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Jesus name and man is equal chapter 34. The Bible reads in the word of the Lord came on to me, saying, Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel and say unto them, Thus sayeth the Lord God unto the shepherds, woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves. Should not the shepherds feed the flock? Now, the word shepherd is synonymous with the word pastor. That's what pastor means. And so what he's in essence telling him is preach against the pastors of Israel. Now, a literal physical shepherd is a guy who leads the sheep and he takes them to where they can eat. He takes them to where they can get water. He protects them from enemies. And so the Bible uses this as an illustration of the Lord. You know, the Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want he leads me beside the still waters, etc. And so the Lord is the chief shepherd. And then pastors are supposed to be an under shepherd that is also feeding the people from the word of God, teaching them the Bible, guarding against enemies. But there are a lot of bad pastors out there. There are some wicked shepherds out there that are not actually benefiting the flock whatsoever. There are all kinds of bad churches, bad pastors. And the Bible here is giving us an example where Ezekiel is being told to preach against these guys. Now, a lot of people today will say we should never preach against another pastor or don't ever preach against these other churches or other pastors. What does the Bible say? You know, the Bible says, hey, preach against these pastors that are wicked pastors. They're not feeding the flock. They're feeding themselves. Now, stop and think about that. What would that look like with a spiritual pastor? You know, because obviously we understand a shepherd who's just chowing down and he's not actually leading the sheep anywhere where they can actually eat. But think about a pastor. Well, how about a guy who doesn't preach what the Bible says? He doesn't teach the truth from the word of God because he's more interested in his paycheck than in actually delivering truth. You see, there are some pastors out there that make an incredible amount of money, like they make literally millions of dollars because they just get up and just tell people what they want to hear. So then they pastor a church with thousands of people in it and they're willing to make any compromise necessary to just get on TV and be on the radio. And they're not on TV getting attacked or criticized on TV. I mean, they're on TV being lifted up by this world because, let's face it, Joel Osteen and Rick Warren and T.D. Jakes are telling this world exactly what the world wants to hear. And so therefore they have no problem being on TV or the radio. And they are multimillionaires. My son was telling me about a website that exists just showing pastors caught in the act of wearing super expensive shoes. So I'd never heard of this. I didn't know such a website existed, but he told me there's a whole website about it showing pastors wearing a super expensive pair of shoes. And there's a whole TV program that was out years ago where they went to these L.A. pastors and these guys are just multimillionaires wearing fancy suits and driving fancy cars, et cetera. It's out there and it's not even just the big name guys like Joel Osteen or Rick Warren. There are a whole bunch of other guys like that on a more local level that are also millionaires. And again, for people listening to the sermon decades from now, a million dollars used to be a lot of money. OK, in 2022, when I was preaching this, that was still a lot of money. They're going to be like, millionaire, what do you mean? They just I mean, don't they deserve a regular paycheck? But anyhow, that's what they'll think someday with all the inflation. But the point is that, you know, pastors are not supposed to be rich. And let me just say this. Let me just make this super clear, unequivocal. Any pastor who is wealthy, who is rich, is not right with God. Period. What about this guy? One hundred percent, unless they got wealthy doing something totally different. So, I mean, if somebody did something different, maybe a guy has a business and he makes millions of dollars in business and then he decides to go be a pastor. OK, I could see that being legitimate. I don't know anybody like that. I've never seen an example like that. But let's say there was a guy who got wealthy in something totally unrelated and pastored. That's the only exception I could possibly see, folks. But let me tell you something. I don't believe there's any exception to this. If a pastor is wealthy, if he's rich, he is not right with God. It's wickedness because God did not ordain the position of the pastor for a guy to get rich and to feed himself and to just get fat off the flock. Now, let me say this. Obviously, pastors should be paid a livable wage. And the Bible says, let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honor. Especially they who labor in the word and doctrine, you know, don't muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn. The laborer is worthy of his reward. There's nothing wrong with a pastor being paid. There's nothing wrong with a pastor being paid well. OK, but he should live a lifestyle that is similar to the lifestyle of the flock. Am I right? I mean, you know, he should be living just a middle class lifestyle. What the flock is pretty much living. But let me tell you something, when you're making five hundred thousand dollars a year and again, this is 2022 Arizona, that's a lot of money. You are super rich if you're making five hundred grand a year or a million dollars. And I'm not you know, I'm throwing out these figures, but there are tons of pastors all over America, these mega church pastors that are, you know, making five hundred grand a year, four hundred fifty grand a year. Nine hundred thousand dollars a year. And then some of them will try to justify it like, oh, well, you know, yeah, I mean, I'm a millionaire, but that's not from being a pastor. That's my book over here that I wrote. Well, it's like, well, but hold on a second. You know, you're a man of God as as an occupation, supposedly. You're a preacher. You're a pastor. It's your job to teach people stuff, to teach people the Bible. You're writing this book that