(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

🎵Music🎵 Let's take our sit and let's start our first service and get our hymns and turn to hymn number 324. Hymn number 324. Let's sing the song, Draw Me Nearer. I am thine, O Lord, I have heard thy voice, and it's all thy love to me. But I love to rise in the arms of thee, and be closer drawn to thee. Draw me nearer, nearer, blessed Lord, to thy cross where thou hast stopped. Draw me nearer, nearer, nearer, blessed Lord, to thy precious leading side. Consecrate me now to thy service, Lord, by the power of grace divine. Let my soul look up in a steadfast hope to the beautiful Lord. Draw me nearer, nearer, blessed Lord, to thy cross where thou hast stopped. Draw me nearer, nearer, nearer, blessed Lord, to thy precious leading side. O the pure delight of a single heart, I spend when I kneel in prayer. And with thee, my God, I communest when to pray. Draw me nearer, nearer, nearer, blessed Lord, to thy cross where thou hast stopped. Draw me nearer, nearer, nearer, blessed Lord, to thy precious leading side. There are depths of love that I cannot know till I cross the narrow sea. There are heights of joy that I may not feel I rest in peace. Draw me nearer, nearer, nearer, blessed Lord, to thy cross where thou hast stopped. Draw me nearer, nearer, nearer, blessed Lord, to thy precious leading side. We thank the Lord for this morning. We ask, O God, that you protect the members who are still coming here. I pray that you bless our first service from the congregation of singing, the reading of the word, and the preaching of the sermon, Lord. I pray that you would hug our pastor this morning to preach to us. And I pray that you would fill him with the Holy Spirit, O God. I pray that you would also help us, the members, Lord, and who are the listeners, to be attentive with the sermon, Lord. Forgive us for our trespasses, Lord. And I pray that you would also bless us a good letter this afternoon so that we can go out and preach the gospel. We're asking all of these things. We love you. Do the same for you. All right. Good morning, everybody. Welcome to Verity Baptist Church. And take out your bulletins here today. We'll go through some announcements. And our verse of the week is 1 Samuel, chapter 30, verse 24. The Bible reads, For who will hearken unto you in this matter? But as as part as they goeth down in the battle, so shall as part be that tarryeth by the stuff, they shall part alike. And that's a great verse. We'll tie into our second sermon. We are a family-integrated church, meaning children and infants are welcome during the services. We do have a mother-baby room back there for your convenience. We have some basic rules on the mother-baby room down there below. On the next page, we have our service times listed. First service is at 10 a.m. Second service, 11-15. The wind saving Bible study at 7 p.m. So many times listed there in the bulletin. 2 p.m. on Wednesday's meeting at Marikina Freedom Park. Of course, we have so many on Saturday, schedule announced every week in our group chat. And of course, we do have soul winning around 1-45 here today. Our salvation and baptisms are listed there for the year as well as the month for all of our churches. And as you can see in Manila, we broke our record from last year. We have already passed the mark. And actually yesterday in Pampanga, we also broke our record for a year as well. So praise God for that. On the next page, we have just our basic announcements on upcoming activities. So today, we actually have the Laguna Church service. We had to delay it for a week, so those members that are part of the Laguna Church service are down there today. Next week is our monthly prayer meeting. And our plan for our first Sunday in the new building is going to be in two weeks. So that is exciting. On October 6th, it's coming up very quickly. Obviously, going to a new building, there's a lot of small things you don't think about. I'm sure once we get in there, there's still going to be a lot of things that we need to make some adjustments and figure out. So obviously, be patient with us. But we're definitely excited about that. So in two weeks, we'll be moving there for the first service, unless we have another typhoon or whatever, you know. But hopefully in two weeks, so praise God for that. Coming up then in the end of November, Bonifacio Day, on that Saturday, we're going to have a big event in Tanay Rizal. So we'll have more information as we get closer to that event. Our birthdays and anniversaries are listed down there below. We have the basic rules of conduct there in the back. And you should have an insert in the bulletin for notes for the sermons here today. I do want to thank you for the prayers for my travels recently. And it's tough to adjust to a 12-hour time difference. So yesterday, I fell asleep at 6 p.m. I wasn't planning to fall asleep. I was trying to stay awake. And my head went down. And then my wife had to wake me up saying, hey, you need to move to the bed. Because I was just out. And so if I fall asleep during the sermon, the first man that comes up here, just take my notes and just finish the sermon. But actually, preaching keeps you awake when you're tired of it. I've learned that from experience. But anyways, that'll be it for announcements. We'll have Brother Marlon lead us in another song. All right, for our next song, let's start on hymn number 325. Let's sing the song, Cross and Obey. When we walk with the Lord In the light of His Word What a glory He sheds on our way While we do His good will He abides with us still And with all who will cross and obey Cross and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey Not a shadow can rise Not a cloud in the sky But His might quickly drives Him away Not a doubt nor a fear Not a sign nor a tear Yet above all we cross and obey Cross and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey Not a burden we bear Not a sorrow we share But our God He thought richly we'd make Not a gift nor a loss Not a frown nor a cross But He's blessed if we trust and obey Trust and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey But we never get through By the light of His love Until on the altar we lay For the favor He shows And the joy He bestows Not a man who will cross and obey Cross and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey Then in fellowship sleep We will sit at His feet Or we'll walk by His side in the wind What He says we will do When He says we will go Never fear only Trust and obey Trust and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey It's time to take our Titan offering For our script reading, please open your Bible to Macho chapter number 8. Macho chapter number 8. We will read beginning from verse number 1 to verse number 27. Please say amen if you dare. Macho chapter number 8 beginning from verse number 1 the Bible reads When He was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed Him And behold, there came a leper and worshiped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt thou canst make me clean And Jesus poured His hand and touched him, saying, I will be clean And immediately his leprosy was cleansed And Jesus said unto him, See thou tell no man, but go thy way So they stopped to the priests and offered the gift that Moses commanded For a testimony unto them And when Jesus was entered into Capernaum There came unto him a centurion beseeching him And saying, Lord, may servant Liet at home take up the palsy previously tormented And Jesus said unto him, I will come and heal him The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof But speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me And I say to this man, Go, and he goeth, and to another, Come, and he cometh And to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it When Jesus heard it, he marveled and said to them that followed Merely I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in sale And I say unto you, That many shall come from the east