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

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Welcome to Steadfast Baptist Church. Let's go to Psalm 139 in the white handouts. You should have some white handouts in front of you or behind you. Or in your Bible, preferably, Psalm 139 verses 19 through 22. Sing it out. Surely thou wilt slay the wicked. Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God. Depart from me, therefore ye bloody men. Depart from me, therefore ye bloody men. Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? Am not I grieve with those that rise up against thee? Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? For they speak against thee wickedly. For they speak against thee wickedly. And thine enemies take thy name in vain. And thine enemies take thy name in vain. Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? Am not I grieve with those that rise up against thee? Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? I hate them with perfect hatred. I hate them with perfect hatred. I count them my enemies. I count them my enemies. Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? Am not I grieve with those that rise up against thee? Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? Amen. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for the opportunity again to be in your house in the Church of the Living God. I pray you please be with us as we keep singing. Help us to sing with understanding in the Spirit, Lord, and to worship you, Lord. I pray that you fill your messenger with the Holy Spirit, be with Pastor Anderson as he preaches from your word, and give us ears to hear. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Let's go to hymn number 236. Hymn number 236, let's sing it out. Hymn number 236, No Not One. Sing it out. There's not a friend like the Holy Jesus. No, not one, no, not one. None else could heal all our souls' diseases. No, not one, no, not one. Jesus knows all about our struggles. He will guide till the day is done. There's not a friend like the Holy Jesus. No, not one, no, not one. No friend like Him is so high and holy. No, not one, no, not one. And yet no friend is so weak and lowly. No, not one, no, not one. Jesus knows all about our struggles. He will guide till the day is done. There's not a friend like the Holy Jesus. No, not one, no, not one. There's not an hour that He is not near us. No, not one, no, not one. No night so dark that His love can cheer us. No, not one, no, not one. Jesus knows all about our struggles. He will guide till the day is done. There's not a friend like the Holy Jesus. No, not one, no, not one. Sin ever saved by His friend forsake Him. No, not one, no, not one. Poor sinner find that he would not take Him. No, not one, no, not one. Jesus knows all about our struggles. He will guide till the day is done. There's not a friend like the Holy Jesus. No, not one, no, not one. Was there a gift like the Savior given? No, not one, no, not one. Will He refuse us a home in heaven? No, not one, no, not one. Jesus knows all about our struggles. He will guide till the day is done. There's not a friend like the Holy Jesus. No, not one, no, not one. We do have a verse for the week there on the front of that bulletin. We're in Psalm 12 verse 3, week number 3 of that Bible memory passage. Then we have some service times listed there and some church-wide soul winning times on the left-hand side. Brother Cameron, did we get a total for salvation this afternoon? Nine. Nine total. I don't think that added to the list. Good work on soul winning. Keep up your hard work there. We'll have soul winning again 5.30 p.m. right before the Thursday evening service. We want to continue to keep our expectant mother in prayer. She is expecting their second child to be time out. So excited for that. And of course Pastor Anderson, he's going to be preaching for us this evening service as well. It's been a blessing to have him here. Please let him know that we're thankful for him. And then also July 23rd is going to be the Tulsa, Oklahoma Soul Winning Marathon. We'll get some of those details lined out probably this week so that we can get those in front of you. It's a good soul winning in Tulsa. So if you're able to make it, we encourage you to be there for that. And then August 18th through the 20th is going to be the Mighty Men's Conference in Texas. Glen Rose is about an hour south of Fort Worth. And it's a Thursday through Saturday event. And so if you're interested in that, you can see me after the service. There is a sign up sheet for men who would like to attend. You just mark your name down and we'll get that list to Pastor Shelley. And then September 3rd is going to be the Fort Smith Soul Winning Marathon. As I mentioned this morning, that's going to be our first soul winning marathon that we're hosting that's across state lines. And so I'm really excited about that. Fort Smith is a very low income area and the soul winning hopefully will be pretty fruitful. That's kind of the goal and the reason why we picked that area. And so if you can make it out, that's Labor Day weekend. And so that'll be the Saturday before Labor Day, September 3rd. That's all the announcements for this evening. We'll go right to our next song, hymn number 162 in your hymnal, To God Be the Glory, hymn number 162. Alright, hymn number 162, To God Be the Glory. Sing it out. To God be the glory Great things He had done So loved He the world That He gave us His Son Who yielded His life An atonement for sin And opened the life gate That all may go in Praise the Lord, praise the Lord Let the earth hear His voice Praise the Lord, praise the Lord Let the people rejoice O come to the hot earth Through Jesus the Son And give Him the glory Great things He hath done O perfect redemption The purchase of fun To every believer The promise of God The vilest offender Who truly believes That moment from Jesus The pardon received Praise the Lord, praise the Lord Let the earth hear His voice Praise the Lord, praise the Lord Let the people rejoice O come to the hot earth Through Jesus the Son And give Him the glory Great things He hath done Great things He hath taught us Great things He hath done And great are rejoicing Through Jesus the Son But purer and higher And greater will be Our wonder, our transport When Jesus we see Praise the Lord, praise the Lord Let the earth hear His voice Praise the Lord, praise the Lord Let the people rejoice O come to the hot earth Through Jesus the Son And give Him the glory Great things He hath done First Chronicles chapter 12 Now these are they that came to David, to Ziklag, while he yet kept himself close because of Saul the son of Kish And they were among the mighty men, helpers of the war They were armed with bows and could use both the right hand and the left in hurling stones and shooting arrows Out of a bow, even of Saul's brethren of Benjamin The chief was Ahaziah, the Joash, then Joash, the sons of Shemaiah the Gibiothite and Jeziel and Pelet The sons of Amabeth and Beracha and Jehu the Anathite And Ishmael the Gibeonite and a mighty man among the thirty and over the thirty And Jeremiah and Jehizel and Johanan and Jehoshaphat the Gadirothite And Eluziah and Jeremiah and Beeliah and Shemaiah and Sephathiah the Harpothite And Elkanah and Josiah and Azarael and Joazar and Jashobeam the Korathites, the Korhites And Jo, Elah and Zebediah the sons of Jerome of Gedor And of the Gadites, there separated themselves unto David and to the hold and to the wilderness Men of might and men of war fit for the battle that could handle shield and buckler Whose faces were like the faces of lions and were as swift as the rose upon the mountains Ezer the first, Obadiah the second, Eliab the third, Mismaniah the fourth, Jeremiah the fifth, Attiah the sixth, Eliel the seventh Johanan the eighth, Elzebad the ninth, Jeremiah the tenth, Mxpaniah the eleventh These were the sons of Gad, captains of the host, one of the least was over a hundred and the greatest over a thousand These are they that went over Jordan in the first month when it had overflown all his banks