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Thank you very much. Thank you. Hello and welcome to Sure Foundation Baptist Church, thank you for coming out to our Thursday evening service. Please take your seats and find your green hymnals and turn to page 140. Page 140 to green hymnals, find your seats, we have an anchor. Page 140, we have an anchor. Sing it out with me on the first. The billows roll, fastened to the rock which cannot move. Grounded firm and deep in the Savior's love. It is safely bored till the storm will stand, porch is well secured by the Savior's hand. Though the tempest rage and the wild winds blow, not an angry wave shall our bark or flow. We have an anchor that keeps us whole, steadfast and sure while the billows roll. Fastened to the rock which cannot move. Grounded firm and deep in the Savior's love. When our eyes behold through the gathering night, the city of gold our harbor bright. We shall anchor fast by the heavenly shore, with the storms all past forevermore. We have an anchor that keeps us whole, steadfast and sure while the billows roll. We shall anchor fast by the heavenly shore, with the storms all past forevermore. We shall anchor fast by the heavenly shore, with the storms all past forevermore. We'll have our guest speaker, Pastor Jonathan Shelley, will be preaching for us on Saturday evening. And again, it's 4 p.m. and we're having tacos. So, we've got three different types of meat and if you're on the carnivore or carnator or whatever kind of diet you're on, then you can just eat the meat. You can give me your tortillas and then you eat the meat. Anyway, we also have dessert and chips and salsa and stuff, so we'll have stuff to drink and all that. And let's see, we're going to be playing the not so newlywed game and what else? Oh yeah, all the men will be sleeping on the couch after they get all the questions wrong. That usually happens. So, you know, we're trying to bring couples together. That's just how we do it at Sure Foundation Baptist Church. But anyway, Pastor Shelley will be preaching for us on Sunday morning and then he has to fly out. But Sunday morning he'll be preaching for us, so I'm very excited about Pastor Shelley coming to preach for us. He's a great man of God. He's a great preacher. And you definitely do not want to miss this Sunday, okay? And February 14th, we have the Kids Valentine's party at 12 at the Lambert's Home. And I think you all got the food and everything. I noticed after I brought it up last weekend, all the stuff was getting done. Alright, so it's great for them to open up their home. And if you haven't already RSVP'd with Miss Rachel, is it Miss Rachel? Then you just can't come. No, I'm just kidding. I'm sure you have time, so it'll be fine. So it's going to be a fun time for the kids that Monday. And the 20th, I'll be preaching at Verity Baptist Church on the PM service, March 4th through 6th. Our Sure Foundation Baptist Church Spokane church plan is going to be celebrating their third anniversary. And Pastor Joe Jones will be preaching Friday night for us. There will be a soul-winning marathon, and then I'll be preaching both services on Sunday. And this is something new that we're putting in the schedule. It's the Detroit soul-winning trip. So we have Brother Timo's leading up a group that's going to Detroit. And I can't remember what the dates were. We have a video in the makings. April 23rd through 25th. So if you're wanting to go, you're going to have to jump on the airplane tickets as soon as possible. So 23rd through 25th. And there's also, me and Pastor Mendez are doing like preaching in New Jersey. And that'll be June 10th. So yeah, we're going to be in Jersey. Yeah, I probably didn't say that right. But anyway, we're really excited about that trip too. So we're going to meet a lot of people from the northeast area. So that's June 10th. I think through 13th there's a soul-winning marathon. But me and Pastor are preaching. Me and Pastor Mendez are preaching on June 10th. We also have our church camp, June 1st through 4th. The Red Hot Preaching Conference is July 14th through 17th. And the Fish Coin Challenge is in the bulletin. And I've had two people do it so far. People will have photographic memories apparently in our church. But anyway, we've had two people do it and I got the coins. I found them. They were in my pocket the whole time. So if you're going to memorize that scripture there, Matthew 1727, just ask me. You can repeat it to a non-family member. Word perfect and you get one of the coins. And we are a family-integrated church. That means the children and infants are welcome during the church services. And we do have comfortable seating in mother-baby rooms and a dad-baby room back there. The mother-baby room is back there. And you can still listen to the sermons and everything like that. If you need to use those rooms for feeding or changing or whatever else you need, please utilize those rooms. No unattended children in the building, please. And no food in the assembly area. Please silence your cell phones if you would at this time, please. And escorts to your vehicles are available by the ushers. They're the guys with the pins on their shirt that say Usher. And you can do online donations and text-giving information on the bulletin there. And you can see the Tizen offering that came in for January. And we celebrated birthdays this week and an anniversary for Eli and Amy, 30 years. Congratulations. It seems like he's sleeping on the couch prematurely this week. But anyway, we also have some friends from Sacramento here tonight. Thanks for coming, Moses and his new bride. I mean, I didn't know our church was a destination for honeymoons. But the weather is really nice. It's abnormal for this time of year. Yeah, amen. He brought the sunshine in from California. So thankful to have you both here. And that's all I have for announcements. Go ahead and sing another song. Turn handles page 155. 155. Doxology page 155. Sing it out loud. Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise Him all creatures here below. Praise Him above ye heavenly hosts. Praise God and holy Ghost. Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise Him all creatures here below. Praise Him above ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son, and holy Ghost. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. We're going to have a short time of prayer for the prayer request. And if you're new to the church, we do have a system for doing the prayer request. We do have a WhatsApp group. And so you're welcome to join that group. You just have to get with my wife on that. she will add you to the prayer request group. And so everybody gets to see the prayer requests as they go live, whatever time, whatever the need is. If you don't have WhatsApp or you're not like technologically savvy, we can also add your email to the email list and send that out as well. So let's go to the Lord in prayer. Let's bow our heads together. Lord, we thank you so much for the privilege of prayer. Lord, we can come to you with our petitions and we know that you'll answer them. Lord, we pray for the expecting mothers, Ms. Kylie and also Ms. Alana. And we just pray that you'd take care of them. Lord, help them as they go through some uncomfortable phases in their pregnancy. And Lord, I just pray that you would help them deliver healthy babies and that they would be healthy and safe during the delivery process. And we also pray for Mary, Alex's wife. Just pray that you would, Lord, help her. And you've been answering prayer, Lord, and I just pray that you continue to work in their hearts and their lives and help her to overcome a lot of the medical issues that she's going through, Lord. And also we pray for Steadfast Baptist Church that's going through spiritual warfare or they've been going through it a lot. I just pray that you'd bless Pastor Shelley for the things that he's having to go through and the rest of the church there. Lord, I just pray that you'd watch over them, bless them, keep them and destroy their enemies, Lord, and make them confounded before you. And Lord, we pray for Julene for her unspoken prayer request for Ms. Alejandra for her prayer request about her permit, Lord, you know the need there. And also she has two urgent unspokens. Lord, we ask a prayer for Sheila for her appeal to go through and be approved