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

Man, the title of my sermon this morning is censorship of God's word, censorship of God's word. I want to focus on verse 31 there in chapter 8 of John. Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, if you continue in my word, then are you my disciples indeed and you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. The truth shall make you free. Part of freedom is having the ability to know the truth. When the truth is withheld from you, then that's a form of slavery or bondage or servitude. That's why he says you'll know the truth and the truth will make you free. The absence of the truth means that you're not free. Now all throughout history and all throughout the Bible, there have been people, governments, organizations, religions that have tried to silence the truth of God's word and tried to stop the gospel from being preached or tried to stop other parts of the word of God from being preached. This is nothing new. Now flip over if you would to Acts chapter 4. Throughout the book of Acts, this is actually a major theme that just comes up over and over again where the Jews are trying to stop God's word from being preached. They want to silence preachers. They want to silence the word of God from going forth. Any time God's word is being preached in a great way, there are going to be many adversaries. Paul talked about a great door being opened before him, an effectual, and he said there are many adversaries. Look down at your Bible there in Acts chapter 4 verse 1. The Bible reads, and as they spake unto the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came upon them, watch this, being grieved that they taught the people and preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead. So all they're preaching here is just the simple gospel of Jesus Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and there are people that are just grieved by that. Isn't it amazing how people just can hate the Lord so much they just don't even want to hear about the resurrection of Jesus, just grieves them or angers them or upsets them, and they're on a mission to stop it, and that's what we see here. Look at verse 14. And beholding the man which was healed standing with them, they could say nothing against it. But when they had commanded them to go aside out of the council, they conferred among themselves saying, what shall we do to these men? For then indeed a notable miracle hath been done by them as manifest to all them that dwell in Jerusalem, and we cannot deny it. But that it spread no further among the people, let us straightly threaten them that they speak henceforth to no man in this name. And this is a theme that you see a lot through the book of Acts, that when they can't answer what's being preached, they can't deny the power of God's word, they can't deny the truth of what's being said. When they have no argument, then they say, all right, we just need to threaten these people. We just need to stop them from speaking. See, God's word is powerful, and people who don't want God's word to be believed in, their answer is, well, let's just shut it up then. We can't prove it wrong. We can't actually have an argument that would disprove the gospel. So let's just shut them up. So we're just going to straightly threaten them that they speak henceforth to no man in this name. Look at verse 18. And they called them and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John answered and said to them, whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye, for we cannot but speak the things that we've seen and heard. So when they had further threatened them, they let them go, finding nothing how they might punish them because of the people, for all men glorified God for that which was done. Flip over to chapter 5. So that's Acts chapter 4. Go to chapter 5, verse 28. This is again, they're dealing with the same people, saying, did not we straightly command you that you should not teach in this name? And behold, you have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine and intend to bring this man's blood upon us. Remember, these are the people who said his blood be on us and on our children. Hey, why are you holding us to that a few days later, a few weeks later? Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, we ought to obey God rather than men. The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree. So they say, we're going to obey God rather than men. And then the next words out of their mouth is saying exactly what they're being prohibited from saying because they're prohibited from saying what? Oh, you're bringing this man's blood on us. So what's the first word I was about? Hey, we ought to obey God rather than men. Guess what? You killed Jesus, right? That's the next thing that they say. They're not going to censor the message. They're not going to say, okay, well, let's just focus on a different part of the word of God and let's stay away from the part that's offending them. No, the next sentence is you hanged him on a tree. You killed Jesus. Look at verse number 40. And to him they agreed and when they had called the apostles and beaten them, they commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus and let them go. And they departed from the presence of the council rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name and daily in the temple and in every house they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ. So the reaction of the apostles is consistent. When they're persecuted, they stand their ground. When they're told not to preach in the name of Jesus, they continue preaching. When they're beaten for preaching in the name of Jesus, they rejoice and then they keep preaching. They don't stop. They don't cease. Look if you would at chapter number six. Flip over to chapter number six. So we've looked at chapter four, chapter five. Now we're into chapter six. Look at verse 10. And here's that theme again in verse 10. They were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spake. So here's Stephen, a powerful preacher, speaking the word of God. They can't resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spake. So what's their reaction? Do they back off and say, well, you know, we can't stop this guy. We can't resist this. This is the power of God. Do they fall on their knees and get saved or do they at least just back off and leave them alone? No. They start lying about him, getting him arrested. They must censor God's word. Look at verse 11. Then they suborned men which said, we have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and against God. And of course that was a lie. And they stirred up the people and the elders and the scribes and came upon him and caught him and brought him to the council. So they got to get him arrested. They got to drag him before the authorities. They got to call the police because they can't resist the spirit and the wisdom by which he spake. Look if you would at chapter 7, verse 54. This is when Stephen has been called before the authorities and he's given the chance to speak for himself. And Stephen has just preached that great sermon that we read in chapter 7. And then in verse 54 it says, when they heard these things, they were cut to the heart. God's word has a way of doing that, doesn't it? God's word and spirit-filled preaching will do that. And it says they were cut to the heart and they gnashed on him with their teeth. But he being full of the Holy Ghost looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God and said, behold, I see the heavens open