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

Well, good morning to everyone. Welcome to our services this morning here at Faith Board Baptist Church. If you would please take your seats and find a songbook close by. Let's turn them to hymn number 172. In your hymnals, number 172, Love Divine, All Loves Excelling, number 172. Once you've found your place, we'll sing it on that first verse. Love Divine, All Loves Excelling, Joy of Heaven to Earth come down, number 172. Love Divine, All Loves Excelling, Joy of Heaven to Earth come down, Fix in us, I humble gladly, All thy faithful mercies crown, Jesus, thou art your compassion, Your unbounded love thou art. Fix in us with thy salvation, Mentor every trembling heart, Bring, oh, bring thy loving spirit into ev'ry troubled rest, Let us all in thee and heaven, Let us like that second rest, Take away our venues in, Alpha and Omega be, End of faith as it's beginning, Set our hearts at liberty, Come, Almighty, to deliver, Let us all our life be seen, Suddenly returning, Never for thy death we'll see, We will be always blessing, Certainly as life holds above, Gray and crazy without ceasing, Glory in thy perfect love, Finish in thy new creation, Through its thoughtless let us be, Let us see thy great salvation, Perfectly restored in Thee, Change from glory into glory, For thine are leading our ways, Till we cast our crowns before Thee, Lost in wonder, love, and grace. Dear Father God, we thank you for allowing us to be here today. Please bless the Church for singing, preaching, fellowship, and soul winning today. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Amen to hymn number 441. Great is thy faithfulness, number 441. Singing on that verse, verse 441. Great is thy faithfulness, O God my Father, number 441. Singing on this verse, verse together. Great is thy faithfulness, O God my Father, There is no shadow of turning with me, Thou changest not thy compassions they fail not, As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be. Great is thy faithfulness, Great is thy faithfulness, Morning by morning new mercies I see, All I have needed Thy hand hath provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord unto me, Summer and winter and springtime and harvest, Sun, moon, and stars in their courses above, Join with all nature in manifold witness, To thy great faithfulness, mercy and love. Great is thy faithfulness, Great is thy faithfulness, Morning by morning new mercies I see, All I have needed Thy hand hath provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord unto me, Pardon for sin and of peace that endureth, Thine, O dear presence, to cheer and to guide, Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow, Blessings, O mine, if ten thousand decide, Great is thy faithfulness, Great is thy faithfulness, Morning by morning new mercies I see, All I have needed Thy hand hath provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord unto me, Great is thy faithfulness, Great is thy faithfulness, Morning by morning new mercies I see, All I have needed Thy hand hath provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord unto me. We'll go through our announcements together. If you don't have a bulletin slip up your hand nice and high. We'll get to you with one. On the inside we have our service time. Sunday mornings at 10 30 is our preaching service. Sunday nights at 6. Wednesday nights at 7 is our bible study. This week will be in Judges chapter 15 continuing with the story of Samson. We've got the soul winning times listed there below as well as salvations and baptisms. And then across the page please speak with myself or brother Segura or someone else if you would like to be baptized today. Thank you to everyone who participated in the small town soul winning trip to Globe yesterday. Nine soul winners went out there and had seven salvations. The next trip to Safford is going to be this Friday and Saturday. So leaving Friday morning, coming back Saturday evening. All the information is over here. This trip is going to be led by brother Corbin Russell and you can sign up. The transportation, lodging, food, everything's provided for. So if you're available on Friday and Saturday and you'd like to come then you are more than welcome. And then below that we've got a new bible memory passage and boy is this a good one. Romans chapter 4 verses 1 through 8. I think out of all the bible that I've memorized I probably end up quoting, you know, Romans chapter 4 verses 5 through 8. I've probably quoted those like more than any other scripture in a sermon. So you want to talk about something that you can use. Okay this is some good stuff. So I would strongly encourage you even if you don't normally do the bible memory passage, Romans chapter 4 verses 1 through 8 is a good one. So don't don't skip this one. And then the deadline to recite it for the prize is going to be May 16th and then the weekly singing classes are every Sunday at 5 pm right here at the church building. On the back the homeschool field trip to the Out of Africa Wildlife Park is this Thursday and so don't forget about that. Be sure to read all those instructions and follow them carefully. You know these church events are free but we ask that you respect them anyway even though you're not paying for it. Respect them by, you know, being on time and and treating it as if you had paid for it even though it's free all right. And then below that we've got other upcoming events listed there. Soul winning stuff. Spanish night. I believe that that ship has already sailed to March 11th but we're kind of just reflecting back on it in the bulletin. And then there's going to be another one next month in April. Be the second Thursday in April. So that's about it for announcements. Let's go ahead and sing our next song. Come lead us. All right in your hymnals you should find an insert of the hymn Rejoice in the Lord. If you don't have one please raise your hand and we'll sing it. Rejoice in the Lord. Great hymn by Ron Hamilton or Rejoice in the Lord. Let's sing it on that first verse. God never moves without purpose or plan. Let's sing it out together on that first verse. God never moves without purpose or plan. When trying a servant and loathing a man. Give thanks to the Lord though your testing seems long. In darkness he giveth a song. Rejoice in the Lord. He makes all my say. He know with the end of each path that I take. For when I am tried and glorified. I shall come forth as gold. I could not see through the shadows ahead. So I looked at the cross of my Savior instead. I bow to the will of the master that day. Rejoice in the Lord. He makes no mistake. He know at the end of each path that I take. For when I am tried and glorified. I shall come forth as gold. My Father knows best and I trust in his care. Through purging or fruit I will bear. Rejoice in the Lord. He makes no mistake. He know at the end of each path that I take. For when I am tried and glorified. I shall come forth as gold. Abide with me fast falls the even tide number 106. Sing it out with me all together on that first verse. Abide with me fast falls the even tide. The darkness deepens. Lord with me abide. When other helpers fail and comforts flee. Help of the helpless so abide with me. Swear to its close that thou mightst let all gain. Curse joy's growth in this. Glory's pass away. Change and decay in all around I see. O thou who changest not abide with me. I need thy presence every passing hour. Why by thy grace can all the temptors bow. Who like thyself by guidance they can be. Through cloud and sunshine oh abide with me. O thou thy cross before my closing eyes. Shine through the blue and point me to the skies. As morning breaks and earth's main shadows flee. In life and death oh Lord abide with me. All right at this time we'll pass our offering plates around and as the plates go around let's turn our bibles to second kings chapter 17 the book of second kings in the old testament second kings 17 we'll start reading in verse number one follow along silently with brother raimond as he reads second kings 17 1 second kings chapter 17 and verse 1 the bible reads and the 12th year of ahas king of judah began hoshea the son of elah to reign in samaria over israel nine years and he did that which was evil in the sight of the lord but not as the kings of israel that were before him against him came up shamanezer king of iseriah and hoshea became his servant and gave him presence and the king of iseriah found conspiracy in hoshea for he had sent messengers to sow king of egypt and brought no present to the king of iseriah as he had done year by year therefore the king of iseriah shut him up and bound him in prison then the king of iseriah came up throughout all the land and went up to samariah and besieged it three years and the ninth year of hoshea the king of iseriah took samariah and carried israel away into iseriah and placed them in halah and in habor by the river of goza and in