Amen. All right. If you want to take your hymnals, we're going to turn to page number 259.
It's page number 259. Jesus saves.
beautiful sound, Jesus saves, Jesus saves, spread the tidings all around, Jesus saves,
Jesus saves, bear the
Tell to sinners far and wide, Jesus saves, Jesus saves,
St. E. Islands of the sea echo.
Jesus saved, Jesus saved, by His death an endless life.
Jesus saved, Jesus saved, sing it song.
Jesus says, Jesus says,
Shall salvation fall and free,
Highest hills and deepest caves,
This our song of victory.
Jesus says, Jesus says.
Have a bulletin, please share it next to you.
I think we ran out a little quick today.
But the verse of the week is John 5, verse 24.
John 5, verse 24.
Verily, verily, I say unto you,
he that heareth my word,
and believeth on him that sent me,
hath everlasting life,
and shall not come into condemnation,
but is passed from death unto life.
That is John 5, verse 24.
All right service times are at 10 30 a.m. On Sunday and 3 30 p.m. In the afternoon
On 6 30 p.m. On Wednesday evening
So many times we're yesterday at 10 30 and today will be at 1 p.m.
Salvation's report is 7 for July so
For July 0 for August so far
All right, that brings us to a total of nine for the um, that's incorrect 59. I see what they did there
59 for the year so far
Alright, and attendance is at below.
I've kept making events on August 9th, which is next Saturday,
will be the church cleaning day.
And I'll be right after soul winning and food and supplies will be provided just like last time.
Alright, August 17th will be the song leader class between Sunday services.
So basically that's for all men.
to come, and it'll be in between services.
And basically, Remy's going to give us a lesson on how
to properly lead songs, just because you take it
doesn't mean you'll be mandatory to do that.
But if there's an emergency, you can come up
and actually take a position to make sure we can lead
singing songs unto the Lord, which we are commanded to do.
So it's always good to have people trained to do that.
August 23rd, which will be,
Few Saturdays from now will be my wife's baby shower, which will be 1 p.m. The registry is posted
I don't know how to give that to you, but I'm sure the ladies know they understand the whole registry thing
But that has been posted somewhere in the cloud. So
So it is there if you plan to come just go ahead and RSVP with miss Kylie
just so she's ready for everyone who may attend.
August 30th will be the Chini Soul-winning.
Go ahead and turn.
Ryan will have more details to come about that.
All right, August 31st will be the man's preaching night.
So for the man that wished to, remember,
no heresy, tie.
and times will be provided.
So that will come out, I'm sure we'll have a,
as we get closer, we'll have the line out
who's in what's order in the timeframe.
But that's all coming out.
So a lot of things coming up this month.
Kids, remember, it is Psalms 34-14 this week,
for the next two weeks.
So if you memorize that verse,
and you can recite it to Miss Kylie,
you will receive the reward of candy.
Because sugar links to the brain for kids. It is a direct link. If they receive it
Hopefully the words will come out that we want. Alright, so it's a good thing. Just look forward to that
And you have just about a month left to finish the Old Testament challenge if you're still on to doing that
So those are all the upcoming events
Preaching schedule will be Remy this morning, Jason this evening, and then we'll keep on to that routine.
Larissa just had her birthday, and then we have a couple weeks before the next one.
We have a lot of... August is full for this church, man!
Get those birthday gifts, you know comment because man they ain't going to stop once we get into this month here
All right. Hey, that's good to see but no anniversaries. So single men
I mean we got to fill this calendar up. So, you know, you got you got weeks now. I'm joking, but hey
Hey, amen. So we got that rules are all the same
If you have any further prayer requests, please just tell
Ms. Kylie or myself and we'll make sure they get entered into the bulletin.
So with that, let's turn to the Lord in prayer.
Holy Father, thank you so much for allowing this church.
All right, if you want to take your bibles, we're going to turn to Psalm chapter number 67
That's Psalm number 67
God be merciful unto us
That's Psalm number 67
And we'll sing it out on the first.
God be merciful unto us and bless us
and cause his face to shine upon us
that thy way may be known upon earth.
Thy saving health among all nations.
Let the people pray.
stations upon earth see
God shall bless us.
God shall bless us in all the ends of the earth.
excellent thing everybody with apology please pray for the offering all of us
make it to our heavily home
everybody. If you could go ahead and take your Bibles and turn to Romans chapter 14.
Romans chapter 14 and as our custom is here at Sure Foundation Baptist Church we read the entire
chapter before the preaching. Romans 14 the Bible reads
Him that is weak in the faith, receive ye, but not to doubtful
disputations, for one believeth that he may eat all things.
Another who is weak, eateth herbs.
Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not,
and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth.
For God hath received him.
Who art thou that judgeeth another man's servant?
To his own master he standeth or falleth, yea, he shall be holding up, for God is able
to make him stand.
One man esteemeth one day above another, another esteemeth every day alike, let every man be
He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord, and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it.
He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks, and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks.
For none of us live it to himself, and no man dieeth to himself.
For whether we live, we live unto the Lord.
And whether we die, we die unto the Lord.
Whether we live therefore or die, we are the Lord's.
For to this end, Christ both died and rose and revived, that he might be Lord both of
But why dost thou judge thy brother, or why dost thou set at naught thy brother?
For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ, for it is written,
As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.
So then, every one of us shall give account of himself to God.
Let us not therefore judge one another anymore, but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block or an occasion to fall in his brother's way.
I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself,
but to him that esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean.
But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably.
Destroy not him with thy meat, for whom Christ died.
Let not then your good be evil spoken of, for the kingdom of God is not meat and drink,
but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.
For he that is these things serveeth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of men.
Let us therefore follow after the things which make for peace and things wherewith one may edify another
For meat destroyed not the work of God all things indeed are pure
But it is evil for that man who eateth with a fence
It is good neither to eat flesh nor to drink wine nor anything whereby thy brother
Stumbleth or is offended or is made weak. Hast thou faith?
Have it to thyself before God.
Happy is he that condemneth not himself
in that thing which he alloweth.
And he that doubteth is damned if he eat
because he eateth not of faith.
For whatsoever is not of faith is sin."
Brother Kyle, could you please pray for the preaching?
Thank you, Lord, for the gift of your word.
Please bless the preaching that comes to me.
We are there in Romans chapter number 14. We're gonna look in at verse number 10 where the Bible says
But why does thou judge thy brother?
Or why does thou set not thy brother?
For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.
For it is written, as I live, say to the Lord,
every knee shall bow to me,
and every tongue shall confess to God.
So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.
The time I sermon this morning
is balancing your liberty in Christ.
Let's pray.
Dear Father God, thank you so much for the wonderful day.
Thank you so much for everything you do for us, God.
Thank you so much for this church that we have, God.
And thank you so much for everybody that showed up today, God.
I just pray that you'd bless everybody that's here.
And I just pray that you would fill us all
with your Holy Spirit, God.
And I just pray that you'd help me to preach words
that would be edifying and that would help the people
in this room.
And I pray that you'd help me to interpret this chapter well,
God, in a way that pleases you.
And I just pray that I could give something
to the people in this room that would help them
in their Christian life.
And Jesus, may I pray?
