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1 Peter chapter 1, the part of the chapter that I want to begin in is verse number 23 where the Bible reads, being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which libbeth and abideth forever. For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man is the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away. But the word of the Lord endureth forever, and this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you. And this morning, the title of the sermon is Saved by the Word. Saved by the Word. The Bible says in verse 23, being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which libbeth and abideth forever. You see, we are born again by the word of God. The Bible likens being saved unto being born again. It's an illustration of what it means to be saved. And when a child is born, when a child is begotten into this world physically, there's a father there. And the father provides the seed there, okay? And in the case of salvation, that seed is the word of God. Without a man providing a seed, a woman cannot become pregnant. A woman cannot give birth to a child. And it's just as impossible for a person to be saved without the word of God. See, the word of God is the seed that makes that new life possible, that brings life. In fact, one of the most famous parables about getting people saved is the parable of the sower. And the Bible says, the sower soweth the word, okay? The Bible says in Luke 8.11, now the parable is this, the seed is the word of God. And so if you would flip over to James chapter 1, just a few pages from 1 Peter there, go to James chapter 1. The word of God is necessary for salvation. The word of God is the saving agent. The word of God is what brings salvation. And this is a doctrine that needs to constantly be taught because it's a doctrine that's constantly under attack. And it's constantly being undermined by fault. Constantly hear people even asking such foolish questions as, well, I mean, are you saved by Jesus or are you saved by the word of God? I mean, are you saved by faith or are you saved by the Bible? And people try to de-emphasize the Bible or try to say that people like us are Bible-olitors because we worship the Bible. Yes, I worship the Bible because the Bible is the word of God and it was in the beginning with God and it was God. And I'm not going to worship a physical book, but the words of God, they are spirit and they are life and they bring salvation. And the Bible says right here in James chapter 1 verse 18, of his own will begat he us. Again, there's that born again illustration, begat he us with the word of truth that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures. Look at verse 21, wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness and receive with meekness the engrafted word which is able to save your souls. Go to Romans 10. So the Bible is real clear there that the word is what's able to save your souls. We're born again by the word of God. He begat us by the word of truth. So you can't separate the word of God from salvation. The word of God is what brings salvation. You cannot be saved without the word of God. Look if you would at Romans chapter 10 verse 8, the Bible reads, but what sayeth it? The word, the word. It all starts with the word. He said, the word is nigh thee or near thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart. That is the word of faith, which we preach that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth, the Lord Jesus and shall believe in that heart that God has raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation for the scripture sayeth whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed for there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek for the same Lord overall is rich unto all that call upon him for whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on him in whom they've not believed and how should they believe in him of whom they've not heard and how shall they hear without a preacher and how shall they preach except they be sent? As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things, but they've not all obeyed the gospel. For as I say, Lord, who had believed our report, so then faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. You cannot believe in Christ until you hear of Christ through the word of God. So it's a foolish question. The Bible says avoid foolish questions. It's a foolish question. Well, is it believing in Christ or the word that saves you? That's ridiculous because faith comes by hearing the word. It's not an either or. You have to have the word in order to believe the word and believing the word is what gets you saved. Now you say, well, what if somebody just explains the gospel in their own words? Salvation cannot take place, period. Now it's possible for someone to hear the word of God earlier on and then someone might explain it to them and then they might get saved right there. But they have to hear and believe the word of God to be saved. And you can sit there and say, well, I believe that if somebody would just explain the gospel in their own words, I still think someone could be saved. But what you're failing to understand is that throughout the New Testament, the Bible is real clear that getting saved is a spiritual act where the Holy Ghost regenerates and quickens the spirit. This is not a carnal or fleshly exercise when a person gets saved. The Holy Spirit draws them. The Holy Spirit is the one who is bringing their dead spirit to life through the word of God. Okay? So we're going to see more scripture on this. If you would flip over to John, there are a lot of scriptures on this in John. You see, in our fleshly mind and in our fleshly wisdom, we might think it's possible to just explain the facts of the gospel to someone and they would assent to those facts and believe those facts and be saved. But in reality, in order for them to believe, they have to hear the word of God. It has to be God's word, not our words. Because the Bible says faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. And if they could get saved without the word of God, that wouldn't make any sense. Why wouldn't he just say, well, faith comes by hearing an explanation of the gospel. Faith comes by hearing the gospel story. That's not what it says. It says faith comes by hearing the word of God. It says that we are born again by the incorruptible seed, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever, of his own will, but gaddiest with the word of truth. The word is what's able to save your souls. Look at John chapter number 5. I don't think I told you where to go in John. Go to John 5 to start with. While you're turning to John 5, Acts 11 14 says, he shall tell thee words whereby thou and all thy house shall be saved. Ephesians 1 13, in whom ye also trusted after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, in whom also after that ye believed ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise. Look at John 5 24, verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but is past from death unto life. Notice that hearing the word is step one, just like it was step one in Romans 10, just like in 1 Peter, just like in James, just like in Acts 11. Flip over to chapter 6 of the same book, John 6 63. This is an important doctrine. It's something that the Bible talks a lot about. I'm going to get into in a moment why this doctrine is criticized or under attack. There are a few different reasons, but we as Bible believing Christians need to be nailed down on this. We need to know what we believe about this and why. We need to be firm on this and get it settled in our hearts this morning. As we look at all these scriptures, we need to walk out of here and say, you know what? You are saved by the word of God. It is the word of God that saves you. It is a necessary component. It's just as necessary as the seed of a man is to making a human baby. That's how necessary the word of God is for salvation. It has to be there. Look