here's a few people that came to the list.
Michael Bloomberg, Bill and Melinda Gates,
Warren Buffett.
Here's one, George Soros.
Well, I mean, these are great people, huh?
They don't have much of hidden things of dishonesty
in their closet.
They're wonderful.
How about this, Elton John?
Known for his philanthropy I think it's faggotry is what it's really known for
Stupid faggot lady Gaga
Madonna, I mean aren't these just wonderful people
Why are they giving money away? Oh look at this church. They're giving all this money away. Oh like Madonna
Oh like Lady Gaga like Mark Zuckerberg
Like Oprah
How about how about the most popular new one mr. Beast?
The number one YouTuber, talk about guy just giving money away, acting like he's so charitable.
Mr. Beast used to claim to be a Christian.
He even started as a minister. I think his YouTube channel, his banner had a Bible verse on it.
Used to.
Now, as in a more recent interview, they were saying, are you religious or a Christian?
He's like, I don't know. It's too hard to know with all the different religions.
One of his best friends Chris is now like a tranny
He left his wife and kid to become some tranny faggot. I
Mean
That's walking and crafting but but mr. Reese is so nice and he smiles. I mean ever seen any of his thumbnails
He doesn't look like a serial killer
You can go to the store and get his little little candy bar
I mean, the guy can't cringe harder with his smile.
Talk about someone who's fake.
I guarantee that Mr. Beast is one of the least friendly people
in real life, people that actually go up to him.
They probably can't even talk to him or whatever.
He's too busy.
These people are fake, man.
It's just like the Pharisees, just like the Catholic priests, just like a lot of these
people, they're just fake.
They don't really care about people.
Oh, look at all the money they give away.
They only give the money away to disguise what's really going on.
They only pray in fast disguise what's really going on.
They put on a good show.
You know, John chapter 12, if you go there for a second, there's another guy that was
so concerned with poor people, but it was fake.
It was fake, look at John chapter number 12, verse number four.
The Bible says in verse four,
then say, one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot,
Simon's son, which should betray him.
I'm sure John loved writing that, you know,
he's just like, you betrayed him, you know.
Why was not this ointment sold for 300 pence
and given to the poor?
This he said, not that he cared for the poor,
but because he was a thief and had the bag
and bear what was put therein.
Oh, why don't you give money to the poor?
This person's not sincere.
This person's walking in craftiness, aren't they?
They're going around like, oh, why don't you give money to the poor and I want you to donate
to my charity and why don't you help us help the poor people?
Ronald McDonald charities.
While you're poisoning us with your food, yeah, I'm going to give money to help your
Ronald McDonald charities, right?
The Catholic Church while they have their little orphan ministry all the while they're doing human trafficking through their orphanages
All the while you have all these people just fake and sincere
Oh help our adoption agency as we give them to sodomites to be raised by sodomites
I don't like giving money to these charity organizations. I'll give money to my local church where you know what they're not walking in craftiness
Well, they've renounced the hidden things of dishonesty and lastly, they're not handling the word of God deceitfully
A lot of people are handling the word of God deceitfully. They're twisting the Bible to justify what they believe
Goodwood to 2 Peter chapter 3
For a second time, I could take a lot of applications here because honestly people twist scripture for all kinds of things
Don't they for alcohol? I mean people justify alcohol all the time and they really have to twist the scriptures on that one
It's just like, after they're well-drunk, Jesus gave them more booze.
How does that even make sense?
They ignore clear verses that talk about being sober.
They ignore clear verses that say, wine is a mocker.
How do you even get it?
It's like, all the munitions of alcohol are good, wine's a mocker.
Strong drink is raging, and whosoever is deceived there by is not wise.
I mean, let alone Proverbs 23, which tells you clearly to not look upon the wine when it give its color in the cup,
but it's like, again, ignore, don't want to talk about that. They're very dishonest.
They'll just get up and say, oh, the Bible talks positively about alcohol.
What about these passages, buddy? They cover them up.
People are dishonest and twist scripture about all kinds of things, undermining leadership or pastoral authority or male authority,
all kinds of stuff, but let's just, we'll just stick with divorce on this one.