Amen.
title my sermon again like I said is balancing your liberty in Christ. We're
here in Romans 14 and this morning I kind of wanted to finish off the sermon
that I had started on Wednesday which was obviously from the same chapter which
was titled Mind Your Business and in that sermon I kind of focused on the fact
that the first part of this chapter Paul really focuses on the fact that we have
Add each other's throats over little things in the Bible or about the different things that we do maybe in our different in our daily life
they're different from each other and
I'm just gonna summarize a little bit of what I said just so that we're all on the same wavelength here
The reason I'm preaching this sermon though is because I wanted to finish this chapter
But also because I think that the principles in this chapter are just very edifying
And I think that they're very good for people to think about and I think that a lot of
Christians don't think about what this chapter is talking about in their daily life and it causes us to stumble into fall and
So just to give you a brief little summary of what I preach about on Wednesday if you weren't here
The first thing I said on Wednesday was that not everything is worth fighting over and I used in the very beginning this chapter
Paul's talking about people that you know think that you can or can't eat anything or that you you know
Can or can't celebrate, you know holidays or whatever and Paul basically just says like this idea
This is like a paraphrase obviously, but he's like not everything is the end. I'll be all
Not every doctor is worth biting people's heads over,
and he specifically caters that to babes in Christ.
And I just think that that principle though,
is just generally applicable as well,
even if someone's not a babe in Christ.
Like, you just realize not everything is,
not every doctor in the Bible that we see
is something that you need to go to war over.
Like, and just like, you have to like,
you know, go on this crusade to prove your point
how right you are.
And I think a good example that I've well is like,
at this church, we do not believe
that the Jews are God's chosen people.
point blank. The Bible is very clear that we as believers have replaced Israel in the New Testament.
Now we are chosen. Now we're a chosen generation. But here's the thing, if someone did come in here
and believe that, that is not the end of the world. I mean, that's like an important doctrine,
but it's not like so important to the point where I just could have no fellowship with someone or
that believes that. Or for example, if I went to an IFB church that disagreed with us on that doctrine,
I'm not gonna like cause a big scene about that and be like, wait a minute. What is this Israel
flag here brother? What are you doing? Like tear it down like it's like your uh what's his name
Gideon did that? I'm gonna tear this thing down like it's not that big it's not like that like
obviously we want to be right on doctrine but not everything that you're right about is worth
fighting over. That's what Paul kind of brings up in that sermon or excuse me in the in the beginning
Also I kind of talked about the fact that where there is no commandment or principle against something clearly laid out in the Bible
You have a liberty to decide what you want to do in that area of your life
And how you want to serve God in that area of your life and I just I didn't I don't think I don't know if I clarified this
But I should just clarify it right now
This is not talking about liberty in like clear commandments like when the Bible says thou shalt not steal
You can't just be like well, it's my liberty in Christ. I'm gonna steal if I want to and it doesn't apply there
Okay
But when there's something that's gray, like whether or not a Christian can or can't own a TV or, you know, read secular books or play video games or something like that,
when the Bible doesn't clearly address something like that, you have a liberty to decide what you want to do in that area of your life.
God doesn't expect us to do deep dives
into everything that we do in our life
because then you're just wasting your time.
And I was gonna bring up this idea that like,
some people be like, oh, I'm just not gonna shop
at this corporation because they're wicked.
But like, what I was bringing up in that sermon is like,
If you did a deep enough dive on everybody, you'd really find out that everything's wicked.
Like, we couldn't do anything in this world if you judged that.
Like, and I talked about like buying stuff from people, but also just like where you work at,
like going to the park with people that are sinners or something like that, right?
It's like, you can't live a life just thinking about that all the time.
And Paul says that we shouldn't be thinking about that kind of stuff all the time.
That's kind of one of his points in this chapter is that God is not like microanalyzing.
the end of, or the beginning of everything that descends down to you, like he expects us to live a
normal life. And in part that is just going throughout your day without having to just like
worry like, I'm walking on this sidewalk, but was this made by a reprobate? I don't know, maybe I
It's like, you just can't live life like that, okay?
And you shouldn't do that.
And the example that he used was that,
and people miss this a lot,
is that if you ate meat that was sacrificed to an idol,
if you did it ignorantly,
the Bible says you are not sinning.
That proves that God is not expecting you to know
the foundations of every single thing
that you do in your life.
And obviously that applies to the holidays,
but I'll get into that a little bit later on as well.
think the most important thing that I brought up though and I'll come before I start into this sermon proper is that
People we need to understand that people think differently about things and therefore we'll govern ourselves differently about things and
We shouldn't be judging our brothers and sisters in Christ in the areas where they are different from us in that regard
This is obviously within reason. Hopefully everybody understands that this is within reason. Okay, it's like
I don't even want to give an example of this, but I just want you to understand that when I'm talking about this, I'm talking about the choice of movie that someone will watch, or the choice of video game.
Because I again use the example how we can just think about things very differently.
Someone could be like, oh, you're playing a game on the Xbox.
Don't you know that Microsoft runs Xbox and Microsoft is owned by Bill Gates, and Bill Gates is buying all these farms to just raise up the prices for everything, and he's evil, and he's part of the Illuminati?
Dude, you're thinking about it that deep, because I am not thinking about it that deep, okay?
I'm just like, just playing a game, okay, whatever.
But again, it's like some if you think like that though, and you're just like it wounds
your conscience to support anything from Microsoft, don't do it then.
But where Paul was saying in this chapter is that is that you're wrong when you start
to judge other people for that because not everybody thinks like you and people come
to things to different conclusions on things.
why you do something is important in the sight of God.
Not just what you're doing,
but why you're doing it is important to God.
But that was kind of all like for liberty in Christ, but then Paul kind of balances this
idea here towards the end of this chapter and the first way he balances
The liberty that you have in Christ which again just to define that is where the Bible doesn't govern necessarily like where it doesn't give a clear command
On something that's what Christian liberty is
He's saying that something that should balance that out and make sure and keep it in check is that we will give an account to ourselves
to God one day. And we see this in verse number 11. It says,
Now obviously we know this account right here is not talking about salvation because salvation is 100% just by grace through faith.
The book of Romans has said this five ways of Sunday.
I'm not going to belabor this point very long,
but I just want to understand that this account that we're giving in this regard
has nothing to do with our salvation.
You are saved by your faith in Jesus Christ, period, at the end of the day.
However, what I've always kind of figured this verse to mean is that we'll give an account to God in
the sense that it maybe it'll affect like the rewards that we do or don't get in heaven.
People might disagree with that, but I don't know how you explain this verse any other way.
Like, what does it mean when it says that we shall give an account of ourselves to God one day?
You have to explain that away somehow.
And I think it makes sense that if God is like asking you about like why you're doing different things,
it could determine like what rewards you would or would not get.
and it kind of reminds me of like the picture that we saw in Corinthians where it's like the
woodhane stubble and then the precious you know jewels that it's burned in a fire like it's tested
and then what survives that fire is the rewards that you get at the end of the day. That's kind
of my thoughts on that. If someone has a different opinion I'd love to hear it after the service
but that's kind of just how I've always interpreted that. So this is to balance our liberty though
in Christ like
The fact that we will give an account to God for the things that we've done
Should naturally balance the things that we do in our life because you'll have to explain
Your reasoning and what you did and why you did it while you're on this earth
That should kind of be a thought that kind of makes you tremble a little bit
It makes you shake a little bit like be like man
Because you like I said on Wednesday
I can explain a way to everybody in this room why I do what I do in my life
But good luck when you're standing for God Almighty trying to do that. So it's like that's a nerve-wracking
Fearful thing I would imagine
But this is something that also should balance our liberty look at this next verse verse number 13 it says
Uh, let us not therefore judge one another anymore, but judge this rather than no man put a stomach block or an occasion to fall in his brother's way.
So, really quick before I get into that too, as well, on Sunday, I think it was last Sunday, I preached about, you know, judging people and how, like, people go crazy and think that you just can never judge anything.
That's obviously not true, and I, and I used to how Matthew, I talked about how Matthew 7 was, uh, talking about hypocritical judgment.
But here's another type of judgment that's wrong, and it's judging your brother and sister in Christ in the liberty that they have in their life.
all is saying right here.
It's not a good thing for us to do.
