Good song to get us going on.
415, 415, victory through grace.
Sing it nice and loud on the first.
Conquering now and still to conquer, right of the king in his mind, leading
the host of all the faithful into the midst of the fight.
See them with courage advancing, clad in their brilliant terrain.
Shouting the name of their leader, hear them exultingly say,
not to the strong is the battle, not to the swift is the race,
yet to the true and the faithful, victory is promised through grace.
Conquering now and still to conquer, who is this wonderful king?
When so the armies which he leadeth, while of his glory they sing,
he is a lord and redeemer, savior and monarch divine.
They are the stars that forever bright in his kingdom will shine,
not to the strong is the battle, not to the swift is the race,
yet to the true and the faithful, victory is promised through grace.
Conquering now and still to conquer, Jesus the ruler of all.
Drones in their scepters all shall perish, crowns in their splendor shall fall.
Yes, shall the armies thou leadest, faithful and true to the last,
finding thy mentions eternal, rest when their warfare is past,
not to the strong is the battle, not to the swift is the race,
yet to the true and the faithful, victory is promised through grace.
Amen.
Great singing.
Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer.
Heavenly Father, we just thank you that we could be here tonight to hear the preaching of your word.
I just pray you'd speak to our hearts through the message,
to fill Pastor Shelley with your Holy Spirit and help us to walk out of here,
better Christians, and I just pray you bless this church
and our soul winning efforts that we could just fill this city and this world with the gospel.
In Jesus name we pray,
Amen. Next is going to be Psalm 126.
You should have a white handout so you can try to find one into your seat there.
If not, anyone? You got one?
Okay, if you don't have one, raise up your hand and Usher will try and bring one to you.
If they don't have enough, you can always turn your Bible.
Hopefully you brought that. Psalm 126.
Let me get my second one in here.
All right, Psalm 126.
Sing it all together on the first.
When the Lord turned again the captivity of Zion,
we were like them that dream.
Then was our mouth filled with laughter and our song with singing.
Then said they among the heathen,
the Lord had done great things for them,
the Lord had done great things for us.
Whereof we are glad, turn again our captivity.
O Lord, as the streams in the sound,
they that sow in tears shall reap in joy.
They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.
Then said they among the heathen,
the Lord had done great things for them,
the Lord had done great things for us.
Whereof we are glad,
he that goeth forth and weepeth bearing precious seed,
shall doubtless come again,
shall doubtless come again with rejoicing,
bringing his sheaves with him.
Then said they among the heathen,
the Lord had done great things for them,
the Lord had done great things for us.
Whereof we are glad.
Amen. Good singing.
Thanks for coming to steadfast Baptist Church for the evening service.
And we, if you don't have a bulletin,
lift your hand nice and high and we'll get you a bulletin.
Also, on the inside we have our service and soul winning times.
Make sure to return your soul winning maps to the bucket over here.
Also report your soul winning numbers to your soul winning captain.
So Sundays, I don't capture any of that data.
So whatever you and your partner had,
y'all just figure that out,
report to your captain,
one person report that for you guys.
Also turn in your maps.
And then if you have any other soul winning throughout the week,
either whoever's leading that soul winning time,
either report it to them and they can report it or you can report it to your captain.
So just make sure one of those things is happening on the right.
Keep all of our expecting ladies and your prayers,
especially since it's so hot.
Okay, so, you know,
I've never been pregnant nor can I get pregnant as being a man,
but I can only anticipate that it would make it hotter.
So definitely keep them in your prayers.
Also the prayer list.
If you need any additional prayer,
please add that to the prayer list via email.
We have a song leading and music class if you'd like to participate.
And it's okay if you've missed one or you just want to jump in whenever.
We'd love to have you join us.
And probably, probably next week.
So we have like two more classes.
Probably next, that's not next week,
but it's like the next time that we have it.
I'll probably go over a few more instructions as far as like some of the
special indentations and special musical notes and things like that.
But then the final one will do a lot of practice.
So we'll get people up here and we'll give them the opportunity to lead some songs and everything like that.
And if you play an instrument, we'd love for you to come and participate as well.
And so just an exercise to help get a little bit better at the song leading and the music practice.
Give you a little bit instruction and then we're going to also get you some real life practice.
So if you stick with it, we'll get you in.
And if you're doing great, you know, in the batter's box, then we'll just put you in the game.
Okay. And so then you can go ahead and knock it out of the park, right?
And then we won't even really, we won't even miss Duncan.
We'll be like, I don't know what happened to that guy.
You know, that guy was just, he would be around with Sun and Ice,
but I can't remember what, you know, his name is anymore.
No, I'm just kidding. No, we'll keep, we'll keep remembering him.
And it's hard to, it's hard to replace, but we'll get it done.
Also have the men's conference.
It's going to be in August.
And so I'm really looking forward to that.
I know that we have other events and stuff like that,
but we'll try to get those added into the bulletin.
Also, we are streaming.
The service is now on our website again with a new streaming service that is not going to get taken down.
All right, so you can definitely check that out.
The quality looks pretty good.
And I'm also been working on some other solutions to have like a different video hosting platform that can't be taken down as well.
And so I'm really excited about that.
And we've been working, me and brother Tim been working really hard on that.
So I'm looking forward to releasing some other things for our church.
We're also working on King James Bible documentary.
And brother Ben is kind of starting to work on that.
We've done almost all of our filming.
We still have a little bit of filming to do, but I'm really looking forward to this film.
I think it's going to be a great project to have completed and a nice thing that we can maybe hand out.
I am kind of planning on doing things different in the future, though, because I don't know how many people actually like DVDs.
I don't know. I'm just curious who owns a DVD player or could play a DVD.
OK, so there's still quite a few. I mean, that's more than half that actually could watch a DVD.
It's just I'll probably still make the DVDs.
But I'm also thinking in like additional is to make like movie passes or something like these nice little like look tickets or whatever.
They say like free movie pass and you can just go and watch it online as well for free.
So I think that might be a good thing to hand out. It's obviously cheaper, but more importantly, it's more universal.
More people can access the information like that.
And so we're definitely trying to invent new ways to get the information out there.
And we still need you guys to go out there and reach people and preach the gospel and to share with people.
And so I'm really looking forward to what's coming down the pike.
That's pretty much all I have for announcements. Let's go ahead and go to our third song this evening.
Four hundred and two are best. One of the note the ice machine is working again and the water fountains back here.
So feel free to if you need water to get some ice water over here and then we'll use the water bottles for soul winning and everything like that.
So thank you so much for your patience on all of that.
Again, that's going to be four hundred and two. Our best.
All together on the first.
Here ye the Masters call, give me thy best.
For be it great or small, that is his test.
Do then the best you can, not for rewind, not for the praise of men, but for the Lord.
Every work for Jesus will be blessed.
But he asks from every one his best.
Our talents may be few.
These may be small, but unto him is do our best.
Oh, wait, not for men too long.
He'd not there's love winning the smile of God.
Brings its delight, hating the good and true.
There goes on bless all that we think or do be did the best.
Every work for Jesus will be blessed.
But he asks from every one his best.
Our talents may be few.
These may be small, but unto him is do our best.
Amen, good thing.
As the offering plates are passed around, please turn in your bibles to James one.
James chapter one, and you can follow along silently in verse starting at verse one, James chapter one.
The Bible reads in James chapter number one.
It says in James chapter one, James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ to the 12 tribes, which are scattered abroad.
Greeting my brethren, count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations, knowing this, that the trying of your faith work with patience.
But let patients have her perfect work that you may be perfect and entire wanting nothing.
If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that giveth to all men liberally and a braideth knot and it shall be given him.