and they put to flight all them of the valleys Both toward the east and toward the west and there came of the children of Benjamin and Judah to the hold unto David And David went out to meet them and answered them and said unto them If ye be come peaceably unto me to help me, my heart shall be knit unto you But if ye be come to betray me to mine enemies, seeing there is no wrong in mine hands The God of our fathers look thereon and rebuke it Then the spirit came upon a Messiah who was chief of the captains and he said Thine are we David and on thy side thou son of Jesse peace, peace be unto thee And peace be unto thine helpers for thy God helpeth thee Then David received them and made them captains of the band and there fell some of Manasseh to David When he came with the Philistines against Saul to battle but they helped them not For the lords of the Philistines upon the advisement sent him away saying He will fall to us master Saul to join the jeopardy of our heads As we went to Ziklag there fell to him of Manasseh, Adna and Jozabad and Jedel and Michal and Jozabad and Elihu And Zilphiah, captains of the thousands that were of Manasseh And they held David against the bands of the rovers for they were almighty men of valor and were captain in the host For at that time day by day there came to David to help him until it was a great host like unto the host of God And these are the numbers of the bands that were ready armed to the war And came to David to Hebron to turn the kingdom of Saul to him according to the word of the Lord The children of Judah that bare shield and buckler were six thousand and eight hundred ready armed to the war Of the children of Simeon mighty men of valor for the war seven thousand and one hundred Of the children of Levi four thousand and six hundred and Jehoiada was the leader of the Aaronites and with them were three thousand and seven hundred And Zadok the young man a young man mighty of valor and of his father's house twenty and two captains And of the children of Benjamin the kindred of Saul three thousand for thereto the greatest part of them had kept the ward of the house of Saul And of the children of Ephraim twenty thousand and eight hundred mighty men of valor famous throughout the house of their fathers And of the half tribe of Manasseh eight thousand or eighteen thousand which were expressed by name to come and make David king And of the children of Issachar which were men that had understanding of the times to know what Israel ought to do The heads of them were two hundred and all their brethren were at their commandment Of Zebulun such as went forth to battle expert in war with all instruments of war fifty thousand which could keep rank There sorry they were not of double hearts And of Naphtali a thousand captains and with them with shield and spear thirty and seven thousand And of the Danites expert in war twenty and eight thousand and six hundred And of Asher such as went forth to battle expert in war forty thousand And on the other side of Jordan of the Reubenites and the Gadites and of the half tribe of Manasseh with all manner of instruments of war for the battle And hundred and twenty thousand all these men of war that could keep rank came with a perfect heart to Hebron to Hebron To make David king over all Israel and all the rest also of Israel were of one heart to make David king And there they were with David three days eating and drinking for their brethren had prepared for them Moreover they that were nigh them even of Issachar and Zebulun and Naphtali brought bread on asses and on camels and on mules And on oxen and meat, meal, cakes of figs and bunches of raisins and wine and oil and oxen and sheep abundantly for there was joy in Israel Let's pray. Lord thank you so much for this wonderful day of soul win and for Pastor Anderson being here and I see that was distracted to a minimum Amen. Well once again it's great to be here and I've had a great time so far I love the area Ironically my children from Arizona can't believe how hot it is here and you know they're just like yeah this heat man I'm like what do you say it's 97 this is nothing it's a nice day But they're not used to the humidity you know so they're learning about what we mean when we say that Arizona is a dry heat you know But I love it it's a great area appreciate everybody who came from near and far to be here tonight And I'm preaching through this series where I'm doing the twelve sons of Jacob and this morning I talked about Asher and tonight I'm talking about Issachar Well again Issachar is one of these guys where the Bible doesn't really say anything about his life but of course he's one of the patriarchs and it's one of the tribes of Israel And there's this great little nugget here in First Chronicles chapter number twelve about the men of the tribe of Issachar who join up with David When David is ready to take over as king of Israel and he's going to replace that dynasty of Saul the Issacharites come out to him and we have this interesting statement And you know what's interesting is that I was able to find stuff to preach about for all twelve of these guys okay I did that before I committed to doing the series you know Because you'd hate to get halfway into the series and then you get to Issachar and it's like ah but I found this verse I'm like there we go I got something So look at verse number thirty two it says and of the children of Issachar which were men that had understanding of the times to know what Israel ought to do The heads of them were two hundred and all their brethren were at their commandment So as we go through this passage that we just read he talks about these different elite troops and different groups from different tribes that become a part of David's army And in some cases he gives compliments to them and he gives some compliments about what the men from the tribe of Gad were like and I preached about that up in Idaho on Wednesday And he's kind of giving compliments to different groups about how good they were at slinging stones or how good they were with their weapons or how they were fearless in battle Or you know all these different compliments and of the tribe of Issachar he says that they were men that had understanding of the times to know what Israel ought to do And that's what I want to preach about tonight that idea of having understanding of the times these are leaders and the Bible says that the rest of the tribe of Issachar were at their commandment So they're rulers of the tribe and we as Christians especially as pastors who are leading other people we need to also have understanding of the times to know what America ought to do Or to know what Americans ought to do Now we're living in some very strange times in America and our country is changing very fast and in many ways it's becoming de-Christianized around us And we today need some preaching to come across the pulpits that addresses the things that are happening in our society right now Now if you would flip over to 2 Timothy chapter 3 Now I kind of touched on this this morning the idea that we can't always look to history to figure out what is right We can't always look at what was preached in the past what was preached a hundred years ago or two hundred years ago Because most of that evidence has perished and the best preachers probably left the least trace in the history books because they weren't popular they were hated of this world But you know also when it comes to the old IFB they have their sort of pantheon of great preachers of the past Jack Hiles, John R. Rice, Lee Roberson, Curtis Hudson and of course many of these are great men of God that accomplished great things in the previous generation And I know that for myself when I was about 18, 19, 20 years old you know I spent literally hundreds of hours listening to audio recordings of guys like Jack Hiles, John R. Rice, Curtis Hudson You know I had all the cassette tapes and all of those what was that thing called real audio files it was like the worst low quality audio format and it would take like an hour to download them on dial up And you know back when