And what I was kind of saying,
that's why I titled the Sermon Mind Your Business last week
is because truly you should be focused
on your own life as a Christian.
Because when you're so obsessed
with what other people are doing,
it's gonna allow sins and errors to be present
in your life that you don't even see
because you're not paying attention.
Like we need to focus on what we are doing
and making sure that we're pleasing to God
and the things that we allow in our life.
Not judging someone else in what they're doing
They're not gonna give an account to you at the end of the day. They're gonna give an account to God Almighty at the end of the day
So let God judge them let God do his job. Okay, you don't need that
You don't have to worry about that because just casting judgment on someone for what they do doesn't really help them
Okay, there's obviously some nuance to that, but I'm not gonna get into that right now
But it kind of reminds me the story like in the Bible where you see like the Pharisee and then the sinner when they're praying to God for forgiveness
What's the Pharisee doing in his prayer?
He's not focused on himself.
He's focused on the other guy.
He's like, God, I think that I'm not like this publican is.
You know, he's like, says all of his good words.
He's like, I'm just so glad I'm not like this guy.
He's not focused on what he should be,
what should be himself, right?
So then the public gets forgiveness, why?
Because he's focused on himself.
He says, God be merciful to me, a sinner.
That's who he's thinking about.
Not other people he's thinking about himself.
And so the picture that one of the things we should draw
from that story is the fact that when we're focused
on other people, we're not gonna be doing what we should be
doing in our own lives.
If you focus on your neighbor's yard,
you're going to have weeds that pop up in your own yard.
And that's what you should be focused on in the first place.
Go to Matthew 529.
Matthew 529.
Obviously, I said that's in reason, so add your own caveats to that, please.
But Paul's just basically saying that we shouldn't be obsessing about what other people do in
their lives, like judging people in that regard, in their own liberties that they have in Christ.
Which again, just kind of brings the point as well, where it's just like ...
What business do you have judging what someone does in their day
when you haven't even done your own spiritual things for the day?
What I mean by that is like, you have no business worrying about what movie someone's watching,
what book someone's reading, what music they're listening to,
what they're doing with their family in their free time
if you haven't even read your Bible today.
If you haven't even prayed today, if you're not doing like the things that are actually listed out in the Bible,
you have no business focusing on what somebody's doing that's not actually clearly laid out in the Bible.
Let people be judged by God.
That's what he's teaching us in this chapter.
You guys are there in Matthew 5,
29 though. Here's what he does though,
that this interesting Paul before I get into that as well,
is that he's talking about that we should be focused on
judging ourselves from this verse.
Did we actually read verse 13? We did, right?
I'm lost up here. I'm just checking.
I'm like, wait a minute.
I was so far in the weeds,
I forgot where I was at.
I need to be worried about my own term.
But Paul's basically saying this, though.
He's not even just saying that we should be focused on judging
ourselves in the sense of what we allow in our life,
in the sense of whether it's good inherently or not.
But he's also saying this, you should
be focused on the fact of making sure
that you're not putting a stumbling block or some kind of snare
in someone else's way that would cause them
to fall in their Christian life.
And we're going to kind of see that here and so we should just kind of grab this from this as I kind of say that
That you when it comes to Christian liberty something that should balance that out as well is
That you need to make sure that your liberty is not causing other people to fall is not hurting other brothers and sisters in Christ
And the good example of that is where I have you guys out in 529 is this idea of like modest dressing
Now there's a big boost nowadays in like feminist ideas and Christianity
and most of them are just like unbiblical garbage like to be straight up with you like feminism
and Christianity does not blend very well at all okay sometimes they get some things right like
i mean a broken clock is right twice a day right even the catholic church gets some things right
like they like get the trinity right just you know sometimes people stumble into being right
with feminism it's the same thing like some of the things that they get right is that
Number one that men and women are equal in value. Obviously, they go a step above and they're like, you know
Actually, they go a waste of above. They're like women are better than men, okay?
Which is just not true either
But then also they'll be like, you know, we do anything a woman can do a man can do or anything a man can do a woman could do
Right if there was like, you know, there's no difference between male and female
It's like but there is though. Okay, and biblically we have different roles in this in this world
But to be clear, that doesn't mean that women are lesser than men, it means that we're just equal.
We just have different roles, okay? We're one in Christ Jesus.
There's things that women do that men don't do and there's things that men do that women don't do.
It's just how it is at the end of the day. That's how God designed it.
So if you have a problem with that, you have a problem with God, who's the Creator, right?
But with this idea of like,
Modest dressing up. I'm trying to even okay. Oh, I see what I did here. There's like a typo here
I'm like what is going on right here, okay?
With like feminism and stuff like that they get that kind of issue right here's another thing that feminism gets right though
It's the idea that marital rape is wrong
Now, I'll be honest with you guys, I cannot believe that there is people that actually defend this nonsense.
Like, this, like, idea that, like, a husband can just force himself on his wife is absolutely disgusting.
And it's absolutely absurd. And if you disagree with me on this, you're just wrong. Just point blank.
I don't know if there's any other way to say that. Like, it's just like, I don't...
People get, like, lost in this idea of being like, well, is it technical rape or not?
I don't care about none of that. What I do care about is this though, that your opinion on that matter should be this, that whether it's technical rape or not, what it is is disgusting at the other day.
It's morally reprehensible. It's a disgusting thing that should not be named in Christianity, okay?
And people, like, whether you're married to a woman or not, actually physically forcing someone to lay with you is evil. It's wrong. It's disgusting, okay?
And people, like, they'll get mad that I say that, but really, if you have a problem with what I'm saying right now, I have a problem with you.
just to be straight up honest with you.
Like, I don't care, like,
this is not Islam Baptist Church here, okay?
This is not Andrew Tate Baptist Church.
This is not Red Pill Baptist Church.
This is Sher Foundation Baptist Church,
where we actually believe what the Bible says,
and what the Bible says,
is that a husband should love his wife,
like Christ loved the church.
That's what it actually teaches.
So this idea like, we are not Islam here.
We don't hate women. We love women.
We think that they're good. We think that they're equal.
We have different worlds, but they're equal.
But this idea that this is just an okay thing,
you have lost your mind if you think that that's true.
That's not what the Bible teaches.
That's not the spirit of what the law teaches either.
So you can be mad about that all you want,
but I'm right and you're wrong at the other day.
So you guys are there in Matthew 5.29.
I literally cannot believe it though.
It's actually disgusting. It's disturbing.
For someone that has a daughter, for someone that has a mother, it's like, put yourself in their shoes.
Like, don't you think that that's evil, that that's wrong, that that's wicked at the end of the day?
Bizarre. People go on there and argue this. I don't...
Maybe I should just be careful what I say, but I just think it's disgusting truly to my core
I do it's weird that people try to justify that kind of nonsense
And I'm not talking about this gay version of rape let liberals talk about where it's just like oh if you could
Worse your wife into having you know time with you, right? Then that's great. No, that's not what we're talking about here, okay?
I'm talking about if you actually physically force that action, you are a disgusting person.
You need to get your heart checked if you think that that's okay, okay?
That is what I'm talking about.
Again, you're acting like a Muslim, not like a Christian at that point. Good night.
But here's something that feminists do get wrong, though.
And that's this idea of dressing modestly.
You guys are there in Matthew 25, 29, it says this.
It says, if I ride I offend thee, pluck it out
and cast it from thee, for it is profitable for thee
that one of thy members should perish
and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.
I've seen women go to this verse before and be like,
this is what Jesus is saying,
I should be able to wear whatever I want as a woman.
And if you have a problem with it,
then you should pluck your own eye out.
