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you Good morning everyone, welcome to Stronghold Baptist Church. You can grab your hymnals and open up to song number 36. Song number 36, Christ the Rose. Song number 36. Alright, let's sing this out of the first. Oh, in the grave He lay, Jesus my Savior, waiting to come in vain, Jesus my Lord. Up from the grave He arose, with a mighty triumph o'er His rose, He arose a victor from the dark, and He lives forever when His saints battlefield. He arose, He arose, Hallelujah, Christ the Rose. Come on church, it's Sunday morning, let's sing this out of the second. One, two, three. One, two, three. He rose. With the mighty triumph over souls. He arose the victor from the dark, don't make any mess, for ever he seeks to reign. He arose. He arose. Hallelujah, Christ the Lord. Thank you for all the blessings in our lives. Thank you for the church, God. Thank you for commanding us not to forsake the assembly, God. We need you so much more. We thank you, Father, for this day we ask your blessed service. In the name of your son, Jesus Christ. Amen. Let's open up to our next song, song number 206. Song 206. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Song 206. Sing us now the verse. There is a song I want to play, something I never had. Jesus has taken my sins away. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Jesus has come and my God's overcome. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Wonderful knowledge was all he brings into a heart that's sad. Your heart is God's, but soul just sings. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Jesus has come and my God's overcome. Oh, say, but I'm glad. We have a fellowship rich and sweet, tough to never relate. While hiding in the soul's retreat. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Jesus has come and my God's overcome. Oh, say, but I'm glad. I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. All your care, give him all that is sad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. I'm glad. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Jesus has come and my God's overcome. Oh, say, but I'm glad. Amen. All right. It's good to have you all here with us, at Baptist Church this morning. This time we'll go through our announcements. So if you don't have a bulletin, just slip your hand up real high, and one of our ushers will get one up to you. We need some people up here in the front row. Keep your hand raised until someone gets to you with the bulletin. And while the bulletins are going around, I'll actually go over a little piece of housekeeping here. So I got a little help with the chore list that we have to do for keeping this place clean and kind of in order. And Brother Rogers, is this your family that helped put this together? I appreciate that. So we've been using this calendar because we don't pay anyone to come in and clean the facility here. I feel like we could handle that ourselves. It's not something we'd need to be spending money on. We could all pitch in and make sure this place looks really nice and is in order for our services here. And what we'd been doing in the past was someone would just volunteer for a day to Sunday or whatever for the whole day to be able to make sure the place is clean by the time they leave in the evening. But since we've expanded, it's gotten to be quite a bit of work. It kind of takes a long amount of time, and there's not as many volunteers and I understand sometimes people hang out and want to stick around, and it sort of leads to a lot more time invested being here late on, say, a Sunday night. So we kind of came up with a new solution for this, and I like the motto, the phrase, many hands make light work. So instead of having one person just sign up and say, I'll be responsible for all the cleaning that needs to be done on a service, we have everything split up into many different tasks. So if you would like to volunteer, this is going to be very helpful. This way you can volunteer to do one or two things. We could get it done really quickly. There's no overlap. You don't have to talk to someone and be like, hey, what should I do, this or this or this? Hopefully this will keep things very well organized, and I do appreciate everybody who sticks around and wants to help get things in order here. But we have some things that are done, like Wednesday nights is not very, we don't use the facility that much, so there's less cleaning that's required to keep things in order here. So there's a lot of things that are blocked off for Wednesdays, but then there's other things that we do every Sunday. So if you don't mind, if you want to help out, I'm going to put this in place of the calendar that's up there right now, and you can sign up for as many of these as you want, but at least it's itemized. You kind of know exactly what you're doing, and I haven't had a chance to look through all of this and scour it and make sure everything's there. So this is our first pass at doing it this way. If you see something that you know, hey, Pastor, we need to make sure this is on the list, let me know and we'll add it to the list, okay? If anything doesn't seem to be working out this way, please just give me your feedback and let me know how it's all working. So, all right, I think everyone should have a bulletin now. If you open up to the first page, you will see our service times listed there. Sunday morning at 1030. Sunday evening again at 5 p.m. Wednesday night at seven is our Bible study. We'll be in Psalm 72 this week. We've got the soul-winning opportunities listed there as well as the salvations and the baptisms for the month of September as well as for the year. With the offering totals at the bottom of the page, let's go ahead. If you have any salvation numbers to report for the week, just slip your hand up real quick. Let's get that counted up. Yes, sir. One Friday. One Friday. Very good. Yes, sir. Saturday. And yes, ma'am. Saturday as well. Very good. Yes, sir. Okay, great. Did I miss anybody? All right, very good. Keep up the good work. Preach your gospel to Jesus Christ. That's what it's all about. We've got soul-winning time this afternoon. If you want to come out with us, especially if you're new to soul-winning, if you've never gone before, you don't even know what that is, we go around. We talk to people. We knock on doors, try to get in conversations and explain how people can know for sure that they're saved, that they're going to go to heaven when they die by putting their trust in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. You can see how we do it. We go to scriptures. We only talk to people that are interested in hearing about it. We're not trying to do, like, we're not salesmen going out trying to just do everything we can to get someone to buy our product. We're not selling anything, right? We're trying to show people how they could be saved. So if they're interested in hearing about that, we will take as much time as needed to show them what Jesus did for them. We'll show them the scriptures. We'll show them that that's, hey, this is what the Bible says. Here's what you need to do. You want to call the name of the Lord? Great. And we help them through that process. So that's what we do. And if you have never done before and you're interested in, you want to join us, you don't have to do anything, but just show up to our soul winning time and we will pair you up with someone who is experienced and you could just kind of see what we do here. But it's what this church is all about. So if you really want to get a good feel for our church, please join us for one of our soul winning times. All right. Continuing on prayer requests. So we have, in addition to the prayer requests this morning, and we've been dealing with, there's a lot of people on the prayer list that have some very serious situations in their life. But we're going to be adding a new name this morning that is actually a positive thing. So at the beginning of our prayer list, we kind of have that place reserved for all the people who are expecting children, people, women who are pregnant. And we just found out that the Bosticks are expecting. So congratulations to brother Brian and Saba. And please add them to your prayers and very good news. So we're all excited about that. As well as the rest of the ladies who are with child on our list, please pray for them as well. Lots of people are very ill, especially with the cancer. I know Bobby Levy is not doing well at all. Please, please pray for him and just the condition that he's in. As well as my mother-in-law, she received some bad news that the cancer has spread significantly to other parts of her body as well. So appreciate more prayers there as well. They're changing her chemotherapy and kind of increasing it and things like that. And then, yeah, let's see. I mean, there's multiple people with cancer on our list. I don't know the details on Anne John. The people at the bottom of the page there are people from the retirement home that we minister to. So those are all of the requests that came in from that facility. And not a whole lot. Does anyone have any updates other than what I already mentioned for the prayer list? Anything new? Yes, ma'am. I'm sorry? Bobby? Okay. So, again, last week, we got some kind of bad news update with Bob Levy. At this point, they're deciding that there's nothing more that they could really help him with, so he's just moving into hospice care, which is essentially just keeping him comfortable until he passes. That's what that care is for, so please pray for him. Obviously, we believe in miracles, and even when man can do nothing, God still can do, so pray that God will heal him, and also God will strengthen him and his family and people through this process. So we'll continue to keep out hope and