at John 6 63, it says it is the spirit that quickeneth. Quicken means to bring to life. Quick means alive, like where the Bible says that the word of God is quick and powerful. The quick and the dead. Jesus will judge the quick and the dead. It means he's going to judge the living and the dead. So the Bible says it is the spirit that quickeneth. If you study this chapter, the context is eternal life. The context is everlasting life, brought up repeatedly. It is the spirit that quickeneth. The flesh profiteth nothing. The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life. You see, the words of God, the words of the Bible, the words of Jesus Christ, they are spirit. They are life. They quicken the unbelieving soul. Look if you would at chapter 8 of John, chapter 8. And while you're turning there, here's a verse that ties in well with John 6 63 that we just read. Psalm 119 50 says, this is my comfort and my affliction for thy word has quickened me. Thy word has quickened me. Look at John 8 30, as he spake these words, many believed on him. You see how God's word creates faith. Jesus speaks the word. They hear the word. As a result, they believe on him. As he spake these words, many believed on him. Then said Jesus to those Jews, which believed on him. If you continue in my word, then are you my disciples indeed, and you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. So after they're saved, he wants them to continue in the word to become a disciple. See everybody who believes on Jesus Christ, isn't necessarily a disciple. They're saved. They're going to heaven. That doesn't make them a disciple because discipleship is a lot of work. It's denying self. It's taking up the cross daily. It's following Jesus. And the Bible said, you know, if you're not willing to forsake everything, you can't be Jesus's disciple. Now do you have to forsake everything in order to get to heaven? Absolutely not. That would be a workspace salvation. If you had to deny self and take up the cross daily in order to make it into heaven, that would be a workspace salvation. The Bible says, for by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. You don't have to work every day for a gift. A gift is given to you for free, but discipleship does take work. So basically we get saved by hearing the word of God and believing it. Then if we want to be a disciple of Christ, we continue in the word. We read the word every day. So the Bible is there also for our Christian growth, not just for our salvation. Now look at chapter 15 of John chapter 15, John chapter 15 verse three. And the Bible reads, now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Now you're clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. It's the word of God that cleans us of our sin, that cleanses us of our sin through salvation. And so it's very silly to try to separate Jesus from the word. Jesus was the walking, talking, living, breathing, physical manifestation of the word of God. The word became flesh and dwelled among us. And we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the father full of grace and truth. This Bible is the written word of God. And separating the two is a mistake and a fallacy. Some people have said, well, Jesus is just called the word of God because that's just a name. It has nothing to do with actual words in a book. That's just a name. Well, somebody explain to me, what kind of a name is that? Why would you name someone word? The word. Nobody names their kid word. Nobody calls somebody word. That doesn't make any sense. See, what makes sense is that when the Bible talks about the word of the Lord or the word of God, that's talking about the things that God says. In the Old Testament when they said, this is the word which the Lord has spoken. It's what he said. It's the word of God, right? Well, the word of God was in the beginning with God and was God and the word became flesh and dwelled among us. And we beheld his glory. The glory is of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. That's why Jesus Christ, when he returns on a white horse in Revelation 19, his name is called the word of God. And then it says that he has a name written on his thigh that says, faithful and true. And then in the next chapter it says, these words are faithful and true. And then in the next chapter, I've had said these sayings are true and faithful. See, the sayings of Christ, the word of Christ, the word of God was manifest and dwelled among us and we beheld his glory. And it was the glory of Jesus Christ, the son of God. That's why the Bible says, for there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the word, and the Holy Ghost. And these three are one. So you don't want to separate Jesus from the word of God. Now, there are so many similarities between Jesus and the written word of God because they're both manifestations of who God is, okay? For example, if you think about Jesus as a human being, as a person, Jesus was 100% God. He was divine. The Bible said that in him dwelled all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. You know, the Bible says God was manifested in the flesh and preached unto the Gentiles and so forth. So Jesus, we believe strongly in the deity of Jesus Christ, that Jesus Christ is 100% God. I mean, the Bible says in Hebrews 1.8, unto the son he saith, thy throne, O God, is forever and ever. So there's no question about that. But at the same time that Jesus was 100% God, Jesus was also 100% human. He was actually a human being. And this is the miracle of the birth of Christ, is that Jesus, being God, actually became man so that he actually took upon himself the limitations of being a human being in the sense that he was hungry and thirsty and tired. He was tempted in all points, like as we are, yet without sin. And we even see that when he's in the Garden of Gethsemane, he's crying out to the Father, he's sweating as it were great drops of blood, and he's dreading going to the cross. As a human being, he's dreading having to go to the cross and endure the cross and all the shame and spitting and mocking that he's going to endure and all the pain and suffering. And he even says, not my will, but thine be done, not as I will, but as thou wilt. Now what does that show? That he has his own human feelings about it, right? But he's submitted unto the will of the Father. Look, that's pretty amazing. It's hard to even wrap our minds around the fact how Jesus could be God in the flesh, but yet be a human being. But what's interesting is that the Bible, if we think about the Bible, the Bible is exactly the same way. Because the Bible is divine, but the Bible is also human in the sense that when we read Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John, we can actually get a feel of the personality of the author. When you're reading the books that Paul wrote, you can see a difference between those books and the books that John wrote or the books that Peter wrote. There's a different style there. But at the same time, they're all perfect. The whole Bible is perfect. The whole Bible is without error. There's nothing wrong or false in the Bible. Everything in the Bible is true. Every word of it is true, just as Jesus was totally perfect and totally without sin. But he was still human. So even the Bible has a human element to it in the sense that human authors were used, but yet because it's God-breathed, because it's the Word of God, because God spake all these words, it's also divine and perfect and so forth. So the written word is a manifestation of who Jesus is. Jesus is the Word, and you can't separate the two. Look, yeah, there are plenty of verses about how we're saved by Jesus and saved by the blood of Jesus, but then there are a whole bunch of other verses that say we're saved by the Word. Why? Because in order to have our faith in Jesus Christ, we have to have our faith in the Word of God, because faith comes by hearing by the Word of God. I just gave you two pages of Bible verses that clearly stated that. Go to Luke chapter 16, and