book of 2 Samuel chapter 1, 2 Samuel chapter 1.
If you don't have a Bible,
there should be one underneath the seat in front of you.
2 Samuel 1, 2 Samuel 1, the Bible reads,
"Now it came to pass after the death of Saul,
"when David was returned from the slaughter of the Amalekites
"and David had abode two days in Ziklag.
"It came even to pass on the third day that behold,
"a man came out of the camp from Saul with his clothes rent
"and earth upon his head.
"And so it was when he came to David
"that he fell to the earth and did obeisance.
"And David said unto him, 'From whence comest thou?'
"And he said unto him, 'Out of the camp of Israel am I escaped.'
"And David said unto him, 'How went the matter?
"'I pray thee tell me.'
"And he answered, 'That the people are fled from the battle,
"'and many of the people also are fallen and dead,
"'and Saul and Jonathan, his son, are dead also.'
"And David said unto the young man that told him,
"'How knowest thou that Saul and Jonathan, his son, be dead?'
"And the young man that told him said,
"'As I happened by chance upon Mount Gilboa,
"'behold, Saul leaned upon his spear,
"and lo, the chariots and horsemen followed hard after him.
"And when he looked behind him, he saw me and called unto me.
"And I answered, 'Here am I.'
"And he said unto me, 'Who art thou?'
"And I answered him, 'I am an Amalekite.'
"And he said unto me again, 'Stand, I pray thee upon me,
"'and slay me, for anguish has come upon me,
"'because my life is yet whole in me.'
"So I stood upon him and slew him,
"because I was sure that he could not live
"after that he was fallen.
"And I took the crown that was upon his head,
"and the bracelet that was on his arm,
"and have brought them hither unto my Lord.
"Then David took hold on his clothes and rent them,
"and likewise all the men that were with him.
"And they mourned and wept and fasted until even,
"for Saul and for Jonathan his son,
"and for the people of the Lord,
"and for the house of Israel,
"because they were fallen by the sword.
"And David said unto the young man that told him,
"'Whence art thou?' and he answered,
"'I am the son of a stranger in Amalekite.'
"And David said unto him, 'How was thou not afraid
"to stretch forth thine hand to destroy the Lord's anointed?'
"And David called one of the young men and said,
"'Go near and fall upon him.'
"And he smote him that he died.
"And David said unto him, 'Thy blood be upon thy head,
"for thy mouth hath testified against thee,
"saying I have slain the Lord's anointed.'
"And David lamented with this lamentation
"over Saul and over Jonathan his son.
"Also he bade them teach the children of Judah
"the use of the bow,
"behold it is written in the book of Jasher.
"The beauty of Israel slain upon thy high place,
"how art the mighty fallen.
"Tell it not in Gath,
"publish it not in the streets of Ascalon,
"lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoice,
"lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph.
"You mountains of Gilboa, let there be no dew,
"neither let there be rain upon you nor fields of offerings,
"for there the shield of the mighty is vilely cast away.
"The shield of Saul, as though he had not been anointed with oil.
"From the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty,
"the bow of Jonathan turned not back,
"and the sword of Saul returned not empty.
"Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives,
"and in their death they were not divided.
"They were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions.
"Ye daughters of Israel, weep over Saul,
"who clothed you in scarlet, with other delights,
"who put in ornaments of gold upon your apparel.
"How are the mighty fallen in the midst of the battle?
"Oh, Jonathan, thou was slain in nine high places.
"I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan.
"Very pleasant has thou been unto me.
"Thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.
"How are the mighty fallen and the weapons of war perished?"
Brother Drew, will you pray for us?
- It's not gonna be a pleasant sermon for me to preach,
but I'm gonna preach it anyway.
Look down at your Bible at the last verse in that passage.
It says in verse 27, "How are the mighty fallen
"and the weapons of war perished?"
As Christians, we are the chosen to be the soldiers
of Christ, it says in the New Testament
in the book of Timothy.
And as Christians, we are also considered priests
and kings, as in the book of Revelation.
And sometimes God has people that are considered
his leaders that are, I would say that they're comparable
to like mighty men in the Old Testament.
And obviously, this passage here is in the Old Testament,
so I'm making spiritual application from this,
which the Bible certainly allows.
And so, you know, sometimes there's casualties in war,
sometimes leaders in a cause, in the fight that we call,
you know, the fight for the kingdom of God.
You know, sometimes the mighty men fall in battle.
And in this passage, this is where we see Saul,
or we hear about Saul being killed in battle,
but this guy is actually not really telling the truth.
Saul actually took himself out in reality.
This guy probably just witnessed it happen,
or he came upon him after he was already dead.
Doesn't really exactly tell us what happened,
but it tells us how Saul died,
but it doesn't say how this guy, you know,
what this guy saw, what he didn't actually see.
But we'll get to that in a bit.
But we are also called to be instruments of war.
We are tools in the hand of the Lord.
And, you know, he wants us to be meat for the master's use.
And, you know, whether we die, you know,
'cause we all die as all men do,
and whether that's prematurely of our own accord
because of how we choose to live our life,
it's sad when things like this happen.
And of course, many of you might already have heard,
and if you haven't heard,
I'm gonna tell you now that Pastor Roger Jimenez,
the man of God that started this church,
and he was the pastor of Verde Baptist Church,
planted our church here called Verde Baptist Vancouver.
He resigned as the pastor yesterday due to moral sin.
Who has not heard that?
Who's this, you did not know this?
You didn't know?
So yeah, he resigned and I made sure
that I text him to get it from himself that this was true.
Now, of course, there's some ex bozo
that's saying that they're for other reasons,
but I've already looked into all that
long before this even came about,
and I don't believe it.
And in his text message to me,
he said it's not about that,
it's not about any accusations like that,
it is something different.
And if you look on the Verity Baptist Church Facebook page,
you can see what he said.
He doesn't say why exactly,
he just says it's for moral sin.
But all sin, you know, it's, I just, I don't know why.
I didn't ask him why,
and if he hasn't told everybody else why,
he's probably not gonna tell me why.
But I just wanted to get it from him directly,
and because people were texting me
and asking me questions about it.
So, I felt like because pastor ministered our church,
and a lot of people, you know, still respect him,
and still love him.
And, you know, I just, I felt like, first of all,
that I needed to tell you about it if you didn't know,
and also that I wanna preach a sermon about it.
And maybe, you know, now you're just now hearing about it,
some of you, like a great many of you,
are just now hearing about this,
and you're not maybe sure how to feel about it.
