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

Now, this morning, what we're going to do is we're going to begin a brand new series about standards, right, answering the questions, why do we do things the way that we do? Because oftentimes a lot of people will call or email and say, you know, I'd really like to check out your church, you know, do you have any kind of like rules or do you have any kind of like, you know, standards, you know, you guys like really strict and stuff like that. And then it's like, okay, well, how do we answer that? I mean, like, oh, we don't have any dress code. I mean, but at the same time there, you know, somebody comes in here, you know, wearing some modest stuff, we're going to have to ask them to leave, you know, so, uh, but people today, they just have this idea that rules, standards, expectations, all of that is bad. If you have that, if you subscribe to that, then guess what? Well, you're out to lunch, you're, you're a legalist is what they'll say. Okay. But the question that we have is what does the Bible say about that? What does God say? And so the standards, um, are obviously very important now today's sermon title specifically is called the reality of rules for recovering Baptists, the reality of rules for recovering Baptists. And I'm going to get into what that really means here momentarily. Um, but basically what I mean by that, what the topic is today, it's discerning the difference between rules, precepts and principles. Oftentimes in our vernacular, we interchange those three words all the time, but the Bible does talk a lot about laws, which are rules, right? Precepts, principles. What do these things mean for the believer? You have to understand this because this is very critical in your Christian walk. Okay. There's a reason why we don't have a room filled up with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people. Beside the fact that we're a new church, right? The other fact is our culture today, right? Our culture today breeds into people that, Hey, you shouldn't have to follow rules. Rules are judgmental, therefore rules are out the window. They are bad. They are not okay. That's not the way that we want to live. That's so hypocritical because everybody, everywhere, every single day follows rules. There's this college up in Washington that's very popular. It's called Evergreen State. I don't know if some of you may have heard of it, but in their curriculum, they don't give out like tests or exams. Basically you show up to this college and you take the courses and there's no judgment. You just learn the material and you move on. I've had college teachers cause I've been compelled in the past to take college courses. Unfortunately I have a college degree and they would often, you know, I'd get somebody who graduated there with a master's degree and they are always very liberal people, very, you know, against rules, against standards, pretty much let you do whatever you want. You know, like they would just say, you know, I'm just going to stand up here. I'm just going to talk. In fact, I'm going to sit down with a little music stand here. I'm not going to judge you. So if you fall asleep, I'm serious. This is how a lot of these people are. You know, we're not going to set any expectations for you. We're just going to calmly present the material and hopefully it'll just sink into your soul and you'll be super smart and you'll be able to better the planet and save animals and eat dog food and soy beef and all the stuff that we always preach against. Guys, I'm getting way off track here, so again, going back to why we need to know these things. You guys understand this concept very well. People today, they have this hippie Jesus philosophy, right? And they say, oh, well, I want to go back to that church, but they have a rule where there's no rock bands allowed. I would like to go to that church because they're out in the community doing work for God, but they don't have the rap bands. They're against women wearing pants. They're against this, they're against that. You know, they're against all these things and then they just keep bringing these things up and they're like, if it just wasn't for those rules, if it just wasn't for those standards, I would love to go to that church because they're out in the community. Well, the hypocritical thing again is that that's your rule. You can't get away from it. You cannot get away from these rules. Now going back to Hebrews chapter number five. So the writer of Hebrews who I often think is probably Paul, he starts the chapter off, believe it or not, by reminding the Hebrews, the leadership thereof, in the past by saying, hey, guess what? Your high priests, your priests, your Levites, guess what? They had standards placed upon them. Look at verse number one. It says this, for every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins. So he's reminding these guys, hey, your leadership of the past, this leadership that you guys as a whole don't want to let go of, you were set apart in the Old Testament. You were sanctified by God to help men out, to help mankind out. And that's what he begins to say here in verse two. He says this, who can have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the way for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity. And so what is he saying there? He's saying, hey, these Old Testament leaders, right, they were supposed to know the laws. They were supposed to execute the laws. They were supposed to understand rules, precepts, and judgment. Why? To help people out, people that were going astray. They were supposed to be able to teach them the law in a way that sunk into their hearts to produce change, right? Who can have compassion on the ignorant? That's what they were supposed to have. Now, as you read the gospels, is that what you see? Is that how the priests were at that time? No, in fact, most of them didn't even know how to explain to somebody how to go to heaven. Right, like Nicodemus. What do you mean, Jesus? I gotta like go back in my mom's womb? You mean it's not about following the laws? It's not about following the commandments? What are you talking about? And Jesus is like, wait, you're a ruler in Israel, and you don't know these things, right? And Paul here, who I believe, like I said, wrote this, he's reminding them, hey, they were supposed to have compassion on the ignorant. They weren't supposed to do these offerings. They weren't supposed to teach the law for their own selfish greed, for their own selfish gain. And he says that in verse four. Look at verse four real quick. It says, and no man taketh this honor unto himself, but he that is called of God as was Aaron. And so again, what is that? That is a rule, that is a standard. The priests were not supposed to be self-willed, but what do you have today? What did you have back then? You had priests, you had leaders that were self-willed, right? I mean, think about it. They were wearing the long clothing, just making an open show, just trying to show the whole world. Look at how holy I am. Look at how set apart I am. Look at how righteous I am. We have the same thing today. You got your skinny jeans pastor with 18 holes in the right leg and 10 holes in the left leg, right? And he's doing that to produce to us a standard. Look at how cool I am. Look at how relevant I am today, right? I'm free, man. I'm a free thinking, all loving, just great hippie. At least that's what I see when I see those people. Look at verse number 12. So skip down to verse number 12. And this is gonna be the verse that we open the sermon up with. It says this, for when, for the time, ye, and so who is the ye here? He's talking to the leadership, the people who want to hold on to the laws and to the rules only and push those for everything. He says, for when the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again, which be the first principles of the oracles of God and are become such as have need of milk and not of strong meat. And so when you read this passage out, one of the things that you're gonna really come away with is that people that are just concerned with following every single little rule, right? And look, I'm not bashing rules. We need rules. They are necessary. But you have to understand the purpose behind the rule. We're gonna talk about that this morning. But