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Jabin, the king of Canaan, until they had destroyed Jabin, king of Canaan. Let's pray dear God, thank you for your word, thank you for the opportunity to hear preached. I just ask that you be a pastor now, and just give us ears to hear God, and in Jesus name we pray, Amen. Amen. Okay, we're in Judges chapter 4, look down at your Bibles at verse number 1, it says, And the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord, when Ehud was dead. And the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin, king of Canaan, that Rein and Hazor, the captain of whose host was Sisera, which dwelt in Harosheth of the Gentiles. And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord, for he had nine hundred chariots of iron, and twenty years he mightily oppressed the children of Israel. Verse 4, And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, she judged Israel at that time. And she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah between Rhema and Bethel and Mount Ephraim. And the children of Israel came up to her for judgment. The title of the sermon this morning is The Prophetess, or another title can be Female Prophets in Light of the Bible, we're going to talk about female prophets in the Bible. Now let me explain the passage that we just read here in Judges chapter 4, in fact let me just briefly explain what the book of Judges is all about, and what is the main theme that we see in the book of Judges. In Judges we find Israel during a time when every man is doing that which is right in their own eyes. If we can basically characterize what Israel was doing during that time, or why they were behaving the way they were, it's because of the fact that they had a lack of leadership. A lack of leadership, a lack of a king, a lack of a proper judge, and in fact any time that they would go and worship other gods, and defile themselves, and begin to practice paganism, God would often deliver them into the hands of their enemies. They would be oppressed for dozens of years, decades often, and then they would cry out unto the Lord, God would hear their cry, and would raise up and deliver a judge to come to teach them the word of God, and this person would often operate also as a military general. So this person would rise up, come tell Israel, hey you guys aren't right with God, this is actually what the Bible says, this is what the word of God says, you're in sin and this is why you're being oppressed, but don't worry, I'm here, we're going to go ahead and fight against the enemies of God, I'm going to lead you in defeating your oppressors. That's basically the theme, what we see throughout the book of Judges. The judge operating as a teacher of God's word, but also as a military general helping Israel to get out of oppression. And particularly here in Judges chapter 4, we're looking at the story of Deborah the judge and Barak the general. So now we see a splitting of those two offices there, right, because we see typically the judge would be the deliverer, the judge would be the military general so to speak, but now we see that two different people are actually fulfilling this office, Deborah being the prophetess and then Barak being the general. Jabin king of Canaan was basically oppressing the children of Israel for about 20 years alongside with his captain, Sisera, and what we see here is that Deborah knows the Bible. She knows what God's word says, she knows what God expects of the people, and by the way, she isn't going to them saying, hey, I'm going to be your leader. What's actually happening? We see them coming to her. Now that's a shame, amen? Now why is that a shame? Is it a shame that she knows the Bible? No, it's not a shame that she knows the Bible, in fact, women are supposed to know the Bible. What's a shame is that the men and every person of the city is coming to her to have biblical understanding. Now why is this bad during this time? Well, because of the fact that we see that Ehud just died, and Ehud was a great man. Ehud was that famous assassin who killed Eglon, who the Bible says was a very fat man. You know, he shoved the dagger right into his belly, the dirt came out and he delivered them, children of Israel, out of his hand, but what we see is that one of Ehud's contemporaries was Shamgar, and they kind of have overlapping stories there, but Shamgar actually lived until the time of Deborah as well, so that means that Shamgar was a judge when Deborah was there. What's going on, Shamgar? No one's going to Shamgar to hear the word of God, they're not going to him to hear the preaching of God's word, they're not going to him for biblical understanding. Who do they go to instead? Deborah. Now I don't know why what's going on with Shamgar. I do know this is that in chapter 5, we see that the reason the children of Israel are such in a bad condition, and why the streets are so desolate and dangerous to live in, is because of Shamgar, because he wasn't preaching against it, he wasn't leading the people, okay? And I'll get into that in just a bit. So we see here that the children of Israel, they cry unto the Lord and God delivers them through the hand of a judge who operates as a military general, but in this particular story, it's Deborah judging and