and west And shall keep down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness There shall be weeping in nothing of fear And Jesus said unto the centurion, Go thy way, and as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee And the servant was healed in a short same hour And when Jesus was come into Peter's house, he saw his wife's mother laid And sick of a fever, and he touched her hand and a fever leper And she arose and ministered unto them When the even was come, they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils And he cast out the spirits with his sword, and heard all that were sick That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying Him thought took our infirmities and burnt our sicknesses Now when Jesus saw great multitudes about him, he gave commandment to depart unto the other side And a certain scribe came and said unto him, Master, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest And Jesus said unto him, The passes have hold, and the birds of the air have nest But a son of man hath not wertalized his head And another of his disciples said unto him, Lord, suffer me first to go and burn my father But Jesus said unto him, Follow me and let the dead bury their dead And when he was entered into a sheep, his disciples followed him And behold there arose a great impasse in the sea And so much that the sheep was covered with a weight, but he was asleep And his disciples came to him and awoke him, saying, Lord, stay back, be fairies And they said unto them, Why are you fearful of your little faith? Then he arose in the view of the wind and the sea, and there was a great calm But a man marveled, saying, What man of man is this, that even the winds in the sea obey him? Let's pray. Alright, we're here in Matthew chapter 8 and we've taken a bit of a break from the book of Matthew And if you remember, we finished up with the Sermon on the Mount with Matthew 5 through 7 And so here in Matthew chapter 8, that's the context The Sermon on the Mount has just ended, the most famous sermon And it says here in verse number 1, when he's come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him And obviously Jesus was preaching to a big crowd during the Sermon on the Mount Great crowds are following him, and it says here in verse 2 And behold there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean And Jesus put forth his hand and touched him And it's really easy when we're reading through stories of the Bible to kind of quickly read over it And not really think about it, but it's pretty significant that Jesus touches this leper Now turn in your Bible to Leviticus chapter 5 And I would say that if you're an adult in this room, you've probably heard a good bit about leprosy Especially if you've read the Bible, but maybe if you're young in this room You might be like, well, what's leprosy? You don't really understand how this is a big deal But leprosy was a very dangerous infectious disease And it still exists today, just it's not as big, and it's kind of, they've found techniques to kind of heal it So it's a little bit easier But this was a disease where basically if you would get leprosy, you would be isolated or quarantined from the rest of the population They would realize you have this sickness, and it's a skin disease, so it could be seen And you would live in basically a leper colony, and the government would basically drop down food to you But you had to be a great distance from the population And if somebody saw you from a long distance, they could tell you had leprosy, they would just run away They would be afraid The Bible even says that if you have leprosy, cover your lip and scream, unclean, unclean Because of the fact no one's going to want to be near you because they're afraid they're going to get that disease from you Now Leviticus chapter 5, it talks about a lot of different uncleanness and situations And it says here in verse number 1 And if a soul sin and hear the voice of swearing, and is a witness, whether he hath seen or known of it If he do not utter it, then he shall bear his iniquity Or if a soul touch any unclean thing, whether it be a carcass of an unclean beast, or a carcass of unclean cattle, or the carcass of unclean creeping things And if it be hidden from him, he also shall be unclean and guilty Or if he touch the uncleanness of man, whatsoever uncleanness it be that a man shall be defiled withal And it be hid from him, when he knoweth of it, then he shall be guilty And so the Bible says whatsoever uncleanness a man has And what greater example could you think of than having this infectious disease of leprosy And so Jesus literally touches this man that has leprosy So imagine this, he's preaching, he's got thousands of people around him And all of a sudden this leper just kind of comes up I would imagine that the crowd just kind of basically ran away You know a large part of it, why? Because they're afraid And then all of a sudden they see Jesus go up and they see him touch this man I mean they're going to be completely bewildered They're going to be completely confused because that's the last thing you would ever do if somebody has leprosy You would avoid them, you would get away from them, right? You would be afraid of it It kind of reminds me, during the early days of COVID Before the disease had spread to other countries And it was kind of primarily in China There was a lot of YouTube pranks people had Where they'd be on the phone, it's like man my doctors say I have COVID And you'd see people just like run away, like really afraid And with leprosy, I mean if you were living during this time period And you saw somebody had leprosy, you would run away You would be very afraid of that person because you don't want to catch that disease, okay? Now turn to 2 Corinthians 6 Now in the Bible there's something known as the letter of the law And there's something known as the spirit of the law And it's a terminology given in the book of Corinthians And you know it's something that preachers will often mention And what that basically means, the letter of the law is literally what's written in the law You know, thus saith the law, do this or don't do that The spirit of the law basically represents the intent of the law So basically the letter of the law, the certain laws and rules that we have They have an intent or reason why they're actually in the law Now maybe in our government today there could be laws that are kind of pointless or not really useful But in the Bible there's a reason for every single law Now literally Jesus broke the letter of the law because the law says don't touch someone who's unclean, right? But what is the spirit or intent of that law? Well the intent of that law is that if you are clean and you touch somebody unclean You could get that uncleanness and more so you can spread that to other people So the intent of the law is, well if you do this it's going to cause an infection or uncleanness to spread Well here's the thing, Jesus did break the letter of the law but here's the thing He didn't have to worry about getting unclean by touching this man Because he's doing a miracle And he doesn't have to worry about I'm going to get this disease and spread it to other people So he's not actually breaking the spirit or the intent of the law Now of course if a Pharisee or a scribe or someone that was really against Jesus saw this They would immediately be horrified and be like, well thus saith Leviticus chapter 5, right? But of course what we see is that Jesus does this miracle and he actually heals this man Now this is actually what the Bible says but here's the thing What is the purpose for us today in this law? Because there's the literal do not touch someone that has uncleanness or you will be unclean What is the spiritual application? Because the Bible says all scripture is given by the inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine For reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness The question is how is this profitable? What