and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God, watch this, they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and ran upon him with one of God's, ah, stop, make it stop. We don't want to list this guy. Look, a Bible-believing preacher to a reprobate is like nails on a chalkboard unto him, right? I mean people that are God-haters, people who are enemies of the Lord, they do not want to hear the truth. They don't want other people to hear the truth and they themselves cannot stand it. I mean they're grieved. I think they endure physical pain when they hear the Bible being preached. I mean they're plugging their ears. They don't even want to hear another word out of Stephen's mouth. They hate him so much. And this is why there's an agenda today and always has been an agenda to censor God's word, to silence God's word because the wicked don't want to hear it. Why don't they want to hear it? What does Romans 1 tell us? They don't even want to retain God in their knowledge. Well, if they don't want to retain God in their knowledge, the last thing they want to hear is a preacher preaching the Word of God. And the Bible says that men love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil for everyone that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be reproved. And what is Bible preaching? It's like a flashlight just shining the light on sin. You know the Bible says in Isaiah 51, cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet and do what? Show my people their sins. That show the house of Jacob their transgressions. And so Bible preaching, preaching of the Word of God, it shines the light of God's word and all the cockroaches of this world. They want to scurry into the darkness. They want that light turned off. They will threaten you. They'll arrest you. They'll fight you. They'll stir up people against you and do anything to stop you. And there's nothing new under the sun. This is going on in Bible times. It's still going on today. There are always going to be people that are enemies of the Gospel. Look at chapter 9. In Acts chapter 9, and of course it's not always reprobates or God haters, sometimes it's people that are just misguided and they're just confused or misled by the God haters or deceivers or false prophets of this world. And you know the Apostle Paul was one of those people who was in ignorance. You know he didn't hate the Lord, but he ignorantly persecuted the church of God. The Bible says he did it ignorantly and unbelief. He did not know that what he was doing is wrong. So some people that are even good people or at least they're not reprobates could get caught up in participating and persecuting God's people. Even though they're not even a reprobate, but they're just following the people who are or they're influenced by the people who are or influenced by the devil and his minions. So Saul is an example that Acts chapter 9 verse 1, and Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest and desired of him letters to Damascus to the synagogues that if he found any of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem. I mean, think about this, he's persecuting God's people even unto foreign lands. So not only is he saying, you know, we don't want to hear this in Jerusalem, we don't want to hear this amongst our people here in Judea, he's saying, you know what, if the gospel is being preached in a foreign country, I want to go to that foreign country and go round those people up and bring them back and punish them. I mean, he's even persecuting Christians even unto foreign lands, because Damascus is in what country? Syria. It's another country, okay. Look at verse 23, because of course, in chapter 9, Saul ends up getting saved. Saul of Tarsus, who later is renamed Paul, we know him as the apostle Paul, but at this point he's called Saul. Well, he gets saved in Acts chapter 9, and then look at verse 23. And after that many days were fulfilled, the Jews took counsel to kill him. Boy, it's interesting, what goes around comes around, all right. So first, Saul is the one that's breathing out slaughter and threatenings toward God's people, but then he ends up getting saved. Now he's being persecuted, now he's on the receiving end. So it says in verse 24, but their laying away was known of Saul, and they watched the gates day and night to kill him. Then the disciples took him by night and led him down by the wall in a basket. And after that many days were fulfilled, the Jews took counsel to kill him. But their, oh wait, is that, I'm sorry, I'm reading the same verse again. Jump down if you would to chapter 12. Jump down to chapter 12. So we've seen it in chapter 4, we saw it in chapter 5, chapter 6, chapter 7, chapter 9, chapter 12. I mean, this is a major theme in the book of Acts. There are people out there that want to silence preaching. They want to silence the gospel from being preached. Look at chapter 12 verse 1, now about that time Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church, and he killed James the brother of John with the sword. And because he saw it pleased the Jews, he proceeded further to take Peter also. Then were the days of unleavened bread. Now flip back if you would to Amos chapter 7, we're going to look at this in the Old Testament. Of course, there's a lot of example of this in the New Testament. We took a small sampling from the book of Acts. There's more in the book of Acts. I mean, later in the book of Acts, there are people who are swearing not to even eat any food until they've killed Paul. They're so zealous to silence him. All throughout the epistles of Paul, he talks about this. We see it all throughout the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. I mean, it's a major theme in the New Testament. But even in the Old Testament, we see multiple attempts of people to try to silence God's word. And this has been going on all throughout history. You know, I was thinking about William Tyndale. I'm sorry, not William Tyndale. Well, yeah, William Tyndale is another example, though. But William Tyndale, of course, is burned at the stake just for translating God's word into English, okay? Just for wanting people to have the New Testament in their hand, William Tyndale was burned at the stake. Why? Because there were people that wanted to silence God's word from going forth, the Roman Catholic Church. And of course, many other people were burned at the stake just for simply printing the word of God, translating the word of God into the vernacular tongues. You know, why is the Roman Catholic Church so afraid of people getting God's word in their hand? Because then they're going to see that they're being lied to by the priest, that they're being lied to by the pope, that the church is lying to them and teaching them doctrines of devils and extorting money from them rather than giving them the gospel free of charge. And that's why men like William Tyndale were burned at the stake and many others. But then fast forward to the Baptist missionary, William Carey, who went to India. And he wanted to be a missionary to India and give the gospel unto the Hindus. And when he showed up in India to give the gospel to the Hindus, guess who stopped him from doing it? The government of England, okay? The English government, the United Kingdom, they stopped him from preaching the gospel. They made it illegal for him to witness unto a Hindu, to give the gospel unto a Hindu. Now what kind of a wicked heathen government would claim to be Christian and claim to have their church of England, but then when a guy wants to give the gospel to the Hindus, they outlaw him for doing that. And so William Carey ended up