No, he said that nobody pushed him out,
nobody made him do this, he's quitting on his own accord,
and he said he's sorry that he let us down,
but that it was hard for him to make this decision.
Verity Baptist Church is without a pastor,
Oliver, Brother Oliver's not gonna take it over,
so they're gonna be looking for a new pastor,
and I'm sure that their church is devastated.
So, I mean, I'm devastated.
I don't think it's a good thing.
I don't think it's something to rejoice about.
So, you know, obviously, there's been a lot of problems
in the last year and a half that have happened,
but I'm not gonna bring up anything negative
this morning about him,
and I'm just going to preach a sermon out of this passage
kind of about how we should respond to things
when it comes to situations like this,
and I just think that it's important
to see how David responded to the situation
that he had with Saul.
Saul was his boss.
Saul was his leader.
Saul was the king of Israel.
Saul was anointed by the Lord,
and there's two accounts as to what happened
with this guy that comes forward
and tries to tell David this, you know,
how Saul died and David gets the story from him,
but of course he lies.
I don't know if David ever knew that he lied or not.
Maybe the Lord kind of gave that
to him in Revelation later on,
and he definitely knows for sure now,
but you should be careful what you say
and the things that you repeat
because you don't know what kind of accountability
that you're going to get because of it.
And the fact that he just said
that he killed the Lord's anointed
was enough for David to say,
just go fall upon that guy and kill him.
And that's what happened.
So, but anyway, so if you want to see his full statement
that he released publicly,
you can go to the Verity Baptist Church Facebook page
if you have Facebook,
or you can have somebody else do it for you.
But I would also like to remind people
that we're not to receive an accusation against an elder
without two or three witnesses.
And the witnesses must agree under questioning
and scrutiny.
And that's why I don't believe the account
that some idiot out there is trying to put forth.
And a lot of people don't believe it.
But just because the two witnesses contradict each other,
one of the witnesses wasn't even there
for whatever portion that they're trying to say,
that they don't know how to do math,
and they don't know how to get the ages and dates right
and things like that.
So anyway, the Bible says,
and let's turn to Deuteronomy chapter 19 verse 15.
Deuteronomy chapter 19 verse 15.
And I just kind of want to give a couple introductory
passages before we get into the main service here,
or the main sermon.
So Deuteronomy 19, 15.
And this is something that I really want to drive home
to our church because it's real easy to take things
that people say and believe it without having any evidence.
So, and again, he already said that he sinned.
Pastor Mendez already said that he sinned,
he's admitted it, he just hasn't said what he's done.
And so we gotta be careful with speculation
'cause we just don't know for sure.
If you, I mean, we can surmise and we can speculate
all we want, but you just don't really know.
So I would just caution you to not do that.
Deuteronomy 19, 15 it says, "One witness shall not rise up
"against a man for any iniquity or for any sin
"in any sin that he sinneth, at the mouth of two witnesses
"or at the mouth of three witnesses
"shall the matter be established."
Does it say any sin?
Yes it does, doesn't it?
So you should not ever come forward against somebody
without multiple witnesses when it says any sin,
it means any sin, right?
"If a false witness rise up against any man
"to testify against him, that which is wrong,
"then both the men between whom the controversy is
"shall stand before the Lord, before the priests
"and the judges, which shall be in those days."
And, you know, the modern day of that would be Matthew 18.
That's how you will deal with that.
But it says, "And the judges shall make diligent inquisition."
So notice that they have to ask questions.
"And behold, if the witnesses be a false witness
"and have testified falsely against his brother,
"then shall you do unto him as he thought to have done
"unto his brother.
"So shalt thou put evil away from among you."
Now, again, we're in the New Testament,
so if someone was planning on murdering somebody
or something, we can't really do anything about that situation.
We would have to just turn out into the police or something.
But in the case of someone owning someone money,
something like that,
less someone bumps somebody's car in the parking lot,
those things we can just say,
"Hey, you should pay them back," or whatever.
So, and it says, "Then shall you do unto him."
Okay, verse 20, it says,
"And those which remain shall hear and fear
"and shall henceforth commit no more such evil among you,
"and thine eyes shall not pity,
"but life shall go for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth,
"hand for hand, foot for foot."
Now, our modern day way of dealing with this
would be to just, you know, get them out of our church.
So, now turn to 1 Timothy chapter five, verse 19.
1 Timothy chapter five, verse 19.
The Bible says, "Against an elder,"
but pretty good there.
"Against an elder," 1 Timothy 5.19,
"Against an elder receive not an accusation,
"but before two or three witnesses,
"then that sin rebuke before all that others also may fear.
"I charge thee before God and the Lord Jesus Christ
"and the elect angels that thou observe these things
"without preferring one before another,
"doing nothing by partiality."
So in other words, just because you like somebody
better than the other person
doesn't mean that they're right automatically, okay?
So you have to judge each case based off the evidence
and not based upon who you like better.
It's not a popularity contest of who's right or wrong.
You can't just say, "Well, I don't like that person,
"so they're automatically wrong."
That's not how things work.
But that seems to be how it works
in today's justice system.
But just know this that I have analyzed that false story
and that there's more holes in that story
than the Iraqi Navy fleet.
And again, the math doesn't add up.
So just set that to the side.
And if you wanna look into it,
you're more than welcome to look into it.
I'm not gonna stop you.
But if you don't know what I'm talking about,
then just talk to me after church.
So my first point of the sermon is,
bad tidings with ill intent.
We should know why we're telling and repeating a matter.
What is the purpose of the reason
why we're bringing something up?
You know, if you know something
and you're trying to bring it forth to other people,
why are you doing it?
You know, it's important to kind of have
the right motivations for doing things.
I'm not saying hide what's going on or anything.
I'm just saying it kind of matches with the story.
What was the Amalekites, what was this guy's intent?
What was he trying to do?
Was he trying to do just a nice thing and tell David, "Well, this is how Saul died.
I just wanted to let you know so you could just see he fought to the bitter end," or
something like that.
No, that's not what his point was.
So let's go back to our text and look at verse number one.
So this guy is a bad guy, and he has ill intent in telling David this.
And he's acting like he's bringing back the crown and bringing back his bracelet for some
noble cause.
And he's basically trying to suck up to David and try to get some kind of advantage.
You know, he's an Amalekite, and the Amalekites are like the sworn enemies of the children
of Israel.
Look at verse number one.
It says, "Now it came to pass after the death of Saul, when David was returned from the
slaughter of the," what's it say there?
"The Amalekites.