pray that everything will go well. Do we know if the man is saved? He's not? I knew he was a Jewish man, but since then, he still hasn't... that you know of. So pray that... I would say pray above all things that he would get the opportunity to hear the Gospel before he passes on, especially being in such a dire situation that his heart will be humbled and that he'll get that opportunity to hear the Gospel and get saved, so that is the most important thing, especially in that situation. Anyone else have any updates for people who are on the prayer list currently? All right, very good. Well, down at the bottom of the page there, of course, we've got our churches and pastors. We prayed for Mountain Baptist Church this week in West Virginia, Pastor Jason Robinson. Pray that God will bless his family, his ministry, and all the great work that they are doing there. On the next page, the September challenge, we're about halfway through the month, is to attend all of our church services or if not our church services, other church services, other churches. If you're not able to make it to our church, just try to make sure you're in church. Church is important. Whether it's our church, any other assembly of believers, it's important to be in that congregation. To encourage one another, and edify on another, to love and good work, provoke on another, what love and good works, it says in Hebrews chapter 10, and not forsake the assembling of ourselves together as a matter of some is, but so much more as you see the day approaching. So we believe strongly that church is very important. It's important for your own edification, for your spiritual growth, and for learning. It's also good for you in the ministry to be able to help others and encourage other believers in Christ. So please make it a point to make sure you are taking church as much as possible. We've got a new church plant in the works for Greenville, South Carolina. That area, it's not definite exactly where anything's gonna be. It's the very early stages. We're still trying to figure everything out. So just be in prayer, especially for this work that we have planned. And the goal, the hope is to have it up and running by early next year. So sometime, first quarter, is kind of what I'm hoping for. Things can obviously change. Things can fall into place quicker. They might take a little bit longer. There's no saying for certain exactly how it's all gonna work out. Finding location and the space to meet is always a challenge, and it's also a challenge we need to figure out approximately how many people are planning on attending this church plant because I know there's many people who have come through here that have been interested, and I've already heard of some people who said, yes, absolutely, I will be attending the church when it opens. So we need to find out a little bit more before we even decide specifically exactly on a space because we don't want to overplan. We don't want to underplan because we'll be stuck in a lease for at least probably three years, depending on what we'll find, to be able to rent. So that's just a little bit about what's going on there. So please pray for that. It's exciting. I think we're at the stage. It's exciting that after five years, we're at that stage where I feel very confident, very comfortable that we'll be able to handle a new church plant, that we have enough men that are able to step up and lead and preach and really help to get another church off the ground. So that's super exciting. I'm thrilled about this. Hopefully you are too, and there's gonna be a lot of things that people can do to help out. I will try to list out some of those items as time progresses on areas where you might be able to be a blessing or a help for the new church plant. So I will keep you up to date on that. Continuing on with our announcements, our Bible memory passage that we're working on is Hebrews chapter 10. So we are in week three, verses five and six of Hebrews chapter 10. We split this up into two portions. So we're memorizing the first 22 verses. You got three months to do this, so it's quite a bit of time. And if you're able to quote this whole passage without making any mistakes out loud to another person who's checking your work, then you will earn a prize for being able to do that. If you can do that within the time frame, that is allotted. Upcoming birthdays and anniversaries are listed there. We got an anniversary today, so that's exciting. We're gonna sing the anniversary song to the Ricardo family. Now, how many years have you been? Seven? Amen, all right. Congratulations on seven years of marriage. And if you know our anniversary song, please help me out. All right. Sweeter as the years go by Sweeter as the years go by Richer, fuller, deeper Jesus' love is sweeter Sweeter as the years go by All right, we had a few people helping on that one. Amen. All right, congratulations on your anniversary there. The rest of the birthdays and anniversaries are listed down there. Upcoming events this week is that St. Lucia missions trip, so say some extra prayers this week for people in St. Lucia that God will bless all the work of the soul owners that are there trying to preach the gospel, and that'll be very fruitful. I already saw those. I think there's some updates last night on people who have already gotten into town and started soul winning there, so it's exciting. The next soul winning event that we have scheduled here, it's not put on by our church, but Brother Jared Parris is running this one in September at the end of the month, September 30th in Chattanooga, Tennessee. So if you're interested in attending that event, talk to Brother Jared. Jared, raise your hand up real quick right there. Yep, by the pillar. So he is the man that you need to talk to if you plan on coming. Please let him know just so he knows what to expect of people who are showing up and has enough maps and places to go to to support everyone that will be attending there. And if you need any supplies, brother, go ahead and tell yourself to anything that you need from the back. Grab, we got plenty of stuff in stock, so take anything that you need. All right, perfect. Amen, good. I'm glad I don't have to tell you, but it's already known, right? That's what it's there for, and that goes for everybody, not just Brother Jared. We got everything in the back there, our supplies that we give out, the Bibles, the invites, the little cards that has a video of salvation, plan of salvation on it. All of that stuff is free. The DVDs, yes, it's all free for distribution, right? We're trying to spread the word. We're trying to push forward the message of the gospel, so take any of those resources that you need and put them to good use. It doesn't do any good use sitting on a shelf. They just sit on the shelf for you to take and distribute, so I like when that shelf gets empty, and then we just keep replenishing it, so please help yourself to any of those resources back there. Homeschool field trip, the next one is October 6th, so sign up for that. Sign up sheets are right up here to my left, to your right. Make sure you sign up if you want to attend that next homeschool field trip. October 12th through the 15th is the Firebreathing Baptist Fellowship, a steadfast Baptist church. Remember, 8th through the 12th, missions conference at Faithful Word Baptist Church, and then Our Church Camp has a website there. I'm actually going to put another link to our website that will directly link to this so that it might be easier to remember or to key in the web address if you want to attend Our Church Camp. The church camp itself is free. We have reserved a bunch of camp sites, so like tent camping, RV camping, whatever. They all have water, electric, and waste, so you can come with a tent. You can come with an RV. Those are all paid for. Those are all free of charge. There is nothing that you need to reserve one of those spaces. We've also reserved some cottages, okay, but here's the deal with the cottages this year because we're doing things like the new church plant. We're trying to keep our costs down. I put in the reservation so that they would be held for our group, but if you want to have a cottage, what we're going to do is you just have to let me know, and this gives you opportunity to save up for it. The church is not going to be paying all the costs for the cottages, okay? It's gotten to be too much with what we're doing. Maybe in the future we'll be able to offer that again, but this is where we're at now. We've enjoyed some years of being able to have it for free, but the way we're doing it now is we'll hold them. You can save up. You have to pay half of the price up front, so when you're ready, if you want to reserve it, I will release the cottage, and then you can go online and reserve it, and we can coordinate that so that it doesn't get scooped up by anybody else. That way we can have these things available for you. Just let me know by registering on the website if you plan on doing that. It doesn't mean you have to do that right away. It's just if that's something that you want to do or you're planning on doing, register on the site. Let me know, and then we'll be able to work it out. So I just need to know because we're going to be letting go of those reservations when it gets close to the time of the event of the camp. Also, they're very nice cottages. There's two separate bedrooms that have two beds each, and they each have their own bathroom, so maybe if it's something that you wanted to go in with someone else on too. Larger families, yeah, it's harder, but smaller families or couples or singles even, if you wanted to do the cottage thing, you can split up with somebody and say, okay, I'll take this side, you take that side, and it might work out for you. I don't know, but it's kind of