Come on.
I'm gonna preach for you.
Jackson comes in.
Hello.
Yeah.
Oh, hey.
Hey.
Yeah.
What do you think?
Uh-huh.
I'm gonna get a really good one.
Well, here we go.
Here we go.
I'm gonna take a picture.
What are you doing?
I'm gonna take a picture.
yeah
all right everybody welcome to pure
words baptist church happy anniversary
we're gonna go ahead and start with song
number 412 onward Christian soldiers
song four hundred and well onward
christians told
oh
onward christian soldiers marching as
to war with the cross of Jesus going on
before
hey
on
foundation
onward christian
watching
oh
brothers
where the saints have drawn
oh
charity
onward christian soldiers
marching as to
with the cross of Jesus
going on before
onward
thank you people
join our happy throng
when with us your voices
in the triumph song
glory, laud and honor
unto Christ the king
is through countless ages
men and angels sing
onward christian soldiers
marching as to war
with the cross of Jesus
going on before
amen
amen next up is going to be 169
come thou found
song number 169
come thou found
come thou found of every blessing
to my heart to sing thy praise
strength of mercy never ceasing
call for songs of loudest praise
teach me some melodies on it
some quite framing times above
praise the mount I've fixed upon it
found of thy redeeming love
here I raise my Ebenezer
either by thy help I come
and I know by thy good pleasure
safely I'll arrive at home
God be when a stranger
wandering from the fold of God
he to rescue me from danger
interpose his precious blood
oh to grace how great a debtor
greatly I've got strength to be
let thy goodness like a fetter
be hard to be prone to wander
Lord I feel it prone to leave the
God I love here's my heart
oh take it seal it seal it for thy
course above
thank you again for coming to Purest Baptist Church if you didn't already get a
bulletin or you like another one brother James is gonna come by
and get you guys a bulletin and on the front we have
the psalm that we're working on memorizing as well
as we have on the inside service soul winning times I'm gonna get
did we already get the count from today or do we need to get that
23 for today alright praise God on that
and then if we had is there any soul winning from the past week that
needs to be reported was there anything that anybody had
alright that's great work on the soul winning
and it was really receptive out there today even in the heat
and so thanks so much to everybody who participated also
please be in prayer for expecting lady we also have upcoming event
the fire breathing Baptist fellowship in October if you'd like to participate
I believe brother Duncan said there is a sign up sheet over here on the cabinet if you
are planning on coming you can sign up just to give us an idea
and then also prayer request please be praying
for our church family we have church reminders there down below
and that's pretty much really all I have as far as announcements
are concerned we'll go ahead and sing our third song which is
psalm 16 in our special handouts
psalm 16
and we do have plenty of food left over so
please after the service take as much as you want and right after the service
don't forget we're doing our false Bible burning as well so stick around
for that and we're gonna have some s'mores with that as well so
but that we'll go ahead and turn to psalm 16 in your white
King James Bible psalm 16
psalm 16
As the offering plate is being passed
around please take out your Bibles to Ecclesiastes chapter number three
Ecclesiastes
chapter number three as our custom we'll read the entire
chapter before the sermon
Ecclesiastes chapter number three the Bible reads
to everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under the heaven
a time to be born and a time to die a time to plant
and a time to pluck up that which is planted a time to
kill and a time to heal a time to break down and a time to
build up a time to weep and a time to laugh
a time to mourn and a time to dance a time to cast away stones
and a time to gather stones together a time to embrace
and a time to refrain from embracing a time to get
and a time to lose a time to keep and a time to cast away
a time to rend and a time to sow a time to keep silence
and a time to speak a time to love and a time to
hate a time of war and a time of peace
what profit hath he that worketh and that wherein he laboureth
I have seen the travail which God hath given to the sons of men
to be exercised in it he hath made everything beautiful in his time
also he hath set the world in their heart so that no man can
find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end
I know that there is no good in them but for a man to rejoice
and to do good in his life and also that every man should eat and drink
and enjoy the good of all his labor it is the gift of God
I know that whatsoever God doeth it shall be forever
nothing can be put to it nor anything taken from it and
God doeth it that men should fear before him that which hath
been is now and that which is to be hath already been
and God requireth that which is past and moreover I saw
under the sun the place of judgment that wickedness was there
and the place of righteousness that iniquity was there I said in mine
heart God shall judge the righteous and the wicked for there
is a time there for every purpose and for every work
I said in mine heart concerning the estate of the sons of men
that God might manifest them and that they might
see that they themselves are beasts for that which befalleth
the sons of men befall the beast even one thing befalleth them
as the one dieth so dieth the other yea they have all one breath
so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast for all
is vanity all go unto one place all are of
the dust and all the dust again who knoweth the spirit
of man that goeth upward and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward
to the earth wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better
than that a man should rejoice in his own works for that is this
portion for who shall bring him to see what shall be after
him fire heads what a prayer dear lord we just pray you feel past
with your holy spirit as he preaches your word to us that we could all be edified
just help us to be open and receptive to your word we love you in
Jesus name amen.
Amen it's good to be here in an evening service when everybody shows up
it's funny how more people show up at the evening services at
Pure Words than other church because usually you have like a lot of people come Sunday morning
only that's where you get the Sunday morning only group but it's like
it's cool in a smaller church how sometimes the evening service beats out
the morning service even look at the record and it's like the Sunday night service
it's like smashed the other services it's just kind of funny
so but it's good to be here and this evening's sermons
a little bit different than other sermons that
I preach or kind of the style a little bit and I wanted to kind of
reflect on the last five years a little bit
of the church's history in kind of a unique way and
the title of my sermon this evening is just the seasons of life
now here in Ecclesiastes chapter three it seems
to really indicate how there's just all these different seasons I mean look at verse
one again to everything there is a season
and a time to every purpose under the heavens so the Bible's kind of just
giving an idea of the fact that throughout our lives
we're going to go through different quote seasons and
this word season often we think of it as
kind of the four seasons or a weather type thing where we talk about the
summer which in Houston's about ten months and then
you kind of have like a half month fall maybe like a three day winter
and then a couple weeks spring but all joking
aside obviously we realize that a lot of places kind of have
generally speaking four seasons where you have a
winter to the spring to the summer and you have a fall period of
time and they sometimes even change
a little bit right sometimes spring comes early sometimes spring comes
late sometimes winter is extended sometimes summer is extended
there's not always a perfect idea of how long these seasons are
depending on what part of the country you're from these seasons can be radically
different a lot different time periods if you go across
the world often they're having the opposite more of that equator
but if you go on the other side of the equator they're having kind of the
exact opposite season a lot of times that we're having so
when we talk about seasons what's interesting about this word is it's not
necessarily defining an exact period of time it's just saying that it's kind of
generally there was a beginning and end portion and you're in this
general season right you're in this general period of time
that can be categorized as a quote season now in this chapter
brings up some different seasons that people will go through
and this is not a complete list this is not saying
every season that exists because as we read in verse one to everything
there is a season meaning there's a lot more that we could even talk
about than what's specifically even mentioned in this particular chapter
but this chapter just gives us some ideas of some of the
things that happen verse two a time to be born
and time to die so we have two different
seasons very very different yet they
apply to every single person every single person here at a
season where you're born and you're going to have a season where you die there's just going to be
those two events in our lives are going to happen they're
inevitable and they're very unique experiences very
different from one another and in our lives we're going to have a lot of other
seasons in between that birth and that death stage
let's talk about just us as a person but even in our lives there can be
other areas where it kind of experiences a birth phase
and a death phase think about
you know even just someone that owns a business right someone could start a business there's a birth
phase and then the business gets shut down there was a death phase to that particular
business right so all kinds of life experiences
are going to go through these events of birth how about this
church specifically about five years ago it was in the
birth stage it had a beginning the
church came to fruition and it was in the season of quote
birth and that's really the kind of the first thing I want to talk about
there's kind of just five things I want to identify and it's based on
you know we've had church for about five years and I kind of want to
talk about some seasons that I feel like the church has gone through and will go through
and also relate them to us as an individual person but
this church had a birth stage it had a birth period and
it was great now what's interesting about the birth the first
services we had here was on a Friday it was in
August and it was hot and if you think it's hot in here now
it was way hotter in here than when we had that birth service and in fact