people that are overly concerned with just following the rules, you know what? They're not fit for the master's use. They're not fit to teach. Because all they can do is come in here and look and say, oh, you're not following this. Okay, this church over here, they said this about this passage. They do this at this time. They read the announcements this way. They have the music this way. They don't have the piano over here. They have it over here. They interchange piano players out. You're not doing that. You're breaking the law, right? That's what they do. They are not fit to teach. And that's exactly what Paul's saying here. I mean, what does he say? Look at the verse. He says, you have need that one teach you again, which be what? The first principles of the oracles of God. Why doesn't he say that you have need that one teach you the laws? Why does he say principles? So you can see here that there is a very, very important thing that we need to understand about laws. And it has to do with principles. And that's what we're gonna hammer home in this sermon. Now, if you're confused here, like, well, what would he talk about the oracles of God? That's not a word that we often use a lot. Well, you don't have to turn there, but in Romans chapter three, Paul does remind the Romans and he says this. He says, what advantage then hath a Jew or what profit is there of circumcision? Because you remember during this time, the Jews are really just trying to hold on to what they have. They're trying to hold on to their positions. They're trying to hold on to just the laws and the standards and they're trying to audit everyone. They're like, don't forget, you know, don't listen to Jesus and what he said, right? He ignored the law. That's what they'll say. He ignored the law. And Paul's like, hey, what profit is a Jew? What profit do they really have today? And then he goes on to say this, much every way chiefly because unto them were committed the oracles of God. What do we read here in Hebrews chapter five verse 12? Paul saying, hey, you have need that you learn the principles of the oracles of God. And so what he's saying is that, you know, these things were at one time given to the nation of Israel to be a light unto the world. The oracles of God are the standards and the guides that we derive from the laws or principles to live our lives. That is what he is saying there. Now you can turn, you can leave your place there out of Hebrews and go to Exodus chapter number 24. Exodus chapter number 24. And so all that to say this, this is the main theme here. The main point that I want you to understand in the sermon is that God is the God of rules, precepts and principles. We need all three, okay? All three of these work together. As you read the Bible, you will see laws, you will see rules, you will see precepts and you will see principles. We ought not to be a people that ignores any one of those things, right? Because what happens when you do that is that you become unbalanced. You become like a Pharisee, you become like a scribe, okay? The reason why the leadership of that time had a hard time adjusting to Christianity is because they lacked principle, okay? They didn't understand that. They knew the law left and right, right? And they could go up and be like, guess what, Jesus, you're not following the law. You know why they said that? Because they couldn't understand how he summed up the law by using principles. Now, I don't know if anybody else has ever heard this, but I know in my own life, I've gone to a lot of liberal type churches and I always would run into these people that would say, hey, nice to meet you. And we'd start talking about our church past, you know? And they'd always say, you know, I came from the Baptist church across the street, which just so happened to be the church that I got saved in Bible Baptist Church of Port Orchard, Washington. And they would always say this, I am a recovering Baptist. I'll never forget the first time that I heard this. I was like, a recovering Baptist? I'm like, I'm thinking like drugs. Are you like an ex-alcoholic or like, oh, no, no, no. You know, all the rules that they have over at the Baptist church, like the women can't wear pants and you know, there's only certain instruments allowed and there's, you know, you gotta do all these different things. And I thought that was a once in a lifetime event. And then I started to hear that more and more. I meet more people that would come over there. I met this one family, you know, they started, they came to the liberal church we were going to and they started playing music. You know, I started talking with them, you know, tell them about your past. Oh, we're recovering Baptist. We used to go to Bible Baptist Church of Port Orchard and you know, the whole thing, I'm like, man, this is like becoming a real thing. So I've been itching to preach this for years. I've been wanting to get this off my chest for a long time. In that family in particular, you know what they told me? They said, you know what? We feel like we're free over here because we can just drink as much alcohol as we want without fear of judgment. You know, I talked to Jessica like, what kind of church is this? Like, what's going on? You know, and at this point in my life, everything's just starting to close in and things just aren't making sense. You know, and I'm starting to think in my mind, like it might be time to move to the mountains. It might just be time to separate from society because everybody's going absolutely crazy, right? It turns out that that Baptist church nowadays is crazy. Like they have people that graduated from liberal universities and they're not against the NIV. I remember I went back to visit probably about 12 years ago and they had some kids in the hallway playing Smells Like Teen Spirit by Nirvana. Not for the church service, but just out there. And I remember talking to the pastor, you know, I'm like, man, I remember that song from the nineties, you know? I mean, that's Kurt Cobain, that's a wicked guy. I'm like, who's out there playing? Oh, those are my grandkids. Look, ignorance is not an excuse, right? To buck the system, to buck the laws, to buck the standards. It's not okay. And look, everybody in here, you have to follow rules, right? Now we do have certain rules in the church. Like I've made up rules, you know, before we even started the church. Like for example, somebody comes in here, hey, I would like to borrow the church camera to go film. So no, I'm not gonna do that because then I have to do it for everybody, right? There's little things like that. There's rules that have to be in place. We have speed limits out in town, right? Those are rules. Those are things that we have to follow. Those come externally. There is a reason why those are in place and why we have to follow them. Let's see, what else? Idaho, real big on patriotism, right? You know, that's what we're known for here in this state. Oh, we have an X amount of patriots. Nothing wrong with that. You know, I believe you should not try to overthrow the government and stuff like that. But the problem with the patriots here is they're parasitic, right? Because what happens when we come and knock on their doors oftentimes? They say, oh, well guess what? I have the right for you not to be here. You should not only never come to my door again, but you should never come to my neighborhood again. In fact, that's what a man told me on the phone yesterday about what, 5.30 calls the church phone and hey, guess what? There is some people on my porch with a kid and I would like to know why they're trespassing on my property. They were here looking at my cars. They were here for about 15, 20 minutes. I'm pretty sure they stole stuff from my living room and he just starts going off. He says, they don't have the right to do that. They don't have the right to knock on people's doors. They should not do stuff like that. That's not okay. I said, are you a cop? He says, no. I said, do you know the law? And he says, well, they can do that. I said, are you trying to tell me that our church people can't go and knock on any doors? He's like, yes, that's right. I said, quote the law to me right now. He's trying to sidetrack, right? He tried to step aside and he tried to say all this other. No, no, no, no, no. Oh no, oh no. You tell me the