good morning everyone and welcome to steadfast baptist church it's great to see everybody
here this morning go ahead and find our seats we'll get started with this morning service
and for our first song this morning we'll sing song number 237 song number 7137 this
morning let's all sing that out together we're singing everybody let's open up the service
now with a word of we thank you once again for this great church and this great morning
to serve you thank you for allowing us to gather here and sing unto you this morning
we just ask now to help us lift up our voices fill us all with your spirit and it's in
jesus name that we pray amen for our next song let's go to song number 292 be a little
bit of a newer song to us i think it's very easy to pick up on song number 292 his way
with thee noel sing it out song number 292 let's all sing that out together jesus and
be always pure thank you so much for coming to steadfast baptist church if you did not
already get a bullet in you would like one just lift up your hand nice and high and one
of our ushers can come by and get you guys a bulletin we have on the front our bible
memory passage it's romans chapter number 10 verse number 13 for whosoever shall call
upon the name of the lord shall be saved and great verse there to memorize on the inside
is our service and soul winning times down below is our church stats also on the right
is a list of expecting ladies please be in prayer for those who are expecting we had
a Texas A&M college soul winning marathon Friday and Saturday brother Diego is helping
lead that several people that went down from our church and they ended up having 18 salvations
so congratulations to them I guess A&M guys can still get saved so that's impressive down
below we have upcoming events and we have a children's choir that's beginning tonight
so it's gonna happen at the right after the evening service so if you have a children
from four to seventeen they would like to participate in our children's choirs you
can have them begin practicing with us after the evening service in our fellowship area
so really looking forward to that and hearing them perform for us on Easter we have the
Foley baby showers happening soon March 7th I believe the details are on the back of this
and then there's a car Carthage Texas soul winning marathon March 21st how far is that
brother Sam it's about three hours so we'll probably have a caravan that comes from our
church as well but it's about three hours and so if you'd like to participate there's
another soul winning marathon March 21st we'll also have a big soul winning push April 4th
most likely it'll be you know within about 20-30 minute driving distance of our church
so probably somewhere in the Dallas Ford area we'll be planning to do a bigger push right
before Easter as far as going out and preaching the gospel and then we have Easter services
on April 5th children's choirs are going to be performing that morning April 5th and you
don't want to miss they always do a really good job on the back is the details about
the baby shower if you'd like to participate it's March 7th 12 to 2 it's here at the church
you can always bring a side dish or dessert to share if you would like it is nursing's
only preferred if you'd like to get them a gift or register on Amazon and please RSVP
to Mrs. Souther if you're planning on attending down below is our prayer list and we try to
keep this up to date if you have any additional prayer request or if something's not accurate
please just let us know and we'd love to update it and try to get it corrected and so we
try to keep this a living document and if you have other prayer requests you can always
email them to us at stepfastbaptistkjv@gmail.com and we'll try to do our best to pray for
you and to join with you in prayer.
On the inside we had the congratulations it's really to my wife but on the birth of Miss
Evelyn Bell she was born on the 23rd, 8.56 p.m. weighing eight pounds six ounces and
twenty and a half inches long congratulations thank you so much to everybody who prayed for us honestly
it was a really great delivery and Evelyn is doing awesome she's a super great little
baby and we really love to have her and she looks just like Abby so it's kind of fun
she's got tons of hair and that's definitely kind of fun so we're excited for you guys
to get to meet Miss Evelyn on the inside we also had a do we have this missionary letter
and all okay we have the missionary update of what happened in February with our evangelist
in the Philippines, Evangelist Urbanic and so in February they had 1,626 salvations for
the month and wow that is a lot it's mostly a carryover from some of the missions trip
that we had had that had kind of been both January and February but they were able to
partner with Pastor Stuckey and their church and go into schools and to do a lot of preaching
and a lot of evangelism there and honestly they're just doing a big work out there and
it's great there's a lot of people out there that are supporting that work, Brother James
from our church, Brother Kenton Knowles who's from the Bahamas he's out there doing a lot
of work and of course there's a lot of crossover with you know Pastor Stuckey and members
of their church and just you know it's really there's a great work going on in the Philippines
highly recommend if you ever want to go on a foreign missions trip to that side of the
world the Philippines is definitely a place you can you should consider going and it's
definitely very dense population and so you just have endless opportunities to get a lot
of people saved very humble very Christian in general a lot of people there are interested
in the things of God they speak English pretty well I mean at least enough to communicate
and get the gospel to most people and so honestly the Philippines can't be recommended enough
we we definitely have a heart for the Philippines we probably have an over representation of
Filipinos in our church but that's great we love it and we wouldn't want to have it any
other way and so we're definitely keeping them in our heart in our prayers in our minds
and our hearts and and so you can read through this entire update letter the work that they're
doing over there is incredible we do have a smaller church plant that we have over there
that evangelist urbanic is leading and then also if you just be praying for him his church
the soul winning pray for their family they have some prayer requests on the back please
also pray for brother james the guy goes hard and even has a lot of back pain and he really
pushes himself to really do a lot of work and so definitely pray for brother james he's
definitely a big influence over there as well so that's pretty much all i really have as
far as announcements are concerned we're going to go ahead and sing our psalm of the week
and it's going to be psalm 126 psalm 126 you can use our special binder or use your
bible it's a little bit easier with the binder psalm 126 psalm 126 psalm 126 i'll sing that out together
oh
now as the offering plates are being passed around go ahead and open your bibles to the book of luke
chapter number 13 that is luke chapter 13 we read the chapter the bible says then were present at
that season some that told him of the galileans whose blood pilot had mingled with their sacrifices
jesus answering said unto them suppose ye that these galileans were sinners above all the
galileans because they suffered such things i tell you nay but except ye repent ye shall all
likewise perish or those 18 upon whom the tower in siloam fell and slew them think ye that they
were sinners above all men that dwelt in jerusalem i tell you nay but except ye repent ye shall all
likewise perish he spake also this parable a certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard
and he came and sought fruit thereon and found none then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard
behold these three years i come seeking fruit on this fig tree and find none cut it down why
cumbereth it the ground and he answering said unto him lord let it alone this year also till i shall
dig about it and dung it and if it bear fruit well and if not then after that thou shalt cut it down
and he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath and behold there was a woman which had
a spirit of infirmity 18 years and was bowed together and could in no wise lift up herself
and when jesus saw her he called her to him and said unto her woman thou art loosed from thine
infirmity and he laid his hands on her and immediately she was made straight and glorified
god and the ruler of the synagogue answered with indignation because that jesus had healed on the
sabbath day and said unto the people there are six days in which men ought to work and them
therefore come and be healed and not on the sabbath day the lord then answered him and said thou
hypocrite doth not each one of you on the sabbath loose his ox or his ass from the stall and lead
him away to watering and ought not this woman being a daughter of abraham whom satan hath bowed low
these 18 years be loosed from this bond on the sabbath day and when he had said these things all
his adversaries were ashamed and all the people rejoiced for all the glorious things which were
done by him then said he unto what is the kingdom of god like and whereunto shall i resemble it it
is like a grain of mustard seed which a man took and cast into his garden and it grew and waxed a
great tree and the fowls of the air lodged in the branches of it and again he said whereunto shall
i liken the kingdom of god it is like leaven which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal
till the hole was leavened and he went through the cities and villages teaching and journeying
toward jerusalem then said one unto him lord are there few that be saved and he said unto them
strive to enter in at the straight gate for many i say unto you will seek to enter in and shall
not be able when once the master of the house is risen up and has shut to the door and you begin
to stand without and to knock at the door saying lord lord open unto us and he shall answer and
saying to you i know you not whence ye are then shall you begin to say we have eaten and drunk in
thy presence and that was taught in our streets but he shall say i tell you i know you not whence
ye are depart from me all ye workers of iniquity there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth
when you shall see abraham and isaac and jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of god and you
yourselves thrust out and they shall come from the east and from the west and from the north and from
the south and shall sit down in the kingdom of god and behold they are last which shall be first
and there are first which shall be last the same day they there came certain of the pharisees saying
unto him get thee out and depart hence for herod will kill thee and he said unto them go ye and
tell that fox behold i cast out devils and i do cures today and tomorrow and the third day i shall
be perfected nevertheless i must walk today and tomorrow and the day following for it cannot be
that a prophet perish out of jerusalem oh jerusalem jerusalem which kill us the prophets
and stonest them that are sent unto thee how often would i have gathered thy children together
as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings and ye would not behold your house is left unto
you desolate and verily i say unto you ye shall not see me until the time come when ye shall say
blessed is he that cometh in the name of the lord let us pray dear heavenly father thank you for this
day i thank you for the great works that have been accomplished at this church please bless
those of ours on the mission field i pray that you would please bless pastor shelly now as he
preaches the word of god to us please fill him with the holy spirit and boldness please help us
to pay attention to the message in jesus name amen amen i want to preach a sermon this morning
called adapt or die adapt or die now it's coming from this perspective right here in verse number
three where it says i tell you nay but except you repent ye shall all likewise perish and so the
bible is giving this concept or this idea that if you don't get right with god if you don't repent
you're going to die and in fact this is just a general lesson that you need to learn and
can apply to so many areas of your life and i want to really dive into this principle and really make
a lot of applications this morning but what do we what do we adapt to or what is adapting it's
just changing just evolving you know and we have to evolve to our circumstances whether we're doing
something wrong we need to fix it we need to change we need to adapt we need to evolve this
idea of repenting is the concept that you're doing something wrong you're on a bad course you're on
a bad trajectory and you have to repent you have to change course and in fact many times the word
repent is kind of like making a complete turn right you're basically going the exact opposite
direction you were going one way now you repent now you're going a completely different direction
and the word repent simply means to turn or to change the context is always driving what that
actually means when we talk about salvation itself you have to adapt or die because if you do not