But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering for he that waiver it is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.
For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord.
A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.
Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted,
but the rich and that he is made low because of the flower of the grass he shall pass away.
For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat,
but it wither at the grass and the flower thereof fallen and the grace of the fashion of it parishes.
So also shall the rich man fade away in his ways.
Blessed is the man that endureth temptation,
for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord had promised to them that love him.
Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God, for God cannot be tempted with evil.
Neither tempted he any man, but every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed.
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin and sin when it is finished, bringeth forth death.
Do not err, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above
and cometh down from the father of lights with whom is no variableness,
neither shadow of turning. Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth,
that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. Wherefore, my beloved brethren,
let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath.
For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.
Wherefore, lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness,
and receive with meekness the engrafted word which is able to save your souls.
But be he doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.
For if any be a hearer of the word and not a doer.
He is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass.
For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was.
But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein,
he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.
If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue,
but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain.
Pure religion and undefiled before God and the father is this.
To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the word.
Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. Father God,
I pray that you fill Pastor Shelley now with your Holy Ghost and just give him clarity of mind as he preaches to us.
And also, Lord, help us to listen carefully to the message you've laid on his heart
and protect us as we go home after the service. In Jesus' name, I pray. Amen.
So the verse that I want to focus on is verse 25,
where the Bible says, But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty,
and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work,
this man shall be blessed in his deed.
And the title of my sermon is being driven from this passage,
where it has the phrase, the law of liberty, or the perfect law of liberty.
And this is even mentioned in chapter two.
If you look down a little bit further, look at verse 12. So speak ye,
and so do as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty.
So notice that the Bible is bringing up something that's happening with the law,
being judged by this, being judged by the law of liberty.
Now, some people, they have a weird idea about the law of liberty.
They think the law of liberty is I can just do whatever I want.
How could you be judged by something like that?
How could a freedom clause that simply just says,
do as thou wilt, which is really the motto of Satanism,
then end up judging you? It can't.
And really, the law of liberty, we have to understand,
is that it's not some new thing.
It's really just a description of God's law.
It's just adding, it's not saying like there's this,
there's the law of God, and then there's this law of liberty,
and it's this completely separate thing or whatever.
No, the law gives liberty, okay?
But we have to understand everything in its context.
Go back to verse 25 in chapter one.
It says, But whoso looketh in the perfect law of liberty,
and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer,
but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.
So it's saying, if you follow the law of God,
you continue doing the law of God,
it's going to end up bringing blessing in your life.
And this is so evident throughout the scripture.
Think about Psalms chapter number one.
Blessed is the man that walketh not
in the counsel of the ungodly,
nor stands the way of sinners,
nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful,
but his delight is in the law of the Lord.
Okay? And it makes it clear that whatsoever he doeth
shall prosper. When it's talking about this man,
the light's in the law of God,
the light's in the law of the Lord,
that walks in the law of the Lord,
there is a freedom that comes from God's law.
And you know, for a title,
there's a lot of things that I thought about,
but I'm like, let's just use the Bible's phrase,
the law of liberty, meaning what?
God's law gives you liberty.
God's law gives you freedom.
True freedom, true liberty,
is always within the boundaries of God's law.
Everything outside of that is actually no freedom whatsoever
or it's a worse version of true freedom.
Now, go over to John chapter number eight,
John chapter number eight,
and we're going to read a kind of a form,
a famous verse of Jesus Christ,
but we're going to get a little bit of context here.
What is the title of the sermon?
The title of the sermon is the law of liberty.
We have to realize that God's law is not restrictive.
It rather brings freedom.
It rather brings liberty.
A lot of people would say,
oh, that church is so restrictive
and there's all these rules
and, you know, a fundamental Baptist church,
why would I want to go to a fundamental Baptist church?
They're going to tell me all these things I can't do
and there's no liberty and there's no freedom.
But this is a short-sighted perspective.
They don't actually understand what freedom and liberty are
and by them feeling like they can go outside
of God's boundaries and going outside of God's law,
they're going to find out real quick
what it's like to not have any freedom at all,
what it's like to not actually have true liberty.
Liberty and freedom,
if you want the most freedom and liberty,
it's going to be always inside the boundaries of God's Word.
Now, look at John chapter eight, verse 31.
Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him,
if you continue in my word,
then are you my disciples indeed?
Notice being a disciple is not automatic.
Being saved is not being a disciple.
Being saved is just believing.
But he says, hey, if you believe and you're saved
and then you follow my commandments,
you continue in my commandments,
you're a doer of the word,
then are you a real disciple?
You know, a real disciple is not one who's backslidden.
A real disciple is not one who's not going to church.
A real disciple is not one who's breaking God's commandments.
A true disciple of Jesus Christ is not just saved,
they're doing all the Bible.
They're following all the commandments.
Why was there only 12 disciples?
It wasn't that there was only 12 saved people
at the time of Christ.
There was only 12 people who were continuing in God's Word,
who were continually following the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, obviously one of them was a devil,
but we're just saying in general,
that's why they were called the disciples
because they were truly serving God with their lives.
And if you want to be a disciple, it costs you something.
In fact, it really just costs you everything.
That's why the Bible constantly talks about
taking up your cross daily,
you know, crucifying the flesh,
you know, when you put your hand to the plow,
no looking back,
you know, all this strong language.
And of course, false prophets use this to describe salvation.
They're just not even saved, so they don't even get it.
We don't have to do any work to be saved.
We don't have to do any deeds to be saved.
We don't have to continue doing anything to be saved.
All you have to do is believe in Jesus one time saved.
But if you want to be a disciple,
you want to draw close to the Lord,
if you want to be his friend,
you have to then also continue into the law of God.
Now, here's the beauty of doing that.
Freedom.
Here's the beauty of that, liberty.
Look what he says in the next breath.
And ye shall know the truth,
and the truth shall make you free.
So notice he's attaching something.
If you decide to make yourself a disciple of Jesus Christ,
if you decide to continue in God's word,
if you decide to follow his commandments,
he's going to give you something.
He's going to give you truth and freedom.
And let me say, there is a close relationship.
In fact, it's basically two sides of the same coin,
truth and freedom.
With no truth comes no freedom.
With no freedom comes no truth.
These two things are really tightly wound together.
If you want real freedom, it has to come from truth.
You know, that's why a lot of the principles
that we have in America are really biblical.
You know, when we think about like our First Amendment,
you know, our First Amendment is the idea
that we can have the freedom to exercise our religion
and we can say anything.
And that's designed for one purpose.
It's designed to protect the truth.
Because no one's trying to protect the lies, really.
They're fine with all that.
It's that we need this liberty and this freedom
to be able to say the truth.
Because when you say something true that people don't like,
they want to shut you down.
They want to cancel you.
They want to eliminate that.
And countries that are the literal most strict,
countries that would be the worst place as far as liberty
or freedom on a personal level, let me ask you this question.
How much do they like truth?
I mean, are you allowed to tell Xi Jinping,
are you allowed to tell the Communist Party
the truth about what's going on with the Uyghurs?
Are you allowed to expose the truth of what's
going on behind the scenes of the CCP?
Is that really a beacon of freedom and liberty in China?
They have certain websites you can't even go to.
They restrict their internet because they
don't want certain information to get out there.
You know, YouTube, is YouTube just a beacon of truth,
no censorship?
I mean, North Korea, is this really where you would say,
man, there's a lot of liberty there?
You see this direct correlation to a country,
the least amount of truth they have,
the least amount of freedom.
And the countries that have the most amount of truth
seem to have the most amount of freedom.
What would be the most free country on the planet?