Now, the truth in this matter is this, is that we should realize that no matter what a woman is
wearing, we should never use that as men to justify lusting after them, okay? Because here's the
reality. We live in a sin-fallen world. There's going to be women out there that are not Bible-believing
Baptists. They're not going to ever dress like we think that they should. But at the other day,
it's your responsibility as a man to guard your eyes and to guard your heart and not use
their actions to justify that. You are responsible for your own eyes is what Jesus Christ is saying
But and I should bring this up too as well. This also goes for rape as well
There's like an argument among conservatives
Well, they'll be like, you know, it's important to determine like what a woman was wearing
To determine guilt and whether or not if she got raped or something like that
I was watching a video which just blew me away. It was this guy
Reacting to a Baptist preacher. I don't know what kind of stripe this guy was
But it's a stripe that I would never want to be a part of he got up there
And he said something like normal at first. He was like
me and my wife were like looking at these, you know, different stores that girls walk into,
and he was like, and nowadays there's more women that wear shorts than that wear skirts and dresses.
I'm like, okay, he's cooking with that right there. That's where he immediately stopped cooking,
though, okay? Then he goes on and he says this, he's like, I'm just gonna tell you guys right now,
he's like, I haven't said this for a long time, I'm gonna tell you guys right now. He's like,
if I was on the jury in a case of rape, and a girl was wearing like short shorts, he said,
He said, because a man's a man at the end of the day.
What in the world?
He's talking about straining at a nat and swallowing a camel.
That's like a pervert.
How disgusting of a person you have to be to even say something like that,
let alone behind the pulpit.
It's just unbelievable that like that.
The Bible does not make any caveat for what a woman is wearing in the Old Testament.
It just says, if you are a rapist, you should be stoned with stones.
You should be put to death.
You should surely be put to death.
So, again, to balance that, I'm not saying that it's good for women to wear just whatever
they want.
But I am saying this, no matter what a woman's wearing, for lust and in terms of obviously
forcing yourself upon her, that is way out of bounds, way just disgusting, okay?
Where are we at here?
I'm talking about, oh, this is another thing I saw from this verse that I wanted to bring
up too as well.
There was a story, I don't know if you guys saw this a while back where this, like, I
But this guy went in there and like shot the people up that were inside there because he was like,
they were just tempting me to sin because they were all dressed and modestly.
It's like, what in the world is like, this like incel weirdo behavior is super bizarre.
Like, again, straightening out of that and swallowing a can was like,
she's dressed and modestly, so I'm just gonna go mow them all down.
That does not make you righteous. Okay, that shows like how wicked your heart is because again
What do we see from Jesus is that if I ride a I offends the you plug it out. You don't go hurt someone else
bizarre
Talking about dressing modestly though, then you get back on the dragon blossoms kind of these stories, okay?
It's our job as Christians because people when I was about like women saying like I guess we're whatever I want
Listen, the Bible tells you that you're supposed to dress modestly in Timothy
But also in Romans 14 what we just read is that we're not supposed to be a stumbling block for other people as well
I don't know how you could argue that a woman dressed up like a taught the Schmatte is not
like causing a stomach block to other people, right?
It's not good.
If that's a word you don't know,
it's because it's like a word I basically made up, okay?
It just means someone not dressing good, okay?
It's your interpretation.
So I'm speaking in tongues behind the whole bit, okay?
But even like speaking about this too like I don't know if you guys I don't know if you guys are on your feed
You're getting bombarded with all this American Eagle stuff the Sydney Sweeney stuff
This is like blowing me away about all this stuff like I was like getting a bunch of like ads for this and like they're like
Oh, they're trying to call this girl a Nazi and I'm like what's going on like where are they doing that?
And then I go and like watch the video and it's like you can only watch like 10 seconds of the video
because she's dressed up like a hoochie mama in the video.
She's talking all seductive.
She's making bad innuendos.
And it's just like, but it was bloody ways
that this is what the conservative party was rallying
behind, like conservative.
What are we conserving anymore?
Like the right for women to dress up like whores and ads,
that's what we're conserving.
I guess they're mad, I guess they're
They're happy because it's not a tranny, which I guess that is some kind of a win, I guess, or whatever.
But it's just like, we have like, people like rallying behind a girl who's dressed like a whore on an ad online.
The conservative party, it just shows you how far it's fallen. It's useless nowadays.
That's what they're conserving. That's what they're obsessed about.
Really weird to me.
Go to Romans 14 verse number four again, if you love your place there, Romans 14 verse number four.
This idea of not being a stomach block to your brother and sister in Christ though
And that was all just modest related so I just had to get that all out there
This idea of not being a stomach block in Christ though applies to
Every Liberty that we really truly have
Like I already told you guys this first one like about the holidays
I already told you like if you think that Easter and Christmas are pagan you're just wrong at the end of the day
Okay, there's I don't know how to say besides the fact that you're just wrong
But here's the thing if someone did believe that I wouldn't argue with them about it
I wouldn't make a big deal about it
I wouldn't like fight with them over it especially if they're a new babe in Christ that comes to church because
What is the point of offending them over that, right?
That's also why I'm really not the biggest fan of like holiday decorations in the church,
like putting up the Christmas trees, putting up the Christmas lights and all that kind of stuff,
because you might think like that's kind of dumb, and to be fair it is kind of dumb,
that someone would look at a Christmas tree and be offended about it.
But here's the thing, if I can avoid offending people,
Over something that's useless. That's pointless. That's what I'm gonna try to do as a Christian
I think that that's walking charitably. That's what we see from this passage here from Paul
So if someone is gonna look at a Christmas tree, it's gonna smite their heart and like oh
Pagan it's trying to manipulate you right? I'm just like, okay. We don't need a Christmas tree then that's just my opinion
Same thing with food if someone was a vegetarian or a vegan
She was like if I knew that they're coming over to my house
I'd make a meal that doesn't have meat in it and it's like if they came to the church
I'm not gonna like pivot my sermon to offend them like
I was going to preach on Romans 14, but now the title of my sermon is
Rise, Peter, Kill, and Eat, okay?
It's like, just some stuff like that.
It's just like, it's not really the point to offend people over.
Here's another example that I didn't really use last week, though.
There's a kind of an argument that people have with when it comes to like breastfeeding whether you should breastfeed covered or uncovered
Which just to tell you what I think about that
I'm kind of surprised that people make a big deal about that because to me like it's just like who really cares
Like you're just trying to feed a baby. You know what I mean? Like when I went to Malawi Africa on a missions trip
It's they were not breastfeeding like how American girls do a lot of time like they're like all like shy
It's just like you just like it just like
Baby on like no discretion no discernment or anything about it. Okay, and it was a little jarring at first
But you just gonna get used to like the cultural difference. Okay a difference. Okay
But it's like people make like a really really big deal about the like you got to like put in your prayer tent
So you can feed your baby or you got to like go hide away like you're doing something sinful to feed your baby
I'm just like really like that's where we're at
But again, I bring that up because though. I think that's silly
I do still think that if people really I do get offended by that you shouldn't offend them in that area because what's the point?
You know what I mean?
Like what is the point of being offensive when you don't need to it's kind of the really the whole theme of this chapter
But some people I guess would probably say like
Well, it could make a man like lust after that.
It's like, if you're lusting after that,
you have way bigger problems.
You weirdo.
You need to go get your heart right,
because that's bizarre.
That's really weird.
Talked about movies last week like someone thought that TV was wicked. They thought electricity was evil
Okay, we can you can come over I'll turn the lights off at my house or something
Probably not okay, we're gonna have a candlelight service because brother Amish is coming to town. Okay
Also kind of a
There's another one that I think is kind of silly the cussing I've said this before but it still does blow me away like people
Like get super offended about cussing like to the max. They're just like
I can't believe that they would say this four-letter word that means, you know, feces.
You got to use a different four-letter word that means the same thing.