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ you will die and go to hell and what's so ironic about this phrase
that I'm using is it's actually kind of coined by a lot of evolutionists and they'll try to teach
this idea of macro evolution and how different forms of animals adapted and became other forms
of animals and the giant Tyrannosaurus rex eventually became a chicken you know and that's
basically what they'll teach in public school today not only that in our nation's mall the
national mall you can go to one of their history museums you can walk in and see these giant
dinosaurs everywhere and they'll show you these diagrams of how this dinosaur slowly adapted into
a chicken which you'd kind of think like wow that's a pretty strange transformation to go
from a red hot fire preaching you know Tyrannosaurus rex into now a little chicken
I guess some people can really do it you know I just didn't you know see that that actually
happens but sometimes it happens right but at the end of the day you know if you stay at
Tyrannosaurus rex and die and you evolve into a chicken and survive I guess that's better right
but look that's all fairy tales and nonsense anyways but we have to understand that you know
the devil uses truth and in a clever way to kind of teach lies and when it comes to the theory of
evolution you know there are truths when it comes to natural selection there are truths when it comes
to microevolution some of the things that they're teaching are just observable facts there is
speciation we obviously see various kinds of animals that exist and when we think about dogs
specifically we can really see a lot of adaptation to their environment some dogs are tall some are
big some are small some are ugly like a rat some have you know you know this long hair to adapt to
a cold environment some have a very short you know thick hair to you know adapt to some kind of a hot
climate you know the dingo looks different than the husky and the chihuahua shouldn't even exist
but you know that's my personal opinion but i'm just saying like we see all of the speciation and
variation in animals why because they had to adapt or die you put some some kind of a tiny
little rat like dog up in a cold climate they'll die you take a husky and you put it in a hot
climate it'll die now of course because of modern technology because of air conditioning because of
domestication people can keep these things alive when they would naturally die out from their
environment and we even have a lot of situations in this world where people would probably die out
except for they're being propped up by artificial means and so we have to understand though that if
you do not adapt you will die and this is an important concept and so funny the evolutionists
believe this and yet they're not going to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ they're not going to
evolve and become a Christian and end up going on into the next life into the afterlife they will
perish and everyone will forget them we will forget them and never remember them and they will just
turn back into dust and they will be spending eternity in hell because they didn't actually
adapt and now in this particular passage I do not believe it's talking about you know necessarily
the direct context is about salvation if you did want to make it about salvation of course you could
but some people try to save to repent of your sins to be saved meaning going to heaven that's not
true the Bible teaches that salvation is a free gift that all you have to do is believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ the only repentance in relation to salvation would be that of stop trusting in
your works turning from that and turning to believing in Jesus Christ and accepting his
free gift but I believe in Luke chapter 13 what's actually being described and being talked about
is how the nation of Israel as a whole had to turn back to God they needed to repent and turn back
to the Lord and get back on the same page or their nation was going to perish and we see that
happening in 70 AD that the Jews were destroyed by the Romans for having not accepted Jesus and not
turning back to the Lord and being very sinful and wicked Jesus described them as an adulteress and
wicked and an evil generation, they were devouring widows houses, they were just basically fake,
they were not sincere, they were not genuine, they were not keeping God's commandments and of course
as a result of rejecting the Word of God and rejecting Jesus and not turning back to the
Lord he's going to wipe them all out just like individuals who die from random things in their
current day. He brings up a couple examples here let's read in verse number four, "Or those eighteen
upon whom the tower in Siloam fell and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that
dwelt in Jerusalem." So it gives like two different stories where people had recently died and of
course there's the tendency for people to think that someone that dies prematurely that there was
something wrong with them like oh that was just a bad person so that's why he ended up dying or
he must have had some issue or he's worse than me that's why he died and that's why I survived
it's kind of a survivor's bias but that's not true Jesus is saying hey these people aren't
like worse sinners than you it's just time and chance happening through them all some people die
sometimes good people die sometimes rotten people die sometimes good people survive sometimes rotten
people survive you know it doesn't really it's not just always dependent upon how good or bad you are
time and chance happen it to every single person but what he's trying to say to them as a whole
group if you guys do not repent you don't adapt you it will all perish you all in the same way
be slaughtered by the romans because the first example is how the the romans kind of like had
something to do with a lot of these galileans dying he's talking about them their blood being
mingled in their sacrifices so you know one's an accident perhaps i guess i don't know actually
maybe in verse four the tower of siloam fell in a sense that maybe like the romans came and
besieged it and knocked it over and they died it seems like there's an indication that the romans
are somehow having something to do though with these galileans dying and that's foreshadowing
what's going to happen to their city Jerusalem how it's going to be knocked down and how it's
going to be torn down it's going to be thrown down every stone of the temple was thrown down
off of the temple mount and their entire temple was destroyed in 70 AD by the Romans kind of this
foreshadowing here in the story this tower being thrown down and them dying whether it was an
accident or the Romans doesn't really change anything the point stands that hey if you don't
repent if you don't adapt you will die now what's the point of this story why is Jesus bringing this
up well again verse 5 I tell you nay but except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish he's giving
them this war this is this is gonna tap into y'all okay verse six he spake also this parable a certain
man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard and he came and sought fruit thereon and found none
then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard behold these three years I come seeking fruit
and on this fig tree and find none why cumberth at the ground and he answering said to him lord
let it alone this year also till I shall dig about it and dung it and if it bear fruit well and if
not then after that thou shalt cut it down. So what is he saying? Hey the whole point of this
particular story is that if you guys don't apply this same parable to yourselves you too will
perish like this tree is going to perish. It's like hey there's a tree here it's not producing
fruit and then he asks this question why cumberth at the ground? Like why are we wasting the soil's
resources? Why are we wasting water? Why are we wasting airspace? Why are we wasting any time,
effort, and energy on this particular tree if it's not going to bear any fruit? And Jesus isn't
just like eh don't worry about it no he says cut it down. Now they say like don't just cut it down
I mean it's already there right think about how much effort and energy it took for the tree to be
there someone had to plant it someone had to water it someone you know and again there's just so much
time and effort and energy and it's there so then he says all right fine let's dung it. Now dunging
is kind of gross okay isn't that and it's probably kind of shameful you know you have to have dung
spread all over you but at the end of the day he's trying to give them an opportunity to actually
get right you know in my mind again maybe I'm just reading into this but dunging it kind of makes it
seem like you're putting some shame on it right it's almost like you're shaming it and this is
what I would call tough love right this is your tough love that you're giving to this tree saying
hey nothing's working you're not producing fruit you're not in a good direction you need to adapt
so we'll put some dung on it as a last-ditch effort and look if you won't adapt though
if you won't bring forth the fruit if you're not going to change well then God's just going to cut
you down God's just going to destroy you God doesn't want to allow you to just keep wasting
resources and you know this is a dangerous lesson that churches and Christians need to learn that
if you do not produce fruit God could cut you down let's go to Revelation chapter number two
go to Revelation chapter number two why because churches need to to adapt or die now when we talk
about adapting what are we saying we're saying that if you're not producing fruit if you're not
doing what the Lord is saying you need to figure out a way to get it done because at the end of the
day results are what matter now think about this if you work at a sales company if you're a salesman
and you're just not making sales you need to adapt you have to figure out a way to to adapt or die
a company that's making no sales has to adapt or die and think about what will be you know think
about a company that's not doing well in sales think about a company that's going downhill it's
losing money it's not making sales it's going in a bad direction and then the manager comes in and
says you know we should stop caring about numbers we're not going to look at spreadsheets anymore
we're not going to pay attention to bank accounts anymore we don't want to we don't want to you know
see winners and losers we don't want to think about which salesmen are doing good and which
ones are doing bad we don't want to look at our expenses we don't want to talk about that kind of
stuff you know these companies that are always concerned about numbers you know and bragging
about numbers like we don't we don't want to do that you think that's going to go well for the
company you think that people are going to want to buy their stock think we want to invest in a
company when they don't say hey here's here's the numbers here's our projections here's our strategy
here's our product here's how we're going to improve we're trying to adapt we're trying to
improve look you know we live in a country that has free market capitalization and let me tell
you something it's a good thing because it forces companies to adapt or die whereas you in communism
or something where the government is just basically propping up companies or industries
or organizations and there's no real incentive to do better make good products whatever it's just
you're going to get your paycheck no matter what they're going to sell the product no matter what
they're just propped up it doesn't cause people to make better products it'll cause people to make
better products you got to adapt or die that pressure that environment of competitiveness
actually drives that better products why does america have so many good products because
there's a lot of competition the more competition it's going to drive down prices it's going to
increase quality in general and you know when there's less competition what does it do it
increases prices it also decreases the quality of the product that's why of course in our country
we've always tried to avoid things like monopolies because a monopoly can get to a situation where
people just start jacking up prices and the quality of goods diminishes you know having more
competition and having more freedom typically yields better results in a sense you know when
you lived in europe and it was like go to the catholic church or not well that yields a pretty
bad result whereas if you have a free market of churches where you can go to any church you want
there's no obligation you could not go to church you can go to church you can go wherever you want
you have a car so you can drive within an hour or two of wherever you'd like to go to go to church
you know what that's going to do it's going to force churches to adapt or die it's going
to force churches to actually try to figure out how to put forth a better product because
if you're just in this small tiny town where there's no option it's just like this one horrific
option or no option. A lot of people just kind of hold their nose and go to this tiny little church
in the middle of nowhere. But hey, in the Dallas-Warworth area, you have options, let me tell you something.