I was like 20 and Pastor Roger Jimenez was like 16 we'd be trading cassette tapes of preaching at church every time we're at church we're trading sermons and we'd be downloading from the internet recording them onto cassette tapes I had my cassette Walkman I'd go to work and listen to it all day when I was at work and I mean we listened to hundreds of hours of preaching from these guys and we learned a lot we were edified we grew in the faith And it was always a supplement to the preaching that we were getting in church physically you know Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night on a weekly basis And it was never a substitute it was always a supplement to the actually going to church and hearing the preaching And we would listen to that stuff for hours and hours and hours and hours and I think it's great to listen to the preachers of the past but let me tell you something We need to listen to the preaching of today more than we need to listen to the preaching of the past because the preaching of today is addressing the issues of today that we're dealing with today Now of course there are timeless truths that we could listen to from these sermons from the 60s and 70s and things but at the end of the day those guys were dealing with different battles in that generation They were dealing with different subjects and the Holy Spirit is speaking to the churches today through men of God today I hate this attitude that says oh well back then you know that was the real preaching you know I was just talking to somebody the other day this is a great person But he said to me like well you know the preachers back then man you know we're greater than anything we have today And I'm just thinking to myself you know I don't like that attitude because you're just glorifying or romanticizing the preaching from back then You know there are men of God today that are preaching great sermons that love the Lord that are doing great works for God and that's who we need to be listening to People that are alive right now Now again many truths are timeless but it's not just our job as preachers to preach exactly what the Bible says It's also our job to understand the times that we live in and apply the Word of God to those times You see if all I'm going to do is just get up and tell you exactly what the Bible says Well then you don't even need me because you could just pick up the Bible and read it for yourself If you want to see exactly what the Bible says you could pick up a Bible and read it But in Nehemiah chapter 8 the Bible shows us what preaching is It's to read the scripture and then to give sense and understanding of what that scripture says and means And we ought to as preachers apply that preaching to the times that we live in And so we need to understand the times that we live in The men of Issachar are complimented by God that they knew the times They had understanding of the times, they were able to discern the times You know Jesus Christ rebuked the Pharisees and he said you know you look at the weather and you say Oh it will be fair weather today or it'll be poor weather today because the sky is red and lowering And he said you hypocrites you can discern the face of the sky but can't you discern the signs of the times And he rebuked them for not having an understanding or discernment of the times We as pastors need to understand the times in which we're living and we need to apply scripture to those times And preach a sermon that is unique to 2022 or that is for a 2022 American audience I listen to sermons from the 1960s and sometimes I laugh because of what they preach about that's so irrelevant today The stuff that they talk about because everything's just about the hippies And they're talking about you know all these songs that nobody listens to anymore All the music that they're preaching against is totally irrelevant And everything's about you know how mad they are that Richard Nixon is going to visit you know the leader of communist China And everything and they're talking about all these current events that are totally irrelevant And it's kind of fun to hear that but you know I want to hear somebody talk about the stuff that's going on right now today in America Because today there are some really wicked things going on in America and somebody needs to call it out And thank God for your pastor, thank God for brother Dylan Oz who gets up and calls a spade a spade and preaches something that is relevant to what we're dealing with right now And you know what's funny is that a lot of people in the old IFB they'll say well you know you guys in the new IFB You know you're preaching on all this stuff you know this reprobate doctrine and you're preaching about the sodomites You know I don't remember hearing any of the old time preachers talk about that but stop and think about this Why would the old time preachers have spent a lot of time talking about sodomites when that was barely even a thing back then Think about that I mean if you're preaching in the 50s and 60s that is not relevant to the lives of the people to whom you're preaching And so that's one of those things that you would just barely touch you know because it comes up and you're you know you got to preach everything And so you just kind of touch it and say move on to something else What to God that's what we could do The reason we're constantly preaching about it is because every single day we are faced with that battle We're faced with that issue and the brainwashing of our society trying to cram this agenda down our throat And so therefore preachers are constantly having to push back and fight back Now they say oh you know you guys are obsessed You know of course you look at the comment section of these videos against Pastor Shelley and brother Dylan Odds And this is what they'll say in the comment section oh I'll bet you he's you know he's in the closet that's why he's thinking about this That's why he keeps preaching about it no no he's thinking about it because you idiots are cramming this down our throat every day Because it's on billboards because it's in the news because it's constantly in the media and in every even cartoon now They're constantly forcing this on us we can't even go a single day without seeing all the rainbows and all the stickers and all the flags So obviously yeah it's vexing our souls it's on our mind and we want to preach about it But they say well why didn't the preachers of yesteryear preach about it because it wasn't a thing I mean think about this let's let's take it a step even weirder okay What about the part in the Bible that says you know you're not supposed to look on your grandmother's nakedness That's a commandment in scripture right What if I got up and week after week and just got up and I'm just like hey Don't look at grandma naked you know just and I'm just going on and on about that People think like Pastor Anders is weird it's crazy I know that's in the Bible but why do you keep talking about it Or what if I got up and just kept turning to the part in Leviticus about you know thou shalt not lie with a beast or something And I'm just up here just week after week part four series about why you shouldn't lie with a beast People would think it was crazy I mean they'd be right to be like I'm leaving this is weird this is crazy Well here's the thing guess what if the preachers of the 50s and 60s would have got up and preached whole sermons against homosexuality That's how it would have felt it would have been like oh why are you bringing this up why are you even talking about this This isn't even a thing does everybody understand what I'm saying So that's why it's so important that we listen to the preachers of today the preaching of today who's confronted by the battle And facing the issue that we're dealing with yeah 1960s preaching is going to be great for timeless truths But it's not going to cover certain things that weren't relevant back then but they are relevant now does everybody understand what I'm saying So look at 2 Timothy chapter number three the Bible tells us in 2 Timothy chapter three because we're talking