the cities of the meads for so it was that the children of israel had sinned against the lord their god which had brought them up out of the land of egypt from under the hand of pharaoh king of egypt and he had feared other gods and walked in the statutes of the heathen whom the lord cast out from before the children of israel and of the kings of israel which they had made and the children of israel did secretly those things that were not right against the lord their god and they built them high places in all their cities from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city and they set them up images and groves in every high hill and under every green tree and there they burnt incense in all the high places as did the heathen from whom the lord carried away before them and wrought wicked things to provoke the lord to anger for they served idols wherefore the lord had said unto them he shall not do this thing yet the lord testified against israel and against judah by all the prophets and by all the seers saying turn ye from your evil ways and keep my commandments and my statutes according to all the law which i commanded your fathers and which i sent to you by my servants the prophets notwithstanding they would not hear but harden their necks like to the neck of their fathers that did not believe in the lord their god and they rejected his statutes and his covenant that he made with their fathers and his testimonies which he testified against them and they followed vanity and became vain and went after the heathen that were round about them concerning whom the lord had charged them that they should not do like them and they left all the commandments of the lord their god and made them molten images even two calves and made a grove and worshipped all the hosts of heaven and served bail and they caused their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire and use divination and enchantments and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the lord to provoke him to anger therefore the lord was very angry with israel and removed them out of his sight there was none left but the tribe of judah only also judah kept not the commandments of the lord their god but walked in the statutes of israel which they made and the lord rejected all the seed of israel and afflicted them and delivered them into the hand of spoilers until he had cast them out of his sight for he rent israel from the house of david and they made jeroboam the son of nebak king and jeroboam drove israel from following the lord and made them sin a great sin for the children of israel walked in all the sins of jeroboam which he did they departed not from them until the lord removed israel out of his sight as he had said by all his servants the prophets so was israel carried away out of their own land to israel unto this day and the king of israel brought men from babylon and kuthath and from avis ava and from hamath and from sepharvayim and placed them in the cities of samaria instead of the children of israel and they possessed samaria and dwelt in the cities thereof and so it was at the beginning of their dwelling there that they feared not the lord therefore the lord sent lions among them which slew some of them wherefore they spake to the king of iseria saying the nations which thou has removed and placed in the cities of samaria know not the manner of the god of the land therefore he hath sent lions among them and behold they slay them because they know not the manner of the god of the land then the king of iseria commanded saying carry thither one of the priests whom he brought from thence and let them go and dwell there and let him teach them the manner of the god of the land then one of the priests whom they had carried away from samaria came and dwelt in bethel and taught them how they should fear the lord how be it every nation made gods of their own and put them in the houses of the high places which the samaritans had made every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt and the men of babylon made succoth and the men of kuth made nergal and the men of hamath made ashima and the avites made nebas and tartak and the sephirvams burnt their children in the fire to a dremelik and anemelik the gods of the sephirvam so they feared the lord and made unto themselves of the lowest of them priests of the high places which sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places they feared the lord and served their own gods after the manner of the nations whom they carried away from thence unto this day they do after the former manners they fear not the lord neither do they after their statutes or after their ordinances or after the law and commandment which the lord god commanded the children of jacob whom he named israel with whom the lord had made a covenant and charged them saying ye shall not fear other gods nor bow yourselves to them nor serve them nor sacrifice to them but the lord who brought you up out of the land of egypt with great power and a stretched out arm him shall you fear and him shall you worship and to him shall you do sacrifice and the statutes and the ordinances and the law and the commandment which he wrote for you he ye shall observe to do forevermore and ye shall not fear other gods and the covenant that i have made with you ye shall not forget neither shall ye fear other gods but the lord your god ye shall fear and he shall deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies howbeit they did not hearken but they did after their former manner so these nations feared the lord and served their graven images both their children and their children's children as did their fathers so do they unto this day brother daniel will you pray for us uh dear father heaven please uh feel pastor with your holy spirit and please um bless us all with the wisdom and understanding through this sermon we pray in jesus name amen man the title of my sermon this morning is hybrid religion hybrid religion here in second kings chapter 17 we have an example of religions being mixed you know where you have this religion of the people of the land and they're coming from all these different places the bible says in verse 24 that the king of israel brought men from babylon and from kutha and from ava and from hamath and from sepharvayim and placed them in the cities of samaria instead of the children of israel and they possessed samaria and dwelt in the cities thereof and these people that are coming from all these different places they're bringing a variety of religions with them and a little bit later it lists all the different false gods that they worship and so the children of israel because their disobedience to god have been removed from the land of israel but obviously the the babylonians you know don't want excuse me the asyrians don't want to just leave it empty you know they don't want to just take most of the israelites out into captivity and then just let the land go to waste they're moving their people in you know they're moving in other foreigners from the isyrian empire and these people are coming with all these different religious backgrounds and they show up and god begins to punish these people for worshiping demons in the promised land you know i mean they're in the promised land they're in israel and they're worshiping all these false gods and so god punishes them by sending lions among them so people are getting tore up by these lions and so look what the bible says in verse number 26 wherefore they spake to the king of isyria saying the nations which thou is removed and placed in the cities of samaria know not the manner of the god of the land therefore he had sent lions among them and behold they slay them because they know not the manner of the god of the land then the king of isyria commanded saying carry thither one of the priests whom he brought from thence and let them go and dwell there and let them teach let him teach them the manner of the god of the land so what you have to understand is that a lot of these people in the ancient world they thought that each geography has a god and they believe that all of these gods are equally valid but that you know if you're living in the land of the philistines you got to worship the god of the philistines or if you're living over in edom then there's an edomite god and they thought that it was a geographic thing now obviously every lie is based on some kernel of truth there is a truth in that the promised land of israel is associated with the lord but over and over again the bible hammers that god's the god of the whole earth and that all the gods of the nations are idols and it's the lord that made all of the heaven and the earth the sea and everything in them so these people just think well okay we have our god but when in rome you know if we're going to be in this land of israel we have to worship the god associated with that land so let's send a priest over and he's going to teach them you know how