does that actually mean to us today? Don't touch someone that's unclean Now obviously there's the direct application that if you have an ailment or a sickness Don't go out in public Or if you go out try to cover your mouth and make sure you're not spreading that disease And of course you know you as a person that are clean or healthy You don't want to be around a bunch of people that are sick because you might get that sickness as well, right? What is the Bible actually trying to teach us? Well notice what it says here in 2 Corinthians chapter 6 verse 14 Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you the temple of the living God, as God hath said, I will dwell in them and walk in them And I will be their God and they shall be my people Verse 17 Wherefore, come out from among them and be ye separate This is the main verse we use when we say the doctrine of separation Separating from those that are unsaved Separating from those that are ungodly Separating from those that don't want to serve God And it says here And be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing And I will receive you Now look, when you're reading the book of Leviticus It's not the most exciting part of the Bible, right? I'm actually in Leviticus right now And you know what? A lot of it you're reading about all these laws of uncleanness And they go to the priests They see what color is it in the skin And all these things you're like, what's the purpose of this? Well, what the Bible's reminding you over and over and over again Is touch not the unclean thing And what it's saying is, in a spiritual sense Touch not the unclean thing Separate from those that are living ungodly You say, what exactly are you talking about? I'm saying, don't sit in front of a television And brainwash yourself with the world's material I'm saying, don't sit here and listen to this rap and rock And all this garbage music The Bible says, touch not the unclean thing You say, why? Because if you are clean and you touch somebody unclean You're not Jesus You're not going to make what's unclean clean, are you? It's not going to happen But you know what could happen? You touch something that's unclean And you might actually be unclean yourself Maybe you've seen these videos before Where you have two things of water And you got the clean water At least I hope this is clean because I'm drinking this And you got the unclean water And you pour clean water into unclean Guess what? It's still unclean, isn't it? But you pour unclean water into clean What takes place of the clean water? It's now dirty I mean, if you wash your shoes and shine your shoes And they're perfect, they're immaculate And then you step in dog do or whatever Guess what? You made your shoe dirty You didn't make the dog do clean, right? That's just what takes place when something clean touches something unclean What's clean becomes unclean But people have this idea in a spiritual sense It's like, well, just eat the meat and spit out the bones You can just listen to whatever you want and watch whatever you want And you're just so spiritual that you will just find the small little nuggets of good information And discard all the garbage That's not the way it works, my friend If you sit here and listen and watch the world's garbage You're going to be filled with that stuff, right? What are some of the examples of this? Because, you know, in today's world, you know, there's a lot of opportunities with YouTube And the computer to watch all manner of things And one thing a lot of people do is they'll listen to a lot of politics, right? And they'll listen to maybe even conservative politics Now, look, if you listen to conservative politics in the US, it's Fox News Or you listen to news here There might be some good information But you know what? You're also going to get a lot of lies You're also going to get a lot of garbage Now, I'm not saying you can never pay attention to anything that is on the news I mean, I've been paying attention to what's happened to Apollo Kibbeloy recently But I'm just saying Just for my entertainment and enjoyment, right? But I'm just saying that if you sit here and just fill yourself with that hours and hours and hours all day long You know what's going to take place? You did not just make all of politics in this country become righteous You know what you did? You just made yourself a little bit unclean You just filled yourself with this Or, for example, in today's world, there are a lot of conservative podcasters One of the most famous guys, a guy by the name of Joe Rogan Right? And Joe Rogan, he's had TV shows He's a UFC announcer And in many ways, he's, I guess, a conservative podcaster But the guy, I think he's an atheist He's very blasphemous against God Here's the thing If you were to listen to Joe Rogan You would actually get a lot of good information Because a lot of what he says is actually true But you know what you would also get? You would get a lot of bad information And here's the thing You're not going to all of a sudden turn this blasphemous, foul-mouthed person Into a righteous and godly person You know what's going to take place? All of a sudden, you're going to start acting and talking like the world That is what actually takes place Go in your Bible to Psalm 101 Psalm 101 Psalm chapter 101 And in your personal life Don't hang around with ungodly people And think that you're going to make them righteous It doesn't work There's some people, they get saved And then, you know, they're like, well, I don't want to leave my church Because I want to try to reach them And it's like, look, a lot of us have tried that before Maybe you've stayed at Baptist churches Or stayed at churches that are wrong And guess what? Those churches never change, do they? They never change And I get it I've tried that before I've been at churches and I realize there's a lot of problems And I was like, well, let me try to help this church Maybe I can teach them, you know, about soul winning Maybe I can help clear up these doctrines they're wrong on And what ends up taking place? You end up being the bad guy You end up being the person that gets preached against, right? And what you're trying to do is make something unclean clean But it doesn't work that way Something clean is not going to make something unclean clean Unless you're Jesus, right? What's going to take place is you will end up being unclean I was actually reading this in my Bible yesterday before church in Psalm 101 And sometimes I try to read five Psalms a day in a month In addition to my Bible reading, you know, 150 chapters in Psalms So I came to Psalm 101 And notice what it says here in verse 3 And this is a very famous verse But I want you to pay attention to a part that maybe we kind of skip over sometimes Psalm 101 verse 3 I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes Now, obviously when this verse was written The television was not invented The computer was not invented The cell phones were not invented Obviously that's a great modern day application But they had applications during those days as well Right? To a lot of things they would not go to Because of what they would see with their eyes But notice what it says I hate the work of them that turn aside And of course that's the way that you ought to feel about the vice pangites of this world You ought to hate the sin and the wickedness that exists in this country And exists in this world But I want you to notice what takes place if you do set yourself before something that's wicked It says, I hate the work of them that turn aside It shall not cleave to me You know what that's implying? That if you do set wicked things before you You know what's going to take place? It's going to cleave to you It's going to stick to you You watch ungodly movies and shows You listen to ungodly music You know what's going to take place? It is going to stick with you a little bit All of a sudden you're going to think Well maybe it's not that big of a deal You know, this sin that they promote