it was packed I can't remember for you know exactly
what the numbers were but I think it was like 119 or 120 people
that we had somewhere in that range it was well over 100 people
and everybody was just packed in here I was like standing in the back
we didn't even have anywhere we were out of seats you know what I mean and so we were just
filled in here I had two creatures it was a
double feature so we had two sermons and again it didn't get
any cooler I mean I think it was like 85 in here or something like that I don't know it was super hot
but we had Manly Perry came and preached for us and then Pastor Steven Anderson had preached
for us as well that evening and Old Path Baptist Church had brought
a bunch of people I think some other people had come to visit maybe
Pastor Major had had some people in his church and so we just had a packed house
tons of people here and it was funny because some people were already
thinking like oh man you know we need another building or you know
we're packing this place out and things like that and I'm like just wait till Wednesday you know
just wait till Wednesday now Sunday morning we I think we still
had like 90 people or so so we still had a good crowd on that first Sunday morning
but Wednesday it was like 18 or 20 I don't know
it was really small in comparison and you know after a
few weeks I mean the Wednesday crowd was pretty small I mean it was only like
15-20 people on a Wednesday night service and that's just kind of
to be expected you know when you start a church you're going to have a lot
of people just maybe come out the first you know one or two services
it's going to be a lot of people but then when church becomes real it's not just the exciting
birth floor anymore then it starts to see like who's really in the church
right and from that point we kind of had a little bit of growth
and really you can kind of relate this to just
persons as in general right we all went through a
birth phase as a person a lot of times at someone's birth
you have a lot of extended family and a lot of people come and they
check out the new baby and it's kind of exciting but then when you finally
go home it's like okay this thing cries all the time
and uses the diaper you know uses the bathroom on itself all the time and
the excitement kind of wears off a little bit right then it just becomes hard work
boy taking care of a newborn baby can be a lot of work a lot of
stress a lot of pressure especially the first one because the first baby you take
it home and you're like what do we do with it like you're just like I don't even know like it can't even
move it's scary it's so tiny the mom is
just worried about every breath that it takes you know it's just like
it's like okay it's breathing still you know it's just like it's really stressful
but you know eventually after you know four or five kids you're just like yeah it's fine
you know what I'm just kidding but of course these phases
of life they seem really dramatic sometimes they can
feel like forever you know maybe that newborn phase can feel like a long
time but then in hindsight you're like wow that went over so quickly
and that's just kind of how life is sometimes life slows down on you and it
feels like this is going to take forever but then you
realize you know what it wasn't that bad or I wish I had
enjoyed that experience more or I wish I had been there
when that particular experience had happened we had a lot
of people that were at our first services and you know
now they're no longer going to our church anymore and that's just the reality
but we have some people that were we have some people that were at the first services and they're still
here today so you know what praise God for that but
there's going to be a lot of experiences in your life that are going to have this birth
phase or this new phase and we should
recognize that it's not going to last forever though
whatever initial excitement or energy is not going to last I remember somebody
came to our first services and it was
Sunday morning and so we had a good service I mean like 80
something people and it seemed like there was a lot of energy people were excited
and someone talked to me right after the service and they said oh man I'm just so
excited about this church this is I'm just I'm going to come to
every service and every soul winning time and I'm just
so excited to be part of this church I didn't see him on Sunday night
and then guess what I never saw him again ever
and it was just kind of funny it's like he got kind of wrapped up in the
newness or the excitement of it all but then it was just like
I guess I don't know where he went you know I've never seen this person ever again so
you know it's not to shame the person it's just to say like
some people just get really excited about stuff when it's new but then as soon as the
newness wears off they're kind of just like hit the road they're not really
into it as much anymore what are some other phases of our lives that
sometimes have that newness well how about getting saved isn't that a new
phase in someone's life the moment they get born again they go to that birth
phase and sometimes you'll even notice Christians when they get saved
they have that initial high energy that excitement
that zeal of just like they got saved and now I want to serve God and it's
kind of fun but then that sometimes will wear off real fast won't it
then it's like oh I have to go to church and read the Bible
and serve him and it's not like it's cool it's not as cool
as they thought maybe at first and so then a lot of people kind of don't
last right they get saved and they're excited and it's not like
they're not saved anymore they're just you know realizing that
serving God's actually hard work and not very many people are interested
in the hard work of going to the next stages or the next
seasons of life and so some people what they do is they
chase this new birth
high and basically people just they can't
last in anything they just have to go to the new so
you'll notice there's a lot in relationships people will
that because when you first get into a relationship and
for some of us that are married and been married for a while maybe forgot about this but like when
you're first dating or maybe first engaged or you're newly
married sometimes your relationships not even work at all
it's just fun like you just you just enjoy each other it's just
exciting really everything that they do that's negative and bad you
somehow like it like I like the way you burp you know it's just like it's weird
but then after you get married for a while you're just like why'd you have to burp on it you know that was
gross you know it's like it's kind of your perspective and attitude
starts changing about everything it's like oh I love how sloppy they
are it's cool and then it's like whoa you know I don't like cleaning up after you anymore
right I mean all of the things that were easy
and fun and the new part of your relationship they change
and so what some people will do is they'll say well I like that feeling
I had with them at first apparently our love didn't last
so then they go chase a new relationship not realizing it's just a completely
different season of life no one no one is gonna
go through this birth phase forever and no relationship
will go will have the birth phase over and over you have it just that one time
you just have that one honeymoon phase you just have that one
beginning stage and look there's nothing wrong with it being more exciting
or high energy or a lot of fun but it's just not realistic
to live your life just chasing that new high every single time
that's why people that get divorced end up getting divorced more likely the next time
isn't that crazy it's like people that get divorced are
so much more likely to get divorced again and then again and again and again
and again you're just like you'd think you'd figure it out by now but it's really it's
a character flaw that they have where they just keep chasing that high that new
high of everything and we want to realize that sometimes
we're in a season of life that's not new
and that's okay you know we need to make sure that we're not afraid of doing something
new but at the same time we're satisfied with hey
I've already done the new thing and now I'm just that season's over like I'm not gonna do
that anymore I'm doing completely different seasons you children
you young adults in here you're gonna go through a lot of new seasons
in your life you're gonna have a season where you move out of your parents house
it will happen eventually okay and then
you might get married okay that's a new season of life
when you first start having children that's a new season of life some people do
all three of these the same time right they end up moving out getting married and having
children in a period of like less than a year and it's just like a bam
of new okay but no matter what
you have to realize that while it might be exciting or fun
or intimidating or whatever it just it only happens
you know for a short period of time and that's just not life in general that's just one
season of life and you have to get through that season
with the right expectations enjoy it while you have it
but realize that is not what's gonna life it's not realistic
to live in this new phase of life or entire life you know you're gonna have
days in the fall pretty soon I don't know how I don't know when
there's gonna be a few days in the fall where it's gonna be perfect outside
like Houston has some days in the late fall and even
in the winter that are just amazing and I remember
I guess every time I ever visited Houston before I lived here it was always in the fall
or the winter and so I just thought Houston was like the most amazing place
ever I was just like wow this is so awesome like I'd come
it'd be like December it'd be like 75 and I could play
golf and the trees are green I was just like this place is amazing
it's like you know I wasn't visiting in the middle of July ok
but you have to be realistic about it and say you know what not every day
in Houston Texas is gonna be that 75 degree
perfect weather low humidity no you're gonna have days where it's
110 99% humidity and it's just like whoa
that's not what I was expecting and see this is the
same with everything in life sometimes you're gonna have those fun moments enjoy
it right ok you have that 75 day go out have fun
ride a bike have a picnic enjoy that moment
but realize it's not gonna last forever same with your marriage you're gonna have a honeymoon phase
you young adults you'll have a phase where you have a honeymoon phase with your
spouse enjoy it put all the effort
and time and fun you can end up enjoying that experience but realize that's not
marriage that's just you get that 175 perfect day
and then marriage is gonna soon turn into humidity
at 100% hot heat
insufferable temperatures no rest day or night and you're just
like ah give me that other day back now of course
