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

I serve a risen Savior, He's in the world today. I know that He is living whatever man may say. I see His hand of mercy, I hear His voice of cheer, and just the time I need Him, He's always near. He lives, He lives, Christ Jesus lives today. He walks with me and talks with me, a long life's narrow way. He lives, He lives, salvation to impart. You ask me how I know He lives, He lives within my heart. Good singing, song 31 on the second. In all the world around me, I see His loving care. And though my heart grows weary, I never will despair. I know that He is leading through all the stormy blast. The day of His appearing will come at last. He lives, He lives, Christ Jesus lives today. He walks with me and talks with me, a long life's narrow way. He lives, He lives, salvation to impart. You ask me how I know He lives, He lives within my heart. Rejoice, rejoice, oh Christian, lift up your voice and sing eternal hallelujahs to Jesus Christ the King. Of all who seek Him, the help of all who find. None other is so loving, so good and kind. He lives, He lives, Christ Jesus lives today. He walks with me and talks with me, a long life's narrow way. He lives, He lives, salvation to impart. You ask me how I know He lives, He lives within my heart. Great singing, let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for this wonderful holiday and thank you for your Son Jesus Christ and all that He did for us in His life on the cross, in hell, and of course rising again from the dead. I pray that this service would be honoring and glorifying to you and that everyone would just remember your Son Jesus Christ today. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. All right, for our second song, just flip over to the right, 32, He Lives on High. Song number 32, He Lives on High. Song 32, He Lives on High. Christ the Savior came from heaven's glory to redeem the lost from sin and shame. On His brow He wore the thorn crowned glory and upon Calvary He took my blame. He lives on high, He lives on high, triumphant over sin and all its shame. He lives on high, He lives on high, someday He's coming again. He arose from death and all its sorrow to dwell in that land of joy and love. He is coming back so I'm glad tomorrow and He'll take all His children home above. He lives on high, He lives on high, triumphant over sin and all its shame. He lives on high, He lives on high, someday He's coming again. Weary soul to Jesus come confessing, redemption from sin He offers Thee. Look to Jesus and receive a blessing, there is life, there is joy and victory. He lives on high, He lives on high, triumphant over sin and all its stain. He lives on high, He lives on high, someday He's coming again. Great singing. Thanks so much for coming to Steadfast Baptist Church. If you need a bulletin, lift your hand nice and high. And whenever ushers can come by, get you guys a bulletin. On the front we have the Bible memory passage, Revelation 1 verse 10. On the inside our service and soul and times and our church stats. Please continue to pray for all of our expecting ladies. We also have a weekly prayer list. Please pray for our church family. Baby showers on April 15th for the Negueros. We also have the Mother's Day tea, April 15th. We have several church reminders in there. Please pay attention to those. Also our Bahamas missions trips coming up. And then again, a reminder, we got some new invites. We got our movie tickets. And then we also have the new Preserve Bible DVDs. And these also have the QR code on there that just goes straight to our website, reservebible.com. And of course you can just watch it for free on the website as well. Plus, you know, a DVD is limited to like 720p. Whereas, you know, you can have 1080p on the website. So it's even a little bit crisper of a viewing pleasure if you watch it online. But of course we want to have the DVDs out there too. Some people like this. And so feel free to grab these and hand them out as you go soloing. We are doing the Lord's Supper this evening. So immediately following the sermon, I'll just make a few announcements about it. And as soon as I'm done, we'll sing our last song as we're singing our last song. We'll just have our ushers and everybody help pass out all of our elements. And then once we have those passed out, then we can partake together. The Lord's Supper is welcome to anyone who's saved. So, you know, you don't have to be technically a member of our church as long as you're saved. And you take it seriously. And you're not in violation of 1 Corinthians 5. Then you're welcome to partake with us. And so that's kind of our standard as far as taking the Lord's Supper. And I'd just like to make that clear. I'll be preaching a sermon kind of about that a little bit. And so you might have a little bit more information. But we will be doing that immediately following our service. So let's go ahead and sing our third song, Psalm 126. You can use our special handouts or you could just use your Bible. Psalm 126. Psalm 126. Psalm 126. Let's sing it out nice and loud together. When the Lord turned again the captivity of Zion We were like them that dream Then was our mouth filled with laughter And our tongue with singing Then said they among the heathen The Lord hath done great things for them The Lord hath done great things for us Whereof we are glad Turn again our captivity O Lord, as the streams in the south They that sow in tears shall reap in joy They that sow in tears shall reap in joy Then said they among the heathen The Lord hath done great things for them The Lord hath done great things for us Whereof we are glad He that goeth forth and weepeth bearing precious seed Shall doubtless come again Shall doubtless come again with rejoicing Bringing his sheaves with him Then said they among the heathen The Lord hath done great things for them The Lord hath done great things for us Whereof we are glad Let's sing it this time. If you please turn your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 5. 1 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 1 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 2 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 3 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 4 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 1 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 5 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 6 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 7 Corinthians 5 as the offering plates are being passed around. 1 Corinthians 5 the Bible reads, It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife. And you are puffed up and have not rather mourned, that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you. For I verily, as absent in body but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I were present, concerning him that hath done this deed. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened, for even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. I wrote unto you in an epistle, not to company with fornicators, yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters, for them must ye knees go out of the world. But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner, with such an one know not to eat. For what have I to do to judge them that are without? Do not ye judge them also, do not ye judge them that are within, but them that are without, God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person. Let's pray. Lord Father, we just thank you, Lord, for your son, Jesus Christ. Lord, for dying for our sins. Lord, for the death, burial, and resurrection. We ask that you fill Pastor Shelley with your spirit. Thank you for the salvation that we saw today. We love you. We thank you. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. We're in 1 Corinthians, chapter 5, and this is a chapter that's kind of... Can you turn me down just a little bit? It just seems like it's echoing or something weird. Chapter 5 is about church discipline, and I think it's an important chapter because it helps set up a little bit of context when we get to 1 Corinthians, chapter 11, but notice it says in verse 1 of chapter 5, it is reported commonly that there's fornication among you and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles that one should have his father's wife. Now, what's interesting about verse 1, if you actually think about it, is that the sin that's in this church is not even only recognizable by the church, but it's recognizable to people that aren't even part of the church because notice what he says. It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, so that means that there's a lot of people talking about this issue that don't go to that church. They're not even a part of that church. They're saying, but it's common knowledge. Everybody realizes that your church has a bunch of fornicators in it or has fornication in it, and in fact, of course, it's probably spreading like wildfire considering the situation that someone has as father's wife because that's a very strange form of fornication, but according to the Bible, any fornication is wicked and it's not tolerable in the church of God, but in this chapter, he brings up a pretty extreme situation. Verse 2, it says, And ye are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you. Now, the King James Bible uses ye and your to denote plurality, so what's interesting about this situation is it's not like everybody's coming to this church and they're all upset about this obvious bad person in the church and it's just the pastor's tolerating it