It's like, okay, seriously, but like...
bring this up though because like people really get offended about this kind of
stuff and I'm just like we're talking about words here just what like obviously
there's some things that people can say that are pretty vile I understand that
and if you grew up in a house where it's not where you were taught not to cuss I
also understand that but it's just like when people get like like they'll be
with a little judge your whole spirituality
Based on like a few words that you say I just think that that's bizarre and I don't think that's biblical
Okay, like I've had now two separate co-workers two separate co-workers from two different companies that I've worked for now
Come up to me and tell me I know that you're a real Christian because
You don't cuss at work and then every time they do that they always bring up somebody else at work
That's a Christian that cusses and they're like unlike
so and so over here that says he's a Christian and cusses and I'm just like
That's your judgment of whether someone say or not is whether they're cussing or not like come on man
But people still they like I saw someone say like cussing is a litmus test on someone's heart and where they're at spiritually
Is it really though like?
We're, I don't know, again, we're talking about,
we're like, I can see things in the Bible like,
God does use euphemisms for things in the Bible.
Usually when it's talking about like body parts he does.
Like he says like your stones,
he says your privy member,
he says your secret parts, he says stuff like that.
So that I more so understand.
But we're talking about like words like that mean feces
or that means like female dog.
I know you guys are thinking about the words
as I say this to you now, but it's like,
but we just, you just can't name it.
It's like, I don't know.
I just, it's kind of weird to me.
Here's another thing that I think is weird too,
I'm just random about things that I think are weird right now.
But when people get super judgmental as well,
when you're replacing cuss words
with something that's not a cuss word,
it's like, I have people be like,
if I say like, you know, what's flipping that, or whatever,
and you're like, ooh, don't you know
that that really means the effort of, it's like,
I don't know, I just think it's a phariseical attitude, I really do.
It's like if God can replace words like stones,
which we all know what it's talking about,
and use euphemisms,
then why can I not do the same thing for different words, right?
I don't know. Again,
there's probably some nuance and discussion that you could have about those kind of things.
But it's like, if I'm trying to replace a word so that I don't offend your weak heart,
then why are you judging me for it?
Because I'm trying to at least reach out something for you.
Reach out something back to me and like give me a little bit of grace too as well.
You know what I mean?
Romans 14 verse 14, it says,
No, I know and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus
that there is nothing unclean of itself,
but to him that esteemeth anything to be unclean,
to him it is unclean.
Just briefly on a pause on that,
what Paul is talking about in context here
is talking about food.
Cause I've seen people go to bizarro extremes
with this kind of verse too.
Like some girl I saw one time,
this is a long time ago about online,
she was just like,
Someone was saying that pornography was a sin and she was like quoted this verse and the verse where it says to the pure all things are pure.
She was like, it's only a sin if you're, you know, not a pure person.
It's like, this is not what this is talking about here.
Okay, you way out to lunch on that one.
Okay.
Yeah, this is he's talking about like food right here specifically and probably holidays, right?
And this is probably some other things that fall into that branch. You have to grab the context of what Paul is saying here
He's not just saying every literal thing. Okay under the Sun is like that
Where we had Romans 14 we're gonna go to Romans
No good a mark 940 real quick not mark 9 verse number 40 and keep your finger there Romans because I'll probably read a couple
Verses from there before we go back
The thing I want you to grab in this version I kind of made this point last week, but it's really true is the fact that
Something can be 100% sinful for you and not sinful for other people.
And people think that that kind of sounds weird at first, but it really is true.
That's what he's teaching us with this chapter, that how you view something can determine if it's sinful or not.
This is not talking about clear commandments. This is talking about gray areas and liberties again, just to be very clear about that.
Because some people just think about things in different ways and that's okay.
But just you thinking that something is sinful.
when you don't have a verse behind it or when you don't have like a clear principle against it,
is does not mean that it's sinful for other people. What I mean by that again is this,
is I had a cohort one time I was telling them that for Karina's birthday we took her to Disneyland.
We had like a whole trip about it like we went to faithful word LA down or it was no it was first works at the time
Yeah
Still now it is too as well, but it was it was first works then but we went down there
We have like a weekend trip and we took her to Disneyland and I was telling my co-worker about this who is
Christian in name, but that's literally just about it.
And he was super judgmental about it.
He's just like, oh, he was like,
I thought you're like a Christian.
Why are you taking your kids to Disneyland?
And I was like, I was like, I was,
I couldn't even believe he was like,
because I just thought I was safe
in the clear of bringing this up to him.
And he's like.
Don't you know that Disney supports all these wicked thing and does this and that and I was like no to be honest
I didn't know that because that's not what I spend my time doing
I don't spend my time researching what Disney does in their political leanings and what they do with their money or their lobbying or whatever
Okay, I don't care
But I just bring that up because like to him. He's just like you're supporting a wicked evil corporation
How could you and I'm just like I'm just trying to make sure my daughter has a happy birthday. You know what I mean?
But it's like, again, that's just the difference.
If he thinks that, though, that's okay,
then he should not take his family there.
But why is my Liberty Judge of another man's conscience?
Is what Paul said in First Corinthians
like we saw last week.
Again, if that offends you in this room,
if you're feeling the Disney hate river,
don't go to Disneyland then.
That's you.
That's not everybody else though.
Not everybody thinks like you.
That's what we should understand.
We should grasp from this.
Just because you think something is wrong. It doesn't mean it is wrong when you don't have a verse right behind it
Obviously is what I'm saying. Okay, but also to balance about balancing Liberty
Here's another balance that Paul brings up right here is that when you do something in your liberty with Christ
You have to consider the people around you look what it says in verse 15. It says Romans 14 15
I need you guys turn away from it, but if you have your finger there, hopefully you just look at this verse. It says
but if thy brother be grieved with thy meat,
now walkest thou not charitably,
destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ died."
Some people, again, our brothers up earlier,
they think that if they're just right about something,
that's just the green light to go and offend.
Anybody that disagrees with them,
This is not spiritual. This is not a spiritual attitude is what Paul is saying here again
I've said this before I think but it's like that's people think that because that's what conservatives teach nowadays that being as
Offensive and as jarring as possible is being righteous and being good
That's not what Paul is saying right here though
He's saying there's some things that you could be so right about that you're actually wrong about and how you betray and how you
Behave and how you interact with people is what he's saying because I just want you to remember this again
Who's right in this argument here?
The person who thinks that there's dietary restrictions
in the New Testament, or the person who thinks
that they can eat everything they want to.
This person right the person who thinks that they can eat everything that they want to is right
100% Paul makes that very clear from this chapter
And he said that there's nothing inherently sinful about eating pork or about eating shellfish in the New Testament
Those things are done away with in Jesus Christ
But he says this if you use that Liberty though to hurt your brother in such in Christ to destroy them
Then you are sinning
then you're not walking charitably anymore.
And so you should just grasp from that
that your liberty ends where it begins
to hurt the people around you.
And that's an important thing to realize
in this whole chapter is that just being right
about something does not mean that it's not sinful, okay?
Because you can be right to death
about being able to eat whatever you want to.
But again, I think this is going to get forward, but it's really true.
Someone comes in that you know is like a vegan, or you know is a vegetarian,
or you know is like a Jew or something like that.
You're like, here we got this, you know, pulled pork sandwich for you, buddy.
Like, here you go, right?
And then they leave church where they get all offended about it.
You don't even get a chance to preach in the gospel.
What was it worth it at the end of the day?
Like, you just got that little moment of joy and exerting the fact that you were right.
You know what that comes from though?
It just comes from pride.