law right now. And I said, you can't do it because that's not the law. That's stupid. And at the time I didn't know we had anybody out soloing so I told the guy, look, you're an idiot. We don't have anybody down there. You've probably been hibernating for a couple months because it's been like two months since we've been down there. And most people don't go rob houses with little children. I'm sorry to explain that to you, hero. And he's like, what kind of pastor are you? I said, shut your mouth. Don't you ever call me again and try to tell us what to do. And then I hung up the phone on him and blocked his number so he can't call anymore. Okay. Now, why I'm telling you that story, I have no idea. I'm just kidding. I'm half kidding here. Something to do with laws. Anyways, let's start off here. So the sermons broke down into three parts. We're gonna talk about rules. We're gonna talk about precepts and we're gonna talk about principles and how they all work together for the believer. Why we need all three of them, okay? So you probably guessed, if you had to give a definition of a rule, it's something that is basically placed on us externally. The government has all kinds of rules, don't they? In fact, the government has so many rules, they don't even know what they are. They have so many laws on the books, they can't even remember them all, right? Oftentimes they'll flip through their little ordinance book and they'll hit the jackpot. Oh, it says this in here. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, we can get them on this, right? But they didn't know that before they searched it, okay? So God's laws are not like that. He lays everything out there very plain, very simple, and he expects us to meditate and to know why he has instituted those laws and those rules. Exodus chapter 24, we're gonna look at verse number 12. So if you put the word law into your concordance, it's gonna come up like 450 something times. And if you start in Genesis and you work all the way to Exodus, most of that time, it's gonna be like your in-laws, okay? But the first time you actually get to it is right here to law. Look at verse number 12, it says this. And the Lord said unto Moses, come up to me into the mountain and be there. And I will give thee tables of stone and a law and commandments, which I have written that thou mayest teach them. So what do we see here? That God's going to give Moses commandments. He's going to give him laws that he has to teach. Not that he just has to repeat, okay? And that's the attitude that a lot of people have today, right, thou shall not steal. They'll just say that. But do you really know what that means? How do you actually learn what that really means, right? Because human nature is I want to get as close to not breaking that law as possible. For example, okay, speed limit sign, 35 miles per hour. Now can I go 35 and a half, okay? Have I broken, look, because it's still in that 35, you know what I mean? That's how we think, that's how we operate. You know, or this, you know, can I go 10, right? Can I go 10 down Fairview here on Sunday morning when I'm running behind? Or typically Wednesday, right? You ever run into somebody who's, you're late and they're just going like way, way under the speed limit here. That's often how people in general act towards laws, right? They just take the blanket statement of what it is and they want to get as close as they possibly can to not breaking it because that's just human nature. Now go to Joshua chapter 23. And I want you to keep your place in Joshua because we're gonna come back to it a little bit later. And we're just gonna kind of go through here. Remember we're talking about rules, we're talking about laws and so in Acts as we learn that God gives Moses laws to actually teach the people, why? For their safety, okay? Rules are supposed to be put into place for safety reasons to protect us, at least that's what we're told. I think that's kind of funny here in Idaho because the other day, I think it was last Sunday, we were driving on the freeway. They were going to get Steven. And actually, I think this was Friday and we get to the stoplight here and I look over and there's two guys on a motorcycle. One guy's, both, neither one of them have helmets on, right? But one guy's got his mask on and no helmet, okay? Oh, but I'm a patriot, I follow the law. Do you think that our lawmakers really care about your safety? Because if they did, when they put the law into place, it says, hey, we care about your health, we're going to make it so that you have to wear a helmet. Right? But what does that guy on a motorcycle do? And he said, well, I'm following the law. Now I'm like right up there because I'm wearing my mask. I don't want to get the sniffles. I don't want to lose my, I don't either, that thing sucks. You all know it, the coronavirus sucks, okay? But having your brain splashed all over the freeway, it sucks a little bit worse, okay? So just keep that in mind. You're not going to get taught the law from our government, is what I'm trying to say. Joshua 23, you look at verse six, it says this, be therefore very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the law of Moses that ye turn not aside therefrom to the right hand or to the left. And so this can teach us a lot of things about rules, a lot of things about laws. You either keep them or you break them. And that's just a simple truth, that is just a simple fact. You're either going to turn to the right or you're going to turn to the left. You're either going to go that 35 or you're not, okay? And that is what it is. But he says, be therefore very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the law. This is so true for us even today, because when you decide, you know what, I'm going to develop some standards for myself that come from the Bible, I'm going to hear preaching, I'm going to read the Bible, and I'm going to actually implement and apply these things to my life. Guess what? That takes courage. It took courage back then and it takes courage today. Why? Because your coworkers will come after you, your family will come after you, your so-called friends will come after you for doing that. And so it takes courage to follow the law and the way that God wants us to follow the law. Now go to Psalm 119, Psalm 119. And so these people that say, you know, it's so funny because they'll just, oh, you have rules, you have standard blah, blah, blah, blah. I would go to that church, but I can't because of your law, because your rules, whatever. But at the same time, out of the other breath, they'll tell you that you have to keep the commandments. Well, if you don't keep the commandments, then you're not saved. It's like, well, what are you talking about? Which is it? I mean, seriously, talk about a double-minded man being unstable in all his ways. That is what these people seriously are. But I want to read these verses to you because I want you to see the heart of God. I want you to see the importance of laws in keeping rules. They are a necessary thing, especially for the believer. But look at what you're going to see here in Psalm 119. You're going to see a benefit. This verse here, I mean, I love this verse. I have this memorized. I quote it to myself every single week and you're going to see why, especially those of you who preach. But this isn't just for people that preach up here. This is for everyone who preaches the gospel. Look at this here, Psalm 119. Look at verse 18. Open thou mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law. So when God gives laws, when God institutes laws, we ought not to just look at those things like, oh man, there's some more rules I got to follow. Oh, I got to follow these rules. That's not okay because God's law provides and produces wondrous things, wonderful things, right? Pastor Mihai talked on Friday about how many layers of truth there are in just all throughout the Bible. That's exactly what this is saying here. I could preach out of Hebrews 5 today. We could have another man come up here right after me, preach another sermon on Hebrews 5 and you get a whole nother layer of truth. And it would just keep going on and on and on and on because God's wisdom is infinite and that's a wonderful thing, you know? But yet human laws or these man-made laws, they don't always work that way, okay? And