Barak leading that military to fight against their oppressors. Now what do we see in the story after that? Well, Deborah comes, she gives the word of God to Barak. So did God choose Deborah to be a prophetess? To be a judge? No. She kind of became the judge by default. She took on that position by default, God gave her the word of God and told her to go to Barak and say, hey, you need to go deliver my people out of the hands of the oppressors. Now what would I liken this unto? Well today, you have men who have a hard time leading their house, or maybe they just don't want to be in church, they don't want to read the Bible, they don't want to go sowing, but their wife is on fire for God, right? And what happens is, you know, if they have children, they have a family, and the wife knows what God expects of their family, but the man is not stepping up to the plate, by default, she will basically take charge. Now is that right? No, it's not. It's not right. Why? Because that's out of order. The order should be that the man is leading the house, amen? The order should be that the man should be the spiritual giant within that household, lead his wife, lead the children, be the example, say, hey, we're going to church today, hey, we're reading the Bible, hey, we're serving God, as for me and my house, we shall serve the Lord, right? Not like, well, I don't want to go to church because I'm too tired, all right, we're going to stay home from church then. More like, well, you know what, pop a B vitamin, or take a Monster, or do whatever you got to do, we're going to church. False sleep during Brother Mejia's preaching, whatever you got to do, but we're going to church. You see, it should never be a question whether we are in the house of God, amen? That should be a part of just who we are. Sunday should never be a matter of, should we go to church today? Hmm, should I even be in the house of God today? No, what you should be questioning is, should I even do anything else? Because going to church is who we are, but it takes a strong leader, a man, to actually do that. Now, what happens if he doesn't? Well, the woman leads by default. The woman leads by default. And I've known women who do a great job leading their children, and they're doing the best they can to lead their children, to lead their household, because the man is not stepping up to the plate, okay? Does it make it right? I don't agree with it. I don't like it. It's not God's order, you know, but sometimes it happens, okay? Now, I would prefer that over just not being in church at all, amen? Not having your kids in church, not being in church, obviously, those are the lesser of two evils, so to speak, but at the end of the day, the best option is just to have the man in church, even if he doesn't know as much Bible as his wife, even if he's not as spiritual as his wife, be in church so you can get spiritual, get the Bible knowledge, get that role in order so you can become the man that God wants you to be, okay? That was free. So what we see here is that she gives the word of God to Barak. Barak, you know, the bold and confident man that he is, you know, he gets that word and he says, well, unless you go with me, I'm not gonna go. You wimp. God just told you, you can do it. And Barak says, well, Deborah, I mean, unless you go with me, girlfriend, I can't go. Now that's very different from what Moses said, right? When Moses told God, except your presence go with me, you know, then I won't go if your presence doesn't go with me. Your presence doesn't go with me, whereas Barak is just like, well, I need Deborah with me. What in the world? So we see that Barak gets that, he goes out to Sisera, and he exercises faith. Why is he highlighted in the Hall of Faith in Hebrews chapter 11? Well, because of the fact that he believed the word of God, okay? Yeah, it came from Deborah, and he ended up overcoming him. Now here's the thing is that because he was such a weak leader, I believe God removed the honor from him to be able to kill Sisera. Because ultimately, what happened to Sisera, the captain that we see here, he goes into Jael's tent, right? And that's where we find the famous story where Jael, she's like, come on in, she gives him milk to drink, and she lays him down, and she hits the nail right on the head, right? She drives a tent nail within this temple, and in fact, if you read Judges chapter 5, you see that probably the nail was so thick that it really just decapitates his head off. He slumps at her feet, okay? Strong woman. He comes in, Barak comes in, and Sisera's already dead. Now I don't know about you, but I would have been disappointed. I'd be like, man, just say that I did it, all right? I think that privilege was removed from Barak because of the fact that though he had enough faith to go after Sisera, he didn't have enough guts, he didn't have enough boldness, he didn't have enough faith to just get the word himself, right? Instead of asking for God's presence, he asked for Deborah's presence. It's weak, okay? But it's a great story. It's a great story, and it's a story of faith, it's a story of resilience and tenacity to overcome what seems to be the impossible obstacles. And it's a story that we can gather for us and apply to us today to step out in faith, but let me just