here's one of the reasons why this is important today. Because if we have a corrupted Bible, what we ended up with is a corrupted Jesus. Think about it. I mean, if Jesus is the Word, and if everything we know about Jesus comes from the Word, then if we have a corrupted Bible, we would end up with a corrupted Jesus. It wouldn't be the Jesus of the real Bible, it would be the corrupt Jesus of a corrupt Bible. You see, the Bible warns us in 2 Corinthians chapter 11 of another Jesus. The Bible warns that there are those who would preach another gospel, and that there are those who would preach another Jesus. So just because people use the name Jesus, it doesn't mean that they're preaching the Jesus of the Bible. There's another Jesus out there. And a lot of people will even say things like, well, the Jesus I believe in is like X, Y, and Z. And then it doesn't line up with scripture. It's like, well, then you're believing in another Jesus. The true Jesus is the Jesus of the Word, okay? Now look at Luke chapter 16. This is a famous story about the rich man and Lazarus, and it talks about how the rich man went to hell, and Lazarus is in heaven with Abraham. And it says in verse 23, and in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torment, and seeth Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom, and he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I'm tormented in this flame. But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receiveth thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things. But now he is comforted, and thou art tormented. And beside all this, that between us and you there's a great goal fixed, so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot, neither can they pass to us that would come from thence. Then he said, I pray thee therefore, Father, that thou would ascend him to my father's house, for I have five brethren, that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. So here this guy, he's in hell, and he realizes that it's too late for him. Abraham explains to him, you can't leave, and nobody can come from here to you, and nobody can come from there to here. You're stuck there. And he says, okay, well, if I can't save myself, if I'm stuck here, at least I don't want my loved ones to come to this place of torment. So he says, I have five brethren, send Lazarus to go tell them how to be, I don't want them to come to this place of torment. Now what does Abraham tell him these people need in order to not go to the place of torment? What's going to get them saved? Look at verse 29. Abraham saith unto him, they have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them. So notice, what is the solution for these people's salvation? It's the word of God. Abraham says, if these people are going to get saved, it's going to be through hearing the word of God. They need to hear Moses and hear the prophets, because, of course, this is before the New Testament had been written, so their written word consists of Moses and the prophets. Even back then, salvation was through the word. Salvation's always been through hearing the word of God. It's always been God's word that quickened. And he said in verse 30, nay, Father Abraham, but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, if they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead. Now this should show you right here that it's impossible to be saved if you won't listen to the Bible. If you won't hear Moses and the prophets, nothing can convince you to be saved, because the word of God is the only thing that can give you the faith to believe. And so if you hear the word of God and you don't believe it, you know, you can't be saved unless you hear it again later and change your mind and repent and believe it in the future. But it's not some piece of evidence that they need to see. You see, if you study the Bible, especially the four Gospels, there are a lot of examples of people seeing a miracle that they could not deny and yet walking away and still rejecting Jesus Christ. I mean, in John chapter 11, which is one of my favorite chapters in the Bible, where Jesus raises a dead body back to life. He actually brings Lazarus out of the grave. And in that scripture, he brings Lazarus out of the grave. They literally watch a guy that they knew was dead that had been in the grave for four days and they mocked Jesus when he basically stated that he was going to bring him forth. They watched him come out of the tomb with grave clothes. They saw him unwrapped and they saw that it's Lazarus back from the dead. And then they went and had a council with the Pharisees how they might destroy Jesus. And then they said, we even want to get rid of Lazarus because people are seeing Lazarus. They're talking to Lazarus and it's making them believe on Jesus. We need to get rid of Jesus and Lazarus. You see, if they won't hear Moses and the prophets, look at verse 31, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead, Lazarus rose from the dead. They weren't persuaded. Jesus Christ himself rose from the dead. They were not persuaded. And you can say, well, yeah, Jesus rose from the dead, but they just didn't really believe that Jesus had risen from the dead because he showed himself to the disciples and the apostles. Yeah, but see, Lazarus was raised from the dead in front of everybody. And they still didn't believe. Okay. Because of the fact that it's the word of God that brings, it's faith that comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God, not by seeing a miracle, not by just having something explained to you or a logical argument. No, you have to hear Moses and the prophets. And if you won't hear that, well, then you're not going to be persuaded by anything because there's nothing more powerful than the word of God. I mean, what's more powerful, the word of God or man's logic? What's more powerful, the word of God or signs and wonders? The word of God has the most power. The Bible says, for I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Go over to first Timothy chapter six toward the end of the new Testament, first Timothy chapter six. Now let me tell you why this doctrine is under attack today. Why is it that something that's so clear in the Bible as the fact that Jesus is the word? Why is there so much resistance to that? Why are there so many people who balk at that doctrine and they, they, they jump through all these hoops and they do all these mental gymnastics and they go to all these pains and they try to take you to the Greek and take you to the Hebrew, just on a mission to just prove to you that Jesus is not the word and they try to tell you about some Greek philosopher that talked about the logos and that when it said Jesus is the word, it's just really that Jesus is the logos, which is some spiritual force that Plato talked about or what, you know, they come up with all this junk, all these lies, all this false doctrine that's not scripture based to deny the clear teaching of the Bible that Jesus is the word. And then these same people just go through pains to tell you that you don't need the Bible to be saved. You don't need Bible verses. You don't need scripture to be saved. It's enough to just hear the story, just to hear the gospel. Just paraphrase it, just put it in your own words and don't use the word. Why it doesn't make any sense. Why wouldn't they just accept the clear teaching of pages and pages of scripture that I read that the word of God is what saves us and that Jesus is the word made flesh. I mean, why don't they just take it for what it says? I'll tell you why. Because there's a wicked agenda out there that wants to promote all of these paraphrases of the Bible and false versions of the Bible, that's why. And so they have to teach people that, well, the word's not that important or using the exact words that God used isn't really that important. Just get the gist of it across. Just get the thought across. Just get the story across. You see, if they actually taught that Jesus is the word, then people would take the