the best solution I had for this. Of course, we are going to be providing for the pastors that come into town, but as far as just everybody else is going to have to be on that basis. So hopefully you understand, but we've got a lot of things going on, a lot of things in the works, and we're trying to make the best of our resources. So that's about it for the announcements this morning. I'm going to turn the service back over to Brother Peter, who will lead us in our next song. Yes, sir. All right, church, if you can open up your hear notes. Song number 75. Song number 75 on Jordan's Stormy Bend. All right, church, let's sing this album first. All right, church. All right, church. All right, church. All right, church. All right, church. All right, church. We're singing this time. I'd like to ask the ushers if they can set up for our Sunday morning offering. And, church, while the offering plates are being passed around, you can open the Bibles to the book of John, chapter 21. That is the book of John, chapter 21. And as we do customary here at Strong Hold Baptist Church, we'll read the entire chapter as Brother Michael Ricardo, if you can please do that. Once again, that's the book of John, chapter 21. John, chapter 21. The Bible reads, after these things, Jesus showed himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberius. And on this wise showed he himself. There were together Simon Peter and Thomas called Didymus and Nathaniel of Cana and Galilee and the sons of Zebedee and two other of his disciples. Simon Peter saith unto them, I go a fishing. They say unto him, we also go with thee. They went forth and entered into a ship immediately. And that night they caught nothing. When the morning was now come, Jesus stood on the shore, but his disciples knew not that it was Jesus. Then Jesus saith unto them, children, have ye any meat? They answered him, no. And he said unto them, cast the net on the right side of the ship, and ye shall find. They cast, therefore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes. Therefore, that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, it is the Lord. Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt his fishes coat unto him, for he was naked, and did cast himself into the sea. And the other disciples came in a little ship, for they were not far from land, but as they were 200 cubits dragging the net with fishes. As soon then as they were come to land, they saw a fire of coals there, and fish lay thereon and bred. Jesus saith unto them, bring of the fish which ye have now caught. Simon Peter went up and drew the net to land full of great fishes, and hundred and fifty and three. And for all there were so many, yet was not the net broken. Jesus saith unto them, come and dine. And none of the disciples durst ask him, who art thou, knowing that it was the Lord. Jesus then cometh and taketh bread, and giveth them, and fish likewise. This is now the third time that Jesus showed himself to his disciples. After that, he was risen from the dead. So when they had dined, Jesus saith unto Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, loveth thou me more than these? He saith unto him, yea Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, feed my lambs. He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, loveth thou me? He saith unto him, yea Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, feed my sheep. He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, loveth thou me? Peter was grieved because he had said unto him the third time, loveth thou me. And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things. Thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, feed my sheep. Verily, verily, I say unto thee, when thou was young, thou girdest thyself, and walkest whither thou wouldest. When thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shalt gird thee, and carry thee, whither thou wouldest not. This spake he, signifying by what death he should glorify God. And when he had spoken this, he saith unto him, follow me. Then Peter turned about, seeing the disciple whom Jesus loved following, which also leaned on his breast at supper and said, Lord, which is he that betrayed thee? Peter seeing him saith to Jesus, Lord, Lord, and what shall this man do? Jesus saith unto him, if I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me. Then went this saying abroad among the brethren, that that disciple should not die. Yet Jesus said not unto him, he shall not die, but if I will that he tarry till I come. What is it that to thee? What is that to thee? This is the disciple which testifies of these things and wrote these things. And we know that his testimony is true. And there are also many other things which Jesus did. The wish of they should be written every one. I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen. Let's pray. Father God, we thank you for the book of John. We thank you for the whole Bible. And God, allow for us to have our ears open to hear what thou say of the Lord, what you have for us to be able to take home with us. Fill past the birds with your spirit. Allow for us to be attentive to your word and to be able to take whatever you have for us to take home with us. And I thank you for all the souls that have been saved this week and for the souls to be saved in the future. We praise you and thank you for all that you do in Jesus' name. Amen. Alright, this morning I want to just teach on the importance of having a good testimony. A good testimony. We started there reading the last chapter in the book of John. And, of course, the Gospels themselves are testimonies of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So it's really important. They're called the four Gospels because they teach on the birth, the life, the death, the burial, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That's what the books are all about. And just by the definition, what is a testimony? A testimony is a declaration of truth or a fact. It's declaring something to be truth. It's a testimony. It's why people give their testimony in a court of law. Because you're supposed to be declaring something that you know to be true. You're testifying to something that this is true. Obviously, we have a very important job as believers to testify to the truth of salvation and our Lord Jesus Christ. There's a lot of truth that we need to testify. So it's important to have a good testimony. Now, the Gospels themselves literally are, as I was just saying, they are a compilation of a testimony given by different individuals that can all say for themselves, hey, these things happened, right? The second to last verse here in John 21, the Bible says this. This is the disciple which testifieth of these things and wrote these things. And we know that his testimony is true. So this is the apostle John who is testifying of all these things. That's right. This is how he closes out the book saying, look, OK, this is the apostle. This is the guy that testifies of all of these things. I'm the one bearing witness. I'm the one testifying and saying that these things are true. This is how it happened. Starting in John one, one in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God. You're starting off about Christ and saying, and we beheld his glory, the glories of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Right. We know it starts talking about Jesus. It starts talking about his early life. It talks about all the miracles and the teachings and the doctrine. And it goes into all of these various things and then going into, of course, his crucifixion and his resurrection from the dead. And all of the gospels are similar. Turn back, if you would, to Luke chapter number one. Luke chapter number one. We see this at the beginning of the Gospel of Luke. Now, not all of the gospels explicitly are saying, hey, this is a testimony. But we have it in two out of the four. And it's obvious that the other two also are accounts given from the perspective of somebody who is with Christ throughout his whole ministry. They are the witness. They are and they ought to be credible. They are credible witnesses. And another title, I'm teaching on a good testimony, but another title could be a credible witness. Because we are to be credible witnesses. I mean, think about it. If someone's declaring something to be true to you, what are the types of things you're going to want to know? I mean, you're going to want to know a little bit about the person who's telling you these things. I mean, you don't just believe everything that you hear, just anyone that says anything like, yep, I believe it. The simple believeth every word, the Bible says. But we need to be prudent. We need to find out knowledge. We need to be diligent and understand, like, hey, is there credibility to this assertion? Is there credibility to this testimony? It ought to be tried. It ought to be examined. Which is why our faith is not just some total blind faith. It's not this unreasonable, irrational faith. There is reasonability to it. There is rationality to it. It matches up and it makes sense with the way that our world works and we can see and observe the way everything works. And it fits together with the Word of God perfectly. So the observational truths that we see can be, you know, the Word of God is confirmed through all of those things. And even just the way that we're built with our conscience, with, you know, all that we see about us, all of creation speaks to the Creator, speaks to the glory of God. And so, but it still all has to be taken by faith in the end. Ultimately, there's still this lack of a 100% guarantee, verifiable proof. It must be taken by faith. But it is not irrational faith. There is evidence supporting the faith of the testimony that's given to us. And at the end of the day, anybody giving any