But I want to show you in 2 Peter chapter 3, it says in verse 16,
as also in all the epistles speaking in them of these things and which are some things hard to be understood which they that are unlearned and unstable rest as they do also the other scriptures under their own destruction.
Notice that there's people resting scriptures.
This is the handling of the Word of God deceitfully.
And nothing bothers me more than when I watch people just twist the Bible to fit their narrative,
doctrines of convenience, not being sincere, misusing stories, misusing parables, doing all kinds of crazy stuff.
Well, I've typed in an article about divorce, or I just typed about divorce, and this is
one of the articles that came up.
It was one of the number one articles that came up.
It's for some organization, and I don't know how big it is, but for purposes of the Internet,
I mean, if it's one of the ones popping up as a top result, or might as well talk about
it, it's called the National Association of Christian Ministers.
And they had an article called, What Does the Bible Teach About Divorce or Marriage
and Ministry?
That was the title of the article.
Pretty early into this article there. This is their first kind of addressing this issue of
What does the Bible teach about divorce and they're bringing up what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 5 verses 31 and 32
We'll just read it
They have it quoted in here. I even think they had King James, but it said it has been said who sort shall put away his wife
Let her give him a writing of divorcement, but I say in you, that whosoever shall put away his wife, saving her the cause of fornication,
cause her there to commit adultery, and whosoever shall marry her that his divorce committed adultery.
Now this is what they said.
From verse 31, we can be sure that Jesus is referencing Deuteronomy 24, 1-4.
However, the things that he says here sound very contrary to what the law states.
He seems to say that divorce is forbidden except for adultery
and that it is forbidden to marry a divorced person.
Now, again, I think that they're still using a modern version
of understanding of this because the exception is not for adultery.
It's actually for fornication.
Yeah.
And fornication and adultery are different.
Yeah.
Because adulterers are put to death.
They'll already said that.
There will be no point in like saying,
oh, by the way, you divorce an adult, he's dead,
there's no point in divorcing them anymore.
Okay, the reason why it has an exception for fornication
is because
You know, you can't put someone to death for fornication just by itself.
Fornication is not a capital crime, but in the context of lying about it and deceiving
a man about it, then that could be the result of the death penalty.
So the fornication is still not the death penalty, it's the lying about it, which is
defrauding your spouse, and that was the exception where you'd be put to death.
they could be divorced and I believe the reason why it kind of gives both scenarios is because
maybe not all contexts afford the opportunity to put them to death like Joseph and Mary.
Joseph doesn't have the ability to put Mary to death so he says being just he thought a way
Okay, and so he was finding some uncleanness thinking that she became she conceived by a man
Not by the Holy Ghost thinking to put away her brilliance. That would have been fornication
Not adultery as it was prior to them actually being wet. There are espoused
So maybe someone could argue that it was adultery, but either way that was how the law was being applied
They're saying, hey, it seems like Jesus is saying divorce is forbidden except for this exception and that it's forbidden to marry a divorced person.
Well, that part's right.
It seems like what Jesus is saying is what he's saying, you know.
Albeit, I get they have the modern version issue.
Says, yet the law clearly states that divorce is permissible and that is indeed acceptable for the divorce to remarry.
The law definitely isn't just always saying this is quote acceptable.
You know, the law gives revision of what you would do in a situation where you had two wives.
That's not saying it's acceptable.
They're just saying this is what you would do in that particular scenario.
It's not saying this is what you should do.
Here's another thing he says in this article.
If we analyze the whole Sermon on the Mount,
we find some outlandish statements about plucking out eyes,
cutting off hands, permitting people to rob us.
What?
permitting people to rob us?
Unjust anger interpreted as murder,
instructions not to resist evil or defend ourselves,
and the instruction to, quote, be perfect.
If we are to take those statements literally,
we must accept them all literally,
not just the passage about divorce.
Now, again, that's...
This is really bad logic.
Number one, we are supposed to strive for perfection.
We understand we never will be,
but no, when Jesus said be perfect, he wasn't joking.
