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Amen. All right, we're there in Genesis chapter number two. This morning we were in Genesis chapter number three, tonight we're in Genesis chapter two, but we're in completely different sermons and different ideas. Tonight we are continuing, of course, our series called Declaring Doctrine, and this is a series where we're studying, we're doing a systematic study of the major doctrines in the Bible, and this is a series that we do and then we take a break from and we come back to it, and I'm going to keep doing this until I get through every major doctrine in the Bible. As far as I can tell, or as far as the list that I've developed, there's, I don't know, like 30 different doctrines that I want to cover in this series, and I'm not going to do it in 30 weeks. We've done some, move on to something else, come back to it, and we come back in sections. We've done the doctrine of the Word of God and hit everything that had to do with the Word of God. We've done the doctrine of the Godhead and hit everything that had to do with God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, deity, and all those things. We've been in a section on doctrine, on the doctrine of salvation. If you remember a couple of weeks ago, I did a sermon on the doctrine of salvation. We talked about the theological terms for salvation, like justification and atonement, and we looked at those things, and then last Sunday night, I did a sermon on the doctrine of eternal security. Just to kind of let you know where we're going because we're hitting this idea of doctrine and the doctrine of salvation, next week, I'm going to be preaching a sermon on the doctrine of the new man, and the Sunday after that I'm preaching a sermon on the reprobate doctrine, but tonight I'm preaching on the doctrine of individual soul liberty, individual soul liberty, and this is a doctrine that fits within this category of the doctrines of salvation. It's not complicated, but there are some things that I want you to be aware of, and part of the reason that I'm doing this series is because I want our church to be the most biblically educated church in this city. I want us to be the most biblically educated church, period, but I want you to know what we believe, why we believe it. Another reason I'm doing these doctrinal sermons is because our church in the past has trained many men for the ministry, and I plan on continuing to train and send men out for the ministry, and I want them to have reference, a reference of what we believe and why we believe it and what it means to be a Baptist, and today we're dealing with this doctrine of individual soul liberty. I want to give you some thoughts and encourage you to write them down if you have a notepad or if you can write on the back of your course of the week. Let me begin by just giving you a definition for individual soul liberty. Some of you may have never heard that term before. Maybe you've heard it, but you're not familiar with it. Let me just read this for you. Individual soul liberty, also referred to as soul competency, is a Christian theological belief of the accountability of each person before God. According to this teaching, someone's family relationship, church membership, or ecclesiastical or religious authorities cannot affect the salvation of that individual soul from condemnation. Instead, each person is responsible to God for one's own personal faith in Jesus Christ. The doctrine of individual soul liberty is the doctrine that teaches that God has given free will, that God has given liberty to every person, to every soul, in order to choose what they believe, to choose if they will believe. So I want to give you some thoughts in regards to that. It is the doctrine that each person is responsible to God. It is a doctrine that no other family relationship, no church membership, no other religious authorities can have an effect on your salvation. It is the fact that God has given you the freedom of choice, the free will to make a decision. And I want to explain this to you and make sure we thoroughly understand it tonight. And if you're writing down some things, I'd encourage you to write this down. Number one, let's talk about what individual soul liberty means. What exactly do we mean by individual soul liberty? Well, individual soul liberty means that individuals are responsible to make the choice to respond to God. Individual soul liberty means that individuals, people, are responsible to respond to God, or they're responsible to make the choice to respond to God. And I want to teach this to you or highlight this for you in different categories. First of all, it applies to the category of sin. We all can make a choice regarding sin. You're there in Genesis chapter 2. I'd like you to look down at verse number 15. This is, of course, a famous story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. We've been talking a little bit about it today, this morning, in a different context. But notice Genesis 2.15. The Bible says this, And the Lord God took the man and put him into the Garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying... Now, notice what God commands the man. He says, Of every tree of the garden, thou mayest... Notice this word, freely. Thou mayest freely eat. That word freely or free there means liberty. It means freedom of choice. It means freedom of will. God told Adam, Thou mayest of every tree of the garden, thou mayest freely eat. That's individual soul liberty. In fact, individual soul liberty began at the Garden of Eden. Notice verse 17. But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shall not eat of it, for in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shall surely die. Now, sometimes people ask the question, they say, Well, if God knew, if God said, if God put this garden and said, You can eat of any tree, but there's this one tree, there's this one tree that you're not allowed to eat of. In fact, if you eat from that tree, you'll damn all mankind to sin and death and hell. People ask this question, Well, why did God even put the tree there? Why didn't God just remove that tree or why didn't God put that tree somewhere else where they wouldn't have access to it, where they wouldn't even have the choice to make that decision? And the reason that God did not do that is because God has given us free will. God has given us individual soul liberty. See, God did not create Adam and Eve as robots, where he just made them do what he wanted to do. But God created man, the Bible says, for his pleasure, and he gave him a choice. He told Adam, You can eat of any tree. In fact, you can freely eat of any tree, but just not this one. Well, what if I eat of it? What are you going to do about it? Well, I'm not going to do anything about it because it's your choice. But the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shall not eat of it. Now, just because God says, Just because I'm not going to stop you from eating it doesn't mean that you won't bear the consequences. For in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Go to Genesis chapter 3, look at verse 6. See, we all can make a choice regarding sin. In fact, we all will make a choice regarding sin. Look, we like to sit there and say, Oh, well, the devil made me do it. It's not my fault, the devil made me do it. But the truth of the matter is this, that