America.
Now, obviously, that's been dwindling.
Obviously, in the past, maybe there's
been moments when we had more freedom.
And in some ways, it's ebbed and flowed,
depending on different circumstances, who you are,
where you're from.
But everyone knows that America is the freest, the most liberty
of any place on the planet.
And let me tell you why.
It's because it has the most truth in it.
It has the most churches worshipping God.
It has the King James Bible at its cornerstone.
That is why we have the freedom.
As soon as you get rid of the truth in a country,
you're going to get rid of its liberty.
You're going to get rid of its freedom.
This is also the truth with you and your personal life.
It doesn't matter what application we make here.
Personal level, your church, the state, the country, a nation.
It all is the exact same principle.
If you, as your household, decide to reject the Bible,
reject God's law, get it out of your house,
you know what's not going to happen?
You're going to have liberty and freedom in that institution.
How about the public schools?
Which, of course, I'm not an advocate for public school.
I wish they'd all be demolished or let
us have one for a church building or something.
But they shouldn't be a public government institution.
We should let homeschooling come back and thrive in this nation.
But even that institution, as flawed as it is,
it at least had the 10 commandments,
at least had the Bible at times in its history.
And it was a lot freer.
There was a lot more liberty.
Now you go to certain schools, they
have metal detectors just to enter in the school.
They have all kinds of policies and procedures in place
to try and protect the students from drugs,
from fornication on campus, from assault on campus,
from weapons and murder and all kinds
of threats that could happen in the public school institution.
And you say, why?
Why is it not as free anymore?
Why is there all these rules?
And why are there all these regulations?
It's because there's no truth there.
Because they rejected the truth.
Why is it that when I go to the airport,
unless I pay for a TSA pre-check, which I highly,
this message is brought to you in part by TSA pre-check.
OK, get TSA pre-check.
You have to get literally molested just
to get on an airplane.
And of course, they're just catching
terrorists left and right, aren't they?
Oh, wait, never are they.
Why?
Because America rejected the truth on 9-11.
I mean, if America had said, hey,
we want to investigate this.
We're going to demand every one of our politicians.
We're going to demand all of our state.
We're going to demand everybody look at this.
I mean, if online mediums like YouTube and everything
like that didn't censor the truth on that issue,
the TSA would never have turned into what it is.
And we'd have more liberty.
I mean, it used to be you could walk all the way up
to the gate at an airport and hug and kiss on your family
getting off the plane.
It used to be, in some cases, you
could walk onto the plane without a ticket
with your spouse or somebody like that, drop them off,
and they say, do you have a ticket?
You're like, no, you have to leave.
And then you walk back off the plane.
And I mean, the metal detectors were basically
just trying to stop you from walking
in with like a shotgun or something, OK?
It wasn't like all the rules.
I mean, you could take certain liquids and certain things.
Now it's just like so heavily regulated.
There's so much molestation.
You didn't used to have to show up at the airport
like 5,000 hours in advance to look at the line
to where you have like 10 disgruntled people that don't
even like they hate their job, put you through the meat
factory and grind you.
And when they have to search you or whatever, it's intense.
I was flying to do some filming for our documentary.
And Ben was with me.
And he didn't have TSA pre-check.
And so I'm like 30 minutes just sitting here
watching everybody else come through the line.
And I mean, it's just like old lady.
Like old lady is just like this.
And I mean, they're just molesting this lady up and down
trying to find some contraband or something.
I don't know what they're trying to find on this old lady.
Little girls, just everybody.
And I mean, there would be chicks that are virtually
wearing nothing.
Because apparently it's cool to dress naked anymore.
And I'm thinking like, what are they hiding?
I mean, there isn't anything hiding with this person.
Yep, but they have to molest them, you know,
to basically get on a plane.
And you know what, that's not liberty.
That's not freedom.
Why?
Because we reject the truth.
Oh, because we're so afraid that Osama bin Laden's cousin
is really going to come here with a box cutter
and hijack a commercial airline by a couple box cutters.
And then they're going to fly that plane
into the top of a building.
And it's going to crumble all the way down
to the seventh floor in its own footprint.
And all the gold just disappeared.
But the passport made it, OK?
We found the passport, folks.
We just didn't find any of the plane.
We didn't find any of the passengers.
I mean, you couldn't find the black box
that's supposed to be virtually indestructible.
But we found the paper passport.
We found a bandana.
You know the red?
I'm not joking.
This is the state of our country where people,
and look, even intelligent people, I've had them,
they're like, oh no, jet fuel went down the elevator shaft
and it melted it.
It's like, wow.
Just the rejection of truth is just
going to give you no liberty in this country.
Oh, well, I mean, so many people in our country
just gave lip service the most free and fair election ever.
What is that bringing us?
Yeah, a lot of liberty these days, huh?
Inflation.
You have the liberty to pay just astronomical prices on gas.
And a lot of these industries are monopolies.
And you have no choice.
I mean, if you want to do anything on social media,
a lot of liberty there, right?
You have like five options and they all have the same policy.
News, you just have like five options
and it's all the same story, given
by five different people with a little bit different branding
to give you the facade of choice.
I mean, the freedoms in our country are eviscerated.
They're evaporating quickly because of one thing, truth.
They're rejecting truth.
And the more you reject the truth,
the more you're going to have servitude.
The more you're going to have slavery
to the lies and the deception in this world.
Now, think about the context here.
John chapter number 8, Jesus Christ is talking to the Jews.
He's telling them, if you believe in me
and then you follow my commandments,
you're going to have liberty.
You're going to have freedom.
Now, how do they respond to arguably one of the greatest
verses in the Bible?
Verse 33, they answered him, we be Abraham's seed
and we're never in bondage to any man.
I'll say as thou ye shall be made free.
Now, this is what's funny to me, because every time I've always
thought about this verse, I always think about Pharaoh.
I always think about Egypt, 400 years in bondage.
We've never, never been in bondage to anyone.
And think about their timeline.
They're going back to Abraham.
Abraham was way before Moses.
So even if they were trying to say in our lifetime,
never in our lifetime or something like that,
but they brought up Abraham, which is like way back
in history, they're going to say,
I mean, that's rejecting the whole Bible,
if you think about it.
But how about this?
It's rejecting modern reality, because who's
in control of the Jews as they utter these words?
The Romans.
They're literally under Roman rule saying,
we're not in bondage to anyone.
It's like, what are you talking about?
This is like a leftist talking point today,
where they say stuff like, men can get pregnant,
or free and fair election.
Joe Biden is the most popular president ever.
Well, that's funny, because I've never seen anybody have
a pro-Biden shirt, hat, bandana, bumper sticker, anything
anywhere.
You would think 80 million people, one of them
would be like, I like Biden.
I don't know if the graves have stickers on them
or something somewhere.
The only stickers I see is the like, I did that one.
You go to the gas pump, and it's like, I did that, or whatever.
That's like the only Biden.
Or the like, let's go, Brandon.
But I don't think that's a positive message.
Reference earlier sermons if you want to know what that means.
But I'm telling you that when it comes to liberty and freedom,
it's coupled with truth.
And that truth is in the fact that God's law, God's word,
those boundaries give you real liberty.
They give you real freedom.
When you reject this, you become a servant
of the highest bidder.
You become a servant of the strongest force.
Who's the strongest force in the world at this time?
The Romans.
Therefore, they are subjugated to the Romans.
Now, let's read a few more verses here.
He says, oh, we've never been bondage to anybody.
Verse 34, Jesus answered them, verily, verily,
I stand you, whosoever committed sin is the servant of sin.
And the servant abideth not in the house forever,
but the son abideth forever.