and also for her health. And Lord, we just ask that you would heal her, Lord, from the elements that she's been going through, Lord. It's been hard on her. I just pray that you'd give her a special blessing and heal her body. And Lord, for Ms. Sarah Miller, we pray that you would just answer her unspoken according to your will and the prayer that her business would take off. And Ms. Sarah Lewali wants to give you the praise, Lord, for her mom going through the dental surgery fine and that she's healing and that everything's working out well for that. And Lord, we pray for all the salvations on the list. There's a lot of people praying for loved ones to be saved, Lord. I pray that we wouldn't forget about them and that we would care about those people and pray for those people. And Lord, there's just too many to list tonight, but you know the need and pray that you'd help us to have a burden for lost souls in this church, Lord, that we would never lose sight of the fact of you came to seek and save that which was lost. Pray that you would help us to remain steadfast and unmovable and our hearts always yearning to win lost souls to you, Lord. And pray that you'd watch over our church family in this church, Lord. Pray that you'd also watch over all of our leadership in our church plants, Lord, and a special blessing for our church in the UK that we planted almost a year ago. I pray that you would just bless their anniversary weekend that's coming up this weekend, Lord, and that you would bless all the preaching and Lord, that you'd make their day, their special day to go all as planned. And Lord, they'd continue to win many souls to you, Lord. And we pray all these things in Jesus' precious name. Amen. Amen. Please turn with me to the book of 2 Corinthians, please. Chapter six. Book of 2 Corinthians, chapter six. And as is our custom, we'll read the entire chapter. 2 Corinthians, chapter six. Please follow along silently with me. We'll start in verse one of 2 Corinthians, chapter six. We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that you receive not the grace of God in vain. For he sayeth, I have heard thee in a time accepted. And in the day of salvation, I have suckered thee. Behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, now is the day of salvation. Giving no offense in anything that the ministry be not blamed, but in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in watchings, in fastings, by pureness, by knowledge, by long suffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report, as deceivers and yet true, as unknown and yet well known, as dying and behold, we live as chastened and not killed, as sorrowful yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing and yet possessing all things. Oh, ye Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you. Our heart is enlarged. You're not straightened in us, but you're straightened in your own bowels. Now for a recompense in the same, I speak as unto my children. Be ye also enlarged? Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers? For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye are the temple of the living God. As God hath said, I will dwell in them and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore, come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you, and will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. Brother Timo, would you pray for us? Amen. Amen, all right, and so last week, I bit off a little more than I could chew. I've done that a couple times since I've been a pastor, and more than a couple, actually, but I didn't want to skip over the last few verses in the chapter because I felt like they're really important, and so we're gonna backtrack to chapter number five, and we're gonna cover verses 18 through 21 before I get into 2 Corinthians chapter six, and I'm gonna be preaching another sermon out of 2 Corinthians chapter six about separation, so that'll be the following week, but before we begin, let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we thank you, Lord, so much for all these that would come out on a Thursday evening after a long week, and just pray that you would, Lord, that you would revive us right now, Lord, that you would help us to just not feel tired, to just be into the service, into the word of God. I pray, Lord, that you would give a special blessing to anybody that's here, and that's faithful to church, Lord, I pray that you just bless them, Lord, and we thank you for the visitors that have come, and Lord, for the people that have been getting saved in our church, and I just pray, Lord, that you'd help me as I preach this sermon to be filled with your spirit, and to be filled with power and boldness as I preach, in Jesus' name I pray, amen. All right, so let's back up to chapter number five and look at verse number 18. The Bible says, and all things are of God who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation. And so the Bible is kind of changing gears here in the end of this chapter, and kind of just going at these last few verses are about this ministry of reconciliation, and the Bible says that God hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ. Now you think of the word reconcile, what does it mean? It means to restore friendly relations between. You think about like a husband and wife, the Bible says that you're supposed to be reconciled to your spouse if you're at odds, maybe someone, the marriage is in trouble, and the Bible says you're not supposed to get divorced and remarried, but you're supposed to reconcile with that spouse if at all possible. And so God has reconciled us to himself, he's restored friendly relations to him by his son Jesus Christ, isn't that what it says? And hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation. Now what is this ministry of reconciliation? Well obviously it's talking about us having people reconciled through our preaching, through the preaching of the gospel. And so God wants us, you know Jesus Christ left, and he's in heaven, and he's on the right hand of the throne of power, right? The throne of the father, he's on the right hand. And he left us here to continue to reconcile people unto him, and it's still by Jesus Christ, but we are partners with God in this thing. And so a lot of people will say, well you know you guys don't get anybody saved, you know it's all God. And it's like well we realize that we're not the one that died on the cross, was buried and rose from the dead. We understand that, but the message of the gospel, he said that we need to go preach the gospel to every creature, that we need to go out in the highways and hedges and compel them to come in, right? And so God wants us to be a minister of reconciliation. Each and every single person in this room, and Pastor Mendez kind of revealed this to me also that this whole book, 2 Corinthians, is there's a lot of stuff that's about ministry. So if you're looking to go into the ministry, you know there's a lot of things in here that can help you out. We'll cover some of those things later on, but we need to be soul winners. And we need to realize that God has already reconciled mankind to him through Christ, but we have to tell people about that. Every generation needs to have people that are willing to go and be ambassadors and tell them about the Lord Jesus Christ, tell them how to be saved. And it's like, again, it's kind of like we're the bride of Christ so to speak, whereas Christ has, he's not literally married us, but we're spiritually married to Christ if you're saved. So we want to be reconciled to God through the Lord Jesus Christ. The Father wants that relationship. He wants that reconciliation to happen, because mankind is at enmity with God. Mankind is sinful, and mankind has separated themselves from God through their sinful ways. And the only way to reconcile is through Christ. Christ is the only one that can live the perfect life. He's the only one, you know, that was the virgin birth, he was born of the Virgin Mary. He's the only one that literally kept all of his parents and God's commandments until the day he died. He didn't commit one sin. And so he was able to have the sins of the whole world poured upon him as he was on the cross. The Father had to turn his face away from him, and he was abhorred by God himself. And then the Bible says that he was nailed on the cross. We didn't