You know, when you have as many barbecue options as you do in the Dallas-Warworth area, let me tell you,
Spring Creek barbecue is going downhill. Why are they closing so many places is because you have so
many options. You know, why do restaurants thrive and restaurants fail? It's because of the product.
If the product's good, it's going to do well. If it's bad, it's going to go downhill fast. And
that's just how the world works. This is how God's economy works as well. When he's looking at
churches, he's looking at the fruit. He's looking at the production and he's saying, "Hey, if you're
not producing, if you're not doing what I want, I'll just get rid of you." Look at Revelation chapter
2 and verse number 3. He's talking about the church at Ephesus, "And as born has patience,
and for my name's sake has labor, and has not fainted. Nevertheless, I have somewhat against
thee, because thou hast left thy first love." Now this is what's important. There's a church
that has patience and is laboring for Jesus' name and has not given up. It's not like they're
doing nothing. They're working, they have patience, they're doing all kinds of stuff,
but here's a problem. They've done something. They've left the first love. Nevertheless,
I have something somewhat against thee because thou hast left thy first love. "Remember therefore,
from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works, or else I will come unto thee
quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except the serpent." Look, you could be
doing the second works, the third works, the fourth works, the fifth works, the sixth works,
the seventh works, but if you forget the first works, he says, "I'll just trash you." Look,
God is not saying like, "Well, I know you have a great choir. I know you have an awesome music
program. I know you have good Sunday school. I know you have all of these beautiful buildings
and decorations, and I know you have all these different things that you're just, you know,
you have a meal club, and you have a fitness club, and you're teaching the little kids how to paint
and stuff. Yeah, I'm so glad that you're doing all this stuff, but let me tell you something.
You leave the first works, you're done. You don't want to emphasize the first works. Well,
I'll just remove your candlestick then, because why cumber at the ground? Oh, I know you got
leaves, and you're providing shade, and you look nice, but at the end of the day, if the tree
doesn't produce fruit, does it even matter? Is it even a tree anymore? Why cumber at the ground?
Why waste all these? I mean, think about it. God, what if God just blesses a church or a pastor,
which is hundreds of people, and then none of those people are really zealous for soul winning.
They're not zealous for getting people saved. They're not zealous for the first works.
You're wasting the potential of those people, and by wasting the potential of those people,
you know what you're doing? You're causing less people to go to heaven. You're sending
more people to hell. You know, God doesn't want to take these resources and dump them into a tree,
and then that tree just waste and squander all of those resources. You know what? He'd rather
that tree die so then that water and soil can be used on another tree so that more people get
saved, because you know what? God wants people to get saved. I don't know if you know this or not.
God is trying to figure out how to get people saved, and you know what? God is going to adapt.
God's going to say, "Hey, this tree's not working anymore." Burn it. Trash it. Go the way to John
chapter 15. Go to John chapter 15, and you know what? He does that with people too, not just
churches. You have to be careful. If you're a Christian and you don't care about soul winning,
you're walking on dangerous territory, my friend. You have the gospel. You've been given this free
gift. You're an ambassador of the Lord Jesus Christ. You've been enlisted in the military.
You know, in some militaries, and I'm not saying this is right, but I'm just saying in general,
you were drafted into the Russian army, and it's World War II. They're like, "March forward or
we'll shoot you." Like, you had to go fight the Nazis. You had to go fight the Germans. And it's
like, if you retreated, they'll shoot you. There's a lot of movies about it, too. There is this
famous movie that I like. It's called, like, "Enemy Behind the Gates," I think is what it's called.
It's like "Enemy at the Gates." It's like a sniper movie. At the opening scene, it's like all these
Russians are on boats, and they're, like, bombing them. They're shooting at them. And they're just
saying, like, even if you just jump into the water to just prevent yourself from dying, they'll shoot
you, too. So, like, people are, like, jumping in the water, and then the Russians are just shooting
and killing their own soldiers and jumping in the water. Again, I'm not saying this is right. I'm
not saying this is kind of extreme. But in a sense though, God is also saying, look, if you're in our
military, you are a soldier, and if you decide to not produce, well, guess what? I'll take you home
early. And, you know, it's everything. If you are on a basketball team, if you're on a football team,
if you can't score, He's going to take you out of the game. He's going to bench you. He's going to
say like, "Why put this person in the game if all they're going to do is just turn the ball over and
never score and never pass and never do anything?" It's like, why is this person even on the court?
Right? Why is this person even in the game? Why is this person out there? If you strike out every
single time when you're at the plate, why would they keep putting you in to bat for them? It's
like you got to at least produce some hits. You got to at least do something. And in the same way,
God feels this way about Christians. You are attached to the vine of Jesus Christ,
and so he wants to produce fruit through you. And if you don't produce fruit, there's a danger here.
Look at John 15.1. "I am the true vine," this is Jesus, "and my father is the husbandman." This is
the Trinity again. They're not the same person. Jesus is the vine, the father is the husbandman,
and what is he going to do? The vine? "Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away."
He says, "And every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit."
So not only this, if you're not going to adapt and can create fruit, he'll just trash you. But
even if you are producing fruit, he still wants you to adapt even more, prune certain things,
keep evolving, keep getting better, so that you can do what? Bring forth even more fruit.
It's all about the fruit, it's all about the production, it's all about the success,
it's about the numbers. This is how God feels. He says, "Now you're clean through the word,
which I have spoken unto you, abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself,
except it abide in the vine, no more can ye except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches,
he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. For without me ye can
do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch and is withered, and men gather
them and cast them into the fire, and they are burned." What is this talking about? Now again,
work salvationists would love to teach you have to do works to be saved. False. That is not what
we're talking about. Salvation is a free gift. And boy, some people prove that. They prove that
stupid people can get saved, that weirdos can get saved, freaks can get saved. I mean, man,
you could be anything and get saved. But let me tell you something. If you want to be a productive
member of Christianity, you have to produce fruit. You have to adapt. You have to get some smarts.
You actually have to apply the wisdom of the Bible. You know, they say ignorance is bliss,
but you know what? Ignorance is going to cause you to perish early because God can't use you.
God wants you to get some wisdom. He makes wise the simple. You can be simple, but you know what?
Don't stay simple forever. Get some knowledge. Get some wisdom. And of course, who's wise? It's
the person that's going out and producing fruit. "He that winneth souls is wise," is what the Bible
says. You can be simple concerning that which is evil in this world, but you know what? You better
be wise considering the things of God and understanding you better bear fruit. You need
to adapt or die. And Jesus wants us to constantly be thinking about are we producing fruit? How can
we produce more fruit? What resources? What opportunities? What has God given me so that I
can produce fruit? And we need to use these things. We need to adapt or die. Go if you would to,
I want to go to Proverbs chapter 15 for a moment. Go to Proverbs chapter 15.
And honestly there's just a lot of Bible that we could talk about. I want to make a lot of
applications so I'm probably going to move on. I think I've really proven my point so far from
the Bible of this concept that we should adapt or die. Here's another proverb though that's going
to really drive in this point. Before I kind of move on, before I make some applications,
here's just another verse to really drive this in. Proverbs 15, look at verse number 10.