say this, is that's all it should do. The story of Deborah, the prophetess, the only thing that it should do to us is encourage us to step out in faith and turn to flight the armies of the aliens, amen? You say, why do you say that? Well, because unfortunately people today use this story as a justification for female pastors. And they'll say, well, Deborah was a prophetess of the Lord, and like Deborah was a judge. I'm sorry, did we see anything about pastors here in chapter four? So they take this story in the Old Testament of Deborah preaching the Bible, not being the military general, just completely just preaching the word of God to Barak, preaching the word of God to Israel, and automatically that's their justification for female pastors. And I've had people tell me that, where they say, well, you know, I don't agree with you, I think women can be preachers too and pastors too, and you know what, Deborah, Deborah, Deborah. Well, you know, if Deborah was so popular, why isn't she in the Hall of Faith in Hebrew chapter 11? You know why? Because it doesn't take faith to preach the Bible. It just takes knowledge of the Bible to preach the Bible, right? She didn't step out in faith to do some great exploit. All she did was communicate and instruct Barak what God told her. The one who had to step out in faith was Barak, because Barak was the one who was supposed to go out and look for Sisera and turn to flight the armies of the aliens, and that's exactly what he did, okay? Do we see the ordination of Deborah here to fulfill the office of a bishop? You know, do we see anybody laying hands on her to become Pastor Deborah? No, what we see instead is Deborah just basically stepping up to the plate, okay? Look at verse 5, it says, and she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah between Rhema and Bethel and Mount Ephraim, and the children of Israel came up to her for judgment. So obviously she was characterized by knowing God's word, because people came to her and said, hey, what does the Bible say about this, okay? Now what does this remind me of? Reminds me of like Pentecostal pastors, okay? Lady pastors in Pentecostal charismatic type churches, and it disgusts me to be honest with you. I'm disgusted by female pastors, let me just be quite honest with you, but let me tell you this. You know what disgusts me more than a female pastor is the man who sits in the pews listening to it. That's more disgusting than the female pastor. I mean, I hate the fact that there even exists a female pastor, but what disgusts me more than that is the man who sits in that service listening. Now let me take it a step further, let me show you a greater abomination like Ezekiel said. There's a greater abomination than that. How about the man who sits in the pews and says, amen, to the female preacher? But you know what, this is the world in which we live in today because you have Joel Osteen's wife preaching, and I'm sure there's a bunch of men so-called in that stadium just nodding their heads and loving it and just saying amen and just eating it up with fork and spoon. That's wicked folks. Well, they're preaching the word of God. First of all, Joel Osteen's wife is a false prophet, okay? She's married to a false prophet, birds of a feather flock together, okay? They're both vultures. But what we see here, and look, I'm not downplaying, I'm not down on any lady who knows the Bible. Ladies should know the Bible. The commandment to give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine is not just for men, it's for ladies as well. And I'm gonna explain to you why it's important for women to know the Bible in just a bit, but let me just say this, I'm not down on that. What I'm down on is when women think they can usurp the authority of a man, step behind a pulpit and preach the word of God, okay? Now why is a woman judging Israel instead of a man here? Well, because a man isn't available to do the job, unfortunately. That's basically what it was. It doesn't make it right, okay? And I explained to you regarding Shamgar, look at chapter five and verse six. And I noticeably, Shamgar, the story of Shamgar, this is him in his latter years, okay? And one thing that I've noticed is that men of God, pastors, they often have a good run when they're young, preach their hardest sermons, they do great exploits, but when they start getting up there in age, they start slowing down and compromising, okay? This is very much a thing in the old IFB, where you see older pastors who were once on fire for God, now they're accepting the pedophilia in the church. You know, you have a church like that, Faith Baptist Church, okay, in Wildomar, Pastor Bruce Goddard, who literally, I mean, he had a bunch of, not a bunch, but he's had multiple staff members who were just straight pedophiles. And look, it's not like, well, they're pedophiles and he just like kicked them out and didn't want anything to do with them. He was defending the pedophiles, right, Brother Chris? He's defending the pedophiles, standing up to them, telling people to stay off of social media. That's wicked, folks. But look, I remember him preaching in our chapel when I was in Bible college and this guy was saying, slut this and slut that and dressing like a whore and preaching all hard and everyone