or whatever Because what do they say about rock music? It's sex, drugs, and rock and roll Right? And that's literally what it's about I used to listen to rock music And the amazing thing about listening to rock music Is you never pay attention to what they're saying And it just goes to your subconscious Right? I used to listen to Aerosmith and Guns N' Roses And if you know those bands, very wicked Blasphemous, evil bands and evil groups And you listen to this music And you don't really realize it But you're promoting, or what they're promoting Is drinking and drugs And look, I've always been against drinking Ever since I was a kid Because my parents, they didn't drink But the thing is, you listen to this over and over again And all of a sudden you start thinking Well, it's not that big of a deal Right? Or they use the Lord's name in vain And you hear that over and over again All of a sudden Well, I mean, it's wrong But it's not that big of a deal Why is it that you have that reaction? Because of the fact you get desensitized Right It's called the process of normalization Right It's so common And you see it in here all the time All of a sudden it starts to actually feel normal You say, what's the biblical advice? Here's the biblical advice Set no wicked thing before your eyes You realize something is wicked Just say, no, you know, I don't want to watch that I don't want to listen to that And here's the thing If you're actually around godly people They're probably not going to try to get you to listen to something ungodly So there you go back to the separation of 2 Corinthians 6 Don't hang around a bunch of ungodly and wicked people Turn back to Matthew chapter 8 Matthew 8 And you know what Where it really hits close to home Because you might feel like you're spiritual And it doesn't affect you Which is not true according to the Bible What about though if you allow this stuff to enter into your home And it sticks with your children See, children are actually very impressionable And if you allow this stuff to be seen and heard inside the home Do you realize that it's going to stick and cleave to a young child Well, it's no big deal I mean, it's one of the big things as a parent That you start Because kids pay attention to everything that you listen to And everything that you watch You know, we do let our kids watch some things But we have a rule that when they say something like You know, oh my god It's like, change it now It's like, you're not watching that again But what can easily take place is Parents can be hypocrites where I'm not going to let my kids do this But then you say, well, you know, it's okay for me It's like, no, it's not okay for you What's going to take place is It's going to cleave to you And what's even worse It's going to cleave to your children Right Here's what it says in Matthew chapter 8 verse 3 And Jesus put forth his hand and touched him saying I will be thou clean And immediately his leprosy was cleansed So right when Jesus touches him This man is healed And I'm sure a lot of people are watching him And looking at Jesus Figuring, well, he's going to get dirty or whatever But they see this man And immediately they see that this guy is cleansed This is a skin disorder Also a nerve disorder But they would see immediately All of a sudden the leprosy is gone Right Now here's the thing though Do you think that everybody would automatically feel safe Being around someone who had leprosy And just got healed Probably not I don't think I would It's like, well, I'm still going to keep my distance For a couple months And just kind of see what happens Okay Here's what it says in verse 4 And Jesus saith unto them See thou tell no man Right Now Jesus says this many times in the Bible I'm not going to have you turn anywhere else for sake of time But Jesus says, you know, don't tell anybody about this And that seems kind of weird to us Because if we get somebody saved The last advice we're going to say is Just keep going to Catholic Church Pretend that you don't believe on Christ Pretend that you're worshipping these idols Don't tell your family about it That's the last advice I would ever give Right But obviously with Jesus it's a little bit different Because he's got a big crowd following him And what you see in the Bible is that He gets surrounded by people It makes it impossible for him to actually go into cities And preach the gospel And it has actually become a bit of a distraction It's kind of like you're preaching the gospel And sometimes you'll have a bunch of kids will surround you And then the kids are surrounding you and making noise And it makes it actually hard to preach the gospel To other people that want to listen Because they're being a distraction And I can say that as a white person This takes place to me in the Philippines a lot There'll be like a bunch of just little kids that come around And I realize they're probably too young to understand what I'm saying But I'm trying to talk to older kids Often they become a distraction Okay Now here's what it says in verse 4 And Jesus saith unto him, See thou tell no man, but go thy way Show thyself to the priests and offer the gift that Moses commanded For testimony unto them Now turn to Leviticus chapter 14 Leviticus chapter 14 So here's what you have to understand about leprosy If your neighbor got leprosy and you're living in this day Everybody would end up finding out about it It would be a very public thing Everybody would know about it Everybody would talk about it Everybody would be afraid I mean if your neighbor got leprosy You'd probably be looking in the mirror every morning And just kind of concerned Maybe you have leprosy You'd be worried about if your neighbor got leprosy What about the relatives that are still there They might get leprosy then we might catch it You'd be afraid of that It was a very very public thing And because it was a very public thing to get this infectious disease The actual cure when it takes place There was a very public situation to make everybody aware That somebody was cleansed of leprosy Notice what it says in Leviticus chapter 14 Leviticus 14 verse 1 And the Lord spake unto Moses saying This shall be the law of the leper in the day of his cleansing He shall be brought on to the priest And the priest shall go forth out of the camp And the priest shall look and behold if the plague of leprosy be healed in the leper Then shall the priest command to take for him that is to be cleansed Two birds alive and clean and cedar wood and scarlet and hyssop And you know what Jesus said is Offer the gift that Moses commanded What is the gift that Moses commanded Well the Bible mentions right here This is the gift, this is the requirement In fact you see other examples in the New Testament Jesus cures those 10 lepers and what do they do They go to the priest They go to the priest you say why Because they had to offer this gift It had to be a very public thing People had to realize so and so has been healed It wouldn't be good enough if you get leprosy and go back to your home And your neighbors are afraid Don't worry I'm cured It's like well where's the proof that you got cured Right you would want a real proof And of course the proof would be you went to the priest And this becomes very public it becomes very known What is the symbolic example Well an example I thought of is think about if somebody gets kicked out of church That's a very public thing That's a very known thing I mean many of you were members of this church when various people got kicked out And guess what you know it It's a known thing it becomes a very public thing Now if somebody's not really a member of church They just come from time to time And they get mad and leave and they go quietly No big deal But unfortunately that's not usually the way things take place Often when somebody gets kicked out of church It becomes a very public thing Right it becomes a very known thing And here's the reality If somebody gets kicked out and it's a big situation And I don't