If the son, therefore, shall make you free,
you shall be free indeed.
So he says, oh, OK.
Even if you're not in bondage to a man, which of course
they are, if you reject my word, you are in servitude to sin.
Because you think like, oh, well, the Bible
is so restrictive, it says I shouldn't drink alcohol.
But I want to have the liberty to drink alcohol.
But then those that start drinking alcohol
become drunkards and become alcoholics,
and they couldn't quit drinking if they wanted to.
Oh, I'm not in bondage to anybody.
Well, how about Jack Daniels?
How about Captain Morgan?
And you won't even want to drink it,
and you'll just find yourself at the store.
You'll be spending way too much money.
I mean, it's taxed so high.
Alcohol is so expensive.
I mean, you go to a restaurant, and you
order an alcoholic beverage.
I mean, these things are $7, $8, $9, $10, $11, $12 a pop.
And for some reason, you can drink alcohol way more
than water.
So people have like four, five, six drinks.
You go to the baseball game, and a hot dog's $10.
I don't even know what an alcoholic beverage is.
I mean, I don't even know, it's like $10 or $8
or something like that for a beer.
Or if you get a tequila or something like that,
I mean, we're talking about skyrocketing prices.
You drink liquor and go to a liquor store, tons of money.
The only people that like liquor stores are the owner,
because they rake it in.
Talk about a high profit margin selling sin.
But let me tell you something.
These people that think they have so much liberty, oh, I
want to go drink.
I want to commit fornication.
I want to do drugs.
You're going to find out real quick that sin is not
the master you wanted.
That sin will make you do things that you didn't want to do,
that you didn't want to have to deal with.
Consequences.
You know, you're going to have to serve someone.
If you think that you're going to be your own boss, wrong.
Even if you own your own business,
you're subjugated to the customer.
Even if you say, well, I'm the husband,
I get to tell my wife what to do.
Well, you got to go to work and provide for her,
and guess who's going to tell you what to do?
The boss.
You know, everyone in this world has someone over them,
has some kind of a leader.
And at the end of the day, if you want real liberty
and real freedom, it's going to come
through serving God's word.
Go to Romans 6.
Go to Romans, chapter number 6.
So when it comes to the law of liberty,
we have to realize that God's law is what gives us liberty.
God's law gives us freedom.
And when we decide as a society to reject God's laws,
we will no longer have liberty and freedom.
You know, it used to be that you could just show up at church
and preach the Bible and go home unmolested, unharassed.
But you know what happened?
The United States of America decided to reject God's laws,
get rid of God's laws, and allow dangerous predators
and God-hating Satanists to roam the streets
and to now no matter where you go,
those predators are in existence.
And they don't just terrorize us, my friend.
They terrorize everyone.
Why do you think it is
that so many businesses put a sodomite flag
up on their business?
Because they don't want these people to go and harass them.
They are subjugated by these bullies, by the gay mafia,
as it were, and this gay mafia is going
around bullying everyone in our society.
And no one likes it.
No one wants to deal with it.
Everyone hates it.
You know, when the government has the force you to like people,
it's because no one likes them.
I mean, if they were just so likable
and everyone thought it was so normal,
then why would they have
to have a giant propaganda machine telling you that?
You don't have to convince people things that are true.
I don't have to convince people that water is good for you.
You know, when was the last like advocate,
like you should drink water.
Have you ever considered water?
It's like the number one best-selling product.
I mean, you just go to the store,
and it's just water bottles are everywhere.
Almost every store has water bottles.
Walmart, the gas station,
everybody's just selling water like crazy.
I've never even seen, I mean, except for the fancy water, okay?
But I'm just saying in general,
I'm not seeing like drink water.
You know, it's like we figured that one out.
You barely even have to advertise things like an iPhone.
People are beaten down the door just to get the next iPhone 55
or whatever version it is on, you know, this week.
I mean products that are good sell themselves.
You don't have to have this fancy,
you know, if it has to be something where they say,
look, we're going to bring you all the way out of town.
We're going to pay your flights
and we're going to tell you about how wonderful this timeshare is.
And we're going to give you all these brochures
and we're going to show you all these charts
and we're going to put a lot of pressure on you
and it's a one-time sale that's only going to happen now.
This is a, this is all the warning signs that this is a trap.
This is not a product that you want.
A product that is good, that makes sense, sells itself.
Products that make no sense,
you have to have a slick salesman,
you have to have that car salesman to come around
and basically polish the dirty junker
and try to tell you that it's better than it really is.
And people that are like that, existing in our society,
our government is trying to put lipstick on the pig out there
and try to sell us a bill of goods that's like,
hey, these child molesting predators are wonderful.
Let's celebrate them.
I mean, a dude who will literally chop off his nuts
and put on a dress,
we should celebrate that for an entire month.
Oh, and in fact, we should put him
as one of the principal health advisors for America,
as an example of how to be, you know, healthy,
an example, a beacon of health,
not like someone who's physically fit,
not someone who's living a healthy lifestyle.
I mean, these people live a death style.
They're the ones getting AIDS and monkey pox and HIV
and every other, you know, four-letter acronym.
That's an STD.
HIV, AIDS, just everything under the sun,
gonorrhea, chlamydia, you name it, they have it.
They like COVID vaccines.
They like everything that's unhealthy.
I mean, anything that's unhealthy,
but of course they like organic food.
It's like the one thing.
It's like, I don't get it.
It's like they think they're going to expand their lives
by getting this organic food or whatever.
It's like, sorry, buddy, you're in trouble.
And they are a slave to sin,
but because they exist in our society,
because we rejected the laws of God,
we let them just ruin our lives.
And we have to deal with the consequences
of living in a society that rejects the law of God,
the law that gives you liberty to walk up
and down the streets unmolested,
the law that in the 1950s,
children could go and roam the streets
without their parent helicoptering over them,
and they still thought they were safe.
I mean, even when I was a child,
I would just go blocks away from my house.
My parents didn't know why I was riding my bike,
riding, going, running around, hanging out with kids.
No problem. It's safe.
My parents wouldn't lock their doors.
I grew up never locking doors on anything virtually.
I didn't lock the doors on my car.
I didn't lock the doors on my house.
It just seemed safe.
And you say, what happened to all that safety?
We kept getting away from God's law,
which brings in danger,
which just ruins your life,
and not just as a society, it ruins your personal life.
Look at Romans chapter number six, look at verse 12.
Let not sin, therefore, reign in your mortal body,
that you should obey it in the lust thereof.
Now, let me tell you something about the word reign.
Reigning is what kings do.
You know who's the king in many people's life?
Sin.
Sin is the king of their life.
Sin is telling them what to do.
They're doing things they don't want to do
because sin is telling them what to do,
and saying you're obeying it.
Saying, hey, you're going to lie because I told you to lie.
You're going to drink because I told you to drink.
You're going to do drugs because I told you to do drugs.
You're going to commit fornication or adultery
or all kinds of evil things.
It's like you're not even in the driver's seat.
It's driving you where you want to go.
This is a dangerous lifestyle.
Look at verse 13.
Neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness
unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God
as those that are alive from the dead,
and your members are instruments of righteousness unto God.
For sin shall not have dominion over you.
For you're not under the law, but under grace.
What then shall we sin because we are not under the law,
but under grace?
God forbid, know ye not, that to whom you yield yourselves
servants to obey?
His servants ye are, to whom ye obey, whether of sin unto death
or of obedience unto righteousness.
But God bethank that ye were the servants of sin,
that ye have you obeyed from the heart
that form of doctrine which was delivered you,
being then made free from sin, ye
became the servants of righteousness.