marriage then has its ebbs and flows it has of course then good days again
in the future but you kind of start with the good you kind of start
with that high energy you kind of start with the fun and we want to be
people that realize hey I shouldn't be intimidated to start new things
but also I realize it's not gonna last you know I'm gonna go through that birth
phase and it's gonna be fun it's gonna be exciting but
it's just not gonna last forever so inevitably
you're gonna have something happen and it's going to go
into a second phase and the second phase that I want to talk about is called
change change so point one or season
one I talked about was birth we're all gonna go through all kinds of different birth experiences in
our life right the new birth salvation marriage children
you start a new job you get a new business you
how about this church this church had a new start right it had a new phase
but it's just not gonna last forever something's gonna happen
and then everything's gonna change everything's gonna be different now
for this church things changed pretty dramatically
and not really that far in go if you went to luke chapter 10 I want to go to another place
in scripture luke chapter number 10 now in relation
to ecclesiastes chapter 3 I don't have a specific parallel
where I can just show you this specific thing but notice that it's constantly bringing
up things like there's a time to be born and a time to die
something happened there right something changed when you went from birth
to death you know as there's a time to love and a time to hate something happened
it changed right so it's constantly contrasting to extremely
different things but what happens consistently is things are changing
and things are always gonna change you're not gonna ever live in
a perfect state of just one season you're gonna have all kinds of different
seasons you can hang on to summer but guess what fall's gonna come
and then winter's gonna come and then spring's gonna come and then summer's gonna come
and it's just the only thing you can really expect for the climate is for it to change
oh let's start a movie called you know climate change
well that's convenient since the climate changes every second
right I mean the weather's never the same okay so okay
yeah sure the climate is changing I'm shocked
wow you know why they came up with that because they used to say it was cooling
and then it would like not be cooling at all it'd be really hot and then they'd be like oh it's
global warming and then it was like cooling again and they're like oh crap
it just keeps changing they're like climate change you know it's just like
so then that way when we have really cold days they're like see climate change
and then really hot days oops see climate change it's just like oh I guess it always fits
because it's always changing you know what that's the reality of seasons is they're always changing
and for this specific church hey we went through a pretty
big change when you know I heard the news about steadfast Baptist church
and what was going on up there and
I felt like they were in a really bad spot with not
I didn't know how many options it didn't seem like very many it really was virtually none
and so I was like hey I'm willing to help try to figure out
what's going on but as a result of me trying to help that
church that was going to cause this church to go through a change there's going to be a
change in how this church was running now
you know it would be impossible for me
to not think about that particular you know change
for this church and for steadfast and all the things that happen and
sometimes you play that hypothetical game right you play that thing like
well you know what if I had made a different decision or what if things had gone a different
way and you could play that all day long I think that in
hindsight when I think about that change that happened
like selfishly sometimes I think like well it would have been like my life would have been a lot
easier if I had never done that you know I would have a lot more
money if I had never done that because you know I had to give up
a really good high paying job I had to sell all my stuff I had to go
move to a place that's way more expensive I've been
paid a lot less money since you know working there
and not only that but in addition
to just all of those things transpiring I got
locked into some really bad situations where people rip me off
for just egregious amounts of money that may have never happened
if I had never gone down the road so like in some ways I'm just thinking
like oh man that was rough and
you know there's also just other things like I like
Houston a lot I picked Houston I want to live here right so now I have to live in a different area
so there's some differences there you think about the church you think about
the people but you know there's so many good things that happen too
and at the end of the day you know this is
one thing that I kind of just thought about in hindsight about that change
that just makes me really appreciate it is I believe that
there are like literal people alive today that would
not be alive if I had never taken over said that and what I mean by that
is like I can think of people that ended up getting married
or relationships that happened or people that had children when they didn't want to
anymore or whatever and then I literally see their baby
and it's like a reminder to me like wow this person just wouldn't even
physically exist if that had happened and that is a pretty
like big deal when it comes to the idea of like
your life's decisions when you can actually look at a person and say like this person
exists based on decisions that I made
or my wife made or other people have made and you can really look at it and say like
wow that's a good decision right that brought
forth life that brought forth good things not only that just the people that
we witnessed to the people that we got saved the events that have happened
personal growth that I've been able to have and you know
to some degree I think that this church location
specifically pure words may have somewhat suffered
or may have somewhat been a slower growth pattern by
me helping take on said fact I mean I think that's just a fact
there's probably no way to know for sure but this church probably
would have grown a little bit more or like reached a few more people if I had been focused
or dedicated down here but maybe not but at the same time
like when it comes to the work of God what is
more important is it more important for just this location to do well
or is it for all of Christianity to have a net positive
move and I feel like the work that's been done up at steadfast
is just the amount of work that's been done is
so much in scale that whatever a little bit of extra
growth we would have had here is dwarfed by the amount of effort
and work and success that we've had from me
helping that church and us as a church helping that
particular church but here's the thing sometimes
you have life moments and you just have to make a decision
and I want to show you that in the Bible look at Luke chapter 10 verse 30 here's a story
doesn't Jesus answering said a certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho
and fell among thieves which stripped him of his raiment and wounded him and departed
him leaving him half dead and by chance
there came down a certain priest that way and when he saw him he passed by
on the other side and likewise a Levite when he was at that
place came and looked on him and passed by on the other side but a certain
Samaritan as he journeyed came where he was
and when he saw him he had compassion on him and he went to him
and bound up his wounds pouring in oil and wine and set him on his own
beast and brought him to an inn and took care of him
and on the morrow when he departed he took out two pence and gave them
to the host and said unto him take care of him and whatsoever thou spendest
more when I come again I will repay thee which now these three think
is thou his neighbor unto him that fell among the thieves and he
said he that showed mercy on him then said Jesus unto him go
and do thou likewise so according to the Bible we're supposed to
model our lives after the good Samaritan now
when we look at the good Samaritan this is not necessarily the
phrase used in the Bible it's just what we the colloquialism we use to describe this man
he's certainly a Samaritan the things he does are good
hence we kind of have the term the good Samaritan a famous
term why is he considered the good Samaritan it's because
when no one would help this guy that was in a bad situation
he decided to help him now here's the thing was the Samaritan
obligated to help this individual the answer is no
here's a question if he had not helped him who was going
to help him according to the story basically no one
right he was kind of this man's only option here
now also think about what happened this guy is going
to suffer the Samaritan suffered from
this story what are some of the ways that the Samaritan suffered number one
it's he definitely had a loss of time right don't you think
it took some time away from the Samaritan to have to stop
assess the situation help this guy get this guy into
a place of lodging so he had to sacrifice his time
in order to help this particular individual not only that it
cost him money he literally paid two pence not only that
but then was willing to pay whatever bill was going to come in the future
so the Samaritan is losing his time he's losing his money
and then here's another thing that I think kind of correlates to this
is he had to lose his plans I'm sure that the
Samaritan had some where he was going he wasn't just wandering
around doing nothing he probably had a plan he's probably headed
somewhere he probably had some direction for his life and the direction
of his life got shifted and altered in order to
help this particular individual and you know what sometimes
in our lives we may already have a plan we may already have
a vision we may already have our money and our time already
allotted but there's just this person event or something in our
way that says you know what this person needs help and what is Jesus saying
Jesus saying hey be like the Samaritan and be willing to be
driven off course be willing to give up of your time be willing to
give up of your money be willing to give up of your plans so that you could
help this particular individual and you know what when
our church looks at another church that's suffering and
it's like who's going to help them well there wasn't necessarily any real
obvious options and I'm just speaking really bluntly like
steadfast was just in a bad spot not a very not a lot of good options
not anybody really volunteering technically I think I'm the only person
that volunteered but I didn't even realize I was volunteering
I called Pastor Anderson and I just said hey what's going on he's like
we don't have any pastor I feel like the church really needs one it's in a bad spot