have to do any of that stuff. Christ did that for us, and we couldn't endure any of that stuff. The way he was beaten, the way he was mocked, the way he was spit upon, we couldn't endure those things. Christ didn't want to go through those things. He prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, that the cup would pass from him. But he knew that he had to do the will of his Father. And he realized what he was about to go through, and the Bible says when he was praying that it was like great drops of blood. But it wasn't blood, it was sweat drops that were like blood was just pouring out of his face. So he knew what he was gonna have to go through, and he was willing to do it. And he was so weakened by the time he went to the cross that someone else had to be compelled to carry his cross for him. He didn't get anything to eat, he didn't get anything to drink. He suffered greatly for us, and then he was buried in a borrowed tomb. He didn't even have a tomb that was his own tomb. He had to borrow it from somebody else. And then the Bible says his soul went to hell for three days and three nights. And he rose from the dead, triumphing over the death, even the death of the cross. And he appeared to many witnesses, including his disciples, and he appeared in front of 500 people at once. He showed himself to the disciples several different times. And then he was last of all seen of Paul, the one that's writing this epistle, as one born out of due time. And he had to be the one that reconciled this. Nobody else could do that job except for Jesus Christ. And look at verse number 19, it says, to wit that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. See, the Bible says it's the word of God that saves. Jesus Christ is the word of God. But listen, you still have to preach the Bible to people so that they'll be saved. You can't just say, you know, wear like a little badge that says Jesus on it and just go, and then people get saved. Well, Jesus saves people. Yeah, but you gotta tell people about Jesus. You gotta tell people out of the Bible about Jesus. Where's everything recorded about him? In the Bible, right? So you can't just walk up and go, Jesus saves. You have to explain the gospel to people so they can understand it so they can be saved. And there's bozos that teach that kind of stuff. I've heard people say that. I've heard pastors say that. They're like, it's just Jesus. It's like, yeah, don't be cheeky, okay? You have to get people saved through the Bible. It's not your own words. It's not your personal testimony. You can't just take your own words and just say, well, I'm gonna use my own words and dumb it down so people can understand. Look, they're not that dumb. They can understand the Bible if the Holy Spirit would allow them to be convinced of the scriptures being true and convinced of their sin and convinced of their need of the Savior. You know, God didn't make it so you have to interpret everything for him. You just have to read to him what the Bible says. And I mean, you gotta interpret it to the point that you're showing people what it means. But the Holy Spirit is part of the process. The Holy Spirit goes before us. When we go out soul winning, the Holy Spirit goes out and he convinces people of their need of Christ. And while we're preaching to them, we don't see this happening. But you know, God is there with us helping us. He's the one that gave us the power to preach the gospel in the first place. It's not our own power. So if you go out on your own power in your own flesh trying to get people saved, it's not gonna happen. And yeah, you can get people to pray with you and all that stuff, but I'll tell you what. If you're not asking for God to fill you with the Spirit, if you're not, you know, just diligently working hard when you're preaching the gospel, you can lose people. You can take too long. You can go to Genesis and end in Revelation and you've lost them, you know, 20, 30 minutes ago. Just get through the points, make sure they understand them, get them saved. You know, there's a happy medium there. But you know, when people get the glazed over, look, you've gone too long. So if they get the gospel glazed, you know, then they're just, yep, yep, yep, just hurry up and keep talking so I can get out of here. You know, we don't wanna be like that. We wanna reconcile people to God. And the Bible says that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses. So what does that mean? Well, that once that reconciliation happens, God does not impute any more sin to their account. Everybody has an account of sin and you know, people, some people store it up until the day of wrath. They just heap upon themselves more sin. The more people, the older people get, the worse they get, you know, and get worse into sin. Some people, you know, are given over to a reprobate mind and they make it even worse. But God does not impute sin anymore once you're forgiven, once you're reconciled to him. Is that what it says? Not imputing their trespasses unto them and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Look, you gotta get out and preach the Bible. You can't just, like I said, you can't just preach it in your own will and your own words. Jesus saves, but just showing people a button that says Jesus doesn't save people. Actually, there was this, this homo one time was mocking a Christian for doing this. And I'll never forget, I wasn't even saved at the time, but he was my friend's dad and he was a homo. But anyway, that's beside the point. But that's what homos do, they'll mock the word of God, right? But he said that that's what somebody did, he said that he was, of course he worked in a flower shop or whatever. But anyway, he said that the guy had a button that said Jesus right here, and that he walked up and he'd go, Jesus. And the guy just mocked him and made fun of him. And you know what, obviously that guy wasn't gonna get saved no matter what he said to him. But look, that's not what we're called to do, to do our own little Ray Comfort style things and give someone a fake million dollar bill and all that other garbage. Look, it's just the gospel. You ask someone if they wanna be saved, can I show you from the scriptures how to get saved? Yes or no? If it's yes, you show them. If it's no, then you move on. And look, once somebody, I've noticed this a few times that when someone says no, the people will still continue to try to engage that person, just cut it off, just be done with it. You're not gonna convince them. Once I, and Pastor Mendez taught me this too. He said, I just take it as a no from God that they don't wanna hear it. So you can just keep blathering on or whatever, but how many times have you actually got someone saved when you continue with someone after they told you that they didn't wanna hear it? I mean, just think about it, it doesn't really happen. So we can't just use our own power. We can't just kick our foot through the door. I've seen people do that too. Some bozo that went to our church a long time ago, he would stick his foot in the door and then he'd do this weird little bow or something before. You know what I'm talking about? And then he's like, I'm prepared to preach the gospel of peace unto you. It's like people are gonna think you're weird instantly when you do something like that. Just be normal, okay? You don't have to be weird. So, but God's committed to us the ministry and the word of reconciliation. That means it's our job to go out and reach people. It's like, well, you're the pastor, it's only your job. No, that's not what the Bible teaches. We're all part of this ministry of reconciliation. He's given it to us all. So really, everybody in here is a minister of Christ. Now you might not be the pastor or a deacon or an evangelist or whatever, but you're still part of the ministry, okay? And so what does it mean to be imputed? What does that word mean? Well, it means to attribute righteousness or guilt. So you can have, you know, because it says not imputing their trespasses. So that means that if they're not saved, he does impute their trespasses unto them, right? And like if you're guilty of one, breaking one commandment, doesn't the Bible say you're guilty of breaking them all? So that, you know, once you're convinced as a law breaker, then it's like you've broken them all. But once you believe on Christ, then all that gets