And David had abode two days in Ziklag.
It came to pass on the third day that behold, a man came out of the camp from Saul with
his clothes rent and earth upon his head.
And so it was when he came to David that he fell to the earth and did obeisance.
And David said unto him, From whence comest thou?
And he said unto him, Out of the camp of Israel am I escaped.
And David said unto him, How went the matter?
I pray thee tell me.
And he answered, That the people are fled from the battle, and many of the people also
are fallen and dead.
Saul and Jonathan his son are dead also.
David said unto the young man that told him, How knowest thou that Saul and Jonathan his
son be dead?
And the young man that told him said, As I happen by, chants upon Mount Gilbo.
Yeah, he just happened to be walking by, right?
Behold Saul leaned upon his spear, and lo, the chariots and horsemen followed hard after
him.
And this part makes me think he had to have seen this from some sort of vantage point.
Because that is true.
He was being followed hard after by the Philistines.
And it says, "And when he looked behind him, he saw me and called unto me, and I answered,
'Here am I.'
And he said unto me, 'Who art thou?'
And I answered him, 'I am an Amalekite.'
And he said unto me, 'Stand, I pray thee, upon me, and slay me, for anguish has come
upon me, because my life is yet whole in me.'
So I stood upon him and slew him, because I was sure that he could not live after that
he was fallen, and took the crown that was upon his head and bracelet that was on his
arm, and I brought them hither unto my Lord.
So David's asking him the right questions, and trying to just get a feel for what, you
know, I think he just wanted to generally know what was happening here, and what exactly
happened.
So now let's look at verse one again, and this is kind of a big part of the puzzle here.
It says, 'Now it came to pass after the death of Saul, when David was returned from the
slaughter of the Amalekites, and David had abode two days in Ziklag.'
And this guy is an Amalekite.
So what's his motivation?
He's probably just trying to get in tight with David so he can betray him somehow, spy
on their army, because the Amalekites hate David.
They hate the children of Israel.
He's just trying to suck up.
He's an enemy of Saul.
Well, he probably knows that David has been tracked all over the place, and that Saul
is trying to murder David.
So he's probably not thinking that David's a righteous man.
He thinks that David's going to respond in a different way.
But David responds to the way that God wants him to respond, because David's a man after
God's own heart.
Because a lot of people, if they were being tracked everywhere they went, they would not
respond the way David did.
A lot of people respond, "Well, I'm just going to kill him," or, "I'm going to make sure
I get my revenge," or whatever.
And David wasn't like that.
David doesn't say a negative thing about Saul in this whole passage.
As a matter of fact, David laments the fact that Saul is dead.
David laments the fact that this happened to Saul.
And even though Saul was trying to kill him, I mean, David protested with Saul.
He tried to get Saul to stop chasing him.
He showed him that he could have killed him a couple times, but he even felt bad about
just cutting a piece of his clothing off.
But is that how most Christians respond when someone's attacking them?
No.
Is that how most Christians respond when some other Christian is attacking them?
No.
That's not what you really see.
You see that people want to defend themselves all the time.
And look, sometimes, you know, you do kind of got to defend yourself.
But in this, I'm just saying that in this case, you know, if David's a man after God's
own heart, what he did here was right.
How he responds here is right.
And so he says in verse, well, turn up, keep your finger here and turn over to first Chronicles
chapter 10.
But he probably thinks that David's going to be like, oh yeah, you killed him?
Well here, let me give you some rewards for what you did.
Because he's thinking this is how I think, this is what I would do, this is what a worldly
person would do, this is what a human parasite would do that is not a Christian that's not
saved, this is what I would do this.
He probably thought David was going to be like, oh thank you for killing Saul, I'm glad
he's finally dead.
That's not how he responds though.
But look at what the real story is.
And the Philistines followed hard after Saul and after his sons, and the Philistines slew
Jonathan and Amenadab and Malchizuah, the sons of Saul, and the battle went sore against
Saul and the archers hit him and he was wounded of the archers.
Then said Saul to his armor bearer, "Draw thy sword and thrust me through therewith,
lest these uncircumcised come and abuse me."
But his armor bearer would not, for he was sore afraid.
So Saul took his sword and fell upon it.
Where's the part where he talks to the Amalekite in there?
Do you see that part?
Who's the person that's telling this tale?
This is the Holy Spirit, this is the narrator of the Bible saying this.
So when the narrator of the Bible says something, that's what the actual truth is about the
subject.
So, because nobody else was there to witness this, and I'm sure that the Amalekite isn't
the one that wrote this, all right, because he's dead.
Not three days later, he's dead.
And when his armor bearer saw that Saul was dead, he fell likewise on his sword and died.
So Saul died and his three sons and all his house died together.
So I would say this, that we should look inward as to the reasons why we share bad news.
This guy was not sharing this bad and ill news for anything other than to self-serve.
And some people just want to cause problems.
Some people just want to share the news, these kinds of bad news and things like this, to
cause problems or to get some sort of an advantage to suck up to people that they think might
be like, "Oh, you're a good boy.
Thank you for doing all that."
And some people will twist the stories to their own advantage and to get favorable outcomes
later.
We really should look inward inside of us and see the motivations of why we do things,
what the purpose is for us doing things.
But we should also wonder about someone else's motivations for telling stories and just make
sure that they are telling the truth.
We shouldn't just take everything that people say at face value.
I'm not saying just like that we should not believe anything anybody says, but we should
also have a little bit of skepticism and not just believe everything.
Because sometimes people could tell us something and it's like that game telephone or whatever
where it's gone around so many times and you're getting different facts from different people
that they got wrong too.
When a story gets repeated, you know, the Bible is perfect and yeah, the Bible is perfect,
but our conversations that go around aren't perfect.
And we're going to mess it up.
So we really should pay attention and make sure that we know that what we're repeating
is the truth.
And so that's, that's just something that we should learn as Christians to not just
repeat everything we hear because we don't know whether it's true or not.
And we should find out, you know, what, you know, think about what, like what motivation
do they have to say this?
And our intuition is good and reliable in a lot of cases.
You know, sometimes you have that intuition like, Hey, maybe I shouldn't walk down the
street at 11 o'clock at night by myself.
That's a good thing to listen to.
Listen to that voice, that still small voice in your mind saying, Hey, that's a dumb idea
or that dark alley in New York City at midnight and you're by yourself and you have no weapons.
I mean, it's just not a smart idea or maybe just walking through a pack of gang members,
you know, late at night.