or something. It's like the whole congregation is fine with it because notice what he says, and ye are puffed up, so he's making it seem like as a plurality, the church themselves have no problem with this or they don't think it's a big enough deal. I can very much see that attitude being an attitude you see today in many Christian churches, where they'll put on their billboard, Come as ye are, right? And of course, when it comes to salvation, you can come as you are, right? I mean, you could be in an adulterous relationship actively and you can come to Jesus and you can get saved, as evidenced by the woman at the well. You can come to Jesus filled with demons. I mean, you could be in active demon possession and you could come to Jesus as you are and you could be saved. You can come to Jesus in a bloody flux and you're going to be saved right then and there. We have a woman just reach out and touch his garment and she's healed. But you know, would we really want our church to be filled with people that are demon-bossessed, have severe health issues where they're just bleeding out or just all these different situations? It's like, no, church is different than all of these scenarios, right? Someone that's in a severe health situation, we don't want to necessarily expose everybody to that kind of illness or sickness. You know, leprosy was without the camp. We don't want to just bring someone in with some highly contagious issue or some kind of a defilement issue. We don't want people coming into the church that are demon-bossessed, you know, where they're like, my name is Legion. You know, that would be weird. We would be like, well, you can't come in. You know, whenever somebody uses, like, a pronoun of they or them for themselves, they're not welcome at church, okay? It doesn't really matter why. It's just that's not acceptable, right? So you have situations where people could be, you know, in a bad situation, but they're not welcome in church because they're living an actively wicked lifestyle. But that doesn't mean they couldn't have been saved. Sometimes they were saved whenever they believed on Jesus Christ. We see people like demon-bossessed people getting healed. We see the adulterous woman. We see prostitutes. We see publicans. We see all these different situations. But, you know, there's a difference between being a sinner and being a repentant sinner in the sense that, you know, some people say, oh, Jesus, you know, hung out with sinners. Well, yes, but wait a minute. We're all sinners, number one. But number two, Jesus did not, Jesus did not go to the most sinful in their sinful condition and hang out with them in their sinful condition. Jesus didn't go to a brothel to hang out with prostitutes. No. A repentant prostitute was hanging out around him, and he allowed her to be in his presence, not because she was, you know, so holy, because nobody's holy enough to be in Jesus Christ's presence, but rather because she's seeking Jesus. And, of course, you know, those who were of Jesus' disciples and those who were close to Jesus and those who were having fellowship with Jesus, they may have had past sins where they were very wicked, but, you know, in the moment, they're trying to get right with God. You see even tax collectors or you see rich people, you know, Nehemiah, that's what I call him, or not Nehemiah, Nicodemus. Nicodemus, I always get mixed up that name on my mind. Zacchaeus, I'm sorry, thank you. Zacchaeus, as soon as he's confronted with Jesus and Jesus comes to his house, what happens? He says, hey, anybody I've ripped off, I'll make sure to give back even more than I ripped them off, and I'm going to give half my money to the poor. I mean, he's just so excited that Jesus is willing to be around him that he's like, hey, I'm going to change. Okay, and so Jesus hung out with that individual. But, you know, Jesus wasn't going to the most sinful that are continuing to sin. He's not hanging out with a gang. He's not hanging out at the casino. He's not hanging out at a bar. He's not hanging out at the brothel. No. Yet, do some of the individuals that have some of these sins, did some of them come around Jesus and hang out? Sure. But they were penitent. And this is what you have to understand about 1 Corinthians 6 and other passages in the Scripture, that even though you may have had this really sinful act or committed these bad sins in the past, if you've decided to repent of that, clean that up, then you can have restored fellowship. You can be with Jesus. You can come to church, right? Someone that was a prostitute in the past, as long as they're deciding to not do that anymore, hey, they can still come to the Church of God. They can still be a part of the Church of God. But not while they're actively still trying to be a prostitute, folks. The same with fornication. Of course, what is that sin? Fornication. What is this chapter all about? Fornication. Is there a problem? Could this guy come to church having committed the sin of fornication? Yes. But not while he's actively in the process of still being in a fornicating relationship. So, what you have to understand is that these sins, especially in 1 Corinthians 5, they're kind of a lifestyle-type sin. Someone that's in an active lifestyle of this particular sin. It doesn't mean that they're currently participating in that sin. It means that their lifestyle is actively participating in that sin. So, it's not like, well, you know, I don't commit fornication at church. I do it elsewhere. Okay, well, that doesn't mean that you're not a fornicator and you shouldn't be tossed out of the church. Right? It's just saying you're in an active relationship of fornication. It's obvious. We can see it. We know about it. And of course, today's culture, we have a lot of people who just live together. That would mean you're in active fornication. And so, if you're living with someone that's not your spouse, I'm going to always believe you're in fornication. You know, I'm not going to be naïve and think that you guys just play checkers at night. You know, I know how the world works today and you can't pull a quick one on me and I realize what people are like when they're alone. Okay? It's natural. And of course, you know, I would say fornication is probably the most tempting of sins on this list, especially, because of the fact that it's natural for a husband and a wife to have desire for each other. And of course, that's the whole reason you even got married is because you have a desire to be with that person. It's natural. And of course, it's not like it's hard to want to do this type of thing. It's very easy. That's why I personally believe as a parent, you should do the job for your children. Because when it comes to fornication, I don't think that children are very capable of preventing themselves from committing this sin. And of course, what do most parents do? They send their kids off to college, which is almost like trying to get them to commit fornication. I mean, think about it. You're taking them out of your house and then you're putting them in a petri dish of fornication and just saying, like, have fun. I mean, it's almost like rum spring up, but for four years or however long, it's really kind of a foolish attitude and it's almost designed to just destroy the youth. And we notice that a lot of churches even, they'll send all their youth to Bible college. But just because it's a Bible college doesn't mean fornication isn't rampant in the Bible colleges either, folks. And let me tell you something. We need to stop shipping off our youth when they're in the most vulnerable state of their lives into this environment. There's arguably, you're going to say, what is the most likely time period of a person committing fornication? Like, at what age is someone the most likely to even commit fornication? It's probably between 18 and 22 anyways. So you're taking the most vulnerable time when they're the most immature, everyone's virtually single, and then you're just all putting them together in this environment where essentially just fornication is going to become almost impossible to avoid for anyone. That's why I personally just don't want to put my children in that situation. I did go to college and I've been around a lot of people and boy, the temptation is so strong that even people that are very dedicated or Christian and don't want to make that sin or cause that problem, they'll fall victim of this. And according to the Bible, you know, we shouldn't have this attitude of like, well, you know, it's not a big deal. Notice he's saying these guys are puffed up. Oh, we're such a better church than everybody. We love people where they're at. And we just bring everybody in and we just try to love on them. Why don't you just embrace the grace, Pastor Shelley? But you know, that's kind of a prideful attitude when you think that you're more gracious than God. And a lot of people think that they're more gracious than God. And let me tell you something. There is nothing wrong with loving sinners. There's nothing wrong with loving people in there, you know, when they've committed big sins. But you know what we need to do? We need to love them without tolerating their sin. And what really makes me angry is watching people tolerate sin and then tell me how much more loving they are than a church like ours. So, you know, there's even ministries out there that women will go out and they'll commit fornication. They'll have a baby. They'll have a child out of wedlock. And the ministry is designed to help ladies in that situation. Now, and they're like parachurch