He wasn't acting like this isn't real.
And he is saying,
if you were juxtaposition,
rip your eye out or go to hell,
you would want to rip your eye out.
The reality is, it just doesn't get you into heaven.
It doesn't actually help you get there.
But he was saying you would rather rip your eye out than go to hell. He wasn't joking
It is literal
He's just not saying do it. I get that
But when he says that when you divorce your spouse and marry another one, it's adultery. It's not a joke. It's literal
It is a form of adultery
It is a type of adultery. Is it the same level of adultery?
I would say it's a lesser form, but it's still adultery.
Just like hating your brother and your heart is a form of murder,
albeit it's a lesser form of murder.
But it's not like it's not, it's just a spiritual, lesser type of murder.
This is what the article says.
Therefore, every person that has ever lusted must pluck their eye out
if they are to be obedient to Christ.
The Bible doesn't say that.
This is just, again, twisting the scripture,
resting the scripture to the owner's description,
handling the word of God deceitfully
so they can justify something, divorce.
He says, the truth is that Jesus rarely ever
spoke in, quote, literal terms.
Quote, hyperbolic method.
He said, this is their example.
He's like, this is how Jesus would speak.
I'm so hungry, I could eat a horse.
You know, it's funny, if Jesus only primarily spoke in a hyperbolic way, why do you have
to use expressions or phrases that he didn't use?
Why wouldn't you just use the time where he said something like that?
Because he never said, I'm as hungry as a horse.
That's a silly expression.
And look, I'm not saying that Jesus never used hyperbole in any way.
Obviously, he spoke in parables.
But at the end of the day, he wasn't just making these outlandish claims that we can't really believe.
And what a cope, right?
He's just real clear about, hey, you put away your wife, you marry another, it's adultery.
And they're just like, yeah, but what about this time when he said, pluck out your eye?
Who cares?
What did he actually say about divorce?
Now then they go on to say
What about divorce ministers?
Because doesn't first Timothy chapter number three say the husband of one wife and they're like well actually you go back to the Greek
It really just means a one-woman man
One woman at a time, okay
Whatever that means
And he said this, they're saying if we had to believe
that you have to be married to one wife and not divorced,
to be a minister, then we'd have to believe three absurdities.
So he said, these are the three absurdities
that we have to believe, if that's what the passage is saying.
Absurdity number one, that overseers
has to be the husband of one wife.
Therefore, all ministers must be male.
That's an absurdity.
Now, I'll just give you the definition of an absurdity.
Something so ridiculous or wildly unreasonable
is, according to them, wildly unreasonable
to believe that the pastors are supposed to be men.
That is wildly unreasonable.
Yet, it's like, isn't like every male leader
in the Bible a male?
I mean, this is, it's Moses and Jacob and Joshua
and Timothy and Titus and Paul and the 12 disciples were.
Men.
That's absurd. That's wildly unreasonable.
Here's the second absurdity we have to believe.
It states that overseers must be the husband and wife. Therefore, they must indeed be married.
It's absurd to think that your pastor should be married.
This is their article. They're claiming it's absurd to think that the pastor should be a man and that he's married
based on the fact that the Bible says the husband of one wife.
Based on that statement, it's absurd to think that pastors should be men that are married.
This is the type of logic you get when you run away from the Bible.
Here's the third absurdity we have to believe.
Following Christ's teachings in Matthew 5,
if they become adulterers for marrying after divorce,
then they are doomed to live in the sin of adultery as long as they stay married.
Therefore, divorced people ever married are adulterers and cannot be saved."
What?
What was absurd is what you said.
I don't have to believe that.
Okay?
Obviously, this verse is not saved.
Because you know what?
You can be an adulterer and be saved.
You could be an adulterer for the rest of your life and be saved.
Here's another thing. I don't believe that if you get remarried, you're just this in perpetual state of adultery either
It was the single act of getting remarried. That's the adultery then from there on you're the same as everybody else
Say you're sorry move on with your life
Okay, it's not because then they're trying to claim. Oh now you have to like get divorced again or something to get out of your
Adultery or whatever. It's like they're saying this is absurd. No
It's obviously that singular act is a form of adultery.