I mean, there's, you know, walking into a person's yard, it has a picture of a pit bull
and says, beware of dog.
They will kill you.
Really?
I mean it, you know, I mean, it's just, there's just things that we shouldn't do.
And when our alarm bells go off, we should listen to those things.
But our intuition isn't always right either.
Sometimes we think people are doing things that they aren't really doing, and sometimes
we can work, we can work up these theories in our minds that aren't really true.
And so we do have to be careful with that too, because we are fallen, we are sinful,
and so we just gotta be careful with that.
So our intuition is good and reliable in a lot of cases, but sometimes it is wrong.
So number two this morning, the response of David and his men to the news of Saul's destruction.
Let's look at verse number 11.
It says, "Then David took hold on his clothes and rent them, and likewise all the men that
were with him."
So David didn't say, "Good boy, thanks little lap dog for killing Saul."
No, he took his clothes and rent them.
Not that guy's clothes, he took his own clothes and rent them.
This is just a sign that, you know, it's just an hour showing that you're upset, that
you're, you know, visibly upset about something.
And it says, "And they mourned and wept and fasted until even for Saul and for Jonathan
his son and for the people of the Lord and for the house of Israel because they were
fallen by the sword."
And so they weren't like, "Oh yeah, these guys have been chasing me around trying to
kill me.
Oh, I'm glad they're dead.
Yeah.
Now, David, we can just anoint you king and everything's all good now."
Is that how they acted?
No.
They're upset.
They're bitterly weeping.
They were mourning.
They were fasting until even.
And they were sad that the people of the Lord died.
They were sad that the nation of Israel was being crushed.
And you know what?
There's a church out there that's hurting right now.
And I think that we should be very careful about how we respond to this.
And look, I'm not going to be anybody's babysitter on the internet.
I'm going to tell you what you should and shouldn't say.
But I'm just telling you, I'm just trying to show you this morning, how did David respond
in a similar situation where, look, Pastor Mendes didn't die, okay?
And, you know, I think God's got a second chances.
I'm not saying he's going to be a pastor again or something like that, but, you know, is
that the end of his story?
I mean, I hope not.
I hope that he gets things right, whatever he was doing wrong, and that he can move on
and serve God with his life, you know?
I don't want to see him crushed and not serving God.
I want to see him serving God.
I mean, it's not like he didn't do great things for God or something.
So he did do great things for God.
So it's not like he's just reprobate unto me now or reprobate unto, you know, it's like
he just, people are just too quick to throw people out as trash and their pastor minutes
had a lot of great years in the ministry.
So I'm not going to just throw them in the garbage can.
So at least I'm not going to, you can do what you want, but I'm not going to do that.
So but it says they were upset.
They're visibly upset.
They're actually weeping.
It wasn't fake tears.
Those were real tears.
They fasted and they mourned for all those people.
But first notice how it says it puts them in order.
It says for Saul.
I mean, he's the one that out of all the people, he would think, "Well, David probably wouldn't
care about weeping over Saul, but he does care."
And it says, "And David said unto the young man that told him, 'Whence art thou?
Where are you from?
Were you from, homie?
What set you claim?'
'Nah.'"
And he answered, "I am the son of a stranger in Amalekite."
And I'm sure right then and there, it's like David's got the alarm bells going off.
"Didn't I just get done killing all these fools the other day?"
And he's coming to tell me this and David said unto him, "How was thou not afraid
"to stretch forth thy hand to destroy the Lord's anointed?"
And David called one of the young men and said,
"Go near and fall upon him."
And he smote him that he died.
And David said unto him, "Thy blood be upon thy head
"for thy mouth hath testified against thee,
"saying I have slain the Lord's anointed."
And look, I mean, just apply it in our modern day.
Obviously, pastors aren't kings, I understand that.
But pastors are still leaders and pastors are still
to be respected in that way and to sit there
and just trash everything he's ever done for his whole life
and for all the ministry that he's done
over the last year and a half or whatever
is not right either.
So I don't think it's proper to just reprobate him
or obviously I haven't seen anybody doing that exactly,
but I have seen some pretty bad comments out there
for as much as I've been on, which hasn't been much.
But people that have been safe for a couple of years,
trashing a guy that was a good man for a long time.
I'm not saying he's not a good man now, he's saved.
I mean, he's probably baptized more people than you have.
He's probably got more saved people than you have.
I mean, not saying that it's a comparison either,
but I'm just, you know, it's like,
you're still wet behind the ears, boy.
And he did more like in the first year than you have.
I don't know, I think that when you see the response
of David, when you compare it to how you see people
acting now, it's just, it's disgusting.
And I'm not saying that some people don't have the right
to be upset because I know that they do.
But somebody that has, I mean, some of these young
Amalekites, I don't feel like that they,
they're not thinking about the things that they're saying.
Because it's not like, you know, first of all,
nobody knows what he did.
And you know, if it turns out there was some horrific thing
that he did, then obviously I might reconsider
some of the things I'm saying, but I mean,
as far as I know, it wasn't anything that would deserve,
you know, just completely throwing them in the trash.
So anyway, it says, and David said,
how was I not afraid to stretch forth thy hand,
destroy the Lord's anointed?
David called one of the young men and said,
go near, fall upon him, and he smote him that he died.
David said unto him, thy blood be upon my head,
for thy mouth is testified against thee,
saying, I have slayed the Lord's anointed.
So he said, I have slain the Lord's anointed,
so he testified against himself.
And so David put him to death.
That's why I said, be careful about the things you say,
because they can come back to haunt you.
You know, I'm sure he might've said,
doesn't record this, but he might've said,
I was just kidding, I really didn't mean that.
That didn't really happen.
It's like, no, too late, buddy.
You already said what you had to say, you know?
But even so, he's still bearing false witness
that he did something that he didn't do.
And then David's probably thinking,
well, this guy's a bad guy anyway.
Why is he telling me this?
Why is he lying about the story?
So again, we should be careful
about what we say about a man of God.
And you know, you're like,
well, he's not a man of God anymore, okay?
Well, really, because we're all,
everybody that's saved is a man of God,
everybody that's saved is a woman of God.
I mean, you know, again,
we're not supposed to be respecters of persons,
but it's not a light thing.
Just because Pastor Mez resigned
doesn't automatically give us carte blanche
to say whatever we want.
And people kind of get this attitude like,
you know, if someone does something wrong,
that you can just hold that against them
for the rest of their life.
Obviously, I know this is new, this is all whatever,
but still, I mean, you don't really know all the details.