about having understanding of the times Being able to look at the things that are going on today understand them and apply scripture to them and preach relevant sermons to the issues that we're facing today Living preachers preaching what the spirit leads them to preach in 2022 to fight the battles that face us It says in verse one of chapter three this know also that in the last days perilous times shall come For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good Folks this in many ways is the day we're living in where people hate those who are good It literally enrages the left in this country just to be a straight Christian male married to a woman and producing biological children and just raising them in a nuclear family You're the enemy. You're bad. Okay, so there is prophecy here that someday we would get to a day where people will be despisers of those that are good Men will be lovers of their own selves, narcissistic, generation selfie, everyone obsessed with themselves, hateful toward the things of God, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despised of those that are good Traitors, heady, high minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof from such turn away And so the Bible is talking about a perilous time when all this wickedness will abound around us And then over in chapter four if you jump forward to chapter four he says in verse two preach the word Be instant, in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine But after their own lust shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears and they shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned into fables Look, he's saying even in perilous times, even when wickedness and ungodliness abounds, keep preaching the Bible Even in a time when people don't want to hear it, they don't endure sound doctrine, they're heaping to themselves the Joel Osteen's and the positive preachers preach the word anyway And he says in verse five, watch thou in all things endure afflictions Go through the persecution. If everybody hates you, hey, know that they hated me before they hated you Endure the afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry And so today, even in a day of perilous times and people don't want to hear hard preaching, we can still do a great work for God We can endure the affliction and do the work of an evangelist Now what does that mean? That means that as they're hating you, protesting you, fighting you, trying to shut you down, you can still go out that afternoon and get someone saved on door to door soul winning Isn't that interesting? You can show up on Sunday morning and the protesters are out there and I'm preaching this for the people that are up from Fort Worth Who all is up here from Fort Worth today? We got a couple people And the thing is, you know, they're dealing with all these protesters and freaks and weirdos outside the church Hopefully, you know, I've got my fingers crossed this Wednesday, maybe we can have peace But they deal with all these people but here's the thing, you show up to that freak show of all the weirdos protesting and they're saying We don't want you in our town. We don't want you here. We want you to leave. We want you gone We don't want hate or we don't want this type of religion in our area You know, get out of town. We want you evicted. We want you somewhere else You know, they wanted to get Pastor Mejia out of El Monte, California. Get him out. Get him to another town But in that same town, that afternoon, you can just brush off the criticism, brush off the affliction And you can go knocking doors in that exact afternoon and get somebody saved in that town So even as you endure affliction, you can do the work of an evangelist at the same time And it's our calling to do both So even as all the battling is going on and all the afflictions and tribulations are rolling, we can still do the work of an evangelist We can still get somebody saved in the afternoon, preach hard on Sunday morning, get somebody saved on the afternoon, preach hard on Sunday night Okay, that's what God has called us to do Even in a perilous time, even in times when things are very wicked in our country And so he says, watch thou in all things endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry Have a well-rounded ministry, tighten everything up, full proof ministry, have everything as it should be, have balance in the ministry And you know, a lot of people today, they misunderstand the new IFB because they think that all we do is just rip face and raise hell and whatever But you know, we also love people and we go out and do the work of an evangelist and get people saved What about that? You know, in the words of Planned Parenthood, that's only 5% of what we do You know, is slaughtering sodomites verbally, not literally now But you know, the bottom line is today that yeah, people out there, they're going to paint us as the enemy and that we're the bad guys But you know what, we know that we're preaching the word of the Lord, that we're doing right And so we just need to endure the affliction and do the work of an evangelist And we need to be able to read the times that we're in and discern them and understand them So part of understanding the times and discerning the times is to be able to preach the relevant sermons that address the issues with which we're dealing You know, for example, against the sodomites because that's something that we're dealing with right now in this country It's a big deal, we didn't choose that to be the theme of the month of June, they chose that for us But you know, there are other things where we can look at the times and have a greater understanding about things like, for example, end times prophecy And this is another reason why we should not rely on the preaching of the past, but that we need to be listening to the preaching of the present, today From men who understand the times and know what we ought to do today Let me give you an example You know, there are a lot of guys who are falling for this deception of preterism And if you don't know what preterism is, preterism is this doctrine that basically says that the prophecies in the book of Revelation, most of them have already happened in the past And you know, the second coming of Christ has already taken place and it all happened in the first century A.D. It's all over, it's all behind us And you'll have these preterist type doctrines or another doctrine that's picking up steam lately is post-millennialism Which is this idea that basically we're going to evangelize this world and it's going to get more and more Christian and then Christ will return You know, it's like an idea of bringing in the kingdom or somehow that the gospel is going to conquer and we're going to turn this thing around And the world is going to get better and better We on the other hand are pre-millennial which means we believe the world is getting worse and worse Right, so we believe that in general the world in general is going to get worse and worse and then Christ is going to come and straighten everything out That's pre-millennialism Post-millennialism says that no, we're going to fix things ourselves and then through the power of God we're going to fix it and then Christ is going to return Now here's where this is coming from A lot of this preterist stuff and post-millennial stuff, when you want to listen to what these guys give as proof It's like they want to pull out all these preachers from the 1600s and come at you and say well historically this is what the church has believed And you know pre-millennialism is new and whatever But here's what's wrong with their logic Is that if you actually look outside you can see that they're wrong So like put down your book for a second Put down the theological treatise Put down your bible for a second And go outside and tell me if the world is getting evangelized and more and more Christian and if things are getting better or worse I mean shouldn't that be pretty obvious to just look out there and see that things are getting worse not better And I remember I was talking to this guy