ministries. Now, and they'll say, oh, the church is not loving. They're not kind. They don't give grace to these people. They'll have no help if they were in that situation. Now, here's the thing. I don't mind helping a lady that's committed that big sin or is in that problem. You know what I'm not going to do? I'm not going to help her while she's still living with that boyfriend because that's not helping her. It's not helping her to continue to allow her to be in that fornicating relationship. If she's not going to get it right, if they're not going to get married, if they're not going to try and establish the right model of the Bible, then I'm really not even loving them. And what happens is if I give financially, if I give money or I'm giving assistance to young ladies in this fornicating relationship, you know what I do? I start taking away the incentive away from her to actually get married. And you know who does this the worst is the government. The government loves to take away the incentive for young ladies to get married by giving them handouts and money. You know there's a program called WIC. Who knows what I'm talking about? WIC, okay. Now if you live in the north side, you probably don't know what this is, but if you live in the south side and you go to certain grocery stores, WIC items will be off the shelf. You can't even find them. I remember I went to a Walmart one time and it seemed like the store was normally stocked, but then I would walk up to an aisle and it would be like bread, just no bread. And then the eggs, just no eggs. And then there was milk and just no milk. But everything else was on the shelves and I'm like what is going on? And then I noticed like every single item that was completely depleted was a WIC item. And it was like what is this WIC? It's Women, Infants, and Children. And it's a program designed to help single mothers or children and so they'll give them, they can just sign up through the state government. I think it's a state affiliated program, but essentially they'll just give them free food. So if you're on WIC, you can go to the grocery store and they have limits on what you can get there. Like you can only get so much milk or so much whatever. But what a lot of these people do, especially these women, is they'll buy items that they don't need and they won't use just because they're on this WIC. In fact, they'll buy a lot of formula even though they don't have a child and then they'll sell the formula on the black market so they can just get money through these programs or whatever. And a lot of them are just continually in this lifestyle where they're having constant children with random men that they're not married to and you'd say, well, how do they keep making this mistake or keep causing this problem? Because they're being paid for through programs like WIC and other opportunities where people are just giving them all these handouts and all this money. And let me tell you something, that's not loving that young lady. Loving the young lady would say, look, the reason why you're in this situation is because you're a whore, okay? And you need to stop being a whore and you need to actually get a husband and you need to be with a man, plus men. Men are constantly whoremongers and not willing to take care of their family. Look, according to the Bible, if you get caught committing fornication, you're supposed to marry that individual as soon as you get caught. That's what the Bible says. The only exception is if the dad just says no. So according to the Bible, you are supposed to go to the father of the lady. If you commit a fornication with someone, you're supposed to go to that father and you're supposed to say, I've committed fornication with your daughter. Here's the dowry anyways. Can I marry your daughter? Now, he gets the dowry, period. So you already have to pay. You have to do everything that you would do if you're going to marry them, and then only if the dad's just like, no, you're a complete scumbag. You can't even marry my daughter. Then the dad had veto rights in that particular situation. But it's also a shame to that father for having let his daughter go down that road, isn't it? And so, you know, and look, I've even seen this though. I've known people who commit fornication and the parents are just like, don't marry that guy because he's a loser. And in some cases, he is a loser. You know, doesn't even have a job, can't even take care of himself. Why would you want, you know, to be married to a guy that can't even take care of himself? That is not a good situation. And of course, because of the fornication culture that we live in, you know, we have so many young people that have just so much bastard children or they've had so many different relationships and the more and more they commit this sin and the more and more they go down this dark road, the harder it's gonna be for them to actually get married. And I believe that we currently have a culture that's destroying itself and it's destroying the young women of our culture. Hookup culture. You know, this disgusting hookup culture where people just go out and they just commit one-night stands and just fornication with anybody just all the time. And our culture is trying to just perpetuate this and cause all the young ladies to dress like literal whores all the time and to think that it's cool to go and lie with whomever and that that makes you cool. There's been TikTok videos going out there where women are bragging about how much fornication they've committed. It's like a contest of them or something, which is really stupid because, of course, as a woman, you know, you have to understand that virtually every guy that's, you know, even amongst godly guys, almost every guy will commit that sin with you. I mean, it's just like, it's silly to brag about something that's so easy. It'd be like, look how much candy I passed out to children. It's like children will just take candy, like, indiscriminately. It's not impressive. It's like, did you see how much candy I gave to this child? Wow. Yeah, because children will just take candy. I mean, it's not impress... It's like debating atheists, you know? It's easy to beat an atheist in a debate. That's not impressive. Just like committing fornication as a woman is not impressive. Now, of course, for men, they act like it's macho, like, oh, man, you know, I'm really hot stuff. Look how much fornication I've committed. Look how many ladies I'm lying with. But at the end of the day, you know, that's not something to brag about. And let me tell you something. The next lady you're with is not impressed. You know what I find? It's interesting. No matter how weird our culture gets and how disgusting and how much fornication it commits, every single person on both sides of the aisle still prefers a virgin. I mean, you have all these weirdos out there. You have, like, Andrew Tate, and you have all these other people online. They'll even tell you. They'll say, like, well, I still prefer a virgin, though. I still prefer young girls. And they'll say, like, well, why do you prefer a young girl? Because she's been, you know, with less men. And it's like they can see that there's a value attached to that. They can see that there's a reason why that's important. But yet they don't care that they keep ruining all these other young ladies. And I'll tell you, there is a culture. American black culture is trying to ruin the young ladies of our society by just... I mean, you want to talk about hook-up culture. How about hip-hop music? How about rap music? And they always act like, oh, well, you have to understand us black guys, we're the most macho or something like that. Like, there's just this weird stigma of how black guys are just the strongest and the best, and they're the most desirable or something like that. But let me tell you something. Most of the guys in that culture and in that situation will never marry you, will never provide for you. And what they're really doing is they're just destroying a huge swath of the human population and causing all kinds of young women to be defiled and no one to want them again. Oh, but it's so much, it's so cool, it's so fun. But we notice, you know, other cultures aren't like this. There's not a stigma to, you know, well, I hooked up with a Japanese guy. You know, that's not really a stigma, is it? Or some Asian guy or whatever. Or some guy from China or some guy from Africa even. But there's this stigma being with, you know, the football players or the baseball team or whatever. But let me tell you something. Those are the worst guys usually, and all they're doing is just destroying and defiling so many young women. And then it makes it to where both parties don't want each other. The young women that have been defiled don't want a normal, average, godly dude, and the average, normally godly dudes don't want women that have been so defiled. And so it's literally causing us to have a situation where we're going to have so many young people that are never going to get married and they have no one to marry. And they're just going to be in this perpetual lifestyle and cycle of just destroying themselves. You know, we need to get back to the Bible and condemning fornication. I am against fornication. It is not healthy. It is not good. It's still a wicked sin, and I'm not going to... Just because our entire culture has given itself over to this, just because it's so popular, I'm not going to downplay it. In fact, I hope I make people so uncomfortable that they never commit fornication. And so, you know, I'm just getting started. Let's keep reading. Verse 3. For I verily as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already as though I were present. How dare you judge? He's not even part of the church. He's like, I already judged you guys. Verse 4. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you're gathered together in my spirit with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver, session one, unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Look, the apostle Paul got up and said, I hope that the guy in your church is delivered to Satan to be killed. That doesn't sound like he's soft playing this issue. Can you imagine someone getting up and being like, hey, this guy over here needs to be delivered to Satan to die? That's extreme. But you know what? That's how serious the apostle Paul is taking this in. He's saying, look, you know, while we don't have the power and authority to, you know, punish this guy civilly or any way, what we can do is at least cast him out of the church. And when he's cast out of the church, notice that he's going to be delivered to someone, delivered to Satan. Notice when you're in an active, fornicating lifestyle, who is your master? Satan. Is it any coincidence? I mean, is it any, you know, how strange is it that when you look at the world today, what is perpetuating fornication more than anything? Music. It's the music. And of course, what is the devil? The devil is an anointed cherub. And of course, the devil loves music. And he loves to whisper in the ear. Look, I can't even just go to Walmart. I go to Walmart or I go to just a restaurant just with my family. And you know what's blaring in the music? It's like, yeah, let's hook up tonight, baby, yeah. And I'm just like, I'm just at the store trying to buy bread. Like I went to Kroger and it's like sitting here trying to tell me how this guy wants to go to bed with every single whore in the planet. And I'm thinking like, what does that have to do with me buying bread at the store? Like I really needed to know that I need to hook up with a bunch of ladies while I'm there getting some jelly and peanut butter. Like this doesn't even make any sense. But we live in a culture, we live in a society that can't even like go five seconds without having music on. And almost all music is just a perpetual beat to just fornication, fornication, fornication, fornication, fornication, fornication. And it's like, I wonder why people are hooking up so much. You turn on the radio, it's just fornication. You turn on the TV, you turn on, you know, one of these music TV award shows or the Grammys or something like that and it's just pure Satanism. Satan wants you to commit fornication. He wants you to destroy yourself. He wants you to be taken out of serving God. And look, if there's one sin that's probably the easiest sin for people to commit, it's fornication. You know, I definitely struggle with sin just as much as the next guy. But you know, some sins aren't necessarily that enticing to me, especially when I was young. When I was young, I never wanted to drink alcohol really. It wasn't that enticing. But let me tell you something. Every guy, you know, has a desire for women. You know, unless you're a fag or something, but you know, even them. Most fags probably still desire women too. So it's really hard to find a guy that doesn't desire women whatsoever. And you know, while some people desire alcohol or some of these other sins, like everyone is tempted with fornication. I don't care who you are. I don't care how godly you think your little children are. They are gonna be tempted to commit fornication. Because it's just so, so easy. But the Apostle Paul is making it clear this guy should be delivered to Satan. Verse six, your glory is not good. Know you not that a little leaven leavened the whole lump? So what's the problem? Well, when you have an active fornicating lifestyle in the church, it's gonna affect the whole church. All the young people think, oh, it's okay then. Oh, it's not a big deal. I went to an independent, fundamental Baptist church where there was two young people that had both had children out of wedlock and they were just living together. They weren't even married. They have two kids that aren't from their relationship, from other relationships. And, you know, it was real obvious that it wasn't from them either. I'll let you figure that one out why, okay? And they're hosting our Sunday school party at their house. I'm thinking, like, what in the world? You have a couple that is living in fornication and you're inviting the whole church to come to their house to have a party. I'm just like, at what point does 1 Corinthians 5 apply? It definitely applies there, folks. And so many people, they want to get away from this chapter. They almost just pretend like this chapter doesn't exist, and they'll say, well, you know what? I just love people like Jesus. I have grace. But wait a minute, what does it say in verse 6? Your glorying is not good. You're not wonderful for accepting and tolerating this behavior. No, you're gonna leaven the whole church. You're gonna ruin the whole church. You're gonna incentivize other young people to commit that sin. Whereas people who are, like, if someone that's obviously committing fornication is in the church and they get thrown out, you know what the young people are gonna be like? I don't want to be that person. That was embarrassing. Look, I've been to church where people are thrown out for that sin, and I'll tell you, it was embarrassing. It was embarrassing for me, and I wasn't even, had nothing to do with it. I didn't even really know the people that well. But I was just so embarrassed, it's shocking. But you know what? Sometimes it's good because it helps you realize, you know what, shame should come back to our culture. It used to be even called the walk of shame. That doesn't even exist anymore. It used to be that you'd be more nervous than a whore in church, but apparently, now they just bring the whores on stage to sing. Now, you know, there's just no shame whatsoever in our society, and you know what? I want to bring it back. You know why people don't like judgmental preaching? Because they're ashamed of their sin. When you're not guilty of something, you don't have a problem with preaching. You only have a problem with preaching because you're guilty of it. And let me tell you something. The reason why so many people are in this sin is because fathers will not protect their daughters. Because I believe a dad has 100% control in this situation, and the men of our country are letting their daughters be whores. And it's disgusting, it's terrible. You should be ashamed of yourself. How is it that the men of this world don't have shame anymore that their daughter's a whore? That their daughters are committing? I mean, these days, men will be out in public with their daughters, and their daughter is wearing nothing. And I'm thinking like, ah! How could you do such a thing? How could you want to take your daughter and flaunt her off to everyone? And of course, our culture has made it seem like the dad doesn't have any decision-making there, or can't tell his daughter no. But let me tell you something. Yes, you can. And yes, you should. Sick of this. Look what he says in verse seven. Purge out therefore the old leaven, that you may be a new lump as year on leaven, for even Christ our Passover sacrificed for us. So what we're supposed to do is we're actually supposed to purge out old leaven. People that are in the sins mentioned in 1 Corinthians 5 are supposed to be purged out. Now, of course, if they repent, if they get it right, they can be welcomed back. You know, it's not like just because you commit a sin one time, you just forever have no relationship with God or church or anything like that. But if you're still in an active situation like this, then you need to be punished so that you'll stop. Think about it this way. If you never punish people through church discipline, if you never say, hey, you're not welcome here while you're in this active fornicating or drunkard lifestyle, then why would they ever stop? What's gonna cause them to stop? You know, I know people, they'll say, yeah, I don't like that so-and-so's in an active fornicating relationship, but, you know, I'm just gonna give them grace. Okay, well, you said you didn't like it. How are they gonna be incentivized to quit doing it? They're not. And if they don't quit doing it, you know what's gonna happen is they're gonna end up destroying themselves. You know, if a young lady tells her boyfriend or fiancé or whoever it is, if she says, you know what? I'm not going to commit fornication with you until I'm married. You know, until we're married, we're not gonna go to bed together. We're not gonna do that relationship. You know what's gonna happen is that guy is gonna immediately make a decision about you. He's either gonna decide to immediately marry you or have nothing to do with you. But you know what you're doing is you're forcing the issue. When young women don't do this, they end up perpetuating themselves in a situation where you're never gonna really know what's gonna happen. You know, if a guy stops dating you after you say no, he's not that interested in you. A guy that'll still date you and still, you know, be interested in you after saying no is someone that is least worthy of being considered for marriage. But, you know, if some guy is walking up to a young lady and he's asking her to commit fornication with him, he has no incentive to marry her if she says yes. We see that constantly in the Bible where men will commit fornication