having to move his operation onto a part of India that was colonized by Denmark because Denmark was giving him free reign to preach the gospel. And so he had to move his operation to a part of India that was on Danish territory because the English were banning him from preaching the gospel. And you know what? By the way, this has nothing to do with the sermon, but let me tell you something. England is one of the most wicked countries that there is and has been super wicked for hundreds and hundreds of years. And you know what? I'll guarantee you a big part of it is because they were given the most amazing Bible translation of all time. They've been given the greatest translation of God's Word in the history of mankind since it was originally penned down in Hebrew and Greek. The greatest translation of all time is the English King James Version. Any way you measure it, okay, whether you measure it just by its literary greatness, by its beauty, by its power, by its accuracy, and most importantly, by the fruit that it is born, and by the amount that has been used throughout the world, the King James Bible is the greatest translation of the Bible that has ever existed. And here you have a nation that is given this great gift of the King James Bible and the Word of God, and it's printed and available to the common man, and King James New Testaments are going all over the place. You know, unto whom much is given, of him shall much be required. And you know what, they have become a wicked place. They mishandled the Word of God. Today you can even go to the town where King James was born and there's not a single church in that town that preaches from the King James Bible. When they knew God, they glorified him not as God. When they had the Word of God right there and they had the truth right there and turned away from it, boy, they have become a super wicked nation. And you know, people don't talk about it very often because I guess they're our buddy. They're our ally, so they can pretty much do anything and we're going to look the other way as the United States of America, but what about all the tens of millions of people that the United Kingdom is responsible for murdering and killing in the 20th century? Nobody even knows about that. Nobody even talks about how wicked the British Empire was and what they did in India. Tons of people are starving in India while they export all the food. Did you know that the United Kingdom are the ones who invented the concentration camp? They're the ones who coined the phrase concentration camp and they used it down in South Africa. They put people in concentration camps in South Africa and they have murdered, and you know, I thought our whole country was based on throwing them out. When did they become our buddy again? You know what I mean? Wasn't the whole country of the United States of America founded on, we got to separate from these people. We got to get away from this wickedness, these tyrants, this tyranny from across the Atlantic Ocean and then, you know, at some point along the way, our misguided leaders became allied with them and have joined them in all kinds of wicked wars and atrocities that they've committed. They have murdered so many civilians. It's not even funny the way that they have fought and oppressed people for hundreds of years. You know, that's another story but, you know, just for sake of this sermon, how about the fact that they banned William Carey from giving the gospel to the Hindus, right? But they don't mind with their troops just opening fire and just shooting the Hindus in massacres when they're colonizing India. They don't mind murdering Hindus. They don't mind oppressing them and stealing from them and ripping them off. But then, oh, God forbid somebody would come and preach the gospel to the Hindus because, you know what they said? Oh, that's bad for business. And the love of money is the root of all evil. And you know why they banned William Carey from preaching the gospel unto the Hindus? Because they didn't want to mess up their East India Tea Company, right? The same tea that our American forefathers dumped in the water at the Boston Tea Party. You know, they don't want to mess up their East India Trading Company. So let all these Hindus go to hell. You know why? Because they hated the Hindus. That's why. Why? Because they only love themselves and love money, okay? We should love people and want them to get the gospel, amen? So look, there's nothing new under the sun. Evil governments like the United Kingdom have stopped people from preaching the gospel. And you know what? I wanted to go preach the gospel and the United Kingdom banned me, right? So they banned William Carey a few hundred years ago. Have they changed? No. Now they're banning me from even having a layover at the London Heathrow Airport. There's no free speech there. It's a wicked place. But all throughout history, governments and private companies and individuals and religions have tried to silence God's word. Now here's a great example of this back in Amos, chapter 7. Amos, chapter 7, verse 12, also Amaziah said unto Amos, O thou seer, go flee thee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread and prophesy there, but prophesy not again any more at Bethel, for it is the king's chapel and it is the king's court. So what you have to understand is at this time, the nation of Israel had been divided into two kingdoms. The northern kingdom of Israel, that's where Bethel is located, and the southern kingdom of Judah, that's where Jerusalem and places like that are located. And so here, Amos has been called by God to be a prophet to the northern kingdom, okay? So he's being sent into a very hostile territory because the southern kingdom was more friendly toward the things of God and usually closer to God throughout their history, whereas the northern kingdom of Israel rarely ever had anything to do with the true God. They were the more wicked kingdom, which is why they went into captivity like a century before Judah did. But he is sent there by God to go and basically be a missionary to that northern kingdom and preach that northern kingdom of Samaria or Israel. And they're basically trying to deport him, you know, they're trying to send him home and say, hey, look, you know, you've got to go back home to Judah. You can't preach here. And of course, Amaziah here, he's petitioning the government and everything in order to get him banned and sent back, and the king of Israel would send him back and so forth. But what does he say in verse 14? Then answered Amos and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son, but I was a herdman and a gatherer of sycamore fruit, and the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel. Now therefore, hear thou the word of the Lord, thou sayest, prophesy not against Israel, and drop not thy word against the house of Isaac. Therefore thus saith the Lord, thy wife shall be a harlot in the city. Now look, that's not something that you want somebody to tell you, especially if they're a prophet of God. You don't want the preacher to tell you, hey, by the way, your wife is going to be a whore. Your wife shall be a harlot in the city, and thy sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword, and thy land shall be divided by line, and thou shalt die in a polluted land, and Israel shall surely go into captivity forth of his land. So what do we see here? There's a lot of great things we can learn just from this short little story in the book of Amos. We can see that first of all, wicked people want to silence God's word. They want to shut up the man of God. They want to