Don't just go around thinking that you know everything
and then just acting like a jerk about it.
But let's turn to Psalm 105, verse 13.
Psalm 105, verse 13.
And really, we should be careful how we talk
to any child of God in reality.
It says in 105, verse 13, it says,
when they went from one nation to another,
from one kingdom to another people,
he suffered no man to do them wrong,
yea, he reproved kings for their sakes,
saying, touch not mine anointed,
and do my prophets no harm.
And obviously again, we are priests and kings
unto the Lord in the New Testament,
so I believe that this would probably apply
to all Christians.
That's why it says that we're not supposed to,
who are we to judge another man's servant?
And we should be careful just what we say
and how we say it about people.
And I think that I'm probably guilty of doing this too.
I'm not saying that I'm perfect or something,
that I have not really just ripped on people
that I probably shouldn't have or gone too far before
'cause I know I have.
But that's why we grow and mature in the faith, right?
But we know for a fact that this is a song of David.
We know for a fact it is.
And so he's saying this,
that we're not supposed to touch the Lord's,
he's saying touch not my anointed
and do my prophets no harm, that God said this.
And so David acts this out and says,
hey, if someone's gonna say that they killed
the Lord's anointed, well, guess what I'm gonna do to them?
I'm gonna kill them.
Because he just, Abimelech didn't even do anything to Sarah
and God came to him in a dream and said,
I'm gonna kill you unless you give back his wife.
Thou art but a dead man, is what he said.
And he hadn't even touched her.
He's like, I haven't even touched her yet.
He's like, you better not,
you better just give her back or you're dead, right?
So, but how do we know that this is David
in the Psalm 105?
'Cause sometimes it doesn't really say,
we don't really know, it just has those little headers.
Well, because it's something in the first Chronicles,
you don't have to turn there,
but first Chronicles 16, 21 says,
"He suffered no man to do them wrong,
"yea, he reproved kings for their sake,
"saying, 'Touch not my anointed
"and do not my prophets no harm.'"
And this is, so it's quoting this chapter,
first Chronicles chapter 16, verse 21 and 22,
is quoting the Psalm that he wrote in Psalm 105.
So again, we ought to be careful how we speak
about pastors, but also any Christian,
and make sure that what we are saying is true.
And we should also make sure our motivations
for saying what we are saying are pure,
and we should make sure that our hearts are right
about the reasons why we would say and do something,
and we should consider who's master that servant is,
because they don't work for us,
and they're not accountable to us necessarily.
So they're accountable to God,
and he's the one that judges, right?
And I'm not saying we're not supposed to judge, right?
I'm not being like Gandhi or something up here.
Well, obviously we can judge things,
and we're supposed to judge things.
But when it comes to the condemnation of someone
in this manner, you know, God is the one that does that.
So, you know, if you're saying that someone's a vegetarian
and they're weak or whatever,
I mean, the Bible does say that, but...
(laughing)
But we're not supposed to destroy people
over stuff like that.
Turn to First Corinthians chapter 10.
First Corinthians chapter 10.
Gabe, can you fill this up for me?
It's just water.
Thank you, buddy, appreciate it.
First Corinthians 10.
Look, I'm not saying we shouldn't call people out
when they do wrong or whatever.
I'm not saying that.
And I'm kind of a firm believer on pastors
rebuking pastors.
When pastors are fighting, obviously I think
it's perfectly acceptable for pastors
to fight against each other and so on and so forth.
I've already preached about that before.
And I think if someone's doing something
that's super wicked, it has to be called out.
You know, I agree with that.
But I just, when I see Christians just backing
their favorite pastor and just saying
whatever they want about somebody,
I just, me, I just find that repulsive and disgusting.
As does me though, I guess.
But I think other people think it too, so.
Anyway, 1 Corinthians 10, 11 says,
"Now all these things happen unto them for in samples,
"and they are written for our admonition upon
"whom the ends of the world are calm.
"Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth
"take heed lest he fall.
"There hath no temptation taking you,
"but such is common to man.
"But God is faithful who will not suffer you
"to be tempted above that you're able,
"but will with the temptation also make a way to escape
"that you may be able to bear it."
So the Bible's warning us here
and that we should take the old stories
in the Old Testament and the stories in the Bible.
These are given to us for in samples
and are written for our admonition.
So the story that we're in tonight or this morning
is another story or example that we can use.
And people say, "The pastors aren't God's men.
"The pastors aren't anointed."
Well, yeah, actually they are.
They are God's men.
They are anointed.
And so are you.
You're anointed also.
"We have an unction from the Holy One,"
the Bible says in the book of Hebrews.
So we have the anointing of the Holy Spirit
upon all of us if we're saved.
But God does use men to lead people.
He always has and he always will.
So for people to say that that's not true,
they're idiots 'cause they just are.
But the Bible also says that we can use these things
for in samples and we can make spiritual application
of these things, but what I really wanted to make sure
that you get out of this, though,
is that they're written for our admonition
upon who the ends of the world will come.
That's us, okay, that they're given to Christians
in the New Testament, "Wherefore, let him that think
"if he stand, standeth to take heed, lest he fall."
So it's real easy to get up and play Monday morning
quarterback on how somebody else should have done something
or how somebody else, you know, and then just sit there
and throw all this judgment at somebody,
but you better take heed, lest you fall,
because, you know, whatever measure you judge with,
you know, it'll be met to you also.
So, I mean, if you're just out there
just dealing death and destruction with your words,
you know, be careful because it can come back
to haunt you also, because maybe God will make sure
that you get called out publicly too.
And so we just ought to be careful the things that we say
and make sure that you're right when you say them.
Because it's embarrassing when you say something
about somebody that's not true and you have to walk it back.
So if you think that you're this high,
that you're this perfect, outstanding, stellar Christian,
and you're out there just flapping your gums all the time,
if you got some kind of sin in your life that's pretty bad,
it's gonna come back on you.
Let's turn to James 3.1, James 3.1, James 3.1.
The Bible says, "My brethren, be not many masters
"knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation."
If you're just trying to be the master of everybody
and the gatekeeper of the new ISB all the time
and you're the gatekeeper of righteousness
and everything goes through you,
you better be careful how many people
you're trying to be the master of
and how many people you're trying to be righteous over
because you might have a little bit of trouble with that
because the Bible says, "Be not many masters."
We shouldn't just try to be the Lord over everybody.
You're not the Lord of anybody.
God is the Lord over everybody.
But, you know, obviously everybody has their positions
of authority here on this earth.