You know, it's so funny when they say what we have to believe is absurd, and then we read that.
Adulterers cannot be saved.
Well, you know what, then you're going to have to go to passages that say,
unbelieving can't be saved, and liars can't be saved, and then pretty soon no one's saved,
based on your work's base salvation.
Here's another thing that they say, this is the end of the article, go to John Ford and we'll finish.
He said, Christ recognizes divorce and remarriage as legitimate when talking to the woman at
the well.
So you ready?
Jesus is going to recognize divorce and remarriage as legitimate.
John chapter 4 verse 17, the woman answered and said, I have no husband.
Jesus said under a thouas, well said I have no husband, for thouas had five husbands.
Didn't you see him just recognize that divorce and remarriage is legitimate?
It's like okay, obviously we can recognize that people do sinful things that doesn't legitimize them
Just saying hey, you've done the divorce and remarried five times doesn't say that was a good thing or legitimate or recognizing it as good
This is their conclusion. They show these verses and this is what they say from these things
We must conclude that the subject of divorce is confusing
You're just confusing
However, some of the church's interpretation of the matter both denies the power of God
to forgive sin and lack sound reasoning.
Therefore, it is the NACM's position that God permits divorce and forgives sin, and
that divorced ministers who have been called by His grace may continue to serve Him with
their callings.
You know what?
Just shut up and they can be divorced, women and dykes and whatever.
Just accept it all.
I mean, what's the point of qualifications if they mean nothing?
What does?
If the husband of one wife doesn't mean they're male and doesn't mean they're married
What does it mean? Yeah?
Their definition was it's a it's a man. That's like a one woman man
One woman man at a time
Even by their own definition is still a man
Did you realize that and he's still with a woman?
But you know that's that's that's what people do when they you know
They don't want the truth and God will make you look stupid. Isn't that we read in Malachi?
Hey, we'll make you look base
We'll make you look we'll have dung on your face
That's what a lot of sodomites have they've done on their face literally and spiritually
And, you know, we don't want to be a ministry that is handling things dishonest.
We don't want the hidden things of dishonesty.
We don't want walking craftiness.
We don't want to handle the Word of God deceitfully.
You know what?
Divorce is not confusing, never divorce.
That wasn't confusing.
What's confusing is all these exceptions.
The modern version is saying, well, for sexual immorality, what does that even mean?
All these different excuses, you know as Christians we need to just get a vocabulary that just says hey never divorce
It's not on the table. There's no exception
What God has joined together? Let not man put us under I vowed till death and we're supposed to keep our covenants
Even if you thought there was an exception for divorce the Bible says you're not allowed to break your vow
And you already made a vow to God anyways
So just honor your vow and just keep your vow
And it's just, it's frustrating how many pastors they just twist things to what, to accommodate the itching ear today.
There's so many people that just want to believe, no, I think I can get divorced or I want to listen to some rabbi
or I want to listen to some Judeo-Christian minister so that I can get divorced.
Well, you know what? I'm not going to preach it.
I'm never going to permit it.
We're not going to, we're not going to skirt around the truth.
And you know, if we have to call it alcohol, divorce, whatever, we're going to do it.
We're going to have accountability for our money, for our church, and, you know, we don't
want to be a ministry that's just afraid of the truth.
The truth fears no investigation.
This is the truth.
And if we can't be honest, then we really are just a failure.
And we not only be honest as a ministry, we need to be honest as persons, as husbands,
as wives.
about who we are. Let's go to prayer.
Thank you, Heavenly Father, for giving us the Bible
so that we can know the truth.
I pray that you'd give us the courage to come into the light
and not allow ourselves to hide in the dark.
I pray that you'd help us to renounce dishonesty,
to not be fake, to not be insincere,
and to just embrace the truth no matter what that looks like,
whether it be pleasant, ugly,
And I pray that you would help our ministry to be an example that you can succeed by being honest.
You can succeed by being truthful.
And I pray that you would help us to continue to be honest and to love the truth.
And in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
page 147, Leaning on the Everlasting Arms.