to worship the lord so that they can at least be blessed in the land and so it says in verse 28 then one of the priests whom they had carried away from samaria came and dwelt in bethel and taught them how they should fear the lord how be it every nation made gods of their own and put them in the houses of the high places which the samaritans had made every nation in the cities wherein they dwell so what we have here is that this priest shows up and he's going to explain to them how to worship jehovah how to worship the god of the bible and they say okay you know we're going to worship the lord but we're not going to replace our other religion we're not going to replace the gods we used to worship we're just going to sort of tag on the worship of the lord to what we're already doing so we're going to have our same idols our same religion but we're just adding on the bible we're just adding on the worship of the lord and so it says in verse number 30 the men of babylon made sucketh benath that's a god that really sucketh and the men of cus made nergal and the men of hamath made ashima and the avites made nibhas and tartak and by the way you say i've never heard of these false gods that's because they're fake and so they stopped mattering after a while you know every god beside the lord eventually is just going to be forgotten he's just going to fade away and be gone forever but the name of god will abide forever the name of the lord the name of jesus christ will endure forever but these other false gods were were gods that have come and gone and nobody cares anymore about nergal or ashima and it talks about these different gods that they made and look at verse 32 it says so they feared the lord and made unto themselves of the lowest of them priests of the high places which sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places and remember just a couple verses earlier the houses of the high places were associated with these false gods that they made they made false gods put them in the houses of the high places and it's saying they feared the lord and they also made these other priests that would serve their false gods in these houses of the high places verse 33 they feared the lord and served their own gods after the manner of the nations whom they carried away from mens unto this day they do after the former manners and notice these next words they fear not the lord now hold on a second at the beginning of verse 32 it says they feared the lord at the beginning of verse 33 it says they feared the lord then we get to verse 34 and it says they fear not the lord and then you jump down to verse 41 so these nations feared the lord what's going on here feared the lord feared the lord they don't fear the lord they feared the lord now some people point this oh it's a contradiction in the bible and usually when people want to talk about contradiction in the bible this is the kind of stuff they'll point to which just comes from a lack of understanding the context of what's being said here's what the bible is teaching us here if you fear the lord and you fear other gods you're not fearing the lord so from man's perspective he's fearing the lord in addition to other gods but from the lord's perspective he does not see that as you fearing him because you can't have any other gods before him you have to fear him alone he has to be your only god you cannot mix the lord with some other religion you can't mix jesus christ with any other religion it's got to be exclusively jesus it's got to be exclusively the god of the bible and so when it says they fear not the lord it's saying that fearing god plus other gods is not fearing the lord from his perspective unto this day verse 34 they do after the form of manners they fear not the lord neither do they after their statutes uh or after their ordinances or after the law and commandment which the lord commanded the children of jacob whom he named israel with whom the lord had made a covenant and charged them saying ye shall not fear other gods everybody see that so if you actually would read these in context it makes sense and that's how every so-called contradiction in the bible ends up being you shall not fear other gods nor bow yourselves to them nor serve them nor sacrifice to them but the lord who brought you up out of the land of egypt with great power and a stretched out arm him shall ye fear and him shall you worship and to him shall you do sacrifice and the statutes and the ordinances and the law and the commandment which he wrote for you ye shall observe to do forevermore and ye shall not fear other gods the covenant that i've made with you you shall not forget neither shall you fear other gods see how you just keep saying don't fear other gods don't fear other gods don't fear other gods do not fear other gods it's got to be the lord only now did he say this hey if you move to another area worship the god in that region but that's the mentality of these other nations around them like well i'm with the philistines now so i got a sacrifice to the philistine god but if i move over to here you know i might have a little keychain with my philistine god on it as well but i've got to worship the god of this geography god is saying i don't care where you go you will not worship any other gods and later he scatters them into all nations of the world and he tells them that in those nations where they've been scattered they better be seeking the lord if they ever want to come back they've got to be worshiping the lord and notice when daniel is taken to a distant land what do you see him doing only worshiping the lord shadrach mishak and abednego are taken to a distant land they're only going to worship the lord they refuse to bow down they don't hybridize and do well we're going to worship the lord but we're also going to bow down to the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar has set up no way god is the god of the whole earth and he demands that all of our fear all of our worship all of our uh respect be directed at him and him alone and not to have any other gods before him and it says in verse 40 howbeit they did not hearken but they did after their former manner so these nations feared the lord and served their graven images both their children and their children's children as did their fathers so do they unto this day now turn if you would to first thessalonians chapter one in the new testament we're done in second kings but go over to first thessalonians chapter one in the new testament and in first thessalonians chapter one we have a great verse on repentance in regard to salvation which is a really misunderstood subject by a lot of people when it comes to what role does repentance play in salvation now biblically speaking salvation is by faith not of works lest any man should boast and so salvation is by grace alone through faith alone to god alone be the glory and it's not by deeds of righteousness which we have done but according to his mercy he saved us there's no works involved in salvation we can also study the bible and very easily come to the conclusion that turning away from our sins turning away from our evil way following the laws of god that's works when we follow god's law that's called the works of the law when we turn from our evil way that's called works and so a lot of people they're teaching that repentance in regard to salvation is well you got to turn from your sins in order to be saved you got to turn from folks if that were true we're all doomed none of us is fully repentant of all our sins or fully well you just kind of you know got to be willing to turn away that's not what the bible says because turning from our sins is something that we do every day that's a daily thing every single day we deny self we take up the cross and we follow jesus but that is not what salvation is because salvation is a one-time thing it's not born again and again and again it's born again okay you get saved one time you're saved eternally you become a child of god but turning from sin is something that we have to keep doing you know uh new sins will crop up in our lives and we have to turn from those things so we're constantly repenting of sin throughout our christian life that's not salvation salvation is believing on the lord jesus christ it's not any work involved on our part it's believing it's faith the real repentance in regard to salvation you know if you look at a verse like say repent and believe the gospel what is the real repentance in regard to salvation is that whatever you used to be trusting in you have to turn from trusting in that to trust in jesus christ as your savior so let's say i'm worshiping a false god let's say i'm working worshiping you know sucketh benoth or whatever that false god was in uh second kings chapter 17 i can't just add jesus onto that or well i'm buddhist but i'm a born-again buddhist no you're not you might think you've been born three thousand times or something but you're