he said I'm going to preach here every other Sunday and Pastor Jimenez is going to preach
the other alternate Sundays until we get a pastor and
if you know anything about Pastor Anderson or Pastor Jimenez that is an
amazing statement for him to even make because these guys don't miss
preaching behind their pulpit for anything Pastor Anderson would drive
all night pulling the hair out of his legs just
just to go and preach a sermon at his church I mean the guy just does
not miss preaching sermons at his church I mean when I went to his church
for two years and almost never was he not there
preaching a sermon I mean pretty much so for him to say he'd be willing
to miss a whole Sunday every other week until they
could find a solution is saying they're in a bad spot I mean that's just
clearly a bad situation I just said well what can I do to help I'm closer
geographically and he was just like hey you could be the pastor
and I was like sure and he'd tell me later
he's like I was joking when I said that
I was like okay but I just said that I was being honest when I
said I was willing to help okay now of course I realized hey
this is gonna be rough you know this is gonna like
the biggest problem I had the thing that really made me the most
upset or not want to do it was just thinking about this thinking about Pure Words
and having to leave you guys and not being here as often
as I could have been in the past because the first service
the first service I've never been at Pure Words was the Sunday
night I left to go to steadfast I'd been to every single service before that
never missed a service was not planning on ever missing a service I hadn't
had a guest preacher you know replaced me like I was here for every single
service and then that was the first service I'd leave and that was the hardest
service I've ever had it was the preacher in the morning and then to have to
go up there it wasn't fun I know people here were very upset
people you know were very distraught about that but at the end of the day
you know the newness had wore off we were hit with a change
but you know what that's life the
newness was never gonna last forever sometimes you just have change
and in hindsight how could the samaritan look
and say I made the wrong decision right couldn't the samaritan play this play
like hypothetical themselves and be like man I wouldn't have been late for work that day
I wouldn't have wasted a bunch of time I wouldn't have I would have more
money but you know what Jesus is commending him on what he
had did now you can have different opinion than me this is just my personal
opinion not what the bible says my personal opinion is I think that the parables
in the bible especially that Jesus gave are probably real stories like I know they're
a parable and I know that he's just using them as an example but the God of
the universe in his infinite wisdom probably is able to think of like things that actually happen
or know things that actually happen and then use them as real parables
in these stories so I think that this probably is something that actually really happened
but even if it didn't we can still keep going with this
hypothetical samaritan guy that do we even see
anything in the bible how the samaritan benefited from that situation
the bible never says like the samaritan won the lottery
but then the samaritan you know but then the guy got healthy
and he was actually a rich guy and he gave him a bunch of money we don't even
we never hear about that he just lost time he lost
money he lost his plans and let me tell you something God was looking down
from heaven and praised the samaritan didn't he and you know what sometimes
that's going to be us sometimes you might have an opportunity to help someone
and it's going to cost you time money and effort and you
may never even get it back in this life you know what God's looking
down from heaven and he's pleased with you and he's pleased with the riches
that you're storing up yourself in heaven you know the poor widow
woman who threw in two mites into the treasury and Jesus Christ looked at her and said that she
gave more than they all you know the bible didn't say when she threw in the two mites then
she won the lottery the next day either in fact we never even see
any example of her getting any kind of money on
earth or in this life now I'm sure God provided for her I'm sure
God took care of her just like he cares about the sparrows of the field and he cares
about everything about us I mean he knows the number of hairs on her head
okay for some of us that's more than you know others but
for some of us that's not a hard task to count but at the end of the day
you know think about like how much does that even
matter to us right what if you went home tonight and you're like
I need to know how many hairs are on my head today let's
count them you know it's like that's such a trivial detail most of
us if not every single person on earth has never cared about the exact number
of hairs on their head but God cares somehow I mean think about how much
more God cares about us than we do care about ourselves
and it's like if I lose out on my time effort energy and money you know what God
still cares about me the same level and God's still gonna take care of me and God's still gonna
provide me you know what God wanted me to do God want me to have the faith to actually help someone when
I see them in need and God wants us as a church and wants us
as a congregation wants us as Christians to help people when we have opportunity
when you have that opportunity to help somebody when the opportunity is presented
unto you you know what are you gonna do are you gonna be willing to step
in go to Deuteronomy chapter 22 I want to show you another verse here Deuteronomy chapter 22
you say what do you think about this in hindsight well you know what I think
I think it helped all of our church to learn
that it's important to be willing to sacrifice for other people
even if it's at our own detriment
it helps us to see that example and say you know what we can
we could help bear one another's burden we could help do good
unto someone else now this is a principle taught everywhere in scripture
it's not necessarily the most fun sermon but you know I guess
you could go to Joel Osteen's church and learn about how to win the lottery or whatever
but not here Deuteronomy 22 look at verse 4
thou shalt not see thy brother's ass or his ox fall down
by the way and hide thyself from them
thou shalt surely help him to lift them up again
now again this is just a principle of the bible saying like if you see
someone in need that you can help
then you should help them now I don't think that we should get this over the top
literal idea that just every single person
you've ever seen broken down on the road you better help them and just every person
you can't help every single person right?
I don't think that's what the bible is saying but we all have opportunities in our lives
where we could help someone it's not necessarily
it's within our power we have the opportunity we have the option
and what is the bible saying don't hide yourself when that opportunity arises
when it's really clear and it's really obvious that you can help this individual
especially when you're being asked
hey don't hide yourself don't pretend like you don't see it
and think about in context of what we're talking about what is an ox
in the bible often pictured as
well does god care for oxen the bible says in the new testament
and the answer was a rhetorical question but the answer was no
the oxen was actually a reference to pastors and preachers of the bible
you can think about this steadfast kind of lost their ox didn't their ox kind of
fell in the ditch the bible says that a whore is a deep ditch and you know what
that ox fell in a deep ditch didn't it okay
now you have a neighbor that loses their ox
well what can you do you could help them get a better ox or a different ox
or whatever okay and at the end of the day we shouldn't
just hide ourselves and pretend like well our church is great nuts to you
guys you know sometimes we should go beyond the idea of
just being an independent fundamental baptist church and actually help other christians
i mean where do you see that in the bible where the new testament churches are just like
nuts to the eph the ephesians or who cares about the galatians or
why did god have to write an epistle to the seven churches which are nation
does he know we're independent here you know it's like that's so stupid
to have this idea getting so independent that you can't even help other
churches or care about them you know or know what's going on in other
churches obviously i'm i believe in the ifb
i believe in being an independent fundamental baptist church what that means is we're not
dependent on another church to survive we are
sufficient and we should try to get as many sufficient churches as possible and not have them
all dependent on a pope or dependent on one denominational
circle that's uh because then you get too much power concentrated
it's easy for it to get really corrupted some of these
denominations that exist out here the denomination owns all the
property so like i you know there's the episcopal church
if anybody knows about the episcopal church they kind of like owned every building so
what happened though is some of the more conservative episcopal churches
they started preaching a lot of things that the denominational headquarters
didn't like anymore so then they were gonna literally evict them
out of their church buildings for what they were preaching now i know a little bit
about this okay about getting evicted from your church for what you're preaching
because the headquarters isn't like so and you know it's not anything
new to me in fact you know the episcopal church is going through this way before
i even thought of going through this problem and
it was actually one of the biggest church cases that's happened in all of
the united states i think even in texas where several episcopal churches
were kind of in a lawsuit against the main denomination over who owned
the building and it went through all kinds of
you know layers of courts and everything like that eventually went to the texas supreme court
and they ruled in favor of the individual churches
and said that they get their building and so it's just like nuts to you
you know wicked denominational headquarters now obviously the episcopals
are really off doctrinally they have some serious issues you know i've met some
and they seem safe so i don't think that everybody in that denomination
is just an unsaved reprobate obviously there's probably a lot of bad people
most of them were the ones that were with the headquarters you know they were with that the more
liberal branch because think about it this way almost every branch of christianity
kind of has a conservative version of itself and
kind of has a liberal version because like even us as
baptists there are some really bad baptists out there