really say anything about it You know what's going to often take place That person's going to say a lot of lies on the other side I mean you've been at our church When this has happened haven't you If you've been here for several years You were here when a family tried to split our church And they started to just tell other members of the church Well you know pastor Stuckey's a liar This is what he said blah blah blah And they just try to make excuses for all the list of sins that were committed And it's like are you kidding me It's like you did all these things And then it's like you try to throw out dumb excuses Right and it's like look I mean all these sins are there There's so many witnesses But the reality is it's a very public thing If somebody gets kicked out of church For whatever sin it is And then later on let's say they're allowed back at church I make the decision, they've repented They've gotten right with God It wouldn't be good enough to just let them come in And sit down beside someone at church Because people would be like whoa Doesn't this person have leprosy I mean isn't this person you kicked out Isn't this the person you preached against I mean it would be a very public thing to let them back into church And look if somebody gets kicked out of church And they get right with God Well praise God for that That's not a very common thing But if that happens praise God for it But because it's a very public thing to get kicked out of church Guess what it would be a very public thing to be let back into church as well Now when I say a very public thing I'm not necessarily saying the entire internet world needs to know Because I don't really care about the internet world that much Every once in a while you got to let the internet world know Because of the fact you know they're known in the internet world or whatever But in general I mean if it's a local church thing and nobody knows about it It's like oh we'll turn off the cameras I'll talk about it quietly so nobody else knows And that's fine right But it's a very public thing because everybody at church knows It would be a very public thing to let them back at church as well Go to Matthew 8 Matthew chapter 8 And when you think about leprosy What is the fear of leprosy? The fear is it will spread When somebody gets kicked out of church Here's the thing people are like well what about that person They try to make excuses Here's the thing I'm not really concerned about the person getting kicked out of church You know who I'm concerned about? I'm concerned about everybody that does not have leprosy Somebody gets kicked out for fornication or drunkenness or extortion or whatever it may be I'm worried about all the members at church that don't have leprosy I'm worried about the young kids that are impressionable I mean I'm sure many of you have been at Baptist churches Where all of a sudden just teen girl after teen girl just ends up getting pregnant And nothing's ever said about it Nothing's ever done about it Isn't that right? And it's like the evidence is right there And you know what you're actually teaching kids You can get up here and preach whatever you want But when you accept it when you allow it You know what you're actually teaching the young people here It's not that big of a deal to fornicate out of marriage and get pregnant And here's the thing I don't want my kids to be taught It's no big deal to go out and fornicate and get pregnant out of wedlock I want to teach my kids at a young age You know what? You need to stay pure until the day that you're married If we just allow whatever sin in this church it becomes a free for all And then what's the point of preaching any rules if we don't actually live by those rules Right? Matthew chapter 8 verse 5 Matthew 8 verse 5 And in Matthew 8 verse 5 the Bible says And when Jesus was entered into Capernaum There came unto him a centurion beseeching him And saying, Lord, my servant lieth at home Sick of the palsy, grievously tormented Now turn to your Bible Keep your finger in Matthew 8 But turn to Luke chapter 7 Let's see the parallel story in Luke 7 Luke 7 verse 1 Now when it ended all his sayings in the audience of the people He entered into Capernaum And a certain centurion servant who was dear unto him was sick And ready to die And when he heard of Jesus he sent unto him the elders of the Jews Beseeching him that he would come and heal his servant So this centurion is a very powerful man And he sends elders of the Jews to Jesus saying Will you come and heal my servant? Okay? Verse 4 And when they came to Jesus they besought him instantly saying That he was worthy for whom he should do this For he loveth our nation and he hath built us a synagogue Verse 6 Now at first glance this seems kind of strange This man, the centurion, sends elders of the Jews To bring Jesus And when Jesus gets there he says Don't come to my house That seems kind of strange doesn't it? It's like well didn't you ask him to come And now it sounds like you're rejecting him Go to Matthew 8 and I'll explain what's taking place Matthew chapter 8 Matthew 8 verse 7 And Jesus saith unto him The centurion answered and said So the centurion says I'm not worthy You're better than coming into my house to heal this man Now before I explain I want to explain to you what a centurion is When you see that word centurion You see that root, the c-e-n-t-u-r It might remind you of the word century Century is 100 years And this is the same root Or you think of cents There's 100 cents in a dollar And what it's saying here With centurion is this It says A centurion was a commander Nominally of a century A military unit originally consisting Of 100 legionnaires The size of the century changed over time And from the first century B.C. through most of the imperial era Was reduced to 80 men So basically a centurion Is a man that's in charge Of 100 legionnaires I mean basically he's a very powerful man He's a man who's respected He's a man with money He's a man who's known Well here's what it says in verse 9 What he says is I don't want you to come into my house Because I'm a powerful man That tells people to go and come and do What he's basically saying is If you come into my house People are going to think that I'm bossing you around That I'm telling you Come into my house Do this, heal my servant And then go and he's like People are going to think that I'm above you Or in charge of you And he's like I don't want people to think that I'm not worthy of that Because this is a man who's very famous and powerful I mean it'd be like if there's a high level politician today And they said Pastor Stuckey I want you to come and pray for this person Now I don't expect that to take place But they're naturally going to assume Well of course Pastor Stuckey came because he had to Because this man is powerful He's going to feel like he's obligated And what this centurion is saying is If I have you come into my house People are going to think that I'm above you That I'm better than you And this man realizes Hey you have the ability to heal people You are the savior You're above me I'm nothing compared to you Because people are going to think I'm ordering you Come and do this Now go and lead because you did what I told you So he's saying instead of you coming in Just speak the word And my servant will be healed It says here in verse 10 When Jesus heard it He marveled and said to them that followed Verily I say unto you I have not found so great faith No not in Israel Now that's a pretty insulting comment That Jesus said To those that are from Israel Because they're the chosen nation They're God's people And then this Roman centurion Has this great faith And then Jesus says you know what He had better faith than anybody in Israel Right that's a very offensive comment To those that are of Israel Because they think they're better than everybody else They're the chosen nation They're God's people no matter what they do And then now Jesus is saying you know what This Roman centurion He's