"Correction is grievous unto him that forsake it the way, and he that hateth through proof,"
notice this, "shall die." So what's the adaptation? In a sense, it's just kind of receiving
correction. You're receiving correction, you're receiving reproof, and not only are you receiving
it, you're doing it. Because it's one thing to be yelled at, but if you don't actually implement it
and you're a forgetful hearer and not a doer of the work, well, then that doesn't really benefit
you. You need to be someone that not only can receive correction, but take the correction and
apply it to your life and make a change, which is the actual adaptation. God, God is not a
respecter of hearers. He's a respecter of doers. He doesn't respect those that hear the word of God.
He respects those that do the word of God. Okay. So God is not pleased with those that come to
church and hear all the right things and don't do it. He's pleased with the people that do it.
So let me paint you a picture. Someone goes to a soul winning church, doesn't go soul winning.
Someone goes to a church that's a wet blanket on soul winning but go soul winning. Let me explain
something. The guy not going soul winning but goes to a soul winning church, God's not pleased with
that guy. The guy that's going to a wet blanket church and going soul winning, he's more pleased
with that guy. Now at the end of the day, God's probably thinking like, "All right, let's get out
of the wet blanket church and go to a good one." And he's probably thinking to the guy, "Hey,
I'm glad at least your tithe is like going to a good church at least, but let me say you need to
go soul winning yourself." It's not enough to just hear about the good things. It's not enough to
just hear like, "Hey, I should love my wife." You just love your wife. It's not enough to just hear
like, "Hey, love your children and do good on your children." You need to actually love your children
and do good on your children. It's not enough to just hear like, "Hey, we should go out and reach
the laws of the gospel." It's go out and actually reach the laws of the gospel. And look, it's not
even enough to just go and just kind of just, you know, just put a little door hanger on the door and
then just walk away and just be like kind of lame and weak and whatever. No, you know what's important?
Actually getting the person saved. It's not even enough to just tell them like, "Hey, Jesus will
save you." You know what you should do? You should help them call upon the name of the Lord and
actually pray and get saved too. Let's sit there and walk up and just basically try to tell them
a little bit about the gospel and then just walk away. Be like Ray Comfort, "When are you going to
do that? When are you going to do that? When you go home tonight, are you going to do that?" It's like,
"No!" Which of course, you know, he's asking him to repent of all their sins, so he's preaching a
false gospel anyways. But isn't it so lame? It's like you're standing there, he's like, "When are
you going to do that?" It's like, why don't you just say like, "Hey, let's do it now." Hey, you know
when you're going to do it? Now. Now is the accepted time. Now is the day of salvation. It's not even
today, it's now. If you actually have a King James Bible, you should update your language. You should
adapt, all right? Adapt to the King James Bible. It's not today is the day of salvation, it's now is
the accepted time. Now is the time to get saved. Hey, when should I get saved? Now. Hey, when
should you adapt to God's Word? Let me tell you something, it's now. When you hear the Gospel,
you know what the right response is? To get saved now. When you're wrong, when you have something
off, when you're not right with God, you know when you should change? Now. You know when you need to
adapt? Now. Because you never know when you're going to perish. And in many cases, if you don't
adapt, you will die. And why do people not adapt? Because they hate correction. Because
correction is grievous unto them. Because they hate reproof. Because they don't want to realize
they've done something wrong or they are wrong. Often, what is it? It's pride, stubbornness,
laziness. Just really just being kind of stupid probably in general and just not having good
wisdom. Because there's nothing wrong with being corrected. You know what's wrong? Not receiving
and applying the correction. We all need correction. We all need adaptation. We all need to constantly
be improving. And someone that's not a constant learner, someone that's not constantly trying to
improve will be left behind. Sorry you know the left behind movie that should have been about how
you're gonna get left behind before the you know but it's not that we're talking about the tribulation
we're all going through the tribulation. But you know what you might get left behind in the sense
you might be taken home early. You know the pre-trib rapture is kind of true for the people that are
lazy and won't do anything for God. They'll take He'll take them out of here fast. They won't go
through the tribulation, but they're not going to go peacefully. God's going to violently take them
and snatch them back up in heaven through all kinds of different means. Now there's a lot of
ways and directions we go to the servant. I kind of thought of this this three points that I just
kind of wanted to make. Go to Nehemiah chapter 13 and it's kind of based on an idea of like warfare
because we could make a lot of again applications for this. If you think about just warfare in
general adaptation is very important or you'll die and we are in the Lord's army. We're fighting
a spiritual battle and there's always overlap and parallels to carnal warfare as well as the
spiritual warfare. But in a carnal warfare there's kind of like three big things that are really
important in that warfare to be successful and you know I played a lot of like computer games
and video games growing up and these these are true in these games as well okay. But you have
to consider yourself like thinking about these three elements consistently or you're gonna lose.
Number one you have to be thinking about your economy. Number two you have to be thinking
about your troops and number three you have to be thinking about your tech okay and if you don't
think about all three of these you can really start to lose fast in a warfare situation. If
you don't have money coming in if you don't have a good sustainable economy well you're gonna just
dry up fast you're gonna have no money for troops or for tech and you will probably die. If you have
all this money and all this tech we have no troops well you're gonna basically just get you know
decimated by any troops at that point and look if you have a lot of money coming in you have a lot
of troops but they have low tech if they have no technological advantage well they could get
slaughtered very quickly because of technology and so for a warfare situation you must adapt or die
and and for many of us we live in America so we haven't understood warfare you know we're not
living in the Middle East right now where President Trump just bombs us for no reason and then Iran
bombs the other side for no reason and there's just all this conflict and war and turmoil all
the time we don't live in Ukraine where our borders are constantly switching all the time
we don't live throughout a lot of places in this world where there's constant warfare and regime
change and threat of death but for those people this is real I mean it is real there's real warfare
real bloodshed real fighting and for countries to survive they have to be thinking about their
economy they have to be thinking about their troops they have to be thinking about tech
and if you don't have these things you will die you will literally die a country can't just say
you know we're not going to care about economy we're not going to care about how many troops we have
we're not going to care about our technology you're doomed because other countries will and they
will invade you and they will take you over and they will destroy you this is an important thing
and look in the christian fight we have to think about this that with the devil that we're fighting
we have to make sure that we're taking care of our economy that we're taking care of our troops and
that we're taking care of our technology otherwise the devil can defeat us we need to be using every
tool that we have and adapting so that we don't die and those who are not adapting will perish
now nehemiah chapter 13 we're kind of making this spiritual application here nehemiah chapter 13 look
at verse number 10 the bible says and i perceived that the portions of the levites had not been given
them for the levites and the singers that did the work were fled everyone to his field then i contended
with the rulers and said why is the house of god forsaken and i gather them together and set them
in their place so we have a story here where they're trying to rebuild the house of god they're
trying to reestablish themselves and become a christian nation again and the nation that's
supposed to be a light unto the gentiles but they're not giving their tithes and offerings
unto the lord they're not giving of their money and their substance to the house of god and so as
a result what happens well if the lord's economy is going to diminish well his ministers are going
to diminish because they can't even survive they can't even provide for their financial needs
so what do they do they flee under their own fields and they're just working regular jobs
just to pay their own bills and then what ends up happening the house of god is forsaken the house
of god diminishes the work of the lord diminishes look at the church doesn't tithe and give offerings
and give money to the church well then it's going to perish how do you think things are going to
flourish how are missions trips going to be accomplished how is evangelism going to be
accomplished how is the work of the lord going to be accomplished it's through the economy of that
church and that church needs to be thinking about its economy and of course you know we need good
stewards of that economy we don't want the pastors to be like eli's sons hafnai and phineas that are
wasting the lord's resources and making people abhor the offering of the lord because it's just
going to like little caesar's pizzas or something like that it's not actually going to evangelism
you know i was i was looking at the southern baptist convention recently and in order to
be a part of the southern baptist convention you have to donate a portion of your funds to their
cooperative fund or something and typically i think it's like understood as like maybe a 10
percent so it's like all the money that comes into the church they have to give like 10 percent of
their money to this cooperative fund and they give all this money to the cooperative fund
and then this cooperative fund then gives their money to another fund okay then they have to give
their money to this international missions board and then they have like another board that's like
for their I guess domestic stuff or their more local stuff or something and of course anytime
you're passing it to these boards these boards have all these different ministers and all these
different conferences and stuff so it's just like just watering down the amount of money it's like
they're saying you give money to the church and then it gets watered down to this corp this like
fund and then it gets watered down to the next fund and then finally like gets to the missionary
and and boy it's just like this this jewish trick of how much they just water down that money
until it actually gets to the mission fund and then you get to the missionaries and they're
just sitting there just learning how to try to do like du lingo or something you know they're
trying to you know there's some mexican trying to learn japanese trying to reach 1.5 people a year
okay and and then you're kind of sitting here thinking like people are giving millions and
millions of dollars to try and reach the world with the gospel and then it's like what percentage
of that money is even getting there that seems so dishonest it just seems so corrupt it seems like
so inefficient like how would you feel if you're giving all this money to missions and then you