and they're like, ah, bye. You know, Absalom's brother with Tamar. As soon as he got what he wanted, he was done with her. In fact, he hated her. And let me tell you something. You know what's so funny? Guys that commit fornication a lot, they hate whores. Like, they'll look down on them and they'll talk so horrible about whores and they'll say everything about them. But you know what? They're just being a hypocrite about it. But, you know, it doesn't change the fact that they'll hate you after having you giving them exactly what they claim that they wanted. Just like Tamar gives her brother-in-law what he claims that he wants. I mean, she didn't realize she was forced. But he gets it, and then what happens? He hates her and he despises her. So as young women, you need to make sure that you're saying no. And sometimes you might have the power to say no because you're the weaker vessel. So you know what? You need other people in your life to love you enough to say, hey, don't say yes to that person. And then let's figure out where he's really at. Let's see what kind of a person he really is. And a lot of people just live together and then they'll find out this person is with other people. They're not faithful. They have all kinds of serious issues. And, you know, young people get all their needs met for, too. You know, the Bible talks about Sodom. One of its problems was that it had fullness of bread and abundance of idleness. Talk about college. I mean, they're taking out student loans and whatever. So they have nothing to do. Guess what they do? They commit tons and tons of fornication, drinking and partying, and it's destroying our youth. It's setting them out for such a bad start on life. What's the worst way to start out on life? Being addicted to drugs and alcohol and having bastard children and no spouse. It's like, what's a good way to start out on life? Having a career and getting married. That's a good way to start out your life and you're going to end up in a lot better situation. But those that are committing fornication, this hookup culture, what it's doing is it's destroying all of these young people and no one loves them enough to say stop. No one loves them enough to say it's not satisfactory. And, in fact, you know, when you allow people to be in fornication, you know what you're allowing? You're allowing hookup culture in our society. You're allowing STDs to become rampant. I mean, who wants an STD? Who wants gonorrhea? Who wants herpes? Who wants all of these disgusting, filthy things that'll never leave you? You always have to have treatments and ointment. You know, it used to be whenever I was in school that STDs were a really high percentage. I can't even imagine today. I can't even imagine today. I would venture to bet anybody in this room, you know, any of the young people that go out and commit fornication, it's almost more likely you'll get an STD than not from that particular relationship. So you might as well just say, hey, I want STDs now. They're gonna damage the youth permanently, you know, when you commit fornication. You're gonna have bastard children, which, of course, you know, how does a young lady provide for a baby when she has no husband? She can't. So they have to take them to daycare or to nursery or hire a babysitter. And, you know, what does a young 18-year-old, you know, it's so funny to me, these young 18-year-olds will go out and get a job when they have a baby and they have to pay for a babysitter. And I'm thinking, like, how are they gonna make more money than what they're paying for this babysitter? I mean, who's gonna hire an 18-year-old whore to do anything? I mean, that's not a very worthwhile employee. They're not reliable. They have no self-control, no skills, and, frankly speaking, they're probably gonna be a distraction for your entire workforce. It's like the worst person to want to hire. That's why, you know, what do these women typically do? They're a waitress. Or they realize, you know, why they have the things that they have is because they only have one thing to offer, and so they just offer that more. You have all these online websites now dedicated to women just selling their body online. It's rampant. It's disgusting. Why would there be so many young women that have so such low self-esteem that they're willing to just put their body on display for anybody and everybody? And let's be honest. Their clientele is disgusting. It's the scummiest, weirdest, creepiest people. I mean, these ladies wouldn't even want to be in the same room as their clientele, but they're hidden through the Internet, and they're just selling their body online because that's the only thing they have. But you know what? Why not give that to a husband? And they just get all these bastard children that they can't raise, they can't provide for, and we're gonna have a lot of consequences from the children being raised by this hookup culture. You know, why is it that American black culture is so bad? Well, how about how many single-mother situations there are? And I mean, I live in areas that are heavily saturated with American black culture, and you know what you'll see? You'll see a lot of young men just wandering up and down the streets looking like they're up to no good. And I'm sitting here thinking, like, but what are these men gonna do? Because no one's... They have no father, typically, in their life, so no one's teaching them, training them, no one's giving them instruction, no one's disciplining them. They typically don't have a high level of education, and so what do they do? They just kind of fall victim to their environment. They fall victim to their situation, and their situation was bad because their mom was a whore. And it's like fornication is literally destroying our country in large portions of our population, and nobody cares. Fornication's giving you a lifetime of regrets. People that... Have you ever noticed that people who commit fornication, they're never satisfied with it? Well, I committed a lot of fornication this year, but now I'm done. I got it all in. I finally feel good. People that have a one-night stand, they're never like, well, that was the last one because it was just so satisfying. No, they're like, I got to have more. It's the same as drugs because what happens in your brain is the same thing as drugs. It's a high, and then they have to chase that high over and over and over and over again, and they can never really get any kind of satisfaction from that lifestyle. So they just constantly... That's why it just escalates. And, of course, a woman is going to be very timid about the first time she commits fornication, but the second time, it's easier. The third time, it's even easier. It eventually gets to a point where it's just nothing. I mean, it's meaningless to them. They're so desensitized to it that it has no impact on them anymore, and they have what the Bible calls is a whore's forehead where they feel no shame. Not only do they have no shame, they'll brag about it. And our culture's so disgusting. There's women on social media and stuff. They'll have shirts bragging about committing fornication and then abortions, too. And you're just like, how did we get to such degeneracy in our culture? It's from all these single-parent households. It's from just allowing people to destroy themselves. When you commit fornication, you're also going to not have a desire for a godly pursuit. Think about this. When you're distracted with fornication, you're typically not also reading the King James Bible. People are typically not just like, you know what, I want to read a couple of... I want to read 1 Corinthians 5 before I go out to the bar tonight. They're probably not in church regularly. They're probably not going soloing. They're like, hey, you guys want to go soloing with me before we go to the club? It's like, no, probably not. You know, whenever they invite their boyfriend or girlfriend over, they're probably not like, hey, let's put in Pastor Anderson. You want to come over tonight and watch Pastor Anderson? I'm pretty sure they're not putting in sermons on fornication. They're like, hey, let's put this in and see what this one's about. You know, it's like, oh, okay. So typically what's going to happen is you're not going to pursue God the same when you're in this active fornicating lifestyle. And so it's important to try and remind people, wake people up and say, hey, quit committing fornication so you can serve God with your life. You're not here to serve yourself and to serve the lust of your flesh. You're here to serve God. And let me tell you something. That appetite is never going to be satisfied anyways. We need to purge out that old leaven. You know, you're not going to have a pursuit of career. You know, men, instead of pursuing careers in college, what are they pursuing? Women. Hookups. Just degeneracy. Beer pong. Parties. You know, most guys going to college, you'll be surprised how stupid they really are after going to college. Like, they're sometimes less intellectual than they were before going into college. And it's like, why? Because they didn't study academics. They were studying academics a lot more in high school and they forgot a lot of that through college because all they did was cheat because college is a joke. Look, I went to college and one of our classes was an online class where the teacher gave us the test with the answers before the real test. And you would take the test online. You know what the curve was on our first test? Ninety-seven. I was like, someone's dumb out there. They made it to 97. And so this is