Now, I like this phrase because people
will take a quote out of what I just read for you
and then use it in the exact opposite meaning that it has.
They'll say, well, I'm not under the law, I'm under grace.
Who's ever heard that phrase?
And it's like you bring something up in the Bible
and they say, well, I'm not under the law, I'm under grace.
But wait a minute.
Didn't it say in verse 18, being then made free from sin,
ye became the servants of righteousness?
It didn't say I became just completely free.
It says, now I'm a servant of righteousness.
Instead of serving sin, I serve righteousness.
Now, what does it mean to be under the law?
To be under the law means I have to deal
with every consequence that results
from me breaking the law of God.
Now, what's the biggest consequence?
Death and hell.
But I'm not under that, meaning no matter what sin I commit,
I could never go to hell.
It is impossible.
I'm not under the law, I'm under grace.
And not just from hell, but I'm also
under grace in the context of the fact that when I sin,
I don't take a lamb or an ox and go and offer that on the altar
to try and make sure that God doesn't kill me tomorrow.
Because I'm not under the law, I'm under grace.
So when I sin, you know what I do?
I get on my knees and I pray to Jesus Christ,
and I say, Lord, will you please forgive me?
And then by His grace, I don't die tomorrow.
By God's grace, He doesn't punish me the way I deserve.
Because if we got punished the way we deserve, many of us
wouldn't be sitting here.
Many of us would already be in heaven,
because God's law is really harsh.
The law, we're very sinful.
So when we say that we're not under the law,
we're not saying we don't follow the law.
We're saying we don't get the consequences of the law.
Because what would be the opposite of getting
the consequence of the law?
The grace.
What is grace?
Not what I deserve.
What is law?
Getting what I deserve.
So this is a better way to word this
to help our modern liberals to understand it.
I'm not under the consequences of sin.
I'm under the grace.
So I'm not going to get judged by the law in the sense
that I'm not going to have to necessarily suffer
all the consequences, because I have God's grace.
Whereas without God's grace, what do you get?
You're under the law.
You're going to get judged by that law.
You're going to be judged by the perfect law of liberty
that we talked about in James chapter number two.
So don't let these liberals, don't
like this liberal philosophy kind of creep into your mind
and thinking like, well, because I'm saved by faith
and I'm under grace, I can just do whatever
I want with no consequences.
That's not true.
And when you decide to not seek God's grace, you will get that.
And you'll become a servant of sin.
And he's trying to tell you, stop being the servant of sin.
Start being the servant of righteousness.
Meaning start following God's laws, and you know what?
You won't have to do whatever sin tells you to do.
You'll wake up in the morning and say,
you know what I want to do today?
I want to serve God.
Whereas when you commit sin, sometimes the opportunity
to serve God is stripped away from you.
First Corinthians chapter number five
is a chapter on church discipline.
If you are a drunkard, you are not welcome to come to church.
And there are some people, I know them.
They are an alcoholic.
And because of their alcoholism, they don't come to church.
And they don't want to drink.
They want to give it up.
They want to let it go.
But you know what?
They're a servant of the bottle.
They're a servant of Jack.
And they're a servant of Captain Morgan.
And they're a servant of all these beverages.
And so they're not waking up in the morning saying,
I want to have the liberty to go to church and serve God.
They're going to serve their belly.
They're going to serve alcohol and do things they don't want
and puke their guts out and destroy their marriage
and destroy their life and not have a job
and basically ruin everything.
Oh, because they're so free.
It's a joke.
It's a lie from the devil.
Whereas those that aren't a slave to the bottle,
they wake up in the morning sober,
not with a splitting headache.
They wake up in the morning with their clothes on.
They wake up in the morning not next to a stranger.
They wake up in the morning next to their wife.
They wake up in the morning next to their spouse.
They wake up in the morning without holes in the wall.
They wake up in the morning without alcohol
spilled everywhere.
They wake up in the morning and say, I get to do whatever I want.
You can tell someone that's an alcoholic just by their house.
You go to their house and there's beer bottles and glass
and all this stuff shattered everywhere.
Everything just looks run down.
It looks disgusting.
You walk in, it smells like a bar.
It smells like animals just came in and used the bathroom
everywhere in their household.
They don't want to live like that.
But you know what, they're just a slave to it.
They're a slave to the sins of this world.
Now, I want you to go to Judges chapter 2.
And I have a lot more that I could cover,
but I think the point has been made.
If you want true liberty, if you want true freedom,
it comes from the law of God.
Now, I'll give you a couple other examples of this
just so you can understand from a personal level.
You know, when you put boundaries in your life,
it gives you freedom.
If you have a house and you have a fenced backyard,
you have a nice gated fence in the backyard, a big area,
you can let your children run around
in the backyard with complete liberty and freedom.
And you don't have to worry about them running away.
You don't have to worry about intruders.
You don't have to worry about wild beasts.
You don't have to worry about this.
You can literally just let them run around.
Whereas if you had no fence, you couldn't just
let your little kids go and play in the backyard
without supervision because you'd have to literally worry
about a stray animal.
You'd have to worry about just a person coming.
You'd have to worry about them running away.
You could be worried about the elements, right?
If you have a fenced yard, you can take out
all the dangerous elements that exist in that yard.
So you kind of have to make a padded cell or whatever.
But you can basically make it to where they can hang out.
Because if it's just the wild, you
could have all kinds of sharp rocks and dangerous trees
and holes and all kinds of elements
that would be a hazard and a danger to your children.
So it's like, oh, there's a fenced backyard.
It's so restrictive.
I've never heard that argument.
I've never heard someone say, man, my backyard's awful.
It has this really big fence that no one
can get in and out of unless they go through the gate.
It's so restrictive, man.
No, no, no, it's great.
Everyone loves that.
Why?
Because it gives you all this freedom within that fence line,
doesn't it?
And the same exists with God's law.
God basically sets the parameters.
He sets the fence to how our lives and society should exist.
And then we just get to have all this fun inside.
Kind of like of all the trees of the garden,
how many of us freely eat?
There's one in the midst of the garden.
You know what Adam should have done
is he should have built a giant wall around that tree.
Should have chopped down some of the other ones.
Should have been like George Washington
chopped down the cherry tree.
No one wants to eat cherries.
And then they just basically build up a wall around that.
I'm offending someone, OK?
Cherry pie, whatever.
Apple's better, OK?
But even if it was the apple tree
that you weren't supposed to eat from, build a wall around it.
So that you can't get there.
And then they would have had all this freedom
in the Garden of Eden.
But by rejecting the Lord's commandment,
taking of the forbidden fruit, eating
what they shouldn't have eaten, now they're kicked out.
Now he has to work harder than he ever had before.
Now he's a slave to sin.
Now his children are going to be tainted with sin, OK?
Even in marriage.
Having certain boundaries in marriage,
like being faithful to your spouse.
Oh, there's all this restriction in marriage.
I'm just with one person.
That's so restrictive.
OK, so then just sleep around, and then what's going to happen
is your spouse is going to divorce you.
And then you're going to have something called alimony.
And let me tell you something, it's not free.
It's not freedom.
You're going to have child support.
In fact, the government, without asking you,
will just come and just take the money out of your bank account.
That's not liberty.
That's not freedom.
Oh, well, you know, I have all this liberty.
How about the liberty to see your children
whenever you want when you're in a monogamous relationship?
When I want, I can go home and see my kids whenever I want,
wherever I want, take them wherever I want,
teach them whatever I want, take them to church whenever I want.
There are families, there are individuals that cannot bring
their children to church.
In Canada, there was a man whose wife
wanted to get a transgender surgery or hormones
or something to their daughter, to their child,
and the dad was refusing it.