word really seriously and say, don't tamper with it. Don't add to it. Don't take away from it. Leave it alone. Leave it as is. But they want to sell a Bible, quote, unquote, called the message, which is so unrecognizable. You can read chapters in there that you have memorized in the King James and you won't even be able to figure out that it's the same chapter. I mean, I looked up the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes. And I mean, it was just, it was mind blowing what the message did to it. It was like, instead of saying, you know, blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy or something, it was something like, you know, God can really do the most in your life when you're at the end of your rope. It was something like, it was, I was like, what in the world? That's not even the Bible. That's not even anything close to it. I mean, look it up. The message or the Seventh-day Adventist clear word, which is as clear as mud, total paraphrase, or the living Bible, which I like to call the dead Bible, because the word of God is quick and powerful. And the living Bible is a twisted paraphrase that just changes everything. You say, well, people don't really treat that as their Bible. Oh yeah, there are plenty of people who carry that thing around and claim that it's a Bible. But not only that, but what about the new American standard? What about the ESV? What about the NIV? These so-called versions make major changes to scripture. And if people actually understood the importance of the word, hey, this is a salvation issue. This is an issue of life or death for people. This is an issue that has to do with the very nature of who Jesus is. All of a sudden you wouldn't just be a member of the Bible of the month club and getting a new Bible every year and use Bibles that are constantly changing because Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. That's the agenda. That's why if you talk to a guy like James White, who's one of the biggest guys that wants to push other versions and be against being King James only, that's why he'll take great pains to tell you, you don't need the Bible to be saved. You don't need scripture verses to be saved. You don't need the word of God to be saved. He sat and argued with me about that when we interviewed him for New World World Bible verses, because that, you know, he won't accept that. And they scoff at you when you say that Jesus is the word. But let me tell you something. If the word of God is necessary for our salvation, then we better make sure we have the word of God. Now listen to me. You cannot be saved. And you know, this offends people and you say, well, I'm never coming back. Good. Don't let the door hit you on your way out, buddy. Let me tell you something. You cannot be saved from corrupted scripture. We're saved by the incorruptible seed. We're not saved by a corrupt scripture. Okay. And let me tell you something. If you want to know why, when you go out door to door soul winning and you knock on the doors of hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people who go to these big non-denom churches and you ask them, do you know for sure if you died today, you go to heaven? And they say, well, I hope so. I mean, I'm trying or yeah, I think I would. I live a pretty good life or I have no idea. And if you go soul winning, you know, that's true. You run into hundreds and hundreds of people who go to these big non-denom churches. But here's what's funny. If you go to the statement of faith of a lot of those same churches, you know what it'll say? It'll say, oh, we're saved by faith. And it'll say that you cannot lose your salvation. Now explain to me why the church believes on paper on the statement of faith that salvation is by faith and that you can't lose your salvation, but then you talk to the people at the door and they'll tell you, you can lose it all day long. And they think that they're going to get to heaven, hopefully if they are a good person or if they obey Christ enough or whatever, I'll tell you why. Two reasons. Reason number one, the church is not teaching doctrine. The church is giving a lot of fluff and they're not really making doctrine clear. They're just giving a lot of motivational speeches. But number two reason is because these churches don't preach the word of God. They preach the NIV, they preach the ESV, they preach the new living translation. And so what's coming from the pulpit doesn't have any power. Okay. The word of God has power to quicken and to create faith in the listener. But see these people in these churches that are preaching false versions, they go week after week and they still don't have faith in Jesus Christ as their only way to heaven. They're still trusting in themselves. Why? Because the word of God isn't there. You know, I spent five years as a teenager going to an NIV preaching church and it was a Baptist church and I promise you that the statement of faith and the pastor all would have clearly told you salvation is by faith alone and you cannot lose your salvation. But half the people in the church weren't saved and didn't believe that and didn't even understand that. See a lot of people when they don't believe the gospel, a lot of it's because they just don't even understand the gospel. But the light of the gospel comes through the word of God being preached, not through some phony twisted version of the word of God. And I turn if you would to John chapter three, John chapter three is one of the most famous verses or one of the most famous chapters in the Bible, isn't it? I mean, if you had to pick a top five chapters in the Bible, wouldn't you say John three would be on that list? In fact, it may even be the top three. I'd probably say that the most famous chapters in the Bible would be first Corinthians 13, Psalm 23 and John chapter three. And the number one verse of all time is John three 16. You know, just as far as popularity, familiarity. So this is not an obscure passage in the Bible, is it? John chapter three. Well, here I've got the ESV, which is one of the top five false Bibles that's out there today. And a lot of Baptists are using this and a lot of churches are switching over to this and they claim it's really more accurate and more faithful and all this. And this is the one that's being pushed by the James White types. You know, the, the, the so-called reformed Baptists. And by the way, the reform Baptists are about 90% reformed and 10% Baptist reform, meaning Protestant. They're basically a Lutheran or a Presbyterian who dunks people. That's pretty much what they are. Who dunks adults. That's pretty much what the difference is. But here's the thing. John chapter three, verse 36. Okay. Look down at your King James Bible there and read this crystal clear verse on salvation. He that believeth on the sun has everlasting life and he that believeth not the sun shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him. So it's really clear what the difference is between someone who's saved and somebody who's not saved. Right? Okay. Listen to that same verse from the ESV. One of the most popular versions in the top five. It says, whoever believes in the sun has eternal life. Whoever does not obey the sun shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. So right here, according to this verse, I mean, if you're reading this and look, let's say a sincere person is just reading this because they think this is the Bible. They think this is a real, you know, copy of the word of God. And they're just looking to the Bible and they're looking for answers and they want to be saved and they want to know what it means to believe on Christ. If they read this in the ESV, basically what this is telling you is that the opposite of believing in Christ is not obeying Jesus Christ. So they walk away thinking, oh, well, believing, that means I also have to obey him. Because, listen, you look down at your King James, listen to what the ESV says. Whosoever believes in the sun has eternal life. Whoever does not obey the sun shall not see