actually better than the rest of you Right And of course we understand that you know Because the elders of the Jews go and they say This man's worthy because he loves our nation And he built a synagogue I don't think that Jesus was impressed That this man loves the nation And built this synagogue Because like well these are the people that are going to kill me The synagogue is no longer Going to be a Godly thing whatsoever Right But he realizes that this is a Godly man And this is a Godly man This is a good man, a Godly man who has this great faith Verse number 11 And I say unto you that many shall come from the east and west And shall sit down with Abraham and Isaac And Jacob and the kingdom of heaven But the children of the kingdom Shall be cast into outer darkness There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth Now what exactly is Jesus saying? Here's what he's saying That Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob Are known kind of as the fathers of faith Right You know obviously going back to Genesis You know with Adam Adam was a saved man We get that But Abraham's kind of the man that we kind of look back to The promise through Abraham He believed it was counted them for righteousness The book of Galatians talks about Abraham as the example And it's not being a physical descendant It's about spiritually believing the same thing Right And of course Abraham had a son named Isaac Isaac had a son named Jacob Jacob had 12 sons Jacob has renamed Israel You have the 12 tribes of Israel Right And what he's saying is Many people from the east And in the Philippines we're in the east Right Many people from the west The United States I mean I'm kind of you know both here Are going to sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob But you know a lot of people that are not going to sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob Are the children of the kingdom of Israel Those that should have been God's people Those that had the oracles of God Those that heard the word of God Those that should have believed And he's saying you know what they're going to be They're going to be at a place where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth Right And that's the reality with most of the Jews Now of course during the days of Jesus There were a lot of Jews that did convert and believe on Christ And then there's a lot that didn't In our modern day you know what the religion is It's not the religion of those that actually believed on the coming Messiah It's those that rejected the Messiah The religion of Judaism is 2,000 years after the group of people that rejected and killed Jesus Christ And of course if you were to look at Jewish teachings today like the Talmud They blaspheme Jesus Christ It teaches in the Talmud that Jesus is the bastard child of a man by the name of Pantera He's the son of Pantera That's what it teaches And they teach that Jesus was a sorcerer That basically he healed by the power of Beelzebub Same thing that those that rejected Jesus taught during the days of Jesus And you say what's going to be the end result of the Benjamin Netanyahu's of the world The Jerry Seinfeld's, these famous Jews You know what the end result is going to be? There's going to be weeping and gnashing of teeth where there's outer darkness in the heart of the earth In the lake of fire burning for all eternity And you say wow that sounds offensive Well the Bible says he that believeth not the son shall not see life I mean it doesn't really get much simpler than that For all of sin to come short of the glory of God And guess what? Regardless of whether you're in the Philippines or the US or Israel All of us are sinners And the only forgiveness, the only salvation is in Jesus Christ Doesn't matter what your lineage is Now a modern day example might be this for those that are kids here today It doesn't matter if your parents believe on Christ You've got to believe on Christ It's like wow I mean I've got the bloodline of two saved parents That does you no good You've got to believe on Christ yourself to go to heaven The Bible says here in verse 13 And Jesus said unto the centurion go thy way and as thou hast believed so be it done unto thee And his servant was healed in the self same hour Verse 14 And when Jesus was coming to Peter's house he saw his wife's mother laid in sick of a fever And he touched her hand and the fever left her and she arose and ministered unto them So here's what the Bible says in verse 14 It says that Peter, his wife's mother was sick Okay So it's saying Peter has a mother-in-law If you have a mother-in-law what does that mean that you have? It means you have a wife Right Go to Matthew 16 Matthew 16 Now look According to the Catholic Church The big church here in the Philippines What do they say? They say Peter was the first pope Right Now the Bible is very clear here That Peter had a wife He had a mother-in-law His wife's mother Right Now in the early days of Catholicism there are actually a lot of popes that were married So basically they changed their teachings like 1500 years ago And said you can no longer get married Because today I mean Pope Francis is not married Pope Benedict is not married Pope John Paul was not married I mean I have no doubt that they probably all have mistresses I have no doubt that they have you know little boy slaves or whatever But they're not married you know as a man to a woman And the Bible of course is very clear That you must be the pastor having a wife Right You're not a pastor if you don't have a wife You have to have a wife Right Right Very basic requirements in the word of God Well how is it that Peter is the first pope If the Catholic Church says well you cannot be married to be a priest Because priests today I mean isn't it there's the denomination in the Philippines of those that are married What is it Agla Payan is that the name of it And they basically rejected the Catholic rules And you know they are married and you know I've seen documentaries on it There's a large number here And look I would say this I believe that during our lifetime the Catholic Church will actually let priests get married in the future You say why is that Because they've got to eventually cover up the scandal of all the pedophilia and homosexuality And because of the fact they're not finding enough priests that actually want to agree to a life of celibacy Right But Peter had a wife and according to the Catholic Church you're not supposed to have a wife if you're the pope Now let me just read you what the Bible says Then we're going to read what the Catholic Church says about this And here's what it says in Matthew 16 verse 13 When Jesus came to the coast of Caesarea Philippi He asked his disciples saying whom do men say that I the Son of Man am And they said some say that thou art John the Baptist Some Elias And others Jeremiah's are one of the prophets So Jesus is asking his disciples who are they comparing me to And some people say you're like John the Baptist You're like Elijah You're like Jeremiah You're like one of these great prophets that came before He saith on to them but whom say ye that I am He said okay that's what the world says about me But what do you say about me And Simon Peter answered and said thou art the Christ The Son of the Living God You know what Jesus is saying in the example he's giving He's saying I am better than everybody else Isn't that what he's saying I'm better than John the Baptist The man that was greater amongst you know of anyone born of a woman I'm better than John the Baptist I'm better than Elijah I'm better than Jeremiah You know it doesn't really get much better than John the Baptist and Elijah I believe Elijah is one of the two witnesses John the Baptist I mean is perhaps the greatest man Unless somebody came after him that was better Nobody before him was better according to the Bible I mean he's as good as anybody who's ever lived And maybe there's like a small group of the greatest who have ever lived Maybe he's not