wiped away, and then the righteousness of Christ is imputed to you. So it's to attribute to a person or persons vicariously or to a scribe as derived from another. So we get our righteousness, not from the good works that we do or the fact that we're such good Christians. We are attributed righteousness or imputed righteousness because of our faith in Christ. And I'm gonna prove that to you really simply. But, you know, when you're saved, you know, here's, and this is why I'm gonna take a little bit of time on this because it doesn't matter how many times I preach this kind of stuff. I preached about the Pentecostals not being saved last week because they don't believe in eternal security. So because, you know, and here's the thing. If you don't believe in eternal security, that means that you think that your destiny lies in your own hand. That means that you think that sin is still imputed to you and that you have to repent every time you do a sin or you're not saved. He loves me, he loves me not. He loves me, he loves me not. Pretty confusing, isn't it? But in the scriptures of Matthew, didn't it say that he said I never knew you? That means you were never saved. If you don't believe the truth about eternal security, then you don't believe God. You're calling God a liar, the Bible says. And so I wanna spend a little bit of time on this just because I think it's really important to understand where we're coming from. People are like, yeah, what do you just believe, easy believe-ism? Yeah, I do, that's what I believe. That's exactly what I believe. I'll wear like a pin of honor. Easy believe-ism, come on. The Bible doesn't say hard repentism, does it? It doesn't say you have to do the works and believe in Jesus, does it? No, it says once you're saved, God stops imputing sin to you, stops imputing sin to you. And so he puts the righteousness of Christ upon you and it's like you never sinned, right? That's what the Bible actually teaches. When you're saved, you are no longer having sin imputed to your account. And two, upon said reconciliation with God, instead of sin being imputed to your account, you're imputed with the righteousness of Christ. Let's turn to Romans chapter four and I'll prove this. And actually, if I had time, I'd read the whole chapter, but you know what happened last week, so I don't wanna get there. But anyway, Romans chapter four, let's look at verse one. The Bible says, what shall we say then that Abraham, our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found? For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory, but not before God. Abraham was a pretty good person, wasn't he? Abraham was a great guy, he loved a lot, he interceded for him, he kept the commandments to the best of his ability. Was he perfect? He wasn't perfect. But the fact that he was, the Bible says that if he were justified by works, he would have somewhere to glory. According to fellow man, because everybody thinks that they're a good person, that's the number one answer. That's the number one answer people give at the door. Well, why do you think you're going to heaven? Because I'm a pretty good person. That's what everybody thinks. And so, if they looked at Abraham and saw his great works, they'd be like, he's definitely going to heaven. But that's not the way God looks at it. It says, but not before God. For what sayeth the scripture? And I love this verse right here because what sayeth the scripture? What does the Bible say? That's what it's saying. What does the Bible say? That's what's important. And people are like, well, I guess I don't believe the Bible for, I don't believe the Bible as much as I thought. Hey dummy, you better believe the Bible because that's all you have, that's all your salvation is based upon. It says, what sayeth the scripture? That's what's most important. Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. So, it was counted to him that he was righteous because he believed God. Isn't that what it says? Okay, so now it says in verse four, now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. So, if you're trying to work your way to heaven, it's not of grace. Grace is God's riches at Christ's expense. Grace is unmerited favor. God gives you salvation, you don't deserve it. You deserve to die and go to hell. That's what you actually deserve. You deserve to go to hell for every sin you've ever committed, and the fact that people don't believe on Jesus, that's what they actually go to hell for. It's not reckoned of grace, but of debt. So, you owe a debt. If you're gonna try to keep the law to get yourself saved, you owe a debt, and guess what? You already failed the first time you sinned. You already have sin imputed to your account. Look at verse five. It says, but to him that worketh not. Let me read that again. But to him that worketh not. Let me read it one more time, three times. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. What does it say? Your faith is what counts, okay? It's what you believe, it's not what you do. Isn't that what it's explaining here? But yet, you'll have all these people that'll just be like, well, you just, you believe, you believe, you believe. Yeah, I do, because it says, if you believe, you're saved. Right. Look at verse six. Even as David also described it, the blessedness of the man unto whom God impudeth righteousness without works. Let me be really clear. It's without works. So what are works? Keeping God's commandments, not breaking his commandments, doing nice to walk in old ladies across the street with their groceries, you know, dog sitting for some dog or whatever, whatever it is. Works. Things that people, you know, things that you do that are good, or you're not doing bad, that's what works are, right? Now it says unto whom God impudeth righteousness without works. So the impudeth is without works. Verse seven, saying, blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. So he's saying, your iniquities are forgiven. So how many iniquities are forgiven? All of them. Does that mean the past? Does that mean the present, the things you did today? How about tomorrow? How about the day after that? How about the day after that? How about the day after that? How about the day you die? I made this illustration about someone getting cut off with traffic, okay? And then they flipped the person off, they cussed and said blankety blankety blank and then they smashed into a truck and died. If you're saved and that happens to you, you're gonna go right to heaven. Now is that a replay that you wanna have going on once you get there? Probably not. But it's a good thing God doesn't have that jumbotron that people always talk about that replays all the sins of your life. That doesn't happen. That's not exactly the way you wanna go. Like you wake up and you're like at the gate of St. Peter. No, I'm just kidding. You're at heaven's gate. You're like, you come over here. No, but God's not gonna impute that sin to your account. But see, there's millions of people out there in this world that think in that scenario, they're not sure where they would go. Or they think for sure they would go to hell. See, it's not up to chance. Like I said in that sermon, people die from sinning probably more than we realize. It's a direct result of whatever sin they committed. And you might not ever know what that sin is, but sometimes God takes people home early. And sometimes we don't know why. But it could be a sin that they committed, like Saul going to the witch at Endor. You know, the Bible tells us that. But the only reason why we know that for sure is because the Bible specifically points that out in First Chronicles, okay? It says that he went to see, you know, because he didn't obey God's word, number one, and because he went to see the witch, all right? And so God will kill people for sin. But see, where did Samuel say Saul was going when he died? Where'd he say? He said, tomorrow you and your sons will be with me. Samuel went to heaven. I mean, nobody really disputes that. So him and his sons. So the last thing he did before he left this world was fell on his own sword and killed himself. And how many people out there that are tricked by these Roman Catholic idiots are going to hell and they think that anybody that commits suicide is going to hell? That's a moral sin. Well, you can't kill yourself. Well, actually you can. People do it