God gave you individual sole liberty. Which means that you get to make the choice, you get to make the decision, you get to decide whether you'll obey or disobey, whether you'll do what God wants you to do or not do what God wants you to do. Genesis chapter 3, look at verse 6. And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was pleasant to the eyes and a tree to be desired to make one wise, notice, she took of the fruit thereof and did eat and gave also unto her husband with her and he did eat. And the eyes of them both were open and they knew that they were naked and they were sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons. See, the individual sole liberty means that as individuals, we all are responsible to make the choice and we will all make the choice to respond to God. This is done in the category of sin. We all can make a choice and we all will make a choice regarding sin. But let me give you another area where this affects us. Go to the book of Revelation if you would towards the last book in the New Testament, Revelation chapter 22. Revelation chapter 22 and look at verse number 17. Last book in the New Testament, Revelation 22 and verse 17. Number 1, we all can make a choice regarding sin and we all will make a choice regarding sin. Secondly, we all can and we all must make a choice regarding salvation. The Bible teaches very clearly that salvation is a choice. Revelation 22 and verse 17, the Bible says this, and the spirit and the bride say come and let him that heareth say come and let him that is a thirst. Notice these words and the Bible here is referring to coming to God, coming to salvation. When it says let him that is a thirst, that is you can cross reference that back to Jesus speaking to the woman at the well saying that anybody who drinks of this water will thirst again but if you drink of the water that I shall give you, he says you will never thirst. It will spring up a fountain of living water inside of you and this is all a reference and an analogy to salvation. He says come let him that is a thirst come, notice the last part of verse 17, and whosoever will, and whosoever will let him take of the water of life, notice our word there again, freely, liberty. Now if you notice the word will there and whosoever will, the word will means whosoever wants to, whosoever is willing to, whosoever desires to. See, salvation is a choice that we make, we choose, the Bible says hey anybody who wants to, whosoever will let him take of the water of life freely. Go to the book of Romans if you would, Romans chapter number 10. You have Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, Romans chapter number 10. And I'm not going to take the time to do it tonight but we could go, we could open up the book of John and go after, you know, just look at verse after verse after verse after verse where God says whosoever, whosoever, whosoever believeth in him shall not be ashamed, whosoever believeth in him will not be condemned. The most famous verse in the Bible, John 3 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, shall not perish but have everlasting life. All throughout the Bible we see this whosoever word especially being applied in salvation, why? Because salvation is open to anyone. Anyone who wants it can have it but it's their choice, they must choose it. Romans 10 9 says this, it says, that if, I want you to notice that word if there, that's conditional. It's conditional upon a choice. It's not, it's not just understood that everyone will, it says that if, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shalt, that means and they will, they do this, shall believe in thine heart that God is raised from the dead. Notice thou shalt be saved. Look at verse 11, same chapter, Romans 10 verse 11, for the scriptures say whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. Look at verse 13, for whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. See the Bible says that we all can and in fact we all must make a choice regarding salvation because salvation is a choice. It's whosoever will, it's a decision you make, it's a decision that somebody makes. In fact, let me help some of you soul winners out. I've over the years we've of course been in ministry, now my wife and I have been in ministry for 10 years and we've had the privilege of training many, many soul winners through our soul winning seminars and through just individually helping people. One thing I've noticed with a lot of soul winners and maybe some of you soul winners would agree with this that it's difficult sometimes to kind of close the deal. If I could use a business term and if that offends you, that's not my intent. Obviously we're not selling anything, we're giving the greatest gift that someone could receive for free. But, you know, often times you sit there and you explain the gospel to someone and you go through all the steps and you understand it's kind of difficult to get them to pray or to bring up the prayer and I would just offer you something that I use because I like to use a gift illustration throughout my presentation. I use a gift illustration that a gift is free if I were to give you a gift but then ask you to pay me for it, would that be a gift? And the answer is no. What if I would ask you to do something, wash my car, is that a gift? And of course the answer is no. And I use that illustration when I'm in Ephesians 2, 8 and 9 to explain that salvation is not of works. I also use a gift illustration to explain that look, just because a gift is free for you doesn't mean that somebody didn't pay for it. If I go out and I buy a gift for you and I give it to you, it doesn't cost you anything but it costs me something. Well the gift of God is the same way. God gives it to us freely but it costs him something. It costs the fact that he sent his son to die on the cross and I like to use that illustration. When I get to the end of my presentation, I like to bring up the gift illustration again. And I'll look at somebody and say, hey listen, let's say I went out and I bought you a gift, I wrapped it up, I put a bow on it, I put a name tag on it, I wrote your name. And I said here you go, I'm giving you this free gift, you don't have to give me anything for it, you don't have to do anything for it, it's a free gift, I'm giving this to you. And let's say you said to me, thanks but no thanks, and you rejected my gift. Did that gift ever become yours? And people will often say, well no. And I'll say, well why not? Well because I didn't take it, I didn't accept it, I didn't want it. And I'll tell people, well look, the gift of God is the exact same way. Jesus already paid for it on the cross. He offers it to all of us freely but you get a choice whether you'd like to accept it or reject it. And I'll ask somebody at the door, I say, if you could accept the gift of God would you do it? And you usually will say, of course I would. Well let me show you how you can do that. Romans 10, 9, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth. See, salvation is a choice. We all make a choice and we all must make a choice. We all make a choice and we will make a choice regarding sin but we also make a choice and we must make a choice regarding salvation. And this is what the Bible teaches. This is individual soul liberty. Let me give you another area where individual soul liberty applies. You're there in Romans