there are some baptists out there that you're thinking like what in the how are you baptists
where i live in the dallas fort worth area right now there's a church called like
broadway baptist church their pastors are literal sodomites
like i'm not even joking like open
sodomites as the pastor that's a baptist church like what if
that was the only experience you ever had with baptists you would think like all baptists are
wicked as hell you know what i mean and even methodists you know
the united methodist church they're like all sodomites and dykes and
lesbians but then there's like really conservative versions of methodists
that are not like that at all now again i'm not trying to recommend
other denominations they have serious problems
hey if the bible is your boss then you're a baptist ok that's
i like that phrase and i believe it and i'm a baptist for a reason you have a baptist bias
that's right but i am saying this that you know when it comes
to all the denominations out there there's a lot some are a lot better than
others and even within the same denomination there's some of these conservative
and liberal branches but they went through a big change
too you know that episcopal church went through a big change we've gone through a change
the newness wore off and you know you have this with your children you know
at first they're just this sweet little baby that they can't do any wrong and
then all of a sudden they get lungs and they start screaming and
they become a toddler and boy you go through a lot of changes
with a child a child almost it just
their life is just changed like now they scream now they cry
now they eat different kinds of foods now they don't sleep at night anymore
now they're walking now they're getting into everything now they're running
you know now they climb on everything it's just like raising a child
it's just like change change change change change change change i mean they're just constantly
going through all these different phases and cycles and it's just like every cycle
feels like an eternity sometimes then you get to phases like teaching them
how to read and you're just like wow are my kids like
mentally handicapped or what you know but that's just sometimes the
the reality is like you go through these different phases and it's just like
they're all difficult teaching someone how to read is hard teaching
children how to use the potty can be hard and not
it's never the same some kids you're like i don't even remember teaching you
and you just learned how to use the potty other ones you're like why can't you figure this out
you know like what's wrong with you you know they're all over the map
discipline it can be all over the map you know and then you have these kids and
then they become a teenager talk about change whoa
changes of mood changes of attitude changes of behavior
you know there's really not any consistency to
raising children you're going to go through these changes in a church
we're going to have even other changes that we go through and we don't
want to be afraid of those changes we just want to realize it's going to happen
and this church will never be the way it is right now
forever you see i really like pure words baptist church
right now we'll enjoy it right now because it won't be like this six months from now
and it won't be like this a few years from now and it won't be like this you know it's just going to
continue to change and you have to just embrace that and realize okay
things are going to change your relationship is going to change you know your children
are going to change enjoy the little years enjoy the baby years
because you won't have them forever and I know even my wife like
it's been about two years since we've had a baby and she misses
it she talks about it she loves it she loves the little baby
face she loves all the nuances and all the cute things and
the outfits and whatever now I guess she loves 15 diapers a day or what
you know I don't know but she loves that face so much and so
when you're in those spaces enjoy the things enjoy the moment
that you're in and don't just get upset that everything's
constantly changing because eventually your life will be over
and you never got to enjoy any of it go go to Romans chapter 5
go to Romans chapter 5 so
I'm not talking about every phase I'm just using a few here's the
third one that I think that we kind of went through and this is a phase that's really
important is the patience phase because you have the
birth which is fun and exciting then something changes but most of the time
you're going to go through changes that aren't as fun
you're going to go through changes that are difficult you're going to go through changes that are hard
and what you have to have is you have to have patience during that new season of life
and you have to kind of endure that particular
season of life maybe you have to endure the really heat season
if you don't like that or you have to endure the winter if you don't like the winter season or whatever it is
I'm sure all of us have different preferences but sometimes
you're going to go through hardships and you have to have patience you know it's said
in Ecclesiastes chapter 3 there was a time to keep
and that can be applied in a lot of ways but one thing that I think is
sometimes you just have to keep God's commandments
sometimes you just have to keep going to church sometimes you just have to keep going soul winning
sometimes you just have to keep doing the right thing even though you don't want to at all
even though you're kind of getting weary of it
it's maybe getting harder you're not liking it as much
maybe there's a person at church you don't like
I'm sure some people have had that experience okay and
you've got to realize that person may never come again though like there could be
you could be really frustrated about that but then soon enough they won't be there
and then you never have to have that problem again or you know
even in your marriage sometimes your marriage can have a lull and you feel like oh man I'm going to be married
to this person for another 50 years they could die tomorrow
number one number two it could totally change
if you're a woman your mood will change okay
a couple times in the next hour especially when you get food
right now you're kind of upset because you're getting closer to dinner but then you'll have food and you'll be happy
again seriously it's real
and you know you'll go through all these moods you'll go through all these changes
but sometimes you just have to endure you just have to be patient you have to just go through
it and you know for me personally
you know when I didn't have Evangelist
panic care preaching three times a week and I was coming here every Thursday
it was a hard phase in my life it was just
very difficult and there wasn't really any good options
and honestly apart from like
my wife and my family I feel like I had a lot of
negativity towards me during that phase a lot of people
very close to me even people that I like a lot were kind of
just like you should just stop doing that or you should give that up or
why don't you just preach the same sermon you preached on Wednesday night
I'm just like you know like why don't you just put a TV down there and they just
watch TV and I'm like oh I had someone tell me
like why don't you just give the church to Pastor Anderson
what does that even mean he's not a part of our church how does that even
help that church you know that doesn't even make any sense to me and I'm just
like thinking like you just don't get it and I'm like I'm not going there on Thursdays
because I just love driving in Houston traffic you know
and I love driving down there no no I'm doing it because
the church needs good preaching I love those people
and it's the right thing to do it's just the right thing to do
and you say like well how long are you going to do it I had no idea
and you know there were some times where I'm just thinking like man I don't know if this is ever going to change
it was a hard phase in my life my life was
very stressful sleep was not
always ideal but you know
and the money wasn't necessarily ideal either you know because I could
I could have spent more time doing other things or whatever
and it wasn't like I'm drawing a paycheck driving down here you know
I think I thought about it one day and I was like you know I always give people that come
guest preach for me you know like a love offering I was like if I got a love every time
I went down there you know I was like but of course I never did
that and I don't even think there would be anything wrong if someone did that but I'm just saying
like obviously the church can't necessarily afford things like that or whatever
but at the end of the day it was just a hard phase in my life
and I'm just thinking like I don't know if this will ever change okay
but sometimes you go through these difficulties and you just have to keep going through them
just hold on tight because what does the Bible say in Romans 5 verse 1
therefore being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ
by whom also we have access by faith in this grace where we stand
and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God and not only so
but we glory in tribulations also knowing that tribulation worketh patience
and patience experience and experience hope and hope
makeeth not ashamed you know going through that phase of life
and now having evangelist or bandit down here
and having gone through another change that gave me patience
experience and another word hope gave me hope
that when I go through another difficult phase of my life in the future
that it probably won't be forever and that I'll be glad that I made
the decisions I did you know there was sometimes I came down here for Thursday night church and it
was like me and the tailors you know or me and the tailors and like one other
person or something like that right and even I would show up for soul winning
and a couple times it was just me but most of the time
it was just me and one other person and what was funny to me is like
it wasn't even the same person like for like for six months it was
this person and then like they left and then like another person for the next six
months and then like another but it was like I felt like God just kept giving me just like one random
person you know it was like I don't even know if I like this person I'm just
glad they're here though right like I just appreciate that this is another person I can
go out with or hang out with or go soul winning with
and you know it was just a it's like a
character building exercise you know the midweek service
is a character building exercise for all of us because you could
always find something to do with your time you could always
not have to spend as much money you could have always had different plans
but you know what you just do what's right and you actually serve God and he'll bless that
and you have to realize we need to have the patience to just do the right thing