what the professor, she emails me, she's like, I'm afraid that some of you might have cheated on the test. Shocker. Really? Why would you think that? I'm like, you never even have to go to class. It's online. You never have to show up. There was no homework, four tests a semester, and all you have to do is copy and paste the A, B, C, or D from the thing. Wow. I'm so glad I'm paying thousands of dollars for this. And let me tell you something. You can skate by through college pretty easy. In fact, I would argue that most of my high school courses when I was a senior and taking, I was taking like advanced classes were all way harder than any of the college courses I ever took. I took tons of college courses and by far the hardest was the high school classes that I had. My high school, you know, whenever I took pre-calculus and some of those courses, I think I took like one business math class that had a lot of calculus in it and it was kind of hard, but it really, for the most part, most of college was way easier. And of course, you know, college, because they just have to keep accepting dummies in there, they keep lowering the standards and you'll find that most people in college aren't even that smart. I remember being in an English class and this guy wrote like five sentences in one, the longest run-on sentence I've ever seen in my life, and I remember they were like, hey, pass papers around and judge. I'm just like, wow, this is like the worst thing I've ever seen. And then the teacher gets up and she's like, isn't this the best thing that's ever been written? And I'm just like, no. But you could tell like the teacher and the student wanted to kind of have a relationship and I was like, okay. So apparently it doesn't matter how good of a writer you are, it's just weird, it's weird the society that we live in that men are not pursuing a career, but why are they not pursuing a career? Because they're pursuing fornication. But young men, don't be foolish, pursue academics, pursue wisdom, pursue godliness, pursue righteousness, pursue God, and guess what? All those other things will be added unto you anyways. Because any time you meet these young ladies, you know what they want? They want a guy that has a job and a career and is smart and is going to take care of them. Even the ones that screwed themselves over with fornication and just destroyed themselves, that's what they still want. They never want the broke guy. In fact, it's so funny. I mean, every girl is basically just like, I just want him to be rich. They don't even care what he looks like. That gives hope to some of you, okay? I'm just being honest. You know, girls care way less about looks than you realize, okay? Now they do, they care about it, but at the end of the day, apparently money answers all things, okay? So you'd be surprised. Also, you're going to have a lack of a family pursuit. You're not going to be rejoicing with the wife of thy youth, and you're not going to have the children that God wants you to have. Most people that are in this hookup culture are trying to use methods to prevent having bastard children. And there's a lot of ways to prevent that, and so they employ all of them, whether that be through devices, pills, drugs, alternative methods, all kinds of weird stuff that people are doing. And you know, it's turned our culture into a culture of perverts. And our culture is just very perverted on these issues. It's just making everything disgusting. And frankly speaking, it's the church to blame, partly, for this, because churches aren't exercising church discipline anymore. They tolerate this fornication lifestyle, and they think it's good. They're not purging out the old leaven. But what does it say in verse 8? Therefore, let us keep the feast not with old leaven, neither with leaven of malice and wickedness, but with unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. I wrote unto you an epistle not to company with fornicators. How clear could the Bible get? People would be like, oh, how dare you separate from someone that's a fornicator? But Paul told me not to. And not only did Paul tell me this, he was speaking under inspiration of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost told me not to. Well, you know, I follow Jesus' example. What about the Holy Ghost's example? And please explain to me again how Jesus was hanging out with people in an active fornicating lifestyle. His disciples were married. Yeah, did sometimes women that were prostitutes or whatever encounter Jesus, and did he give them the gospel? Sure. But you know what? I guarantee some of us today went out and gave the gospel to people that commit fornication on a regular basis. They might even be in fornication. I've knocked on a door. And the lady just said, like, I'm a prostitute, when I first, you know, knocked on the door. It was just like, whoa. And I, you know, it's like, well, do you want to know how to be saved? She was like, no, and then just slammed the door, and I was like, okay, bye. But you know, I would have given that person the gospel if they wanted the gospel. It's not like, oh, well, I'm just so loving. You know what I wouldn't have done? I wouldn't have been like, hey, it's cool. We like prostitutes in our church. That's bizarre. You know, how is that gracious? How is that loving the children of this room to let that into the church? How is that loving the young people? What kind of message are you sending to the young men? I mean, there's a lot of young men in our church. If you think about it, our church is filled with young men that want to be married that are having a hard time with that. What if I just brought in a bunch of, like, whores and prostitutes to come into the church? Do you think that would make it easier or harder on these young men to abstain from fornication? That would be way harder. That doesn't even make any sense. That's foolishness. So, of course, we're not going to just bring in every harlot and yahoo into the church and just be like, let's do it. You know, let's just have whoever, whatever come in. No, no, no. They're not welcome. Notice what it says in verse 10. Yet not altogether the fornicators of this world or the covetous or extortioners or the idolaters, for then must he needs to go out of the world. So he's saying, we're not going to start a commune here. Obviously, everybody has a job. Who in here would say, I work with people that are either drunk or in an active communicating lifestyle? Okay. Lots of hands. Okay. So he's not saying quit your job. He's not saying that you, you know, and it's not like you can't be nice to these people. It's not like you can't talk to them or be friendly. But you know what? They shouldn't be your best friend and they're not welcome at church until they change their lifestyle. Now, I do give grace. If someone is in one of these situations but they're just visiting, I'm not going to just throw them out. Because frankly speaking, they need to first hear the message, right? You know, if we get someone saved and they come in, you know, it's their first time, there's a 90% chance they're never coming back anyways. So there's no need for me to throw them out. Okay. But then let's say someone sticks around, keeps coming, learns the doctrine, then eventually they need to have a discussion with the pastor or whoever and say, look, this is just not something that's supposed to be in church. If you want to keep coming to our church, you have to fix this issue. Also, if you have people in our church that already know better and then they're caught doing one of these things, then they need to be confronted on it. Now, there's been people that have, you know, been guilty of various things on this list and I've confronted them about it. And, you know, if they're repenting and they want to fix it, then I don't see why I need to necessarily throw them out right away. But if they're going to dig in, if they're going to stay, you know, in that situation, it's public or whatever, then you know what? I'm going to have to make that public within the church because you're not supposed to accompany with that individual. And, of course, that's the most loving thing we can do because we're saying, look, you're destroying yourself. Please stop. I mean, what if someone was just in here cutting themselves? Wouldn't we be like, please stop cutting yourself? Right? If someone was about to drink poison, wouldn't we all scream at them like, stop drinking poison. The same as with fornication, you're destroying yourself and we're saying, hey, please don't destroy yourself. Please don't hurt yourself. Please don't harm yourself. This is not good for you and it's not good for our church and it's not good for our family and it's not good for the young people. And you know what? We're going to purge out the old leaven. Otherwise, the whole lump is going to be leaven. Whenever we say fornicators are welcome, what else are we going to let in? And I'll tell you what. Churches that don't have the boundary of fornication, they never have a boundary. You know, then pretty soon you're letting trannies in the church. And it's like, whoa, how did you get to trannies? And it's like, well, if you won't stop at fornication, then you won't go anywhere. Look, I've been to churches where they won't throw the fornicator out and you know who comes? Sodomites. Sodomites come to church too. And I don't want to go to a church with that. Who wants to go to a church with trannies? Okay, I'm glad you didn't raise your hand, all right? I mean, how cool would it be if people in here were drunk? You know, wouldn't that be so