so when people come up to us and they want to say, oh, your rules and your laws, God's not the God of law. He's not the God of rules. Guess what? You're wrong, hippie. You're seriously in error and you need to be corrected. You need to be shut up and that's what we're going to do. If you haven't noticed, one of my goals in life is to wage war against new evangelical Christians. I want them to know about our church. I want them to know that they're wrong because you know what? They send people to hell by the droves. We always say, oh, you know, the Mormons and the J-dubs. Yeah, that's true for like here, like the Mormons. And in some areas it's the Catholics, but really the new evangelicals, they outnumber all of them. Cause on, just on coal, right? You got Mormon tabernacle, you know, liberal Baptist church, nom-to-nom, you know, and it just goes on Mormon tabernacle, Mormon seminary, you know, new evangelical, new evangelical, hippie church, hippie church, right? That's how it works here. There's like three churches and a Mormon temple for every human being who lives in Idaho. I mean. Jump down to verse 53. Jump down to verse 53. And I want to show you how God wants us to view His law, how He wants us to react to other people that would mock, that would scoff at His laws. Look at verse 53. Horror hath taken hold upon me because of the wicked that forsake thy law. You know, when I see the new evangelical mocking at God's word, saying, you know what? I can't believe that you read from that old book. That horrifies me. You know, I'll never forget it. When I was at the liberal church, you know, one day I was helping clean up the sound booth and stuff like that. I was rolling up cables and this guy came up to me and he's like, oh yeah, you know, you got the King James over there. And I was like, yeah, that's the only one I use. He's like, you know, that's just crazy. Some people are like really over the top with that stuff. He's like, I just can't believe, and I'm not trying to be rude, he's like, but I just can't believe that people still hold to that stupid old book. I came this close to putting him in the hospital. Seriously. The only reason I didn't is because I think the Holy Ghost restrained me. That horrifies me. You know His word, you know, Psalm 119, perhaps the largest chapter in the Bible, is all about the Bible. Essentially what he's saying, he's saying that about Jesus Christ and he doesn't even realize it because he's just concerned with following Ray Comfort's laws. Have you ever looked with lust? Have you ever done lust? Have you ever done that? Think about those people. You all know them. They're wicked. You should be horrified at them. You should be horrified by Joe Biden appointing these faggots and these trannies and these inept people to make laws for this nation. When you hear Obama mocking the Bible, you should be horrified by that. But what does the new evangelical say? Oh, don't judge. That's just his interpretation. That's just how he sees it. We still gotta pray for him. We still gotta love him. You think I'm crazy, but I unfortunately have sat in church services where they've said those very same things. Go to Revelation chapter two. Revelation chapter number two. So again, we ought to have a love for the law, but we ought not to have an unbalanced view of the law, of rules, regulations. Again, I'm not downplaying rules. I'm not downplaying laws. We need them. We should follow them, but you're gonna see what I mean here in a moment. And so here's a couple of verses for the hippies. Revelation two, look at verse 26. It says this. This is Jesus speaking here. He says, and he that overcometh and keepeth my works unto the end to him will I give power over the nations. Please understand he doesn't say him who does all this work. I will make sure that he stays safe. We're not talking about salvation here. Okay, verse 27. And he, so the person he's talking about here in verse 26, and he, verse 27, and he shall rule them with a rod of iron as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers even as I received of my father. Do you understand, do you guys realize that in the millennium time, which is in the future today, that Jesus Christ will implement rules, that he will implement laws, that he will have standards, that he will have expectations just like he does now. It's how this thing started, right? Rules is how it is now. Rules, laws, it's how it's going to be. Rules and laws. But yet people today, oh, he doesn't have any laws. That was just in that dispensation that he implemented those laws, okay? Now he's just love. Everything's love, only love. No hate, no standards, no judgment. What's that stupid, oh yeah, that Purple Planet, Purple Planet Fitness, right? Right, that's their motto, right? No judgment here. I like to watch those videos of these big, you know, roided out guys going in there and just like slamming all the weights around and stuff like that. Totally off topic, but nonetheless, it's very, very amusing to me. And so laws aren't going anywhere. They are here to stay. Now go to Mark chapter number 10, Mark chapter number 10. So the application here with rules is that they have a purpose, right? But we need to learn the purpose behind them. And that's what we're going to talk about here next with precepts, okay? With precepts. So again, rules, we need to follow them, especially God's rules. Because unfortunately we live in a time where the government is making laws and rules to go against the Bible, right? Are we going to follow those? No way. Nope, not a chance. We're not going to. We submit to the higher authority, which is God, the God of the Bible, the word of God here. But we're going to transition right now. And I want to talk about precepts. If somebody were to give you a test question, say, hey man, what's the difference between a rule and a precept? What would you say? Could you write that out? It's okay if you can. Just means you don't know it. And I'm going to teach you that right now. In fact, this here is the perfect passage in Mark chapter 10 to teach what a precept is here. Now, verse number two, I want you to look at this because it talks about the Pharisees here. It says, and the Pharisees came to him, to Jesus, and the Pharisees came to him and asked him, is it lawful for a man to put away his wife, tempting him? You see, these guys were always trying to get as close to the edge of the law as possible without appearing to break it, right? And so now they're trying to tempt him. Look at verse three, and he answered, I love how Jesus always answers these people, and he answered and said unto them, what did Moses command you? Right, so he always responds with a question because he is obviously God, he is obviously wise. He's trying to draw their air out of their hearts and make them see that, right? He never falls prey to their baiting, right? They're trying to bait him in a debate. They're trying to get him in an argument with the law. But see, he, being the word of God, understands laws. He understands laws and rules, and he understands precepts and he understands principles. And this is what you're gonna see here. He's gonna teach them what a precept is. Now look at verse number four, and they said, Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement and to put her away. And Jesus answered and said unto them, for the hardness of your heart, he wrote you this precept. Okay, keep your place there, but go to Deuteronomy chapter number 24. And so what we're about to read here in Deuteronomy chapter number 24 is what Jesus refers to here as a precept, okay? Look at verse number one for you there, Deuteronomy 24. And so in Deuteronomy chapter number 24, I'm just gonna say this right now, it's important that you understand the situation here. Who's talking? Is it the narrator or is it Moses? And it's Moses. Look at this, verse number one says, when a man hath taken a wife and married her and it come to pass that she find no favor in his eyes because he hath found some uncleanness in her, then let him write her a bill of divorcement and give it in her hand and send her out of his house. Now, if you started reading the Bible in Genesis and you got here, she kinda maybe scratch your head like, what in the world is going on here? You know, God made two into one and now it seems like God's endorsing divorce, but