was like, man, this guy's crazy. Not anymore. Looks like that was all a show. Jeff Owens is another example of that, right? But this is, there's no new thing under the sun. We see this with Shamgar. Shamgar did a great work, but in his latter years, it looks like he probably slowed down and his leadership was not there and because of that, you know, the oppressors came and took over. Look at verse six. It says, in the days of Shamgar, the son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways were unoccupied and the travelers walked through byways. The inhabitants of the villages ceased. They ceased in Israel until that I, Deborah, arose, that I arose a mother in Israel. So what is it saying? The byways are like the alleys, right? So basically saying that in these days, the highways, the main roads, people were staying off the main roads. It was so dangerous. You have Sisera and his army oppressing people, you know, going around oppressing them and bullying them and literally, we see later on in chapter five, you know, taking women as captives. So no one is in the highways and in fact, if they wanted to travel, they would take the byways. But notice that it says, in the days of Shamgar, God didn't put that there on accident. He wanted you to know, hey, this leader, Shamgar, in his days, when he's supposed to be the deliverer, the judge of Israel, all this stuff is happening. So what does that tell us about Shamgar? He's a weak leader. He's not doing his job. And that's why it says, I, Deborah, arose, that I arose a mother in Israel. Ain't that a shame. Ain't that a shame that Deborah sees this and says, well, if Shamgar's not gonna tell the people, then I'm just gonna tell them. Not right, but by default, this is what happens, okay? Go back to Judges chapter four. Now Barak was probably a great general, but you know what, he probably just wasn't a great student of the Bible, right? Right, they didn't know the word of God too well. Verse seven says, and I will draw unto thee, to the rivers, to the river Kishon, Sisera, the captain of Jabin's army, with his chariots and his multitude, and I will deliver him into thine hand. That's the prophecy given from Deborah to Barak. And Barak said unto her, if thou wilt go with me, then I will go, but if thou wilt not go with me, then I will not go. What in the world? Who are you talking to, Barak? God or Deborah? And she said, I will surely go with thee, notwithstanding the journey that thou takest shall not be for thine honor, for the Lord shall sell Sisera into the hand of a woman. Oh, man. And Deborah rose and went with Barak to Kadesh. So basically she's like, all right, I'll go with you, but guess what? The honor's taken from you. It's given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof, it's gonna be given to Jael. She's gonna be the one who's gonna have the privilege to kill this guy. You know, sorry, it's not gonna work out. And she's gonna take that honor, okay? Look Barak, you should have just opened up some scrolls and learned the Bible, prayed and asked God to reveal what it is that he wanted you to do in Israel. Instead of going to Deborah. Now keep in mind that the judges in this time, they're teachers of God's word, that's exactly how they would operate. They would come and judge the people. What that means is basically tell them, hey, you're involved in paganism, stop, repent, or God's gonna keep judging you. This is what God's word says, I'm judging you, okay? So that's exactly what Deborah was doing. But we don't see here anything about her being a pastor. And look, well, I'll get into that in just a bit, let me tell you why I'm against women pastors, okay? Because some people will listen to this, it's like, oh, I can't believe it, he's some kind of chauvinist pig, hog. Pigs are females. If you're gonna call me a chauvinist animal, you know, don't call me a pig, a pig is a female, hogs are males, amen? And look, the Bible says this. And here's the thing, there's people out right now, they're just twitching, they don't like what I'm saying, because you've been so indoctrinated by this feminist crap out there, you've been watching so much TV and movies, you know, too much Disney in your television, watching so many princesses and how they disobey their dad and run off with their boyfriend and live happily ever after, that's why you're mad at this. Why don't you open up the Bible instead of Disney? You know, you're so busy looking for a whole new world, instead of looking for the whole word of God, amen? You're so busy watching The Lion King, you're not reading about the King of Judah. What's another movie out there? You know, you know. I'm just saying, look, if you feel like I'm stepping on your toes, then I'm not doing my job because I'm supposed to be stomping on your toes. Because this should be something that you listen to and it's just sweet as honey, because this is what the Bible says, right? Why am I against women pastors? Why do I hate women pastors like Joyce Meyers? You know, Victoria Osteen, Oprah Winfrey, and make no mistake about it. She is a prophet, prophetess. She's just a false prophetess. Okay. But how about this? How about Paula White? For you Republicans out there. That's actually Donald Trump's spiritual advisor. And by the way, you know what