It really does.
contention comes from pride and like the reason why we want to destroy people just like just wreck
these libtards and and just absolutely decimate these people that don't agree with us a lot of it
comes from pride at the end of the day because we want to be right and and it's like that pride
with pride comes contention is what the bible says
I want you to notice as well though this verse that we just read it says destroy not him with thy
meat for whom Christ died. This is the second time that Paul brings this up so I really think that we
should stop and pause and think about it for a moment that like his argument here is that you
should be mindful for how you treat other people that come to church that are saved that are in the
faith because of the fact that Christ died for them and like when you really kind of think about it
Christ didn't just shed his blood to save you individually as a person, he died to save all of us.
And if Christ cared about every single individual that saved enough to shed his blood for them,
and he looked past all of our faults and all of our sin to die for us,
how much more should we, you know, keep that moving forward with the people that are in this room?
And with other brothers and sisters in Christ that will meet in the faith.
Romans 14 verse 16 it says let not your good then your good be evil spoken of it says for the kingdom of God is not
Meat and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost
I also want you to notice this argument that Paul brings up right here
and why we shouldn't offend people over minor doctrines.
And he says it's because of this.
It's that the kingdom of God is not meat and drink,
it's righteousness, it's peace,
and it's joy in the Holy Ghost.
What is he saying when you boil that down?
He's saying this, as a Christian,
you should think about the big picture of things
and how you behave on a daily basis.
Like so many times we wanna just let like,
our emotions in one moment determine like our actions and what we're going to do,
but Paul's telling us that if we want to be spiritual as Christians,
we need to know our end goal and then make our actions line up with that goal.
Like for example, talk about like you know church building and stuff like that.
If you want to build a church so that you can do more works for God than he
submits to us here that just offending people over things that don't matter is
not the best strategy to do that at the end of the day. And Paul's really his
because his message from this is this. He's like whether someone celebrates
Christmas or Easter is not gonna matter in heaven one day.
Whether someone eats meat or doesn't eat meat is not going to matter up in heaven one day.
What he's saying?
He's saying this is what does matter though.
The divisions you cause by fighting about stuff like that.
The people you push out of church by arguing about stuff like that.
The works that don't get done because people can't even fellowship together in a church.
He's saying, that is going to matter one day in heaven.
And that's what you always need to go back to and think about.
Like, your actions at the end of the day
should always be reflecting the bigger picture in life, which
is the fact that we are not here just
to have a good time on this earth.
We are here to build the kingdom of God.
You always got to go back to that in your mind as a Christian.
Because if you miss that, then you'll
start to behave, not spiritually start to behave carnally,
is what Paul is teaching.
And if you just kind of thought about it at the other day,
With all of these things that like what your end goal is you just truly realize that just being right about something isn't as important
As you know risking the work of God
Romans 14 verse number 18, it says this, it says,
for he that is in these things, serve with Christ,
or he that is in these things, serve with Christ
is acceptable to God and approved of men.
Again, what is Paul saying here?
He's saying this, he's saying that if someone's
serving God in righteousness and in peace and in joy
in the Holy Ghost, they're on the right track
and they're approved of God and of men.
What does that mean?
What is he saying by that?
He just is saying this is that when people
are generally doing the right thing,
we shouldn't be at their throat as a Christian.
This, like, you can apply this a lot of different ways.
Like, if I, like, know of a Baptist church
that is, you know, right on salvation, King James only,
they have a couple other key doctrines.
The other minor doctrines that we don't agree on are not going to be a big deal at the end of the day.
Because what we're seeing from this is what Paul is saying is that if they're trying to serve God
and they're moving in the same direction as us and we're all trying to move towards serving Jesus Christ,
just because they're not in our specific lane or path,
It doesn't make a difference the other day.
He doesn't know what I mean.
Like, just because someone doesn't believe every single doctrine
that I believe, that doesn't mean that I can't fellowship with them
or hang out with them or have a good time with them.
Like, obviously, big things, we should always keep that in mind.
But again, as I've said before, not everything is the end of the world.
You guys are there in March 9th, 40.
This is biblical, what we see.
It says,
for he that is not against us is on our part.
Some people will have this attitude where it's just like,
if you don't exactly agree with what I think
about every single subject, you are my enemy.
If you're not in my club, you are my enemy.
You're not doing what's right.
That's not the attitude that we see
from Paul right here though.
He says this, he says,
for he that in these things serves Christ is acceptable to God.
And what things was he talking about?
Not the meat and drink, not the holidays,
but in serving God and righteousness and in peace
and in joy in the Holy Ghost.
That's what he's talking about.
He's saying that generally to say this,
if someone's on the right path,
that they're doing good things for God,
even if they don't lock step, line up with you,
they shouldn't be your enemy.
You shouldn't be attacking them.
You shouldn't be hindering them.
Because when
You do that and when you cause division with people like that,
what you're really doing is you're hurting the work of God at the end of the day.
Because I want you to understand this, division is the enemy
of the work of God. That is why the devil wants to split
churches. That's why the devil wants to make people that
believe like 99% the same hate each other and be at each other's
throats. You know why? Because when they're at each other's throats like that,
doing the work of God is what it is and so that's why the Bible all over the
New Testament it talks about unity like how we're supposed to be like one in
mind one in spirit like we're supposed to have like you know a good fellowship
with each other but unity does not just mean that you are 100% conformed like
you just have to believe every single thing that I believe like let me just
give you a good example I would say this I harp on the old I FB a lot and it's
probably because of this probably because they tick me off when they have a
And partly because of this though, as well,
I don't want them to bring their teachings to our church,
but also because I actually care about them the day.
Because the people that you care about the most,
you actually get the most frustrated with
if you actually realize that in life.
Like, I love Baptists and I love people that are saved,
I love brethren, but it really makes me mad
when I know that they're preaching stuff
that's just absolute garbage, okay?
So that's why I preach kind of hard about that.
But like to be clear, if someone came in
and they didn't believe like us,
or if I was going and visiting another church,
I'm going to try to be peaceable with them, okay?
And I'm going to try to get along with them to the best of my ability
because that's what God wants from us.
Truly, and we see this in this chapter as we move forward.
But, like, just because someone doesn't line up with me perfectly,
that doesn't mean that they're an evil person.
That's what God is teaching us right here.
Obviously,
Add your own caveat to that and I would say this as my own caveat to this is that
Sometimes splitting and fighting is necessary. There is things to fight over. There is some things to split over
Okay, just to be clear
But you should just kind of realize that whatever you're gonna split over whatever you're gonna fight over
It should be because if you allow that to stay in
Fellowship with you or next to you that it's actively hurting the kingdom of God
Okay, it's kind of the difference that you should see in that regard
But just to be clear, there's a lot of good people in IFB churches
Like the guy who like I talked about this before the guy who taught me a lot about prayer
I think is a really really great man
And I see that he loves God and he doesn't believe there's if we actually went up and compared doctrines
We probably are off on a lot a lot of things
But you know we're in lockstep on faith alone for salvation the King James Bible and soul winnings
You know what? I'm like I can get along with him. Okay?
He thinks the Jews are chosen if he thinks that the rapture can happen at any time if he there's actually a lot of stuff
I want you to do that. I disagree with him on but that's what my point is like
It's not that important at the end of the day. Okay, I can still fellowship with him
Romans 14 verse number 18
God looks at people's heart not at like a checklist of doctrines that they have to did they have to believe to be a good person
Okay
Romans 14, verse number 18, it says,
for he that in these things serve with Christ is acceptable to God and approved of men,
let us therefore follow after things which make for peace and things wherewith one may edify another.
I just want to realize that this is like three consecutive chapters that Paul has brought up this
idea of peace in. Like in chapter 12, he says if it be possible as much as the life when you
live peaceably with all men. And then in Romans chapter 13, he's talking about living peaceably
with the higher powers. And then right here, he's saying that with brothers and sisters in Christ,
you're supposed to try to live peaceably with them as well. And I think that you should grab from
that this. We naturally are going to tend towards division. We're naturally going to tend towards
fighting. We're naturally going to tend towards being at each other's throat. And God doesn't
When people are at peace and they're not thinking about whatever, you know, their brother and sister in Christ is doing,
then that's when you're going to be able to do the most works for God.