you're making millions off of because that book is full of garbage. That's why you made millions off of it, because if you actually wrote a book where you actually laid down some hard biblical truths, it's probably not going to be on the bestseller list because all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. And broad is the way that leads to destruction and many there be which go in there at because straight is the gate and narrow is the way which leads them to life and few there be that find it. But not only that, let's say you did write a godly, righteous book as a pastor that became a bestseller. You know, it really wouldn't be right for you to just take those millions of dollars from that book and say, well, this is my own personal profits, these millions, because hold on a second. You're being paid by the church to dish out God's word, to dish out truth. And that's what you're doing through that book. So you don't need just lose my personal money. It's like, well, hold on a second, buddy. You wrote that book in the name of God, right? You're writing that book about Christianity. You're writing it about the Bible. That's part of your job as a pastor. And so therefore that falls under you getting rich as a pastor. Now, you know, if you're a pastor and you write some best selling book that has nothing to do with church and nothing to do with the Bible, OK, fine. But to sit there and make millions of dollars on your church podcast or your church book or your church related blog or your religious audio or video, do you see what I'm saying, folks? What's wrong with this? A man of God should never use religion in order to make huge amounts of money. Sure, he needs to feed himself. He needs to feed his family. He's totally entitled to having a house and food and clothing and, you know, taking care of his needs and not having to worry about money all the time and be pinching pennies and so forth. But, folks, I'm telling you, I'm not there's no exception to this, that any pastor who is making millions off of the house of God, who's a rich pastor, is he's a false prophet. He's a phony. He's wicked. That's why the world loves him. That's and you know, it shows his motivation right there. And the love of money is the root of all evil. He's there for the money. Now, people have accused me of being a millionaire. OK, there's a website having the net worth of people, and it's just it's some dumb, fake website, and it said that I'm worth five million dollars or whatever. Folks, let me tell you something. I don't have any extra money in my bank account at all. None. OK, so I mean, the money that comes in every month, I spend it every month just feeding and clothing my family and paying my bills. I do not have a savings account with a bunch of money in it whatsoever. OK, but yet people lied and said, oh, he's you know, he's worth five million dollars. You know, that's what a local pastor was saying about me. And you say, well, why does that offend you? You know, why it offends me is because when he's trying to claim that I have this huge amount of money that I'm just sitting on five million dollars, you know what? He's painting me to be something I'm not because I think that that is not right for a pastor to just sit on these huge amounts of money and make huge amounts of money from pastoring. And so that's why it offends me, because because I'm not that kind of a person, because I don't and I don't want to be seen as that because these guys that are like that are rotten. And, you know, you see a pastor with the Armani suit, you know, if he didn't receive that as a gift. You know, why don't you just decide probably ninety nine point nine, nine, nine percent, that guy's a false prophet, that guy's a phony, because why would any normal man of God who actually reads the Bible and knows what it teaches feel the need to buy some super expensive suit like that when the Bible sits there and tells us that our life is not about our clothing, you know, and that man only looks on the outward appearance. God looks on the heart and that we should wear modest clothing, modest apparel. I mean, is Louis Vuitton and Armani menswear? Is that modest apparel? Is that modest clothing? You know, just a modest suit, twenty thousand dollars. I mean, is that really modest apparel? No way. And so we as pastors are not called to a vow of poverty like we're some Catholic monk or something, but we are not to be seeking after filthy lucre and preaching things which we ought not for filthy lucre's sake. Watch out for it, my friend, when you see the fancy clothes and the fancy shoes and the fancy car and the mansion run screaming in the other direction from that church. That is my advice to you. You say, well, you know, you ought to have those things if he's running two thousand. I mean, he's running five thousand in church. You ought to have those things, folks. It doesn't matter whether I'm running in my in my congregation is running three hundred or three thousand or thirty thousand. You know, that's not really relevant, is it? Because, you know, whatever my needs are to live a normal Christian life, you know, there's no reason for me to go beyond that and say, well, look at me, I'm running three thousand. So therefore I need to be in a mansion with an S shaped swimming pool or something. OK, no, I don't. And by the way, there's nothing wrong with running three thousand if you did it the right way. I would love for our church someday to run three thousand, but the vast majority of churches that are running three thousand are running three thousand because they're not even preaching the truth. They're just bringing in a rock band in order to get the crowds in. They're giving a little 15 minute sermonette. And so we need to preach against these pastors. And you say, how dare you preach against other pastors? The Bible literally says, prophesy against the shepherds, preach against these pastors. They're they're they're feeding themselves. They're not feeding the flock. They're withholding Bible doctrine from the flock. So there are all these great teachings in the Bible, like Romans Chapter one, like the Book of Jude, that they wouldn't touch with a 10 foot pole. How about First Corinthians five about church discipline? They're not going to touch these things with a 10 foot pole. These mega church pastors, they're not getting