literally saying that you know you're better than anyone But you're like the best of the best or whatever But these are some great men no question about it And you know what he's showing But they're not the Christ They're not the Messiah They're not the Savior I am better than everybody else That is the context as we get to this famous scripture Jesus is using a comparison I am better than everybody else who has ever existed Right Verse 17 And Jesus answered and said unto him Blessed art thou Simon Bar-Jonah For flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee But my Father which is in heaven And Jesus saying Simon you're right I'm better than John the Baptist I'm better than Elijah I'm better than Jeremiah I'm better than anyone who has ever existed Verse 18 And I say also unto thee that thou art Peter And upon this rock I will build my church And the gates of hell shall not prevail against it What is the context before verse 18 Jesus saying there's nobody better than me Would it make any sense then in verse 18 To basically say the exact opposite And say but you know what Peter you're really good as well You're better than John the Baptist Elijah and Jeremiah also And you know what you're the first pope The gates of hell will not stand against you You're better than everybody else on earth Does that really make a lot of sense Because the context leading up to it Is saying no one's even close Right because I would say I mean if I were to rank I'd say John the Baptist is here And Elijah is here and Jeremiah is here Maybe I'm wrong And all these great people are in this list here So they're here And maybe you know us in this room That are soul winners are here And then Jesus is like you know way up there There's no comparison Would it make any sense then To then just state but you know what Peter You're the rock The gates of hell are not going to stand against you It's funny because throughout the Bible Who does the Bible mention as being the rock On Christ the solid rock I stand Rock of ages That's not about Peter my friend It's about Jesus And every verse like without dispute The rock is Jesus He's our rock And then people think that he's teaching the opposite Well the context shows He's referring to himself Now I don't know if he literally pointed to himself And said upon this rock Or if he's basically stating that this statement you said About me being better than everyone Me being the Christ upon this rock Saying yes I am that Messiah Yes I am that Christ But what he's saying in the context is I'm better than everybody else Now here's where people get confused This is a local church And of course Jesus is going to be leaving earth And if you have a local church The only person to be in charge of the local church Is Peter at this time He's the one who has the keys to the kingdom of heaven And that's true In a local church you need a leader That doesn't make you the leader of Christianity on earth Because nobody could be that And every single individual church Who is the head of that church? Jesus Christ He's better than anybody else There's no comparison between Jesus and anybody else Because you look at Peter Can you really say about the life of Peter That the gates of hell did not prevail against him? I'm pretty sure later on in the book of Matthew People come up to him and say You know you're with Jesus He's like no no not me You say why? Because men fail Look you know Paul said Follow me as I follow Christ What's the idea? Hey if I'm leading the charge and going soul winning And reading the Bible follow my example But if I'm not Follow Christ my friend Don't be very careful about putting too much trust Or faith in men You say why? They will fail They will mess up Look I will do my best as your pastor To be a great example But you know I'm going to make mistakes I'm going to fail And the reason you should read the Bible is not because I'm reading the Bible You read the Bible You go soul winning You live a separated life You be a godly person You do what's right Because it's the right thing to do Regardless of what anybody else does Why? Men are going to fail But guess who doesn't fail Don't we sing Jesus never fails? Jesus is the rock Peter's not the rock my friend The gates of hell It doesn't take the gates of hell to prevail against Peter It takes a little girl And he's afraid of the confrontation And I'm not trying to be down on Peter I think Peter's going to get more rewards in heaven than me It's just a fact though Right? It's like Peter did a lot of great things But the Bible also highlights a lot of mistakes that he did Right? Now I want to read you what the Catholic church says about this Okay St. Matthew recording the gospel Jesus entered Peter's house And found Peter's mother-in-law in bed with a fever He took her by the hand and the fever left her Note that the passage does not mention St. Peter's wife But only his mother-in-law The gospels however make no mention of St. Peter's wife Living or non-living Therefore St. Peter's wife must have died Before Jesus called him to be an apostle Now I don't know about you Because I read the Bible a lot of times And never once did I walk away And say, you know what? It seems like Peter's wife is dead Because when it mentions Peter's wife's mother I mean the implication to me is she's still alive That he has a wife that's living And I don't know where you would get that But what is the Catholic church doing? Basically they're just teaching for doctrines The commandments of men They're just making stuff up Because they want to teach you, well, priests are not allowed to be married Popes are not allowed to be married Cardinals are not allowed to be married They want to make up that excuse And they'll say, well Peter wasn't really married Peter was already dead And it's so stupid because so many popes in history Had wives while they were the pope Are you going to just stand up here and say Pretend like that's not true I mean you can just go on Wikipedia Look up all the popes that have existed Many of them in the early days actually were married They had wives And guess who also did? Peter Right? Turn back to Matthew chapter 8 Matthew 8 Matthew 8 Now here's the thing about this And I don't want to go on to too big of a rabbit trail Because the sermons are going to be very long already anyway But Despite the fact you have all these priests And cardinals and bishops and the pope and everything And they make a vow of celibacy I'm never going to be intimate with a woman ever And of course nuns make the same thing Of course the Bible never says that It says pastors should be married and have children But the Catholic church says the opposite Right? Here's the thing about this Don't be foolish and think that all these priests Are just going celibate their entire life There's probably never been a priest That's ever been celibate their entire life Number one The Catholic church Is filled full of sodomy And the LGBT with the Catholic priests But number two Catholic priests actually have a lot of children Nuns have a lot of children You say, wait a minute pastor Where are you getting this from? What children do they have? I mean have you ever heard of an orphanage? Do you know why the Catholic church Is so obsessed with orphanages? Because they got to hide All the children of the Catholic priests All you have to do is go on YouTube And watch documentaries where this person Didn't know who their father was They found out it was a Catholic priest I grew up in an orphanage I didn't know my father They just basically don't tell you who your father is You just grow up Orphanages are filled And honestly, you might say, well that sounds like a conspiracy Literally, go on YouTube There's so many documentaries of people that say Hey, you know what, I was fathered By a Catholic priest, I never met him And what does the Catholic church say? Well, we'll give you money to help take care of this child Only if This news never becomes public Basically they would tell that woman We'll give you