Matthew 5.9 says this as well. It says,
Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God.
I just want you to understand, being a peaceful person is a good thing for the Bible.
Like if someone just...
always seeking to fight with people,
that's not a good quality to have.
Just always looking for a fight,
always looking for division,
always looking for strife.
That's not a godly quality.
That's not a quality that's part of the fruit of the spirit.
Supposed to be love, joy, and peace
is part of the fruit of the spirit, right?
That's what shows that you're living Christ-like
is what the Bible's talking about there in Galatians.
It's like being a meek person is not being a weak person.
You should understand that as well.
And that,
You know, diffusing situations and not blowing things up and not making mountain out of molehills is a good quality to have as a Christian.
Because we want peace.
The devil wants contention. The devil wants division. The devil wants to separate people.
But you got to look past just your emotions. Again, what is the theme that he's trying to tell us here?
Look past your emotions in that regard.
and think about the big picture the other day.
And what is the big picture that we're only here
for a short time, so we should do as much work
for God as we can.
And the way that we're gonna do that is by being
in unity with people, not in division with people,
even if they're not lockstep with you on every single thing.
Romans 14.
Verse number 20, I didn't even bring this up, but I probably even should too.
This is another thing that the conservative party, I could just preach a whole sermon against the conservatives and the liberals.
Good night, I won the world.
Okay, just to balance it out, okay?
But like, seriously, this warmongering attitude that comes from the conservative party is not a good thing either.
Not in the New Testament.
The Bible says that we don't fight against flesh and blood.
We're not supposed to be fighting like a carnal warfare. We're supposed to be fighting a spiritual warfare in the New Testament
So like I don't know how Christians ever got duped into thinking they're just going over and blowing up a bunch of Muslims
And the Middle East is a good thing. That's not what the Bible teaches
It says bless are the peacemakers and then like all throughout the new test new testament
It's focused on peace and having love for people
But then like Christians that's like the one time Christians want to actually go back to the Old Testament
And so they can kill people and so they can fight people is what that's all that's all they use the old
Testament 4. They don't care about Leviticus 2013. They don't care about none of that other stuff.
But, David went and fought with people. So that's what I'm sticking with, brother.
Okay, but in the New Testament, though, we're called the peace. We're called not
to be fight. Like, and I get you get into a lot of stuff like that, but it's like,
what is America doing meddling in other people's businesses in the first place?
It's not a responsibility. We're gonna go fund a bunch of people to kill each other.
We're gonna take down like an evil government just so they can rise up
Why are we focused on that as America? Why don't we focus on the problems that we have here?
Because we have a lot of problems in America nowadays.
I don't care about what Ukraine is doing. I don't care about what the Middle East is doing.
They're always going to be fighting, okay?
Why isn't America focused on being righteous and focusing on putting its money and its effort here?
The American people need the American government.
Why are we sending money to Israel?
They hate Jesus Christ. They hate everything that our American values supposedly stand for.
It's nonsense. But again, how do Christians get duped into believing that stuff?
It's because they don't go with what the Bible says. They do what Fox News tells them.
They do what Newsmax tells them. They do what Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck
tell them if they were even around. So I'm sure that those are both goners.
The last time I saw them, they're pretty old, okay? But
look, we're going to get some modern. Who's the modern? Tucker Carlson.
He's not even Fox News anymore. He got kicked out. Candace Owens. Oh wait, she's not a part of that
Who do we got left? Jordan Peterson, he's a great guy, right?
Wrong big time, okay?
I like some of Jordan Peterson's stuff, but the dude is not...
a good Christian. Okay, I'll just I'll just leave it at that for right now. Okay?
Romans 14 verse number 20 being like in both senses in a spiritual sense and in
a physical sense just fighting and warring with people is not good. We
should look for peace as Christians. Romans 14 verse number 20 it says,
All things indeed are pure, but it is evil for the man who eateth with offense.
It is good neither to eat flesh nor to drink wine nor anything whereby thy brother
stumbleeth, or is offended or is made weak.
If you know that something offends someone, don't just rub it in their face just to be
offensive.
That's not a godly quality, okay?
So if you know that that natural deodorant offends me, don't be trying to send me no
natural deodorant in the mail, okay?
That's a joke, okay?
A little crunchies out there.
But we shouldn't really, like if you know something bothers someone, don't just defend them in that regard.
Keep it to yourself. That's actually what we're going to see right here.
I think people miss this a lot as well. Look at verse number 22 of this. It says,
I just want you to realize this that like what Paul is saying right here is like if you disagree with people on
Something that's like a standard opinion. He says have that faith to yourself and before God
So if you disagree with what the majority of people say that doesn't mean you have to just go with the crowd
You can do your own things with Paul saying here. He says if you have faith have it before God
But here's what people usually want to do.
They want to tell everybody about what they're doing,
so that they can win them over.
Or just because they want to justify what they're doing.
It's like, they can't just go watch a movie in private.
They got to tell someone, oh, I went and watched this movie.
But it's not a bad thing, because it wasn't that gay
in the movie, OK?
It's like, OK.
Maybe keep that to yourself.
And maybe just don't do that in the first place, right?
But again, like I want you to grasp that that he's saying like if you have faith on something if the faith he's talking about
It's not just in God. He said about you're having faith in that what you're doing is okay
Okay, that's what he's talking about from the context. It's like just keep it to yourself then and keep it to God
If you just like abhor Easter and Christmas
Keep it to yourself because nobody else I'm sure believes that in this room. Okay, if you disagree about, you know
the the meats and stuff like you're like
Shell fishes of the devil or something like that. It's like you can believe that just keep it to yourself
But also in a regard where it's flipped like
Like, again, I probably brought this up on Wednesday, but it's so true.
People would be like, I was in a cult because they just controlled every aspect of my life.
How are you letting anybody control your life?
What are you talking about?
Do your own thing at your own house, okay?
Obviously, within your liberty of Christ, within something not being sinful.
But if someone, if everybody's telling you, like, this is sinful, this is evil, maybe
it really is, but also besides that, if you don't agree with them, you're just like,
You don't have to go with what they say.
You can do your own thing at your own house.
Is what Paul is saying here.
Have your faith alone to God is what he's saying.
If you, everybody in the church is like,
this movie is just whatever.
It's not like a really bad movie.
It's just like whatever.
They're just like, I'm trying to think of a movie.
This is why it's hard because I'm like,
you guys are going to pick
apart whatever example I pick up here, okay?
Airbind.
Airbind. There we go. There we go.
I mean.
Worshipping the creature out of their creator, that's wicked as hell.
That's what people do. It's like...
But yeah, it's something like AirBud. It's a good example.
It's just like, if everybody was telling you,
AirBud is of the devil, okay?
Don't watch it!
Why would you listen to them if you don't agree with them?
Don't listen! Go watch your AirBud if you want to, okay?
Go go do your own thing like truly I again said this but I'm just like
I don't care like I care about what people think in the sense that like I don't want to offend someone by my liberty
But if someone looks at what I do in my free time and they have some kind of problem with it
And I truly to the bottom of my heart don't believe it's wicked. I'm gonna do it anyways
Sorry, if you don't like the books that I read if you don't like, you know
The movies that I would watch if you don't like the video games that I would play if you don't like the hobbies that I would do
That's cool
I just don't care about what you think to be honest like in that regard. I again, I care about not offending you
but when you're judging me based on my liberty,
I don't care what people think.
Why are people not like that?
I don't understand, I could not be in a cult
because nobody could dominate my life like that
because I would never let that happen.
