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

["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Second Ward Baptist Church. It's great to see you all here for our Sunday morning service. If you'd all please have a secret animal and open up that animal. Song number 22. We can begin this morning's service by singing song number 22, our lost in the blood. ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] Father God, we thank you so much for this church. In Jesus' mighty name, amen. Amen. Amen, thank you brother. Let's turn our handles to song number 13. Song number 13, let's Jesus bear this cross among us. Song number 13, let's Jesus bear this cross among us. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for everyone, and there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Let the world go free, for there's a cross for many. Between those sessions, I'm not really sure what to do yet for lunch. There's a couple options. So who thinks they'd come to the soul winning that Saturday? If you can't make it, you can't make it. I'm not trying to embarrass anybody. I'm just trying to get an idea of how many people would make it. So two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight-ish, nine. So about a dozen people. So all right. Well, I'm thinking probably just getting either Panda Express or maybe one of those six-footers from EG's. I was thinking a couple of those subs. So some chips and things like that. So I'm hearing EG's. I think it was from on high. So I heard a still small voice just said EG's. You know, must be the Lord. I've gone Baptist coastal up here, folks. So returning to Charismatics. I'm hearing voices. I'm seeing visions. I'm envisioning a large sub sandwich. It's probably because I didn't eat breakfast. But anyway, so we'll have something. Probably EG's. But if you can come out and help us with that, we'd appreciate it. But I also understand there's a lot going on. Also, speaking of volunteering, there's the signup back there for cleaning the building. So we need to have the building cleaned between the Sunday and midweek service. The schedule's back there. I'm probably going to redo that so it's more vertical and not this weird position so you don't have to write your name like this. So we'll redo that. But that signup sheet is back there. There's also a punch list underneath of that list. So if you ever show up, you don't know what to do, you just pull the punch list out. I probably have it laminated so you can kind of check it off. Maybe get a dry erase marker. Maybe make a little bit more of an official place. But, you know, all the cleaning. If you have any questions about cleaning, just come see me. I don't want to bore everybody this morning with details about the cleaning. But signup if you can. Also, on the back, there's just some mentions about some soul winning that has and will take place for our church. Of course, we had the Toronto Soul Winning Marathon, which I wasn't able to get to. I was sick while that went on. But we did have, up in Toronto, 36 soul winners at the height of the event with a total of 187 salvations over the course of that event. So it was a great success up there in Toronto. And then also, you might not even know this, but we have a church plant in Germany. And it's a smaller congregation, but they went out and they had 11 salvations and 5 soul winners were out soul winning. That was yesterday. And so that doesn't sound like something that's not noteworthy. Well, you know, there it is. That's a very, not exactly the most receptive place in the world to go soul winning is Europe. Obviously, there's probably pockets and places. I don't know a lot about it, but this is definitely something worth rejoicing over. So continue to pray for our church plant there in Germany that will continue to grow and that will eventually become its own thing out there as well in time. There's also the big soul winning trip to St. Lucia coming up on September 17th. If you can get yourself there, we're going to help you out with a lot of other things. But this is a great trip. I mean, it's going to the Caribbean, folks. If you've never been, there's going to be a lot of that kind of soul winning taking place to the Caribbean over the years. But if you can ever get to one of these trips, it's great if you've never been to the Caribbean. And it's a beautiful place to visit, go down there and win some souls, too. It's very receptive. So also, I want to mention, if anyone has any videos or photos of our church over the last, you know, since whenever the church started, if you could see me or get me those videos, I'm planning on putting together like an anniversary montage to play that Sunday morning. So if there's anybody out there that has videos on their phone or anywhere, just come see me and let's get that compiled so I can start working on that because I really don't have any, I have very limited video editing skills. So this is going to take me a lot of time. So the sooner we get that, the sooner I can start working on that and then we can have a nice little video to kind of, you know, remember the last five years. So if you have that, please come see me. Also, you've got a few more upcoming events below that. Take note of that. That'll do it for announcements. We'll go ahead and sing one more song before we get into the preaching this morning. Psalm number 46, my Savior, first of all. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know. I shall know, and I shall know. I shall know. I shall know if I shall know you, I don't know if I could live with you. I shall know if I shall know you, I don't know if I could live with you. I shall know if I shall know you, I don't know if I could live with you. I shall know if I shall know you, I don't know if I could live with you. Verse 1, the Bible is, Then we turned, went up, with the way of Asia, and God of Asia came out against us, and all his people, Abba, and Reah. And the Lord said unto them, Fear not, for we deliver him and all his people, and his land, to thy hand, and thou shalt do unto him, as thou didst have decided on him, king of the ambulance, and to our escort. So the Lord our God delivered him to our hand, Abba also, king of Asia, and all his people, and we smote him till none was left and him remaining. And we took all the cities, at that time, there was not a city, but we took not from them, three score cities, all the regions of Argo, the kingdom of God and of Asia. All these cities were vents, with highways, gates, and bars, beside them were all towns of great many. And we utterly destroyed them, as we did on the side of the king of Asia, utterly destroying the men, women, and children of every city. But all the cattle, and the spoil of the city, we took for a prey to ourselves. So we took at that time, out of the hand, the two kings of the Ammon, and the land that was on this side Jordan, from the river of Arna, to Mount Arma, to which Hermon, the Sidonians, called Syria, and the Ammon, and Ammon, it's called Shengar, and all the cities of the plain, and all Gilead, and all Bayshah, and the south of, and Reah, the cities of their kingdom, of Ah, and Bayshah, for only Ah came Bayshah, the maids, the remnant, the giants. Behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron, and all the land of Arna, and all Bayshah, and all Reah, the children of Ammon, nine Cubans was the length of it, and four Cubans the breadth of it, after the Cubans were banned. And this land, which he possessed at that time, from Arra, which is by the river Arna, and half of Mount Gilead, and the cities thereof gave items to the Reubenites, as the Gadites, and the rest of Gilead, and all Bayshah, being the kingdom of Ah, gave items to the half-tribe of Manasseh, and all the region of Arna, with all Bayshah, which was called the Man of Giants. Gilead, the son of Manasseh, took all the country of Arna, onto the coast of Beshurah, in the Aitetah, and called them after his own name, Bayshah, Eebah, and Gilead, unto this day. And they gave Gilead to the naked, and to the Reubenites, and to the Gadites, and gave them Gilead, even unto the river Arna, the capital valley, and the border, and even unto the river Jethro, which is the border of the children of Ammon, the plain also of Jordan, and the coast of Shenandoah, even unto the sea of the plain, even the salt sea, under Ashgab, and eastward. And I commanded you at that time, saying, Lord your God, I have given you this land to possess it, and you shall pass over it armed before your brethren, and show them visually all that are meek of the war, where your wives and your little ones, and your cattle, who know they have much cattle, shall abide in your city, which they have given you, unto the Lord, and have given rest unto your brethren, as well as unto you, and unto their possess also, the land which your Lord your God has given them, beyond Jordan. And then shall you return, and remand, which is possession, which I have given you. And I commanded Joshua at that time, saying, That I, as I have seen all of the Lord, your God have done, as these two kings, so shall the Lord give unto all the kingdoms, whether thou passest, who shall not fear thee, and will your God, who shall fight for you, and have assaulted the Lord at that time, saying, O Lord God, thou hast begun to show thy servant thy greatness, and thy mighty hand, for what God is there in heaven, or in earth, and to do according to thy works, and according to thy might, I pray thee, let me go over, and see the good land, that is beyond Jordan, that goodly mountain of Lebanon, for the Lord