silence the word of God. They'd rather burn Bibles and just do whatever they can to threaten it and stop it from spreading. But then we also see that the man of God should not back down. Here we see Amos not backing down, boldly continuing to preach, refusing to go home, refusing to go back to Judah, and not softening the message at all, but getting right in this guy's face and preaching super hard against him personally. But the last thing that we need to see from this story that's very important, we need to see the consequences of seeking to censor God's word. You know, when you try to stop the gospel from being preached, when you try to stop God's word from going forth, and when you seek to censor God's word, there are serious punishments and consequences. How could you not be cursed by God if you're actually seeking to stop God's word from being preached? And look at this, his wife shall be a harlot in the city. His sons and daughters were going to die by the sword. His nation was going to be wiped out and defeated. That's a pretty serious consequence. These are major punishments that are a direct result of trying to censor God's word. Because it says in verse 16, now therefore hear thou the word of the Lord, thou sayest, prophesy not against Israel, and drop not thy word against the house of Isaac. So what did he say? Stop preaching the Bible. Stop preaching the word of God to my people, okay? Therefore, what's verse 17 say? Therefore, what does therefore mean? As a consequence of that, because you said that, because you told a preacher, don't preach the word of God here, because of that, your wife's going to be a harlot. Because of that, your children are going to be killed. And because of that, your nation is going to be destroyed. That's a pretty serious consequence. That should make people think twice about trying to stop the word of God from being preached and trying to censor God's word. God is going to punish these people who seek to censor his word. You know, I think of the fact that not only was I banned from preaching the gospel in the United Kingdom, but I was banned from preaching the gospel in South Africa. And what's interesting about that is that when we were planning the trip to South Africa, we made it clear we're going there for one reason, to give the gospel. We're not there on some crusade against homos. You know, that's what the media always wants to make it about, you know, because that's the subject that they're obsessed with, and that's what they want to focus on. And look, I'm all for ripping face and preaching against the Sodomites, but we were going on a missions trip, and when we're going on missions trips, that's not our agenda. I mean, our agenda, when we go to Imariz, Mexico, or anywhere else, was to do what? Preach the gospel. You know, we're doing soul winning, we're evangelizing, we're just trying to get these people to first base, okay? We're trying to get people saved, trying to get people out of hell, yeah, later we want to get them baptized and also teach them to observe all things Christ commanded. But on this particular trip to South Africa, the goal was soul winning. But of course, they made a big thing about, oh, he's this hate preacher and blah, blah, blah, and they ended up getting me banned from that country. Well, there was a guy specifically who made the decision to ban me, and his name was Malusi Gigaba, okay? And this was the guy who made the decision, he's the minister of home affairs or minister of interior affairs, and he is the one who said, Pastor Steven Anderson is banned. And not only did he ban me, he banned like 20 other people. He banned my wife, he banned Pastor Dave Berzins, he banned Dave Berzins' wife, he banned Roger Jimenez, he banned a whole bunch of people that are just, they just went on Facebook and just anybody who said anything about going, or just seemed like a friend of ours, they're just banning them, ban, ban, ban, ban, ban. So this guy who made the decision, his name is Malusi Gigaba, well, I looked him up on Wikipedia, he was a member of the Communist Party until 1990. Now he's a member of a party called the ANC or African National Congress. Well, you know what just happened to him this week? This week, he just had to resign from his political office in disgrace and humiliation. Why? Because under the curse of God, that's why. This wicked man who told us, don't preach in South Africa, don't bring the gospel here, don't bring your hard preaching style here, that wicked perverted individual has now been publicly shamed and humiliated, okay, he's in big trouble because he was lying under oath. Now, a few years ago, he was caught in adultery, but that doesn't even matter anymore. I mean, nowadays, politicians commit adultery and nobody even bats an eye, nobody even cares. I mean, look, California just elected a new governor, okay, I believe his name is Gavin Newsom, and this guy, Gavin Newsom, that was just elected as the governor of California used to be the mayor of San Francisco, okay, and when he was the mayor of San Francisco, he was caught in adultery while he's the mayor. He's committing adultery with his best friend's wife, with his campaign manager's wife. What a disgusting, evil violation of Leviticus chapter 20 verse 10, okay, and this wicked adulterer who, while he's in office, is committing adultery with the man's wife who even helped him get elected, that's what an evil covenant breaker, truce breaker, adulterer, selfish, evil piece of dung this guy is, okay, but he's just elected governor of California, no problem. Stop and think about that. I mean, I remember when Bill Clinton was committing an act of disgusting fornication in his office, abusing his power as president, right, by being with one of his interns in the office. Well, you know what's interesting about that is that at the time, everybody was shocked and horrified by it. But nowadays, these guys commit adultery and nobody even bats an eye, nobody even, I mean, they wanted him impeached, they want to remove him from office. Now people do that stuff before they get elected, they do something even worse where they're actually committing adultery with their friend's wife and now it's like, where do I sign up to vote for this guy? I mean, just landslide, let's elect this guy. I mean, it's not even a question of can he stay in office, it's like, let's bring in the adulterer, put him in office. So of course, the fact that Malusi Gigaba committed adultery a few years ago while in office, of course, that doesn't even matter, nobody bats an eye, okay. But now he's been found to be lying under oath and now he's been found to have a pornographic video of himself that's gone viral on the internet. I'm not even going to go into it because of the fact it's too disgusting, but it's the most humiliating, disgusting thing that you can imagine that you would want to be publicly exposed of yourself and you know what, God is humiliating this man, God is making a fool of this man, God is making a laughing stock and an idiot out of this man, God is destroying this man and you know what, it's only going to get worse for him. God is going to continue to humiliate him, God is going to continue to punish him and make a fool of him and it's all going to culminate when he splits hell wide open. Don't mess with the preaching of God's word, don't mess with soul winning, don't mess with the word of God going forth, God will judge you and Malusi Gigaba is a perfect example and cautionary tale of what happens when you mess with Faithful Word Baptist Church missions program, buddy. You want to mess with us? Well you know what, you can