chapter 10. Flip over to Romans chapter 14. Not only can we and we will make a choice regarding sin and not only can we and we must make a choice regarding salvation but we must also make a choice regarding doctrine. Romans chapter 14. Look at verse 5. One man esteemeth one day above another. Another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day regardeth unto the Lord and he that regardeth not the day to the Lord he does not regard it. He that eateth to the Lord for he giveth God thanks and he that eateth not to the Lord he did not and giveth God thanks. And in this passage we just see this example that when it comes to what you believe, you know that you get to choose what you believe? You make a choice. The Bible says here, give us an example. One man esteemeth one day above another. Another man esteemeth every day alike. Well which one's right and which one's wrong? Well notice it says let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. When it comes to doctrine, look, you are not a robot. God has given you a choice to be able to read the Bible. If you're saved, you got the Holy Spirit of God, you can open up the Bible, you can study the Bible and you can make decisions for yourself. Your job is to know what the Bible says and make decisions and oftentimes, you know, people will come to me and ask me questions and ask for advice and I'll tell people, well here's what I would do and here's why I would do it and here's what the Bible says and here's the application but honestly, you've got to make a decision for yourself and oftentimes I tell people, you must not sin against your own conscience. You must be fully persuaded in your own mind. See, individual soul liberty means that you don't go to a church like the Roman Catholic Church during the Dark Ages and hear a sermon from a language you don't even understand and have people just tell you, well do this and do that and don't ask questions. No, you get to individually come to God and study the Bible and make decisions for yourself. Now let me just give this caveat and this is a biblical caveat that obviously within the umbrella of a church, there's an authority structure. Look, you get to decide what you believe but there's some things that you can choose to not believe that'll get you kicked out of this church. You can come to Verity Baptist Church and decide you're going to spread, you know, false doctrine about the deity of Christ or false doctrine about the King James Bible or whatever. That's your choice to make, just know that when you decide to band yourself with a church, with a church family, you are identifying with what that church believes and look, we don't tell people, you don't have to agree with everything that we believe around here but you need to not be going against us. And I've said this oftentimes, in fact just recently somebody asked me this question, I have no problem with unsaved people coming to this church or people that maybe don't believe exactly like we believe. There's lots of people in our church that started coming, when they started coming they didn't believe eternal security and it was weeks before they believed eternal security and that's okay, we'll let people come, they're not sure. I preached a sermon this morning about motherhood and all those things, maybe people come and say I don't know what I think about that. That's fine, you don't have to agree with us, you have individual soul liberty. Now we're not going to allow somebody to walk in here and try to fight us on it, we're not going to allow somebody to walk in here and spread false doctrine, as long as you're not spreading false doctrine you can believe what you want and of course there's caveats to that and if it's damnable heresy then we can't allow that, the Bible teaches we can't allow that. The point is this, you get to choose individual soul liberty is why you come to a church like Verity Baptist Church and your pastor tells you you should write this down, you should take some notes, you should write some references, you should underline this, you should circle this, you should know, you say why pastor why are you always trying to get us to take notes, why are you always trying to get us to turn to the passage, it would be a lot easier for me to say just you know trust me I'm preaching out of the King James Bible, just close your Bible, I'll read all the verses to you and you just listen to me, that would make things go a lot faster, why do I take the time to have you turn, why do I take the time often times to tell you how to get to a passage and I want you to open it, I want you to put your eyeballs on the page and look at it, why? Because I want you to know what you believe from the Bible, when you walk out of this church and you've got some family member that says well why does your wife stay home with the children or why does your wife dress a certain way or why don't you go to these certain places or do these certain things, if the answer is well because that's what pastor said, wrong answer, if the answer is well pastor said, this isn't a cult, we're often accused, people accuse us of being a cult, look if I'm a cult leader and I've been accused of being a cult leader so many times, if I had a dime for every time somebody said I was a cult leader, let me tell you something, my job would be a lot easier if I was a cult leader, I'd have to answer a lot less questions, I'd have to study a lot less, I wouldn't have to study as much as I do, I wouldn't have to prove anything, just say just do it because I said it, we're telling you open your Bible and look at it, this is what the Bible says, this is what the Bible teaches, this is what the Bible, this is what we learn from the Bible, why? Because individual soul liberty means that you get to make a choice regarding salvation, it means that you get to make a choice regarding sin but it means that you get to make a choice regarding doctrine and look, every man should be fully persuaded in his own mind, say pastor why are you going to take 30 weeks on Sunday nights over the next however many years it takes to do this where you're going to teach us systematically through these major doctrines of the Bible, here's why, because I want every man, woman and child in this church to be fully persuaded in his own mind, I want you to know what we believe and why we believe it and I don't want the answer to be because pastor said so, he that regardeth the day regardeth unto the Lord, he that regardeth not the day, so Lord he does not regard it, he that eateth, eateth to the Lord for he giveth God thanks and he that eateth not to the Lord he eateth not and giveth God thanks, we all can make a choice regarding sin, you're there in Romans 14, skip down to verse number 11, I said individual soul liberty means that individuals are responsible to make a choice to respond to God, individual soul liberty also means that individuals will be accountable for their choices when they stand before God, see the reason that individual soul liberty is important is not only because you are responsible to respond to God, it's important because you are accountable for how you responded to God, Romans 14, look at verse 11, Romans 14 and 11 says this, for it is written, as I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God, look at verse 12, so then every one of us shall give account of himself to God, you know the