up and preaching what First Corinthians five says about throwing people out of the church who are living in fornication or drunkenness or whatever gross sin that they're in idolatry, whatever major sin. You know, they're not preaching that they're saying, bring in the homos. Fornicators, sure. You know, and let's face it, people are living in fornication. That's a major sin, but it's 100 times more normal than these freaks that they're bringing in now. And so if God is saying, you know, church discipline, the fornicators, how much more the sodomites should not be allowed. But yet today, these pastors, they're just going to censor whole chapters of the word of God. They'll never preach on Leviticus 20. They'll never preach on Romans one. They'll never preach on First Corinthians Chapter five. You know, we could go down the list of passages that they won't touch. Why? Because they don't want to offend people, they want to maximize their revenue so that they can be filthy rich and take all their money straight to hell with them. OK, so that's what's going on. They eat the fat. It says in verse three, you eat the fat and you clothe you with the wool and you kill them that are fed, but you feed not the flock. Basically, you're profiting from the flock, but you're not actually feeding the flock. You're not actually helping the flock. The diseased have you not strengthened, neither have you healed that which was sick, neither have you bound up that which was broken, neither have you brought again that which was driven away, neither have you sought that which was lost, but with force and with cruelty have you ruled them. So there's a lot going on in this verse. Let's let's look at a few of these things. First of all, it says, you know, you didn't strengthen the diseased or heal the sick. Often in the Bible, sickness or disease is symbolic of sin. Sin is like a disease. Leprosy is often a picture of sin in the Bible. And so a sermon is meant to fix these things. He said, you know, you didn't bind up what's broken. You didn't stitch up what's broken. You didn't heal the diseased or heal the sick. You know, it's our job as preachers to preach against sin and help people fix the problems in their lives. Let's face it, most of the problems in our lives are caused by our own sins. And so when we get up as pastors and preach against sin, we're actually helping people straighten out their life. We're helping them fix their problems so they show up and they're sick. They're diseased because they have all kinds of sin in their life and maybe they don't even know better. And so they come to church and the Bible is preached and they realize, OK, here's what I need to be doing. Here's how I live my life. Here's how I fix my marriage. Here's how I deal with my children. Here's how I deal with my job. Here's what I need to do. And so the pastor's job is to help fix problems. You know, a famous preacher of yesteryear said that a sermon should be like a greasy wrench. You know, a sermon doesn't necessarily have to be some beautiful oration with three points and a poem, but a sermon needs to get the job done. A sermon needs to fix something. A sermon should be like a greasy ranch where it's useful and it gets in there and fixes things. Maybe a little ugly sometimes, but it gets the job done. That's what preaching is supposed to be like. But these pastors, they're not fixing problems. They're just getting up and giving a feel good motivational speech, but they're not actually getting to the root of people's problems, which is sin in their life that needs to be fixed. But not only are they not preaching to get sin and thereby helping people fix their lives, but also they're not going out and seeking the lost. You know, Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost. What does seek mean? Seek means go look for, go out and look for the lost and get them saved. You're not going to find these mega church pastors, these fat cat preachers. You're not going to find them out knocking doors, soul winning and trying to win people to Christ. In fact, even the people that come into their church that are brought in through their advertising campaigns or whatever mailers that they sent out or ads that they placed about how cool they are. And how relevant they are and how hip they are. Even when people actually come to them. They don't even get these people saved because their sermon not only doesn't preach against sin, they also don't even make clear what it means to be saved. They also don't preach a clear gospel. And so we go out as faithful or Baptist Church and we're, first of all, not waiting for people to come to us. We go looking for them. We go seeking the lost to preach the gospel to them and we talk to person after person after person who goes to these giant churches that are watered down, liberal churches where you can't figure out what they believe and they're not preaching on sin and they're not preaching a clear plan of salvation. And we knock on the doors of the people who go to this, you know, what are some of these examples? Cornerstone or whatever. You know, this one down in Chandler with all the perverted billboards, you know, oh, I go to Cornerstone. So, you know, for sure, if you die today, you go to heaven. Well, I hope so. I'm a pretty good person. That's the kind of answers you get from these people who go to these hip, trendy mega churches in the area. They go to Living Word Bible Church where, you know, Kenneth Copeland is a frequent guest or whatever. They this church, I think it's called Living Word Bible Church. Their whole Yellow Pages ad shows these are our guest speakers, Joyce Meyer, Kenneth Copeland. We've had Benny Hinn, TDJ, you know, they list all of the big name phonies that have come and preached. And then that white dude with the dreadlocks, he comes too. Todd White or Ron, what's his name? Todd Todd's way too white to have dreadlocks is what his name should be. OK, but anyhow, they, you know. We talk to these people every week, we go out and we actually knock the doors. And one of the first things we ask people is like, hey, do you go to church anywhere and you figure out pretty fast which churches are filled with saved people and which churches are filled with unsaved people? Because you'll knock the doors of people from a certain church and you'll ask them and they'll constantly