But, you know, if you're not a master, you know,
it says, "Be not many masters."
Try not to have authority over so many people
that, you know, you're overextending yourself.
Look at Ecclesiastes 7:16.
Ecclesiastes 7:16, the last we turn to
before we get to the third point.
We're almost done with the second point here.
And in Ecclesiastes 7:16, the Bible says,
"Be not righteous over much."
So we're not supposed to be many masters,
but we're also not supposed to be righteous over much.
"Neither make thyself over-wise."
Why should thou destroy thyself?
So how would you destroy yourself?
By trying to be righteous over much.
Trying to be master over everybody.
Trying to be righteous over much.
You're the gatekeeper.
You're the one that's always just the most righteous.
You're the one that's always the most, you know,
trying to be lording over everybody
in the comments sections on YouTube and Facebook and stuff.
And you think that you're, you know,
some edgelord or whatever.
It's annoying.
It really is.
It's like, can't people just have the right
to feel any way that they want about something?
You know, someone's making fun of,
like someone putting crying emojis or whatever
on Pastor Menza's post.
It's like, those people have gone to that church for years.
They've had children born to them in that church
and raised their children in that church.
It's like, what, they don't have a right to be upset?
Who the hell do you think you are?
You're not the edgelord.
You're not the master of that church.
You're not the righteous one over that church.
People can feel how they want to feel.
And if they feel upset, then they feel upset.
It's not, that's not the church you go to.
Don't you worry about the church that you go to.
And stop worrying about everybody.
Start, you know, cleaning up your own backyards
and then, you know, stop knocking on the neighbor's door
all the time and thinking that it's your job
to just police everybody's internet comments.
It says, "Be not over much wicked,
"neither be thou foolish.
"Why shouldest thou die before thy time?
"It is good that thou shouldest take hold of this.
"Yea, also from this withdraw not thy hand,
"for he that feareth God shall come forth of them all.
"Wisdom strengtheneth the wise,
"more than ten mighty men which are in the city,
"for there is not a just man upon the earth
"that doeth good and sinneth not."
See, if you're trying to be righteous over much,
just remember this, there's not a just man upon the earth
that doeth good and sinneth not.
Everybody sins.
So, I mean, to just act like you're the cream of the crop
and you rise to the top all the time
and you don't do any wrong,
the Bible just exposes you right here.
"Also take no heed unto all words that are spoken,
"lest thou hear thy servant curse thee."
And look, people should be able to live down
some of the things that they say too.
Just because someone says something
in a time when they're in a bad mood
or whatever doesn't mean that you should just
hold a grudge against them for the rest of their life.
So people should be able to live stuff down
and just because someone did some things
that they shouldn't have done,
look, we can overlook those transgressions sometimes.
I don't like everything that everybody says
all the time either, but I can still look past them.
I can still be your friend.
So obviously, but if someone's just trying to be
some over, people that are just like overly over righteous,
over much trying to be everybody's master.
It's just like, you know, dude, you're single.
You have no spouse.
You have, you just, you haven't lived life yet.
So just settle down, you know?
And it says, for oft times also thine own heart
knoweth that thou thyself likewise has cursed others.
So you're worried about what everybody else is saying,
but what about you?
I mean, is the Bible wrong?
They haven't cursed other people?
No, they have.
So I'm just saying that you should think about
how righteous over much you wanna be
when you're not exactly as righteous as you think you are.
And you should not try to be masters over so much
when you can't even master your own life either.
That's all I'm saying.
Just think about the things that you're doing
before you do them.
Think about what you're typing in
and pushing enter on before you enter it.
And we should still give grace to people,
and you don't know what everybody's situation is.
So, again, there's a church down there
that's hurting right now.
They don't have a pastor now.
And, you know, Pastor Merritt still has a family.
So, I mean, there's things to think about.
So, and it says, "All this have I proved by wisdom.
"I said, I will be wise, but it was far from me."
That's an interesting verse there.
"All this have I proved by wisdom.
"I said, I will be wise, but it was far from me."
See, we say that we wanna do something a lot of times,
but we just don't follow through with it.
No, I'm gonna be wise about this situation,
and then you're just like, you just do the opposite.
It's 'cause we're sinners, we're sinful people.
So we just oughta be careful about how much destruction
we wanna throw on other people, that's all.
And point three is David chose to remember
the positive things about Saul, not the negative.
He didn't bring up the negative whatsoever.
Look at verse, back in our text in 2 Samuel 1, 17,
look at how he deals with it.
David deals with it.
It says, "And David lamented with this lamentation over Saul
"and over Jonathan, his son."
So Saul tried to murder David again
and have him killed multiple times.
I mean, he had to get 100 Philistine,
he tried to get 100 Philistine foreskins.
David brought him 200.
He's an overachiever.
I mean, I don't wanna get one.
I mean, that sounds pretty gross to me.
Like, I don't, ah, I'd be like,
have my armor bearer do that or whatever.
It's like the grossest thing I could think about.
But anyway, but Saul was just not good to David.
I mean, he was for like a short time,
but for the most of the time, he wasn't good to him.
And yet David doesn't even hint at this at the end.
You know, in this situation with Pastor Jimenez,
I'm choosing to remember the positive things
and great things he'd done for us,
for me personally, for our church.
And look at verse 18, it says,
"Also he bade them teach the children of Judah
"the use of the bow.
"Behold, it's written in the book of Jasher."
So he wanted to remember something that Jonathan did
that he had taught him
that he could pass on to other people.
And it's not like Pastor Mendes didn't teach me anything.
He taught me a lot.
He taught me things I still put into application.
And I'm sure he taught you guys things too.
And he got a lot of people saved,
and he got a lot of people baptized,
and he taught a lot of people the Bible.
It's not like he just didn't do anything for God.
And so I think that we can still take the positive things
about Pastor Mendes and his ministry,
and we can still use those and apply those things.
It's not like we just say,
"Oh, he messed up, so everything he did was wrong."
No, that's not true.
And it says in verse 19,
"The beauty of Israel is slain upon the high places,
"how are the mighty fallen?"
And it says, "Tell it not in Gath,
"publish it not in the streets of Ashkelon,
"lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoiced,
"let the daughters of the uncircumcised,
"let the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph."
And I'm sure that there's a lot of people
out there rejoicing today because of this,
because Pastor Mendes was very hated
because of the sermon that he preached
against the sodomites, and he just,
he still to this day couldn't have a YouTube channel
that would stay on for more than a few minutes,
and he did fight.