say oh having lots of kids is really hard Pastor Shelley
well just have the patience to get through it because you know what it's not
going to be forever they're not going to be two years old forever
you know how long your kids are going to be two years old? One year
365 every two year old is at a max
366 days okay that was a leap year alright
and if you didn't even have them in a leap year then it's only 365
days it never lasts any longer than that they eventually turn 3
and then they turn 4 and then they turn 5 and then they turn 20 and then they're gone
right eventually they're gone and you'll never have
that phase ever again and I'll explain this when I get to
my last point but you have to realize that not every phase of life
is the most enjoyable phase birth is a lot more
enjoyable than the next two phases we've talked about
the change phase or the patience phase where you have to go through the difficulty
the hardship the hard work and you know what this church has gone through a lot
of hard work seasons seasons where we're just
kind of just chugging along trying to still do the right thing
you know maybe we're waiting on the AC to get fixed and it's like this is a long
phase right that patience right we have to have patience
on all kinds of different things that are going on about
our particular church situation but you know what it's okay
and I personally don't think that we're going through that phase anymore I think that we're kind of
headed towards a fourth phase that I want to talk about which is a growth phase I feel like our
church is now headed into a growth phase so we've talked about birth we went through
birth as a church we've gone through change as a church we've gone through a patience
phase where we had a lot of hardship but I think right now we're in a growth
phase where it's time for us to just build spiritually
and literally physically go to second Peter chapter number
three go to second Peter chapter number three but you know we're all going to go
through different hardships I think that this is similar to
raising children again they get birthed then they go through a lot of changes
early and then you have to go through some certain patience phases with your children
and they all may be different you know teaching them to read might be the patience phase
teaching them how to use the bathroom might be the patience phase and being a teenager
might be the patience phase right you're going to go through those patience phases
but also your children are going to go through a growth phase
where they're growing a lot they're growing physically they're growing mentally
they're growing spiritually and it's important to invest
in your children during these phases because how you invest in their
growth phase is how they're going to end up is how they're going to mature
and you know what you only have so much time while you're going through that particular
phase you know if there's a plant growing it only has that growth phase
at one point in time and if it doesn't go right you won't produce
fruit okay if the growing season doesn't have the rain
if it doesn't have the nutrients in the ground then it won't grow
and it won't be able to produce fruit it won't be strong enough mature enough
healthy enough or whatever and it just won't produce fruit so it's important for us to go
through the proper growth phase and even our
church if our church doesn't go through a proper growth phase where we're growing
spiritually and physically and everything else then we may not
produce all the fruit that we could and we might become lacking
and the Bible tells us very importantly to grow
look at 2 Peter chapter 3 look at verse 17
beware lest ye also being led away with the error of the wicked
fall from your own steadfastness but grow in grace
and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ
and be glory both now and forever amen so according to the Bible we're supposed to grow
and it's important to grow because if you don't grow
you'll probably just end up getting destroyed
think about it like a tree if you plant a tree
the early stages of a tree's life is very delicate it's very fragile
and a lot of people will even get anchors and they'll tie it around the tree
just so it'll kind of grow straight and it'll grow
appropriately because if at some point you have a big storm
or something runs into it it could knock it over it could ruin
the root system like something bad could happen but once that tree ends up
growing into a big full mature tree it's going to be hard to really
get that thing off course or to knock it over
a little tiny shrub or a little tiny tree a child could run that thing over
but then we're talking about a great oak a child if it runs in the tree
the child's going the other direction the tree's going to be fine
and think about that from a Christian perspective us as Christians some of us
might be in that still early stock phase of our
Christianity and we're tied down
sometimes those tie downs are your parents you young adults and
teenagers your parents are the ones that are holding your tree upright you're trying to
lean all over and they're just like keeping you upright you know you need to keep growing
because eventually your parents are going to cut those cords and if you didn't end up
growing straight and you didn't grow to be a thick tree well then the
storms of life may come and knock you over and destroy you and
what is it saying you could be led away with the error of the wicked and fall from your own
basket you know we need to think soberly about ourselves
and realize that we could all get driven out of truth
we could all stop serving God and that's
something that we need to keep on the forefront of our mind and say you know what I need to maintain
the right principles I need to keep growing and being
knowledgeable and getting stronger and more spiritual
so that I'm not knocked off course so that it's harder to knock me
off course go to Exodus chapter one and I'll say it this way
someone that's been in this church since day one
someone that says hey I've been a member of Pure Words Baptist Church for five
years and then we take another person in our church that's been I've been a member
of steadfast I'm sorry Pure Words for five months
you know who's more likely to quit the church the person that's been here for five months
because they don't have as much invested they haven't
had as much roots so it's much more likely that that person is going to walk away
or quit or not be a part of the church whereas the person
that's been there for a really long time it's like it's a lot harder
for them to want to leave or get out so it's like the more you invest
and the more you just put years and years and rings on that tree it just keeps getting bigger
and bigger and bigger and bigger and then it's a lot more difficult to knock over
it's like if you've been going to church three times a week for thirty years
how likely do you think it is for that person to just drop out of church all of a sudden
probably not going to happen but the person that's been doing it for three weeks
how likely is it that person to maybe quit going to church
you know it's a lot more likely that that person may end up getting out so that's why this
growth phase is so important you know someone that knows everything in the Bible
how likely is it that they're going to get sucked into one of these garbage churches out here
probably almost zero percent chance I mean that's what I love about
the kids in this church is they're going to know so much Bible by the time
they're an adult they're never going to go to Joel Osteen's church
they might get backslidden and they might become worldly but they're not going to go to
Joel Osteen's church like if they decide they're going to go to church they're going to go to church like this
right they're going to go to a good kind of church because they realize what church really is
so it's important to grow in grace and knowledge and get all these
things going in the right direction also it's healthy for a
church to grow physically and even if we go through difficulty even if we have
freaks come and you know yell at us or whatever you know that doesn't necessarily
stop us from growing or going through a growth phase and I think our church will
continue to grow as long as we're doing the right things but look at Exodus chapter 1
verse number 12
the Bible says
but the more they afflicted them the more they multiplied and grew
now this is so funny because it's like the more they try to stop
them from growing as a congregation they just keep getting bigger and bigger
and I think that the same is going to be for our church and churches
like ours where the more and more our world just keeps trying to
suppress Christianity and becoming more open and obvious about their agenda it just
makes our churches look more and more attractive like our church
you know five years ago it's like y'all are kind of weird and you
you make a big deal about all these issues and you
make it seem like the sodomites are going after children it's like do you really think in
2023 a lot of people are confused that sodomites are going to have children now
I mean now it's like oh wow like that church is right
that church actually knows what the Bible says hey that church
is actually doing Christianity you know people are starting to
wake up not only that when people are actually following God's commandments
they actually get married and have children and start producing a lot of children
it was funny I was talking with brother Dylan about this the other day
but it's steadfast in the Dallas 4th area we're already getting a little
tight on our building but you know we're doing great
it's great for us right now and we're doing well but you know when we have
a big Sunday morning you know almost all the chairs are full already and
we have about 235 people
that are on our membership role and our membership role is people that
are actively coming so like as soon as people are not coming I take them
off so that's a very accurate count of like people that are actually coming
to services on a regular basis and so we have about 235
and if you look at our bulletin we have almost 15 ladies pregnant
and I was telling Dylan I said whether we try to grow or not
in one year's time we're going to have 250 people
on the sheet just from a sheer fact that they're having children
and when you look at how many children we have in our churches
you know that church this church other churches you know eventually
they're going to become adults okay I think steadfast specifically
has like over 100 kids in that church probably more
100 kids well here's the thing when they start getting married
and having kids the exponential growth rate
goes through the roof folks okay they go through
think about it this way in 10 years a lot of them will probably have gotten started
getting married and start having kids if they actually do what the bible says which we're