not a born-again buddhist there's no such thing as a born-again hindu right you say well you know i'm a born-again mormon no you're not okay you can't just sit there and be a part of a false religion teaching a different way to heaven in many cases worshiping a different deity not believing the bible not believing in jesus christ your savior not fully trusting in him and then you can't just add jesus onto that okay if you're jewish right you're going to have to renounce judaism in order to be saved in order to believe on jesus christ and become a christian you can't just say oh i'm just adding jesus onto my messianic judaism fingers and folks judaism teaches a lot of false doctrines and it teaches a workspace salvation and they're worshiping another god because if you don't have the son you don't have the father you're going to have to reject some things right somebody who's jewish gonna have to reject some things about judaism in order to embrace salvation through jesus christ you know you're gonna have to reject some things about islam and you're gonna have to walk away from islam if you want to be saved you can't say well i'm a born-again muslim you know i'm i'm a muslim but i also believe jesus the son of god wrong you need to ditch islam in order to get saved because islam clearly teaches that god has no son so you see how biblical christianity and islam cannot coexist you can't have this hybrid and say well i fear the lord no you don't you cannot mix the i believe on jesus not if you're believing in buddha as well you have to believe in jesus 100 i love what philip told the ethiopian eunuch if you're actually reading a king james bible where he asks him what baptized and philip tells him if thou believest with all thine heart thou mayest if thou believeth with all thine heart thou mayest and he said i believe that jesus christ the son of god and he stopped the chariot baptized him so notice you you're supposed to believe in jesus with all your heart meaning that you don't have a part of your heart for these other religions other gods other ways to heaven or like well i think you know going to heaven just by being a good person but i'm kind of just believing in jesus to be safe and just kind of cover all my bases wrong my friend so repentance in regard to salvation is you have to turn from what you used to be trusting in and turn to jesus christ as your way to heaven you know maybe you were trusting in your good life your good deeds your catechism your confessional booth whatever you got to turn away from that and you got to trust in the lord jesus christ look what the bible says in first thessalonians chapter one it says in verse nine for they themselves show of us what manner of entering in we had unto you and how you turned to god from idols to serve the living and true god and to wait for his son from heaven whom he raised from the dead even jesus which delivered us from the wrath to come so according to the bible here when these people received the word of god when these people got saved they turned to god from idols that's the turning involved in salvation you know these people are in thessalonica so what kind of idols are they worshiping in thessalonica this would be the greek pantheon right this could be zeus and hermes and all these other false gods of greek mythology they turned away from those idols to serve the living and true god what if they hadn't turned away from those idols would they be able to serve the living and true god if they're still hanging on to aries and zeus and hermes all these things absolutely not because you've got to trust jesus christ alone and you can't have this hybrid where you're mixing two different religions you have to be all in for jesus christ that's what the bible clearly teaches the old testament taught that the new testament teaches that you've got to believe on him alone now here's an example of a of a hybrid religion today and that's roman catholicism now why is roman catholicism a hybrid how did it get that way how did it become this unbiblical hybrid because folks you look at a lot of things that the roman catholics do and teach and you say that's not in the bible anywhere where are they getting this how did they become a hybrid i'll tell you exactly how they became a hybrid it's because whenever you force people whenever you force people to join a religion you end up creating a hybrid and let me explain to you why if you think about it back in the days of the roman empire for a period christianity was illegal and you know christians are being persecuted and thrown to the lions but eventually things changed constantine comes along and not only does he make christianity legal which that's great you know make christianity legal but then things go a step further and christianity becomes the official religion of the roman empire so it went from being you can't be a christian to well now you have to be a christian now both of these things are wrong people should obviously not be prohibited from being a christian but they certainly should not be mandated you have to worship christ you have to be saved you have to believe in jesus you have to be a christian this is wrong now some people might disagree with that and they would think to themselves well no i mean if i were king i'd make everybody go to church at a baptist church you know i'd make everybody worship the lord now listen if i had a button on the pulpit if i had a button on the pulpit right now this isn't that other sermon but if i if i if i had a button on the pulpit right now where i can push this button and everybody in america would have to go to a baptist church or if i were king and i had the ability to make a rule that everybody in america has got to go to a baptist church every sunday i would not make that rule i would not push that button and let me tell you why because you know what you do you'd be filling the churches with unbelievers that defeats the whole purpose of even having a church i mean why would i want to bring in a bunch of unsaved bozos a bunch of false religions why would i want to fill the church with buddhists hindu's catholics muslim oh you're going to reach them no they're going to reach us when you bring in that many people you're bringing in all that corruption you're bringing in false doctrine those people are going to start having a say about how the church goes they're teaching sunday school they're involved but their heart is not in it see here's the thing when a person of their own free will says you know what i'm done being a pagan i'm going to turn from idols to god you know their hearts in that and you know what they do they become fully christian they go all the way in and they're ready to ditch the old religion and read the bible and worship the lord that's it but here's the thing when the roman emperor just says all right everybody you're christian now a lot of people are like i don't want to be christian i want to be pagan so guess what they do they end up being a christian on the outside and a pagan on the inside and what happens when you just have all these thousands and millions of pagans going through the motions of being a christian you know what they actually do they bring over a lot of that paganism into christianity and that's why roman catholicism that's why it starts with the word roman okay it's like mainly roman a little bit catholicism okay it's heavy on the roman why because if you look at roman paganism they had all these gods and goddesses and they're each associated with something you know you've got the god of the forest you've got the god of the rivers and you've got the god of the ocean and you've got the god of carpenters and you've got the god that's associated with uh you know farmers and you've got the god for the shepherd and they've got all these false gods that they worship and they're associated with different things you name something and you'd say okay which roman god you know goes with that attribute or that situation who do you pray to in that situation well guess what the catholics do they come along and say well no no there's only one god it's only one god but here we've got a saint of the rivers we've got a saint for the forest we've got a saint for carpenters we've got a saint for farmers we've got a saint for the shepherd and they've got a different saint to pray to in every situation so either way you got a little statue of some dude that you're chanting to except now instead of being called the god of the forest it's the patron saint of the forest but you're still praying to him you're still venerating him you still have a graven image to him and so you see how the pagans being forced to be christian hey is the great you know we're all christian now no because what you've done is you've just got an outward profession of faith in christ you've got an outward conformity to quote unquote christianity but yet it's paganism on the inside and so the roman catholic church is filled with all