testimony, you have to decide, do I believe that or not? I mean, so any way that you determine any type of truth, it's going to have to come down to some level of faith. So if you're in a court of law and people are saying, hey, no, no, I saw this guy, you know, what are you going to do? You have to rely on people's testimony. Now, obviously, there's things that are more, that don't rely on people these days with forensic evidence and some other things that can work together to try to establish the truth of a matter. But if someone's going to give a testimony, if someone's going to testify to something, at the end of the day, you have to determine whether or not what is being said is true and the claim. And even in a court of law, all the forensic evidence is just that, it's evidence. There's still a claim being put forward. There's a plaintiff, whether that be the state, the government, saying this person commit this crime, that would be the testifying that this person is guilty of something. Everything else is the supporting evidence, right? So there's the testimony being given, hey, this person commit this crime. That's the complaint. And then everything else is going to be supporting evidence. So we have a testimony. We have our faith in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ to be our Savior, that that is the way of salvation. There's a lot of evidence out there, but we need to be able to provide a good testimony and be a credible witness that these things are true. Luke 1, 1, look at what the Bible says there. Paul says, For as much as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us, even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word, it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order most excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed. So this is a letter, like the Gospel of Luke. Luke is writing this letter to Theophilus, and he's expressing, saying, Look, for as much as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us. So there's plenty of people out there who are declaring these things that we all believe to be true. So there's a lot of people making this declaration. There's a lot of witness stating that these things are true. He's saying, So you know what? I chose to do, since I had perfect understanding of these things from the very beginning, since he was a minister of the word, since these things were delivered, he says, unto us, which from the beginning were eyewitnesses. He was eyewitness to these things. He's testifying to these things. He's saying, I have perfect firsthand knowledge of these events. And he's saying, So I am going to provide this to you. So here's my testimony. And he's writing to Theophilus because I would imagine that Theophilus is someone who might find the testimony of the apostle Luke as credible. The physician, the great, you know, someone like Luke. Oh, wow. Here's somebody. I can believe what he has to say. I can at least take it seriously based on many things, many factors. Right? And if we want to be effective, in turn, if you go to Matthew chapter 8. I don't want to get too far ahead of myself, but if we want to be effective, obviously your character is going to matter. And you think about the things of God are probably the most important things that we could ever talk to anyone about. If you are not found to be a trustworthy person, just in general, in some of the smallest matters, who in the world is going to listen to you or believe you if you try to talk about things that are extremely important, like their salvation, like where their soul is going to end up when they die? It was really important to make sure that we have this doubt. Hey, just for the for the word of God going forward. God used men as vessels, yes, but he's got to use some men that have a level of integrity and people who are going to be perceived as credible witnesses and not just total derelicts or people who are known for just saying anything for a buck. Right? There's plenty of people that prostitute themselves out there and say anything. It's called the mainstream media. They'll say whatever they're told to say for a quick buck. And they'll testify to all manner of things. But to be credible, you need to find someone who has integrity. You need to find someone who's going to say, you know what? No, I'm only going to speak those things which the Lord speaketh. I'm only going to say those things that are true. I'm not going to confuse this and muddy up the waters and be this wishy washy type of a testifier or someone who you don't exactly know what's your motivation. No, we're sold out for this. We wholeheartedly believe this. We know these things to be true. And I have no there's no reason for anyone to question my integrity of whether or not I'm telling you the truth. These are the type of people that the Lord is going to use. He used, you know, even just bringing Jesus Christ in this world that the Bible talks about Joseph and Mary as just being devout people who are had good character. It doesn't go really far in depth, but we know that they were chosen specifically to be the human parents on this earth of Jesus Christ to raise him, to bring him up. They had to have a good testimony before the Lord in order to be in that position. We know that Joseph was a just man. He looked to the law, even when it came down to what he was trying to determine, whether or not he wanted to stay with Mary when she was pregnant. It says he was a just man. He was looking to the law of God and kind of discerning and determining what is he going to do about this information? Because there's a big deal. And on and on we can go, right? We know nobody is perfect, of course. And those different people in the Bible have had their share of sin. But at the end of the day, God's not using these people that have a bad rap, a bad testimony, that were known charlatans and known people who would just be deceivers to be the ones that he's using to carry forward his word. It doesn't mean you can't serve God, of course. I'm not saying that. So in times past if you were someone who was a habitual liar, someone who couldn't be trusted, it doesn't mean you can't serve God. You can serve God, but you need to work even harder now to try to build up a good reputation. But that's also why there's qualifications for things like a pastor. Because a pastor is not only the teacher, but he's the figurehead and someone who's administering the church. And you can't be someone who's accused of riot and unruly and someone who has a bad reputation. Why? Because this job is important and being able to carry forth the word of God is important. So you need to have some level of character that's been established to be a credible witness. There's a couple of verses here I just wanted to show because I'm talking about a testimony, so I wanted to go a little bit in depth. We saw that the Gospels are testimonies because they're things that are being stated or declared to be fact. But things, our actions, can also be a testimony in themselves. And I just want to show you some biblical examples of this because the actions can be demonstrating a truth. And the reason why you do that, even if you're not physically, like, audibly speaking, you can have a testimony through your actions. So look at Matthew 8, verse number 3. The Bible says, And Jesus put forth his hand and touched him, saying, I will be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. So this man, his leper, came to Jesus. He wanted to be cleansed. Jesus heals him. Look at verse 4. And Jesus saith unto him, See thou tell no man, but go thy way, show thyself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded for a testimony unto them. So as soon as Jesus saves him, spiritually, you know, like, the spiritual implication here, the, what's, good night, why is my brain so foggy? The symbolism, thank you, yes, yes. The symbolism is that this man is receiving healing. Well, I mean, he physically is healed of leprosy, but the spiritual symbolism is that is how it's just as easy to be saved, right? Spiritually speaking, we are in a condition like we're spiritual lepers because of our sin. We have this disease that can't, it's incurable disease of sin. But when we go to Jesus and we call on Jesus and ask Jesus to save us, hey, we're washed clean as white as snow, right? He cleanses us of all sin. So then what he says, it says, okay, now go offer your gift that Moses commanded for a testimony unto them, which symbolically would be now go and sin no more, right? Look, he saved you from sin. Now how about you show the testimony and give honor to the testimony and the law of God by now living a life that's going to be following the law and looking to the law to guide you into how you could live righteously in this lifetime. You're already saved, you're already cleansed, but now go forth and do this. And by going back and observing the Mosaic law, he's saying you're giving a testimony unto them. Yes, you are saved by Jesus, but give that testimony unto the law that it's good, that it's still a good law, that action is the testimony. One more example is in front of Mark chapter six. There's many other examples, but these are two I chose because I want you thinking about your testimony being more than just your words. The words matter. The words are a declaration of something that's true that you are testifying to. So, of course, your character needs to be there, but not just your words, but your actions also will testify to the things that you believe. They could give a testimony to other truths by your actions. Here is an action that Jesus commanded his disciples when he sent them out to preach the gospel that in itself was its own testimony. Verse number 10 of Mark, chapter six, the Bible reads, and he said unto them, In what place soever ye enter into a