one time and he was trying to convince me of this preterist stuff And I said just stop for a second, I said stop for a second So you are telling me that you don't believe that the anti-Christ is coming, one world government, one world religion You don't see any of that coming You believe that you know we're living in the kingdom right now and it's going to get even better I said have you stopped to think about the fact that that doesn't line up with reality And the guy was like that's actually a really good point He said it's like you know that's actually kind of a good point I'm like what about the United Nations and the world council of churches And you know it's all going toward a one world system, a one world government, one world religion, one world currency And he's like you know that's actually a really good point And here's the thing if your theology doesn't match reality there's probably something wrong with your theology It should line up with what's going on in the times that we live in And so here's what I would say I would say that I can understand why people, even though it's not biblical and it's never been biblical I can understand why people believed in preterism or post millennialism in the 1600s Because from where they're sitting you know the Roman Catholic Church had all this power And then they're watching the Roman Catholic Church lose power as the Protestant Reformation goes forward All of a sudden bibles are being printed and bibles are churning off of printing presses And all of a sudden the Roman Catholic Church is losing power in all these countries And yeah the Protestant Reformation you know it didn't end up the way we would have wanted it to end up That's why we're Baptists and not Protestants But the Protestant Reformation was going in the right direction It just didn't go far enough It just stayed too Catholic But it was on the right track there for a while you know they were going the right way And so you can see how if you were living during that time you could get this idea and say You know hey I think the Pope is the Antichrist and you know this is Babylon the Roman Catholic Church And it's all being destroyed and the gospel is prevailing and we're churning out bibles And you know people are getting saved and people are figuring out that it's by faith alone And you know one of the mottos of the Protestant Reformation is sola fide faith alone Right grace alone to God alone be the glory You can understand how somebody who's in that point in history could think hey things are getting better You know the gospel is going to prevail The Word of God is going to prevail The evil Catholic Church is going down And we're going to flood the land You know you can understand how somebody could get like a post millennial kind of a doctrine It's never been biblical folks It's not in the bible But I'm saying you can see where they're coming from But let me just be frank with you I feel like anyone who believes in it now is kind of being an idiot You know what I mean because it's like that's not how it went down Because what's the result of the Protestant Reformation Well let's look at our Protestant churches today Let's look at the Presbyterians today And sure you could point to a very small minority of actual bible believing Presbyterians That have a King James bible and believe salvation is by faith And if you talk to them you know what they'll tell you They'll tell you well most of these Presbyterians are all going to hell Even the Presbyterians that are saved would even tell you that Okay the Lutherans are pretty much just like the Roman Catholics You know they're just as unsaved as the Roman Catholics Okay you got the Lutherans they don't believe in faith alone Go soul winning and talk to them They don't believe salvation is by faith alone You got the Methodists Look where they are Look at all these products Look at the Church of England today Did the Church of England just keep on reforming and getting better No today the Church of England is super liberal They've got sodomites in the pulpit They don't believe the bible at all They're worse than the Roman Catholic Church The United Methodists are worse than the Roman Catholics Many of the Presbyterians and Lutherans are worse than the Roman Catholics They're more liberal They're more homo-welcoming and so forth So the Protestant Reformation didn't do what it was supposed to do Because all these mainline Protestant denominations ended up getting super wicked And today who's really carrying the torch of the gospel? It's a bunch of Baptists and Evangelicals Either Baptists or non-denom people that are actually believing in the right salvation Nine times out of ten And it's usually independent Baptists that are doing the series evangelism and door knocking And really getting the gospel out there But my point is you could forgive them or understand where they were coming from back then to believe that But today if we have any understanding of the times that we live in If we have any discernment of the times We would be able to look out that door and say this country is not getting more godly It's getting more ungodly And that should be obvious to everyone The soul winning is not getting more receptive It's getting less receptive I've been soul winning for 23 years Just about every week For 23 years I started when I was 17 I'm 40 now And I've been soul winning and let me tell you something It was more receptive 20 years ago than it is now It was more receptive 10 years ago than it is now Now look I'm not going to stop soul winning Because whether it's very receptive or a little receptive You're always going to be able to get somebody saved out there if you go long enough You put in enough hours you're going to get somebody saved And so I'm never going to give up on soul winning Let's just put in more hours Let's just get more manpower out there We'll get them saved We'll find that one that wants to get saved But I'm just being honest with you It is less receptive than it used to be And if we were to get in a time machine and go back to the 1960's It would be more receptive even than anything we've ever known in our lifetime And so you have to understand that You know the Bible is our final authority This is where we get our doctrine But what we read in the Bible should match up with reality If reality is true and the Bible is true They should both match So if you have some doctrine that says Oh post millennialism You know we're going to turn things around in this country We're going to turn this world around for Christ And then you look outside and there's no hint of that That should make you reevaluate that doctrine Am I right? Or what about this doctrine that says Well you know all of the Israelis are going to get saved in the end times Why don't we see any hint of that in real life? Because it's a misinterpretation of scripture It's a twisting of scripture See my view on Israel actually represents reality What the new IFB teaches on Israel is what we see in reality If you were to get on a plane and go to Tel Aviv You're going to see what we've been talking about You're not going to see what the old IFB has been talking about You're going to see what we've been talking about You're going to see non-Christian, ungodly people who have no interest in the Gospel 99.9% And so we need to have an understanding of the times and discernment of the times And we need to make sure that what we're preaching is Number one, relevant to the day in which we live But number two, that it matches up with the realities that we're facing today I'm not going to sit there and preach something if reality proves it to be false Well the Bible says, yeah but you're probably just reading that wrong You're probably misinterpreting what the Bible says if it doesn't match reality And of course, as I said, the Bible has never taught post-millennialism The Bible is crystal clear in Revelation 20 that Jesus Christ returns And then his saints rule and reign with him for 1,000 years after he returns Anybody who just reads Revelation 20 will see that very clearly But all I'm saying is I can see where