all the time and it's unfortunate. And you know, and what they don't realize, the people that are not saved that commit suicide, those people go to a worse place than they were at before. They think it's so bad here. How about being, you know, on fire for the rest of eternity? I mean, I'm sure that they will wish they could take that moment back. But if you're saved, you go to heaven regardless. Now let's skip down to verse number 22. It says, and therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, but for us also to whom it shall be imputed. If we what, what does it say? Repent of all of our sins, is that what it says? What does it say? If we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered for our offenses and was raised again for our justification. What does justification mean? What does justified mean? I mean, if you use the little, you know, just as if I'd never sinned, that's justified. God justifies you though. You don't justify yourself. Christ justifies us. Christ is the one that imputes his righteousness upon us. Let's turn back a chapter to Romans chapter three and verse number 21. Romans chapter three, verse number 21. The Bible says, but now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God, which is by what? Faith. Is faith believing? Is faith trusting? Yes, it is. Of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe. I mean, it's like the Bible's just repeating it over and over again and people are just like, you have to repent, you have to repent, you have to repent. No, you have to believe, you have to have faith. Yes, it's easy to be saved. It's easy believism. That's what we preach. I don't apologize for that for one second. You're like, well, you think you can just live however you want once you get saved? Yeah, but do I think it's a good idea? No, because God chastises every son whom he receiveth. So that means that once you become his child and when you get saved, when you believe, you become a child of God, that he chastens every son whom he receiveth and daughter. You don't get to get out of it, ladies, all right? So just like we chasten our children when they do wrong, God chastens his children, you know? And so can you do whatever you want and still be saved? Yeah, but I don't know how long you're gonna be alive on the earth. I mean, Samson's a perfect example of this. Samson like was a Nazarite from his mother's womb. He was supposed to be a Nazarite for his whole life. And he did like, he broke like every rule of being a Nazarite and even let his hair, allowed his hair to be cut. He went to a prostitute. I mean, he killed multitudes of people. He touched dead bodies. You know, touching dead bodies is one of the things, like he stacked heaps upon heaps. He killed a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass. I mean, I'm sure he had to touch them, right? Maybe he was stepping on them. I mean, a thousand people, that's a lot of people. But Samson's an example of someone that can be, you can be filled with the Spirit of God, you can be saved, but you can also destroy your own life. And at the end, he was blinded. His eyes were put out and he was grinding and they were making sport of Samson, right? And the last thing he did was what? Let me die with the Philistines and cave the whole house in on himself and he died. So he did kill himself, didn't he? But you know what, he woke up in heaven. He still had his eyes, I'm sure. His eyes were brought back, hopefully, you know. I mean, I don't wanna see him blind up there, but you know, I'm sure he got his eyes back. But you know, again, so that's a picture of that, yes, you can be saved and still, you know, have a sinful life and God ended his life early. His life didn't go to the fullest that it could have because his life was riddled in sin. What verse was I at? Okay, so verse number 22, even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ into all and upon all that believe, for there's no difference, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely, does it cost you anything? No? By his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are passed through the forbearance of God. Now there's a lot of big words in there. Propitiation is a big word. But basically what propitiation means is he's the appeasement of God's wrath. He is the propitiation through faith. So God's wrath was satisfied by Jesus Christ's sacrifice on the cross and his perfect life. So, but it says through faith in his blood, you know, it's forbearance, God forbear, you know, he decides not to impute the sins upon you that you deserve to have on you. Says to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness that he might be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. I mean, it's just repeating it over and over again. But people still don't get it. People still don't understand it. People still, you know, it's just pointless to argue with people that just can't see the plain truth right in front of their faces. And you know why they can't see it? Because their mind is blinded. The devil's blinded their minds and hardened their hearts. You know, they just can't believe. They have a hard time, you know, obviously we don't give up on people unless they're, you know, we know for sure they're, you know, servants of the devil or whatever. It says, where is boasting then? A lot of people boast about how good they are, don't they? And how they're, you know, but even people that are deceived will still say, well it's all, it's grace, it's grace through faith. You know, you just accept Jesus as your personal savior. Then you gotta repent. You know, but what do they mean by repenting? Look, people will also say that we're afraid of the word repent and we don't believe in repentance. That's garbage. Of course we believe in repentance. But repentance means a change of mind. And so you have to change your mind. Whatever's sending you to hell, you have to change your mind and believe on Christ. That's when it comes to salvation, then you're changing your mind about, because everybody has their own belief system of how they get to heaven. Some people just, most people just say I'm a good person, that's why I'm going. But some people it's by whatever religious thing that they're into, but the bottom line is you're only saved through faith. If you believe in Jesus, you're saved. Where's boasting then? Can't boast. It's excluded. By what law? Of works? Nay. Nay. It's not of works. Says but by the law of faith. Nay is an old word that means no. In case you didn't know that. By what law of works? No. No. It's not by works. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. I mean, how much more clear can it be? Now then we are ambassadors, back in our text, we are ambassadors for Christ as though God did beseech you by us. We pray in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God. So we're supposed to bring that message, everything that I just showed you in Romans, that's the message we preach. Faith. You're justified by faith. Of the law? Nay. You're not saved by the law. We use the law as a schoolmaster to bring people to Christ. Some people will try to say that they haven't sinned. That's very rare. But most people know that they're sinful. And when you show them God's word, they believe God's word, you're on the right track with getting them saved. So an ambassador, what is an ambassador? It's an accredited diplomat sent by a country as its official representative to a foreign country. That's what ambassador, the current definition of it is. So let me read that again. An ambassador is an accredited diplomat sent by a country as its official representative to a foreign country. And so the Bible says that we are ambassadors for Christ. What is the country that we're from? Anybody know? Spiritual Israel? You know, that's our nation. We're the nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. Christ took it from the Jews and he gave it to us. I mean obviously if you're a Jew and you're saved, then he gave it to you too. There is no difference between the Jew and the Greek. We're all one in Christ Jesus. So we're all the same. That's why the Hebrew roots movement is so stupid. Because they still wanna stick to the old Judaism and try to bring Christ and they're at odds with each other. You know, you can't just, if people come in blowing the shofar, they're gonna get sent out the door immediately. Because