The dad was imprisoned for trying to stop it.
Talk about liberty.
Talk about freedom.
Well, here's something, don't marry a reprobate.
Oh, I don't care about God's law.
She's pretty.
Well, tell Samson that.
She's pretty.
Yeah, Delilah was real pretty, wasn't she?
Well, I have all this freedom.
I can marry whatever lady I want.
I could marry Amber Heard.
Don't ever do that.
The worst woman to probably marry ever.
Well, she's pretty.
OK, but you know what?
There's a lot more than looks when it comes to marriage.
It might be one of the important things,
but it's not the most important.
And it's certainly not the only thing you should consider.
And when you just say, well, I don't care that God says
I should marry a Christian.
I want to marry this Buddhist.
I want to marry this Muslim.
I want to marry this Catholic, because she's pretty.
Well, guess what, you might become a servant of sin
and be in drug places you didn't want to go,
your children drug places you didn't want to go.
You know, when you work hard, you end up getting money,
and then you have the freedom to go wherever you want.
Buy whatever you want.
All the principles of God give you freedom and liberty.
Rejecting God's law always makes you a servant.
It makes your life hard.
Now, I had you turn to Judges, chapter number two.
This is a consistent theme in your Bible.
Judges, chapter number two, look at verse 12.
And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers,
which brought them out of the land of Egypt,
and followed other gods of the gods of the people
that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them,
and provoked the Lord to anger.
And they forsook the Lord and served Baal and Asherah.
And the anti-Lord was hot against Israel
and delivered them the hands of spoilers that spoiled them.
And he sold them into the hands of their enemies roundabout,
so they could not any longer stand before their enemies.
Now, did that sound like liberty and freedom?
Why was it that they lost liberty and freedom?
Because they would not follow God's law.
Notice what it says in verse 12, and they forsook the Lord God.
Verse 13, and they forsook the Lord.
But notice, it says, and they served Baal.
And then they just served no one.
Then they were free.
Because when you forsake God, you end up serving someone else.
You end up worshipping someone else.
And a lot of businesses today, because they
don't want to worship God, you don't have to worship Baal.
How do they worship Baal?
Well, instead of having Christianity in their business,
you know what they have?
A Sodomite flag.
And they're literally having to worship Baal,
whether they like it or not.
They literally have to serve Baal,
and they have to serve the prophets of Baal,
and they have to serve all these sons of Belial,
and they have to serve Satan, and they
have to serve Satanism.
And they can't even tell them no,
and they just succumb to the devil.
And they even eat their own.
I saw this article, and it was just funny.
But it was like this Sodomite couple started a coffee shop
or something.
And I can't remember where this was,
but I was reading the article.
They only hired other Sodomites, right?
Well, the Sodomites' employees decided to stage a revolt.
And they wrote a demand.
They all quit.
They were on a strike together.
And they wrote a demand letter to the business owner.
And they say, you guys aren't woke enough for us,
because y'all are guilty of gentrification.
They just make up words, whatever.
Essentially saying that they favor
the more higher income neighborhoods and individuals
over the lower income.
Well, yeah, they're a business.
I'm pretty sure every business is
trying to get the rich people to come in and spend
their money in their business.
They're also a racist.
So they said, because of this, you guys
need to dissolve the company and distribute
all of the proceeds to us.
So all the employees are striking in his business,
saying shut it down, sell all the goods,
and give us all the money.
Well, then the business owners make an apology video.
And they say, you guys are right.
We're guilty of gentrification.
We want to make it up to you guys or whatever.
And then the owner of the business where the business is
located, like the landlord or whatever,
just because of all this drama, I guess their lease was up.
And they just leased to some other person
and just were kicking them out.
So then the whole business just collapsed
and just was eviscerated.
And nobody got anything.
Liberty, all this freedom.
But they're having to serve bail.
They worship bail.
And bail has unrealistic demands.
Bail is insatiable.
Bail wants the blood of every innocent child.
Bail wants the blood of every single person.
Bail will not stop until everyone is a sodomite
and everyone is commit mass suicide.
That's when bail stops.
It's like hell, which is never satisfied.
Bail is never satisfied.
And you know what I love about the Lord?
You know what?
He is satisfied with us at times.
We don't have to just go on this trip.
I mean, think about salvation.
It's already been satisfied.
There isn't an insatiable bloodlust of the Lord.
He took the once for all offering
of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And his wrath has been satisfied by the blood of Jesus Christ.
And we have peace with God.
We have the grace of God.
We don't worship this God that says, well,
just keep serving me every single day.
And it's never enough.
In fact, blow yourself up.
Kill as many infidels.
Just all this demand, and maybe I'll let you into heaven.
Maybe I'll give you 72 virgins.
But we're capping it at 72, OK?
Who comes up with these numbers?
I wonder if like Muhammad was sitting there and he's like,
you guys get 12 virgins.
And no one's like wanting to go and like bomb themselves,
like blow themselves up.
Actually, it's 36.
It's like, no one?
50.
Some guy in the back is like, can you do any better?
72.
All right, now we're in.
It's like, where did they come up with these numbers?
And were these even real people?
Or are these just special people in heaven waiting for you?
This is the bizarre religion, my friend.
And that's Islam is not a religion of liberty and peace.
Go to any Islamic state.
The women certainly don't have any liberty.
The women don't have any kind of freedom.
Oh, the fundamentalist Baptist women, they're just so pressed.
And they're just so tied down.
You know, man, I can't believe Pastor Shelley,
he doesn't make his wife work at all.
She doesn't ever have to provide $1 again in her life.
The horror.
She never has to have a job again.
She can have as many children as she wants, and I pay for it.
That's so terrible.
And as the children multiply, we have
to get a bigger van than I have to pay for.
The horror for her.
She gets to wake up whenever she wants.
She goes to bed whenever she wants.
You know what meals I make her make?
Whatever she wants.
The horror!
You know what clothes I make her wear?
Whatever she wants.
You know, I never forced her to wear anything.
I might have told her what I believe, but I never forced.
She gets to do whatever she wants virtually.
I mean, there's so much liberty.
Now here's the thing.
If she starts violating the law of God,
if she starts violating the law of the household,
then it might become pretty restrictive.
Then, you know, more things might happen.
And she might become a servant of sin.
But let me tell you something.
Fundamental Baptist women have it great.
Don't let the world lie to you.
Look what other religion is giving women freedom.
Oh, feminism is getting freedom.
Oh, freedom to compete against men in athletics.
The freedom to murder a child and feel the consequences
and shame of that for their entire life.
The freedom to cut off parts of their body that work the best.
The freedom to not have children.
I mean, you know why women aren't having children?
Because they can't pay for them.
That's like one of the number one reasons
why people get on birth control or kill their children.
They're like, well, how am I going to pay for it?
Like at college or, you know, I can't then have a job.
You know, why are all these single mothers
doing these type of things?
Because they don't have a job.
They don't have a man to provide for them.
They're not actually getting any of the liberty.
Feminism gives you no liberty.
It gives you no freedom.
Oh, I guess now you have the freedom
to be drafted into the military.
What a great privilege that is.
You know, it's silly what the world offers you in return.
You know, you feel like, oh, God's so restrictive
and he's holding me back.
He's giving you the most liberty and freedom
you could possibly have.
And yeah, there is boundaries.
You know what, it's the law of liberty.
Because the maximum amount of liberty
is with the maximum amount of God's law
in every area of your life.
Now, this is what I want to close on.
Go to Romans chapter number four.
I had some other things I thought about talking,
but I want to give you a little bit of hope this evening.
And here's the hope.