life. So I've literally stood at somebody's door and preached to them, look, it's just believe, it's believe on Jesus Christ. And I've had them pull out this verse in an ESV or other modern versions that twist this and say, well, no, right here it says you also have to obey Jesus. Believing means you're obeying his commandments. And what's obeying his commandments? It's works. It's a work salvation. Okay, not only that, flip over to Genesis 3.16. I just found out about this this week. Because the thing about these modern versions is that they're always constantly changing. They're constantly, they constantly change. The King James is exactly the same as it was 400 years ago. I don't care what any liars will tell you about how it's been revised and changed. We have a replica in the back, we have an exact replica from a museum in the back of a 1611 edition of the King James Version. You put your Bible on top of it and compare it yourself and you'll see it's exactly the same. Besides spelling changes, who cares, this isn't a spelling bee, it's the Word of God. Doesn't matter how you spell it. I don't care if you spell believe with a V or two E's or a U. Hey, but just as long as you don't spell believe O-B-E-Y. That book hasn't changed in 400 years. You know, the scriptures that I memorized as a child are still the same today. I memorized Psalm 23 as a toddler and I can still quote it today and it hasn't changed. These new versions are constantly changing. The NIV changed in 1984, major change. In 2011, it underwent another just major dramatic change. I mean virtually, every single chapter is dramatically changed. These aren't minor changes. They go through major overhauls all the time. They're constantly changing, okay? Which the people that believe in them, they must not care very much about the Word of God if they're okay with it just changing all the time. What if Jesus just changes on us? Now Genesis chapter 3, 16, again, this is not an obscure verse because of the fact that it's the third chapter in the Bible. And how many people start out reading the Bible and they say, you know what? I'm starting at the beginning. And maybe they fizzle out around Exodus or maybe they fizzle out around Leviticus, right? Start reading the Bible, it's like, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and they kind of phase, you know, fizzle out. But I'll tell you what, Genesis 1 through 3 are probably some of the most commonly read chapters in the whole Bible because of people starting out, especially on January 1st. Millions and millions of people all over the world are going to read Genesis 3 on January 1st, right? Well, when they read it in the ESV this year, it changed. The ESV just changed. Genesis 3, 16, and it says in the King James Version there, unto the woman, he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children. And here's the phrase I want to emphasize. Thy desire shall be to thy husband and he shall rule over thee. Now, get that. Thy desire shall be to thy husband and he shall rule over thee. Does everybody understand what that means? It doesn't really take a genius to figure out that it's saying that the woman is going to have desire for her husband. Her desire will be to her husband. She will have a desire to please her husband. This is natural in women, to have a desire to please their husband. They want their husband to have. That's why if you criticize your wife or tell her that she did something wrong, she doesn't like that because she has a desire to please her husband. She makes her feel like a failure, right? So that's why that hurts. And it's really important to her that her husband feels that she's doing a good job. Her desire is to her husband and he shall rule over her. You see, this was not the way that God originally created man and woman. But after eating of the forbidden fruit and after these punishments are being doled out, there's a curse placed upon the woman that basically God would multiply her sorrow and her conception and that in sorrow she would bring forth children. And that her desire would be to her husband and he would rule over her, meaning that they're not going to be a co-equal 50-50 team, but that rather she's going to have an innate desire to please him and that he is going to be in a position of authority over her. He is going to rule over her. This is a pretty important verse. This is pretty foundational to future doctrines in the Bible about wives obeying their husbands or about the husband being the head of the wife and the head of the household and so forth. This is foundational in the beginning of the Bible where that's laid down. Now in the ESV of a few months ago, right, that I've got in my hand, you know, it says something pretty similar to the King James. It says your desire shall be for your husband and he shall rule over you. Pretty similar to the King James, right? Pretty much saying the same thing. Your desire shall be for your husband and he shall rule over you. Same thing. Okay. But the ESV just changed. And the new edition of the ESV says your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you. Now is that the same? That's the opposite. And I could show you tons of verses where these new versions literally say the opposite. Now if you sit there and say, well, the ESV is right about that, okay, then here's what you're saying. You're saying that every Bible in the history of mankind has been wrong. And even the ESV was wrong last year and the King James is wrong and the NIV is wrong and the living is wrong. It's all wrong because all this time we thought that women desired their husband and that he ruled over them. But it turned out she's been designed to be rebellious and not want to get on board with her husband's program at all. But he's going to rule over her anyway. But that's not what the Bible has ever taught. But now in the ESV, I mean, people are going to pick it up on January 1st and pick up their brand new hot off the presses ESV and be reading and be like, oh, oh, no wonder my wife doesn't want to obey. But, you know, no, the real reason why your wife doesn't want to obey is because she's been brainwashed by the feminist movement and Hollywood and the media. But you read in the ESV, you're going to think, oh, it's just normal. That's just normal. She's, of course, she's not going to want to get along. Her desire is contrary to her husband ever since Adam and Eve. But, look, we could go on all day. I could get up here and literally for the next three to four hours just open the ESV and just show you all the lies, show you all the false documents. And then we could spend a few hours on the NIV and we could just go through it and show you and we could show you where it affects salvation again and again and again. I could even take you to famous salvation verses and even verses in the Romans wrote and show you how they've been changed. And let me tell you something. This is why we can't have agreement with so many of the mainstream Christian Bible teachers and preachers. They don't even have the same Bible. How can you expect somebody to be doctrinally sound when they're reading a book that constantly leads them astray? And if you believe that these new versions are right, what you're saying is that everybody was wrong for hundreds of years. In the 1600s, everybody was wrong. 1700s, everybody was wrong. 