sorts of paganism and mumbo jumbo that has nothing to do with but where in the bible do you see show me in the new testament monks nuns monasteries confessional booth indulgences the pope right saint this saint that praying to the saints the bible says there's one mediator between god and men the man christ jesus one mediator but the catholic church has a mediator literally for every day of the year that's why when people are born in other countries in europe we don't really do this in america but everybody's got their their name day or their saint's day you know my wife talks about this like oh it's so-and-so's name she doesn't worship other gods folks but i'm saying uh she told me about this is what i should say that you know isn't there one for every single day of the year am i wrong about that is there some day of the year where you're just like saintless no because in school she said that in school you don't celebrate your birthday you know we would bring cupcakes for the whole class back before that was cancelled or whatever but you know she said they don't celebrate birthdays they celebrate the name day the saint's day am i wrong you give me a funny look all right yeah so so yeah they celebrate this this so to them that's an important holiday for them like we're into our birthday in europe they're into their name day they're saying because it's like basically whatever day saint stephen is associated with i would celebrate that because my name's stephen and but there's literally one for every day of the year so that's a lot of saints that's a lot of options to pray to you you could go to the dollar tree and there's all these candles lined up of all these different it's like you could get a new saint to pray to you for a buck i mean think about it you could go to the dollar tree with 20 bucks and walk out with like 20 deities to pray to and everything's covered i mean your plumbing will be covered you know your your produce will be covered your animals will be covered if you lose stuff you got oh where which one you know you find the one for when you lose stuff under the couch cushions or something you know you pray to saint finder or whatever saint where's waldo i don't know but but literally i've been to the dollar tree and just seen all these saints and it gives you the prayer right on the candle shows you a picture of some stern looking dude and gives you a prayer to chant and you light this candle and boom genie comes out of the bottle and everything's fixed folks this isn't bible it's not christianity it's paganism anytime you force people to convert what are you doing you're bringing corruption into your religion you're bringing corruption into the church it's not just as easy as okay everybody we got a priest here to tell you you know these there's too many lions we got a priest here he's gonna tell you how to worship the lord you're all going to be christian now all right and then you're going to be fine did it work in second king 17 no the priest shows up he teaches himself but in the end what are they going to do they're going to keep worshiping tarteck and all these other nergal and all these other bozos and so the point is it doesn't work to force people to switch religions you just end up corrupting the religion and that's why the roman catholic church is so corrupt but even in modern times the roman catholic church continues to do the same thing not only did they do this back in the roman days and pick up all that paganism well here in the southwest of the united states we have our own specific brand of catholicism right here because of the catholics coming over here and forcing the native americans to convert and so because you have the roman catholics coming in and forcing the natives to convert now you pick up all this superstitious hocus pocus from the native americans and now you can bring that into the catholic church too so right just two miles from here we've got the town of guadalupe where the yaki tribe is and what do they do yeah they practice their own brand of catholicism and every easter they they flog themselves or flog each other and go through all these strange things that most catholics aren't even necessarily doing but they've kind of got their own mix of native traditions plus catholicism you know and and look we could look at tons of examples like this all over the world the fancy word for it is religious syncretism when one religion absorbs the practices of another religion and this is why we need to have uh the freedom or the liberty to choose the lord jesus christ and we should not force that on other people or force them to be christian now go to joshua chapter 24 joshua chapter 24 in the old testament now some people would say well you forced your children to be christian here's the difference the difference is that my children from a child know the scriptures what your to make them wise unto salvation through faith which is in christ jesus and i bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the lord that's a little different than walking up to a naked indian who's 35 years old and saying you're going to be christian now or we're going to kill you you see the difference because that guy might not necessarily want to be a christian but because you're forcing him to be a christian he's going to do it on the outside but he's bringing in his false religion or saying to a jew you must convert to christianity he might do it outwardly but then he brings in all this judaizing doctrine and he's what's called a crypto jew right or all the different examples you should never force people to be a christian and anytime people throughout history have been forced to be a christian it's a mistake and it ends up corrupting christianity by bringing in a bunch of unsaved people because if you tell somebody hey you got to be christian or we're going to kill you they're going to be like okay i'm christian but nothing changed in their heart nothing changed on the inside god teaches liberty god teaches freedom he wants people to make that choice not for it to be forced upon them now someone may say well you know israel didn't have religious liberty and i've heard this brought up a lot saying hey there's no religious liberty in israel everybody had to worship the lord or you know religious liberty is not biblical but hold on a minute let's stop and think about this first of all number one israel was given the choice of whether or not they were going to worship the lord look what the bible says in joshua 24 verse 14 now therefore fear the lord and serve him in sincerity and in truth joshua 24 14 and put away the gods which your father served on the other side of the flood and in egypt and serve ye the lord and if it seemed evil unto you to serve the lord choose you this day whom you will serve whether the gods which your father served that were on the other side of the flood or the gods of the amorites in whose land you dwell but as for me and my house we will serve the lord watch this and the people answered and said god forbid that we should forsake the lord or serve to serve other gods for the lord our god he it is that brought us up and our fathers out of the land of egypt from the house of bondage and which did those great signs in our sight and preserved us in all the way and they go on to recount all the great things the lord has done for them why we forsake the lord we want to serve god now look how joshua is really pressuring them and forcing them to be worshippers of the lord in verse 19 and joshua said to the people you can't serve the lord he's like you cannot serve the lord now it's not like he's really pushing hard trying to talk him into it he said you cannot serve the lord for he's a holy god he's a jealous god he will not forgive your transgressions or he says now look obviously he's not telling them hey you guys don't want to do this what he's doing is he's just making sure they understand what they're getting into obviously he wants them to worship the lord obviously he's preaching to them he said earlier serve the lord but what he's saying is but what he's saying is you know what make sure that you want to do this isn't that what he's saying look if you serve the lord he's a jealous god you can't serve the lord if you're going to be serving these other gods too and everything you've got to be all in joshua said to the people you cannot serve the lord for he is a holy god he's a jealous god he will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins if you forsake the lord and serve strange gods then he will turn and do you hurt and consume you after that he had done you good and the people said to joshua nay but we will serve the lord and joshua said to the people you're witnesses against yourselves that you've chosen you the lord to serve him and they said we are witnesses are they choosing the lord or what they made this choice this is their choice now let me ask you this where in the old testament do we see the