is wroth unto me, and for yourselves, and not here. The Lord said unto them, Let us suffice thee, and speak no more unto me in this matter, and get thee up, and to the top of this hill, and lift up thy eyes, and eat them westward, and northward, and southward, and eastward, and behold it, thine eyes, for thou shalt not go over this Jordan, but charge Joshua with courage and with strength, for he shall go over before this people, and he shall cause them to inherit the land which thou shalt see. So we invoke the vow of the Lord against God to do it. Let us pray for us. Amen. So I'm going to continue on and finish up the series I started a couple weeks ago on the three dread seas. If you remember, again, we used that analogy of the Red Sea crossing in ancient Israel, how they had to get through that sea, how that was something that they were faced with. They were looking back at the Pharaoh's army, whereas Moses was looking ahead at the obstacle that was before them. And that's something we need to learn to do in our Christian lives, understand that even though we've been saved and we've come out of the world, and we're endeavoring to walk with the Lord and to live a godly Christian life, there are still things we have to get over. There are still seas that we have to get over. There are still things that we need to get through, so to speak, in the Christian life. And honestly, this could be a very long series that we could just keep talking about all these different things. But for the sake of, you know, just moving along on other subjects, we're going to wrap it up today and talk about the last dread sea, which is the letter C, right? And some people, you know, when I started the series, some people were trying to guess what the next two seas were. A couple of people got last week's, but no one guessed what today would be. The last sea we're going to look at is the Sea of Cowardice. The Sea of Cowardice, or being a coward, or being fearful. This is something that the Bible talks about. It doesn't necessarily use that word, but it does talk about being afraid or being fearful or having fear. Or another way it talks about it is being ashamed, right, of being ashamed of the gospel, being ashamed of Christ, being ashamed of the man of God, being ashamed of these different things. This is something we have to get through in our lives. We don't want to live our Christian life fearful. Now again, just like the other seas, there were caveats there, right? Just like, you know, every time the Bible talks about fear, it's not necessarily a bad thing. Just like when it talks about complaining, often, you know, it's talking about praying and lifting up your complaint before the Lord. You know, so there's, we want to make sure we're getting fear in context, okay? We want to make sure we understand what cowardice is and what fearing, you know, what being afraid is, you know, in the context. Because there is a good fear, and then obviously there's things we should fear, people we should fear, then there's other people and things we should not fear. And if you're there in Deuteronomy, of course, this is where, you know, Moses is starting to rehearse their history and preparing the children of Israel to cross over into the land of Jordan. And he's talking to Joshua, verse 21, it says, And I commanded Joshua at that time, saying, The eye and eye shall have seen all that the Lord your God hath done unto these two kings. So shall the Lord do unto all the kingdoms whither thou passest. He's saying, you've already seen what God has done for you here in the wilderness against these other kings. Now when you pass over and you go into the land of Canaan, you're going to defeat these other kings. You've seen what God can do, and this is what you need to keep in mind when you go into the kingdoms whither thou passest. Verse 22, what did he tell him? He shall not fear them, right? And he didn't say you should never be afraid. There's nothing you should never fear, but he's saying you should not fear them. Do not fear these people, these kings in this land where you're going. Why? So Lord your God, he shall fight for you. He's saying there's no need to be afraid. It would be wrong for you to be afraid in this instance because of the fact that God is fighting on your behalf. If you were to show fear in this instance, Joshua, you would actually be doubting God. You would be lacking faith. You need to not fear and trust the Lord. God's already proven what he's able to do with these other two kings. You've already seen it, so don't be afraid. So we have to understand again that fear is something that can be either good or bad. And if you would, go to Deuteronomy chapter 31 and Deuteronomy chapter number 31. I want to use this word fear and kind of use it synonymously with the word cowardice or being a coward. Because that starts with the letter C and I've got to make it fit within the series. So that's the only reason I'm using that letter. But the opposite of fear or cowardice, when you think about it, is courage. We don't want to be cowards. We don't want to have cowardice in our lives. We want to be people who are courageous. We want to have courage in our lives. That's not to say we should never fear. Obviously there are instances in which we should fear. Look there in Deuteronomy 31 verse 6, again where he's commanding Joshua. He says, Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them. For the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee, he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee. So there's this great promise that's being given to Joshua that he's going to have victory. That if he'll go into the promised land and have faith and not be afraid that God will work on his behalf. And this is something we have to have in our lives. We need to have faith that the Lord is going to work. We have to have faith that God is going to see us through. That he's not going to fail us and that he's not going to forsake us. Once we understand that and we believe that by faith, that gives us good courage. It allows us to continue to press forward for the cause of Christ. It continues to help us to keep living for Christ. It bolsters us, this faith that we have at not being fearful. We want to be people who have a good courage in the Christian life. We don't want to be cowards in the Christian life. And look, cowardice is something that can show up in a Christian's life. And we'll get into that here towards the end of the sermon. But again, just kind of showing you there that the opposite of being a coward is having courage. He's saying be of a good courage, fear not. Be not afraid of them. So if we're going to be cowards, if we're going to be fearful, we're going to let people who lack courage. Now keep something there in Deuteronomy and go over to Hebrews chapter number 12. Hebrews chapter number 12. We'll come back to Deuteronomy a little bit later. So obviously, you know, we want to be people who have courage. We want to be people who are not afraid. We want to be people who are strong and have a good courage, as he said in Deuteronomy. But that's not to say that there aren't instances in which we should fear. There are people that we should fear in this life. There are things that we should be somewhat afraid of. We should have a healthy fear of some things. And there are people that we should fear. You know, probably the first person we should think about fearing is the Lord. Obviously, we should fear God. The Bible commands this. Look, this is a commandment that's just talked about so much in Scripture. It's impossible to cover it all this morning. I'll just read to you from Psalm 2. It says, So what is it that we should be wise about? What is it that the kings and rulers of this earth should be instructed in? Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. And I'm pointing this out because of the fact, you know, I've heard over the years, thankfully I'm hearing less and less of it, that sometimes people will teach that fear is just having a healthy respect of God. It just means to revere or to respect God, to not actually be afraid of Him. But that's not what the Bible says. And we'll look at some other passages here in a minute, but I'll read to you again in Psalm chapter 2. The Bible says, Serve the Lord with fear. You know, serve the Lord with a healthy respect for Him. You know, like you would salute God or you would just, you know, you'd give Him His proper respect, right? But it says to serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Obviously, trembling is something that is associated with fear. Who here has ever been so afraid that they've literally trembled? Okay, you guys need a man. I'm just kidding. No one's ever going to raise a hand again ever, you know, even when they want to, right? I've been there. I remember when I was living with my dad down in the Virgin Islands. He had this big tree out front in his yard, and down there they have these termite nests that will just grow on these branches, and they're huge. And, you know, this is probably going to, you know, upset all of the ecologically minded people in the room, but he wanted to get rid of these things. You got to deal with termites. They'll destroy trees. They'll get into your house, whatever. So he said, take this gas can and climb up there and pour it in the nest. Now, he didn't light it on fire, okay? There's a lot of stories with me and my dad and gas and fire, okay? I've noticed. You know, you guys probably noticed the theme here, right? Gas is a very handy thing, right? It's great for burning brush, blowing things