give you the right answer like, oh, yeah, I'm saved. And, you know, I believe on Jesus and I can't lose my salvation because it's all by grace through faith. You'll get that answer consistently from people who go to a church and, you know, you realize, hey, that's a pretty good church. At least the people are saved over there. They're preaching a clear gospel down there. But then you consistently knock the doors of the people that are going to these mega churches and some of them will be saved because they'll say, oh, I got saved at a Baptist church as a kid. I got saved at a Baptist summer camp as a teenager or something. But then you'll just run into person after person who isn't saved because the gospel is not clear. They're certainly not seeking the lost because you don't see them leaving their ivory tower to actually go out into the neighborhood. They're too big of a celebrity for that. They're too busy, you know, down at the mall buying their clothes or something. And not only are they not seeking the loss, but even when you put the loss right in front of them, they can't even get the loss saved. They can't even just preach to the people that are actually even there. Like, how hard is it to make sure that your congregation actually knows how to be saved? Like, you got their attention, I would say, three times a week, but these churches usually only have one service a week. And I would say you got them for an hour three times a week, but really they got them once a week for about 15 minutes. But really, somebody is coming to your church every week. Hey, if somebody came to my church every week for 20 minutes, I guarantee you that person is going to know how to be saved at the end of a year. In fact, they'll probably know how to be saved at the end of a month, OK? But to sit there and go to these churches for years and you don't even know if you're going to heaven? Something's wrong with that church. Something's wrong with that pastor. Call that fat cat phony bogus preacher out for being the wicked shepherd that he is, feeding himself, not seeking the loss, not saving the loss. And then the people that are saved that are going to his church because they got saved at that Baptist summer camp as a teenager. Well, are they binding up their wounds? Are they offering any solutions to their problems? Are they healing the sick? No, they're not. And look, folks, I guarantee you that the people that are in this building tonight who have gone to this church for a long time and who have straightened out their lives, people who maybe in the past, they had been living wrong. And they'd been a drunkard or they'd been a drug addict or they had been living in fornication or maybe into gambling or whatever they were into. I guarantee you that those people would say, you know what, man, I am living such a healthier life now. Not just physically healthier life, but spiritually healthier life. You know, man, the word of God has bound up some pus-filled wounds in my life. And now I'm living a clean life. I'm living a blessed life. I'm serving God. Why? Because I got the sin out of my life. But the church down the street, pastored by the fat cat preacher, he's telling you that sin is fine. You know, he's telling you, hey, man, we don't want to judge anybody. And, you know, we're not under the law, but under grace. And he'll take a truth that, yeah, it's true, we're not under the law, but we're under grace. He'll turn that he'll turn the grace of God into lasciviousness and basically just teach that anything goes and everything's fine. And it's fine to live in fornication. It's fine to go out and drink and do all these things. You know, he's not going to preach to you what the word of God actually says. Then he also brings up this example in verse four, where he says, you know, I'm not going to get through this chapter tonight. And there's already a big chunk at the end of chapter 33 that I didn't get through. But it sounds like a couple of sermons for Sunday. All right. Sounds like we're going to be in Ezekiel on Sunday because there's just too much stuff here to talk about. But it says in verse five or sorry, at the end of verse four, it says with force and with cruelty, have you ruled them? Now, that part right there, I wouldn't apply that to the megachurch pastor because the megachurch pastor is not even ruling them at all. I mean, he's not even doing, he's not even ruling them at all. He's not really doing much of anything except just getting up and putting on a show, putting on his skinny jeans once a week and walking around and the platform and saying some cool stuff, you know, for 20 minutes and then just cashing his check. Okay. But what, you know, with force and with cruelty, have you ruled them? If we wanted to apply that part of the verse, I think another group of people that we could apply that to would be, how about the Roman Catholic Church throughout history? So let's get a time machine because the Bible is relevant in all periods. So when I'm preaching in Ezekiel 34 in 2022, I want to apply it to something that we can see with our eyes going on right now. So do we see some pastors getting fat off the flock? Yeah, there's a whole website about their shoes for crying out loud. You know, do we see some pastors that are not seeking the loss and they're just in it for themselves and they're in it for the money? Hey, that's really relevant right now. Now, this part right here, I think if we really wanted a good example that includes this cruelty and force, I'd say the Roman Catholic Church, because if you study the history of the Roman Catholic Church, here's what you're going to find. They also got fat off the flock. I mean, these priests were super wealthy. They had way more money than the people that they're ministering to. They did not live a similar lifestyle to who they were ministering to. But throughout history, much of the Roman Catholic clergy was living large and covered in gold and silver and precious stones. The Roman Catholic Church itself was wealthy, but these pastors and local churchmen were also super wealthy, getting fat off the flock. They're also not seeking and saving the lost. Because, first of all, they're lost, they're not even saved because they're Roman Catholic, so they're pagans. They're not even preaching the true gospel of Jesus Christ by faith alone. They're preaching