nation of israel you know conquering nations outside of their territory going outside their territory and having a conquest of other nations and say all right everybody in this other nation's got to worship the lord now where do you see them saying all right we're going to conquer this other country we're going to conquer moab and the philistines and the edamites and we're going to force a foreign country to worship the lord i don't see it in scripture you know what i see in scripture is that you have a group of people that god makes a covenant with and they make a covenant with him and they have to worship the lord because they're his nation they're his chosen people and they've made this choice it's sort of like my wife and i have made this covenant of marriage we've chosen each other so now we're committed to each other she can't be with other men i can't be with other women right but that doesn't mean that i have the right to impose on other people who they can be with or who they can't be with right that's not that's not my business you know and i would not be able to control some other woman that was just a girlfriend or a concubine if i haven't entered into that covenant with her you know but i've entered into a covenant with my wife so i have the right to demand that she worship me only no i'm just kidding anyway you know i have the right to demand you know that she be exclusive unto me but i wouldn't have that right to demand that if it was just against her will and she has no interest or whatever does everybody see the difference here so that's kind of an analogy you could use to think of is that israel chose the lord they entered into this agreement willingly this isn't god going around forcing everybody and the bible even clearly says in the book of acts that he allowed the nations to to walk in their own ways and and he allowed them in the old testament to to go and worship these other false gods but many people in these nations did turn to the lord and god sent preachers to them and and many of them would get saved and and turn to the lord and so forth but god does not force people to worship him god wants a cheerful giver god wants people to willingly love him and serve him and believe in him not because they're being forced but because they want to and so you say well you know israel didn't have religious liberty religious liberty isn't biblical here's my other response to that number one number one i said well that's a a relationship that they chose to enter into with the lord it's a covenant that they made but number two i would bring up the fact that it didn't work did how the nation of israel work out it crashed and burned that's why we're here in the new testament okay see one way of studying the bible and i don't want to go too deep on this for sake of time but one good way to study the bible or to understand the bible is to realize that in the old testament it's a series of god trying things with man and they don't work out don't work out don't work out don't work out obviously god knew everything from the beginning but the reason that he goes through this process of trying something trying something trying something is he's illustrating to us our need for the savior our need for jesus christ and that things can't work without jesus so he demonstrates that you know we start on the garden of eden it doesn't work out then it's like okay god curses the earth and man's gonna have to work hard by the sweat of his face and god curses the earth doesn't work out the whole earth gets violent and wicked so then god ends up having to flood the earth and then after the flood he says okay i'm not going to curse the earth anymore and then he says okay now i'm going to institute the death penalty you know because there was too much violence before the flood so he institutes the death penalty he's not going to curse the earth does that work out no because then they go and build a tower of babel okay it's going wrong again so then god confounds their languages divides the nation separates them out into like 70 nations and then he picks one man abraham to be the patriarch and to be the guy who's going to father a new nation that's going to be a nation that worships the lord and that nation is going to be a light to the gentiles you know it'll be like this one pattern nation that could evangelize the world and show everybody else how to do it right how'd that work out didn't work out under the judges did it work out no so okay let's try something new let's try having king saul of course that wasn't god's idea but man's idea was let's have king saul didn't work out so then god says okay well i'm gonna pick a king after my own heart you know we're gonna pick a new king and yes god chose saul but obviously it was man's idea and it was not god's will for them to have a king but they said we want a king anyway and god said fine give him a king and then he picked saul saul didn't work out so then he tries again with david how'd that work out well in the end david's monarchy went bad it went wrong and it crashed and burned they end up going to babylon and then he puts him in captivity for 70 years and then he tries it again with ezra and nehemiah brings them back new temple let's do this so it's just over and over again the old testament trying things trying things trying and you know what the bible says in the book of hebrews it says if that first covenant had been faultless then should no place have been sought for the second he's saying if the old testament were good to go you wouldn't need a new testament but it wasn't god that was the problem it was the people that were the problem because it says for if that first covenant had been faultless then should no place have been sought for the second for finding fault with them he saith and then he talks about how he's gonna make a new covenant with the house of israel and with the house of judah after those days saith the lord and so we see that there was a problem with the old testament the problem was the people that were under the old testament they messed it up so to sit there and and point back to the old testament nation of israel and say well the nation of israel had no religious freedom so therefore you know we shouldn't either that doesn't make sense because that system didn't work okay now what about the moral laws that god gave the nation of israel yeah those should all be imported into the new testament because jesus didn't come to destroy the law or the prophets but to fulfill but the religious laws of the old testament should not be imported into the new testament because we're under a new covenant which by the way judaizers the bible says is called the better testament in hebrews it calls the new testament the better testament the better covenant established upon better promises so why do you want to go backward now look obviously when we look at the old testament law all scripture is profitable for doctrine yeah we should look at the old testament law to figure out morality the morality taught by the old testament is the ultimate morality of what's right what's wrong and so obviously all of those things still stand and when we look at the criminal justice system of the old testament hey obviously we would do well to learn from that to pattern our criminal justice system after that biblical model i'm for that but the thing that i'm not for though is taking the religious aspect of the old covenant and importing that into the new testament okay and demanding and forcing everyone to worship the lord because of the fact that in the new covenant that's not how it works okay we have liberty we have freedom and we should choose and like i said even in the old testament there was liberty because you could always just leave you know the nation of israel was a place where you had to worship the lord because it was the special nation and so forth now who's the special nation in the new testament is in america no the special nation in the new testament is all believers and it's not a geographical thing so again you choose to join don't you when you believe on christ you choose to join just like in the old testament people could choose to join the nation of israel if they wanted to they could go ahead for the land of the philistines david did it at one point you know i mean you could always leave i didn't see anybody you know stopping david at immigration i don't see anybody stopping samson at immigration when he's going down there to marry a philistine girl i didn't see any border checkpoints stopping him or anything so anybody can leave whenever they want and by the way notice that when they're in the wilderness with moses moses purposely pitched the tabernacle of the congregation without the camp so that only the people who wanted to seek the lord would go to it they would resort there and and basically they put it outside the camp so you had to make an effort to go to it that way the bozos don't show up okay seriously