people were coming from in the 1600s But if you're still believing it now, I don't see where you're coming from It makes no sense. It's absurd now, okay? You look at preaching from the 1960s and you say, well I found this sermon by this old time preacher And you know, he said that homos can be saved You know, and we should win them to Christ Hey, I can understand why he's not well versed on that topic because it wasn't a thing in his generation You know, when I first started pastoring 16 years ago People thought that my preaching against the Sodomites was too radical You know, and they thought I was overboard and over the top But I'll bet you that less and less people are thinking that now in 2022 If they have any understanding of the times and discernment about what's going on in our country right now They should be right about now saying, you know, these new IFB guys I think they might be right about these freaks and perverts and what their agenda is Because they're seeing it come to pass around them You know, the Bible said that in the days of the coming of the Son of Man In the second coming of Christ, that it would be as it was in the days of Lot As it was in the days of Lot That's talking about Sodom and Gomorrah If you have understanding of the times, you'll understand that that's where things are going Where are we heading? Are the post-millennialists right? Are we heading toward a righteous Christendom? No, we're heading toward Sodom and Gomorrah And that's what the Bible said would happen That's what the pre-millennialists have been preaching all along And that's what's going on That's having an understanding of the times and discerning the times And the signs of the times and saying, hey look We see out there that this agenda is predicted in scripture That it would be like it was in the days of Lot And that in the last days, according to chapter 3 of 2 Timothy That reprobates will abound in the last days Because 2 Timothy 3 is describing reprobates It says, if you're still there in 2 Timothy, go back to 2 Timothy 3 And the Bible says in verse number 7 Ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses So do these also resist the truth Men of corrupt minds reprobate concerning the faith But they shall proceed no further For their folly shall be manifest unto all men As theirs also was He's talking about reprobates That's why they're perilous times Because reprobates will abound Look down at your Bible at verse number 13 But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse So look, as we approach the end times False prophets are going to get worse Evil men are going to get worse Seducers are going to get worse The world is going to get worse That's what the Bible teaches Deceiving and being deceived But continue thou in the things which thou has learned and has been assured of So again, our preaching needs to represent reality And when we look at sound biblical doctrine That says Christ returns before the millennium That says that evil men and seducers are going to wax worse and worse That says that the anti-Christ is going to come There's going to be a one world religion One world system We look around and if we can have any understanding at all We see that the prophecy that we preach in this church And churches like it Is actually in line with reality I mean is it really that hard If I get up and preach hey the Bible prophesies a one world government You're like, well that will never happen It's already happening Well you know the Bible prophesies a one world religion Oh I can't see that ever happening I mean can you ever see you know Islam and Hinduism and Christianity and Judaism all coming together Yeah it's happening Right now high level leaders in all of these religions are saying Hey you know I mean the Pope is saying Hey you don't have to believe in Jesus to be saved And atheists are saved as long as they do good works And you have Muslims and Hindus and Christians Putting aside their differences We're all going to come together I mean that's what's being pushed and promoted today The tolerance and diversity And we've got to just respect all religions And respect all faiths Except for fundamentalist Christianity But respect all other faiths And bring it all together Why? Because that's what the Bible said would happen And that's what's happening That's what we've been preaching And before I was even a pastor When I was a kid in the 1980's I can't even count how many times I heard sermons about One world government One world religion Antichrist is going to come right Premillennial teaching is biblical Okay These things are going to happen In the future It's all laid out in scripture And we can see it already starting to happen Right now Now we don't know when the end is going to come But that's the trajectory Okay The trajectory is evil men and seducers waxing worse and worse Also Jesus Christ himself said And he asked this question He said you know when the son of man comes Will he find faith on the earth? Now why would Jesus say But when the son of man comes will he find faith on the earth? Why would he ask that question if things are going to get better and better Leading up to his coming And more and more people are going to be saved And more and more Christianity No it sounds like it's going to be less and less And what did the Bible say That before the day of Christ comes He said There should be a great falling away first And the man of sin be revealed The son of perdition Who opposes himself and exalts himself above all that is called God Or that is worshipped So that he as God Siteth in the temple of God Showing himself that he is God So the Bible tells us in 2 Thessalonians 2 That you know the Antichrist is going to come But first there's going to be a great falling away Now Is that something that we see happening today? What are you happening today? Would you look around and characterize what we see in America in general today As a great revival in our nation Or a great falling away Now maybe there's a great revival amongst our brand of churches And you know what There for sure is a great revival amongst new IFB churches And our churches are growing And reaching people And winning souls And thriving And we're multiplying And we're doing great But what about our country in general In general There's a great falling away In general Less people are going to church In general More churches are apostatizing And getting away from the truth That's what scripture predicted would happen Okay And so We need to make sure that our doctrine Matches reality What we see And if we have understanding of the times And we have understanding of scripture Understanding of scripture The two match perfectly Okay And we need preachers who understand both Now a lot of people when they hear this phrase Understanding the times Or discerning the times They might misunderstand this That you know We need to follow every twist and turn of the news You know We need to just be jacked into Fox News And just getting every twist and turn And knowing everything that happens politically in our country I don't believe that that's what the Bible is saying When it says That they understood the times The first reason I don't believe that Is because The children of Issachar Didn't even have the internet And they didn't have Fox News They didn't have They didn't have like Some kind of a little radio Where they're getting You know Sean Hannity And they're getting all this stuff And they're just following CNN And getting the news all the time Obviously that's not what the Bible is saying When it says having understanding of the times He didn't say You know every single world event that's happening in the times It's not about knowing every twist and turn of the news It's about understanding the times Because what did the Bible say about the children of Issachar? They had understanding of the times Didn't necessarily say that they knew every single thing that's going on In the kingdom of the Hittites You know They're just so cosmopolitan And plugged into all these world events I don't think that's what the Bible is saying at all I think