become the laughing stock of the world. You know, you think that we're ashamed of what we preach, guess what, we're not. Oh man, they really took you to task in the media. Well you know what, I'd rather be attacked on South Africa media for preaching hard against sodomites and for hating queers, I'd rather be attacked for that because I'm proud of that than to have some video of me doing whatever all over the stinking internet, okay. That's what's going on with the enemies of the Lord today. God is not mocked and whatsoever man soweth, that shall he also reap and when they reject you they reject him that sent you, the Bible says. Jesus said he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me and he that receiveth you receiveth me. Look and if they reject you, they haven't rejected you, they've rejected the Lord because you know what, we're just the Lord's ambassadors. Who are we? We're nobody. I could be anybody. I could be red, yellow, black, white, I could be anybody, right. I mean, God uses anybody who will yield themself to him and will take the word of God and be willing to preach the word of God. I mean, is God a respecter of persons? No. I could be anybody. I could be tall, short, skinny, fat, red, yellow, black, white, blue eyes, it doesn't matter who I am because the stuff that I'm saying didn't come out of my own heart. It didn't come out of my own brain. It came out of the word of God. Okay. Now, look, I've said plenty of things out of my own heart and plenty of things out of my own brain, but guess what? Those aren't the things I'm in trouble for. The things I'm in trouble for is when I preach the word of God. What is South Africa mad at me today? About my opinions about food? About my opinions about athletics? No. They're mad at me because I preached against the sodomites biblical preaching. They're mad at me in the UK today because I preached against Islam. Go look at the order where they banned me from the UK and it says, this is what you said against Mohammed, you're banned. Go look at it. It's on display back. It's in a frame. It's in a place of honor and preeminence in the back of our church auditorium. It's close to the thing about the Southern Poverty Law Center declaring us a hate group. It's a whole little entertainment area to read that stuff, but anyway, the point is God is not mocked. God's going to punish these people and anybody who tries to stop God's word is going to be under the curse of God, you know, and if you would go to Jeremiah chapter 36, you know, there was another guy, boy, God will punish. There was another guy who went after our church hardcore. He was this reporter on CNN and this guy was just going on CNN literally every day for like two weeks speaking against our church. Even after the story was over, it's like he just kept trying to like resurrect the story just to punish us or just to make our lives miserable so he would just keep just finding a new angle on the story. It was like, how can they still be talking about this a week and a half, two weeks later? But every time CNN ran the story, I knew about it because I look at my phone and I have 150 new emails in the last three minutes, okay, from all the haters out there who are watching CNN and hating God's word and what it says and the people that it condemns, okay? And so, you know, I kept just getting blasted by this guy. It totally ruined my fire alarm business. I had to change my phone number. We had people picketing our church. We had people protesting outside our church, all this stuff and, you know, we can look back and laugh about it now but at the time, it was pretty intense. It was pretty stressful at the time back in 2009 and this guy was our main persecutor, this guy Rick Sanchez. Well, you know what happened to him, okay? He got fired from CNN and you know what he got fired for? He kept being anti-Semitic because he said like the mildest thing ever. He said some super mild thing about how the Jews run CNN or something, some super mild thing and he got fired. Why? Because whatever a man says, that's what he's going to read. You know, you want to falsely accuse us and try to make us out to be so hateful. What did he get fired for? For being hateful toward the Jews. He wasn't even really being hateful toward the Jews but you know what? He deserves that false accusation because he falsely accused us and lied about us and I mean this guy lied through his teeth. This is back when our church was really small. This is back in 2009 and so this is the early, our church has only been around for a few years and our church was much smaller in those days. So on Sunday morning, we had 49 people show up for the Sunday morning service when CNN came to our church and they asked me how many people were in church this morning and I said to the lady, I said 49 people and she said okay good because that's what I counted. I was doing a head count as people were coming into church and I came up with the same number. Hey, they reported the next day on CNN and said oh, there's less than 20 people in the church and then they claimed that there were hundreds of protesters when in reality there were like 30 protesters, 35 or 40 or something. I knew it was less protesters than what was in the church and yeah, our church is small at the time. It was a new church. We only had 49 people but he's like oh, it's tiny. There's like less than 20 people. I called the lady out. I said hey, why did he say that when you counted and asked me and she said well, I don't know what to tell you. I said well, he lied and she's like yeah, I know but it wasn't me. It wasn't my fault. I didn't lie. I told him the true number and he chose to lie about it. Okay, well, how you doing buddy and you know then this guy Rick Sanchez, it's funny. Then I'm driving down the road flipping through XM radio. I hear him on XM radio years later. He's like now he's like a conservative talk host with all the pro-republican points when he was like a total leftist. Why? Because people have no integrity. They have no values. They don't believe anything. They just say what gets them paid. That's what they do. And I know I'm off on a rabbit trail. Did I have you turn to Jeremiah 36? Go to Jeremiah 36. I'm giving you a lot of time to get there, all right. Find it. Keep looking. No, I'm just kidding. But anyway, I know I'm off on a rabbit trail but what about this, okay? Who was it who really tried to get me banned from South Africa? Who was really behind it? Who was really responsible for it? I mean the guy who made the decision and said ban Pastor Anderson was Malousi Gigaba and of course he's been shamed and humiliated and his career destroyed and he looks like an idiot and a laughing stock to the whole world. Amen. That's what he deserves and he's going to split hell wide open too. But who was really behind it? Well, the people who actually spearheaded me getting banned from South Africa was this group called Gay SA Radio. And this radio host and his station literally made it like a full-time job to get me banned. I mean they just worked on this every day, every day. They're just making calls, petitions, letters. They're meeting with this person. I mean they fought tooth and nail to get me banned from South Africa. They were the main ones who did it. Guess what? A week after I got banned from South Africa, the United States government sent them a check for $8,000. And it says on there, and this homo radio station, they posted this letter online and said, haha, look, we just got this donation from the United States government for $8,000. Okay, less than a week after me being banned from South Africa. So just stop