we're a New Testament church. We don't blow the trumpets. We don't follow the new moons and all the Sabbath day stuff. We don't have to do that anymore. That's all done away. So as ambassadors though, we are supposed to be reaching out to people of the world. Our mission is to the whole world, right? And so we're supposed to be ambassadors of Christ. We're planning that trip to Detroit. Brother Timo's leading that up. Why, why Detroit? Why not Detroit? It's part of the world, isn't it? So we're gonna send some ambassadors to Detroit and preach the gospel to them. You know, the groundwork has already been laid in some areas there, but you know, and I'm sure there's maybe a good church or two there. But I'm sure they could use some help. Detroit's pretty big. Not sure what the metro size is, but it's more than we can get knock in a weekend, I can tell you that right now. But you know what, that's a good work. We're ambassadors, you know what? We need to respond as ambassadors. When we're at people's doors, we're trying to reconcile that person to Christ. You know, we're going to each door and we're trying to teach them, you know, hey, God wants you to be reconciled with him. I'm here as his ambassador to teach you how you can accomplish that goal. How can you be reconciled with God? And some people don't even realize God's angry with them. You know, so you have to tell him the bad news first and then you tell him the good news. But you know, if someone doesn't want to receive you, move on. So in our case, we are accredited as officials of Christ to reach out for him from the nation of spiritual Israel. Ambassadors don't just stay in their own country, do they? They go everywhere. And so sometimes you're at home, and as Christians, we're supposed to reach the city that we live in, you know, the towns around. We go to our Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth. So the uttermost parts of the earth, that includes everything, right? Now obviously, we can't reach every single place, Shur Foundation Baptist Church, with 80 soul winners or whatever. We can't reach the whole world by ourselves. We need help. And so we partner with other churches when we do these big soul-winning events and soul-winning missions trips. And you know, our job is to reconcile God with man. That's our job. And if we realize that, then we should act like ambassadors also. When you're at the door, be nice. You know, I'm sure ambassadors don't go over there, you know, to these other countries, and just like, you know, they're wearing like, you know, a tuxedo t-shirt with those sleeves, and they're just like, hey man, you know, from America, or whatever. You know, they dress nice, don't they? So we should dress the part, and people are like, well, it doesn't matter what you wear. It kinda does, though. You know, if you're wearing a tuxedo t-shirt and you're on our soul, I'm gonna ask you to put like, something else on. You got the tuxedo t-shirt with the, you're like, oh yeah, we're gonna go soul-winning. Obviously nobody's ever done that before, but I wouldn't, it wouldn't surprise me. But if we're gonna be ambassadors, we should look the part, because does God care what we look like? Yes, he does, he wants us to be covered up. He wants us to be dressed, you know, in a way that would be pleasing to him. I'm not saying you have to, you know, wear a tuxedo, a real tuxedo out soul-winning, but you should look nice when you go out, right? And so, we're supposed to reach everywhere, and we're supposed to act the part also. And I'm not saying pretend, I'm saying we need to act like Christians. You know, so when we're going to the doors, remember, you're in their country, that's their house. And so, we shouldn't be rude to people at the door, we're there to win them over, not be jerks. You know, and we don't want, you know, we don't want us to leave a bad taste in the mouth of those people of Christianity just because you didn't like something they had to say. Just, you know, obviously, we lose our temper sometimes. Obviously, sometimes people can be idiots at the door. I've been threatened to be beat up before, and the guy was like this tall. I was just like, all right, sir, have a nice day, you know. But, you know, we've actually had people that swung on someone in our church before, and I know he hates it when I bring it up, probably, but it happened. But Robert was being nice, sorry I called his name. Robert was being nice, though. But the guy was trying to, what, stop us from preaching the gospel, and he's just like, we're all preaching the gospel. He's like, aw, he freaked out. But, hey, that doesn't happen all the time. That's happened one time in our church. Has anybody else been punched by anybody when you're soloing before? No, just one time, right? Sorry, Robert. He took one for the team. But, you know, a lot of people would have wanted to drop that old man, I would have wanted to. May he hit the right person. Because, you know, and obviously, we shouldn't be fighting back in situations like that, but, you know, I'm sure if you were in a bad mood that day, it might have happened, I don't know. So, but, anyway, I mean, as ambassadors, we should act apart, we should be nice to people at the door, because that's what we're trying to do, win people over, right, not push them away. So, obviously, the way things get preached at our church and stuff, we're preaching to the church families here. We're not preaching, you know, to unsaved people right now. And if they're unsaved, I mean, they just happen to catch it on YouTube or whatever, that's, you know, whatever, but people still get saved by hearing the word of God. And the word of God is very powerful. So, but, obviously, I don't wanna upset people, but sometimes people get upset when God's word gets preached. It doesn't matter what it is. It's funny, sometimes I'll think, well, it's not that big of a deal, but then people will just make all these comments, and I'm just like, wow, I really just made some people mad. That's just like biblical Christianity 101. It's like, I don't understand it. Muslims aren't saved, oh, how dare you? It's like, it's not a big shocker. You know, it shouldn't be a big shocker. Anyway, so, look down at verse number 21. It says, for he hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. So, and that's what imputing is. It's being made righteous. It's like, we're not righteous on our own. We have to be made righteous, and that comes from Christ. The righteousness of God in him. Now let's look at, let's turn the page and move over to verse number one in 2 Corinthians chapter six. It says in verse number one, it says, we then as workers together with him beseech you also that you receive not the grace of God in vain. So, the Bible's, you know, it's kind of, you know, chapter divisions were made, they weren't originally chapter divisions in the Bible. So it's still continuing on with the same thought. We as workers together with him. So isn't that what we were talking about? We work together with him. We're his ambassadors. He went up to a way to a different country, basically, you know, to heaven, New Jerusalem, and he left us here to be ambassadors. And the Bible teaches that we are workers together with him. Isn't that what the Bible says? You don't get anybody saved. It's all God. God does the saving, yes, but we do the preaching. And without the preaching, it's not gonna get done. God doesn't appear to people in the sky and save them. Did anybody have that happen to them in the church? Did Jesus appear to you and knock you off a horse? Did Jesus appear to you in a dream? Did he have long hair? It wasn't him, all right? Was he wearing a dress? Still wasn't him. So, he's not gonna do that. What's the Bible say he does? He sends us as ambassador. He gave us the ministry of reconciliation. Jesus came to seek and save that which is lost. He still has that plan, but he seeks it through us. That's the plan. And exponential Christianity, the growing faith to faith, generation to generation, and sometimes the generations fall by the wayside. And churches like this church here, we wanna pick up that torch and keep running with it to the next generation. And the Bible says that we're workers together with him. Turn to First Corinthians chapter three, verse nine. First Corinthians chapter three, verse number nine. Just a few pages back in your