what the Bible is saying though Is that we as Christians We need to be in this world But not of the world And so we need to kind of Live in the world enough To where we kind of know what's going on And we kind of understand the time Not necessarily plugged into some media outlet In Fox News, CNN Telling us what to believe Or what's going on Or giving us the news But rather that you know Just by living in Phoenix Or Oklahoma City And just going to your job every day And just being outside And talking to the neighbors And going to work And going soul winning Or school Or wherever it is you go You're kind of in this world And you kind of know what's going on But the important part isn't knowing what's going on It's understanding what's going on And having understanding of the times Is when you look at the things that are going on in the world Through the lens of God's word Okay So basically I'm in my study And I'm reading my Bible And I'm read up on scripture I know what the Bible says, right Then I go out into the world And everything I'm looking at everything Through this lens of the word of God You know what I'm saying? And so I understand the times Because when I hear about something happening I'm relating it back to scripture And when I see What's going on with all the times And when I see What's going on with all the queers and everything I'm like, okay It's the days of Lot Is what we're heading toward That's the trajectory This is what God said would happen In a society in decline It would be filled with reprobates, right In the last days, perilous times are gonna come Men who are reprobate All these things in Romans 1 The downward spiral ends there That's the destination And so I'm looking at our society through that lens And I have an understanding of the times Not because I spent so much time Listening to talk radio But because I spent so much time reading the Bible That's gonna give an understanding of the times Because I'm viewing everything through the lens of our times So here's the thing Yeah, I want to spend a lot of time studying the Bible But I also need to spend some time in this world So that I can understand the times that we're living in as well So as a pastor I don't want to shut myself off From society To the point where I'm not interacting with society at all And this has always been a temptation For Christians and men of God throughout history To seclude themselves And so there's nothing new under the sun You have churches who Move out to the middle of nowhere And isolate themselves from the rest of society You have You know, men who Just become a hermit Or they go into a monastery or something And they just lock themselves off From everything And they just, you know, they're just gonna devote themselves To the word of God Or you even have Christian pastors Who just don't get out much And they're just They're studying and they're in the office But they're not out there interacting with people And seeing what's going on And you know, I believe that God wants us as Christians To be a part of the society we live in You don't want to get so separated From society where you're just You're just totally cut off from The unsaved people of this world You know, I believe that God wants us To be in the world but not of the world So we're to be different We're to be salt and light But we're supposed to be mixed in with people And fit in somewhat With this world Not be secluded and form our own community You know, obviously part of us would say Oh man, wouldn't it be great if we could just go Start our own town somewhere You know, we could just found our own Baptist city Baptist city, Oklahoma We could just rent a bunch of property We could just buy a bunch of property And just build our own little Christian enclave But that's not God's will You know, God wants you Right here in Oklahoma City For all the wickedness that's here And there's ungodliness here Even in the heartland of America Even in the Bible Belt I mean, just We're staying right now Our lodging is seven minutes from here How many marijuana dispensaries In the past? Three? It's a seven minute drive Three marijuana dispensaries Everywhere, marijuana In Oklahoma The Bible Belt, the heartland There's queers everywhere Marijuana And people are like, oh that's California It's Oklahoma, it's everywhere It's America You know, but in spite of that I believe God wants you here In Oklahoma I believe God wants me in Phoenix, Arizona I believe God wants Pastor Shelley In that Dallas, Fort Worth area Well, I don't know, maybe not Never mind I believe God wants Pastor Bruce Mejia In LA Because you know, in the midst of a crooked And perverse nation We're supposed to shine as lights in the world And we need to be In the times So we can understand the times And we can preach about the times So that we can do the work Of an evangelist even in the midst of the affliction It's not our job to pull out And isolate ourselves No, no, no, we need to interact with The society We need to be out knocking doors preaching the gospel Right? And getting people saved. Did anybody get saved today? Did anybody get someone saved today out on soul winning? Who had someone saved today out on soul winning today? One, two, three, four, five Five people Got somebody saved out on soul winning today You know, so who cares about Oh, there's too much marijuana And whatever But if we were out isolated somewhere We wouldn't be able to get five people saved today, would we? Because we were already saved We're all saved here, you know But no, we've got to be in the midst of the people To reach the people And we're getting sermon ideas You know When I preach I like to be fired up about something I can just go through a chapter and preach about it But it's also good when I get out in the world And get mad about something Or see something Or see a problem I'm like, I need to preach about this You know, my son came to me a few weeks ago And he said, Dad He said, you know, you need to preach a sermon About sports betting He said, you know, at my job All the young people They're into sports betting They've got thousands of dollars on this junk And they've got the app And they're just so into He says, huge sports betting And then after he said that, I'm driving around town I'm seeing billboards for it all over Phoenix Like, sports betting All the sports betting this, sports betting that We're in a restaurant, the TV was playing It was just all sports betting And you know what, that's a relevant issue That somebody needs to preach about And preach against that garbage And preach against that foolishness Sports betting And you know, I don't want to talk about it now Because I don't want to steal my own thunder Because I need to do a whole sermon on it You know, my son's recommendation But the point is, how did he know How did he know that we need a sermon on sports betting Because he's out there talking to the unsaved He's among people And so he knows what's going on And he's able to Have a relevant sermon idea You know, and I'm out there And I'm talking to people And I'm talking to people You know, I guarantee you That we as soul winners We probably know way more About what these denominations believe Than some seminary graduate Because we've gone out and literally talked to Hundreds of Presbyterians Hundreds of Lutherans Hundreds of Mormons Hundreds of Jehovah's Witnesses Hundreds of Baptists Hundreds of Methodists, right? I mean, maybe thousands in many cases You know, some guy in some university somewhere Is studying what Methodists and Lutherans And Presbyterians believe But we're actually talking to the guy in the pew And we can tell you what the guy in the pew actually believes Because we've talked to a thousand of them And you can figure out Okay, this is a false doctrine That's prevalent because I ran into it at 30 doors That's a sermon idea How many sermon ideas come from soul winning? How many sermon ideas Come from being out in the world And interact- how many sermon ideas come from billboards? You know, you're driving down the street, you see the billboard You say, oh man, these billboards, they vex me