find out it's like 60 cents on the dollar wouldn't that be kind of frustrating if you're like giving
money all this missionary work and they're like well actually we only send 60 percent of the money
to the missions field or 50 percent or 40 i mean what percentage would you be okay with you know i
kind of like a hundred i don't know about you but i would be kind of i feel ripped off i feel jipped
if it was like oh you're only getting you know a small percentage and then of course these
charities in this world are always known for doing this kind of weird jewish trick stuff where they're
just siphoning off the top and ripping people off look you're gonna hurt the missions work when
you're not actually giving them the funds when it's being misappropriated not used correctly
just put in the in the wrong bucket or something like that i mean this is just an evil idea it's
an evil concept you wouldn't want to be doing this and look this is happening all over the world today
where it just you're starving out missionaries and good churches and the work of the lord and look
that is going to not help in the spiritual battle against the devil because the devil seems to have
unlimited funds they keep printing it's called the fed all right i mean the jews seem to never run
out of money how is it fair if christians are having to sit over here with nickels and dimes
like that doesn't make sense right we should be trying to put some of our effort and money and
energy into the work of the lord go to first corinthians chapter number nine go to first
corinthians chapter number nine we need to adapt or die and look if we want the world we reach to
the gospel we need to adapt and not say hey we're going to allow our missions funds to get so watered
down that it now it's just a tiny percentage of what's actually being used why don't we try to
be more efficient and maximize the funds that are being used for missions well we do a lot of
do-it-yourself missions because we know you're not going to waste your own money going on the
mission strip you're not going to you're not going to just take like your money set aside from the
mission strip take half of it and just burn it you're going to probably use your money pretty
wisely because you actually care and and how much more would it be that the church and the Lord's
money be used wisely to get people saved we want to make sure that the missions and the missions
work and the missionaries and the pastors and the deacons and the evangelists we want to make sure
that they're well taken care of why so they can take great care of the work of the Lord so their
churches can thrive so the pastors can thrive so that the work of Lord doesn't diminish 1st
Corinthians chapter 9 look at verse 7 who goeth a warfare any time of his own charges who planted
the vineyard and eateth not of the fruit thereof or who feedeth the flock and eateth not of the
milk of the flock he's saying it would not be effective if a nation had to go to war and
everybody has to pay their own way buy your own uniform buy your own rations buy your own gun
bri by your own ammo i mean there'll be people on the battlefield like i don't want to shoot
because i don't want to like this this ammo is expensive man i mean think about the actual like
legit guns you know these like you know a 50 caliber i mean that ammo's fat that guy that
goes quick you sit here and just you're just dumping brass i mean who has the bank account
to actually fund their own brass to fund their own helicopter to fund their own fighter jet to fund
their own tank to fund i mean how's that even gonna work no it's the government it's the the
collection of the pool of funds that's funding the troops going out there and they're just like
let's just shoot until we run out of ammo i don't care it's like all right load it again you know
they're not sitting here thinking like man i gotta pull out my own i gotta pull out my zelle or
something i gotta pull out my venmo and make sure you know did you really want that i mean
think there's churches out there that charge for tracks i want you to you're just like sitting
you're just putting like hey preserve bible on the door here's a sodomite deception you know here's
this you walk up to the door and you're like you get a sodomite deception you get a sodomite
it's like i don't want you to sit here like i don't know if i want to hand this person a
sodomite deception you know it's like hey you make a movie and it's like hey i really this is an
important truth for 15 dollars what like really i mean look this is just silly it's like if you
actually want the truth to get out there you're going to try and supply your your salesman your
ambassadors with stuff for free you want them to do a good job you want them to have liberty you
want them to go out there and just dump the mag okay you want them to dump the mag you don't want
them to sit here and feel like i don't know if i can spend my money on this shell says say i these
things as a man or say if not the law the same also for it is written in the law of moses thou
shall not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn does god take care for oxen or say
it all together for our sakes for our sakes no doubt this is written that he that plow should
plow in hope and that he that thresheth in hope shall be partaker of his hope he's saying look
the guy going out there on the front of the battlefield the guy out there in the hottest
part of the battle should know like man if i do a good job i'm going to be rewarded i'm going to
be taken care of i get to you know be a partaker of the fruits of the work that i'm doing not
someone just left out to the hottest part of the battle retreated from and just abandoned to just
die because you won't give him the economic supply line you know i'm not pro hitler okay don't hear
me wrong okay i'm not saying that i wish the nazis won but you know the nazis are pretty stupid in
the sense that they they invade russia and they take over this large section of land and instead
of retreating and making sure that the supply lines are taking well care of during the winter
they actually stayed on the front lines you know due to pride and arrogance and a many many nazis
and germans died through the harsh winters because of supply line issues because of just being just
cannon fodder for the russians and if they had retreated and just kind of basically made sure to
take care of their supply lines we might have a different europe you know in the same way it's
just like hey sometimes you have to make sure you're taking care of your supply line because
if you're not taking care of your supply this is why if you go on a mission strip with pastor
shelly your supply line is not going to cut cut off i mean you go with me this is like man that was
awesome that's the best meal i've ever had you're not sitting here thinking like here's a half PB&J
sandwich that got melted on the car ride over you know it's not like we're going to sit here and be
like hey you're in a foreign country and it's expensive and we just want you to not get any
food or not have any supplies or not have any water i mean you look that's not going to make
people want to go again if people are sitting here like man i was just dying of thirst and i
didn't get any food and i didn't get any sleep and it was just it was awful again i'm not saying
that we just pay everybody's way people have sacrificed themselves people put a lot of money
and effort and energy themselves but at the same time i don't want to be accused of the guy cutting
off the supply line i don't want to put people in the hottest part of the battle and withdraw
from them and say hey just figure it out just make it happen just go sleep in the cold in the snow
and do whatever you want no no no god takes care for oxen and how much more should i want to take
care of oxen take care of the guy actually going out there but look if you are running a farm
you want to make sure that your cows are well taken care of they're well fed that they're strong
that they're not going out there just working the field to death you don't want to work them to death
you want to make sure they're provided for and taken care of and at the end of the day sometimes
you have to adapt to make sure that they're well taken care of so that you don't die because when
you cut off the supply line that's actually producing the fruit god's like i don't care
about anything else you need to figure out a way to keep the supply line going to your troops
i mean was it more important for hitler to just have every luxury at his own disposal or have all
the money flowing to him or to his troops you know it's probably more important that he took
care of his troops than it was he takes care of himself that he takes care of all his parties and
whatever and again i'm not saying that he didn't have the money i don't know maybe his incompetence
pride obviously god didn't want that to be the case where they just took over the entire world
okay he wanted uh europe to still be a divided nation and have a bunch of weirdos and freaks
there i guess i don't know but go over to proverbs chapter 14 go to proverbs chapter 14
you have to make sure that you're taking care of your economy this is true of of literal warfare
if you run out of money you run out of funds you run out of supplies it's gonna be rough for you
but another thing is you run out of troops it's gonna be bad for you now if you think about the
civil war there was a big problem there because the union had like endless troops compared to the
south the south was actually a lot more fierce better soldiers better at shooting but here's a
problem there just wasn't many people and so as a result of that the union could spare and they
could just throw troops at you and even though you're better hey you just have enough troops to
just keep throwing you can just water it down and whittle it down and get to a point where you can
can just win through attrition. You can just win. I mean, how do they win at the Alamo?
They didn't win through being better fighters. They just had, you know, like two trucks with
like 5,000 guys in them and it just, you know, they just never ran out of guys. Sorry, there's
a lot of jokes there, right? But it's just like, hey, why did they win at the Alamo? They
just overwhelmed them with troops. It's said that many of the fighters of the Alamo, you
know, they're killing five to one, 10 to one, 100 to one ratio. They're way better fighters.
They're way better defenses. They're way better at, you know, killing. But here's the problem.
If you have 5,000 men, you just get overwhelmed eventually, and you just get destroyed in
the same way that, hey, if we don't have troops, we don't have laborers, we don't have people
going out preaching the gospel, we could get overwhelmed by the sheer volume of the enemies
of the Lord. I mean, there's so many enemies of the Lord. There's so many people that want
to attack and destroy, and that's why it's important to have troops. Now, this is, of
course, true carnally. This is, of course, true when it comes to the spiritual fight.
You know, if you don't have enough men power, you can lose. Why is the movie 300 such an
interesting movie or story? It's that somehow 300 men could keep like thousands, hundreds
of thousands, even possibly millions of troops at bay because they found a bottleneck and
they're able to basically just kind of like keep them there. But as soon as they get around
them and they surround them, they immediately die. Again, this is a legend. This is a story,
but the battle of the 300 Spartans and they're fighting. And it's like, while they have this
little bottleneck and it's just one on one, they're good. But as soon as they get surrounded,
it's just immediate doom. And in the same way, you know, if you don't have enough troops,
you can just be overwhelmed. Even if you're a superior warrior, it's like, hey, this is
the best wide receiver out there. But if it gets tripled teens, it just made us, you can't
really survive. That's why you need another wide receiver. That's why you need another
guy out there. You need a running back. That's why you need other players on the team because
you can't just win with just one guy, right? I mean, that's what LeBron had to learn, right?