Bible. It says, for we are laborers together with God. That's pretty clear, isn't it? We are laborers together with God. You're God's husbandry. You're God's building. So, God uses us as a building. We have the Holy Spirit of God indwelling with inside of our bodies. Once you're saved, you get the gift of the Holy Ghost. And we are God's husbandry. He's lent it out to us to work the fields. He is the true vine. We have to abide in that vine, and we have to work together with God in order to accomplish the goal of reaching the whole world. Husbandry is the care, cultivation, or breeding of crops and animals. So, we are his husbandry. We're the ones that he left to care for and to cultivate and to breed the crops and animals or whatever. We're supposed to reel in the lost sheep and take care of the sheep, take care of what God has already built. And we're building upon his foundation. But we're also building upon the work that men did before us. This movement of independent fundamental Baptists, you know, the torch has been picked up by multitudes of people. But, you know, we're called new independent fundamental Baptists. But what we're preaching is not new. What we're preaching is the old stuff. In reality, we're really preaching the old-time religion. And, you know, there are some things in the old IFB that I definitely disagree with, but I'm not saying there wasn't great works of God going on in the old IFB. Of course there is. Of course there still is. But, you know, there's some things that we believe that are a little bit different. And it's not that big of a deal. But when it comes to salvation, if an old IFB church is teaching that you must repent of your sins to be saved, then that's not a true church. God judges the churches based upon what they are, okay? And if they're preaching a false gospel, they're not a legitimate church. There might be people that are legitimately saved in that church, but if they're preaching a false gospel, then God's just, he's just like, okay, this program is going off the rails. You know, most churches, honestly, don't even go soloing. There's a few churches in this town that do. But I'm not sure what capacity that is, because I don't care, because we're independent Baptists. But, you know, there's some churches that they call themselves Baptists, they call themselves independent, but do they go soloing? No. Why not? Because it's turned into a country club. Because it's turned, you know, it's turned into something that's not supposed to be, and that's how churches crumble and die. We gotta keep moving forward with that torch. But we're working together with God to do that. Look at verse number two, it says, For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I secured thee. Behold now is the accepted time. Behold now is the day of salvation. This is a great verse here. And, you know, the first verse is talking about how we shouldn't receive the grace of God in vain. You know, do something with it. Do something with the grace of God that you got. You know, he saved us under good works, didn't he? So we're the workmanship of God, creating Christ on two good works. So don't receive the grace of God in vain. Do something with it. Because I already showed you the verses where it says you could literally not do any work and you're still saved. But that's not, God wants us to do something for him. So we, you know, we're not gonna sit there and teach, well, you don't have to do anything. You do have to do things, but it just doesn't have anything to do with your salvation. It has to do with pleasing God, getting rewards in heaven, you know, and working together with God to make this world get saved. You know, one person at a time, one place at a time, one faraway country at a time. But he said, you know, this is in brackets here in verse two. It says, for he saith, I have heard thee in thy time excepted, and in the day of salvation have I secured thee. And behold, now is the accepted time. So what's the best time to get saved? Now. Not, don't wait. Don't wait till next week. Don't wait till you're 11 or 12. If you understand salvation and you just say, you know what, I don't want to be weird like my parents that go to church three times a week. It's not weird. It's actually normal. You should thank God that your parents bring you to church. I wish my parents would've brought me to church. You know, obviously, you know, it just wasn't the home I grew up in, but you are growing up in a home and God's gonna hold you more responsible than he would someone that never heard the word of God. Obviously, he's gonna give everybody a chance one way or another, but don't wait to get saved. Now is the time. Kids, you could ask God to save you in your heart. You could ask your parents to show you how to get saved and they'll show you, but waiting is a bad idea because here's the thing, we don't know what a day is gonna bring forth. You don't know if you're gonna get hit by a car. You don't know what's gonna happen. You could die in your sleep. You're like, you're trying to scare us, Pastor Thompson. Yeah, I am. Some say with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garments spotted by the flesh. We're supposed to save with fear. You better fear God. Don't fear me. Fear God. Because the Bible says now is the day of salvation. So what is God trying to tell us? He's saying get saved now. If you're not saved in here, get saved now. And obviously, I'm not gonna come have an altar call or anything like that, but this verse is here. And what's the Bible saying? God is telling you to get saved today. Don't wait. Don't wait for tomorrow. Because you're not promised tomorrow. Get saved when you know that you need to get to, when you know you need to get saved, do it now. Don't wait. So, and it's great. Salvation's great. Is the Christian life easy? No, it's not easy. It can be hard. Living the Christian life is hard. Getting saved is easy. And I kind of showed you a little bit of verses to prove that earlier, so. And, you know, verse number three says, giving no offense in anything that the ministry be not blamed. And, you know, so we're all part of the ministry of reconciliation. And so this, you know, we don't wanna offend people and make them not wanna get saved. You know, I kind of brought this up a little bit earlier. You know, but we shouldn't be out intentionally offending people. You know, we have our own set of beliefs. We know when we see a liberal, it's very easy to spot them. They usually have green hair or bones in their noses or, you know, their car has stickers all over it. Say equality and, you know, Bernie Sanders. We love Bernie or whatever. It's easy. And, you know, we kind of despise that way of thinking. But, you know, they're trapped from the devil just like everybody else is. They're trapped into a system that, you know, is a God-hating system. Liberalism is a disease. But Jesus is the cure. The first time I ever voted, I voted Democrat. Did I lose my salvation? No, because I wasn't saved. But anyway, you know who I voted for? Al Gore. You know why I voted for him? Because I knew George Bush was evil. I thought maybe, well, he's got to be good if George Bush is evil, but that's not how it works. They're both evil. So, but he didn't win, you know, according to the recall. Like some of you guys are like, what are you talking about? It was a long time ago, folks, all right? So, but we don't want to offend people and have our ministry be blamed. We don't want to go and be a jerk to people at the door. We have this bozo that no longer goes to our church in Spokane, but I got a call one time and I really had to talk this lady off the ledge. And she was really upset about the way, you know, he basically just was preaching the gospel of the King James Bible. And I love the King James Bible. And I love showing people the errors in the new modern versions and stuff like that. But look, our job is not to go turn people into King James only people. Our job is to get them saved, then show them the King James only stuff. You know, because if you get them saved with the King James Bible, they're already saved, you know? They can read the NIV for the rest of their lives, but they still got saved by a King James Bible, right? Obviously, I hate the NIV. I hate all the modern versions. I hate every false way. But our job is not to turn someone into something else. Debate