Bible says that every single person will give account of himself to God, every single individual will stand before God at some point, everybody, everybody will be judged by God, you say people that didn't believe on God, people that didn't believe on God will be judged by God, people who rejected God, people who denied his existence, everyone, Bible says and as it is appointed unto men, once to die and after this the judgment, everyone will stand before God, everyone will be judged by God, now not everyone will be judged at the same judgment, I've taught you this and I'll just give you some passages on it again tonight, go to 2 Corinthians if you would, you're there in Romans, you got first, keep your place in Romans if you would, we're going to come back to it later in the sermon, keep your place in Romans but go past 1 Corinthians and 2 Corinthians, everyone will stand before God, now believers and unbelievers will stand before two different judgments, two different judgments both to judge the same things, 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 10 says this, for we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, this is individual sole liberty, teenager you will not stand at the judgment seat of Christ standing behind your mom, standing behind your dad, hey husband you'll not stand at the judgment seat of Christ hiding behind your wife, wife you'll not be hiding behind your husband, church member you won't be hiding behind your pastor, the Bible says for we must all, that's individual sole liberty, individual sole accountability, individual sole responsibility for we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ that everyone may receive the things done in his body according to that he had done whether it be good or bad, you know that we will all stand before God and be held accountable for what we did, now look believers will stand before what the Bible calls the judgment seat of Christ, you will not be judged there based on in regards to salvation, the judgment seat of Christ is not a judgment where it's going to be decided are you going to go to heaven or are you going to go to hell, that decision was made the day you made the choice to be saved, at the judgment seat of Christ there will be no judgment in regards to your salvation and by the way there will be no judgment in regards to your sin, often times people bring up and preachers bring up the judgment seat of Christ and they make it sound like God's going to bring down a big screen and he's going to show you all the bad things you ever did and make you say well what were you thinking there and what were you thinking there and what were you thinking when you did that, God's not going to do that, he already knows what you were thinking, you were thinking about yourself, God's not going to judge you for your sins, my sins have already been paid for, as far as the East is from the West, we've learned this and we've talked about it, but God will judge you for what you did with what he gave you, God will judge you for the things done in his body according to that he had done whether it be good or bad, God will judge you and God will reward you for your works or you will lose rewards based off your lack of works, but all of us, look all of us will stand before God, this is individual soul liberty, individual soul accountability and by the way let me just say this, I believe that every Christian should live their lives in anticipation for this judgment day, my life and your life should be lived in a way where every day we are preparing for the judgment seat of Christ, where Christ will judge our lives, well he will reward us based on what we did for him or we will suffer shame because we did not live for him, believers will stand at the judgment seat of Christ, let me ask you a question, are you living for the judgment seat of Christ or are you living for yourself? Go to the book of Revelation, Revelation 20, let me give you a passage in regarding the unbelievers, unbelievers will stand at a different judgment, it's called the great white throne judgment, we talked about it recently, I think last Sunday night and last Wednesday night, but let's talk about it again, Revelation chapter 20 verse 11, and I saw a great white throne and he met sat on it from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away and there was found no place for them, notice we're all going to be at the great white throne because the earth and the heaven fled away and there was found no place from no place to run, we will all be here and I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God, this is a judgment for the unsaved, for unbelievers, those that are dead and the books were opened, another book was opened which is the book of life and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books according to their words and of course these will be escorted into hell, they will be judged, they will be found guilty, they will be found wanting and they will be thrown into hell, but the point is this that every individual will stand before God at some point, if they're saved it will be at the judgment seat of Christ, if they're unsaved it will be at the great white throne, individual soul liberty means that we're accountable to God and you won't get, look we're not going to stand, you're not going to stand at the judgment seat of Christ, we're not going to stand at the judgment seat of Christ as a church, well we're Verity Baptist Church, look what we did, no, no, it's not what we did, it's what did you do, I think it's funny for some of these people and I understand it and I'm for it, but some of these people say, well you know I would only go to a church that has a strong soul winning program, it's like do you go soul winning, well I don't go soul winning but I'm only going to go to church that goes soul winning, well you're still going to be judged at the judgment seat of Christ as a non-soul winner, even if you went to a soul winning church, in fact you might get judged harsher because you had every opportunity, you might lose more rewards, you will stand at the, look we will all stand before God as individuals, individual soul liberty, individual soul accountability, go to the book of Acts if you would, Acts chapter 8, if you're there in Romans you just flip back to Acts chapter 8, so I said number 1, you know we began with this idea, what is individual soul liberty, individual soul liberty means that we are responsible to make a choice to respond to God, we do that through sin, through salvation, through doctrine, individual soul liberty means we are accountable for the choices that we make because we will all stand before God, some of us at the judgment seat of Christ, others at the great white throne. Let's talk about just real quickly how individual soul liberty applies specifically to doctrines, I've already mentioned them in the announcements but I want to highlight them again, individual soul liberty, there's two doctrines that very specifically go against this idea and I want to just talk about them tonight, the first one is the idea of infant baptism and it's not just infant baptism, it's this idea that you're born into Christianity or you're born into a religious type of program that is going to bring salvation because individual soul liberty means that you must make a choice for salvation, so salvation is something we do out of our