Because we live in America and we're
seeing a lot of freedoms being deteriorated.
But at the same time, we've seen a few things kind of go
our way, right?
Constitutional carry in the state of Texas is a great move.
We've seen in the state of Texas some positive legislation
in other areas.
We've seen abortion obviously overturned
at a national level as far as states get to regulate that.
And I think the state of Texas has pretty much banned abortion
of virtually every kind.
Now, I don't know that there's really
a harsh criminal penalty.
I don't really know all the ramifications.
I don't think anyone knows.
No one really knows exactly what's going on.
Some judges are still fighting it.
There's a battle between our attorney general, Ken Paxton.
And there's all kinds of things.
It's ever evolving, right?
But sometimes it's going the right direction.
Sometimes you don't know.
One of our Supreme Court justices
had talked about other rulings, like Lawrence versus Texas
and Overfall, that need to be challenged
and that they're not constitutionally protected.
And I keep thinking, I keep scratching my head.
I'm thinking like, these people aren't even saved.
Why do they care so much, or why are they
doing the right thing?
But then I realized, in the Bible,
there is tons of times where unsaved,
wicked rulers make good decisions for God's people.
So you can't think like, oh, well,
we have to get a fundamental Baptist in the White House
for God to give us freedom and liberty.
No.
We can get freedom and liberty if we just do the right thing,
if we humble ourselves.
There's a famous portion of scripture in 2 Chronicles
chapter number 7, which is like, if my people, which
are called by my name, shall humble themselves
and shall seek my face, then he's
going to heal our land, right?
That famous portion of scripture is talking about you and me.
It's not talking about Donald Trump.
He's not God's people.
Ron DeSantis, he's a Catholic, my friend.
It's not talking about anybody on the Supreme Court,
because they're all Catholics and Jews.
It's not talking about virtually anyone in our politics,
because I doubt very many of them are even saved.
I hope some of them are.
I don't know.
But let me give you a little hint.
Nebuchadnezzar wasn't saved.
And yet, he declared in all the world,
he was going to restrict Christianity so far,
you had to worship a false god.
And in the next breath, he's making a declaration
that you're not allowed to say anything amiss of the god
of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
That was a quick turnaround.
Daniel chapter number four, he's sending out a message
to everyone in the whole world like, hey,
this is the real Lord.
This is the real God that's setting up whomever he will.
And I've even seen people like Donald Trump
and these others giving lip service
to the Lord Jesus Christ.
And you know what, I'll take the lip service.
Because as long as they give us freedom in this country,
who cares about the other kind of stuff?
I want to just keep reaching people
that are interested in the gospel.
I want to keep having church.
I want to keep serving the Lord.
And you know what, that comes with us doing the right thing.
God can make these people do whatever he wants.
The heart of the King is in the Lord's hand.
He turneth whithersoever he will.
And our American country could get more freedom
if we will serve God, if we will abide by the law of God,
if we will humble ourselves and say, you know what?
Yeah, I know that some of these things that we do seem outdated.
And it might be a little bit unpopular.
But I'm just going to humble myself.
And I'm going to serve God the way he wants to be served.
And I'm going to let him bless us.
Hey, I'm going to go to church three times a week.
Hey, I'm going to dress like a godly Christian in America.
Hey, I'm not going to drink alcohol.
Hey, I'm going to actually exercise
all of the commandments of my life.
I'm going to knock on doors.
I'm going to go to Steadfast Baptist Church.
I'm willing to serve the Lord.
And when there's a group of people that say,
hey, we want to serve God here, God
can open up all kinds of seas, all kinds of holes,
and say, you know what?
We're just going to let these people worship me.
I mean, do you think it was easy for the children of Israel
to walk out of Egypt?
No.
But God changed the heart of Pharaoh.
And let me tell you something about Pharaoh.
He was reprobate.
A reprobate let the children of Israel go.
Eventually, now he chased after them and then was destroyed.
But then he ran them into the Red Sea.
Even the Red Sea couldn't stop the children of Israel.
They walked right through it.
Even the wilderness couldn't destroy them.
Hey, they walk into the Canaanites,
the land of the Canaanites.
They destroyed them all.
Why?
Because when you want to serve God, God opens a way for you.
He opens a door for you.
The problem with America is not our laws.
It's not our politicians.
It's us Christians saying, we want to serve God,
and doing the right thing, and saying,
we want the law of liberty.
We're going to impose these laws on our life
so that we can have liberty.
Let me tell you something, children.
If you feel like your parents are restrictive,
go ahead and just implement all the laws of God.
Start following the Bible exactly right,
and you'll start realizing, I never get punished.
You'll start realizing the liberty of mom and dad.
Whereas when you're breaking their commandments,
you start realizing the wrath of mom and dad.
You want the ice cream after dinner?
Eat your dinner.
You want the discipline?
Don't eat your dinner.
You want mom and dad to be pleased with you
and read you a bedtime story?
Clean your room.
If you don't, then you're going to get the punishment,
and you're going to have to clean your room anyways.
So you might as well have done it the first time.
I mean, go ahead and just put all of God's laws on yourself.
Start regulating yourself so that God
doesn't have to force you.
God isn't going to make you follow His commandments.
He's not going to throw you in jail so that you sober up.
Just sober up so that you don't get thrown in jail.
Now, Romans chapter 4, look at verse 14.
The Bible says this, for if they, which are of the law
be heirs, faith is made void and the promise made in effect,
because the law worketh wrath.
For where no law is, there is no transgression.
Let me tell you something.
The only law that exists is the Bible.
And you've got to think, how are they going to pass good laws?
We have to constantly preach the Bible,
because the only law that exists is the word of God.
And it's the only thing that makes sense,
and it's the only thing that's true.
And if we appeal to truth, if we appeal to logic,
if we appeal to reason, you always
come to these conclusions.
Because it says where there is no law,
there is no transgression.
Meaning what?
There is no such thing as a transgression
outside of the Bible.
You can't sin if the Bible doesn't say it.
And I know people freak out about this.
But if the Bible doesn't have a commandment,
then you're not sinning.
If you're not breaking something in this book,
you're not sinning.
There is no such thing as law outside of the word of God
anywhere.
Now, of course, there's man-made rules,
like you have to wash your hands before dinner.
This is what the Pharisees tried to impose on people.
And they wrote Adam out about their law.
But guess what?
That's not a sin if you didn't do that.
Some people say four-letter words is a sin.
Sorry, that's not what the Bible says.
Don't impose your restriction.
I have the law of liberty.
I'm under grace, OK?
Go to Romans 2.
Let me prove you this.
You say, well, why do you believe in the death penalty,
Pastor Shelley?
Because the Bible says so.
Civil law makes no sense apart from the Bible
because there is no civil law outside of the Bible.
So it makes no sense to only partially believe it.
If you don't believe in the death penalty,
then here's my question.
Why do you believe in any law?
Why do you even believe it?
In your viewpoint, there should be no police, no government,
no anything.
Because who is going to decide what's right or wrong?
The only thing that's right or wrong
is what God's already decided for us.
Now, look at Romans chapter 2, verse 11.
For there is no respect of persons with God,
for as many as have sinned without law
shall also perish without law, and as many as have sinned
in the law shall be judged by the law.
For not the hearers of the law adjust before God,
but the doers of the law shall be justified.
For when the Gentiles which have not the law.
Let me read this for you again.
For when the Gentiles which have not the law.
Let me tell you something.
There is no law apart from God's word.
The only law that exists is the word of God.
There is only one set of rules, one set of boundaries
in our reality, in our universe, and it's God's law.
And they all come from God's mouth.
And he is the creator.