house, thereby till ye depart from that place? And whosoever shall not receive you nor hear you when ye depart thence, shake off the dust under your feet for a testimony against them. Verily I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city. So he's saying when you go into a city and they don't receive you and no one wants you and no one wants to hear you and you're not going to be received in, he says, you know what, literally shake the dust off your feet. Because when you do that, I added that part out. I don't know if they did that or not, but you're showing something, right? It's like, you know what, fine. You don't want to hear the truth. You don't want to hear the word of God. Yep. Let's move on. We're going to the next town. And it was something they were supposed to do because it's a testimony. Because people can see that. They're watching them be like, they're like looking out the blinds. Did you call the HOA? You know what? You and your HOA are all going to die and go to hell. It's going to be worse. It's going to be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah. And look, that's true. It's true. We're not bitter against the people, right? It's just a statement of fact. And you shouldn't be bitter. We'll put it that way. You shouldn't be bitter. You shouldn't be bitter against people that don't want to hear you, right? That's their choice. However, it needs to be shown this is a big deal, right? It's that witness to the people who didn't want to hear your witness. Just through that action of shaking off the dust of your feet. But it's a testimony in itself. So our actions obviously matter, not just to support our witness, but even to be a witness in themselves. Tell me if you go to Titus chapter 2. Actually, while I'm still on this same point, if you get to Titus 2, put a bookmark there and go to 1 Peter chapter 3. They're not that far from each other. 1 Peter chapter 3, and I've got a few references that bring up your conversation. And I've expressed this many times in the past, but just so you know, in case you haven't heard this before, or maybe you're not understanding, of course some of the words in the Bible are a little bit older words, and meanings have slightly changed over time. So when we read the Bible that was translated in 1611, some words are a little bit different today because they're not used always exactly the same way. They're similar, but not exactly the same. When we talk about conversation, you can look this up for yourself. Conversation is more that we talk about conversation of just like, if I were to sit down with Brother Michael and we talk to each other, that's a conversation. Oh, I had a conversation with Brother Michael. But that's not the way that the Bible uses that word. That could be part of your conversation. Conversation is a broader word. Talking about just kind of how you carry yourself and how you live your life is your conversation. So just with that in mind when we read the Bible here, it makes perfect sense. Verse number 1, the Bible says, likewise he wives, there in 1 Peter chapter 3, verse number 1, likewise he wives, be in subjection to your own husbands, that if any obey not the word, talking about the husbands obeying not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives. Not necessarily the things that they say, but the way that they're living their life, the way that they, and it continues on to express this, while they behold your chaste conversation coupled with fear. And if we keep reading, I wasn't going to go through this just for the sake of time, you're going to see more of the things that a good, godly, submissive wife, the attributes not adorning themselves with gold or pearls or costly or way and all these other things that God is describing, like how the attributes of a godly wife. And what the Bible is teaching us here is that if you have an unbelieving husband, right, so you got married, maybe the wife gets saved, the husband didn't get saved. It says be in your subjections that if any obey not the word, and not even just salvation here, I mean if someone's just not obeying the word, you know, whether that be salvation or not, you do what's right. And then when you are providing that testimony, not just verbally, right, not necessarily trying to get too far out of bounds with like teaching your husband as opposed to your husband being the teacher and a guy in your house, he could just see the manifestation of you living a godly life. And I'm not saying you can't give the gospel to your husband if he's not saved, and so don't take that the wrong way. But the way that you live your life, if you are living a godly life, your husband's going to see that. He's going to pay attention and start noticing that, right, because the assumption at least is, I think, it's fair enough to say that either the wife was just living really worldly or wasn't saved at all, and now all of a sudden she's starting to live more. Look, that's going to show forth. And that conversation, the way that you act will have an impact. That's a testimony in itself. Hey, there's maybe something to this. Maybe I should treat this a little bit more seriously. Maybe I should look into this a little bit. And when you get saved, we all ought to, in baptism, die to our old self, die to the sinful man, bury that sinful man, because we're all sinners, so if you can overcome that sin through Christ, like we do spiritually, but also walking in the Spirit, people who know you will notice a difference, if you're walking in the Spirit and not in the flesh. People will notice that difference, and that is a good conversation to have. That is a good testimony just in itself. I mean, it was a testimony for my wife. When we had known each other, and this is a good example of someone who already was saved but was just living real worldly. She had no idea what my faith was back when we first met. I was saved, but other people had no idea what I believed, because I was not walking in the Spirit at all. I was just like any other person out in the world. But then when we reconnected after many years, and after I had already got plugged into a good church, started changing my life, then it was, wow, you're different. But you know what? That was a testimony in itself. I preach the testimony, but I've got a feeling that that testimony that I'm saying had much more impact than if I didn't change at all, and I'm like, hey, come on over. We'll have some beers. You know, whatever. Why would you want to hear anything about the Bible? People just already inherently know in general what the Bible teaches. Thankfully, right? Thank God. There's a lot of just real basic elementary knowledge out there kind of about what the Bible teaches to the point to where it's pretty obvious when you're a hypocrite, right? So if you're living as a total worldly lifestyle, it's like, you're a Christian? Like, really? So people will be like, no, you're not. Even unsaved people are going to be like, no, you're not. Because there should be a difference, right? There should be a difference in the way that you live. If you're going to claim to be a Christian, yes, there ought to be, and that's going to affect your testimony and the things that you say. So in the case with me and my wife, she knew right away that there was something different. Oh, you're inviting me over, and now you've got your Bible out, and you're asking me about being saved? Wow, you've changed. I think she even said that. Did you say that? Yeah, she said that. I'll trust her testimony. My memory isn't always that great. But she did say that. And people who know me in the past, high school, we ought to be living a life that is separated, that we're different. And that will just strengthen the testimony of the things that are true. Because if you really believe these things, hey, why don't you live by it then? And it's what people think. And it's not a bad thought. But let that sink in. If you really believe these things, how are you living? Do you really believe that? And I don't want you to doubt your salvation, okay? I don't. But this is the very reason why I did have any thoughts of doubt in my own mind about my own salvation was literally just because I was living, I was just going like, you know, because I struggled. Because I was saved, I did have the Holy Spirit, and I struggled with sin. But there are times when I'm just going like, do I even really, how can I say I believe this stuff? It was more of a question like, how can I say I believe this stuff? Because, I mean, it makes sense. How can I say I believe this stuff if I continue to do these things? I never got to the point where I thought I wasn't saved, but the doubts were there, right? But ask yourself the question, right? I think it's fitting, and I think it's a good question. We ought to have a godly sorrow that worketh repentance if you are living a wicked life, if you are living a sinful life, if your life is not reflecting the things that you believe, then you know what, you need to analyze that and start making the changes so you can say, you know what, no, I really do believe this, and I'm going to prove this by showing it through my work, through my life, through my conversation. And that in itself does have an impact. Now, I say it has an impact. It's not a replacement for preaching the Gospel. We don't believe in lifestyle evangelism in the sense that, okay, all you have to do is be happy and just live this life where you're just full of joy, and then people are just going to come up to you and ask you, hey, why are you so happy? Look, no, you have to preach the Gospel, right? The conversation is a testimony of the Word of God, but you need to like testify that these things are true. You need to go above and beyond just the way that you live to actually make the statement and to show, you know, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. That is ultimately how people are going to be saved, but seeing your actions will help provide you to be a good, credible witness. They're going to give extra impact to what you're saying just in the sense that people might be thinking, hey, I might be able to believe what this guy is saying. If it made a difference in his life, then maybe there's something to this, right? Things that people can see. It's one little bit of evidence is what it is. It's one extra bit of evidence. Obviously, the power is still in the Word of God. The salvation is going to come through God's Word. People still need to hear the Gospel. They need to hear it all. They need to be convinced, persuaded that that's true, and they need to put their faith in the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, but we want to have as much evidence that we can provide as possible and be the most credible witnesses that we can be. The Bible says this in, I had to turn to Titus chapter 2. I'll just read from Isaiah 59, 12, while you go back to Titus 2. Isaiah 59, 12, the Bible reads, For our transgressions are multiplied before thee, and our sins testify against us. For our transgressions are with us, and as for our iniquities, we nail them. So the sin you have in your life is going to testify against you. It's not going to be in your favor. It's going to testify you, and it's going to testify against, just to anybody, like, you say you believe, but you're doing all this. And look, everyone's a hypocrite to some extent, but it's still like, it's not an excuse, right? It's a fact that we have to accept, but we always strive and work for not being hypocrites. Titus chapter 2, look at verse number 7, the Bible reads this, In all things showing thyself a pattern of good works, in doctrine showing uncorruptness, gravity, sincerity, sound speech that cannot be condemned, that he that is of the contrary part may be ashamed, having no evil thing to say of you. There's going to be people, obviously, in opposition to the things that we testify. So we're testifying the truth through the Bible, the Word of God, Jesus Christ. You know, we're exalted and say, hey, no, this is true. And there's going to be people who oppose that. Now, those people that oppose that, look, you need to make sure you have sound speech. Sound, it's good, it's airtight. People aren't going to be able to attack you and attack your character and attack the things that you say because they can't be condemned, right? They have nothing to say against what you're saying. You need to have good, solid, sound speech, things that make sense, and be able to put forth the Word so that those on the contrary part can just be ashamed because they've got nothing evil to say about you. Because if they can't attack the message, they're going to attack the messenger. But the best testimony is going to be from a messenger that also can't be attacked. Go ahead. Hey, you know, like Jesus said, hey, which of you convinces me of sin? Now, look, I know that if someone looks close enough, they're going to find sin in us. They couldn't in Jesus, but it's just like, well, hey, his words were perfect. That's why we use his words, we use the Word of God to get people saved because they are perfect. Now, turn back if you would. I should have had you keep your place there. 1 Peter 2. Because this speaks exactly to the same point in Titus 2. 1 Peter 2, verse 11, the Bible reads, Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul. So we're strangers and pilgrims now being born again. We're a new creature. We're not of this world. So we're in this world, but because we're not of this world, now we're strangers, we're foreigners, we're pilgrims. We're just here for a short time because we have a heavenly home. That's where our real home is, so now we're just kind of visiting. We're just here temporarily. So he's saying, because of this, because you're pilgrims, because you're strangers, abstain, withhold from the fleshly lusts. They war against your soul, have nothing to do with them. Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles, aka among the unbelievers. You ought to be someone that's known to be honest, not a liar. Not someone who's like, oh man, that guy did work for me and he stiffed me or I did work for him. He stiffed me on the bill. Be honest. Be upfront. Don't be lying about things. Don't be casting shade and trying to get people in trouble. You ought to be someone who's conversational. People say, you know what, that's an honest guy. Even if it has nothing to do with the Bible, be like, hey, I could conduct business with this guy. I could lend this guy my car. I could do whatever and I could trust him. Because he's just known to be, his conversation, his manner of being is an honest guy. He says that whereas they speak evil against you as evildoers, because that's going to happen, right? Especially the enemies of the Gospel are going to try to find anything they can. They're going to demonize you and see you're so hateful and all this other stuff. But honestly, do you know what wins people over? Because I've seen this happen I don't know how many times. And I'll use Pastor Anderson as the best example because he's had the most shade cast on him in the media and everything else. But you know what? Anyone who meets the guy, they don't feel the same way. Except for the total reprobates who just hate God anyways. Yeah, they're going to keep on hating. But the normal people out there that only see what they see on the tell-lie vision and they see the lies that are cast forth and the way that they want to portray someone who's preaching the Word of God, when they actually meet someone like that, in person, they meet in person, oh wow, you're actually really nice. Oh, what, you know, it's like, yeah. And things are done decently and honestly and transparently and, you know, like, there's no reason to be able to speak evil. And I'm not saying he's perfect. It's just one of those things that I know, like, I know him. He's a great guy. He's helped me tremendously and he's sacrificed a lot of things to help me and others and I've witnessed that as well. And, you know, very nice, very personal, but that's not the impression that those that hate God are going to try to give you of them. And they'll do the same thing to me here. Right? Now, we haven't had that much attention and hey, you know what, that's great, I'm fine with that. But at some point it's going to come, people are going to try slandering, if not your name, my name around, and then your association with me or with this church or something like that, and they're going to try to speak evil of you. Oh yeah, these people, they're, you know, and people try to do that already as a guilty by association, even just as independent fundamental Baptists. Because there's been plenty of wicked people in other churches doing other things, doing really wicked things that are going to try to bring a slander on the fundamentalists and the independent fundamental Baptists and everything else. Oh, they're cults and they have all this bad sin and all this other stuff going on. Look, they don't all. But people make that claim and just try to lump you in. Well, that's why we have to show, look, no we don't. That's not us. And are there wicked people that might creep in? Of course. But we have to deal with that. We have to deal with it transparently, we have to deal with it justly and rightly. And it's all you can do. But you have to make sure for yourself, for your testimony, because that's what you're responsible for before God, that you have a good testimony. And that's going to go a long way, that when you have your conversation, as it says here in verse 12, honest among the Gentiles, that whereas they speak evil against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, they're going to see it, right? Because if you're doing it, they should see it. If you're not doing anything, they're not going to see anything. Your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation. They will glorify God, oh, because I have a good conversation, because I'm honest, because I am representing Jesus Christ in a way that the people, the naysayers have nothing to say against us. Doing anything evil. Verse 13, submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether it be to the king as supreme or unto governors as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of them that do well. Now, I don't want to spend a lot of time on this point here. You can see what it says. I think it's relatively clear. And I'll go into another sermon, just the whole all the ways that we should follow the government and things like that. But it's not just total authority either. It's not like you just do everything that they say. Right? There's limits. But I think the sentiment here is, in general, hey, have a good testimony, even if you don't agree with some stupid laws out there, if they're not contradicting the word of God and you can still live your life peaceably, then just do it. Right? Even in some of the smallest matters, because it may not be that big of a deal, but it could influence the way that other people see you or it'll give them some more ammunition to use against you. Right? So, I mean, just think about some of the stupidest things and the smallest things. You know what? Just follow that. Just follow that. Verse 15, for so is the will of God that with well-doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. Your well-doing will speak volumes over the ignorant, the people who just don't even know, because people throw accusations against you. They don't even know anything about you. They just want to fight against what you're fighting for and will say all manner of evil against you falsely for Christ's sake. But they're put