a workspace salvation. They're not seeking and saving the lost. And that example actually fits the ending of verse four as well. They really did rule over the flock with force and cruelty because they compelled people to be Catholic. They compelled them to join the church, and they actually did use force to punish people that they considered heretics by burning them at the stake or torturing them or subjecting them to whatever the inquisition or whatever the penalties. And so they did rule people with force and with cruelty. The Catholic Church did execute huge numbers of people and they were cruel and they ruled with an iron fist over the flock. So if you want an example that fits the entirety of verses three and four, you could look at the medieval Catholic Church as an example. I'm sure there are many other examples. We don't necessarily today see pastors ruling by force, actually using force to rule the flock or compel people to go to the church or whatever. But it's been out there in the past and it is still out there today in the case of Islam. You know, that's a wicked shepherd, that imam or whatever that bozo in a dress following the pedophile Mohammed is is called imam, you know, yo mama, you're dressing like your mom imam because you're wearing a dress instead of, you know, wearing a normal pair of pants like a man. But anyway, and so is the Catholic priest, by the way, dresses like mom and calls himself father, but he's dressed like mother and acts queer. But anyway, sorry, I digress. They were, you know, the Muslims, they used force to come to rule over the flock and compel people to be Muslim. Folks, no one should ever be compelled to be a Christian or any other religion. You know, if I had the power to compel people to go to church, I wouldn't do that if I had the power to make a law that said everybody has to go to a Baptist church on Sunday. And I would say, no way, that would be a terrible law because we don't want to fill the church with unsaved people who are being forced to be there. You know, I only want people to be in church who want to be here, who choose to be here because then we get the right kind of people in here. That's the whole point of church. Church isn't just about filling a building with bodies, it's about being a called out assembly of actual born-again baptized believers. So the last thing we want to do is force unsaved people to come to our church so they can mess it up. Now, if we bring an unsaved visitor, great, because we can give them the gospel and get them saved, but we certainly don't want to force people to come to church. We'd rather just go find them and give them the gospel where they're at. It says they were scattered, the flock was scattered, because there's no shepherd. And they became meat to all the beasts of the field when they were scattered. My sheep wandered through all the mountains and upon every high hill, ye my flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them. You see, when there's not a leader who's actually feeding the flock with biblical doctrine, the flock is tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine. You know, having a pastor get up and preach clear Bible teaching helps the entire flock to be educated, and when the entire flock is educated, they're not just going to be tricked by every doctrine that comes along. You know, some of these people are warning me about a false doctrine that our church is being exposed to, and obviously, it's my job to protect the flock, but you know what I don't do? I don't try to shield our flock from information. I don't try to stop our flock from hearing false doctrine, and let me tell you why. I'm not afraid of people in our church listening to heretics or hearing false doctrine, because I know that our church people are educated in the Word of God enough that they will know the difference between right and wrong doctrine. So I don't have to get up and say, all right, people, don't listen to this guy on the internet. Don't you go listen to that guy. Stay off this website. You know, don't listen to this preacher, because I know that if you listen to some false prophet, you're immediately going to shut it off. See, I'm not saying, hey, don't you go listen to this guy. You know, hey, go ahead and listen to Joel Osteen if you're that bored, if you want to laugh. But you know what? You're not going to be if you're a true faithful word member, you're not even going to want to listen to it. You're going to be disgusted by it. I'm not scared of you hearing what other religions have to say. I'm not scared of you hearing what other preachers have to say. Go out and listen to the other preaching. But you know what? You're so educated here that you'll be able to tell the difference. And you won't even need me to tell you, hey, you know, don't you dare listen to this other Baptist pastor. You'll listen to him yourself and shut it off because he's full of beans. You know what I'm saying? So the thing is, when the pastor is actually preaching clearly, the flock actually knows to stay away from. The wolves that are out there. Now, the reason I call names of these false teachers is to give examples, preach against and expose these guys for what they are. But honestly, there are a million false prophets out there. I can't name them all. OK, there are literally millions. But what I can do is I can feed the flock with biblical doctrine. And you will not be tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine if you go to faith for Baptist Church, because you're you're going to learn the Bible. The people who go to our church, the typical church member here reads their Bible cover to cover once a year. The average member at Faithful Word is reading their Bible cover to cover once a year. And you say, well, man, I go here and I don't do that. Well, then shame on you. Get on the program and read your Bible. But here's the thing. Walk around after the service and talk to the people who go here. You'll find that the people here, you know, they know the Bible stories. They read their Bibles. They know doctrine. If you walked around after the service and asked 20 people about salvation, you're not going to get 20 different answers. Everybody's going to be telling you it's by faith. Everybody's going to be telling you it's eternal security. You're not going to be getting all answers all