he's not. You gotta keep reading. And when she has departed out of his house, she may go and be another man's wife. And if the latter husband hate her and write her a bill of divorcement and give it in her hand and sendeth her out of his house, or if the latter husband die, which took her to be his wife, her former husband which sent her away may not take her again to be his wife. After that she is defiled for that is abomination before the Lord. And now shall not cause the land to sin, which the Lord thy God hath given thee for an inheritance. Now go back to Matthew, I'm sorry, Mark, rather go back to Mark chapter number 10. And I'm gonna explain to you what this means here. So you have to understand the situation that's going on here. God is now forming the nation of Israel. He's brought them out of Egypt. He's already received the law and the commandments that we looked at earlier, and he's going to begin to teach them. But there's a problem here. There's a problem with these people that have spent the last 400 something years over in Egypt. And that is that they have picked up the habits of the Egyptians. And so they were in the habit obviously by the context of reading here of just putting their wives away for any reason whatsoever. And you can see they even still have that mentality in this timeframe here where they're trying to tempt Jesus. Right, and so what are they stuck on right now? They're stuck on the law. They're reading Deuteronomy 24 and say, well, that's a law. They don't have the discernment to understand that it's a precept, that it was for a reason and that Moses gave that not God. Moses allowed that because see, God oftentimes gives leaders autonomy. He gives them a little bit of wiggle room to deal with current situations, to deal with things that are outside the scope of normality, okay? Look at verse number six. So we're continuing on here, Mark 10, verse six. So this is how Jesus says. He says, you know, for the hardness of your hearts, that Moses allowed you to do that. Guess what? It's not a good thing. Verse six, but from the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female. For this cause shall man leave his father and his mother and cleave to his wife and they twain shall be one flesh. So then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder. Now look at verse 10. And in the house of his disciples, I'm sorry. And in the house of his disciples asked him again of the same matter and he saith unto them, whosoever shall put away his wife and marry another commit adultery against her. And if a woman shall put away her husband and be married to another man, she committed adultery. And so here's a statement to just kind of help you understand what I'm talking about here. And that's this, the Spirit's statements or the narrator in the Bible, right? The Spirit's statements surpass the stories, okay? So for example, when Moses says something, right? And then you read something that seems contrary to that. You need to look at who wrote that. And so what Jesus is teaching these people here, hey, Moses gave you that precept. He gave you that rule, he gave you that option because of the hardness of your heart. That didn't come from God. You see, you have to understand that. The stories trump the statements. So when you're reading the Bible, you need to be aware of who it is that is writing that. Obviously the Holy Ghost inspired man and the whole thing's written by God. But when Moses is speaking or Abraham speaking, you always gotta cross reference that to what the narrator says. You know, perfect example, the one that I like to use oftentimes is in 2 Samuel, when the Amalekite comes to David and says, hey, you know, Saul asked me to thrust him through. But what do you read at the end of 1 Samuel? That Saul fell on a sword. Well, how do you solve that? How do you know which one's true? Well, you take the fact that the Amalekite just said that and then you go back to 1 Samuel and you read, oh wait, the narrator, right, the Holy Ghost, the Spirit is the one that said that Saul fell on a sword. So that trumps what the Amalekite said. That's what Jesus is trying to teach these people here. He's trying to say, hey, Moses, because of his autonomy, because God allowed him to give this to you because the hardness of your hearts suffered you to write a bill of divorcement. But he's saying it's not supposed to be that way. And you can get that truth just simply by doing what Jesus said. Just go back to Genesis and read it. Who said that God made two into one? What's the Holy Ghost? It's the narrator who said that. So that trumps what Moses said. But these people, they couldn't understand that because they're just fixated on following the law and following the rules. And what did Paul say in Hebrews chapter number five about people that are just fixated on following the rules and following the laws? What did he say? He said that they're babes, that they have need that one teach them again of the principles and the oracles of God. Don't worry, this will make more sense here in a moment. Go to Isaiah chapter number 28. Isaiah chapter number 28. And so also another thing that most people miss when they read the gospels is that they don't understand that the physical nation of Israel is to be done away with, right? That we're going to the system which we see today where every believer who's born again is born into the spiritual Israel, the real Israel of God, right? And so we have to live by standards. We have to live by rules, by precepts and principles in this crooked and perverse nation here because we don't have a direct king. It's not like it was in the time of David or Solomon, right? Where basically God's over the king, he tells the king through prophets what to do and then the king basically oversees the nation. We don't have that today, right? We just go straight to the Lord for everything. We just have Jesus Christ. That's how we operate. But we're scattered throughout the entire world, right? The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, right? But they're what? They're spiritual, right? So we have to understand that when we read that and Jesus is trying to prepare these people, hey, you know this precept that Moses gave the nation, the physical nation of Israel, that doesn't stand. And it's not gonna stand for you when I get resurrected and you guys get scattered throughout the world. But anyways, back to this idea of precepts here. I want you to look at this here, Isaiah 28 verse nine. Look what it says. So God's saying this. He's having, he wants the children of Israel to understand this. He wants the Jews to know this. Whom shall he teach knowledge and whom shall he make to understand doctrine? Them that are weaned from milk and drawn from the breast. So what is he talking about? He's talking about teaching knowledge and he's posing a question. Who is going to be able to teach knowledge in the end times? That's really what's going on here. And then he gives you the hint here. He says, the person who's weaned from the milk, the person who's no longer fixated, okay, I just gotta follow the rules, right? I just gotta do what I'm told. Look at verse 10. For precept, right? So now we're talking about, okay, precept. So he says, for precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line here a little and there a little. Look at verse 11. For with stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people, okay? And so what do we do about this? What do we do about precepts that we can't do about laws? Well, we realize that, you know what? We have to learn the law, right? Because remember, it's not just about memorizing the law and say, okay, 35 miles per hour and then that's it and I have no other understanding. We need to advance from the law or from the rule to understand the precept or the purpose behind the law, right, we learn that, we apply that, we build upon that and then we repeat. But what we have today is we have a nation full of people that want everything and the here and now and they want it right now, right? Remember the disease of now, I want it now. People don't wanna take the time to build that foundation, to learn a truth, okay? I hear the word of God, you know what? I'm not doing that. I'm not doing that in my life, whatever it is, right? People, you know, when you hear something like that, you