up, and killing termites, apparently, too. But I remember, you know, climbing up, I mean, I was probably about as high as the ceiling with the gas can going out on a branch to pour it into a termite nest, and I was so afraid. I didn't even realize it. My dad made fun of me. He's like, oh, I love it when your knees start to shake like that, and I'm doing this. My knees are literally shaking, right? So it's, you know, I was trembling. Why? Because I was afraid. Was I afraid of falling and breaking my neck? You know, you can mock me and laugh about that, but you know what? Let's put you in that same position and see how you react, okay? My dad was great. Another time we were working at some construction site, and it was this big office complex and it had a huge atrium, and it was like the ceiling was much taller than this. It wasn't twice as tall. It was close to it. And someone had to go up there and clean the glass in this atrium. They had little glass windows at the top of the ceiling in this atrium, and so they had this, you know, four-by-whatever, four-by-eight scaffolding going up, and I had to climb up there and clean the glass, and of course my dad couldn't help himself. He walked by and decided to shake the thing while I'm standing up there, right? So there was another instance where I was fearing and trembling, okay? But that's what he's saying here in Psalms, isn't it? To serve the Lord with fear and to rejoice with trembling, right? Is he saying, hey, be like a Quaker? Be one of these Pentecostals that throws himself on the floor and shakes for the Lord or something like that? You know, no, he's saying be so, you know, you should rejoice with trembling. We should be in a life where we should be afraid of God, still serve him, still rejoice, but never forget that we are to fear the Lord, that we should rejoice with trembling. So obviously God is somebody that we should fear in our lives. You know, being afraid of God doesn't make you a coward. It doesn't make you fearful. It just makes you having a proper understanding of your relationship with God. Look at Hebrews chapter 12. Say, well, that's the Old Testament God. Everybody should be afraid of them. This is such a dumb argument. Everyone should be afraid of the Old Testament God, but the New Testament God's different. You know, it's Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Amen. It's the same God in both Testaments. People like to think that God toned down in the New Testament. It's like, have you read Revelation? You know, have you read these other passages? You know, that God is pouring out his most wrath at the end of the world, you know, in the New Testament. Okay. Look at Hebrews chapter 12 verse 18. For you're not a coming of the mount that might be touched and that burned with fire. This is referring back to when the Lord descended upon Mount Sinai in the sight of Moses and Israel. He said, you're not coming of the mount that might be touched and that burned with fire, nor into blackness and darkness and tempest and the sound of a trumpet. Remember this trumpet was sounded and the voice of words. Which voice? They that heard it entreated that they should not be spoken to them anymore. So the children of Israel at that time, they heard God's voice like that trumpet and they said, don't speak to us anymore. Why hear anymore? Because of how incredibly terrifying it was. Verse 20. For they could not endure that which was commanded, and if so much as a beast touched the mountain, it shall be stoned or thrust through with a dart. And so terrible was the sight that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake. So even Moses, when he's seeing the events of Mount Sinai, that pillar of fire coming down, the thick, black, dark clouds, the thunderings, the lightnings, the voice of God sounding long like trumpet, he's saying that he exceedingly feared and quaked when he came into the presence of God. But ye are coming to Mount Sion, and the city of the living God and the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and the church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and the spirits of just men made perfect. He's saying, you're not coming onto Mount Sinai, you're coming onto that heavenly Jerusalem. And you're coming onto what? Verse 24. And to Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaketh better things than that of Abel. See that ye refused not him that speaketh. So as he's saying here, look, we're not coming onto Mount Sinai, there's no need to be afraid of God. No, he's saying, you're coming onto the new Jerusalem, you're coming onto all these good things, but let's not forget that that's still the same God. I believe that's what he's getting at here. That's why he's bringing up the example of Old Testament, the occasion of Mount Sinai. That's why he's bringing that to remind them. If you were, you would have the right perspective. You would say, like Moses, I exceedingly fear and quake. But because you're not coming onto that, and you're coming onto the new Jerusalem, and Jesus the mediator of better things, you need to keep that in mind. That we're still dealing with the same God. That's why he says in verse 25, see that ye refused not him that speaketh. For if they escaped who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall we not we escape if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven. We have the testimony of Christ having come down and spoken unto us the word of God. Whose voice then shook the earth, but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven. And this word, yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, and that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace where we may serve God acceptably, with what? Reverence and godly fear. He's saying, look, we're receiving all these things. Yes, we're not coming to Mount Sinai, but he's not trying to say that there's a difference. What he's saying here is saying, I'm trying to remind you that the God that came down to Mount Sinai is still the same God that has come down and spoken to us from heaven and will not shake only this earth, but also heaven. He shook the earth back then, but we're coming unto him who's going to shake the earth and heaven, yet once more, therefore let us serve God with reverence, yes, and what else? Godly fear. So when I talk this morning about not being a coward and not having cowardice and getting over this dread sea of cowardice in our lives, we have to remember to keep fear in its context, and we should be afraid of God. I'm giving a caveat here this morning. What does he end, and he ends the verse by saying this, the chapter rather, he says, for our God is, what, a consuming fire. It's still the same God that came down on the pillow fire. God has not changed. God still deserves to be served with reverence, yes, and godly fear. We must learn to fear God in our lives. Go back to Deuteronomy chapter number 10. This is something that Moses tried to get across to the children of Israel in the book of Deuteronomy. He's pretty much just preaching on the entire, you know, great, you think I preach long, you know, he's preaching, basically that's the whole book of Deuteronomy. There's one long sermon. It's Moses speaking to them before they go into the promised land, right? So he's preaching to them, and he's bringing up and trying to prepare them for this, and what's he always reminding them of? To fear God, to fear God, to serve God, to fear God, to obey God. This is something that we need to take heed of today. Don't get this idea. This morning when I say we ought not to be cowards, we ought not to fear things, that there aren't yet still things we ought to fear. He says in Deuteronomy chapter 10, if you went there, verse 12, And now Israel, what did the Lord thy God require of thee but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all his waste, and to love him and to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, to keep the commandments of the Lord thy God in statutes which I command thee this day for thy good. Okay, there's so much packed into these couple of verses right here. So many people today think, you know, serving God is some kind of drudgery. That's him putting shackles on us and holding us back. The Bible says that his commandments are not grievous, right? That we ought to obey and keep his commandments for our good. That's what he said at the end of verse 13. His statutes which I command thee this day for thy good. You know, serving God is for your good. Keeping God's commandments is going to benefit you personally. If we get the sin out of our lives, if we fear God, if we raise our families the way we ought to raise our families, and keep the commandments of the Lord our God and walk in his waste, you know, that's going to benefit us. But notice there, he says, you know, this is a great, you know, a lot of the Bible just gives you points for a sermon. He said to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways, to love him and to serve. So we're to fear, we're to walk, we're to love and we're to serve. Okay, and you know, those things are kind of laid out in a progression. You know, some people stumble in their walk with Christ. Some people are so herky-jerky in their Christian life, they never seem to make any progress, they never seem to improve. Well, maybe it's because you're jumping over the first step, which is to fear the Lord thy God. The Bible says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Okay, that's where you have to start. Understanding, you know, who it is with whom you have to do. You know, that