over the place. If you start asking people about the Trinity, you're not going to get 50 different answers. You know, if you go around and ask people about doctrine and about what Bible we use and why, you know, people are going to know their stuff. People are not only going to say, hey, we're using the King James, they'll be able to articulate to you why they use the King James. They'll be able to explain the gospel. They'll be able to explain Bible doctrine because they're being taught. Okay, that's what church is supposed to be, a place where people are taught so that they're not just tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine. Some pastors, they probably want to keep their church ignorant so that they'll buy all the junk that they're selling them every week. But when there's no shepherd who's actually a real shepherd teaching the people, feeding the people, then the flock ends up getting scattered, meaning the flock is all over the place. The flock is not solid on what they believe. And they wander through all the mountains and upon every high hill because they don't know what the truth is because they haven't been fed, they haven't been taught. And nobody's seeking and searching after them. Therefore, ye shepherds, hear the word of the Lord, verse 7, as I live, saith the Lord God, surely because my flock became a prey and my flock became meat to every beast of the field. Because there was no shepherd, neither did my shepherds search for the flock, but the shepherds fed themselves and fed not my flock. Therefore, ye shepherds, hear the word of the Lord, thus saith the Lord God, behold, I am against the shepherds and I will require my flock at their hand and cause them to cease from feeding the flock. Neither shall the shepherds feed themselves anymore, for I will deliver my flock from their mouth that they may not be meat for them. So what's the Bible saying? The Bible's saying that the pastor has a responsibility to get people saved, to do the work of an evangelist, to win people to Christ, to teach the flock, to protect them from the wolves. And again, what's the best way to protect them? By teaching them the truth. I can't name every false prophet. I can't name every false doctrine under the sun. But if I teach the truth, that's the best way I can put a hedge around you and help protect you is by you actually learning how to protect yourself and learning what the signs are of the enemy. And so he's telling the pastors, look, being a pastor is a responsibility. Yeah, it's a privilege, but with that privilege of being the pastor comes a responsibility. And if you're taking the paycheck, you better be doing the job. And the job is preaching the gospel, preaching sound doctrine, warning the flock, protecting from the wolves, and feeding them with good doctrine, and getting people saved. That's the job. And he says, if you don't do that job, then I'm going to require my flock at your hand. And this goes back to what we saw in chapter 33 of his blood will I require at thy hand. God will hold me responsible. If the church is filled with sin and I'm the pastor and I'm not preaching on sin, God's going to hold me responsible for all that sin in the church because I didn't preach about it. Now, if I preach about stuff and people do it anyway, that's their problem. But if I'm refusing to preach what the Bible says about sin and then consequently the church is filled with sin, that's my fault. And God's going to punish me for the sins that people in this church are doing if I refuse to cover those sins from the pulpit. And the same thing, you know, if I don't preach against false doctrine and heresy and false teachers and then the church becomes infected with false doctrine and I just don't care and I'm just like, well, we're seeker sensitive so we just want to let people believe whatever they want and, you know, we don't want to take too hard of a line on one way or the other. Hey, who cares? Who cares what people believe about the Trinity, right? Who cares if people believe you could lose your salvation or not? You know, I heard about this phony preacher where he was asked, can you lose your salvation? And he just said, well, I just don't think that matters because, you know, it just really doesn't matter. We know if they never had it in the first place, they're not saved. So let's just focus on just getting people saved. But, you know, whether or not you can lose your salvation, that just doesn't matter. That's a false prophet talking right there. Folks, that matters. That's very important because people who believe you can lose your salvation, it's because they think that they're saved because they're living a Christian life and they think it has to do with their works and that if they mess up on the works, they're going to lose it because they're not fully trusting Christ and his finished work on the cross to get them to heaven. And so the shepherds who don't warn the flock about heresy, who don't warn about false teaching, who don't teach clear doctrine from the pulpit, they're going to be held responsible when the flock gets sucked into false doctrine. They're going to be held responsible when the church is in sin because they don't preach on sin. OK, God holds us as pastors to a higher standard. The Bible says, be not many masters knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation. And it's a sobering thought as a pastor to think that the flock is going to be required at my hand if I don't get up and preach hard on sin, if I don't get up and preach clear doctrine, you know, I could be punished by God for that. And the ultimate punishment here is that you're not going to be able to be a shepherd anymore. God's going to take away the flock from you. Now, this could be this could look like a few different things. Number one, when he says, you know, I'm going to take away the flock, you're not going to be a shepherd for me anymore. You're not going to feed yourselves of my flock anymore. For one, that could mean that basically, you know, you don't get to be a pastor anymore. You're going to get fired or have to step down or whatever. You're not going to be able to continue pastoring. You know, God's going to make sure that that happens. And that has happened to some of these megachurch pastors where they get busted being a drunk or they get busted with hookers or they