much fun? No, it wouldn't be fun. People committing fornication, covetous, idolaters. What if someone comes in here with their little graven statues and they're like bowing down in the middle of the earth? That would be weird. Nobody wants that. So they should be rebuked. He says, verse 11, But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or extortioner, with such and one know not to eat. For what have I to do to judge them also that are without, and do not you judge them that are within? But them that are without, God judgeeth. Therefore put away among yourselves that wicked person. Now think about this. If every church did this, like we should, how could you serve God when you're in fornication? You couldn't. But because there's so many churches that tolerate this behavior, people still think that they're serving God while they're in these actively sinful lifestyles. And they're enabling these people to think that they're still pursuing God when they're not. Whereas if every, I mean, if you were just completely shut off from church altogether, you wouldn't be confused and think like, oh, I'm right with God. No, you'd think like, I actually still want to serve God and be a motivating factor to get right with God. You know, Baptist churches used to have a thing called a letter. So you'd be like an official member. And if you ever want to go to another church, you'd have to get a letter from the pastor saying like, you're being passed off to this other church. And I don't do that, you know, for a lot of reasons. It's a little, it's kind of impractical, especially now as there's so many churches. But if someone wants one, I would still facilitate that. And I've had people ask about that. But at the end of the day, you know, that principle is actually a pretty good principle because it's based on a church discipline issue, right? If someone's not in good standing with the church and decides to just randomly go to another church and this person's like, where'd you come from? It's like without a letter, it's like, well, what's going on? There's an issue here. Or if they call that pastor, the pastor's like, this person's been kicked out. Then it's like, well, I don't want you either. And it actually tries to prevent people from just escaping the consequences of their sin. And we don't want people to just be able to escape all the consequences of their sin. Go to 1 Corinthians 10. We're here in chapter five. Just flip over to 10. Look at verse six. Now these things are our examples of the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted. Neither be he idolaters as some of them, as it is written, the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. Neither let us commit fornication as some of them committed and fell in one day three and 20,000. Neither let us tempt Christ as some of them also tempted and were destroyed of serpents. Do you think it's a coincidence that when people committed fornication, who killed them? A serpent. What does it say in 1 Corinthians five? Who's gonna be the one that destroys you? The destruction of the flesh is Satan, that old serpent, the devil. And let me tell you something. The devil is trying to destroy people. You go to Proverbs and you read chapters five, six, seven. It's a lot about the whorish woman. And it'll say you don't know that the dead are there. Like where she takes you is death. And fornication is a death lifestyle. It is a destroying lifestyle. And Satan will destroy you. Who got destroyed from this? How about Samson? One of the strongest men ever in the Bible, but he gave his strength unto women, he gave his strength unto a whore, Delilah, and she destroyed him. And let me tell you this. We do live in a society where a lot of people commit fornication. And so I don't wanna just paint with such a broad brush, but generally speaking, the kind of women that just go to bed with men are usually just the worst women, are the worst kind of women. Especially if she doesn't even know you. A woman that's never met you and is willing to go to bed with you in a relatively short time is a trap. Solomon makes it clear that she's like the worst thing that could ever happen to you. It is, you know, the honeypot. She is going to destroy you and hurt you and she is not the woman you want to be with. You want a woman that has respect, is able to say no, desires to be pure. And of course, you know, maybe they've made that mistake, but they decide now they wanna be pure. God bless them. You know what, you don't wanna be with that woman that's just willing to just lie with anyone. And of course, that is how the children of Israel were tempted. And of course, what does it say in verse 11? Now all these things happen to them for in samples and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Pastor Shelley, you're so mean. You throw fornicators out of the church. Well, you know what, God just killed them in the Old Testament. 23,000 people killed. Yeah, keep your fingers, we're coming right back, but go if you would to one more place, Numbers 25. Numbers chapter 25. Oh, well in the Old Testament, God was mean. No, it's the same God. You know what? The same God that killed fornicators in the Old Testament is the same God that'll kill fornicators in today. And he's saying, don't be foolish and think that it's not a big deal. Now, is fornication worthy of the death penalty? No. According to the law, you commit fornication, you're supposed to get married. That's your punishment. Okay, so apparently marriage is a punishment. No, I'm just kidding. But God could still kill you for that sin. Look at Numbers 25, verses 1. And Israel bowed in Shedom, and the people began to commit boredom with the daughters of Moab, and they called the people under the sacrifices of their gods, and the people did eat and bowed down to their gods, and Israel joined himself in a Belpeor, and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and the Lord said unto Moses, Take all the heads of the people and hang them up before the Lord against the sun, that the fierce anger of the Lord may be turned away from Israel. How did God feel? Oh, you all commit fornication? Hang them high. Well, I'm gracious like God. This is how God felt. Verse 5, And Moses said unto the judges of Israel, Slay ye every one his men that were joined unto Belpeor. Now it says, And behold, one of the children of Israel came and brought unto his brethren a many nitrous woman in the sight of Moses and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel, who were weeping before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. And when Phinehas, the son of Eliezer, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose up from among the congregation and took a javelin in his hand, and he went in after the man of Israel into the tent and thrust both of them through, the man of Israel and the woman through her belly, so the plague was stayed from the children of Israel. Pastor Shelley, you're so mean. Well, you know what? I have never stabbed a single one of my church members with a javelin. Okay? You say, well, I don't know if that was right. Well, let's see how God felt about it. It says in verse number 10, and the Lord's speaking to Moses, saying, Phinehas, the son of Eliezer, the son of Aaron the priest, hath turned my wrath away from the children of Israel, while he was zealous for my sake among them that I consumed not the children of Israel and my jealousy. So when he kills those who commit fornication, you know what God calls Phinehas? Zealous. Hey, you might claim that you have grace, but you're lying, and you know what I have? I have zeal for God. By throwing fornicators out of the church, by not letting them participate in the service until they get right with God, I'm zealous for God, and God is pleased with the congregation. God is not pleased with the congregation, enabling fornication and drunkenness. Go back, and we'll go to 1 Corinthians 11, and we'll finish. Now, of course, there's other sins in here, and I don't have time to go through them all, but drunkenness is another one. You know, it's not just fornication, but that's a big one in our society. You know, drunkards, though, people are drinking alcohol so much, it's insane. And, you know, there's this movement out there now to boycott Bud Light, and I'm thinking, like, great. But you know what? Don't stop with Bud Light. Do all Budweiser products. And don't stop with all Budweiser products. Stop with all alcoholic products, because alcohol will never benefit you. It'll only destroy you. It's another spirit. Alcohol is stupid. There's nothing smart about it. People don't make good decisions while drinking alcohol. In fact, it's illegal to drive when drinking. Why do you think it's illegal? Because you're an idiot. Like, the law has codified. You are an idiot when drinking. Therefore, you're not allowed to drive. Look, women are allowed to drive. Everybody's... I mean, you pretty much just go to the DPS and you can get a license. They're saying you could have an IQ of 60 and you can get a license, but they won't let you if you drink. Why? Because you're dumber than a mentally retarded person when you drink. And it's saying, oh, but I think it's cool. Why is it cool to be dumb? Why is it cool to be inebriated? Why is it cool to be an idiot? How many people die in car accidents every single day because they get drunk or because of a drunk driver killing and slaying innocent people? In fact, you get drunk and you kill somebody, it's manslaughter. You can go to jail for a very, very long time. It's just... Our culture has elevated the most wicked sins. And, of