and think about this for a minute. This group spends weeks and months fighting every day to get me banned. Then they succeed in getting me banned from South Africa and then what happens? Less than a week later, they get a check from the United States government for $8,000. As a donation from your tax dollars, from my tax dollars, the United States government took our tax dollars and took out of the US treasury and gave this homo radio station $8,000 to help them promote diversity and whatever values in other parts of the world. That's because the United States government was behind me getting banned, friend. And this isn't some wild-eyed conspiracy theory when they're sending them a letter thanking them and a check for $8,000 a week after me getting banned. You'd have to be pretty stupid to sit there and say, oh, there's no connection to that. There's no connection. Our government, God bless America, land that I love. And beside her and hide her as she promotes faggotry all over the world, sodomizing Africa, sodomizing Asia, sending faggot ambassadors everywhere, God bless America, because I don't care. You know what? America has become a wicked nation, and our government sent $8,000 to a radio station in order to pay them to persecute me. That's what happened, friend. Our government, my government and your government that I send a fat check to every April 15th, and that our church sends checks to every month, okay, for payroll taxes, they take our tax dollars and they give it to a sodomite radio station in South Africa in order to persecute God's people and stop them from doing soul winning. That's what's going on, friend. That's the world that you live in. Wake up and smell the coffee. So who's really behind it? And so who's under the curse of God now? You know, it's easy to get the amen on Malusi Gigaba being under the curse of God. The United States of America is under the curse of God today. And you know what? That's why there's no American flag up here. You will never see an American flag hanging in this church. And you know the bulletin company that makes our bulletins for us? And oh, am I making you a little uncomfortable right now? Am I making you uncomfortable? Well, you know what? I'll bet Valerian was a little uncomfortable when he had to fly all the way to South Africa and get arrested and flown home and had to, you know, flying to South Africa is painful enough. Being turned around and flying back the same day, that's pretty uncomfortable. But you're uncomfortable because I'm speaking against your precious little United Babylon States of America? I bet Paul Wittenberger was uncomfortable when he was in jail eating slop with his hands with crack addicts. They were eating slop with their hands as a direct result of your government and my government sending $8,000 to a radio station to persecute us over there and to get us in trouble with the law over there. That's what happened, friend. And you know what? We have a company that we get our bulletins from. They send us all these blank bulletins with just the picture and the Bible verse printed in. Every time there's one with an American flag on it, I tear it up and throw it in the trash because I'm not going to bring an American flag into God's house when our country is a wicked purveyor of sodomy all over the world. Okay? You understand? And look, man, I just want to go off on this. There's so much I want to say. I need to stay on target with the sermon. Part of me is like, go to the notes. Go to the outline. Turn to Jeremiah 36. But part of me wants to just, you know, express the truth of our situation today in America and just explain to you today that our government is wicked and evil. And you know what? Today, the vast majority, probably 99% of independent fundamental Baptists today, they are just so flag-waving, patriotic, pro-Republican, pro-Donald Trump, and they just think that if we could just get conservatives elected, we're just going to fix everything. You know what? I heard one of them recently and he got up and preached. This is one of the old IFB flag-waving type preachers. He got up and preached and he said this. He said, you know, a lot of people think that we as preachers shouldn't talk about politics. But we should talk about politics, you know, because he wants to promote Republicans and Trump. That's what he means to talk about politics, right? He wants to promote, you know. And then he gives us an example from the Bible, well, John the Baptist talked about politics. So I guess I'm in pretty good company. Except that when John the Baptist talked about politics, you know what he was doing? He was actually condemning the leadership for their sexual sin. Okay? He was condemning King Herod for what? For what? For having his brother Philip's wife. And then he said, well, I'm in pretty good company because Nathan the prophet went up to David and said, thou art the man. Why did he tell David thou art the man? Because David was committing adultery. And who do these bunch of independent fundamental Baptist flag-waving Republicans want to promote when they talk about politics? They want us to get out there and vote for Donald Trump. Somebody who's never committed adultery before, right? I mean, he would never be in bed with a woman that's not his wife, right? Hello, is anybody home? You're not in good company, old man. You'll be in good company, old man, when you point out the filth and pornography and sin and adultery of Donald Trump. Point that out, then I'll call you John the Baptist. Until then, I'll call you John the Republican. John the Fox News Anchor. And you know what? See, we need to get off this patriotic junk. That's what it is. And you know what? You don't like it, then lump it. Then go somewhere else and go down to the flag-waving Baptist church. But I'm here to tell you something. I made a decision almost 20 years ago in my own personal life, and I made a decision that as soon as our country, because our country wasn't near as bad back then. Twenty years ago, things were a lot different. I said, you know what? We gotta draw the line somewhere. I said, the moment that sodomites are allowed to adopt children in our country, and when children are handed over to sodomites for adoption, is the day that I will never pray for God to bless America again. But I guess I should just go back on that now, because I'm like the frog in the hot water and I just got used to it by now, right? No, I'm going to listen to the Steve Anderson from 20 years ago who thought that was a pretty good place to draw the line. That I can't ask God to bless a country that is sending money to homos all over the world and taking people's children away and placing them in a foster home with homos. Think about it, friend. Wake up. How can God bless that? You know what? I wish that God would bring some kind of destruction on America. Some kind of a famine, or, oh, the economy's getting better. You know what? Maybe God should just wipe out our economy, because then maybe people will receive Jesus Christ as Savior, because you know what I've noticed is that when I go soul-winding in poor neighborhoods, everybody wants to hear the Gospel, and when I go soul-winding in the rich area, nobody wants to hear the Gospel, and when I go to the upper middle class, nobody wants to hear the Gospel. Well, you know what, maybe we should pray for God to just turn this whole country poor so that then people will want to hear the Gospel. And you know, maybe we can eat rice and beans together, and maybe we can wear old tattered clothes together and love the Lord together and not have to look at a bunch of sodomites all day, because