conscience, we choose to do it because you cannot be saved without making a conscious choice, we reject infant baptism, Acts chapter 8, look at verse 36, Acts chapter 8 verse 36, and as they went on their way they came unto a certain water and the eunuch said see here is water, what does hinder me, the word hinder means obstruct or stop, what's stopping me to be baptised and of course if you remember the story, the Ethiopian eunuch is riding down the road in a cherry, he's reading the book of Isaiah, Philip runs up to him, he asks him understand is thou without readers, he said how can I except some man should guide me and he jumps in and begins to preach the gospel to him, as they go down the way they see water and the eunuch said see here is water, what does hinder me to be baptised and Philip said if thou believeth with all thine heart thou mayest, look what is the condition for baptism, condition for baptism is that somebody believes that they are saved, he answered and said I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God and he commanded the chariot to stand still and they went down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch and he baptised him, so why do you reject infant baptism, well we reject infant baptism because baptism must come after somebody can clearly communicate the fact that they believe and have put their trust and confidence and faith on Jesus Christ and it doesn't matter how many baby Einstein CDs you have your baby listen to, your six week old cannot stand up and profess that I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God, your six week old is not able to consciously make that choice, to consciously make that decision, they don't believe that and by the way your six week old is not even condemned, the Bible teaches that if babies die they go straight to heaven, they go to God, they're not under the law, they haven't reached that age of accountability, see the Roman Catholic Church they have this belief and they say well you get baptised into the church and someone else can make that choice for you, your parents can decide to baptise you without your free will and baptise you into the church and now you're saved because you're part of this church, that is not what the Bible teaches, the Bible teaches individual soul liberty, people want to make a conscious decision to be saved, sometimes we go out soul winning, we knock on doors and we ask people the questions you know for sure if you died today are you on your way to heaven and other people they make you know odd statements and you just kind of start conversating, I've had people over the years say to me well you know I was born a Christian, I've been a Christian my whole life and I'm like well wrong answer, you don't get born a Christian, you got to get born again to be a Christian, you don't get well my grandma was saved, my favourite is when they tell me my grandmother was a pastor, it's like good night, I'm not even sure where to start, well my daddy was a baptist preacher or I'm from the south, like what's that supposed to mean, well I was raised in the Bible belt, of course I'm a Christian, no of course that doesn't mean you're a Christian, see the Bible teaches it's a choice, it's individual soul liberty, you don't get born into Christianity, you get born again to Christianity, you must choose to be saved and without a conscious choice we reject because salvation must be done through a conscious choice, we reject infant baptism and we reject any sort of philosophy that says well you get born into it, you were born a Mormon, you were born a Catholic, you were born this, you were born that, look I was born a baptist, I was baptist born, baptist bred, when I die I'll be baptist dead, I'm a baptist that's all I've ever been, that's all I ever will be, I was born a baptist but I was not born saved, I was born into a baptist family but I had to choose to get saved, those are two different things, go to 2nd Peter chapter 3 if you would, at the end of the New Testament you have the book of Revelation, if you head backwards you got Revelation, Jude 3rd, 2nd and 1st, John and then you have the book of 2nd Peter, 2nd Peter chapter 3, how individual soul liberty applies, it applies specifically to infant baptism and any sort of religious organization that teaches that you're born into Christianity or you're born into salvation because individual soul liberty teaches that you must make a conscious choice to be saved so therefore you could not have been born into it, the choice could not have been made for you, your parents could not decide that you're saved, we baptize you before you even knew what was going on, that doesn't work but here's another big one and I would say that this is probably one of the biggest reasons we want to understand individual soul liberty and believe it and defend it and it's because you cannot be saved without a conscious choice, because you cannot be saved without a conscious choice, we not only reject infant baptism, we reject Calvinism, Calvinism is this belief that God chooses who will be saved and who will be damned, it is a belief that God predestinates and that's a biblical word and if you apply it within the biblical context there's nothing wrong with that but the Calvinism teaches that God predestinates who will be saved, Calvinism probably the worst doctrine of Calvinism is the doctrine of limited atonement which says that Jesus did not die for the sins of all, that God did not send his son to pay for the sins of everyone but he only died for the sins of a select few, look Calvinism cannot be true because God wants everyone to be saved, 2 Peter 3 you know the verse, let's look at it, the Lord is not slack concerning his promise as some men count slackness but his long suffering to us were, notice these words, not willing, not willing that any should perish, see what willing there, will, what God wants, you know that God does not want any to perish, you know that God wants all to be saved, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance, see the Calvinists say oh no God saves whoever he wants to save and those that God does not want to save they don't get saved, well the problem with that is if that were true and it's not because individual soul liberties says that God gives you the choice, you must decide but if it were true that God saved anyone that God wanted to be saved then everyone would be saved because he's not willing that any should perish, God's will is that everyone be saved, God's will is that everybody be born again, God's will is that everybody go to heaven but God's will doesn't always get done because he gives us choice, he gives us liberty, freedom, go to Matthew if you would, Matthew 23, Calvinism cannot be true because God wants everyone to be saved therefore he doesn't choose anyone to be condemned, if people die and go to hell it won't be because God didn't want them saved, if people die and go to hell it will be for two reasons, one is because they chose, one reason might be because they chose to reject salvation, somebody presented them with an opportunity to be saved and they chose not to, somebody knocked on their door and said can I show you how you can know for sure you're on your way to heaven and they said no I was born a Catholic, no I was born a Muslim, no I don't want to hear it, people will die and go to hell because they chose individual