why would you want to fill our church with bozos why would you want to fill baptist churches across america with would you want would you want like 90 of our church to be unsafe people oh it's so great when you're reaching people it wouldn't be church anymore if i want to go hang out with 90 unsafe people i just go to a sporting event and you know maybe if we're you know maybe in america you know a good percentage of people would be saved at that sporting event if we were to go around asking people probably every 10th person or so could give us the right answer of salvation in america we'd probably get a lot of people we'd probably run into a lot of saved people a lot of unsaved people but you know the whole point of going to church is to assemble with people of like faith it's a place to go and have fellowship meaning we are fellow believers fellow christians fellow baptists we believe the same stuff so that we can enjoy the camaraderie if we were all here believing something different there'd be no fellowship there'd be no camaraderie there'd be no point it's not even church anymore church is to be separate from the world and so you can't force people in you end up creating a hybrid religion it's not god's plan go if you would to first corinthians chapter two is the last place we'll turn first corinthians chapter two first corinthians chapter number two so here's the thing you know i would i would not make a law that says people have to be a christian you know now i i do i will say this i do think that it would be good if our nation would say we're a christian nation you know that's that's that's what our country was founded on that's what the majority of people are that's what we're going to base our laws on that's our culture this is who we are as americans we're a christian nation but i do believe that people should have the right to not believe in that and not follow that in america you could still acknowledge it as a christian nation and still give freedom to people who are not christians and i could i could also see the rationale of banning certain religions that are harmful destructive or that are invading and trying to take over you know islam but you know i mean look i could see a rationale for banning certain you know there there have been uh times in in certain parts of america in the early days of america where roman catholicism was banned in certain areas because they said hey you know we don't want the pope influencing our country we were trying to get away from that we left europe to get away from that garbage so i could even understand maybe prohibiting certain religions in certain areas because they're you know uh politically destructive or harmful or whatever and just saying hey you gotta do that somewhere else or whatever i don't really care about that discussion because i'm not trying to come up with some fully thought out political science here because i'm i'm just a preacher preaching the bible but i will say this though people should for sure in any geography in any location be allowed to not worship the lord if they don't want to because if you force people to worship the lord you will end up with what you see in second kings chapter 17 you will end up with what you see in the roman catholic church you will end up with what you see over here in guadalupe you will end up corrupting and mixing what does the bible say come out come out from among them and be separate what part hath he that believeth with an infidel but we're supposed to go to church with infidels we're supposed to go to church with people who don't believe in jesus christ we're supposed to go to church with people who reject the trinity are we supposed to go to church with people who believe that salvation is by works are we supposed to go to church with people who don't even believe jesus the messiah or that he's not the son of god count me out that's not even church anymore so if you say well you know everybody's required to be christian you know what you can never require someone to be a christian because you can't control someone's heart you can't no one can control the heart no one can control my heart you know it always cracks me up when when when when you hear these people who kind of have this attitude that the sky is falling all the time and they're always just like oh you know if biden gets elected we're going to be forced to have transvestites working for the church or something you know you know what i mean like oh man if the democrats are going to force us to perform queer weddings they're going to force us to folks no one can ever force me to do those things no one can ever force me to do those things how could anyone ever force me to do that it's never going to happen but see those people when they say oh we're going to be forced here's what they're basically saying they're basically saying that they're going to go along with it if the government commands them to go along with it or that if they're required to go along with it by law folks no one can ever force us to do anything isn't that true we could always just say no i'm not going to well we'll kill you then kill me you can always say no and even if someone did get forced to confess something that they don't believe or or or pretend to believe something that they don't believe which would be wrong for them to do that but even if they did that does that mean that they believe it in their heart they could just be pretending you know you think about like in in in japan or something when they were persecuting christians and they're making them you know step on pictures of jesus where it was a catholic thing so they're like here step on this i'm like i'll step on this i'll step on that long-haired hippie as many times as you want but the thing is you know it's like oh you gotta step on this door but here's the thing does that really change what's going on in that person's heart whether they act you know because you can't even see inside someone's heart you don't even know what they believe right and so you can't force people to believe something you know and you shouldn't force people to outwardly go through the motions of christianity because then you're just filling the church with unsaved people it's better to reach people who want to get saved who want to believe in jesus because then they're actually going to ditch their old religion which is repentance right turn from the old religion and turn unto the gospel of jesus christ look at first i'll close with this first corinthians chapter 2 verse 1 and i brethren when i came to you came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom declaring unto you the testimony of god for i determined not to know anything among you save jesus christ and him crucified and i was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling and my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom but in demonstration of the spirit and of power that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of man but in the power of god now what's the apostle paul saying when we get people saved it's not just we're smarter than them and so we can out maneuver them intellectually we kind of verbally spar with them at the door we win the argument and they get saved is that how people get saved no the bible says people get saved as a result of the power of god the power of the holy spirit gets people saved right the preaching of the cross is to them the parish foolishness but unto us which are saved it is the power of god for i'm not ashamed of the gospel of christ for it is the power of god unto salvation unto everyone that believeth to the jew first and also to the greek and so the holy spirit's power converts people to christ so therefore we should rely on the holy spirit's power to convert people into christ not force people to be saved because we can't really force them to be saved we can only force them to pretend to be saved and then we end up bringing in a bunch of unbelievers and bringing in all the baggage that they're going to bring in because they didn't repent of their false religion and look i'm for evangelizing the indians i mean our church has done a lot to evangelize the indians in arizona but never one time did we say hey this is america buddy you must convert to christ if you want to live here there's a new sheriff in town you you know your party's over yeah you guys were here first well guess what party's over we're here now welcome to my world okay is that what we do no what we do is we go up there and lovingly preach the gospel to them so that the power of god can draw them in so the power of god can get them saved and faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of god and the spirit's power is going to convert the natives unto christ but forcing them to convert is meaningless it's counterproductive and you end up corrupting your own religion in addition to just getting a bunch of fake converts it's got to be through the holy spirit's power not by