her last name is now? Paula White, Cain. Yeah, you heard right. She went the way of Cain. You know, this spiritual advisor who prays over Donald Trump and is all for him and she's over here speaking in tongues. Her net worth is like $5 million. She's wicked. She's going to split hell wide open. You know, this is like the different universe of Bayrack and Deborah, right? Because President Donald Trump is like the general, right? He is the executive general of the United States of America and then you have Paula White who's his spiritual advisor, right? Don't get mad at me. Go to 1 Timothy chapter two. You look up all these women pastors out there, you know, and for example, I think if I'm not mistaken, Joyce Meyers has a net worth of like $8 million. You know, teaching her heresy, bossing around her husband and I think to myself, that guy deserves to be bossed around. Initially I like felt bad about that but then it's just like, no, you deserve it. You little weenie. You little sissified weenie. You sit there on the front row, let your wife talk smack about you in the service, nod your head. You're a eunuch. Let me read to you from Isaiah three verse 11. Woe unto the wicked. It shall be ill with them for the reward of his hand shall be given him. As for my people, children are their oppressors and women rule over them. Oh my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err and destroy the way of thy path. So what is he saying? He's saying, look, a curse upon a nation, a curse upon a church, a curse upon anywhere in the world is when a woman is ruling over the man. That's a curse. Now is God saying that women are inferior? No. Is he saying that they're less in essence? No. Is he saying that they're not important? No. He's saying that's just not my order. So look, if you want to see if God's curse is on a nation, just look at who's ruling. You know what? Our land is filled with lady rulers. They're filled with it. Churches. Even if the pastor is a man, mark it down. There's some churches, independent fundamental Baptist churches out there where his wife is actually the pastor of the church. She's actually the one leading the show behind the scenes and sometimes just right in front of the scene. You know, I remember when we were going to start that church in Ohio, you guys remember that? We're all excited. We're like, start the church in Ohio. And they told me and they're like, hey, you know, you want to come be our pastor? I'm like, yeah, I'll be the pastor for sure. Sounds good. You know, we'll fly guys out there. We have enough preachers to fly people out there every week and get it done. And then, you know, I told him, I said, or they told me, one of the guys told me, he said, you know, but we have bylaws and, you know, church constitution and, you know, deacon and stuff or these deacons and whatever. And I said, okay, well, just vote me in and then I'll just throw it out the first day. Well, I don't know if they're going to be for that. I'm like, well, if I'm coming in, I'm just going to take over. I'm taking over everything. And those bylaws and that constitution is going, it's going to be used as toilet paper. It's no longer valid when I come and rule that place. So he told that to the church and they're just like, great, you know. And I even told him, I was like, we'll go there and we'll liven that thing up. So they voted to have me come preach. They said, you know, Pastor Mejia, he wants to be our pastor, he's going to come preach in two weeks. All in favor, say aye. Everyone was like, aye. They're like, great. This young guy's going to come and he's going to preach. He's going to probably be our pastor. It's going to be great. Awesome. I announced it here. Everyone's happy. The next day, the prophetess, also known as the deacon's wife, basically contacted everyone and said, don't let him come. This guy's a bad guy. He's the boogeyman. And he started saying all the stuff that I preach or whatever and they're like, oh, yeah, she said we can't have him come, so we're not going to have him come. It's like, who? I'm sorry, who? Who's this? You know, Brett I know, the church I know, but who are you? And I'm thinking to myself, what in the world? Is it filled with ladies? Is there any men in this church? And look, folks, let me just be honest with you. If I would have known that and they would have let me go, she would have been the first to go before the bylaws in the Constitution. Throwing her hind her parts out of the church and her weakling husband, that weakling of a deacon, that sorry excuse for a deacon and his deaconess, they would have been throwing out the church that week. Okay? Nonsense. And this is why the church is in decline. That church has been in decline ever since. Some guy, some pastor tried to take over and one of the guys ended up usurping his authority. That church isn't ruined right now. Okay? Oh, well. But you know what? When women rule over an organization such as that, it's a curse. Okay? Now look at 1 Timothy chapter 2. Let's get some scripture in here in regards to why I don't like women pastors. By the way, I'm not against women preachers. Nothing wrong with women preachers. I'm against women pastors. Look what it says in verse 11. Let the women learn in silence with all subjection. Now folks, do