get busted, you know, snorting cocaine or whatever. And they lose that privilege to pastor anymore. And God, you know, caused their sin to be found out as a punishment because they weren't doing a good job as a pastor. But also when he says, you know, you're not going to shepherd my flock anymore, when he says I will require my flock at their hand, it caused them to cease from feeding the flock. You know, another punishment could be that basically every actual saved person is going to leave the church or quit going to that church and they're going to only pastor unsaved phonies. OK, that's another punishment. You know, because, look, there are pastors out there and obviously a lot of these guys that we're talking about are total false prophets, they're unsaved, whatever. But, you know, even a saved pastor could become this guy because don't you think that there are saved pastors out there who don't make the gospel clear from the pulpit or saved pastors out there who don't preach on sin because they want to be popular? Saved pastors who don't do any soul winning? Of course. God's going to punish that guy by either making him lose that position of being a pastor or he could punish that guy by basically leading the good people out of his church, leading the actual saved people to quit the church, and he can just pastor a bunch of phonies and Judases and reprobates and idiots and, you know, wicked people, not the real flock of God. The actual flock of God departs. And so that could also be a punishment. And he says in verse 11, For thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I even I will both search my sheep and seek them out as a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered. So will I seek out my sheep and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day. I will bring them out from the people. And so, again, there's too much to talk about in a short period of time. You know, I have to wrap up the sermon, but basically there are two things going on in this passage just to help you understand the passage. One of them is a spiritual application that we can learn from today. Shepherds are spiritual leaders. Sometimes instead of feeding the flock, they feed themselves. We've been talking about that for the last 40 minutes or whatever. But the point is that also what he's talking about here in context is that in Ezekiel's day, the children of Israel are being scattered into all nations physically because the Babylonians are coming in, sacking the city of Jerusalem and causing the people to be scattered all over the world. Now, why? Because of the failure of their spiritual leaders, their spiritual pastors who were supposed to teach them the word of God, the Levites and the priests failed at their job. And consequently, the nation is literally physically scattered. Today, when we talked about people being scattered, we're talking about them being spiritually scattered like they're all over the place doctrinally. They might physically be still in Phoenix, but spiritually, they've been scattered from the church and from good doctrine. So when he says here, I will be the shepherd, I'm going to be the one that's going to gather these people. We could obviously take the literal interpretation that in Ezekiel's day, he's eventually at the end of the 70 years captivity, he's going to be a shepherd unto his people and he's going to bring them back to Israel in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah. And they're going to be spiritually on track again and they're coming back to the promised land. But again, for our application today in 2022, we could look at this as, you know, the Lord, he looks down and he sees shepherds failing to do their job. He still from heaven is going to act as a shepherd and he's going to find a way to rally his people. Now, again, God is relying on us here on this earth to do that work. Jesus is not going to come down and say, you know what, these pastors are lousy. I'm starting a church in Phoenix myself. Jesus is not physically going to show up and do that. And Jesus is not physically going to go out and knock the doors and do the soul winning and seek and save the lost. While he was on this earth, he did that. He said, as long as I'm in the world, I'm the light of the world, but now we're the light of the world. OK, and Jesus has committed unto us that ministry. So when Jesus says, you know, I'm going to be that shepherd, I myself am going to seek and save the lost, you know, I believe that the way he's going to do that in 2022 is he's going to raise up a new generation of pastors that will actually feed the flock. And he will also, you know, raise up people even outside of the local church, in some cases, to actually evangelize and spread God's word in a place where there is no church. Now, I'm not talking about the United States, because the United States is filled with Bible believing churches. And there are churches in literally every city in America where the gospel is actually being preached. OK, unless you live in some tiny town, you know, the major cities in America, they have churches, maybe they're not perfect churches, but they do have churches that preach against sin and win souls. But, you know, think about a place like Germany, you know, we've been we've been thinking about Germany lately with Brother Anzome here with us, and we've been putting out a lot of preaching and videos in German language. And we've also been, you know, in contact with the brethren over in Germany that are doing soul winning. And in many in many cases, they have no church in their area that they can go to, you know, in many cases, the closest church that's preaching the gospel is hours away in Germany. It's very difficult for them to find a church. But what are they doing? These are people they don't even have a church to go to anywhere in their city. They don't have a congregation that will receive them that's preaching the gospel. You know, Brother Anzome was literally church disciplined from his local church. He was kicked out of his local church for preaching too hard against the sodomites. Now, I didn't find that in First Corinthians five as a reason to kick people out of church. For preaching a sermon that was too hard, he got church discipline. Okay, other other brethren in Germany, they don't even have a church near them that's even preaching