He was an instrument of war for the Lord,
and he was doing a great work for God,
and did do a great work for God.
It says, "Yet, ye mountains of Gilboa,
"let there be no dew, let there be rain upon you,
"nor fields of offering, for there the shield of the mighty
"is vilely cast away, the shield of Saul,
"as though he had not been anointed with oil."
And I feel like people are casting the shield
of Pastor Mendes away as if he was not anointed of the Lord.
Like all of a sudden, and I've seen this happen before
where it's just like someone was,
they're not necessarily some reprobate or something,
but then people act like they were.
Well, his preaching sucked anyway or whatever.
It's just like, well, nobody was saying that
when he was preaching and part of the new IP or whatever.
They weren't saying it then.
But now all of a sudden,
oh, his preaching sucked anyway, it was so boring.
It's like, I knew all along that they were bad.
It's like, shut up, you did not.
That kind of stuff's irritating.
But you know, I don't believe that.
I think that he was anointed with oil, so to speak.
So we need to remember the goodness
and positive things that he's done.
And many were saved, like I said,
because of him and taught the Bible.
Church was planted, our church was planted.
Pastor Stuckey's church was planted in the Philippines
and he's doing great things for God over there.
Many, many hundreds, many thousands of people
have been saved because of what Brother Stuckey is doing,
Pastor Stuckey's doing over there.
So, and we can't take that away from him.
So churches were planted, lives were changed.
And I know that he led a lot of people to the Lord,
even with his video.
So, and people that are like down about this,
don't lose hope.
We need to trust Christ.
That's why we don't put a man upon a pedestal.
This is an important lesson about that too.
We need to hope in Christ.
We should follow men as they follow Christ, but if they stop following or they give us
a reason to stop following them, then it's always we're following men that follow Christ.
And let's look at verse 22.
And hey, we should be positive.
Remember, we need to stay positive.
You know, people can get down about stuff like this, but we're always winning anyway
no matter what.
And we always will.
Look at verse 22.
"From the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty, the bow of Jonathan, turn
not back, and the sword of Saul, return not empty.
Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they were
not divided.
They were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions.
The daughters of Israel weep over Saul, who clothed you in scarlet, with other delights,
who put on ornaments of gold upon your apparel.
How are the mighty fallen in the midst of the battle, O Jonathan, that was slain in
nine high places?
I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan.
Very pleasant hast thou been unto me, thy love to me was wonderful passing the love of women.
How are the mighty fallen and the weapons of war perished?
It's a sad lament.
It really is, because when a man of God goes down, when any Christian falls out, it's a
sad day.
It's a sad day when he wants to walk away from church or walk away from the ministry,
and there's nothing good about it.
It's nothing to rejoice about it.
It's not like the newest scuttlebutt to me.
To me, it's sad.
To me, it's a day to not rejoice, and it's a day to mourn, just like David mourned.
I think it's a day to mourn.
It's a day to be upset, and I don't find any pleasure in it at all.
We shouldn't rejoice when the mighty weapons of war perish in the mighty fall, and when
great preachers and great Baptist churches perish, it's not a good thing.
I mean, do we need more Baptist preachers or are we less Baptist preachers?
We need more.
So, and I'm not saying if he was disqualified, I'm not saying that he should have stayed
pastoring, I'm not saying that, but it's just not a good thing when, you know, because
it's not like Pastor Mendes wasn't a powerful preacher, not as if Pastor Mendes wasn't
doing a great work for God, he was.
And I lament over losing a fellow soldier.
I went to battle with Pastor Mendes a lot of times, I went on lots of trips doing lots
of different things, I preached together with him quite a few times and I just lament over
the destruction that has caused Verity Baptist Church.
I do love Pastor Mendes, I do love Verity Baptist Church, but that doesn't mean that
I don't acknowledge that there were issues and that wrong things weren't done, I'm not
saying that, or that Pastor Anderson didn't have the right to be upset about some of the
things he was upset about, I'm not saying that, I'm not trying to take that away, but
I'm not trying to focus on the negative either, that's all I'm saying.
And that was between them two, and I already said I was going to get in the middle of
it.
If you say that our ordinations are invalid because ordaining pastors quit, or ordaining
pastors quit or fall into sin, I'll just tell you something right now.
I've never taught, and I never will teach, landmarkism, okay?
That's what they're trying to say, like, "Well, because Pastor Minnis had to quit, all the
pastors that he ordained are no longer qualified."
It's like, what are you, some kind of a Catholic or something, or some kind of, I mean, it
actually, there's, there's Baptists that believe this, and it's called landmarkism.
And it's like, basically, a church has to, you can, you're supposed to be able to trace
your churches back to John the Baptist and be able to know that they were a Baptist church
or whatever.
Like, we were at this fellowship thing when we went to a different church, and this church
was a missionary Baptist church.
And the missionary Baptists are big time in the landmarkism, which is basically that they
think that they can trace their lineages back all the way back to John the Baptist.
They really think this.
And this guy was telling me, he's like, I believe in it, but like, not as hardcore as
some people.
He said he was fellowshiping with this church and that they traced their church genealogy
or whatever of the church that he was fellowshiping.
This guy was tracing his church back and he said, sorry, we can't fellowship with you
anymore because we found out that a hundred years ago that your church did communion with
real wine.
So sorry, we can't fellowship with you anymore.
I mean, that's insane.
So I mean, I don't know where they get this idea that we taught that, that if you didn't
get ordained by like a certain pastor that, I mean, obviously we believe that someone
has to ordain you and you had to be qualified.
And if I got ordained by a church of Christ person or something, yeah, I don't think that
that's necessarily legitimate.
But if someone was saved and someone was already, I mean, I'm not a landmark person though.
I don't think that I have to trace back the people that ordain me to the end of John
the Baptist.
I mean, that's weird.
Here's what they say.
They say, that's weird, Southern Baptist movement that advocates for Baptist church exclusivity
and unbroken succession, holding that only local autonomous Baptist churches are true
churches.
In this view, valid ordination and pastoral succession are strictly dependent upon the
continuous traceable lineage of apostolic authority passed down through Baptist churches.
So someone says we're "briders."
That's what they mean.
Only Baptists are the bride of Christ and everybody else is going to be serving tables
for us in heaven.
I'm serious.
They believe this.
They'll be wearing little aprons up there serving us or whatever.
Here's the definition of landmarkism as it relates to the succession of pastors and ordination.
Succession of pastors.
Landmarkism teaches that a valid minister must be ordained by a local church that is
itself in a direct line of succession back to the apostles or specifically to John the
Baptist.