we need the Greek for this? Do we need a dictionary? Do we need a lexicon or is it pretty clear what it says? You're taking that out of context. Well, let's look at the context. The context is woman, learn, silence, subjection. So if we just take that verse in its context, basically what it's telling us is the person who is supposed to be silent or to learn in silence is the woman with all subjection. Now in case you didn't get it the first time, verse 12, but I suffer not a woman to teach nor to usurp authority over the man but to be in silence. Now this doesn't mean that women can't talk in our church. It's like as soon as you come through the doors, just keep your mouth shut. Don't say a word. That's not what it means. What we're referring to here is during the preaching of God's word, women are to keep silence. That's why women are not allowed to say amen in our church and we don't have that problem in our church. You know, every once in a while you have a visitor who comes and they get with it on the preaching. They're like, amen. We had that happen one time. I'll be honest with you. I'm like long suffering. I'm patient. Or sometimes I'm just deaf, like I can't hear them because they're all the way in the back. But this one I heard because she started clapping. She was getting jiggy with it. I mean, she was loving it. And then I said, I just took a commercial break and I just said, look, women are to keep silence in the churches, okay? So no amens by women in the church. That goes for the children as well. And her countenance fell. It's like, why has that countenance fallen? Her countenance fell and she went up to my wife and she said, did he just say that women are to keep silence in the church? You know, my meek little wife, she's all, that's what the Bible says. And she threw the Bible down and she like took off, right? She threw the Bible down and she took off. She left the church, but then she came back and picked up the Bible and said, I need this. Yeah, I need to read it. Man, Paul is such a chauvinist. Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection, but I suffered not a woman to teach nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence for Adam was first form, then Eve. So why is he bringing up this matter of Adam and Eve in relation to a woman keeping silence in the church or not teaching? Look what it says, verse 14, and Adam was not deceived but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. You know why? Because women are naive sometimes, not sometimes, a lot of the times, and you want the best example of that? Eve. That's why we're in the condition that we're in today, right? She was deceived. She was in the transgression. And so if a woman gets up and starts preaching the word of God behind the pulpit, she's going to use a lot of emotion and she's not going to be able to discern and lead the way a man can lead. Let's just be honest, men leaders are better than women leaders. That's how God made us. Doesn't mean women cannot be leaders or they don't have leadership qualities, it's just that men are better leaders because that's how God made us. Verse 15, notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety. Go to chapter three. So we see there the women are to keep silence in the churches. You say, well, I already know this. Well, you're learning it again. You're going to get reiterated with the same doctrines throughout the year over and over again, lest you should think, hey, why don't we have sister so-and-so go up there and give us a little sermonette or something. Look at 1 Timothy chapter three, verse one. This is referring to the qualifications of a pastor, also known as deacon, or I'm sorry, also known as bishop. It says, this is a true saying, if a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober of good behavior, give it to hospitality, apt to teach. How does that work if you're a woman? If the qualifications for a pastor is that he has to be married to one wife, that can't work for a woman unless you're a dyke. And guess what? If you're a dyke, you should even be in the house of God, according to the Bible. Filthy sodomites are not allowed in church, let alone behind the pulpit. Let alone with the office of a bishop. Someone needs to show this to that Baptist so-called pastor in the city of Chad. Does Chad even exist anymore? Does Chap exist? There's some Baptist pastor there, it was a lady, some butch-looking dyke lady there, called herself a Baptist pastor. That's the kind of pastor they deserve, right? You can't do it. You cannot be a pastor unless you are the husband of one wife. It's not gonna happen with a woman. Well, you know, you're taking that out of context. That's like everyone's little go-to card, right? Their little wild card you're taking out of context, you know, that's not what it's saying, that's literally what it's saying, okay? And in fact, in the Greek, I'm going back to the Greek now, okay? The phrase there is a one-woman man. A one-woman man. It's not gonna work for a lady. Go to 1 Corinthians chapter 14, 1 Corinthians chapter 14. So look, before and after church or after the preaching, women can talk all they want. And look, I'm not even saying ladies can't laugh during the preaching, because sometimes I say some funny stuff, and they just