I'm gonna do what I want in my own house,
obviously within the bounds of it not being sinful.
And if it's gray or if it's questionable to you,
that's cool, don't do it at your house,
but you're not in charge of my house, I am.
And I submit to God at the end of the day.
So he's my judge.
Like, again, I already used that example last week, but it's just like, people like I used the example of the Odyssey that I was reading it because I'm trying to learn Homeric Greek.
I have a justification to that to myself. I am comfortable going up to God one day and being like, hey, I was doing this because I was trying to get a better understanding of Homeric Greek, okay?
I'm comfortable with that. If you're not comfortable, then don't do it, okay?
Not that you're probably going to be reading the Odyssey anyways, but it's like...
I just like I'm trying to balance this like idea of liberty and not being like sinful, but also like
Don't let people mind control you like you're some kind of sheep, okay?
That's not what we see from this chapter Paul
That's not what Paul wants from us in this chapter. Is it everybody needs to do the exact same thing. There should be a healthy
Difference in people's lives and that's okay, but we shouldn't judge each other for those differences. What does he say at the end of that verse?
He says
Happy is he that condemneth not himself
in the thing which he alloweth.
I want you to notice that as well,
that when he's saying that, he's saying this,
just because you do allow something in your life,
that does not mean it's good, okay?
He says happy is he that it condemneth himself
not in the thing that he alloweth.
If you're like a person, you're just like,
I just think that Game of Thrones is like a holy and righteous show.
You are way out to lunch and you are condemning yourself.
You could try to deny that as much as you wanted to, but that show is wicked.
That's like when I'm saying like these examples of like, obviously sinful, this is not in that category, okay?
Game of Thrones should not be in like the balances.
I only bring that up because I actually had a girl at work one time when I was in Portland for the water department.
She was asking like what I do in my time and I was kind of telling her some stuff and she's like,
I'm like, ew, I'm not watching this.
She's like, it's a really good show, though.
And I was like, I'm sure it is a good show,
because all the really good shows are the ones
that are super violent, nasty, because that's
what the devil's going to rope you into it, OK?
But I was like, no, it's pretty bad.
And I'm like, I just heard a little bit about it.
And I was already like, oh, yeah, that's not a Christian show.
And she told me, she was like, well, I
mean, it's kind of like a Christian show.
This is literally what she told me.
was like I don't really agree with that one pal okay I think that one's pretty
obvious okay yeah I don't know this girl's compass is way off but that's
the same girl that was like for her birthday she was gonna go to a strip
club she said to support single moms that's literally what she told us oh
okay she's not my beacon of morality there okay
We're gonna wrap this up here, though. Look what it says in Romans 14-23, though, it says,
And he that doubteth is damned if he eat, because he eateth not of faith, for whatsoever
is not of faith is sin. So the first thing I want to bring up about that is that, what
he's saying right here is this, is that if in your liberty...
You start to doubt what you're doing and think to yourself. Maybe this isn't a good thing. Maybe airbud is wicked or something
Okay, just like maybe the show is not very good. Okay, something like that
He's saying, at that point, you should stop it
because if you're doubting, then your conscience
is convicting you and you're going against your conscience,
which is supposed to help you do right as a Christian.
So that's why I said to you,
like things can be subjectively sinful.
Maybe that's not the right word for it.
Maybe I'm trying to, I'm not very educated
as you could probably tell, right?
I'm working on it though.
But like,
Like some things that are simple like like if you like I'm trying to think of a good example
Dang it. I should have wrote all these down. Okay, but like if you just like really like say you were watching like a movie
That you thought was this a good example
If you if you're watching a movie that you've watched in your childhood
You're like, oh, I thought this was clean and then you like have something stumble on the screen
You're like, oh, I forgot about this part when I was five years old. Okay
Turn it off at that point because then your conscious is convicting you right and it says that you're damned if you eat
And it's not saying like damned in the sense that you're gonna go to hell
Okay, obviously we understand that but it's about judgment
Then you are gonna be judged of God for doing something like that
You could be in your daily life because he says for whatsoever is not a faith is of sin
So if you start to doubt what you're doing, maybe there's a good reason for that
Maybe it's because what you're doing is not very good. You're just trying to justify it to yourself. Yeah
Lastly on this, though, I think that the brothers had a long time ago,
but Calvinists will use this verse to say that before you're saved,
literally everything that you do is sinful.
They're like, whatsoever is not a faith is of sin.
So if you help an old lady across the street,
when you're unsaved, wicked, evil,
because not a faith, sorry.
It's like, I had a guy bring this up to me when I was at work.
He really brought that verse up to me.
He was like, so you think it's evil to eat macaroni and cheese?
If you're not saved?
He's like, what does the Bible say?
It's like, oh.
But what it's saying here, if you actually
got the context of everything that we were breaking down,
is this, is that whatsoever is not a faith is a sin in the sense
that if you start to doubt what you're doing,
in your liberty, then it is sinful, okay?
So that's the context of this.
Not that helping old ladies across the street
when you're unsafe is a terrible, wicked, evil thing, okay?
Not everything about Calvinism nonsense.
Don't even give me a start on that, okay?
But like, I'm taking Brother Jason's role up here, right?
We're just waiting for that.
But again, yeah, as we're closing this, okay,
that's a nonsense argument.
Like, I don't even think of like,
like someone like Cornelius,
before he saved, he's doing good things for God.
And the Bible says he's doing good things, right?
How do you get around that?
I don't understand.
So just kind of ending the sermon is this,
is that
We have to have a balance to our liberty
that we have in Christ.
Like I'm like for doing things,
but like when it talks about keeping it to yourself,
if there's something that you know is gonna offend someone,
don't bring it up to them.
And I said this last week,
but it's really good to think about as well.
You don't need to tell everybody
what you do in your personal life
to be like 100% honest with you.
Because that's why I'm sitting here
serving with examples,
and I'm trying to think of myself as like,
if I bring up the wrong show about anything,
you just get like crucified for a big time, okay?
But it's like, again, I'm only doing that for examples,
but I really wouldn't recommend you just talking about everything that you do
because people naturally, as Christians, unfortunately,
we're going to judge each other, we're going to be judgmental about things.
But we should work on that and you should work on not being offensive
with the things that you allow in your life because then it does become sinful.
And again, the last point.
This is not a cult. You can do what you want at your house.
Please, I'm telling you this right now, please do what you want at your house
within the bounds of it not being sinful, okay?
I don't, I, you know how much I care about what you do at your house that's not sinful?
This much. Like a smaller than a grain of mustard seed, okay?
I do not care, and I hope you don't care what I do at my house because
if you do, I don't care what you think what I do at my house, okay? To be honest with you.
Anyways, with that all being said, let's pray.
Thank you so much for this wonderful day.
Thank you so much for everything you do for us, God.
I just thank you so much that you give us such balance
and such wisdom in the Bible, God.
And I just thank you so much that we have
godly principles that can help us to be unified
and to be joined together.
And I just pray that you would help us while we're out
souling, that we'd get people saved,
and that we would help more people to come to church.
And I just pray that you would build the church
and send more laborers for the harvest.
Jesus, I pray, amen.
If you want to take your hymnals, we're going to turn to page number 169.
It's page number 169.
Come Thou fount.
Page 169, we'll sing it out on the first.
found of every blessing. To my heart you sing thy grace. Streams of mercy never ceasing.
Call for Psalms of loudest praise. Teach me some aloneness on it.
safely I'll arrive at home. Jesus saw me when a stranger, wandering from the fold of God,
he to rescue me from danger, enter.
I thank you for everything you do to us, and I pray God that we just want to thank you for the liberty that we have with Jesus Christ, and I pray that you bless the food in the fellowship of the soul and in the Jesus name.