1800s, everybody was wrong. Oh, thank God for the 20th century. Thank God for the 60s, amen? When we could bring in the true Word of God. Okay, what's the fruit of these new versions? What's the fruit of it? It's a country that's going down the toilet morally, soul winning, that's nonexistent in these churches. Churches have become a fun center, a 20-minute sermonette for little baby Christianettes if they're even saved because when they walk in there and keep hearing a false version week after week, that's never going to save them. And that's why isn't it so amazing of a coincidence that whenever I go soul winning and people give you the correct answer that, yes, I know I'm saved because I believe on Jesus Christ as my Savior and I can never lose my salvation, that when they quote verses to you to support that, they quote the King James Version, they don't give you all the right salvation answers and then just barrage you with NIV verses. Now let me just break this down to you real simply because this isn't complicated. This is one of those things that it's not hard to understand, but a lot of people pretend like they don't understand it because they don't want to understand it because it's not that it's too complicated, okay? But I'm going to slow down and make it real clear so that I'm going to keep it so simple that even a theologian will understand what I'm saying. All right, everybody ready? We've seen a lot of scripture. We've seen the evidence, okay? You can't be saved without the Word of God, okay? Agreed? Now, do you need the entire Bible to be saved? No. Most people who are saved have never even read the whole Bible or heard it. You just need some Bible to be saved. I mean, look, somebody could be saved through a verse like John 3.16 or through a verse like Romans 6.23 or Romans 10.9, Romans 10.13. So it's not that you need the entire Bible to be saved, right? But you need the Word of God to be saved. You don't just get faith by osmosis. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God, right? Does everybody understand? Now, the King James Bible is right. The King James Bible is the Word of God accurately translated into English. It's been around for the last 400 years. It has borne fruit all over the world. It is a perfect translation of God's Word. It is exactly what God said in English, which is our native language. And we don't have to learn a foreign language to be saved, people. God's Word is not restricted to one language. If it is, then why is it even in the original? It's in Hebrew and Greek, let alone small portions in Aramaic. So God's not restricted to which language he can speak. So we've got the Bible in English here, okay? Now listen, I'm not saying that you have to... And again, I think this is an example of people just refusing to understand because they don't want to understand. So you'll get up and say, hey, you need the real Bible to get saved, not some fake, messed up Bible. And here's what they say, oh, you're saying that people have to speak English to be saved. You're saying that people have to speak English. No, but we're talking... Who here speaks English? Okay, this is why we're talking about English. Who here doesn't speak English? No one. Okay, so guess what we're going to talk about today. Who here is fluent in Greek? Oh. Who here is fluent in Hebrew? So why would we sit and talk about Greek and Hebrew when nobody in here speaks it? We're talking about English because we all speak English here. But oh, but I need to tell you which Bible in Russian and Spanish and Portuguese, no, we're talking English. I'm not going to get up here and tell you about 100 different languages, what the spiritual state of that language is, and which Bible they have, and all the different versions. So then people will turn around and say, you're saying people have to know English to be saved because you said we need the King James, it's the only right Bible. It's the only right Bible in English, okay? We're not talking about... Why would we talk about other languages when people here all speak English? So we're talking about English. Okay? Is everybody following here? See, this is real simple stuff, but people just, they want to just blind their eyes and harden their hearts and block their ears to the truth here, okay? If you took a verse from one of these fake Bibles, the NIV, the ESV, even the New King James, okay, if you took a verse from one of these fake Bibles that says the same thing as what the King James says, right, if you just used a verse that says the same thing as what the King James, then somebody could be saved from that verse because that verse is the Word of God because it's right. For example, if it says in the King James, verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on me hath everlasting life, and somebody gets a verse that says, you know, he that believes on me has everlasting life, that's the same thing, believeth, believes, you know, or if it says serpent or snake, I mean, that's the same thing, folks, okay? I'm talking about where it changes the meaning. So if somebody took a verse, so people say, well, could somebody get saved from the NIV, could somebody get saved from the ESV, could somebody get saved from the New King James, well, here's the, the short answer is, most of the time, no, because the verses are changed. And if you take what God said and you change it, it becomes a lie at that point. It's a lie. Lies don't save you. How can you be quickened by the Holy Spirit through a lie? It's a corruptible seed and it's going to bring forth corrupt fruit. It's going to take an incorruptible seed to bring forth life. And like I said, if you were to theoretically lift, and probably most of the time this would be a New King James, because the New King James is the most similar to the King James. So yeah, you could lift individual verses from the New King James that say the same thing as the King James and a person could be saved. But when I say that no one's going to be saved from the NIV, I'm talking the verses that are changed, which is virtually all of the Salvation Verses. Most of them are changed. Most of it's dramatically different, where it affects the meaning, where it actually makes a difference. Okay. So my point is that you have to have the real Word of God to be saved, no matter what language you're in, not some lie that says, oh, well, if you don't obey the Son, you're not going to see life, or oh, it's difficult to be saved, or whatever, you know, because you have to work so hard, where the New King James says as difficult is the way of salvation in Matthew 7, or whatever. So the point is, we must have the true Word of God. If we go out soloing with a King James Bible, we're going to get people saved, because the Word of God has power. People are going to hear the Word. We're going to expound it to them. They're going to believe on Christ. They're going to be saved. Many people will be saved. If you went out with an NIV or an ESV, you're showing people a mixture of truth and lies, and then it all becomes a lie. And the only way people could theoretically be saved from it would be if someone just happened to show the verses that are the ones that are the same. You know what I'm saying? Does everybody understand that? I mean, I don't think it's that complicated. And people think it's some radical, you're a crazy, radical cult leader, because you said that a Bible verse that the devil intentionally changed can't get people saved. Well, what a crazy doctrine. You think John 3.36 and the ESV is going to get anybody to heaven? Because it's not. It's going to damn people to hell. It's teaching lies. This isn't that complicated, folks. And you know what? You can sit there and say, oh, well, you just took it too far. You just took King James-onlyism too far. Well, you know what, brother? You can't take it far enough when they're pushing all these false versions in all the bookstores and the Christian bookstores, and all of your big-name preachers are all preaching false versions. We need to stand our ground on this issue. And you know what? It is a part of the reason why these liberal fund centers are filled with unsaved people. It's a big part of the reason why. If they were actually preaching a King James, you'd have people in there actually getting saved a lot more often than when they're preaching these false versions. It's virtually impossible for somebody to get saved in that environment because they're hearing so many lies and so much junk. And you know what? The people right now who are sitting there saying, well, I don't believe any of this. You know what? I got a pretty good suspicion you don't go soul winning. You know what I mean? And the reason I believe that is because