all things are naked and open unto his eyes. Okay, all things are naked and open before him with whom we have to do, the Bible says. There's nothing, you know, God, we don't just come to church and get in God's presence and think about the things of God and then leave. God, you know, sees us every day of every week. He hears what comes out of our mouths. He sees, you know, everything that we're doing throughout the week. You know, that ought to put a fear into us. Okay, a lot of times people don't do things simply out of fear of being caught. Right? But you know, if there's things we think we can get away with in this life, we ought to think again. Because the God that we're dealing with, the Bible says, I know I quote it all the time, He planted the eye, shall he not see? He that formed the ear, shall he not hear? Let the eyes of the Lord go through the whole earth, beholding the evil and the good. God sees us. And if our walk is suffering, maybe it's because we're not fearing the Lord our God like we ought to. And again, we fear and then we walk, what does that turn into? Of course, walking, you know, in his ways is obedience. Okay, we fear the Lord, then we learn to walk out of obedience. Maybe it's not even something we want to do. Maybe we kind of do it grudgingly, we just know it's something we ought to do, we just do it out of duty. We walk in his ways, but eventually we understand that his commandments are for our good, and then we start to do it out of love. We fear the Lord our God, we walk in all his ways, and then we begin to love him. And then we begin to serve God out of a sincere heart. That's why that progression is there. Fear, walk, love, and serve the Lord thy God with all my heart. You know, we want to get to the place where we're serving God out of love. We do that by walking in his commandments. We'll do that more consistently when we learn to fear God. So again, this is all kind of introduction. It's really probably a separate sermon in and of itself. But I want to give you this caveat this morning, that we're not to be cowards. Cowardice is a dread sea we need to get over in our lives. We should not be fearful people. But there are people we ought to fear, we ought to fear the Lord. Who else ought we to fear? Authority. You know, there are certain authorities we ought to fear in our lives. Go to Romans chapter 13. And I know this will probably, you know, rub some people the wrong way to hear this. But this is what the Bible teaches. You know, we are to be subject to magistrates. We are to be subject to principalities. We ought to honor them. We ought to give honor to whom honor. And Romans 13 teaches this, you know, that's talking about principalities, right? Municipalities. Kings, rulers. We ought to have some level of fear of them for the, you know, the punishment they can bring into our lives. Say, well, you know, I'm such a rebel. You know, I'm my own man. You know, I don't fear anybody. Yeah, but, you know, when we're doing 10 over, I'm sure it's nobody in this room. We're doing 10, 15 over on the highway. And then all of a sudden you see that little, you know, that emblem on the side of the state trooper's car in the headlights. All of a sudden, you know, you get that, you know, fear kind of steps in a little bit. At least it's for me. I don't know. Maybe you speed up. I don't know. Maybe you play catch me if you can or something. I don't know. But we've all been driving along and all seen those lights, you know, going off in the rear view. And we're like, hopefully I just pull over and he goes by me. You know, we're afraid, right? Why? Because we haven't been obeying the commands, right, of the speed limit and things like that. That's obviously an example. You know, that's one example, but what about fearing your parents? Children, the Bible says you ought to fear your parents. You know, and that's not just talking about respect, okay? Obviously, we don't want our kids to live in fear every moment of their lives. But let me just say this. If your children don't have some level of fear of upsetting you, you're probably not doing it right. You know, a lot of reasons why my children obey and do the things that they ought to do and listen is because they're afraid of the consequences of disobedience. The Bible says in Leviticus 19, I'll just quote for you, Ye shall fear every man his mother. And I love how you put mother there first, right? Because I think moms, you know, they don't, kids, you know, they stop fearing mom before they stop fearing dad. You know, they'll start to start getting sassy with mom before they'll get sassy with dad. Probably because they just, you know, familiarity breeds contempt. You know, they might spend more time with mom, things like that. But I love how he says, Ye shall fear every man his mother and his father and keep my Sabbaths. What has one got to do with the other? What does fearing mom and dad have to do with Sabbaths? I don't know, but it's interesting that they're together in that one sentence. I am the Lord your God. Why are Sabbath and fearing our parents there? Well, we would never dream of breaking Sabbaths, right? Obviously, we don't keep Sabbaths today. You understand that these holy days have been done away in Christ. There's a change in the law because there's been a change in the priesthood. We understand that. But, I mean, you know, if the Sabbath is something that's commanded in Scripture, I mean, we would never dream of breaking God's commandments. Oh, really? So you fear mom and dad then? Okay. Now, obviously, parents should help their children with this by giving them something to fear. They should fear consequences. Okay. Now, look, if you're doing it right, sometimes it doesn't take more than a word with your children. And, you know, I have to be careful because sometimes when I correct my kids, I'll just say, hey, stop, whatever, stop running, stop doing this. And you can just see it, the terror come over their face. Like, I'm in trouble. What did I do? And it's just like, I just said stop, so stop and we're good, right? But sometimes that's enough. You know why? Because my children are afraid of me. Woo! I can't believe you'd say that. I can't believe you didn't want kids that are afraid of you. Well, they're afraid of upsetting me. They're not afraid of my face like some of you. You know, it's not my looks. They're not having nightmares about me because I'm the boogeyman or something. You know, I'm not crawling out from under the bed, whatever. They're afraid of upsetting me. That's what I mean by that. They fear me, yeah, they respect me, but they respect me because they're afraid of what's going to happen if they disobey the rules. Okay. And again, each one of these points is practically a whole sermon. Fearing authority, how about authority within the church? You know, obviously the story of Acts 5 with the death of Ananias and Sapphira when they lied on the Holy Ghost isn't something we'll ever see play out here in all likelihood. But, you know, when they saw that happen, when they saw Peter call out Ananias and Sapphira and they died, the Bible says that great fear came upon all the church. Upon as many as heard these things. You know, then it says that no man durst join himself unto the apostles. Right? There was respect and there was fear of that authority. We should be upset about, you know, or not upset, but we should fear the consequences of getting out of line in church. You know, and look, there's certain sins that will get you kicked out of church. 1 Corinthians 5. I know that's something that's just gone by the wayside today in most churches and even Baptist churches. They won't preach it, let alone enforce it. But, you know, here we do in this church. And if it's ever found out that people who are in fornication, they go through 1 Corinthians 5. You know, there are fornication, drunkenness, covetousness, extortion, idolatry, these sins. If it's found out that you're guilty of one of these things, obviously some of those is probably never going to happen. But fornication and drunkenness, you know, that's pretty common. And if it's found out, you know, you will be kicked out of church and you won't be welcomed back until you get it right. So, you know, there are things we ought to fear. There are people and institutions we ought to fear. You know, we need to move along for the sake of time. I know we had to go in Romans 13. I mean, look very quickly at verse 1. Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers, for there is no power but of God, and the powers that be are ordained of God. So obviously God is the ultimate authority. But, you know, God has given us, you know, institutions of government. We're not anarchists here. Wherefore, verse 2, who therefore resisted the power, resisted the ordinance of God, and they shall receive to themselves damnation. You know, if we rebel, we start disobeying the ordinances of man, you know, we should expect a punishment. You go out and break the law, you know, you're probably going to end up being punished for it. Verse 3, for rulers are not a terror to good works but to the evil. That's ideally, right? Obviously today it seems like it's backwards. And obviously we ought to obey God rather than men. I don't want to go into all that. But my point is this, is that fear brings obedience, doesn't it? We ought to fear certain people. We ought to fear God. We ought to fear the authorities in our lives. But, you know, so there are people we ought to fear, and it brings obedience. But when we fear the wrong people, that also brings us into a type of obedience too. You obey who you fear. That's really the point I'm trying to make. That's a problem with being a coward. That's why it's something you have to get over. Because if you're going to be afraid of people you ought not to be afraid of, you're going to obey them. And it's going to, you know, that obedience is going to be more like a bondage to you. Right? We obey God, we fear God, and it actually liberates us. Right? It actually, you know, yes it might put constraints on our flesh, it might cause us to walk the straight and narrow, so to speak. But, you know, it also, it's very liberating. His commandments are there for our good. Right? It benefits us when we fear the right people. But when we're afraid and we're cowards and we fear the wrong people, you know, we're going to be brought into obedience unto them and it's actually going to bring bondage into our lives. Fear brings obedience. If you would go to Matthew chapter 10, Matthew chapter number 10. We're actually done in Deuteronomy. I don't know if we went back there, but we're done in Deuteronomy. Go to Matthew chapter number 10. We should not always fear all men. Obviously, you know, we should fear magistrates, we should obey them, we should fear our parents, they're an authority, we ought to fear, you know, institutions like the church, we ought to fear, you know, the Lord, obviously. But we not, that doesn't mean we should always fear all men. And this is really the thrust of the sermon. How about, for example, we should not fear the enemies of God. And yes, God has enemies. There are people out there that hate the Lord. Romans chapter 1. There are those that are out there that are despisers of those that are good, that hate God. And they are God's enemies. God has enemies. It's Bible. Look at Matthew chapter 10 verse 24. The disciple is not above his master nor the servant above his Lord. He's saying you're no better than your master. You're going to follow Jesus, don't expect to be treated differently. Right? And how was Jesus entreated? We all know the story. It didn't go so, it wasn't a cakewalk. It ended up with him being crucified. And he's saying you're no better than me. You're not going to be any different than I am. It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master and the servant as his Lord. If they have called the master of the health Beelzebub, which is another word for Satan or the devil, okay? If they're calling me Beelzebub, Jesus is saying, how much more should they call them of his household? Look, if they're so bold and so brazen to call the Lord himself the devil and that he did the works that he did through the power of the devil, you know, how much more easier is it going to be for them to just belittle us and to call us names and to persecute us? If they can persecute Christ, it's going to be so much easier for them to persecute us. If they can ridicule and mock and persecute the master, obviously that master's servants are fair game as well. They're even easier targets. That's what he's saying in verse 25. How much more should they call them of his household? Fear not them, not therefore. He's saying, like, this is the way it's going to be. Did he say, you know, look, they're going to persecute us, they're going to resist us, they're going to fight us, so let's try to just get along to go along. Let's just try to placate them, let's just try to be their pals, let's just try to have compromise. No, he's saying, don't be afraid of them, because that's what people do. People's first reaction when it comes to the enemies of God is that they fear them. And he's saying, fear them not therefore, for there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed and hid that shall not be known. What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light. He's saying, don't be afraid to preach the things that I've told you to preach. Don't be afraid to speak the things that I've told you to speak. Look, this applies to us today, because so many people today are afraid to speak the things that they've learned about the Lord. They're afraid to preach and speak the things that they've read in God's Word, both in the pulpit and in the pew. There's some Christians that are afraid that other people might find out they're a Christian. There's some Christians that are afraid that it might get out at work or it might get out at school that they go to this church. That's like one of their worst fears. So what do they do? They hide it. They put the light under a bushel. They don't let other people know that they're a Christian. They don't want to be perceived as a conservative Christian or whatever. But that's not what we're supposed to do. And the reason why people do that is because they're afraid. Because they're cowards. They're cowards for Christ. The cowardice is something we have to get over. We need to be bold for Christ. He's saying, don't be afraid of them. Yes, we're going to have persecution. Yes, we're going to have resistance. Yes, we're going to have the enemies of the Lord. But don't let that put your light out. What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light. What you hear in the ear, that preach upon the housetops. He's saying, go proclaim it. Let everyone know. Let the whole world know. And in verse 28, and fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul. But rather fear them which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. What's he saying there at the end in verse 28? He's saying, be afraid of God. You know, the worst that these people can do is kill you. And honestly, that's probably not going to be anything any of us ever has to even consider. Death for Christ. Martyrdom. I don't think we're going to see it. Not in our lifetimes. It could happen. And if it did, you know we ought not to be afraid of it. What we ought to be afraid of is he who has the ability, not that he's going to destroy our soul in hell, but he could. That's who we ought to be afraid of. We ought to be more afraid of upsetting God than upsetting the people of this world. Especially the enemies of this world. And a lot of people get back down today by those that would be considered the enemies of God. Those that hate the things of God, that hate the preaching of God's word. People get back down today. We should not be afraid of them. And look, preachers today are getting back down by the world. And they've gone soft. And they're weak. And they're lily-livered. And they've got a big yellow stripe going down their back. You know, and then you wonder why we're in the condition that we're in. It's because there's so few men of God anymore that are willing to get up and just preach the whole counsel of the word of God. You just say it like it is. You know, that's a big reason why in this church we make a practice of going through the Bible line by line, chapter by chapter. Not just book by book. You know, I don't just get up and regurgitate some Bible college survey course. You know, let me tell you what the book, what Pentateuch means. You know, let me tell you about a synopsis of the five books of Moses. But let me just skip right over Genesis 19. Let me just skip right over Judges chapter 19. Let's just, you know, let's skip Leviticus chapter 20. Leviticus 18. You know, let's just skip these stories. It's not the problem today. It's not what they are saying. It's what they're not saying. And why don't they say it? Why don't they speak in light that which they've heard in darkness? Fear. Cowardice. And it's something that a lot of preachers even today need to get over for the sake of, you know, the people in the pew and this country as a whole. You know, it's a shameful thing when, you know, just these conservative heathens, these unsaved heathens of this world have more, you know, have more of a backbone than God's own people. You know, there's people out there in this world, these conservative talking heads and things like that, that are actually speaking out against some of this woke culture. That are actually taking somewhat of a stand, you know, trying to push back. Even politicians and things like that. What are they standing on? Political philosophy, personal preference, maybe because it's a popular thing, maybe they're seeing that they can garner a following on their side if they take this position. You know, it's all shifting sand and yet God's own preachers, God's own men have the solid rock called the King James Bible, called the Word of God and yet they're too afraid to preach it. Because they're cowards. And they want to just tiptoe around certain passages, you know, just jump over entire, you know, chapters and books and never touch certain passages with a ten foot pole. Well, it's because we don't want to upset people. You know, I don't want to upset anybody in the church. Well, you know, go to Ezekiel chapter number three, Ezekiel chapter number three. You know, another people, another group of people we should not be afraid of is God's own people. We know, this is, probably maybe this is more applicable to a preacher, but a preacher should not be afraid of the people in the pew. It should be the other way around, if anything. People should come to church going, am I going to get my face ripped today? Not that that's the preacher's goal is set out like, whose face can I rip today? Who's going to get it? You know, let me go through my spreadsheet. Who got it last time? You know, it's been three months since brother so and so, you know, had had his face ripped, right? Well, look, if you're just preaching through the Word of God, if you're obeying Matthew 10 and just speak, preaching