trying our best to try and teach them this they'll average between 7 and 8 children
on their own so if you take like 50
couples you've got like 100 kids they all get married even if they only
married each other they're not taking anybody else out
okay even if they only married within that's still at least 50 couples
times 8 that's another 400 people
now they may not all go to my church but they'll go to other like-minded churches
and think about that you could have an influx of 400 people
in Texas generally this area going to a church like our
church and that's just in like you know maybe
20 years 20 to 25 years there's about 10
for them to all start getting married and about another 10-15 years for them to pump out
7 or 8 kids but you could say in 25 years that's another 400 people
that's if we didn't reach a single other soul
if we never brought in another person at all and think about it
this way you know I'm 36 I would preach
until God takes me home you know if the Lord tarries and I preach to them like
85 or 90 or something like that all of those kids
are going to then have kids then it gets
really big folks okay what's 400 divided by
2 that's 200 times 8 that's 1600
right and it gets big fast that's what was happening with the children
of Israel they were having lots and lots of kids and they were
exploding in population they went from 70 souls
70 people to over a million
in 400 years okay that's big growth
now again we have you know almost 70 people here today
but we don't have we're going to be around 400
but at the same time we couldn't have a building with millions of people
in it for church right you would hit a breaking point a lot faster
so it's like when you're following God's commandments and you're doing it right you're going to grow
you know we need to grow because if you've ever noticed Houston has over 8 million
people on paper if you talk about the
illegals it's probably like another 5 million or something I don't know it's like insane
how many people live here and it's just like from
all over with all the people that cross the border I'm sure a lot of them came to Houston
I'm sure there is just tons and tons millions and millions of people
you and I can't knock on all those doors by ourselves we need our children
we need more people we need more recruits you know this area needs more
you know of an influence of a great church to go out there and preach the gospel
and it's important for us to grow spiritually and physically
so that we can reach this world
and you know what's sad is that a lot of people don't grow spiritually
and so then we don't grow physically
this church has probably seen about 200 people come and go
as members of this church since I started but you know how many people
were there from the beginning to now a handful
right but you just have tons of people come and go and come and go
and a lot of them were even really zealous we had people in this church that would come in three times a week
super zealous and now it's just like now they're doing nothing
and you know it's sad I hope that they get back into church or come back here
go at least somewhere do something for God I'm not mad at them
I just want them to do something for the
Lord I want them to have rewards in heaven and we need to go through that growth phase not for my
sake not so we can say we have a big church but so we can get a lot of people saved
I mean we went out with a small group and we had 20 something people saved today
we could get and you know what
I'll just be honest you guys are spoiled to death because if you go soul
winning virtually anywhere else in this world it is in not
even close to the same I mean even just in the Dallas Fort Worth
area it is way harder to get people saved than it is down here
I mean when I come down here it's just like that it's so easy
I mean I remember coming down here when I was at the Watauga phase
of steadfast virtually my only soul winning
that I got people saved was here it was like I go soul winning for hours in DFW
every week and then I come here for like one hour and I get a couple people
saved it's just like praise God for the Thursday time you know it's like the
Wednesday time nothing you know the Sunday afternoon time nothing
and then it's just like you come down here on Thursdays and it's just like
I mean it was just it was in fact I wasn't even getting anybody saved
in English I'd come down here it's just like Spanish Spanish Spanish Spanish I was thinking
like have I even gotten an English speaking person saved in a while like I don't even know
but you know you live in other parts of the country go try soul winning in
Washington state go try soul winning in San Francisco
go try soul winning in Canada man it is
brutal you know it is brutal going to a lot of these other areas hey go soul winning
in Austin now I'm sure
there was some more receptive areas than where I went when I tried it but man when I went there
it was just rough it was brutal it was bad
and I think that there's a lot of areas that are really rough these days
but Houston is not that you guys have one of the greatest
opportunities to get tons and tons of people saved you need to be taking advantage of that
and you need to enjoy the growth phase that you have here that I think
you're in and you can go on go to Galatians
chapter six I'm going to finish I'll try to wrap up real quick
here's the fifth phase I wanted to talk about or season because five years
I'm giving you five seasons to think about this one hasn't happened
but I believe it will happen and it's a
phase that we'll all go through in different ways but it's the reaping
phase there is a reaping phase I would
argue that the reaping phase is the absolute most enjoyable phase
now in Ecclesiastes chapter three it says there's a time to dance
what does dancing symbolize though dancing is symbolizing
joy excitement you know people dance at weddings people
dance at celebrations you know David gets to dance when he
brings back the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem was that
the beginning of his life no that was the end stage of his life and that was the glory days
because he had already gone through all the battles he had already gone through the birth the change
the patience the growth phases he went through all of that and then he finally
gets to enjoy the reaping phase and in a church
churches go through these cycles churches have the
start of the church then they kind of go through changes then they go through a patience
phase and they go through growth phases but then they have like an enjoy phase
and what I've noticed seems like a lot of people will only
go to churches that are experiencing a reap phase
you know what will be this it's a lot of these southern
Baptist churches because the southern Baptist churches they weren't always
as like heretical as they are today and I guarantee most
of them when they started they started in like 1901
1905 or something like that and
at first they were on fire they were the only Baptist in the area they're probably doing the
soul winning they're doing the evangelism then you know they're going through all these
phases but now they're in this like reap phase
but unfortunately through the reap phase they got corrupt and they kind of
got watered down and they went through a lot of these problems but then people
they only want to go to the church where it's like we already have the ten million dollar
building we're already running two thousand people we already
have you know several generations of the people that were here and their
kids and their grandkids and everything like that we already have you know the water
slide and all the programs and all the different
fun bells and whistles and the nice parking lot and you know they already have all those
things and it's like people just only want to go to that church where it's just the
reap phase quote unquote you know if you only ever go to the reap phase
well then you don't have much character and
you pretty much usually go to an apostate type church at that point
because a lot of churches can't handle the reap phase
you know a lot of churches you have a firebrand pastor that builds the
church and he's like on the cusp of the reach phase and then he dies or
retires and then the new bozo guy comes in and basically they go
through the reap phase where they get all ecumenical and watered down and
and of course he doesn't really appreciate it because he didn't build it right he didn't really
understand what was going on but you know sometimes churches can still even go through
a reap phase and it's a good phase and I would hope that at the end of my ministry
I'm not handing off the reigns of some bozo or something like that
but you know every church is going to go through these different phases
and we want to make sure that you know we don't
feel like oh I have to go to the reap phase church you know
like let's compare Pure Words Baptist Church to
Faith Word Baptist Church they're not in the same season
folks Pastor Anderson had to go through a lot of the
patience and growth phases but now their church is running several hundred people
they have a lot more events they have a lot more things going on so they're
in a little bit closer to a reaping phase than this church is
and that's okay because who cares which phase you know it's only
you being selfish that you have to go to a church where you're reaping
why can't you go to a church where you're just investing and you're planting and you're
building and you're going through the growth phase you're going through the patience phase
you know I will argue this that if you're going through the patience
phase you're going to be a better person a better Christian than if you're going to a
reap church now you won't enjoy it as much but it's just like this
it's like are you going to feel better after leaving the gym from working out
or gorging yourself on ice cream it's like yeah
the process of eating the ice cream was really fun
and the working out really sucked but when it's over you're like
well I really enjoy the benefits of actually having worked out and being in shape
and I don't really enjoy the fact that I'm going to feel like a glutton and I'm like
you know after having gorged myself on a bunch of sweets
and so the same could be even applied with church where it's like if you're only going
for church to just reap benefits of it you're not really growing that's not even benefiting you
anyways you should be challenged and investing and putting your time
and effort and energy into church and going through the difficult stages of
a church because you know what you're going to reap what you sow
and if you're only investing in a church to just show up and enjoy
then you're not really going to reap anything
you're only going to reap things when you're investing and putting time effort and energy
into something and in Galatians chapter 6 it has the real famous portion
of scripture here verse 7
hey if you're going to a flesh church guess what you're going to reap? Corruption