there was a time when I didn't go soul winning. And before I started going soul winning, I used to think that all the people in these fund centers were saved. I used to think that people who go to a non-denominational church and say they're a Christian and said they asked Jesus in their heart, I assumed that they were saved until I went soul winning. When you go soul winning and you actually ask people, do you know for sure if you die today you go to heaven? And then if they say yes, you say, well, what do you think it takes to get there? And when you just hear people tell you over and over again, live a good life, obey the commandments, be a good person. You know what? You start to realize that broad is the way that leads to destruction and many there be which go in there at and straight is the gate and narrow is the way which leads into life and few there be to find it. And you know what? If you're sitting there thinking, well, you're just so narrow. Well, okay. Would you like to go soul winning with me and I can show you. We can go soul winning in the shadow of Cornerstone Community Church, right? We'll go right by Cornerstone Community Church or whatever other of these big liberal non-denominational churches and we can go soul winning and we can knock doors and you can listen to all the people tell you over and over again the wrong answer on how to be saved. And then explain why when if we went to those churches' statement of faith, many of them will have the right answer on paper. So why aren't they saved? Either they're teaching their people nothing, well, that's true, or they're using the wrong Bible and they need to hear the King James. They need to hear the real Bible to get saved. And you know what? That's where I stand. And I'm not changing on that. That's where I stood 10 years ago, 15 years ago. I'm not changing. You need the real word of God to be saved. You need the King James Bible to be saved or a verse that's copying from the King James and is right in that verse. Anything that this newfangled junk coming out of the NIV and the ESV isn't saving anyone and I stand by that and that's what I've always said and that's what I'm always going to say because you know what? The doctrine is clear in the Bible. Now one last point I want to make about the word of God being what saves us. Look at 1 Timothy chapter 6. And you say, well, you know, Pastor Anderson, I just, and you look, we've had people quit the church and say the reason I quit the church was because of King James onlyism. I can't handle the King James onlyism. Well, you know what? I say you need to quit the church then because honestly, I can't, how can I have fellowship with somebody who's reading a different Bible than me every day? We're never going to agree on anything. I mean, can you imagine that the senators and the congressmen and the Supreme Court, if there were 400 different versions of the constitution? There's only one version. They already argue about it, but can you imagine what if there were four? Well, I've got the ESV constitution over here. Well, but in the living constitution or the, you know, the new international constitution, the King James constitution, you would have no agree. Look the whole point of a church is to fellowship with like-minded believers. We're not just trying to see how many human beings we can pack in here. We're trying to pack this place with people who believe what we believe. And you know what? If you believe like a non-denom, then you go to the non-denom church. You know, and if you're into Joyce Meyer and Kenneth Copeland and you know, if you're into Joel Osteen and TD Jakes and you know what? Then here, let me show you directions how to get to Living Word Bible Church. His name's Pastor Anderson too, down in Chandler or whatever. But that's not what we believe here. This is big boy church. This is church for mature Christians or for baby Christians who want to grow. This isn't just special ed for people who've been saved for 20 years and are developmentally at age six. You know what I'm saying? This isn't a spiritual special ed class, okay? This is for people that actually want to grow, that actually want to learn, that actually believe the Bible. And you know what? Somebody called our church one time. This is like after our church had only been around for like a year. And this guy called and he said, hey, what time are the services? I told him. He said, hey, is it all right if I bring my NIV? And I said, yeah, it's all right for you to bring it as long as you're okay with me taking out of your hand the moment you walk in and replacing it with a King James. I said, I'll be glad to give you a new one. And he said, oh, good. I was just testing you because if you said you were okay with it, I wasn't going to come. But see, your average church is like, yeah, come on in, bring the NIV. You know what? Look, I'm not saying that we shouldn't be nice to people. I love being nice to people. And you know, when I've seen people who have the wrong version, I've often come to them and said, hey, I got you a new Bible. I bought this for you. I bought a Bible for somebody and had their name engraved on it and said, like, here, I bought this for you, but you can only have it on one condition. Give me that Bible. And then I threw it in the trash. I'm not kidding. So I'm not saying we shouldn't be nice or try to help people. And look, you should be tactful, not mean or rude. And I wasn't rude to the guy that called when he said, hey, can I bring my NIV? I just said, I said, yeah, you're welcome to bring it. But the moment you walk in, I'm going to put a King James in your hand. You know, because this isn't just we all just get together with people with all different Bibles and we all believe something different, but you know, that doesn't even make any sense. And look, are we going to have differences on minor doctrines? Of course. But if we differ on the word of God or if we differ on salvation, that's a deal breaker. Those are huge. Those are the huge issues. The two biggest issues right there. So it's the word of God that saves. Okay. Go to First Timothy Chapter six, verse 20. The Bible says this. Oh, Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings and oppositions of science, falsely so called, which some professing of erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee. Amen. What I want to point out here is that Timothy, a young preacher, is being told to avoid profane and vain babblings and to avoid oppositions of science, falsely so called, which some professing of erred concerning the faith. You see, what gets people saved is the word of God. I think we've established that through a lot of scripture. What gets people saved is the gospel of Jesus Christ, right? The Bible says that when the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that belief. It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that belief. It's the gospel that's the power of God unto salvation. So if we're going to get somebody saved, it's going to be by preaching that person the gospel. It's going to be by preaching the word of God to that person, right? Who wants to get people saved, right? Preach the gospel, preach the word. That's how you're going to get people saved. But a lot of people today, they think that they're going to get people saved by arguing with people, listen up, arguing with people using human logic or showing them some kind of evidence like I'm going to prove to you that the Bible is true in three steps or whatever. But this is not what the Bible teaches. The Bible says here that we are to avoid oppositions of science falsely so-called. Does this say that we are supposed to spend our lives confronting oppositions of science falsely so-called? I'm going to spend my whole life confronting the false science. Is that what the Bible says? The Bible actually says that that's going to lead us into all kinds of contentions and arguments and vain jangling. Have you ever tried to argue with one of these dyed in the wool atheists or have you ever tried