from the housetop, if you're preaching the whole counsel of the Word of God, it's only a matter of time you face, rip somebody's face. That's why they don't do it in a lot of churches. There's certain subjects they're not going to address, certain things they'll never talk about. Why? Because they're afraid of the people in the pew. And look, if somebody has a problem with something that's preached out of the Word of God, they're a rebel. You know, if I preach something, if it's Bible and it upsets you, guess who the problem is with? It's with you. You know, it's not with me because I'm just repeating what God said. Your problem's with him. It's real easy to have a problem with me because I'm nobody. It's like, get in line. You know, take a number. But, you know, who's your problem really with when it's something that's coming out of the Word of God? Look at Ezekiel chapter 3 verse 1. Moreover, he said unto me, Son of man, eat that thou findest, eat this roll, and go speak on the house of Israel. So he's giving these words. Now, I know a lot of you are thinking, oh, a dinner roll. That's not what he's talking about, okay? It's a roll like a scroll, right? Like that kind of a roll. Some of you guys are thinking about those little Hawaiian rolls. Those are so good, right? So I opened my mouth and he caused me to eat that roll. And he said unto me, Son of man, cause thy belly to eat and fill thy bowels with this roll that I will give thee. Then I did eat it and it was in my mouth as honey for sweetness. So it's a great picture of the Word of God that God wants us to fill ourselves with the Word of God. We have to let the Word of Christ dwell in us richly with all wisdom. We need to consume, so to speak, the Word of God. It is our manna. That's why you gotta be in your daily Bible reading, meditating upon the things of God, getting that, like Job said, I have esteemed thy word more than my necessary food. So he's eating this literal roll. I mean, this is literally happening, I believe. And it says that it was in my mouth as for sweetness, right? It was tasted good going in. And he said unto me, Son of man, go get thee unto the house of Israel and speak my words unto them. Saying, now that you have your my words, and he's saying basically I want you to regurgitate this. Everything that is coming to your mouth, you enjoyed it, Ezekiel. It's like sweetness to you. Now go speak it unto them. But what you need to understand Ezekiel is that when you go and speak it unto them, is that they're not going to receive it the way you did. They're not going to say, oh, sweetness. He goes, go and speak unto them, for thou hast sent unto a people of strange speech. So who's he sending them unto? His own people, Israel. For thou are not sent unto a people of strange speech and of hard language, but to the house of Israel. Not to many people of a strange speech and of hard language whose words thou canst not understand. Surely had I sent thee to them, they would have hearkened unto thee. He said, look, if I had sent you to a bunch of strangers, they would have listened to you. But I'm sending you to my own people. I'm telling you to go preach to the house of Israel, and they're not going to receive you. Verse 7, that the house of Israel will not hearken unto me, for they will not hearken unto me. See what he said there? They're not going to hearken unto thee, Ezekiel, because they won't hearken unto me. Who's their problem really with? Is it with Ezekiel? It's with the Lord. For all the house of Israel are impudent and hard-hearted. Behold, I have made thy faith strong against their faces. What is he saying? He's saying, I'm giving you courage. He's saying, I'm giving you this ability to go ahead and preach. He's warning them. He's already warning him, saying, look, they're not going to receive you. You know, the temptation is, if I know what I'm going to say is going to upset people, the temptation is to not say it. To not bring up those words again that I've heard. That's the temptation. This is where a lot of preachers draw the line. They say, well, I know if I preach on that subject, you know, it's going to upset this family. It's going to upset that individual. You know, if I preach against the homos, you know, everybody in the room has, you know, some kind of relationship with the homo these days. You know, and I bring it up because it's kind of a big issue these days. I mean, what's the big topic of our time? The homos. You know, and people are in all kinds of different positions on this. They have all kinds of different takes on this. And then there's what the Bible actually says. Okay? I'm not going to go into all that this morning. I'm simply making this point. Is that a lot of preachers, they know what the Bible says. They know the story of Genesis 19. They know Judges 19. They know Leviticus 20. They know Leviticus 18. They know what the Bible says in Jude and in Romans and 2 Peter. They know these things. What it says throughout all the scripture about this topic, and it's consistent all the way through, that it's an abomination that's worthy of death. That's what the Bible says. Old Testament and New. That they which do such things are worthy of death. Romans 1. Go read it. A lot of preachers, if they understand this, but then, you know, if they're actually going to preach on that, they know that it's going to upset people. And what happens when people get upset in a church? They leave. And that's what they're afraid of more than anything. Is their crowd shrinking? And the offering plate not being as full as it once was. And these people are compromisers. And they're cowards. And they ought to sit down and let somebody else do it. Or they ought to get a spine and go ahead and just piss some people off with the word of God. Me just saying that word probably upset people. Piss. Piss, piss, piss. It's a Bible word. He that pisses against the wall. I'll cut them all off. But that's who a lot of people are afraid of today. A lot of preachers. They're afraid of God's own people. And you know who it is among God's people that they're afraid of? The rebels. The rebels. You know why I'm not afraid to preach this a lot of times? Because I know almost everybody in the room, if not everybody, is on board with probably everything I'm preaching. Otherwise you probably wouldn't be here. And I'm not saying you have to agree with everything that we preach and believe here to come to this church. But you know who a lot of preachers are afraid of? The rebels in their church. The people who have a bad attitude. The people who are bitter. The people who are angry. The people who are not right with God. That's who they're afraid of. And the irony is those make the worst church members anyway. It's like those are the people you want to see leave. So if you just preach it, preacher, if you just get up and preach like you're supposed to, they'd go. And then you wouldn't have the leaven of sin leavening your church. And then you wouldn't have the root of bitterness springing up and defiling many in your church, preacher. But God here with Ezekiel is saying, hey, go preach this word anyway. Behold I have made thy face strong against their faces. You know, you start preaching some things in the word of God and you can just see it come over a person's face. You know, or this. This is my favorite one. You know, you wake up. That's another face that people make. He's saying don't be afraid of their faces. Behold I have made thy face strong against their faces and thy for it against their for it. He's saying, you know what, just go and give it to them anyway. Don't be afraid. Be strong. Be of good courage. Look at verse 9. As an adamant harder than flint, an adamant stone like a mineral, like a rock, I have made thy forehead. Fear them not, neither be dismayed. Don't be afraid to preach what needs to be preached. And he's telling this to Ezekiel. Look, I've preached some hard sermons. I believe that. And I've heard some hard sermons. But I've never had to go to a group of people and say, hey, God's going to wipe us all out. We're all going to be judged and literally destroyed by the heathens. I've never had to preach that sermon. I've never had to go and tell an entire group of people, an entire nation, hey, God's going to destroy us. We're going to suffer famine and destruction. That's a pretty hard sermon. And he's saying don't be afraid to go preach that. We should be able to preach whatever God has told us to preach. Look, preachers should not be afraid to preach any of the Bible, any of it. You know, and there's some things that are real easy to preach, these hard sermons. You know, I'm going to preach against alcohol. Like, come on. And I get it. There's a lot of churches out there today that won't even do that. They'll say, oh, there's nothing wrong with drinking a little wine. Jesus drank wine. But, you know, there's a lot of people in the world, too, that also will admit to you and will know without any Bible preaching at all that alcohol is an evil, that it destroys lives. They're not even Christians, and they'll say that. Is that the kind of thing, that that's the hard preaching that's going on today? You know, a lot of preachers, they don't even have the guts to get up and preach against the sin like fornication. Let alone the real controversial subjects that need to be addressed in the day and age that we're living in. They don't want to preach against adultery. They don't want to preach against divorce. They don't want to preach against a lot of things. I mean, they're afraid to preach about tattoos. Because everyone's