to silence when you're just doing well with well-doing. Go ahead. You want to say I'm all these things, bring it up here. Testify of what I'm doing wrong. And they ought to have nothing to say. As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness, but as the servants of God. Turn, if you would, to 2 Corinthians 5. I'll just read this story from Daniel 6 for you. I think Daniel is a perfect example of someone who has a great testimony, and people tried to use it against, or tried to find fault with him, but they couldn't. This is how we ought to live to have a good testimony. We ought to be like Daniel. Daniel 6, verse 1, the Bible reads, It pleased Darius to set over the kingdom and 120 princes, which should be over the whole kingdom, and over these three presidents, of whom Daniel was first, that the princes might give accounts unto them, and the king should have no damage. So what he did here was he distributed the way that people were going to be ruling in his kingdom. So there was princes at the more local level. There were 120 of them over all the different areas, over the realm that he was over. And then he had another group, the middle management group, right, to shield and protect him as the king from anyone doing anything wrong in those other provinces. So he only had to manage the three guys that were over all the 120. It provides an extra layer of protection to hold the king responsible or whatever for things that are going wrong. He'd just be like, oh, no, I gave that job to this, you know, whatever. That's how he designed it. But the three obviously have a lot more authority because they're over the 120, and Daniel was the number one guy. So Daniel is like next in line behind the king himself as far as the authority or power structure that he set up here. And that's because that Daniel had an excellent spirit. I'll read this for you. You're not there probably. Then this Daniel was preferred above the presidents and princes because an excellent spirit was in him, and the king thought to set him over the whole realm. The king sees what Daniel's doing. Hey, look, Daniel's got his act together. Daniel's wise. Daniel's smart. He's able to handle these things. He's got the spirit of God guiding him into all truth and wisdom. And you know what? That helps you in all areas of life. When you live righteously, when you gain wisdom, when you learn proverbs, when you learn the Bible and you learn these great truths, this carries forward to help you in all aspects of your life, even just on the job. So you put forward the good values. You're a hard worker. You're someone who knows how to labor. You're someone who's honest. You're someone who's faithful. You're someone who doesn't complain. You're someone who can get the job done. All these things are great assets when you're out on the job. They will help you put these into practice. You should have them in practice anyway so that you can have a good testimony of God and of Christ and of the things of God. And then on top of that, you gain knowledge, right? Not just your character being improved, not just having good quality or good traits by just being a good person. We'll call it that way, right? But then gaining knowledge and gaining understanding in the ways that people work and the way that things work out in this world and having that knowledge goes a long way. That knowledge allows you to foresee things that are going to happen when you understand human nature better, when you understand how people's actions work, you just start to understand more about the world in general. It helps you, especially in positions like this, to be even more valuable. And you get that through God's wisdom, the wisdom that the Holy Ghost teaches, the wisdom that is found in the word of God. More than anything else will help and guide you to be in a position like this. So Daniel is exalted. And God allowed Daniel to be elevated too, obviously. But then these other guys, these other presidents, they don't like that. This Daniel, right? There's no way they're ever going to get promoted because Daniel's just this goody two-shoes and he's just good at everything he's doing. And they're trying to find a fault with him, says in verse 4, then the presidents and princes, so it's not just the presidents, but even the princes below them, they're less like everybody doesn't, no one likes Daniel. But the king loves him. The king's like, hey, this is a great worker, right? The other people might hate him. They're trying to do everything they can, but you know what? He doesn't work for them, he's working for the king. The king's happy with what he's doing. But people have it out for him nonetheless. The presidents and the princes sought to find occasion against Daniel, so they're seeking it out. And that's one thing you have to understand too, if you're going to serve God and you're going to have this testimony, you're going to testify that things of the word of God are true, don't be surprised if people are trying to seek out now your sins and actually actively watch you and try to find where you're screwing up and where you're at fault, right? And early on in our church is when we had someone call in about our certificate of occupancy from the fire department. It's like they're trying to find some fault, and literally this is what was happening. It wasn't a friend of the church that was saying, oh, I think you guys aren't being very safe, you need to have this. It was someone that wanted to shut down our services that was calling to get us in trouble one way or another. Because they even said that someone called it. It's not like they're doing some random inspection. Someone called it in. And you know what? That was an area where we should have had our ducks in a row, but by the grace of God we're able to just continue going. We had that all covered and now lesson learned and we keep up with everything that we're supposed to by the laws of this land and doing things the way we do it. That's why we get the inspection. That's why we do things and submit the stuff to follow the ordinances of man and just be like, whatever, I don't want to give. Like what a stupid reason for our ministry to be halted and interrupted here because of some code or ordinance. Well, I mean, think about that. Like, oh, we want to expand and make a little bit more room, but then we just don't follow any of that stuff and give someone an opportunity to say, oh, hey, look, they did this and they didn't get the right permission. And then like possibly just be shut down in the sense of some government official saying, well, no, you didn't do things right here, so we're going to close these doors until it's all fixed or something, you know, whatever. What a dumb reason, right? When we could easily just comply and move on and focus on the things that really matter. Because at the end of the day, it's an annoyance to have to deal with some of these things, but so what, right? So what? Let's just be known as the people, you know what? Stronger than the church? They're good. They're good. They're not trying to, you know, buck the system and not want to do, you know, comply with the laws of the city or the county or whatever. Look, we're going to do everything we can and be peaceable and be upright in the community, right? As much as possible and only put our foot down when, no, we must do this because the Bible says so. And that's it. And we hold to the integrity of the Bible above the laws of man. But otherwise, yeah, so what? We keep doing it. And Daniel, I'm sure, because they weren't able to find any reason, Daniel was following the laws. Only when it was going to be in conflict with the law of God was he not. Otherwise, they'd have a bunch of things to say against him. But what they said was this. It says they sought to find occasion against Daniel concerning the kingdom, but they could find no occasion nor fault. And this is concerning the kingdom, concerning his job, concerning his duties, concerning all the things of the laws of the land. They couldn't find any fault against him. So they had to conjure up a way to where they knew they could make him come in conflict with the law of the land. For as much as he was faithful, neither was there any error or fault found in him. Then said these men, we shall not find any occasion against this Daniel, except we find it against him concerning the law of his God. They literally had to make up a law to be in conflict with God's law in order to make Daniel be at odds with the law, with the law of the land. Because he had that good of a reputation, right? Now, look, you can't control that. All you can do is just make sure you got your priorities right and say, you know what? No, we're following the law of God. But what do we learn or what we see from this lesson? Hey, Daniel had everything together. And he won over the favor of the king, too, because when the king finally realizes what he did, this stupid law he enacted, he was like, oh, man, I really screwed up. Right? And then he was still on Daniel's side. He still cared about Daniel. And, of course, God kept him through it as well, which was most important. Right? All right, I'm going to close up here. I had you turn to 2 Corinthians, chapter 5, just to illustrate, as many of you probably know, as a well-known passage, at least in this church, that we do have a truth that we need to testify. We have a job. And the Bible says in verse number 17 there, Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. Old things are passed away. Behold, all things have become new, and all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation, to wit that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing our trespasses unto them, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Now, then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us. We