course, the devil wants to destroy us and he's using everything he can. Alcohol, music, fornication. But you know what? The church is supposed to be against that. The church is supposed to stand up, be the pillar and ground of the truth and try to encourage people to get right with God, to avoid and abstain from fornication, to avoid alcohol, to be temperate, to have self-control. You say, why come to church on a sunny night? Because you want to pursue God. How many people on Easter today are getting drunk? How many people today on Easter are committing fornication? You know, the millions, millions in America. It's sad. It's disgusting. But you know what? We're not... God's going to judge them without the church. But can we at least judge ourselves? Can we at least just make sure that we're right with God? Now, he says in verse number 24, and when he had given thanks talking about Jesus, he'd break it and said, Take, eat, this is my body, which is broken for you, this due in remembrance of me. After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament of my blood, this due ye as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till he come. So when you perform the Lord's communion, what do you symbolize? You're symbolizing his death. And Jesus' death is pictured as being unleavened bread. Why? Because there's no sin in him. Why would we then want to, as a church, as a whole, have obvious leaven in our church while partaking in the Lord's Supper when there's not supposed to be leaven present? It's supposed to be a process by which we honor the Lord and his body, therefore we purge out the old leaven. We don't want the leaven to be in the church. Now, he warns people, look what he says in verse 27. Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body. For this cause many are weak and sickly among you and many sleep. For we judge ourselves, we should not be judged. So there's a warning in partaking in the Lord's Supper. In context of 1 Corinthians chapter 11, the first warning is taking it irreverently. You know, the people were coming together and they weren't really taking it serious that it's the Lord's body, they're just having a party, they're feasting. You know, why is communion special? When you think about it, nobody really has a meal of this because it's not, like, super pleasant. You know, if you eat this cracker, you're not going to be like, that was so good. But we're taking away the pleasure aspect. You know, leaven, if you think about it, makes bread taste good. And sin gives you that pleasure. But you know what? Bread that's really leaven will make you fat. So, you know, you got that consequence. This unleavened bread and this juice is simply to symbolize Christ's sacrifice for us. We're not here to have a party and have fun. We're here to think about the Lord and what He did for us. And, you know, we have the bread here, and it's whole, just like Jesus Christ was whole, but He came down and then He was broken for us. And it's to picture what He did for us. You know, if Jesus Christ can die and suffer in hell for me, then why can't I go through any experience on earth? Right? Why can't I be broken? And we have to remind ourselves that Christ didn't come here to have a party. He came here to be broken. And our first life is not here to have a party. It's here to be a partaker of Christ's sufferings. And so we're supposed to take this seriously, not just think, like, oh, my life's a party. I commit as much fornication and drinking alcohol and doing whatever I want. No, I'm here to sacrifice and lay down my life for the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm supposed to take up my cross as well. And so, you know, we celebrate Easter, we celebrate the resurrection, but let us not forget the sacrifice that Christ gave us. And so, you know, I like to break the bread while we're all here just to remind you of what Christ did for us, of how He was broken, and the picture of what Christ... You know, we're not just doing this for fun. We're doing it to think about Jesus and Him dying on the cross for us. You know, it's such a nice-looking piece of bread, and now it's just this. And, you know, the Bible talks about the Lord Jesus Christ. When He was on the cross, His vision was so marked that you couldn't even recognize Him anymore, that there was no pleasure about it anymore. And, you know, we have to think about Christ's sacrifice for us. And, of course, you know, for us, it's such a nice-looking piece of bread, and now it's just this. And, you know, the Bible talks about and, of course, you know, for our church, you know, when it comes about drinking and eating unworthily, there's been some confusion about this by some people, but, you know, and I'm not gonna for the sake of time explain all of it, but if you're saved, I believe that you have the capacity of taking the Lord's Supper. If you're not saved, don't partake like Judas, because he ate and drank damnation on himself. If, like 1 Corinthians 5, you're on that list, you shouldn't even be in church, and we're not supposed to eat and drink. So, you wouldn't want to do that. That's gonna bring more condemnation onto you for having eaten and drank unworthily. You're not taking it sincerity. Let us take this of sincerity and truth. How are you taking the sincerity and truth when you're just despising the grace of God? And, lastly, you should only take of the Lord's Supper when you recognize that it's Christ's symbol of his body and blood and that we're doing this in honor of him, not just to eat, not just to satisfy the flesh. That's what it would mean to take the Lord's Supper unworthily, and, of course, if we do such a thing, it could even have a consequence of being very sick or dying, and so we do want to take it very seriously. Now, of course, you should have confidence in taking the Lord's Supper when that's not you. You're not in those situations, because the Lord obviously wants us to do this and be serious about it, but I want us to take it seriously. I'm going to go ahead and pray, and we're going to sing our last song as they pass out the elements, and then we'll partake together. Thank you, Heavenly Father, for giving us this symbol of your death and burial, and I pray that we would take it seriously, that your body was broken for us, that your blood was spelled for us, and that you sacrificed for us, that we would be willing to sacrifice as well, that we would be willing to purge out the leaven in our church, that we'd have church in sincerity and truth, and that as we take of the Lord's Supper that you would bless it to our bodies, that you would help us to be more dedicated to serving you, and you would help our church to be a bright and shining light to convince the world to be more godly, to pursue Christ, to awake to righteousness, and to live a life that's pleasing to you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Song number 36, Christ Arose. Sing out this song nice and loud, with love in our hearts to Christ. Think about these words as we sing them. Song number 36, Christ Arose. Song 36, nice and loud, Christ Arose. Lo, in the grave He lay, Jesus my Savior, waiting the coming day, Jesus my Lord. Up from the grave He arose, with the mighty triumph for His foes. He arose a victor from the dark domain, and He lives forever with His saints to reign. He arose, He arose, Hallelujah, Christ arose. Vainly they watch His bed, Jesus my Savior. Vainly they seal the dead, Jesus my Lord. Up from the grave He arose, with the mighty triumph for His foes. He arose a victor from the dark domain, and He lives forever with His saints to reign. He arose, He arose, Hallelujah, Christ arose on the last. Death cannot keep His grave, Jesus my Savior. He tore the bars away, Jesus my Lord. Up from the grave He arose, with the mighty triumph for His foes. He arose a victor from the dark domain, and He lives forever with His saints to reign. He arose, He arose, Hallelujah, Christ arose. All right, let's go ahead and do another song. Let's do song number 37, There'll Be No Dark Valley. You know what, never mind. Let's do song number 17, the one we sang this morning. It's a new song for our church. Let's go ahead and do it again. 17, One Day. Song number 17, One Day. We'll do it a cappella. One day when heaven was filled with His praises, one day when sin was as dark as could be, Jesus came forth to be born of a virgin. Welt amongst men, my example is He. Living He loved me, dying He saved me. Buried He carried my sins far away. Rising He justified, freely forever. One day He's coming, O glorious day. So as we take of the Lord's Supper, as we take of the Lord's Supper, I'm gonna read just what Christ had said about this from 1 Corinthians chapter 11. The Bible says, Take, eat, this is my body, which is broken for you. This do, and remembrance of me. So as we take of the bread, let us think of Christ's body being broken for us. The Bible says, After the same manner also He took the cup, when He had supped, saying, This cup is the New Testament in my blood. This do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me. And let us think of Christ's blood being spilled for us as we drink of the cup. Say one last word of prayer. Thank you, Heavenly Father, so much for your sacrifice of your Son and ultimately His resurrection, which gives us so much purpose in life. I pray that we would consider ourselves to be honored to have this privilege to be a Christian, to be saved, and to serve you. I pray that we be motivated this week and the rest of our lives to keep serving you. He's gonna be praying. Amen. Amen. You're dismissed.