I'd rather eat rice and beans and live in a messed up house and wear rags and not have my kids be around a bunch of pedophiles and sodomites. Well, what was the iniquity of Sodom? Idleness, fullness of bread, and they committed abomination before me. That's what the Lord said. Why? Because they got so high and mighty, they're so rich, they're so comfortable. Hey, somebody ought to take America down a notch. Put that in your patriotic pipe and smoke it. Somebody ought to take America down a notch. You know, we should be praying for famine. We should be praying for natural disasters. We should be praying for destruction. We should be praying for the economy to tank. We should be praying for bankruptcy. Why would we pray for the most godless purveyor of sodomy on the planet to be blessed by God? You think God wants us to, oh God, I know that we're so fat and lazy and we don't even care about you, and we don't go to church, and we blaspheme your name, and we send our tax dollars to some homo radio station so they can turn Africa into perverts like we are, but God, would you just please give us more money, because we need a three-car garage instead of two, and I want to have a boat and an RV, and I don't want to have to share a vehicle anymore, and we don't have enough money, and oh, it's so hard. You think that's what God up in heaven is like, oh, sure, yeah, let me fix the economy for you. It doesn't make any sense, friend. I don't care about, you know what? I don't care about if we have money or don't have money. You know what I care about? I care about the spiritual state of our nation, because you know what? It doesn't matter how prosperous we are if we split hell wide open as a nation. Think about that. Now, you say, well, none of us are going to hell. Yeah, you're right. We're all saved. Who's saved this morning? Who believes it? Yeah, we're all saved, but you know what? What about them? This nation is on its way to hell in a hand basket. If you don't believe that, you're crazy. I mean, this nation is on a bobsled to hell, and you know what? Every year we go out soul winning, it gets less receptive out there. Every single year, doesn't it? You know, we just find somewhere else, we'll go down to Mexico. You know, we'll go to the Indian reservation, we'll go somewhere else, but you know what? It gets less receptive out there every year, and you know what? I will not even spend five seconds praying for God to bless this nation. I have not prayed for God to bless this nation in a long time, and I'm never going to again. Unless our nation has some kind of a radical transformation. But you know, I already made that decision, I already told that to the Lord 20 years ago, I'm not going to change that decision. I said, when they start putting children in the homes of sodomites, I'm done. That's it. I'm done with it. And that's how I feel. And I believe that God is punishing many of these old IFB churches with madness and confusion and craziness because of the fact that they're not serving the Lord and preaching like they should, but they're serving the government and the Republican party, and that's their God now. And they literally, they skip the Bible reading and go straight to the talk radio. And I can prove it to you, because they're not quoting the Bible, they're quoting talk radio. All right, back to the sermon. Thank you for indulging me. I've been sick, I had some things I need to get off my chest. Jeremiah chapter 36 verse 10. I got a little time left, sit tight, I've been gone for a while. Jeremiah 36 verse 10, because I want to just close on this point. Why is it that governments and private organizations like YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, PayPal, why do they all want to censor God's word? Why do they want to stop God's word from going forth? Why does the US government want to stop God's word? You know, they can't stop it at home because the First Amendment's holding them back. You know, the First Amendment, which still has some semblance of meaning, barely, is holding them back. So they're like, well, let's just persecute them in South Africa then, because we can't stop them here because of the First Amendment. So we'll just persecute them onto foreign lands. We'll send letters unto Damascus, we'll send letters unto Johannesburg, right, and persecute them there. But why is it that the wicked want to censor God's word? I'll tell you why, because the word of God is powerful. The word of God is very powerful. Look at Jeremiah 36 verse 10, then read Barak in the book, the words of Jeremiah in the house of the Lord, in the chamber of Gemariah the son of Shaphan the scribe, in the high court at the entry of the new gate of the Lord's house, in the ears of all the people. When Micaiah the son of Gemariah the son of Shaphan had heard out of the book all the words of the Lord, then he went down into the king's house, into the scribe's chamber, and lo all the princes sat there, even Elishama the scribe, and Deliah the son of Shemaiah, and Elnathan the son of Akbar, and Gemariah the son of Shaphan, and Zedekiah the son of Hananiah, and all the princes, and Micaiah declared unto them all the words that he had heard when Barak read the book in the ears of the people. Therefore all the princes sent Jehudah, the son of Netheniah, the son of Sheolamiah, the son of Cushiah and Debarach, saying, Take in thine hand the roll wherein thou is read in the ears of the people, and come. So Barak the son of Neriah took the roll in his hand, and came unto them. And they said to him, Sit down now, and read it in our ears. So Barak read it in their ears. Now it came to pass that when they had heard all the words, they were afraid, both one and other, and said unto Barak, We will surely tell the king of all these words. So what's happening in this story? This is a really good story. Basically Jeremiah speaks the word of God to scribe Barak, and Barak writes it down for him like as a secretary. Barak brings this and reads it to these people, and when they hear it they say, Oh man, this is important. We've got to read this to the people that are higher up than us. So then they take God's word and then they read it to those people. And when those people hear that, Oh man, you know, we've got to tell these people that are higher up. And eventually it gets all the way to the king, because everybody who hears it is just blown away by it. Everyone who hears it is afraid when they hear God's word, because God's word is powerful and God's word was condemning them. So they're trembling. I mean, God's word is cutting them to the heart so that they keep saying, Hey, we've got to get this to these other people. They need to hear this. We will surely tell the king of all these words. And then this is kind of a funny part, verse 17. And they asked Barak saying, Tell us now, how didst thou write all these words in his mouth? And this is a hilarious answer. Then Barak answered them. He pronounced all these words unto me with his mouth. And I wrote them with ink in the book. I mean, is that funny or what, you know, where, where did you get this book? I mean, how did you get this? Oh, he's like, well, I mean, how did, how did, how did you write down Jeremiah's word? Well, he pronounced it with his mouth, you know, so he was like moving his mouth and words are coming out. And then I took ink and paper and I actually wrote down what he was saying. So it's kind of a smart, it seems like it's kind of a smart aleck response here, but I guess he just didn't know what else to say. I mean, I don't know what else to say, but you know what? It's because they were just having