force and so what do i want you to take away from the sermon you know what what is the moral of the sermon well a couple of points just to summarize what i want you to take away from the sermon the first thing i want you to take away from the sermon is that we've got to only believe on the lord jesus christ as our savior and nothing else okay and that's the true repentance when it comes to salvation it's not like oh i quit drinking i'm ready to get saved now all right well i'm done forticating i'm ready to get saved now folks turning over a new leaf is not salvation okay the real repentance is hey i'm done with buddha i'm ready to get saved now i'm done with islam i'm ready to get saved now i'm done praying the rosary and trusting my works so i'm ready to get saved now that's the real repentance turning to god from idols so that's the first thing i want you to take away from the sermon is to understand god demands exclusive worship in old testament and new testament and the repentance associated with salvation is turning from whatever it was you were trusting in so you can believe on jesus with all your heart that's number one number two is that false religions throughout the world have been made by hybridizing sometimes the bible with a false sometimes they just mix one false religion with another false religion but a lot of religions have come about in this way and and and roman catholicism why is it so corrupt because they forced people to convert back in the roman empire and they forced people to convert in the southwestern united states and what did they do they ended up absorbing false teachings absorbing false practices and uh because they did not understand what i'm preaching about religious liberty and freedom god wants people to choose him and we should never force people to be saved or to be a christian because we can't now i'm not saying again i'm not saying hey let your kids do whatever they want look your children are your responsibility you're to bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the lord they should know from a child the holy scriptures which are able to make them wise unto salvation now ultimately they have to make their own choice to receive the lord jesus christ as their savior they have to make that personal choice but of course we are to demand the worship of the lord only in our own home as joshua said hey you do what you want but as for me and my house we will serve the lord so as for me and my house in 2021 we're going to serve the lord no matter what people do outside my house no one is going to worship other gods in my house no one is going to be a muslim in my house no one is going to be a buddhist in my house no one will be a hindu in my house but you know what the guy down the street has a right to be a hindu the guy down the street has a right to practice judaism the guy down the street has a right to you know be a mormon or whatever other bogus religion he wants to follow you know what i mean now look i would love to reach that guy i would love to give him the gospel i'd love to preach him the word of god so he could see the error of his ways and come over to christ the right way but i'm not going to force him and that and that's why you know when i'm out soul winning when people aren't interested i can't get out of there fast enough now i i'm not rude about it though i've seen some people that are just like somebody's not understood they don't even say bye they're just like hey when i said i couldn't get out there fast enough from the pullet i was using exaggeration okay i still say all right bye have a good day but i'm not just like sticking my foot in the door are you sure you don't have time and here's why because of the fact that if people aren't interested then i'm not interested now i do like to leave people with one verse because sometimes i'll leave them with one verse and they'll get interested you know we were just out soul winning on wednesday and that guy remember that guy we started talking to him and and he wasn't interested in the beginning or he's kind of just like meh but he said okay i'll listen i didn't think that guy was gonna say i was with brother veron i didn't think that guy was gonna get saved because he was just kind of like okay yeah i guess i'll listen and he was just kind of lackadaisical about it but after a couple verses the guy started getting interested you know and it's like okay and then and then by the end of it the guy was just with it he was very interested so look sometimes i've had a situation where somebody's not interested at all hey no problem sorry if i leave you with one verse before i go i leave them with the one verse and then they go oh wow that's really interesting well here you got ten minutes sure you know sometimes it'll change that most of the time it doesn't change most time you leave them the one verse and they're still like all right bye you know but here's the thing i have no issue you know you know what irritates me when i'm out soul winning getting the door slammed in your face nope getting the door stand and getting the door slammed in my face only makes me laugh when somebody just slams the door in my face and just this thing's like shaking i just laugh when somebody said bleep you you stupid bleepity bleep i'm just like wow that guy's a real people sure are friendly around here you know i just i just laugh about it it's funny my kids love it when stuff like that happens when we're out soul winning they got a new story to tell you know you know what irritates me out soul winning is when somebody just like pretends to be listening and they're not listening and it's just like wastes all this time and you end up like just preaching for like 10 or 15 minutes to somebody who's not even paying attention or listening and just kind of wait that's what's irritating because it's like man i wish i could have just moved on to somebody who actually cared who's actually listening never be irritated by somebody who goes and tells you to go jump in or whatever you know i would just say hey i'm looking for the guy who's interested keep moving keep going every door every door where somebody rejects me brings me closer to the door where somebody wants to get saved it's just it's just it's just a process you know i got 19 more doors or 50 more i don't know the number but god knows the number that on the 78th door somebody wants to get saved or maybe on the third door somebody wants to get saved but every door i knock gets me closer that and plus i look at sometimes i'm just absorbing bad doors and i'm like oh great i'm glad other teams didn't have to do that door i was the bad door absorber because i'm not going to quit soul winning i've been doing this for 21 years i'm not going to stop 22 years now man i got to getting old so the point is it's freedom it's liberty where the spirit of the lord is there's liberty and and you know what we don't need the barrel of a gun to spread christianity because we got the power of the holy spirit let islam be the religion of the sword and let christianity be the religion of this sword religion of the sword right here okay but we don't need it we don't behead anybody with this we might give him a paper cut and that's it all right let's bow your heads in our word of prayer father we thank you so much for uh this great uh bible story in second kings chapter 17 lord and help us to understand uh some of the pitfalls or dangers of of forcible conversions or forcing people to be a christian lord thank you that we have such a powerful message that we can get people to convert on a weekly basis just by preaching your powerful word and and your powerful gospel and so lord if there's anybody here today who's not saved lord i pray that they would get saved before it's eternally too late that they would uh come grab one of us and they could almost grab anybody in this church they could they could show them the gospel lord and so i pray that they would be saved before it's eternally too late uh and and help everyone to understand that their all their faith has to be in jesus and it's in his name we pray amen amen please take your hymnals and we'll be dismissed and singing 322 living for jesus a life that is true number 322 i like that chorus there it says my life i give henceforth to live o christ for thee alone number 322 on this first verse together now living for jesus this is the pathway of blessing for me oh jesus lord and savior i give myself to thee me my heart waiting for jesus such love constrains me to answer his calls me i give myself to thee my heart shall be my throne for jesus me jesus atonement my heart shall be my throne to my dearest treasure the bring me i give myself For now, with thy atonement, please give thyself for me. I am no other master. My heart shall be like home. My life I give henceforth to live. O Christ for me alone. In thy great singing this morning, you are dismissed. In thy great singing this morning, you are dismissed.