I'm just kidding. You got to have some teammates, right? I mean, hey, you got to have somebody
on your team that can help you. You need more troops. You need more players, even in God's
economy. Hey, one person can't reach the entire world of the gospel. You need multiple people
out there. You need a Scottie Pippin to pass it to, right? You need somebody. Proverbs
chapter 14, look at what it says in verse 28. The Bible says, "In the multitude of
people is the king's honor, but in the want of people is the destruction of the prince."
You know what? There's nothing impressive about having no army. Hey, we have no troops.
Good job. And again, in the spiritual fight, it's just not that impressive. Now, here's
the thing. Let's apply this to churches. A small church, is there anything wrong with
a small church? Technically, no. A church can be planted. A church can be small. But
here's the thing, staying small, there's no glory in staying a small church because then
you're just going to accomplish small things. There's no glory in just never reaching people.
There's no glory in just not getting people saved. I mean, the Bible says if you're abiding
in me, you're going to bear forth much fruit. So, here's a question. How can you be abiding
in Christ and bearing no fruit? If you're bearing in Christ, if you're abiding in Christ,
the Bible says you're going to be bearing much fruit. Show me a guy that's bearing
much fruit and I'll show you a guy abiding in Christ. Show me a guy bearing no fruit
and I'll show you a guy not abiding in Christ. Because when you get plugged into Christ,
he's a bright and shining light. There's power. There's the Lord's favor. You're going to
tell me the God of the universe is going to pour all of his spirit, power, might, influence,
resources and angels into a guy and it's going to produce nothing? That makes no sense.
I would think that it's going to cause an uproar. It's going to turn the world upside down.
It's going to get a lot of people saved. It's going to piss a lot of people off. It's going
to cause people to die. Like there's going to be action. You know what I mean? You can't
hook it up to a live wire and expect no electricity. And in the same way, if you see just no troops,
no influence, no people, it's just kind of like, what's the point anyways? What's the
glory anyways? And so you know what a church should do? They should adapt. If you're reaching
no one, adapt. If you have no troops, adapt. Countries that have no troops, you know what
they do? They immediately adapt. And you know what they do? I'm going to join a big country.
It's like Israel's not stupid. They're like, we are screwed. We have no troops. We're 15
million people. They've always been that way, right? Before World War II, after World War
II, I don't know how, it just stayed the same, right? There wasn't like a six million dip
or something. But you know what they did? Hey, let's buddy up with the United States.
Why does NATO even exist, folks? Those little tiny European countries can't defend themselves.
They need to say like, "Hey, I'm joining up with this guy. I'm going to be buddies with
this guy." Because they realize if you just are buddies with no one, you will perish.
You got to have some troops. You got to have some people on your side. You got to have
some buddies. You got to have some teammates. That's why alliances are even formed.
Why did Hitler join up with the Italians? Why did he join up with the Japanese? Because
he realized he can't do it on his own. He can't just take on the entire world literally
by himself. He had to basically bring in some other people with him. He had to even make
alliances. Why does the UK take on America? Because they need alliances. Look, if you
play risk and you never make a temporary alliance, you're going to fail. You can't just sit
here and piss everybody off and think you're going to win. You got to kind of have to be
like, "Hey, we're buddies, right?" And then later, you know, you're going to pull the
Jewish trick and you're going to be like, "I'm going to attack you now." And here's
the question. Why did you eventually betray him and turn on him? Because he has a low
amount of troops. If he had a huge amount of troops, you're going to keep being like,
"We're buddies, right? We're friends, right?" You wouldn't just sit here and just attack
him when he has all these troops and you have no troops. That's just a death sentence. You
have to adapt or you die. Every single game, this is life, this is church. I want to go
to another place and talk about one more point. Go to 2 Chronicles chapter 26. Here's another
way you should adapt is technology. And boy, this is crazy. There's been so many battles
and wars over the history of our planet, of our lifetime, where technology was the main
reason why a particular victory was had. Not because of the economy, not because of the
number of troops, but surely because they had a technological advantage. And by having
a technological advantage, well, you're going to win the battle. You're going to win the
war. And let me tell you something, technology is not the devil. I don't know, let me say
that again, right? Technology is not the devil, okay? There are people out there that think
technology is literally the devil, and they're so anti-technology in general. This is not
a biblical concept. Second Chronicles, chapter 26, look at verse 9. "Moreover, Uzziah built
towers in Jerusalem at the corner gate and at the valley gate and at the turning of the
wall and fortified them. Also he built towers in the desert and dig many wells, for he had
much cattle, both in the low country and in the plains, husband also in vine dressers
in the mountains and in Carmel, for he loved husbandry. Moreover Uzziah had a host of fighting
men that went out to war by bands according to the number of their account by the hand
of Jiel, the scribe and Messiah, the ruler. Under the hand of Hananiah, one of the king's
captains, the whole number of the chief of the fathers of the mighty men of valor were
2,600. And under their hand was an army, 300,000 and 7,500 that made war with mighty power
to help the king against the enemy. And Uzziah prepared for them throughout all those shields
and spears and helmets and harbingers and bows and slings to cast stones. And he made
in Jerusalem engines, invented by cunning men to be on the towers and upon the bulwarks
to shoot arrows and great stones withal. And his name spread far abroad, for he was marvelously
helped till he was strong. Now if you think about what we just learned, notice that this
guy cares about economy, doesn't he? Did you read that? Where you notice that he said he
had all of this like money, much cattle. He's a husband man, he's a vine dresser. Notice
he loved husbandry. Hey, this is a guy that cares about producing fruit. Did you notice
he had numbers of troops? And it wasn't just like, we don't care about numbers. It's like
300,000, 2,600. He cares about numbers here, doesn't he? And then not only that, they like
technology. They invented cunning devices to defend themselves and to protect themselves
from what? From the enemy. Because these things are important. Now, of course, when you do
these things, you will be strong. I mean, if you have great economy, you have great
troops, number of troops, you have superior technology, you will be on the top of the
food chain. You will be America. America, best economy, generally speaking. I mean,
we have plenty of troops. I'm not saying we have the most, we have plenty. But you
know what really causes America to be the superpower of the world? Technological advantage.
Through technological advantage is why we're superior, is why we have... And of course,
we spend more money on our defense, on our military, than many of these other countries.
That's why we're so safe. That's why we live so peaceably. Because we have the strong arrows
and we have all these things on our towers that can shoot down and basically cause us
to win the victory. But of course, what's the danger? What's the negative? Well, verse
15, I'm sorry, verse 16, "But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction."
Of course, when you're at the top of the food chain, you can become prideful. We should
always avoid being prideful. But the problem was not being successful. The problem was
not doing these right things. The problem was that he allowed himself to be prideful
when he got successful. So, of course, we always need to be humble and we need to realize
that the horse is prepared against the day of battle, but safety is of the Lord at the
end of the day. Let me tell you something. Technology is not the enemy. Technology is
your friend. Technology is why you live in such a safe country. Technology is why America
is so prosperous. Technology is a good thing that can be used for good things. Now, look,
anything can be abused. Anything can be taken advantage of. Anything can be misapplied.
But at the end of the day, technology is not the problem. I want to go to go to Genesis
chapter 11, go to Genesis chapter 11. There's a story in the Bible about the Tower of Babel
and God comes down and He disperses mankind abroad. And you could kind of take this story
and just run with it in a bad direction. And one of those would be like saying, oh, the
problem here is technology or something. But that's not the problem. And really, if you
think about the story, the technology is not super high tech, okay? I don't know if you've
read this story. Let's read verse three. This is the technology that they had. And they
said one to another, "Go to, let us make brick and burn them throughly." And they had brick
for stone and slime they had for mortar. So they had bricks and pitch. Do you think this
is like rocket scientists? This is genius level. Do you think anybody thought of like,
hey, we could make a brick and we could put some slime on it? This isn't high tech, okay?
It wasn't the technology that was the problem. It wasn't even high tech. It was low tech.
It's just, let's put some bricks together, okay? What's the point? They want to reach
into the heaven, okay? And then again, sorry for you flat earthers, they weren't trying
to get to the actual heaven where God is. Sorry you don't understand the Bible. Heaven
here just means sky. This is what you would call a skyscraper. They want to build a big
building, a big tower. What's the point? So they can have a name, lest they be what?
Scattered throughout the earth. This is what they say, verse four, and they said, "Go
to, let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven, and let us make
a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth." So, man just wants
to stay together, have this skyscraper city, and they don't want to be dispersed. They
don't want division. God doesn't like this, and he says in verse number six, "And the
Lord said, 'Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language, and this they
begin to do, and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.
Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand
one another's speech, so the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all
the earth, and they left off to build the city.
So what happens?
They want to be one, God wants them to be divided.
God wants them to be scattered, and of course God likes division.
Have you ever read Genesis chapter one?
He constantly is dividing things.
He's dividing the light from the dark.
He's dividing the waters from the land.
He's dividing the day from the night.
God is a God of division.
Jesus Christ came down from heaven and he said, "Think that I've come to give peace
on earth?
Nay, I say a sword."
He says in other parallel passages, "Yea, rather division."
God wants division.
From what?
The good and the bad.
He doesn't just want them all together in some Democrat city that's run by the Democrats,
okay?
He doesn't want evil to just be able to take over.
And whenever everything's one, it's just more corruption.
There's not going to be as much division.
And I believe that is what we're reading from the story.
If you're going to walk away from the story, you have to say it's about the scattering.
It's not about technology.
It's not like when people left, they didn't build cities again.
As soon as they leave, they build cities again.
Kane built a city as soon as he left.
Cities have always been built.
Cities were continuing to be built.
It's not that they had low tech.
I mean, you look at places near India and stuff, they had some of the most advanced
technology ever around this time.
They have all kinds of river systems that they're using for their advantage for plumbing
and water and agriculture.
I mean, you look at some of these ancient civilizations, I mean, they're building pyramids,
they're building towers, they're building large buildings.
They had plenty of technology.
God didn't seize technology.
He just wanted them to be scattered.
But then some people, they read the story and they're just like, "Heck bad."
Okay, now there's a group like this called the Amish.
And you know, I heard an example this week and they said, "Hey, I have a Tower of Babel
with me."
And they said, "This is the Tower of Babel."
I said, "Do you know what this is?"
It's the Tower of Babel.
Let me explain something to you.
This is a mouse.
All right?
Nothing wrong with it.
It's not going to hurt you.
They said, "Oh, well, you know, yeah, we need to be careful with this thing.
It's a Tower of Babel, folks.
We need to be afraid of the mouse."
Look, this isn't going to harm you, Amish.
This isn't going to hurt you, Mennonite.
This isn't going to hurt you, little Luddite.
And look, there are people that want to avoid all technology, they're called Amish people.
And what's so funny about it is they're hypocrites because it's not that they're avoiding technology,
they're avoiding certain technologies.
It's not like the Amish are just avoiding technology, they're avoiding certain technologies
that are random and arbitrary because it's a cult, it's a cult.
And look, when people are trying to get you away from technology, it's a cult, it is not
of God.
God is not against technology.
Again, Amish wants you to be away from TV, radio, internet, smartphones.
They don't want you to have cars because then you'll travel away from family and form outside
friendships.
They don't want you to have phones because then you'll actually talk to people that aren't
in your family.
They don't want you to have mass media, which distracts from the Bible.
They don't want labor saving devices, idiots, okay.
And they don't want any individualism.
Look, this is what a cult is.
A cult doesn't want you to talk to somebody else and be like, bro, he sounds like you're
in a cult, man.
Hey, technology didn't hurt you.
Hey, did you know that you can actually read your Bible on your smartphone?
It doesn't even have to.
Look, you can be a sinful, wicked person and be in an Amish culture.
Look, I've talked to people that were Amish and he says everybody's committing adultery,
everybody's getting drunk, everybody's committing all the same sins that the regular world
is committing.
It's not like they're over there just having so much fun, plus they preach a false gospel
anyways.
They don't even believe the Bible anyways.
You know what?
Mass media is not keeping them away from the Bible.
They're keeping themselves away from the Bible and good doctrine.
And you know what?
Be afraid of any person or any group that's trying to get you away from technology, away
from family, saying, "Hey, you need to get a new culture."
You know, don't get a technology job.
There's some pastor that got up and said, "Hey, if you're getting a job in software
or tech, you need to quit immediately.
You need to stop getting a job in that technology field."
'Cause AI.
What?
So the whole world's going to be taken over by software?
You should avoid software.
Why?
How does that even make sense?
Now look, I understand that AI is going to disrupt a lot of industries.
I understand that, hey, in times past, they were just hiring anybody with a heartbeat
to go and type some code and it got a little soft.
Software got a little soft, okay?
I get that a lot of people are losing their jobs right now in the tech industry.
You know what?
A lot of people are doing better than ever in the tech industry too.
And you know, this is what's so funny.
The same pastor got up and said, you know, you don't want to get a tech job because it's
dangerous.
You know what you should do?
Be a farmer.
Yeah.
You 18-year-old guys, become a farmer.
I know you don't have any land, any agriculture experience, any farm equipment, any government
contracts.
Quote, become a farmer.
But, you know, in the 1900s, like 30% of our workforce was farmers.
Now it's like less than 1%.
Why would you go back?
It's like, oh, become blue collar.
Look, I'm pro blue collar work.
I'm pro blue collar jobs.
But let me tell you something.
Life is not about becoming blue collar or white collar.
You know what it's about?
Adapting.
Because whether you're blue collar or not, you need to constantly adapt and improve so
that you don't get left behind.
And a white collar, you have to adapt or you're going to get left behind.
Look, in software, you have to adapt or you'll get left behind.
My dad was a computer programmer for IBM and he learned older programming languages
and he worked until they became all obsolete and then he was obsolete.
I know what it's like.
If you don't adapt, you will die in any industry, in any environment.
And I remember working for a technological company, for a software company, and my bosses
told me, they said this, "Every single day, 90% of the work I do, I don't even know how
to do yet."
They're saying, "Every single day of my life, I have to figure out how to even do it.
I don't even know how to do it yet."
That is a pressure, but you know what?
They have to adapt or they're going to die.
Computer programming languages change all the time.
If you're not learning the new language, you're going to be left behind.
If you're not learning the new software, you're going to be left behind.
If you don't adapt AI, you will be left behind, absolutely, okay?
But it's not this scary thing that's like now no one's going to have a job.
And look, just telling every single person just become a plumber, just become an electrician,
we know that has consequences too, because look, if you just have thousands of people
all wanting the electrical job, you know what happens?
Wages get lowered.
I have like 50 guys that want to work for me.
I can pay even less.
I can pay even lower wages.
What happens if our government just annexes and just brings in even more illegals, just
grants them amnesty or grants them more citizenship, what kind of job do you think they're going
to take?
Look, just going into blue collar work, there could be a lower ceiling.
I'm not here to demonize blue collar work.
I think it's great.
Because let me tell you something.
You learn the trade of being an electrician, you learn the trade of becoming a plumber,
and you start your own company.
You could make more money than any white collar person.
Look, if you want to make wealth, I've already preached that sermon, okay?
And at the end of the day, owning your own business is typically the greatest way to
have financial security and have financial success.
But you know what?
When you own your own company, you better adapt or die, too, because you don't keep
your customers happy.
Look, there's no safety in this world.
You know, you have to constantly do adapt or die.
Don't be afraid of technology.
But here's the thing, because of technology, you have to adapt or die.
You don't create chariots.
The chariot country is going to come and invade you and take you over.
Why did the Ottoman Empire, why was it able to come and destroy the Byzantine Empire?
Because they had gunpowder and they put 600-pound rocks, stones into cannons and fired them
at their castles.
And you know what?
That castle that they thought was so safe, when you have a 600-pound cannonball flying
at you, it's not so safe anymore.
And it failed due to technology.
You have a superior navy, you lose, or you win, you lose to the superior navy.
And of course, it just keeps escalating, right?
It was men on foot, then it's on a horse, then it's on a chariot, then it's the boats,
then it's the aircraft, now it's space.
And of course, these things are important.
You don't keep adapting, you will die.
Hey, if you want to be successful in the workplace, be a constant learner, constantly forcing
yourself to grow, learn new things, challenge yourself, adapt or die.
Hey, you want to be a successful Christian?
You need to constantly adapt by reading the Bible, memorizing scripture, going to church,
being challenged with good sermons.
Don't go to a church where they're just going to tell you, "You're so wonderful."
Greatest church ever.
Let's not even count numbers anymore.
Everyone's a winner.
Participation trophy to everyone.
Everyone gets a little Caesar pizza.
You know, these are called Luddites is what they're called.
In the 1800s, skilled textile workers were afraid of automated machinery.
So you know what they did?
They started just destroying the machines.
They would literally go into the textile factories and they would just destroy the machines because
they were so afraid of them.
It made me think of these people that are trying to take down 5G towers.
You know what I mean?
They're like, "Jesus!"
They're going, they're just trying to like throw them down.
Look, you can't throw them down fast enough.
They're going to keep building them faster than you could tear them down.
You know, they're anti-big tech.
There's neo-Luddites.
These are new people that are alive.
They're anti-big tech.
They don't want you to do anything with AI.
They're afraid of self-driving cars.
It's like, dude, have you seen some of the people that drive?
Self-driving cars is going to be an upgrade.