soul liberty to reject salvation and people will die and go to hell because a soul winner chose individual soul liberty to not go preach the gospel to someone that could have and maybe would have got saved, see we like the idea of individual soul liberty when it's about hey you got to choose to be saved, we don't like the idea of individual soul liberty when God says hey I've given you the responsibility to take the gospel to the world but I'm not going to force you to do it, you get to decide on Saturday morning whether you'll go or not, you know how some people will die and go to hell because you didn't preach the gospel to them and you could have and you should have and they would have if somebody would have brought the gospel to them, that's individual soul liberty, you get to choose, you got to choose salvation, you get to choose whether you'll serve God. Matthew 23 verse 37, I want you to notice what Jesus says here and I want you to notice this kind of highlights this idea that God doesn't always get his way. Matthew 23 verse 37, Jesus says this, Jesus standing on a hill or a mount looking down at the city of Jerusalem and he says, oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets and stonest them which are sent unto thee, notice what he says, Jesus speaking to the city of Jerusalem referring to the fact that they killed the prophets and stoned the prophets and they will soon kill him. He says how often would I have, notice that word would, that's his will, that's what Jesus wanted, he said how often would I have, he says how often did I want to gather thy children together, Jesus said I wanted to gather you, I would have gathered you, he says would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings, notice these words, and ye would not, Jesus says how many times did I want to gather you, but you didn't want to, he says how often would I have gathered thy children together and he says and ye would not, you weren't willing, you didn't want to. What is that? That's individual soul liberty, they got to choose, they got to decide, they got to choose to reject, so therefore we reject Calvinism because Calvinism takes the choice away, you don't get to choose, God chose for you, and people say well I chose to believe, yeah but you only chose to believe because God made you choose and God made you think that you chose but you didn't actually choose, he chose, let me tell you something, God chose everyone, God wants everybody to be saved, the Bible says many are called but few are chosen, why? Because he offers it to all, but only those who choose to accept it will be saved, so we reject infant baptism, we reject any philosophy that says you get born into salvation, and we reject Calvinism, and by the way let me just say this, we got a bunch of little kids, a bunch of kids growing up in Christian's homes around here, and it's good for them to hear every once in a while, hey you kids, you don't get born into Christianity, you might have got born into a Christian family, you don't get born into Christianity, you must make a choice, you must choose, let me give you a third thought quickly tonight if I may, go to Exodus chapter 20, Genesis Exodus, Exodus chapter 20, we talked about what individual soul liberty means, it means that we are responsible to make a choice to respond to God, we see that in regards to sin, we see that in regards to salvation, we see that in regards to doctrine, it means that we are accountable for our choices, we will all stand before God for believers that will happen at the judgment seat of Christ, for our believers that will happen at the great white throne, we see how individual soul liberty applies specifically, it applies to infant baptism, we reject it because infants must make, everyone must make a choice, you get born into Christianity, and we reject Calvinism because Calvinism says God chooses, and individual soul liberty which is talked about the whole Bible says that you choose, and I choose, let me just deal with this real quickly because amongst Baptists, really all Christians, but really a lot of Baptists, and I've kind of pissed off a lot of people over the last couple of years as I preach these things, and that's okay, I'm used to that, in fact it's my spiritual gift, what I've noticed is that a lot of these Fox News Baptists, a lot of these, you know, political type Christians, they'll mix these two ideas, they'll mix religious liberty with individual soul liberty, and they'll say, well, you know, our country gives you religious liberty, and they'll put it in the same category as individual soul liberty, and I want to just speak to you for a few moments on this subject because individual soul liberty is different from the freedom of religion, they're similar, maybe, you could make the argument, but they're very different, you get all the, you know, because Christians today, they all want to and the first, you know, religious liberty, and look, please understand this, I'm not standing up here saying we need to get away from religious liberty in America or whatever, we live in a godless nation, and any sort of protection that we can have to worship God or serve God, I'm for it, here's the only point that I'm making, the only point that I'm making is don't try to take something that our government established and try to make it sound like it's something that God established. Individual soul liberty and the freedom of religion are two different things. Now, when it comes to our political world and the supreme law of the land, of course, the constitution is the supreme law of the land, and the constitution has these ten amendments, I didn't say commandments, I said amendments, these ten amendments, and the first amendment reads this, Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. This religious freedom verbiage is divided into two clauses, one is referred to as the establishment clause, the other one is referred to as the free exercise clause. The establishment clause guarantees that the government will never set up a government church or a government religion. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, meaning they guarantee to us that they're never going to create a state church. Those countries, today even in Europe, there's democratic countries that have the Catholic church or have Episcopalian churches as the church of the state. People pay taxes and taxes go to these churches. Our first amendment in the United States says Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. They're not going to establish a church for the state. The second clause, the free exercise clause, says or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. So here's what the first amendment says. The first amendment says we're not going to make you worship in any sort of government entity church, we're not going to force you to worship in any church, and we're not going to prohibit you from worshiping in any church or any type of way that you want. That's the first amendment. The first amendment says we're not going to make you worship any god and we're going to allow you to worship whatever god you want. That's the first amendment. Now let me read to you the first commandment. Exodus 20, verse 3. Thou shall have no other gods before me. Now if you're honest with yourself, you'll have to come to the conclusion that the first commandment and the first amendment are