pray you in Christ's stead be reconciled to God, for you have made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. The gospel. We have this testimony. We have to proclaim this truth. We are here in Christ's stead. Christ is no longer walking on this earth and leading people to the Father. He's not doing that. So we now have this job committed unto us, reconciling the world unto Christ. And if you are an ambassador, you're representing somebody else. And if the person you're representing is flawless and perfect and sinless and holy, then how are you going to be able to represent that person if you're not trying to be as much as possible a reflection of who he is? It's our duty. So you want to be a good ambassador? Try to look the part, fit the part, be the part of an ambassador. You're representing Christ. You're not representing yourself. So we need to have that good testimony. We need to have a good conversation. Just like Christ, the only way they could get Christ was false accusations. It's the only way they were a convict of anything. Well, you ought to be living a life such that the only way that people are going to convict you of anything and find evil in you is that it's false. Because you are an ambassador and you're representing Christ, that ought to be the way you live your life. The last place I want to turn is John chapter 10. John chapter 10, this is actually the verse that kind of prompted this sermon. This verse stood out to me as it never had before. But just proclaiming the same truth of having this good testimony and being able to proclaim the truth as someone who is reliable, as someone that people can trust. And the result of being able to do that is people will get saved. And again, the Word of God is what saves. But we need to be able to have as much evidence as possible for reasonable people to accept the gospel. And one little part of that that could be helpful is the way that you present the gospel and who you are in delivering the Word of God. We are vessels that God uses. And we're imperfect vessels, but the Bible teaches that we ought to be meat for his use, like ready for his use by purging out the leaven, purging out the sin, so that we could be used to do greater and mightier works for God because more people will receive it. More people will listen. You're being a better ambassador. John 10, look at verse number 40, the Bible reads, And went away again beyond Jordan into the place where John at first baptized, and there he abode. And many resorted unto him and said, John did no miracle, but all things that John spake of this man were true, and many believed on him there. We don't have to do miracles to get people to believe us, right? I mean, if we did, we'd be in really bad shape because I have not witnessed anybody here actually perform a miracle like Christ did, right? Miracles of healing or even just with the gifts of the tongue or other gifts of the spirit that people might have, that God had poured out on those that believed in the New Testament or in the early church. But John didn't have any miracles. John did no miracles. John was a real simple man. John was out in the wilderness. He was just out preaching the Word of God. No fancy clothing, no fancy food, no fancy anything. But he was a man that didn't mince words. He's a man that said things the way that they were. The way that he saw them, hey, this is the truth, whether it was against the king, against Herod, right? Against Herodias, against Philip, against any of the people in charge, or against the Jews, against the Pharisees. It doesn't matter. He just proclaimed the truth, and he stuck to it, and he was consistent, and he taught a hard message, and people heard the message that John spake, and then when Jesus came, because remember, he came to prepare the way for the Lord, the voice crying in the wilderness, that was John, John the Baptist. Then when Jesus shows up, they're confirming, wow, everything that he said is true, and there's no coincidence there, and then many believed on him there as a result of a lot of the plowing that John was doing. They didn't believe right away when John testified, but then when they were introduced to Jesus, when they saw Jesus, when he was doing his ministry, it helped confirm, wow, hey, everything that he said, there it is, it's true. Everything he said is true. A confirmation on the testimony. He was a good, he had a good witness to the truth, and even if you don't see someone get saved immediately, have that good witness. It could impact, and look, this type of influence and this type of impact is going to help, is probably going to help the people that you care about the most, because when we go out to the door, they don't know you, right? So it's really the Word of God or anything visible that they might see about you, your really surface level stuff, but this is going to have the most impact to those that are closer to you, the people who either once knew you or know you, family members, people who are just waiting, you know, you join this church and be like, oh, it's just a phase. Oh, they're just kind of testing things out. They've already been to these other churches and stuff. No, you need to stay faithful. You need to put these words into practice. You need to demonstrate not just for yourself and your own relationship with the Lord, but also for the sake of other people that are going to see you and be able to see the testimony, to see your conversation and be like, you know what? This is different. This isn't like the time that he went to the Buddhist camp or went to, you know, whatever, like if you're known to be someone who's tried different religions. This is different, or this isn't like when he, you know, whatever, right? And any things that you might have been known to have done, right? There would have been maybe foolish things. Now it's different, whatever that may be. Now it's different, because they're actually seeing legitimate changes. They're seeing you grow. They're seeing your testimony. They're seeing, look, this is who I am. This isn't a pretense. This isn't in guile. This isn't fake. I'm not just trying to put on a mask for people to think that I am so holy or righteous. It's just part of who I am. And some of you specifically, I'm not going to bring up anyone by name, but I've had conversations with people where it's like, you know, their family is just, you're still cast shade because of sins of their past. But you know what? Over time, you could win them over, potentially, right? Obviously, they still have a choice to make on what they're going to be. But don't hinder that. Continue to be the good example. Continue to just show, no, this is true. God's word doesn't fail, and I'm going to live the best life that I can and not allow people, give them occasion to speak falsely about the right way, about the way of truth. That's what the false prophets do. They come in, and they're an actor, and they want to put on the IFB suit and try to infiltrate and become looking like one of us in order to then cast shade and bring about a bunch of damage when they didn't believe to begin with. That's how they operate. 2 Peter 2 goes more into depth about that, about bringing the way of truth being evil spoken of because of their evil and pernicious ways. But that ought not to be us, right? Be a good ambassador. Have a good witness. Be someone who's credible, trustworthy, and I guarantee you you'll see more results just in general because God will use you more and provide just that extra ample evidence for people to be convinced. And like I said, it's going to be more so in people that you're closer with than just at the door. Do you care about your loved ones? Hey, sell out to serving the Lord, right? Make the real changes to have the word of God impact your life. That's kind of a side benefit of your family and loved ones, but the real benefit is going to be just for you getting right with God. Dear Lord, we love you. Thank you so much for your word. We thank you for the testimony of Jesus Christ. And Lord, we had to take that on faith. All of us here are believers. We believe on faith. We thank you for the men of God that you've used in the past that had a good testimony and were able to preach your word without people having an evil to say against them, Lord. And we thank you, of course, mostly for Jesus Christ who had the best testimony and was perfect, was without sin and against which no one had anything that they could legitimately say anything against. Dear Lord, I pray that you please help us to be good ambassadors for Christ and that we would just be able to exhibit the life that a believer should exhibit by putting into practice your words. We love you. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Alright, we're going to sing one last song before we're dismissed this morning. Brother Peter, would you please lead us? Church, if you can open up your head notes. Song number 402. Song 402, our best. Song 402. Alright church, let's sing this out in the first. Here be the master's call, give me thy best. For being great or small, that is his test. You lend the best you can, not for reward, not for the praise of men, but for the Lord. Every work for Jesus will be blessed. On the edge from everyone is blessed. Our talents may be few, these may be small. But unto him is to our best our all. We've got for him to love, he not dare smile. Winning the smile of God brings his delight. Aiming the good truth, there goes the best. All that we think or do is the best. Every work for Jesus will be blessed. On the edge from everyone is blessed. Our talents may be few, these may be small. But unto him is to our best our all. Amen church, great singing, thank you so much for coming guys. Amen church, great singing, thank you so much. Amen church, great singing, thank you so much.