is never going to get somebody saved. It's not. So our job is not to go and debate people all about the Bible. It's to go and show the people what the Bible says so they can be saved, right? And so we shouldn't be out intentionally, you know, making people hate our ministry. We already have a bad enough time when we're out preaching the gospel anyway. People, I had a text message last Sunday. I think that somebody called me during my sermon or whatever, and it was on this stupid watch or whatever. I can't, I still haven't figured out how to put it on silent. But I'm old, so. But that same person left me a message and said, quit beep, putting stuff on my beeping door. Beep, beep, beep, beep. And it like, Google actually, you know, from the transcription, it like, asterisked all those words out so I didn't have to read them. It's pretty nice. But it said, beep you at the end of it. So just simply going to someone's door can make them angry. Remember we had the protest? Somebody put an invitation on a homo's door, and then they tried to bring hell against us for it. It's like, you're mad that we won't preach the homo's, but then when we accidentally do, then you're mad about that too? So, we're kind of at like this weird position. You're mad at us for not liking them or whatever, but I don't know. So they came and protested our church for a couple weekends and whatever. It was pretty easy. It wasn't super, super bad, except for the things we had to observe and our children had to see. But Ursula from The Little Mermaid, sorry if I had to put that image back in your mind again. All she was missing was the tentacles. Literally wearing like a gas mask the whole time. She was like, bane or something, I don't know. Let's turn to Philippians chapter one, verse 15. Philippians chapter one, verse 15. But even if someone even was to be contentious, to intentionally preach Christ contentiously, the apostle Paul said some interesting things about that. And I'm not saying to do that, because he's obviously saying it's not a good thing. But ultimately, Christ is being preached, right? Look at Philippians chapter one, verse 15, it says, Some indeed preach Christ even of envy and strife, and some also of good will. The one preached Christ of contention, not sincerely supposing to add affliction to my bonds, but the other of love, knowing that I am set for the defense of the gospel. So basically, there's people that are out preaching the gospel, and Paul was in jail, and they're thinking, well, people just keep preaching. These people are preaching, thinking they're gonna get Paul in trouble or something, that he's gonna get worse treatment in jail or whatever. It says, What then, notwithstanding every way, whether in pretense, like pretending, or in truth, Christ is preached, and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice. Obviously, you don't want people out pretending, but Paul is saying, hey, Christ is being preached. But, I mean, obviously, that's not what we want. We don't want someone intentionally going out and offending people. We don't want people out preaching Christ of envy and strife. You think about the people that go to like the pride parades, right? And they're like, in Seattle, going to a pride parade, and you got a bullhorn, and you're like, you almost are going, you're gonna go to hell or whatever, you need to trust Jesus, and then they get beat up, and they're like, I'm suffering for Jesus. Like, bro, the Bible says not to cast your pearl before swine. So why would you cast your pearl before swine, and what's the Bible say is gonna happen to you? They'll turn again and rend you. And, you know, swine have little tusks that come out of their, you know, they get shaved down or whatever when they're on the farm, they're bred to be more docile or whatever. But, man, have you ever seen like a hog, like, freaking out, like they're mad or whatever? I was at the Oregon State Fair one time, there were some big ol' hogs there, and they were fighting. Like, I'd never seen a hog fight before, but it was scary. I was an adult, too, I was just like, ah! Oh, get back, kids! Like, we had our kids, and they were really small at the time, I was like, man, they could gobble up one of those kids in a few minutes. But, like, they were biting each other's ears and stuff, and they were freaking out, they were like jumping on each other, and, but that's what it's like when you go and preach to these sodomites at a sodomite parade, they're gonna turn again and rend you, and guess what they did to that guy in Seattle? They beat him up, and then he was like, I was, I was destroyed, I was beat up for Christ. It's like, no dude, you just went somewhere where God didn't want you to go. Why don't you go to a place that's receptive? You know, because the pride parade is not, I mean, and look, you're gonna have to view horrible things. Like, you shouldn't be vexing your righteous soul from day to day, you know, trying to reach some dude with lipstick on, and a thong, I mean, come on. It's not, it's, or Ursula, you know? So, we need to preach Christ of good will. We need to preach Christ not of contention, sincerely not of contention. So, we don't want the ministry to be blamed, and, you know, so we're not out there to fight, and when we're out sowing, we're out there for peace, we're out there for reconciliation, we're out there to reconcile mankind with God, just like you got reconciled. You know, if somebody came to your, I don't know how everybody got saved, a lot of people got saved watching, you know, the Bible way to heaven or whatever, but I can tell you what, the guy that led me to Christ, if he would've been like, you idiot, look at, you know, look at what the Bible says, you're so stupid, you know. If he would've just been like that with me, I probably would've shied away, obviously. You know, like, what's your problem, man? Why are you being a jerk? And then maybe not got saved. So that's just, I mean, obviously, you all know that you're supposed to be nice when you're at the door. Can you lose it sometimes? Yes. Have I lost it sometimes? Yes. Have you lost it sometimes? Probably. But that shouldn't be the norm, and we shouldn't be just ready to flip out over anybody that has green hair. You know, if someone has green hair, it doesn't automatically make them a sodomite. That's right. That's a style now. Now, when the dude's got, like, rolled up skinny, skinny britches or whatever, and he's got, you know, he's wearing a pink shirt, maybe you have something to worry about. But it's still no guarantee, because dudes dress effeminate today. Men be men, okay? Don't dress like that. Dress manly. You know, tuxedo t-shirts, nah, I'm just kidding. Anyway, that's as far as I'm gonna go tonight, and we'll pick it up in verse four next week. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you, Lord, so much for this great two chapters in the Bible. Lord, there's just so much great stuff in here, and I pray that you'd just help us, Lord, to not preach Christ of contention or of envy. The Lord, our mission would be a mission of peace, Lord, that we would wanna bring peace between you, Lord, and our fellow man. I pray that you'd help us to be ambassadors, and Lord, that we would look the part, we'd act the part, and we would do the part that we're supposed to do. Pray these things in Jesus' name, amen. Page 281, pass me not, O gentle Savior. Page 281, sing it out all in the first. Pass me not, O gentle Savior, hear my humble cry. While on others Thou art calling, do not pass me by. Savior, Savior, hear my humble cry. While on others Thou art calling, do not pass me by. Let me at a throne of mercy find a sweet relief kneeling there in deep contrition have my own belief. Savior, Savior, hear my humble cry. While on others Thou art calling, do not pass me by. Trusting only in Thy merit, would I seek Thy face, heal my wounded broken spirit, save me by Thy grace. Savior, Savior, hear my humble cry. While on others Thou art calling, do not pass me by. Pass me by on the last. Thou the spring of all my comfort more than life to me. Whom have I on earth beside Thee? Whom in heaven be? Savior, Savior, hear my humble cry. While on others Thou art calling, do not pass me by. Man, it's good to see you all tonight, great singing. I'd like to see you back here on Sunday morning and evening. Eli, can you end us with a word of prayer?