Living in the city, seeing all this junk Yeah, but at the same time It gives you the sermon ideas As a pastor to preach, you know, being around that stuff And so God wants us To be in the world But not of the world God said that he didn't want to take us out of the world He just wanted to keep us from the evil He wanted us to shine As lights in the midst of a crooked And perverse nation Among whom we shine as lights in the world And so we need to understand The times We need to be able to look around See it all through the lens Of scripture Call out the sins of our generation Call out the wickedness That we see going on Right now Okay, unlike maybe what they were dealing with In the 60s You know, we need to preach on the stuff that's happening right now We need to endure affliction Do the work of an evangelist We need to keep on Preaching the word of God Whether it's popular or not popular Applying it to the world we live in Keeping it relevant Going out soul winning Okay So that we can have our finger on the pulse Not just to win people to Christ That's obviously the most important reason to go soul winning But also just to see what's out there And to have our finger on the pulse Of this country spiritually Okay It's not about Being plugged in To media telling you what's going on It's more about What we actually see going on every day In our individual lives That's a little closer to home Than just what the media is telling us is important Or that we should care about It's really more important what's happening Right now Here in our Local areas here Okay And so the Bible says If you're there in 2 Timothy chapter number 3 It says But evil men and seducers, verse 13 Shall wax worse and worse Deceiving and being deceived But continue thou in the things Which thou hast learned And hast been assured of Knowing of whom thou hast learned them And that from a child thou hast known The holy scriptures And wise unto salvation Through faith which is in Christ Jesus All scriptures given by Inspiration of God And is profitable for doctrine For reproof For correction For instruction in righteousness That the man of God may be perfect Thoroughly furnished Until all good works And so what the Bible is saying here is that At the end of the day it is scripture That prepares the man of God To do all the good works That God has prepared for him In this generation To interact with society To preach to the needs of 2022 Scripture gives us the tools to do that Not Fox News or CNN Or whatever And so having understanding of the times Comes from Scripture, reading scripture Understanding scripture And then looking at the world through the lens of scripture Okay And the man of God Can be completely furnished Perfect means complete, right? Can be completely furnished from scripture To do just that So the key to understanding The times is to understand The Bible and apply the Bible To what we see going on Around us and make sure that our Interpretation of the Bible matches What we see out there In the real world All scriptures given by inspiration of God Are profitable for doctrine For reproof For correction for instruction in righteousness In order to correct The wrong things that are out there We use the word of God to instruct people How to live a godly life In 2022 Oklahoma City The answers are in the Bible It's possible to do it We don't have to go hide somewhere We don't have to pull out of society It's possible to raise godly kids In this generation To keep ourselves pure In this generation right where we are And so the men of Issachar They were going To follow David Who represents Jesus Christ Right? David, Jesus is the son of David So David Is going out to fight A spiritual battle He's going to receive a kingdom In the future, just as someday Christ Will receive a kingdom in the future David was going to receive a kingdom in the future The sons of Issachar Separated themselves unto David To fight that battle With David And we today Are separated unto Jesus Christ To fight the battles of the Lord In our generation And in order to effectively fight those battles We need to be men who understand The times that we live in And so The word of God Must Be the lens through which we view society And today There are so many people who look at These issues through a worldly perspective And say, well, you know, they're born that way Or, well, you know Love them Be nice to them Be kind unto them What does the Bible say? You know, that's all that matters Well, I think they're nice people What does the Bible say? Well, you know, I think the world's Better and better Really? What does the Bible say? The Bible's the standard It's the end and the beginning Of all of these issues And so we need to be men like the children of Issachar Who understand the times We need to follow Christ We need to be in the world but not of the world And we need to rebuke The wickedness of our society By knowing what's going on And then taking scripture And preaching Something relevant to today Not just repeating Or parroting preaching From 50 years ago Folks, the Holy Spirit's alive and well today Okay Like, the Holy Spirit didn't go anywhere The Holy Spirit is alive And well in 2022 America And so God's Spirit is moving In the hearts of young men To preach Boldly from the word of God That's what the new IFB is You know, it's a new generation Of young men getting up Understanding the times And preaching boldly Because they're filled with the Holy Spirit Okay, that's the whole idea behind it And the thing is You know, sitting around And talking about some bygone era That's not understanding the times You know, we need to understand that the Holy Spirit's Alive and well right now The Holy Spirit has something to say To this generation And men of God Are getting up in pulpits In 2022 on Sunday morning Sunday night, Wednesday night And you know what? The Holy Spirit of God is moving them To preach the Bible About things that are happening right now And we need to be listening to that We need to take heed onto that And we need to support that And be a part of that And learn from that By listening to the times By listening to preachers who understand the times By listening to preachers who are actually in our time Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord And we thank you that the Holy Spirit is still working In the hearts of preachers, Lord And we thank you for the 7,000 men that have not bowed the knee To Baal And Lord, we just pray that you would continue to do A great work amongst Independent Baptist churches in this country, Lord And even as our country Evitably gets worse I pray that you would help us personally To get better and better Help our churches to get better Help our soul to get better, Lord Help us to be Doing the greatest works of our life Even as this country is in decline And Lord, give us Understanding and discernment of the times, Lord In Jesus' name we pray, Amen Alright, remember on the fourth verse to shout where it says there is a shout for Daniel's band, remember to give a good shout? 309 Standing by a purpose through heeding God's command Honor them, the faithful few, all hail to Daniel's band Dare to be a Daniel, dare to stand alone Dare to have a purpose firm, dare to make it known Many mighty men are lost, dare he not to stand Who for God had been a host by joining Daniel's band Dare to be a Daniel, dare to stand alone Dare to have a purpose firm, dare to make it known Many giants, great and tall, sowing through the land Headlong to the earth would fall if met by Daniel's band Dare to be a Daniel, dare to stand alone Dare to have a purpose firm, dare to make it known Hold the gospel banner high on to victory grand Satan and his host if by a shout for Daniel's band Dare to be a Daniel, dare to stand alone Dare to have a purpose firm, dare to make it known I just want to quickly make one last announcement. We did break our evening record We had 67 in attendance and so therefore we are going to have an ice cream social right after service You make your way into the kitchen area and we'll have everything set up and ready for you to hand you an ice cream