completely the opposite of each other. One says you can worship any god you want, the other says you can't worship any god you want. The first amendment says we won't make you worship and we won't stop you from worshiping any and every and whatever god you want. That's the first amendment. The first commandment says thou shall have no other gods before me. One says worship whatever god you want, the other one says you're not allowed to worship whatever god you want, in fact you're not allowed to have any other gods before me. And then the rest of it gets even worse. Thou shall not make unto thee any graven images, any image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shall not bow down thyself to them nor serve them for I the Lord thy God am a jealous god visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children upon the third and fourth generation of them that hate me. In verse 7 it says thou shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. In verse 8 it says remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Look, did God allow for religious freedom when he established a government, did he allow for religious freedom, and the answer is no. God did not establish the nation of Israel and said, by the way, Thomas Jefferson is going to make sure that you get written to the Constitution that I'm going to allow you to worship whatever god you want. No, that's the first amendment. You might be watching Fox News too much, maybe you need to start reading the Bible. The first amendment says you can worship whatever god you want, the first commandment says you're not allowed to worship whatever god you want. God did not establish religious liberty. Go to Deuteronomy, Deuteronomy chapter 13. We'll finish up. I need to upset everybody. I upset the ladies this morning and I'm upsetting the guys today. Stop messing with my Sean Hannity. Stop messing with all my radio Fox News heroes. Maybe you should get a hero by the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Deuteronomy 13 verse 6. Does this sound like religious liberty to you? This is the laws that God established. Deuteronomy 13 verse 6. If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which as thine own soul entice thee secretly, saying let us go and serve other gods, which thou has not known, nor thy fathers. Namely the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee so far, or far from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth. Notice verse 8, thou shalt not consent unto him. That means don't agree, don't give permission. Nor harken, that means don't listen unto him. Neither shall thine eye pity, don't feel sorry for him. Neither shalt thou spare, don't make an exception. Neither shalt thou conceal him, don't hide him. But thou shalt surely kill him. I don't like you reading that. I'm reading the Bible. I'm just telling you, let's pretend, let's pretend for a minute that God told us the type of laws that he would establish if he ran the, oh wait, he did. It's called Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. If God would establish a country, a nation, and give them laws, here's what he would say. He wouldn't say, you have the freedom to worship whatever god you want. Now look, I understand it's hard for people to hear that because that goes against, you know, my patriotism. But maybe your patriotism is not biblical. But thou shalt surely kill him. Thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people, and thou shalt stone him with stones that he die because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage. The Bible does not teach religious liberty. The first amendment and the first commandment are not the same thing. And by the way, go to Deuteronomy 30. We're almost done. We're almost finished. Deuteronomy 30. Religious liberty and individual soul liberty are not the same thing. Religious liberty says you can worship whatever god you want. Individual soul liberty says God is not going to force you to be saved. You say, well I don't understand. So in the nation of Israel, God said you're not allowed to just worship any god you want. But then he gave them individual soul liberty, so he let them choose. How does that work? Well, it works the same way that I explained it works in our church. In our church, you can come here and say, well I don't, I don't believe those things, or maybe there's something I don't agree with, or I don't believe. We're not going to force you. That's a choice you have to make. Now if you start making problems, we'll throw you out. We're not going to make you agree with us on, on, on every little doctrine, because it's your choice. But you don't get to come in here and decide, well I don't believe in internal security, so I'm going to try to get everybody to stop believing in internal security. No, that'll get you thrown out. Well I don't believe in soul winning, so I'm going to get everybody to stop going soul winning. You can come here and not believe in soul winning. You can come here and never show up to soul winning, and we'll love you. But that's a choice you have to make, individual soul liberty. But we're not going to let you to try to bring that into our church. Well in the nation of Israel, here's what God would say. God would say, hey you don't have to believe on the Lord. You don't have to call upon the Lord. If you don't want to believe, if you don't want to be saved, that's your choice, but you're not going to go worship some other God in our nation. You understand that? But see today you got Christians saying, well we believe in individual soul liberty. Praise God for the First Amendment. No, those are two different things. The First Amendment says, worship whatever God you want. The First Commandment says, don't worship whatever God you want. An individual soul liberty simply says, God's not going to force you to be saved. But if we lived, look if this nation was a nation that was following the laws of God, we would say, you're not allowed to just worship the God of Hindu, of the Hindus, or the God of the Muslims. You're not allowed to just worship whatever God, but we're not going to force anybody to be saved because that's a choice that everybody must make on their own. Those thoughts are two different thoughts. And here's all I'm saying, because people hear me say this like, you're some sort of Venezuelan communist. And look, whatever. The Bible is good for every nation. We should be able to preach the Bible in any nation, and as Christians we should all agree, our loyalty and our allegiance should be to the heavenly nation. I'm a Christian before I'm an American. The Bible does not teach religious liberty, but the Bible does teach individual soul liberty. See, in Deuteronomy 13, God says, hey, don't just go worship whatever God you want. In fact, if somebody tries to get you, to entice you to worship other gods, thou shalt not consent, you should not hearken, you should not pity, you should not spare, you should not conceal, thou shalt surely kill him. That's not religious liberty. But then in Deuteronomy 30 and verse 19, here's what he says, I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I've set before you life and death, blessing and cursing, therefore choose life that both thou and thy seed may live. You say, what is that? Individual soul liberty? God says, I'll let you choose. I'll put before you, I'll put up before you, I'll set