trouble believing it. You know why? You know why they're having trouble believing it? How could somebody just dictate something and somebody writes it down and it's this powerful, it's this amazing. We've never heard anything like this. Never man spake like this man. They're so blown away by the power of God's word. They can't believe that this guy Jeremiah is in prison and he can just dictate this and the guy writes it down and it just is this much of a masterpiece, right? Then said the princes unto Barak, go hide thee, thou and Jeremiah, and let no man know where you be. And they went into the king, into the court, but they laid up the roll in the chamber of Elisha, mother scribe, and told all the words in the ears of the king. So the king sent Jehudah to fetch the roll and he took it out of Elisha, mother scribe's chamber and Jehudah read it in the ears of the king and in the ears of all the princes which stood beside the king. Now the king sat in the winter house in the ninth month. I mean this guy's pretty comfortable, right? He's in the winter house. You know, if you come to find me in November, which is the ninth month at that time, I'll be in my winter home. Not to be confused with my summer home. He's in the winter house and he's listening to it in the ninth month. There's a fire on the hearth burning before him and it came to pass that when Jehudah had read three or four leaves, leaves are like pages, he cut it with the pen knife and cast it into the fire that was on the hearth until all the roll was consumed in the fire that was on the hearth. Yet they were not afraid nor rent their garments, neither the king nor any of his servants that heard all these words, nevertheless Elnathan and Deliah and Gemariah had made intercession to the king that he would not burn the roll but he would not hear them. So here's another guy doing what? He's got to censor God's word. Not only does he not want to listen to it but he chops it up and throws it in the fire to make sure nobody else can hear God's word. Well what happens to him? How does he end up getting punished? Well you know what, he just gets his eyes poked out, oh right after his children are slain before him, then his eyes are put out. That way the last thing he ever saw was his own children being executed, his eyes are put out, he's humiliated, he's mocked, he's made fun of and he dies in a foreign land imprisoned and blind. Okay. Look, there's an agenda out there to censor God's word. What's the, why? Because of the fact that God's word is so powerful. The gospel is so effective. Soul winning is so effective. That's why the devil wants to stop it any way he can because it works. It's effective. Our church is effective. Our church is reaching a lot of people. Other churches like ours all over America, good independent Baptists, they got their head out of the TV and the talk radio and got their nose into the word of God. They're being effective. They're reaching people with the gospel and of course our godless, satanic American government wants to stop it. Of course, YouTube and JooTube and Facebook and Twitter and all that, of course they want to stop it. What's the answer? Boldly keep preaching the word of God and boldly keep on soul winning. Just bold, and look, you need to get your heart on things above, not on things on this earth. Set your affection on things above, not on things on this earth. Where's our citizenship today? I mean where is our citizenship? Well I'm an American. Really? How long are you going to be an American? Just for a vapor? Just for a vapor? How long are you going to be a child of God? For all eternity. And you know what? I will never align myself with the sodomites of this world which are basically running our government, in our government, aided and abetted by our government. I'm not going to do it. And so I, you know, you say, well do you pay taxes? Yeah, I pay taxes the same reason Jesus paid taxes. I pay taxes because Jesus said to pay taxes. I pay taxes because I don't want to go to prison for not paying taxes. I want to go to prison for preaching the word of God. Actually I don't want to go to prison at all, but if I do, it better be for preaching the word of God. You know, I want to get arrested for soul winning, not tax evasion. And you know, Jesus paid taxes and Jesus told his followers to pay taxes. And so yeah, we pay taxes, but you know what? Does that mean that we have to go out of our way to support this government though? To promote this government and praise this government and be a friend of this government? Look, why should I? You go ahead and support it. Why should I support it? What has the government done to me except beat me up, throw me in jail, taser me and send $8,000 to a foreign country to persecute me? And that might not seem like a lot of money, $8,000, but in South Africa $8,000 is like somebody's wages for like six months. Okay, because over there is a different economy. So 8,000 US bucks over there to a fledging little faggoty radio station, that's a lot of money. You know what I'm saying? So you give me one good reason why I should support a government. Well, there is our freedom. Hey, I thought that our freedom came from the creator. Hello? I thought the founding document of our country said that we're endowed by our creator by life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Well then I don't owe the United States government anything except the fact that they have just beaten me, persecuted me, put me in jail, and persecuted me onto foreign lands. And oh, I forgot, they also extorted thousands of dollars from me every April and every month. I forgot to mention that. They protected me. No, they didn't. God protected me. God gave me my freedom. God protected me. Everything good that I have came from God. And we need to stop glorifying and thanking the government for what God gave us. I mean, God's probably up there in heaven like, hey, excuse me, I'm the one who gave you that freedom. You know what I mean? And here you are. Oh, thank you, government. Oh, thank you, Donald Trump. Thank you so much, Republican Party. Oh, thank you, America. Thank you, soldiers. Thank you, everyone else. Thank God. Thank God. That's the only person that I'm going to thank for anything that's been given to me by this so-called government. Thank you, God, that our government's not as wicked as it could be. In Jesus' name, amen. That's pretty much the closest thing you're going to get out of a patriotic prayer from me. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much, Lord, for the freedom that we have in this country that you gave us. Thank you so much for the freedom of religion that you've given us today in this country, Lord. And, Lord, we know that our government hates the freedom of religion. We know that the police department hates our freedom of religion. We know that our congressmen and our senators and our mayor of Tempe hates our religious freedom and they would love to see us go off quietly into the night. But Lord, thank you, Lord, for allowing us to continue to win souls and preach the word of God and even to have an audience of millions online, even though YouTube and Facebook and Twitter all hate us, Lord. Thank you, Lord, for allowing us to continue to preach our message on those wicked platforms. And Lord, thank you so much for allowing us to preach the gospel in this wicked city of Tempe, Lord, and help us to pull as many people out of the fire as we possibly can, Lord, for your honor and glory. And we thank you and you alone for everything that we've been given, Lord, and it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.