need to just say, you know what? Okay, I'm gonna work on that for now. I'm gonna do that and then once you've got that down and once you understand why you're doing that, why God wants you to do that, then guess what? You repeat, so you learn, you apply and you build and you repeat, that's the Christian life. You hear a message about something that you need to improve on and you say, you know what? I'm gonna take that to heart. I am gonna take that personally and I'm gonna build upon that. That is how you do this. You don't get everything all at once. You don't just get saved and all of a sudden, oh God just makes you a new person than the old man and you just automatically know how to sing the hymns and do the right thing all the time. That's not how life works but that's how we're told it should work because the people that say that, they wanna buck the system and they're really rebels. These recovering Baptist or whatever you wanna call them, they're not recovering, okay? They're actually advancing in a downward spiral that wrecks their lives. And by the way, all those people that I told you that have told me, oh, I'm a recovering Baptist, sometimes I go back and I look at the church and I try to find them on Facebook and every single one of them destroyed. Tells me they're saved but God eventually had enough and brought the hand upon them because God takes his laws, he takes his standards, he takes his precepts very, very seriously. Now go to Joshua chapter number one. Joshua chapter number one. So I'm gonna try to put this together here with a little picture in your mind. So let's go back to that 35 mile per hour speed limit sign. You know, if you go up to the dump, they have a speed limit sign that's like 23 miles per hour. They got another one that's like eight miles per hour, three miles per hour. It's kind of funny, you know, just goofing around. So whatever one, but let's just, the standard, 35 miles per hour, okay? So you can really sum up all three things that I'm talking about today by using that picture. So I want you to just picture a speed limit sign that says 35, okay? Just seeing that, that's the law, okay? Now, if I were to say, okay, explain that in a precept, the precept of that 35 mile per hour sign is this, I can't exceed it. I understand the purpose behind it but I also, right, I also don't have the option to go 15 because what happens if you're going 45, 44 miles an hour in the left lane, down the highway over here or the freeway? You could get pulled over by the police for going too slow and obstructing traffic, right? It's a danger. So having that precept and understanding that concept there, you know, though it says max 35, it also does mean when you research it and you look into it that you can't go too slow, okay? That's really what it means. So that's what a precept is, okay? That's what a precept is. Now, the principle would be this. If I took that 35 mile per hour speed limit sign, I flipped it around, covered it up, and wrote drive safely. That would be a principle and that's what we're gonna talk about next here. A principle and don't say, oh, I don't get this. You know, everybody lives by principles. In fact, most people today, unfortunately, they live by a selfish principle. Says, if it pleases me, I'll do it. And that has its roots in what? Satanism, right? Do as thou wilt. Do what you wanna. Who's gonna stop you? I heard a rap song not too long ago by a Christian couple or Christian group or something like that. And the song was, do what you wanna. Who's gonna stop you? You know, something about partying and I know where the wine's at. I'm gonna hang for the ceiling. Let's get wild. Let's get lit. So I went in on the video and found it and I said, what does that mean? What does getting lit mean? I got no response. Because I looked it up on Wikipedia, right? Because I was like, hold on, what does that mean? Get lit up like a Christmas tree. I kinda know what that means, you know? Bang, bang, bang. But what does that mean? You know, and the definition was, well, it can mean like having a really good time or like going to a party, just having a great time. Or it means getting completely drunk, getting lit up like, oh, I'm happy now because of this booze. That's, guess what, guys, that is modern day Christianity. Most Christians today have no idea that that is wrong. That that shouldn't be on the radio. That shouldn't, I mean, that needs to be spoken against today. That's horrible. That's destructive behavior. But that all goes back to a principle. That is being instilled today in this culture and throughout American churches, which is self-pleasure. Do as thou wilt, right? Wasn't that Anton LaVey's favorite thing to say, do as thou wilt? Jay-Z's got pictures all over the internet with that sweater that I think he sells, do as thou wilt, do whatever you want to. Allister Crowley, thank you. What did I say, Anton LaVey? Well, he probably follows it too, huh? Yeah, Crowley is the one that made that popular, right? Do as thou wilt. You know, I think that's, is that a satanic commandment in the Bible, right? Or the satanic Bible, rather? Yeah, do whatever you want to do, right? That flies in the face of Philippians chapter two. Let this mind, which was in Christ Jesus being you, you know, they say, no, that's wrong. That's a rule, that's a standard, that's law. We don't live by rules, standards, laws, which is hypocritical, why? Because they have standards and laws too. The problem is they're just way down here. So obviously principles for the believer should come from studying, right? From studying the law, from studying the Bible. Joshua chapter one, look at verse number eight. It says this, this book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein, for then thou shall make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success. So a principle, right? Principles are the wondrous things that we pull from the law. When you sit down and you say, you know what? I'm going to review my soul winning plan. You start to read your verses, right? You start to read the verses that you use and you ask God, please show me wondrous things out of that law. He's going to begin to give you examples and illustrations and words to actually make that clear to other people, okay? That is a benefit, that is a value, that is a principle, if you will. Now you can leave your place there and go to, real quickly, go to Exodus chapter 20, Exodus chapter number 20. And so think of it like this. A rule is something that externally compels you to do something, right? Back to the speed limit thing, right? The government says as fast as you can go on this road, that's it, okay? Whereas a principle is something that internally motivates you. Have you ever wondered, how can I get my children to follow the rules? How can I get my kids to follow the law? How can I get my employees to follow the rules? How do we do this? Why are some people successful at doing this and others fail? What is it? I'll tell you right now, the secret to that is in understanding the doctrine of principles, understanding the doctrine of principles. So when you instill principles in somebody, like kindness, right? When you teach your kids, hey, you just kind of say, hey, don't hit, don't hit, don't hit. All you, you know, it's good to say that. You need to say that, right? But you need to tell them the purpose behind that, which is the principle. You need to say, hey, guess what? That's not okay. Why? Because we teach kindness in this family, right? And you understand and you teach them the doctrine of kindness, what that means, what that's about, why we should do that, how God feels about that. And you put that word kindness into their hearts, right? You're putting a principle into them and they will in turn automatically follow the law because now you're giving them a key, right? That they can unlock and then they can make good decisions based off of that principle, right? A rule by itself can't do that. We have to learn the precepts, first of all, and then we have to transition and understand the principles. I mean, think about King David, right? What does the Bible say about David? He was a what? A man after God's own heart. He lived his life based off of that principle, you know? People wanna argue, you know, people today who are all about the law, they would argue, okay, well, was