money to take care of that child Unless you let people know That the father is actually a Catholic priest Right, and I encourage you Because I remember the first time I heard that It was probably 10 years ago Immediately I'm like, you know what, that makes sense And I verified it It is certainly true that all over the world Orphanages are filled full of the children Of nuns and Catholic priests And the Catholic church is just trying to keep it quiet Because how stupid is it To say, you've got to live a life Of celibacy There's kind of something called natural desires That God has given both men and women And so to sit here and say, well, they're just going to stay celibate That's ridiculous Anyways, Matthew chapter 8, we'd better hurry For sake of time, verse 16 When they even was come, they brought him to a many That were possessed with devils, and he cast Out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick That it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet Saying, himself took our infirmities And bare our sicknesses, verse 18 Now when Jesus saw Great multitudes about him, he gave commandment To depart onto the other side Verse 19 And a certain scribe came and said unto him Master, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest And Jesus saith unto him The foxes have holes And the birds of the air have nests But the son of man hath not where to lay his head And so this man says I'm going to follow you wherever you go Jesus already commanded, it's time to depart To the other side, and this guy says I'm going to follow you no matter where you go No matter what happens Jesus just let him know, just to let you know I don't always have a place to sleep at night Sometimes I make my bed just a rock And you know, the grass, or whatever And here's the reality You know what, if you're going to go all out serving Christ You have to make sacrifices And you know what, a lot of people are not willing to make those sacrifices Now this man says he's going to follow Jesus wherever he goes And I'm sure that he thinks this is true But Jesus realizes, you know what, it's not true Once you realize it's actually going to be tough You know what's going to take place? You're going to quit You're going to give up It says here in verse 21 And another disciple said unto him, Lord Suffer me first to go and bury my father But Jesus said unto him, follow me and let the dead bury their dead Now if you were to take these verses by themselves You could go way overboard and get the wrong idea Because throughout the Bible Is burial a good thing or a bad thing? It's a good thing It is the honorable thing to do to the dead To bury the dead Especially if they're a believer Right, it's a good thing to do Jesus is not saying, you know what Don't waste your time on the matters of the world Just go all out serving God Don't worry about providing for your family Or brushing your teeth or anything Just go all out serving God That would be the wrong application What you have to realize is Jesus said Hey, it's time to depart to the other side There's not time Basically either come now Or there's no time And this person says, well let me first bury my dead So, and actually let me give you one other example You don't have to turn there But in Luke 9 it adds another one It says, and another also said Lord I will follow thee But let me first go bid them farewell Which are at home at my house And Jesus said unto them No man having put his hand to the plow And looking back is fit for the kingdom of God So this person says I'm going to go But let me first say goodbye to my family And Jesus basically says no Now look Obviously there's separation sometimes from family But there's nothing wrong with being close to your family And you know, in the Bible we actually see almost the opposite Because if you remember When Elisha was called to the ministry He says to Elisha what? Let me go and basically say bye to my parents It's not that he's never going to see them again But he's not going to be working with his dad anymore He's not going to be around them all the time And guess what? Elisha lets him go and say bye to his family You know what the difference is? Elisha actually put into action what he said He said I'm going to say bye and come and follow you And that's exactly what he did This man says he's going to do that But Jesus knows all things And he knows that's not actually true Because isn't it true that many people refuse to separate from family when necessary? It is one of the big reasons people do not serve God Because they're too attached to family I mean you get saved here And your relatives are Catholic And a lot of people refuse to actually live a separated life from them Now I'm not saying it's wrong to ever see them But people want to be so close to their Catholic relatives And I just think to myself You know what? Jesus said that those that are hearing the word of God are my mother and my brothers and my family And you ought to be close to your spiritual family You say why? Those are your spiritual brothers and spiritual sisters in Christ So it's not that there's anything wrong with burying your dead It's not that there's anything wrong about saying bye to your family But their heart wasn't actually in it like they were claiming Verse number 23 Matthew 8 verse 23 And when he was entered into a ship his disciples followed him And behold there arose a great tempest in the sea Insomuch that the ship was covered with the waves But he was asleep And his disciples came to him and awoke him saying Lord save us we perish And he saith unto them Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then he arose and rebuked the winds in the sea And there was a great calm But the men marveled saying What manner of man is this That even the winds and the sea obey him? So we'll finish up Matthew 8 next week There's a lot of great information And obviously we're spending several sermons per chapter You know I could have divided this even more Except there's going to be a lot of repetitive information But you know there's a lot of great information Especially I want you to be highlighted on this centurion Because here's a man who didn't have the word of God Like we have the word of God Or like the Jews have the word of God But here's a man that has strong faith That says you don't even have to enter into my house I have enough trust and faith in you That you can heal my servant even if you never enter in Let's close in word of prayer Dear Heavenly Father Thank you for allowing us to be here today And I ask you to help us to apply the sermon to our lives God Help us to have the great faith like the centurion had God Help us to be willing to give up all And surrender all to you to go all out to serve you God We pray all these things in Jesus' name Amen Alright for our last song Let's turn our hymn to hymn number 360 Let's sing the song for you about everything Hymn number 360 Pray about everything Once I was burdened Ready on the first thing Once I was burdened With many a care Problems too hard for my weak soul to bear Then in God's word came a message so clear Pray about everything Pray about everything A wonderful treasure Prayer's a wonderful thing Blessing all hearts without measure So pray about everything As of your father he loved it to plead He gave us the keys Claiming this promise I dropped to my knees Pray about everything Prayer's a wonderful treasure Prayer's a wonderful thing Blessing all hearts without measure So pray about everything On earth Doubting and fretting Can only bring shame Worry and fear will dishonor his name Go to your savior Pray about everything Prayer's a wonderful treasure Prayer's a wonderful thing Blessing all hearts without measure So pray about everything Riches in Jesus abundant and free Needs in our word for whatever it be Ours for the asking this only is plea Pray about everything Prayer's a wonderful treasure Prayer's a wonderful thing Blessing all hearts without measure So pray about everything Thank you for watching!