what do you mean corruption? look there's so many parents that took
their children and took their family to the fun center Baptist
to the fun center liberal church and you know what their children
now have grown up and you know what they're reaping? Corruption
they have corrupt fruit their children are whore mongers and whores
and having bastard children and they love the world
and they act like the world because why? because they sowed to their flesh and
they went to a church that tickled and pleased their flesh rather than
sowing something spiritual into their children and now they're reaping corruption
and you know what I don't want you to reap corruption from your children
I don't want you to waste time going to church for decades of your life
and then your children are like the devil when they leave you know what there's so many
churches today that are literally raising just hellions
because it's a false prophet and they're just well we just sow into the flesh
there's so many churches today where in the summer instead of preaching
they just watch Hollywood movies and I'm not saying let
in a metaphorical sense I'm saying in the most literal sense you can
imagine like this Life Church who's heard of Life Church
it's really big in Oklahoma but they've spread campuses everywhere I've seen Life
Churches in the Dallas Fort Worth area and I don't know this is cancer spreading all over
but I saw an advertisement they have the whole church decorated like Star Wars
and they're literally just showing Star Wars movies at
church like how is that church
anymore I mean that doesn't even make they're like the Republicans
it's like Democrats become wicked
and then the Republicans become Democrats from two years ago
and then basically Fox News is like two years behind them
and then the liberal churches are just a few years behind them so it's just like well
you know I guess we're just going to start showing Star Wars movies
that's how biblical the church is you know what's next
I mean how much further down can you even go
what do you think the children are going to reap when they went to church and they watched Star Wars
they're going to reap corruption
and they're sowing to their flesh you don't go to church to watch movies
that's not spiritual there's nothing spiritual about Star Wars
that is just only enjoyment and look there's nothing wrong with enjoying things
I'm not against enjoying things I'm not saying that movies can't be fun
I'm not saying you can't have fun you know what church is not an exercise of fun
we're not here to just have fun we're here
to be spiritual and to learn the Bible and to be challenged to serve God
and if you don't what do you read
you read this and I think this is what it says sow to the flesh reap of the flesh
it doesn't say that it says you reap corruption
it's saying you don't even get something good back you get something really bad back
okay now it says in the next portion of this verse
but he that soweth to the spirit shall of the spirit
reap life everlasting not only this it says and let us not be
weary in well doing for in due season we shall reap
if we think not of course in a cycle of a church
I think a church is sometimes longer than a person
as far as seasons go sometimes the seasons of a church might last
longer than the seasons of a person but if you apply this to your children what I've taught you
this evening I think it's really important to understand you're going to have
children go through all the birth phases and then they're going to go through the changes
and then you're going to have to have the patience when you go through the hardships of raising children
and you're going to have to go through a growth phase but eventually all of the children
will leave all the children will leave and you know
what you're only in a reaping season for the rest of your life
you will only reap at that point now here's the thing
reaping is not always good you could reap corruption
or you could reap wonderful grandchildren you know what
you will reap at some point so it's like
oh I'm so tired well guess what you'll eventually be done
you'll eventually not have to do it anymore but why not put as much as you
can into them now and invest as much as you can now
because eventually you'll just be a grandparent and you're just going to only reap
and you know I know a lot of grandparents that they don't get to just
relax you know what they're doing right now they're raising their grandchildren
you know why they're raising their grandchildren because they didn't
raise their children and so their children like I know
many people who it's like basically their child is just a whore
or whoremonger and just has these bastard children and now the grandparents
are basically just raising that grandchild and it's like
you don't want to do that you want to be grandma and grandpa where you just show up for an hour
and then leave right where you just come and you just hang out and look
there's nothing wrong with raising your grandchild there's nothing wrong with loving on them you shouldn't
be doing that you should have raised your children right and they should be raising
their children and you should just be the grandparents but you know what
if you sow to your flesh you're going to reap you're going to reap corruption
and if you sow a lot into your children and you love them and you have lots
of them boy it's being a I can't even imagine how cool
it would be I mean think about it you're a grandparent and you
have like 10 or 12 children all grown raised
married serving God and they're just pumping out children
after children if you had 12 children that are all married pumping out children
you could literally have a new grandchild every
month think about that
like you could like have them just like they're just pumping out it's like a tree that's just constantly
producing fruit and you're just like bam bam you're going to like forget
all their names you're just going to have so many kids right I mean if you had 12 kids
and they averaged 8 each you would have 96
grandchildren you could have like 100 grandchildren
you know what that's doing all the things right or you could have like
Hunter Biden be your son and
you could have a bunch of bastard kids from his you know relationships with all the prostitutes
you slept with and just have to pay child support alimony
and have a weird Jerry Springer family situation going on and just
like basically your just life ends in a train wreck
or you could have the most epic family reunions and tons and tons of
grandchildren and see them all serving God and you know some of the women
you're like I want to be a pastor here's the thing what if you have 12 children and
then they have 8 children you might have several grandchildren that are pastors
you could be literally raising several different pastors
indirectly and how much more influential is that
Timothy it's you know his lineage is traced
spiritually from the mother side not even from the father side
so you know I think that a lot of us we try to get ahead of ourselves
and we try to always look to the future
but the point of this sermon was just to realize look we're going to have a lot
of different seasons of life enjoy the season that you're in
because eventually it will change and you'll never have that season again
enjoy the new phase because you won't have this church isn't going to have
a new church again we're not starting the church the church isn't going to get reborn
okay now it might change leadership
but that's a change right it already had the new phase it already
it's going to have a change it's had that we're going to have patient phases we're going to have
growth phases and we'll you know God willing he told us he promised us
if we are not weary and we don't faint then guess what we'll
reap too we'll have some reaping seasons we'll have some reaping phases
in our church we'll have reaping phases in our personal lives you know
if you build a business a lot of times you're going to go through those hardships and at the end
you get the reaping phase of building a business of a career
of a marriage of all of these different things and you know
we need to be patient and enjoy
whatever cycle we're in and you know what I love the phase we're in right now
this is a lot of fun let us not be constantly focused on what
Pure Words Baptist Church will be and let's be focused on what Pure Words Baptist Church is
and what we're doing right now and get committed and dedicated
and on board with the program right now get on board and
on program with your kids and their lives right now and just embrace
your life embrace the decisions you have everything there's
a season you're going to have these seasons you know what God gave you them for a reason
let's just enjoy them all right goes in prayer thank you Heavenly Father so
much for this church thank you for giving us just so much wisdom in the Bible
that we can understand all the different things that are going to happen in our lives I pray that
we would try to use the Bible as our guide so that we wouldn't be offended
when we may go through difficulties changes we may have
hardships we realize that not every season of life
is always the most enjoyable but you know what through suffering
and pain and difficulty often it makes us better people and I pray that we
wouldn't get discouraged or weary during difficult cycles or harder
times of our life harder times as a church but rather we'd embrace
the challenges set before us we'd embrace the seasons that we're in
we would be appreciative and grateful
for the children and the spouses and the people that we have
in our lives that we can influence and I pray that you would just help us
as we go through the next seasons of our church to give you the honor and the glory
for us to grow spiritually and physically so that we could get more people
saved and that you would continue to bless us so that we could really enjoy
the reaping season and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
And with that we'll go ahead and close it out with one more song
It's going to be song 310, Footprints
of Jesus
Song number 310
Footprints of Jesus
We
lead on a we worthy calling
come follow me
and we see where that footprint's falling
lead us to thee
Footprints of Jesus
that make the path they close
lead them all on the steps of Jesus
there e'er they go
though they lead o'er the cold dark mountains
seeking his sheep
for a long last run
of those mountains helping the weak
Footprints of Jesus
that make the pathway close
we will follow the steps of Jesus
where e'er they go
if they lead through the temple
holy preaching the word
for in homes of the poor and
only serving the Lord
Footprints of Jesus
that make the pathway close
we will follow the steps of Jesus
where e'er they go
then and last when on high he sees us
our journey done
we will rest where the steps of Jesus
then and is grown
Footprints of Jesus
that make the pathway close
we will follow the steps of Jesus
where e'er they go
Thank you.