David just a good shepherd? What would he wanna be called? A good shepherd? A good armor bearer? Or a good king? Or a good follower of God? You know, David would be like, what are you talking about? I wanna be all of those things. And he was all of those things, right? But the carnal mind, the carnal person would get around and debate those things. Well, I've got all these verses that say we should just call him as a good shepherd because of this. Well, I got all these verses over here, man, and to say that he's just a great king. I'm serious, this is what people do who are fixated on just following rules and following laws. You get what I'm saying here? But he says, no, I live by something that you're missing. The reason why I did those things that other people couldn't do is because I understood a principle. It was inside of me. When God said go left, I went left. When God said go right, I went right. When God said stop and pray, I prayed. When God said destroy, I destroyed. Because he understood that he wants to do what God says because he was after his own heart. That's how he lived his life. And so because of that, he was able to do what he did. He didn't always have to stop and say, okay, what does the law say? What does the book say? Nothing wrong with doing that. We all do that. That's necessary. That has its place, right? But in a pinch, when you're called to make a decision now and you don't have time to do that, when you have principles inside of you, you will make the right decision. You will make the right choices. This is why Sunday mornings I try to instill principles, right, because it's principles that change. It's principles that get us to do right. It's not enough to, you know, I don't get up here. You know, you guys, your women should be wearing pants and then just leave it at that. You think I'm crazy, but there are churches that do that. The reason why I talk to so many people that say I'm a recovering Baptist is because the church that they came from that I got saved in, they lost the ability and the discernment to understand what a principle is. That's why. And this church is not going to go down that road. We will instill principles, because we want to be a church after God's own heart. And if we can instill that in all of us, you know what? We're not gonna have to sit around and debate about the law. We're just gonna know to do right. So another example, just to kind of help you understand principle. So the mom who says, okay, you know, hold my hand every time you cross the street and stay close. Good, you gotta say that, right? But what's the principle behind that? Safety. Right, safety. You know, when I worked for the government, they actually understood this concept. They understood principles. And they had an acronym, right? And they had this acronym, and I'm not gonna say it, but it's not bad, but it's just, sometimes I don't know what I can say and can't say, and if I'm gonna get in trouble and let, you know, you get in trouble for the sodomites or something like that. But you know, one of the things when you said that acronym to yourself was when you're in an industrial environment, which can be very dangerous, a lot of stuff going on, things that could fall, because you're supposed to say basically, okay, what's around me right now? What's going on? And what could hurt me? Right, and seriously, just by them instilling that principle, safety, and teaching what that really means and giving you a question to kind of go along with that, they reduce their injuries, I mean, by a ton, which benefits them because now they're not paying out medical bills and giving, you know, months and months of leave to their employees. But it's so true, right? Once the people understood the principle behind safety, behind the safety rules and regulations, like wearing your safety glasses, steel toe boots and stuff like that, and you know, the thicker pants, you know, once people got that and they understood, you know, what's around me and what could hurt me, all of that stuff just came naturally. You know, they weren't like going out the door, okay, I got my checklist. Do I have my safety glasses? Do I have my hard hat? Do I have my steel toes? Do I, you know, they didn't have to do that because they understood the principle of safety, what could hurt me, what's around me, what's going on around me. And that's the same thing in the Bible. For example, let's take a look at Exodus chapter 20, verse 23. We could do this all day, but we won't. We'll just look at one. Exodus 20, verse three. Thou shall have no other gods before me. Okay, you go up to most people today that go to church and you say, hey, you know, you're pushing the commandments on me. You're saying you got to follow the commandments to be saved. Have you followed this one? You know they're gonna tell you, yes, of course. We love Jesus and he loves us. We follow Jesus. We gave our lives to him. Cool. Even though some of the Bible says he gave his life for you, but that's what they'll tell you. So you say, okay, well, that's interesting. When was the last time you went to church? Oh, I don't believe in organized religion. Really? So you don't go to church? You don't pray for other people? You don't edify anybody? You don't learn God's word? You're not trying to develop a mind and a heart that's after God? Oh, well, I love God. Oh, I love God. I don't have any other gods before me. Listen to me. Here's the principle. Whatever rules your life is that God. So we have people that come in here, right? We've had people that come in here, we have a guy that comes in here, love the guy, you know, great guy. He's learning a little bit. But he told me, you know, right over here, he's like, you know, you're not gonna see me for like probably four or five, maybe six weeks because of the NFL. Okay, I gotta catch those games. If you were to talk to him, he would say, I have no other gods before him. But that's not true when you understand the precept and you understand the principles behind this commandment here. What does it really mean? How do we teach this to be applicable to people's lives and to actually live for God properly? Thou shalt have no other gods before me. He wants to be the supreme ruler in your life. He wants you to live to his standards. Now when something else like the NFL is doing that and it's taking you away from God, guess what? That becomes your lowercase G God. You are in violation of this commandment. So you're crazy. You got these standards, you got these rules. Hey, have fun working for me in the millennium then. I don't know what else to tell you. Okay. You're wrong, go to Mark chapter 12. Mark chapter number 12. So anything in your life that you allow to rule you, right? So what do we say? Well, we teach the principle to love God and what that really means. It's not enough just to say that. It's not enough just to say, oh, thou shalt have no other gods. Let's go home. Everybody, you got statues, huh? You got them gnomes out from, you know, you're bowing down to Molech over there and to Ashroth and you know, and to Baal. Oh, we're not doing any of that. But you still got things in your life that are pushing God out of the way. You're in violation. It is what it is. People don't like it, but it's the truth. Mark chapter 12, a little bit of a review here. Look at verse 28. It says this, and one of the scribes came and having heard them reasoning together and perceiving, they answered them well, asked him, which is the first commandment of all? So what he's saying, hey, which is the first commandment? What's the best commandment? What's the one commandment that I can do to where if I don't do all the other ones, I'll still be good with God. That's what this guy is saying. And he's a well-meaning dude right here. You know, he heard, okay, Jesus got some reasoning, you know, but what's his mindset? Well, his mindset is the mindset of all of us at some point in our lives. How close to the edge of breaking the law can I get without breaking it? Or what laws can I break, but maybe still do an easy one to kind of still be accepted, you know? That's what you have going on here. Look at verse 29. So this guy wants one. Remember that, he wants one commandment. Hey, what's the great, he's trying to feed Jesus the answer. Hey, what's the one commandment? Verse 29, and Jesus answered him. The