the gospel. But you know what they're doing? They're soul winning anyway. They're banding together and they're going out two by two. They're getting together once a month with people from all over Germany, and they're doing a soul winning marathon in Germany, you know, and if anybody in Germany is listening to the sermon right now, you know, contact our church, email our church. We'll put you in touch. With some local people that you can go soul winning with, you know, and there's an example where the Lord is working in a place, even though the pastors are completely failing, even though the shepherds are failing, even though these Protestant and brethren and Baptist churches in many cases are failing to evangelize, you know, God's doing a work anyway, and hopefully we can get more good churches established in Germany. But even without a local church in that area, God still is working in the hearts of people through the Holy Spirit. But obviously, you know, we want the work to be done the right way through the local church. And so what we really need are more pastors to get up and actually pastor a soul winning church and actually preach hard against sin. And we are seeing a lot of good churches being planted. And I hope that five years from now or 10 years now, even if our country gets way worse and even if our country gets way weirder and more perverted, and even if in general Christianity in this country continues to go down the toilet, I hope that in spite of that, God will still be doing a great work and raising up new pastors and new churches and new soul winning congregations because God is interested in this work being done. And when God looks down and sees pastors failing to lead and churches failing to win souls and pastors failing to rip on sin from the pulpit, he doesn't just throw up his hands and say, well, whatever, I tried. You know, God's going to work in the hearts of people and he's going to find a way to help seek and save the lost. That's why over and over again, there keep being great movements of soul winning churches in America and elsewhere because God is interested in this from heaven and his Holy Spirit is at work making this happen. And so it shouldn't shock us to see revival coming in waves over and over again because it's the will of God. It's the will of God and the Holy Spirit is going to continue to work. And so we need more young men to rise up and answer the call to preach and learn how to preach effectively and be ready to be a real man of God, not somebody who just wants fame or glory or a paycheck, but somebody who really wants to bind up the wounded. They really want to fix problems. They really want to preach on sin. They really want to preach the gospel. Why? Because they want to fix things. You don't know what motivates me as a pastor. Just let me just get personal for a minute. I'll tell you what motivates me as a pastor and why I get up in the morning, why I am a pastor, why I continue to do this job, even though, frankly, there are a lot of other things I could be doing that would be a little less hazardous to my health. You know, going back to what I was talking about back on Monday. Why? What motivates me to get up week after week and preach? And what motivates me Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday to get up in the morning and to do my very best to dig into the word of God and study and learn and to teach and preach to the best of my ability and to be fired up about evangelizing and our church doing something in this community. But what motivates me? I'll tell you what motivates me is just how broken this world is and just how messed up churches are, how messed up pastors are, how messed up our countries. That's actually what motivates me. So the more messed up things get, it actually keeps me motivated because I'm thinking like, man, I need to get out the greasy ranch and fix stuff. I mean, I want to fix things. I mean, look, don't you want people to know the truth? Hey, it makes me mad when people are being deceived. You know, it gets me upset to see people going to hell in a handbasket because nobody's preaching them the true gospel. Man, it makes me want to organize a soul winning event. It makes me want to organize missions. It makes me you know, when I see all the false doctrine out there, it makes me want to turn on the camera and make the YouTube videos and try to try to get the truth out. It makes me want to get up on Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday night and preach clearly when I see all of the deception that's out there. And so that's what motivates me, man. I'm in this in this occupation because I want to heal the sick, because I want to heal the diseased. I want to serve up medicine three times a week or five times a week. I want to bind up the brokenness of our country and of Christians. You know, I want to seek and save the lost sheep that are out there. That's the motivation. And look, if you get in the ministry for any other motivation, you know, just because you just want to be that pastor, you just want your name on the literature or something. Man, the last thing we need is another self-serving pastor who just wants to fleece the flock and doesn't want to do the work. He that desireth the office of a bishop desireth a good work. If you don't desire to do the job and fix things, then you have the wrong desire. Let's power this up with a prayer. Father, we thank you so much, Lord, for this chapter and thank you for warning us about the bad pastors that are out there, Lord. And I pray that you would just raise up a generation of pastors that are that will do it for the right reason and that will do the work that you've called them to do. Lord, please just work in the hearts of young men and plant that desire in their bosom for the good work of pastoring Lord and people that want to pastor for the wrong reasons. Lord, I pray that you would do what you said you would do in this passage and just don't don't put the flock in their hand. Lord, I pray that you would just confound their plans to be a pastor. I pray that you would derail their and that they would become some other job instead. And, Lord, these wicked mega church pastors, Lord, expose their fornication, expose their adultery, expose their drunkenness, Lord, and punish these wicked pastors. And in Jesus name, I pray. Amen.