Chain link authority.
This is often referred to as linked chain church succession.
The ministerial lineage is not just a personal laying on of hands but a succession of authorized
scriptural churches that empowers ministers.
Exclusion of non-Baptists.
Landmarkers argue that non-Baptist ministers are not ordained by a true church and therefore
their ministerial acts including baptism are invalid.
Purpose of succession.
The goal of this chain unbroken lineage is to maintain the purity of the church ensuring
that doctrine and practices like believers immersion have been preserved without interruption
since the New Testament.
Ordination and authority.
For Landmark Baptist ordination is not simply a recognition of a call to ministry but a
transfer of authority from a valid mother church to a new daughter church or minister.
Essential mother-daughter authority.
Some interpretations of Landmarkism particularly those appealing to J.R. Graves suggest that
a new church must be constituted and a pastor ordained under the authority of a pre-existing
properly ordered landmark church.
Validity of ordinances.
Because ordination must come from a true local Baptist church, Landmarkers reject the ordination
of ministers from other denominations.
So that's basically what it is and this is basically what people, people have been saying
this for years that if so and so, you know, so and so, you know, went bad or they, you
know, they were out because of sin, that that means all the other ones, you know, how many
people could I, look, this is the purpose of being independent, okay?
Just because someone else, you know, people can sin and get out of the ministry.
That means that they're, they weren't legit when they actually ordained you.
That's a weird thinking.
It's a weird teaching and I don't believe that.
So it's just bizarre.
I mean, if you're ordained biblically by the way that you're supposed to be and, you
know, Pastor Meza saved, Pastor Meza is baptized.
He was, it's not like he just believes some weird things or something.
So let's look at Philippians and then we'll be out of here.
Philippians chapter four verse six, and so, you know, I just, and I just wanted to throw
that out there because I've heard that that's kind of going around that it's like, there's
this mission to make people not, not act like we're not qualified so that they could just
take away the qualifications of all the people that we've ordained and things like that,
or people's churches that we've set up.
It's just weird.
So you might be landmark Baptist people, but I'm not.
Okay.
So I don't believe in that and I'm not going to step down because my pastor stepped down.
It's just bizarre, right?
But I just wanted to put this in the end of the sermon because if you're feeling discouraged,
you feel like, I mean, because these kinds of things can rock people and that you might
not say it to me.
You might not say to people in here, but if you get discouraged about this, I don't want
you to be discouraged because look, again, we're always winning in the Lord and you should
probably try to think on positive things.
Obviously, yeah, lament, be sad over the situation and pray for those involved, but what's the
Bible say in Philippians 4, it says, "Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and
supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God.
And the peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ
Jesus."
Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things
are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are a
good report, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things.
These things, those things which you have both learned and received and heard and seen
in me do, and the God of peace shall be with you.
This is a very encouraging passage because when you're feeling down, you can just zone
in on this passage and obviously, you know, we shouldn't just be just worrying and full
of care like Jesus said that we're not supposed to be, you know, he said about Martha that
she's full of care, she's always just worried about getting all this other stuff done and
not worried about the things she should have been worried about like being at the feet
of Jesus and learning from him and he said that she's careful and had been troubled about
many things and we shouldn't be troubled about this obviously again it's sad, it's depressing
but you know we should also think about the things that are true, think about the things
that are honest, think about the things that are just and think about the things that are
pure and whatsoever things are lovely, that's what David did when he thought about the things
of Saul, was he talking about all the bad things that he did to him? Oh he's talking
about you know he's swifter than an eagle, you know he was like a lion, you know his
shield was anointed, he was you know he was this great man of God, that's what he focused
on the great things about Saul that were great about him, not about all the bad things and
how it made him feel, you know obviously he was still sad, he was still lamenting but
in the Lamentation he was still thinking about the great and positive things that Saul was
and how he clothed the women and all the nice beautiful things and you know Saul was a good
man in a lot of ways, he was saved but you know he messed up and so we shouldn't just
focus on people's failures and go inward with it and not taking pleasure in the fall of
our enemies, you know and Pastor Mendes is not my enemy but he might be some people's
enemy, some people might esteem him as his enemy but how are we supposed to treat our
enemies? We're supposed to love our enemies, do good unto them, pray for them you know
and not just go after them all the time and of course reparates is a different thing so
that's a story for another time. But we don't need to be these gatekeepers, tell everybody
how they need to react, tell everybody how they need to feel and just you know go after
them in the comment section. I just think that's bizarre, let people feel how they feel,
you're not the police of how everybody feels about stuff, just let them feel how they want.
Psalm 131, I'm not going to have you turn there, I'm just going to read it for you,
it says in verse 1, "Lord my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty, neither do I exercise
myself in great matters, or in things too high for me.
Surely I behaved and quieted myself, as a child is weaned of his mother, my soul is
even as a weaned child."
That's a good thing, it's a good way to think about things, don't get yourself involved
in matters that are too high for you, not everything's your business, not everything's
yours to know about, just this whole, what do you think you did?
So, if he wanted you to know then he would have told you, if he wanted everybody to know
he would have told everybody, so he doesn't want everybody to know obviously, and if God
wants everybody to know then he'll make sure that everybody knows, so until then I guess
we just, you know, I really don't care what he did, to be honest with you, I honestly
don't, I don't want to know, I choose to remember the great things that were done for the Lord
by Pastor Jimenez, the great works that he did and the great battles he won and the great
times we had together as friends and colleagues and I don't remember the great principles
and Bible doctrines that he taught me. That's what I want to remember. We should pray for
Verity Baptist Church for them to get a new pastor and to continue to reach Sacramento,
California, the United States and the uttermost parts of the earth. We should pray for Brother
Jimenez and that he could get past this and still continue to serve God with his life
and his family. We should pray for the people that are harmed from these events and have
some charity and we should think about how this would affect us if the shoe was on the
other foot because if you're not in that situation you don't know how it feels. So that's all
I got. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you so much for our church here and Lord, pray that you
just help Brother Jimenez and pray that you help Verity Baptist Church. Lord, it's a sad
time and it really has a lot of people heartbroken and confused. I pray that Lord you would just
cut through that confusion, help us to think on the things that are positive and remember
the things that were positive and Lord, for us to be thankful for the church that we have
and Lord, be thankful for the great Christians in our lives. I pray that you'd help us to
think before we say things, think before we post things and do things for the right reasons
and Lord, I pray that you'd just give us grace today as we go soul winning and for the
sermon tonight. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.