first of all the commandments is, hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. So he gives him one, now he's gonna give him two. Verse 30, and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. This is the first commandment. Verse 31, and the second is like, namely this, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these. And so Jesus gives him two principles to live by in which if this guy lives by these, he'll do the whole thing, which means what? They're all important. All the commandments, however many there are, there's hundreds in the Old Testament. I forgot the exact number. There's hundreds, but guess what? If you can hold to principles, you'll automatically do the rest of them. You get what I'm saying? So Jesus is doing what? He's teaching principles, because principles produce change. It's not enough. I saw this Christian movie back in the day, and it's kind of, whatever, but it's called Time Changers, and it had a good principle in there. The movie starts off with this guy, he travels from the 1890s to the future, and he runs with this kid that's stealing hot dogs, you know, and he's like, hey, you shouldn't do that, it's wrong, and the guy's like, oh yeah, says who? And he's like, well, wait, God says that. And he realizes in that movie, and I think this part is great, you know, that what's lacking in today's day and age is the teaching of principles. See, the devil knows if he can cut that principle out and get you distracted, get you off balance over here with just following the laws, maybe a little bit of precepts just for show, and he's got you. He just stunts your growth. If we don't learn principles, like the writer of Hebrews said, we can't go teach other people. It's going to be hard for you to teach other people how to get saved if you don't understand the doctrine of principles. Now, go to Proverbs 16, Proverbs chapter 16, we're getting close to being done here, go to Proverbs chapter 16. While you're turning there, I'm just gonna read you from Proverbs chapter number four. I'm gonna give you another example here of a principle. And there's thousands of these, millions of these that you could pull from in the Bible. But just listen to this. Proverbs 4, 20 says this, My son, attend to my words, incline thine ear to my sayings, let them not depart from thine eyes, keep them in the midst of thine heart. For they are life unto those that find them in health to all of their flesh. So what is the Bible saying there? That when you follow God's laws through the principle of wisdom, that that is health, physical health to your physical flesh, okay? Proverbs 16, keep that in mind, verse 23. Proverbs 16, look at verse 23. The heart of the wise teacheth his mouth and addeth learning to his lips. Verse 24, pleasant words are as in honeycomb, sweet to the soul and health to the bones. So what are we talking about? We're talking about the body, we're talking about the flesh, okay? So Proverbs 4, and like I said, there is others where you learn what? That being wise is what? It's beneficial for your flesh. What are we seeing here? Well, pleasant words are good to the soul, but also health to the bone. So good news is good for your health. Good news is good for your body. Look at verse 25. There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end there are the ways of death. And so here's the principle. Good news and wisdom, I would say are a principle that provides more health for your physical body than all the health rules in the world. Health rules like this. Don't put toxic things in your body, right? That's a good rule. And we should try to abide by that. Lift stuff, move around, exercise, right? Those are health rules. Just type in health rules to Google. All these things come up. What are health rules I should live by? There's thousands of them. There's millions of them. But here's the thing. You can follow all those rules. Get enough sleep. Get your nutrients, right? You can follow all of those things and miss the principle of life that the Bible teaches and still get cancer and die prematurely. What is tried, what is true for the human body? Wisdom and good news. When you hear about people out there getting saved, right, that's good news. That is health to your body. When God answers our prayers and they become praises on Wednesday and you say, I'm gonna put myself last and go to church and hear this good news, guess what? That is health to your bones. So yeah, yeah, we have a standard of doing a prayer list and praises. We have a standard of going soloing. We have standards of implementing wisdom within this church. Why? Because it makes us healthy. I don't know about you, but I really don't wanna get Alzheimer's and dementia when I get older. And so I'm gonna live by the principle that I find taught throughout the Bible. And if I could just take those two, for example, you know what? If we could just take those two, for example, those two principles, guess what? We're gonna follow the other rules that are out there naturally, because it's wise not to put toxic things in your body. It's wise to be around like-minded people. It's wise to get enough sleep. It's wise to do these things. When you understand the principle, you're gonna get the rules and the laws. And that's the secret. That's the key to getting people, even yourselves, to doing the right things. I gotta memorize every single rule. And so we're gonna wrap this thing up here. So just a really quick review. Remember, rules, they're necessary. We should never scoff at the rules. I'm talking about the rules in the Bible, right? But they are external things that are placed upon us. We can't avoid them. There are always going to be rules. When Jesus comes back and he rules this world with a rod of iron, there will be rules, there will be laws, and we will have to follow them. We will want to follow them because we've understood the principles. And number two, precepts are guiding principles that we build upon, right? It's that knowledge of the law, what I can and cannot do. And the principle is that internal thing that says, you know what, I wanna be after God's own heart, right? I wanna be kind, then I know I won't hit other people. I want to be a minister, that way I'll know to give to my brother, you know? The things that we read about in Mark chapter 12, you know, love thy neighbor as thyself, right? If you can do that, you'll come to church, you'll be a disciple, you'll be a blessing to other people. If you love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, then guess what? You're not gonna put other things above him. You're gonna be able to fulfill all these laws and you're not gonna be bogged down, oh, I just can't take all these laws. That's what the hippie does. Our God is the God of rules, precepts, and principles. It is what it is. And you know what? We're gonna need these things because you know what? We are commanded to speak the things which become sound doctrine. And that's what we're gonna talk about. And this combination of things is gonna serve us well. It's why we have success as a church, it's why God loves this church, because we don't scoff at his laws. We don't scoff at his precepts and his principles. We realize there's balance in all three of those things. But the chief of them all, honestly, is principles. When you can understand the principles, the laws, the precepts, all that stuff is automatic. And that's what we need to be in favor of, okay? And that's what we're gonna talk about. So I wanted to just preach this, just to throw this out there, because it's important when we talk about standards to have that foundation, to have that backdrop. Why do we have standards? Why do we have expectations? Why do we do the things that we do? And in the coming weeks, we're gonna talk about standards for various things, why we do them, and how to do them if you're struggling to do them. So let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Thank you so much, Lord, for this church. I just pray that these things, Lord, you would just help to stick them in our hearts and our minds and our souls, Lord, that we would always understand the relationships between rules, precepts, and principles, and that we would get these principles so that we could follow your rules and be pleasing unto you and be fit for your use in this area, Lord. We thank you.