He is the ruler.
He is the referee.
He is the judge.
And the Gentiles, notice, which have not the law,
because there is no other law.
There's just the law of God.
That's it.
Now, some societies partially have God's law
and partially have man-made law and reject.
You know, America used to be founded on this book.
Used to just basically say, hey, here's the law of God.
We're going to just put it into our state laws.
And you know what?
It built the greatest country in the modern era,
a country full of freedom, full of liberty, full of truth.
Why?
Because that's how you get those things,
straight from God's word.
And the other nations, notice, they don't have any good laws.
I've never heard a good law outside of the Bible.
There isn't one.
And even if you don't have the law in your country,
even if you live in communist China,
you still have the law inside of you.
Look at what it says in verse 14.
For when the Gentiles, which have not the law,
do by nature the things contained in the law,
these having not the law are a law unto themselves,
which show the work of the law written in their hearts,
their conscience also bearing witness in their thoughts,
the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another.
Whether someone will admit it or not, all of God's commandments
are inside of them.
You just naturally know lying is wrong.
You just naturally know stealing is wrong.
You naturally know murder is wrong.
You naturally know that faggots are gross and disgusting
and a wicked sin.
You just know it.
No one has to convince you.
They have to spend billions trying to convince you
that it's normal.
I mean, and if it was any campaign,
it doesn't matter if they're trying to normalize rape,
if they're trying to normalize murder.
Oh, yeah, like abortion?
If they're trying to normalize any kind of sin,
we should resist that.
And inside of every person, I don't care if it's a drug
dealer.
A drug dealer knows that lying and stealing is wrong.
A drug dealer knows that murder is wrong.
In fact, if you're a child molester,
most every hardened criminal in the prison
wants to kill you still because they
think you're a gross, disgusting pervert and they hate it.
You don't have to convince.
Why?
Because there's only one law.
And let me tell you something.
Everything that is gross, everything that is wicked,
everything that we think is wrong is found in this book.
Show me a sin that's not in this book.
It's all in here.
We can find every kind of sin.
Why?
Because the Bible is the perfect law of liberty.
It has all of the judgments.
It has all the wisdom, all of the understanding.
It knows everything.
And if you like anything in this Bible, you got to like it all.
It's a package deal.
And this is what I'm telling you as far as hope is concerned.
I don't have to get every single one of our politicians
saved for us to start having better laws in this country.
I have to start serving God better.
If we start serving God better, he
can just change the minds of these people
and just give us more liberty and give us more freedom.
And I don't care if you're like, well,
I don't think that Trump would do that.
He's not safe.
Well, neither was Nebuchadnezzar.
Neither was King Ahasuerus.
He gave liberty to the Jews.
Nebuchadnezzar gave liberty to the Christian Jews,
whatever you want to call them back then.
We can have more liberty if we just do that,
which is right in America.
Revival is available to us in America.
It will serve God.
And you know what, I don't know when the end is.
I don't know when the end times are in.
But you know what, I'm going to fight for as long as I can.
I'm going to resist the devil.
I'm not going to say, hey, Lord, just please give us
the end times because I just want our whole nation to go
down the toilet.
You know what, I think we should get out there and preach hard
and believe the Bible and start serving God and let
God give us a Josiah nation.
Josiah was in a dark time.
But he turned a lot of people back to the Lord.
They had a lot of liberty in his lifetime.
And his kids just flushed it down the toilet.
Now, I'm going to try and raise my children
to not do that.
And I want you to raise your children not to do that.
But eventually, it will happen.
We know it will happen.
But why does it have to happen on our watch?
Why do we have to be the generation that God's
like, you guys were worthless, so I just ended it?
Rather than being like, man, you guys are so fired up,
if I gave you all a bunch of liberty and freedom,
you might just get a lot of people saved.
You don't think God is sitting there, he's like, let's go.
I mean, look, if we're going to think about end times Babylon,
when did it happen?
It didn't happen in Josiah's reign.
It happened in the next generation.
And there's just Jeremiah.
And no one wants to go to church.
No one wants to serve God.
Yeah, at that point, God's just like, all right, well,
if it's Jeremiah's church, OK, that's it.
That's why we need to drag people in.
And we need to get them now.
And we need to preach the truth.
And we need to be bright and shining light.
And you know what?
I believe that God can give us revival in this country.
God can give us better laws.
God can perform miracles.
God could do things that we couldn't even believe
were possible if we will humble ourselves and submit ourselves
to the law of liberty.
But if we as a church say, you know what, nuts to the law,
then God is just going to bring in the oppressors.
God is going to bring in, you know, you will serve Biden.
You'll serve Kamala.
You'll serve Xi Jinping.
And you don't even know what oppression is really like.
If you're in America, you have no idea
what's going on in foreign countries right now.
You have no idea what it's like to be oppressed at the levels
that we could be oppressed.
You know, we better fight back.
We are fighting for liberty.
You know, we don't fight a physical fight.
We fight a spiritual fight.
We're not going to call to arms.
We're not going to hurt anyone.
We're not calling for any violence.
What we're calling for is going out there and preaching
the gospel, preaching the truth, peacefully
handing you a sodomite deception, lovingly,
you know, sweet with gentleness and meekness.
Hey, here's a free movie that'll bring you truth and freedom
and liberty, because God's law is the law of liberty.
Let's close in prayer.
Thank you, Heavenly Father, so much for the word of God.
Thank you so much for our church.
Thank you for giving us an opportunity
to serve you in America in 2022.
Thank you that even though it may be dark out there,
and the whole world lies in darkness,
and our politicians may be evil and wicked,
we still have an opportunity to serve you.
And I pray that you would turn the hearts
of the people in this room to get a zeal for God,
to get an everlasting energy about them,
to realize that true freedom and liberty are
coming from the Bible, are coming
from God's word and his boundaries,
and that any time we get outside of that,
we're just going to bring sorrow and shame and slavery
into our lives.
We'll become servants of sin, and we're not supposed
to yield ourselves to that.
We're supposed to yield ourselves to righteousness.
I pray that we would serve you with joy,
that we'd realize the freedom and liberty
we get to serve the Lord Jesus Christ,
and we wouldn't just waste the opportunity given us.
We wouldn't take it for granted, but that we would humble
ourselves to serve you, and that you could perform
a great act in this nation.
I pray, Lord, that you would just bring revival
in this country, that you would just soften the hearts
of men in this country, that you'd wake them up to truth
in this country, that you would give us an opportunity
to share the gospel and to share the truth
with as many as possible, and that you could just help us
to destroy the wicked.
And in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
Amen, with that, let's go ahead and close it out
with one more song before we head home.
Here, take out your hymnal in front of your seat there.
We're gonna be in 397, little is much when God is in it.
397, 397, little is much when God is in it.
397, little is much when God is in it, all together.
In the harvest field not ripened,
there's a work for all to do.
Hark, the voice of God is calling
to the harvest calling you.
Little is much when God is in it,
labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown and you can win it
if you'll go in Jesus' name.
Does a place you're called to labor
seem so small and little known?
It is great if God is in it and he'll not forget his own.
Little is much when God is in it,
labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown and you can win it
if you'll go in Jesus' name.
Are you laid aside from service,
body worn for toil and care?
You can still be in the battle
in the sacred place of prayer.
Little is much when God is in it,
labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown and you can win it
if you'll go in Jesus' name.
When the conflict here is ended
and our race on earth is run,
he will say to all the faithful,
welcome home, my child well done.
Little is much when God is in it,
labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown and you can win it
if you'll go in Jesus' name.
Amen.
Thank you all for being here.
God bless.
You are dismissed.