You know what I mean?
I mean, think about this.
If we had self-driving cars, we would have no women drivers because they definitely didn't
program the car.
I'll tell you that.
These people only want to use flip phones.
They're just afraid.
You know, we have to have the flip phone.
It's, look, that's an advanced technology.
Isn't it funny that they just cherry pick?
I want 1990s technology because that's not of the devil, right?
They, they say only do trade jobs and they don't want you to go into any of the tech.
Look, technology is not our problem.
You know what's good about technology?
When someone like Pastor Steven Anderson uploads all his sermons to YouTube and reaches hundreds
of thousands of people.
When all the old IB didn't want to do it.
And you know what?
Because they don't want to adapt, they're going to die.
Because they don't want to replace their doctrine with replacement theology, they're
going to die.
Because this younger generation isn't idiots and they're not going to sit here and chill
for Israel.
Look, go find me an 18-year-old, 20-year-old that loves Israel that's not being paid by
Israel.
And even he doesn't like them.
He just pretends like he does.
Look, you better adapt or you're going to die.
You've got to get people in your church.
And look, these old Ivy Churches, they're losing on all of these fronts.
Their economy is going to be hurt when every boomer is dying every single day.
Just another boomer, just another boomer, just another boomer.
They have no more troops coming in because they're losing the youth.
And their technology is really poor.
They're not adapting to technology.
I want to be an early adopter of technology.
I want to use technology.
I'm not afraid of this.
And, you know, people are misunderstanding this.
They're like, "Oh, no one could ever build this," or whatever.
Okay, but, you know, that could be said of literally like any product that we have today.
If your claim is, "I'm going to put you on a deserted island, make it," you couldn't
even make the nice hammer from Home Depot if I put you on a deserted island.
You're not going to be able to figure out how to make rubber and steel and you have
a very crude hammer.
You just kind of have a rock loosely tied together with some kind of a vine you found
on a big stick and this is your hammer.
We would all probably just die.
I'm sorry, I know you think you're, there's maybe a few people here, but I'm just saying
most of us would probably die if just put on a deserted island, you know.
You're not going to know how to do virtually anything.
The globalization which causes us to have cheap products made from manufactured products
all over the world is not your enemy.
And it's not the Tower of Babel.
You know what it is?
It's 1 Corinthians chapter number 12.
You know what it says?
That there's many members in one body.
This is 1 Corinthians chapter number 12.
This is saying you have to have all of these parts in order to make this.
And let me tell you something.
A church needs many members in order to have a successful body.
We need the nose, and the eyes, and the ears, and the kneecaps, and the appendix, and all
the parts that seem to be the least comely, hey, God's going to give them even more honor.
Because we need every single part of the body.
And you know what?
There's nothing wrong with being dependent because we're all dependent.
There's these people that are prideful and they think, "Oh, I'm going to have a built
truck, not a bought truck."
Look folks, no one has a built truck.
No one went on a deserted island and built an engine.
No one went on a deserted island and built.
You just assembled parts, congratulations.
You're not better than everybody else.
These farmer types typically want to think that they're better than everybody because
they can do manual physical labor.
That doesn't make you better than anybody.
Having a white collar job doesn't make you better than anybody.
We all have our role to play.
We all have our specialized knowledge.
We all have our expertise and we have to combine them together to create a great product.
You know what?
This church is not one person.
If y'all showed up to one person, you know what?
It would probably be in my house, which wouldn't happen because we just had a baby, so I don't
think we're meeting at a park.
If there's no one there, there's no one for me to scream at and yell at.
No one to laugh at my lame jokes.
You know?
I mean, look, this King James Bible is a product of so many different people and so many different
technologies.
Hey, I'm glad they went to China and got the printing press.
Hey, I'm glad they went to China and got paper.
You know, China is known for four really important things, gunpowder, paper, the printing
press.
This is my notes.
There's a fourth one.
Does anybody remember?
What is it?
Noodles.
Yeah.
Copying everybody else, right?
I don't know.
Look it up.
There's like four things.
Oh, compass.
Look, the compass is awesome.
Hey, you know, the compass isn't a bad thing.
It's like some people are afraid of compasses even.
They're afraid of digital compasses.
They think that no one even knows how to use a compass anymore.
It's like, you know, in times past, if you were lost in the woods without a compass,
you'd have to like look into the sky.
You might have to determine like where's the North Star.
You might have to determine the trajectory of the sun to try to figure out where east
and west is.
Because obviously you can kind of tell, right?
You can tell where the sun's setting and be like, okay, well that's obviously west.
Or it's coming up, hey, that must be east.
Or hey, hey, there's a North Star, that's where I'm headed.
But today, you have a compass and you're just like, bam, north.
You didn't even have to try.
That's not a bad thing.
Compasses didn't hurt people by not having to use these obsolete skills of identifying
these things in the sky.
And having a digital compass doesn't harm our society.
Having the ability to just pull up a King James Bible on your phone like this is not
a bad thing.
Being able to ask AI, "Hey, is the earth spinning?" and for it to tell you, "Yes, you're an idiot
if you don't believe this," is a good thing.
But isn't it interesting that people that don't like technology are idiots?
They're going to stay stuck in the past and they're going to destroy themselves.
AI is not going to harm you.
You know what?
I believe AI is making me smarter every day.
Look, I'm able to ask AI questions every day.
I use AI all the time.
I'm constantly learning and growing.
I'm growing at a faster rate than ever before.
Learning more.
Being a software developer, I've never been able to accomplish more work in my life.
I've been able to accomplish months of work and just days being a software developer.
And let me tell you something.
They're not going to get rid of every software developer.
Now, the green-haired freak that just sat around and ate latte, drank lattes all day
and did nothing, yeah, he's probably going to be gone.
And I'm not super sad about all the San Francisco layoffs, okay?
But at the end of the day, you know what, there's room for technology jobs.
There's room for blue-collar jobs.
There's room for all kinds of jobs.
Many jobs of the future don't even exist yet.
My dad, when he was trying to become a software developer, he was going into an industry.
They said, "The job that you're going to get doesn't even exist yet."
Not a problem.
But you know what?
You got to adapt.
What is the lesson?
Adapt or die.
You're going to have to constantly adapt.
Plumbers are going to have to learn how to use AI tools.
Farmers are going to have to use AI tools.
I don't care what job you have.
AI is going to make you and force you to adapt.
And if you stay soft, you're going to die.
If you're a church and you stay soft, you're going to die.
As a church, we need to stay adapting and embracing the word of God and constantly improving
and getting better.
That's why you need hard preaching.
Otherwise, you might just become a gross person.
You know what?
We want to make sure that we're constantly adapting and growing.
Technology is not the devil.
We want to make sure that we're improving our economy, our troops, our tech.
Why?
Because the work of the Lord is important.
And you know when we allow these things to go by the wayside, you know what we're really
doing?
We're just showing contempt for the things of God.
I want to use every tool, every resource, and every troop that we have to get as many
people saved as possible.
I don't want to leave anything on the table.
And you know what, I would rather be embarrassed and get more people saved than just be afraid
of correction.
Than be afraid of being shamed, afraid of being wrong, afraid of having to adapt, afraid
of having to grow.
You know, if you want to make more money, you're going to have to grow.
You want to be successful in this life, you're going to have to grow.
You want to get more people saved, you're going to have to grow and be stretched beyond
your comfortable little life, your comfortable little means.
And if you don't, look, the enemy will come in and destroy you anyways.
You can sit here in your castle, but then they're going to come with that six hundred
pound stone, and they're going to shoot it through your castle.
You got to have God on your side.
And it's so important, please believe John 15, if you're not bearing fruit, you're in
dangerous territory.
If a church isn't emphasizing the first works, they're in dangerous territory.
We have to repent, and we have to make sure that we're right with God, and we have to
adapt or we'll die.
Let's close in prayer.
Thank you, Heavenly Father, so much for your word.
Thank you so much for giving us an opportunity to grow.
I pray that you would help press the importance into our hearts and our minds of the gospel
of getting people saved.
You'd press into our hearts and minds the importance of growing, of getting knowledge,
of receiving correction, of constantly pressing ourselves and pushing ourselves to be better
versions of ourselves, to learn more, to grow more.
I pray that you wouldn't allow people to be afraid of change, afraid of technology, afraid
of growth, afraid of correction, afraid of hard preaching, afraid of the enemies of this
world.
I pray that you would cause us to have more knowledge and more growth and more success.
And as we grow and we have success, that we wouldn't allow ourselves to forget that it's
you that gives us that success.
It's you that gives us that knowledge.
It's you that gives us that wealth.
We wouldn't be prideful or lifted up.
We'd be humble.
But we're humble enough to use what you've given us.
In Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.
Alright, for our last song this morning, let's go to song number 379.
Song number 379, "Bringing in the Sheaves."
Song 379, let's all sing that out together.
[singing]
Great singing everybody, you were all dismissed.