to argue with one of these geologists or scientists or biologists who've just bought into the whole big bang evolution thing, hook, line and sinker? It's a big waste of time. And look, they're not just going to break down and just, you're right, I'm sorry, I don't want to be saved. Now a lot of people, they enjoy arguing, they enjoy contention and strife with people and just debating people about these things, but it's not effective and it's not commanded in scripture and God even warns us to avoid this pitfall. Now I'm not against studying science and I'm not against even somebody putting together teachings on science or teachings on creationism from the Bible. I'm all for that. There have been times when I stood behind the pulpit of Faith Lord Baptist Church and taught on creation or taught on this biblical doctrine or debunked the lies of science and so forth, but I'm preaching to the saved. I'm trying to strengthen the believers. I'm trying to confirm us and what we believe and get our doctrine straight so that people don't fall into the theistic evolution or the old earth creationism or this other goofball teaching, gap theory, whatever. But you know, when I go out soul winning, I don't carry around a fossil in my pocket. I don't knock on the door and start telling them all the reasons evolution is false. That's not biblical. It's a waste of time. I'll tell you what I do when I run into an atheist and I knock on their door and somebody says, well, I'm an atheist. I don't believe the Bible. Here's what I tell them. I say, well, I tell you what. I'm going to take 10 minutes and show you what the Bible says how to be saved. And for that 10 minutes, I want you to just pretend for a minute that the Bible is true. Let's just pretend that it's true. And then I'm going to show you what it says, and then you can decide whether you believe it or not. Okay. And I've I've won atheist the Lord that way through the power of the gospel, through the power of the word of God. Okay. Because you say, hey, let's just pretend it's true. I'll show it to you. Then you decide whether you believe it or not. And then sometimes I'll get like five minutes into it and they'll step in and say, oh, I don't believe that. I say, wait a minute. We're pretending. And it's like, oh, yeah, you know, keep going. But if I walked up that same door and said, oh, well, you don't believe the Bible. Well, did you know that the dust on the moon is only a few inches deep? And did you know that, you know, the carbon dating is false because, you know, it's it's a waste of time. These people are choosing to believe that because they want to. The Bible says that they're willfully ignorant of creation in Second Peter three. They're willfully ignorant of the flood. That's what they want to believe for whatever reason. And the only way to cut through that is with the gospel. And look, you're not going to win them all. So here's what you do if they don't receive the gospel. You shake the dust off your feet and you go to the next door because down the street, there's another guy who wants to be saved, who's willing to listen. You don't get tied up in all this this this argument. Now, listen, let me just give you if somebody that you know or love is really steeped into this big bang evolution, you know, here's just a instead of getting into some big opposition. Here's a good way to just avoid it. Here's a good way to just blow it off and to just destroy it in about 30 to 40 seconds. I don't know if somebody timed me, but here's all you tell people. You say, well, you know what? When God created Adam, he created him as a grown man, 30 year old man. And when God created the trees in the Garden of Eden, they weren't saplings. They were full grown trees. So if you would have cut down those trees and counted the rings, you would have said they're hundreds of years old. Really, they're 10 minutes old. And if your doctor would have examined Adam, he would have said that Adam is 30 years old when really he's one day old. Why? Because the earth is it was created as a mature earth, a mature earth, mature human, mature animals, mature trees, caves with stalactites in them. Yeah, that stalactite might have taken a million years except that it was created done. It's not like God just raised a flat plane out of the water in Genesis and it's slowly eroded. He created mountains and trees and rivers and valleys and all of those things ready made. And so that's why it's impossible to date the earth because it was created to look old. Everything was created to look existing and old. All the way down to a radioactive level done. That argument is impossible to argue with. That argument is impossible to disprove. But it has to be just taken on faith. You either believe that or you don't. But that's about as far as I'm willing to go on that conversation because other than that it just becomes a vain jangling to go into all the minutia and argue and argue about. I'd rather just preach about Jesus. I'd rather just preach the gospel. I'd rather just avoid oppositions of science, falsely so called. It's interesting the next word where it says, which some professing have erred concerning the faith. You know, professing implies that that's not really what they believe. That's what the word profession means. You know, like they profess that they know God, but in works they deny. That word profess has a connotation of or professing themselves to be wise. That word, some professing, it doesn't say which some believing. It says which some professing, meaning that that's what they say they believe, meaning that a lot of these people don't even really believe in it. That's just what they're saying. Okay. Now, here's my question for you. If evolution is the big reason why everybody's going to hell, what about the fact that a lot of countries in this world almost no one believes in it? I mean, look at, for example, countries where the atheists make up less than 1% of the population. Like I was just reading about the country of Georgia in Eastern Europe, 0.5% of the people there are atheists or no religion. 99.5% of the people there profess religion, mainly Orthodox church, Protestant, Catholic, Muslim, whatever. What about Mexico, our neighborhood of the south? What's their big problem down there? Is it that they're all a bunch of atheists? No, it's that they're 83% Catholic. Okay. So let me ask you this. Why do people in America today think that if we can just get people to believe that there's a creator, if we can just get people to believe that there's a God and that evolution's false, then they'd all be saved? Well, that's funny because before evolution even came out, people were going to hell since evolution's only been out for 150 years. And that's funny because in Mexico, 83% of the people there are damned not because they're focused, not because they don't, but because they don't believe the gospel and you know what they need? They need somebody to preach them the word of God. They need the gospel. It's the word that saves, and we need to keep our focus on the word of God and preaching the gospel. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for the word, Lord. It's everything that we need to be saved and it's everything that we need for Christian growth, Lord. And thank you for giving us an accurate English Bible, Lord, the King James Bible, the perfect word of God in our language. And Lord, even those who do get saved by some miracle from some uncorrupted verse in one of these new versions, Lord, they're not going to grow until they get a King James, Lord. So please just, please help Christians to understand the importance of this issue, not to downplay it, Lord, and help us to go out and preach the gospel door to door and in the highways and hedges and to every person that we possibly can, get as many people saved as we can. And also to teach people the truth about these modern perversions, Lord, and expose them for what they really are and as they're constantly changing, Lord. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.