got one. They're afraid to preach any of the Bible. And look, no preacher should be afraid to preach any portion on any topic the Bible addresses. And you know what people are finding out? Is that the Bible touches every area of our lives. There's no part of our life that the Bible doesn't address. Go over to 2 Timothy chapter 1. I've got to wrap it up. What am I preaching about this morning? The dread sea of cowardice. A lot of preachers today need to quit being cowards behind their pulpits. Start preaching the entire counsel of the word of God. I'm not saying they've got to preach at every sermon every Sunday, but how about once in your entire career as a preacher you actually turn to one of these passages that you're afraid to turn to and preach it and let the chips fall where they may. What you find is the people you run out with that kind of preaching are probably the people that you don't want to be there anyway. It always boggles my mind when people come to a church that they don't want to be at. Jesus said, whosoever shall be ashamed of me and of my words, him shall a son of man be ashamed. What did he say? Who's ashamed of me and of my words? That's what's so funny when you hear people say, oh Jesus only preached love. What's so upsetting about that? Look, if Jesus only preached sweetness and light and love, no one's afraid to preach that. That statement wouldn't make any sense. Whosoever is ashamed of me and of my words. But Jesus, everything you said is just sweetness and light and love. It's so easy to be treated. There's nothing controversial about it. No, it's because Jesus preached hard things. He called people devils and fools. He called out sin. He preached against things. He preached hard. He addressed the issues of his day. He didn't hold back anything. He preached and he said, this is the way I want you to preach and if you're ashamed of me, if you're ashamed of the things that I've said, and by the way, everything in this book is what Jesus said because he is the word. That's a literal title for Jesus, the word of God. Meaning this is all Jesus. What did Jesus say? It's not just the red letters in the New Testament, folks, in Revelation and elsewhere. It's the words of Jesus in black. That's what my Bible is and every black word, every piece of black ink on white paper in this book is something that came out of the mouth of God. So that's why I should be ashamed to preach any of this. From Genesis to Revelation, all of it. And Jesus said, whosoever is ashamed of him and his words shall the Son of Man be ashamed when he shall come in his glory and in his Father's and in the holy angels. Look, that is going to happen. Jesus is going to come back. We will be in the presence of God. We will be in the presence of all the holy angels. And you know what? I don't want to be ashamed in that day. So I can't be ashamed of God's words. He said in Mark 8, parallel passage, whosoever shall be ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation. Again, what is it that people are ashamed of when it comes to his words? It's because of the fact that they're living in the midst of a crooked nation. When you're living, when you know that you're going to preach amongst an adulterous and sinful nation, you know you're going to upset people. You know if we preach, if everybody in the whole world was in line with the word of God, we wouldn't have to worry about upsetting anybody, would we? If there was no sin, if nobody was committing fornication, no one was a drunk, no one's an adulterer, no one's this, that, or the other thing, no one's got sin in their lives, even the world's got everything straightened out, the whole world's being governed by biblical principles, we wouldn't have anything to be ashamed of. There would be no temptation to be ashamed of it. We wouldn't have to worry about any blowback or persecution. But because we are living in an adulterous and sinful generation, the temptation is to be ashamed of Jesus' words. You know and the more adulterous and sinful a people get, the greater that temptation is. You know if I preach something that's just going to upset a few people, that's not that big of a temptation, well you know I don't want to say I'm going to upset a few people. But what if I preach something that goes international, that goes viral, and then the phone starts ringing off the hook, and then people start getting together and plotting and actually trying to protest and do other things, there's actual blowback by a larger group of people. Then the temptation is more like, I just don't think that's what Jesus would have us to preach out of these certain passages. That's called being a coward. That's called backing down. That's called being ashamed of his words in an adulterous and sinful generation. You know what, that person's going to be, God's going to be ashamed of them. Imagine being a preacher, somebody whose job it was to preach the word of God. That was your life's calling. And then to stand before that same God that you claim to serve out of sincerity and a true heart. And I'm not saying these people don't love God, but imagine being a preacher like that, somebody who's called to preach the whole counsel of the word of God to reprove, rebuke with all long suffering and doctrine, and then standing before God and having failed at the job description. My whole life's work was just, you know, for naught. Not saying I didn't accomplish anything, but to have God just say, well, you know, you get a C minus. That's going to be some people. You know, that's, so again, we're talking about cowardice this morning. This dread scene that we want to get over. We want to be people that are of good courage. They're not afraid. Not afraid of upsetting people with the preaching the word of God. Preacher, amen. But you know another thing some people are afraid of? They're afraid to preach the gospel. And I have to really watch myself when it comes to people because I understand people are different levels in their life, in their Christian growth, and certain people have to grow into these things. You know, people have to work up the courage even to just open their mouth and make known the mystery of the gospel. And I get that that's, you know, anything new is nerve-wracking. Anything you've never done before, especially when you're going to go talk to strangers about their soul. It's not something you, you know, most people wake up in the morning going, I wonder if someone's going to come talk to me about the Bible. No one ever thinks that. You know, so I get that, but I have to kind of check myself because I'm like, what, you know, sometimes when people are reluctant to start preaching the gospel, I'm kind of like, you know how nice it'd be to just preach the gospel sometimes? The only thing I had to do about, worry about the only people I had to worry about offending were people out soul winning. I mean today, it's, you know, that happens now, it's like, it just, it just bounces off me. I'll be having a conversation with my soul winning partner, we'll go to some door, someone will just be a rude jerk. And we just walk away and get right back into our conversation. Like that, like we just forget about it. By the time we're the next door, it's just like, we've already shaken the dust off our feet. Now the first, you know, several times that happens, you know, you might find yourself upset. You might even find yourself out in the middle of the street yelling at people, I don't know. I don't, I'm not saying it's right. I'm just saying, you know, people got to grow into these things. You know, and sometimes I have to remind myself, hey, people need to grow into that. You know, yeah, I get up and preach things and upset, you know, people for other reasons, okay. But that doesn't make it any less difficult for some people just to preach the gospel. The good news of the gospel. You know, some people are afraid to preach that. They're not, it's not, they're not having to be worried about preaching, you know, Leviticus 2013. You know, they're not, they don't have to worry about preaching, you know, on some sin or something like that. Upset, you know, potentially upsetting church members and they don't have to worry about, they have to worry about upsetting some stranger they'll never see again with the gospel. I mean, is that really that bad of a thing? I mean, is that really that, you know, why would we be afraid of that? I'm not saying we can't be nervous. I understand, you know, being nervous about the actual mechanics of going through it and having to speak to a stranger and all of that. Maybe we're more introverted or something. I get it. You know, but people need to learn to do that. You know, I was thinking about this this morning, you know, in my, people can be silent partners for as long as they want. I'm not saying I'll never put pressure on people to speak from the pulpit. When I'm out soloing, I'll never just be like knock on the door with my silent partner and be like, you know, and they get volunteered, right? Like, oh, someone's here, you know. There's a big dog in the yard, I might do that. No, I'm just kidding. But here's what I've noticed when it comes to silent partners. There's two types of silent partners. People who start preaching the gospel and people who quit soloing. There's a silent partner who eventually, however long it takes, builds up the boldness to start preaching the gospel or the silent partner who eventually just gives up on soloing all together. That's usually the way it goes. That's what I've noticed. And people should not be afraid to preach the gospel, okay? I had you go to 2 Timothy, right? Chapter number 1. Paul said, I am not ashamed to preach the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. What did he say? I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. I'm not going to be ashamed of this. What's, you know, what's another word for ashamed? Being afraid, being a coward, okay? If a man suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God on his behalf. Look at 2 Timothy, chapter number 1, verse 6. Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God that is in thee by the putting on of my hands. Of course, Paul is writing to his protege, Timothy. For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. You know, fear, being afraid of man, is not something that comes from God. That comes from our flesh. God has given us a spirit of not of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. Power and love. What's going to embolden you to preach the gospel when you start to love the lost? When you actually care about people's soul, you'll say, you know what, you'll get over your nerves. You'll get over, you know, the inconvenience of it. You'll get over, you know, all the things that stand in our way from preaching the gospel when we have a spirit of love. God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and a sound mind. Be not, therefore, ashamed of the testimony of our Lord. What's he saying? Don't be afraid, Timothy. And obviously, you know, Timothy's a preacher. He's saying don't be afraid to preach the whole counsel of the word of God. Don't be ashamed of Jesus' words. Don't be ashamed of anything that's been written in the word of God. Don't be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord. Nor of me as prisoner. He's saying don't be ashamed of me either, Timothy. You know, some people, that's another temptation. That's another thing they can be afraid of, being associated with a certain ministry. That's your pastor? Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah. Yeah, I go to that church. Man, I hope that's never said about me. I hope nobody in this room ever feels that way about me. Well, yeah, I'm ashamed. I go to that church. I go to Faithful Word. I don't want to let that get out. No, I'm not ashamed of this. Don't be ashamed of this, Timothy. Don't be ashamed of me. Don't be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord. But be thou partaker of the afflictions of the Gospel according to the power of God. You know, be willing to accept the consequences that come with being associated with the Gospel. Be willing to be associated with the consequences that come with being associated with this ministry. Who has saved us and called us with holy calling, not according to our own works, but according to His own purpose and grace which He has given us in Jesus Christ before the world began. But is now made manifest by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ who has abolished death and has brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel. He's saying don't be ashamed of these things and then He's kind of reminding him of what Jesus did. Like consider what, you know, everything that Jesus did for you and to what end did He do it to bring immortality to light through the Gospel. Don't be ashamed of the Gospel. Don't be afraid to preach the Gospel. You're preaching eternal life to people. That's the only way you're going to get people out of hell. That's the only way is through preaching the Gospel. Not according to our works, right? People can work their way out. No they can't. They have to hear the preaching of the Gospel. If we don't preach it, they will remain lost. Wherefore I am appointed a preaching apostle and a teacher of the Gentiles for the which cause I also suffer these things. Boy, we're starting to learn about that in the book of Acts. You know, we just looked at it the last couple of weeks, Acts 13-14. Paul's not just, you know, he did suffer these things. That light affliction, right, that he called it. Nevertheless, I am not ashamed. He's like I took it. I'm not ashamed of the Gospel. I'm not ashamed to suffer for the Gospel's sake. And I know that I will suffer. All that live God in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. Look, if you're going to go out and preach the Gospel, you're going to have to deal with rude people. You're going to run into the mocker. Don't let it stop you. You're going to run into the guy that says, oh look, it's the religious salesman here. We're just going to say, you know, just stupid mean things and belittle you. But then you know what, you're also going to run into those people who really want to hear the Gospel. You're also going to run into those people who will be humble enough and meek enough to stop and listen. People who actually want to hear it, whether they even know it or not. And you'll actually preach to people who will get saved. But if you let all the jerks, you know, the fear stop you, you'll never get the rest of them. Right? That's why Paul was able to say for which cause I suffer. He's like I'm willingly suffering for these things because it's worth it. I suffer also, verse 12, for the which cause I also suffered, nevertheless I am not ashamed. I suffer but I'm not ashamed for I know whom I have believed and I am persuaded that he's able to keep that which I've committed against him, against that day, unto him against that day. Say, well Paul, why are you not afraid to suffer? Because I know whom I have believed. You know, I'm not out preaching some social Gospel folks. We're not out there trying to just reform people. We're bringing immortality to light through the preaching of the Gospel. That's what we believe. We're not out there just trying to get church members. We don't go soul wedding to try to build a church. Okay? You know, I want to be real careful not to give people that impression. I know we do pushes and we're going to do more pushes and we're going to hand out special invitations, but that's not the point of soul wedding, to just build a ministry. We preach the Gospel because it is the power of God unto salvation. You know, and that's why we should never be ashamed of it. I'm not going to promise you you're not going to suffer. And I'm not going to promise any preacher who gets up and preaches the Bible like he ought to that he's not going to suffer for it. But you know what? We ought to both, the preacher and the people in the pew ought to consider whom it is that we have believed. And how much do we really believe these things? We really believe that we're going to stand before God and either be ashamed or not be ashamed. Because of his words. What we did with them. Verse 13, hold fast the form of sound words which thou hast heard of me in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. That good thing which was committed to thee keep by the Holy Ghost that dwelleth in us. He's saying don't give up. Don't cower. Don't be a coward in the Christian life. Don't be afraid of preaching the Gospel. Obviously be afraid of who you ought to be afraid of. Fear God. Serve him. Obey him. Love him. All of that. Serve and obey and fear the authorities that you ought to as I've laid out in Scripture. But you know, let's not dwell in this dread sea of cowardice being afraid of people of this world. Being afraid of being associated with the Gospel. Being afraid of being associated with some church. Shouldn't be a coward. Why? Because cowardice will cripple the Christian. Cowardice will cripple the Christian. Like if you're afraid of his words in an adulterous and sinful generation, you'll shut up. You won't say it. A lot of preachers out there today, they're crippled because they're cowardice. A lot of Christians are Secret Service Christians. They've never preached the Gospel and they're never going to because they're afraid. Don't want to be crippled by cowardice. Let's go ahead and close the word of prayer. Dear Lord, again, thank you for the spirit of love and the power and the sound mind that you've given to us. Lord, I pray you'd help us to walk in it. Lord, that we'd never in this wicked and adulterous and sinful generation that we live in ever be ashamed of your words. But that we would boldly proclaim them from the pew, that we would preach the Gospel of love and grace out in the public, Lord, that you'd help us to be bold in our faith, Lord, and to help us to take the stand that you've called us to. We ask these things in Christ's name, Amen. Alright, we'll go ahead and sing one more song before we go. Amen. Let's open up our hymnals to song number 64. Song number 64, Shall We Gather at the River. Shall we gather at the river, Where the light and the storm are dry, Where the stars are bright and yellow, Where the clouds are bright and yellow, Yes, we'll gather at the river, Gather at the river, Gather at the sand and rain, Gather at the water, Gather at the river, Gather at the sea, We shall gather at the river, Gather at the river, Yes, we'll gather at the river, Gather at the river, Gather at the sand and rain, Gather at the water, We shall gather at the river, Gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, Gather at the water, Yes, we'll gather at the river, Gather at the river, Gather at the sand and rain, Gather at the water, Gather at the sand and rain, We shall gather at the river, Gather at the sand and rain, Gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, Yes, we'll gather at the river, Gather at the river, Gather at the sand and rain, Gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river, We shall gather at the river,