before you life and death, blessing and cursing, therefore choose life and that both thou and thy seed may live. Individual soul liberty means that you will stand before God, you are accountable to God, and you are responsible to God for your salvation and your walk with God. And by the way, individual soul liberty means that our walk with God is a personal walk. It's not corporate. We meet corporately as a church, but your walk with God is very individual. You say, ah, I go to Trinity Baptist Church and they preach hard and they preach this and they preach standards. The pastor he met us preaches against, you know, drinking and preaches against smoking and preaches against dancing and preaches against chewing and preaches against all these things. Okay, well, great. But if you do all those things, it means nothing. Your walk with God is not based off your church corporately. Your walk with God is an individual personal walk with him. And by the way, God wants to be close and intimate with you. You can come to a church like this all you want, but you go out there and just live like the devil. God's gonna hold you accountable. God's gonna hold you responsible. God is going to hold you and judge you. And by the way, there's a great white throne, but God judges us on this earth as well. God chases us on this earth. See, your walk with God is a personal walk, not a corporate walk. Some of you think, well, my wife is really right with God and that'll help me. That's not gonna help you at all. My husband's really godly. That means nothing. It'll help him when he stands before God, but you're gonna stand before God personally. In regards to our walk with God, it's personal, not corporate. It's individual, not group. It's us standing before God. And let me just say this as I finish up. When it comes to our children, we need to be concerned for our children's salvation and their walk with God. Look, I said to the kids tonight, and I hope they heard me, you may have been born into a Christian home that doesn't make you a Christian. You must choose to be a Christian. Let me say something to you parents. Your children may have been born into your Christian home. That does not guarantee they're gonna walk with God. That does not guarantee they're gonna live for God. As parents, we must be highly concerned with the salvation of our children and with our children's walk with God. You have to be paying attention. You have to be watching. You have to be protecting. You have to be loving them. You say, well, why? We're a Christian home in a high homeschool and we go to Verity Baptist Church. That doesn't guarantee your kids are gonna live for God. Look, it doesn't. I'm not trying to scare you. I'm not trying to hurt your feelings. I'm just telling you, when you became a parent, when you became a parent, this became a 24-hour a day, seven-day a week job. And unfortunately, and maybe I'm gonna disappoint some of you, it's not gonna end. I've told you this in the past and something that my wife and I, I mean, if there's one thing that my wife and I talk about, we talk about a lot of stuff. We talk about a lot of things and regarding church and regarding our family, whatever, but I would have to say if there's one thing that we talk the most about is how our children are doing, gauging them, their attitudes, how they say things, what they said, just trying to know their spirits and know where they're at spiritually. We're talking about the little ones when they're starting to get to the place where they could understand the gospel so we could give them the gospel. We're talking about the ones that are already saved and just trying to make sure we have a pulse on their spiritual hearts. I'll tell you this, and I don't know, obviously, we don't know what a day will bring forth, but if my children don't live for God, it won't be for want of desire on the part of their parents and it won't be for want of work on the side of the parents. We're trying to do everything we can to make sure they grow up and live for God. We realize that's not guaranteed to us. We're not just gonna say, well, you know, you're born to a pastor and a pastor's wife, so of course you're gonna live for God, no? Lots of pastors' kids grow up and live for the devil. With that said, though, you know, I recently, I was listening to a pastor recently, and this was an older pastor, and he's got some grown kids that are living for God, they're adults and they're living for God, and he was talking about how he really stressed when his children were small and, of course, when they get into the teen years, that's a whole different monster or a whole other thing. And he talked about the stress and the tension, the worry and the praying and the watching and paying attention and trying to make sure his kids live for God, and I was really connecting with him because I'm like, yeah, that's how my wife and I are, we just, we have this tension. And then he's, and see, in my mind, I thought, we just got to get them raised and we got to get them to grow up, make choices for God, get married, marry the right people, and then we'll be done. But this guy, this pastor, this older pastor, he's saying, yeah, you know, you get them married off, you think you're done, and then he's like, he's talking about how he finds himself driving to his adult children's houses in the middle of the night and just parking in front of their houses at one in the morning and two in the morning and him and his wife and just crying out to God and saying, God, we brought them this far, you got to take them the rest of the way. And I thought to myself, oh, good night, it's never going to end. Even if we marry them off and even if we marry them right, we're just going to live with this tension. I want my kids to grow up and serve God. So why do we live that tension? It's called individual soul living. By the way, your father, God the Father, he lives with that same tension. Every day, he looks down at you and me and says, I want them so badly to walk, to serve me, to walk with me. He would force you if he could, but he can't because individual soul liberty teaches that you make the choice, you get to choose. I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I've set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live. Let's bow our heads in our word of prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you, Lord, for your work. Thank you for the Bible. And Lord, thank you for choice. The fact that you give us choice, you give us free will, you give us the ability to choose. Lord, I pray you'd help us to understand this doctrine, embrace this doctrine. Lord, every time we get to make a decision, help us to remember, individual soul liberty teaches me that God's not going to force me to do anything. But if I serve God, if I walk with God, it'll be because I chose to. Lord, I pray you'd help us to understand that. When we don't want to go preach the gospel, and our individual soul liberty would allow us to not do it, help us to make the right choice. Lord, help us to understand that individual soul liberty is not freedom of religion. Individual soul liberty rejects Calvinism, rejects infant baptism, rejects the idea that we're born into religion or Christianity. It is the belief that we will all individually, not corporately, stand before God accountable to him. In the matchless name of Christ, we pray. Amen.