can't help it, okay? But before and after, people, ladies can talk. Now teach this to the Pentecostal churches. When they're up there going, holla, shalaballa, they're up here giving their testimonies, shaking their rear ends, doing everything unbiblical and ungodly, unholy, unclean. Women preachers speaking in tongues, so to speak, they're speaking a version of speaking in tongues. It's not biblical. Chapter 14, verse 34, let your women keep silence in the churches, read it. For it is not permitted unto them to speak, for they are commanded to be under obedience as also sayeth the law. Now you will not find a law in the Old Testament that says that women are to keep silence, but you will find the concept that women are to be under obedience, and specifically it's referring to a congregation. So when a woman is in obedience in a congregation, part of that is being silent in the church during the preaching. Not to disrupt the service, not to say amen, not to come up and preach, that is an abomination in the eyes of God, okay? And if they will learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is a shame for women to speak in the church, it says. So ladies, if you're out there, you're blabbering your mouth during the preaching of God's word, which I've been in an independent fundamental Baptist church is where they do that. A lot of that takes place in the south, by the way. Back in my old church, there was a southern couple there, and this lady was just like, amen, come on now. And I'm just like, shut up. I remember my father-in-law, some lady did that and he rebuked the fire out of that lady. And she like never talked, she was mute after that. But every time, I mean, oh by the way, this lady was a pastor's wife. You know, you got Tony Hudson, sorry brother Milan, brother Milan's favorite preacher there. Tony Hudson, anybody know who Tony Hudson is? He's this old IFB pastor, he's like really famous in the old IFB. You listen to one of his audio sermons, the majority of the people saying amen are all ladies. They're screaming, saying amen, come on, supporting him. I mean, he's all for it. That's how they do in the south, I guess. Not here. Well, that's just our culture in the south. Well, you know, make it go away south. Yeah, you know what, that is from the south, down deep south from the pits of hell south. Not biblical. I mean, do they just completely bypass these verses here? It's a shame. Well, pastor, what if I have a question? Then ask your husband. Now look, obviously there's exceptions to this rule if a woman comes to church and has no husband, she has no one that she's attending service with, yeah, maybe she could ask the pastor a question. But you know what, if the husband's right there, if the husband is sitting with you right there, you know, that's like a diss to your husband there. Now look, if your husband doesn't know the answer, then husbands, study to show thyself approve them to God. A workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. That's a wake-up call for you to start studying the Bible, to start reading the Bible, to give your wife the answers. Now that's not to say she's not learning in church because if I'm preaching, obviously she's gonna learn, just like you're gonna learn, just like anyone else is gonna learn. But if there's a private question regarding the Bible, she's to go to her husband, okay? Now if he doesn't know the answer, then the husband can come ask me, have the wife say, hey, can you go ask him this? But ideally, you just study the Bible, you know what the word of God says, there you go. It is a shame for women to speak in church. This is not some, what is it called, chauvinistic phrase here, what the Bible's teaching us is what God's order is. And look folks, if God says it's shameful, we ought to believe the same thing, right? It's a shame. It's a shame for a man to have long hair. It's a shame for people to show off their nakedness in their thigh. It's a shame for women to speak in church according to the Bible. Now literally, people will listen to a sermon like this and just completely hate on it and say, that's not biblical, that's not right, even though we just read through the verses here. Well, that was in the culture back then. Well, that's the kind of culture I want. That's the kind of culture God wants us to have. Yeah, but that's like old, you know, that's the way they used to do it in the Jewish, you know, culture or whatever, you know, those are in the Bible times. We live in a different time, we live in a different era. Yeah, but God expects us to live in His era. He expects us to have His principles, His ideologies, His doctrine, His form of doing things. Some things don't change. You know what God's culture is? Thou shall not kill. You know what? That's our culture too. You know what God's culture is? Thou shall not commit adultery. Guess what? That's the culture today too. That's the attitude we should have. You know what God says about sodomites? They should be put to death. That should be the culture today. Whatever God says, that's the culture. It doesn't matter how long ago it was. It's what we should believe, okay? Go to Revelation chapter 2. Revelation chapter 2. Why do I hate women pastors? This is why. Because they're literally up there preaching the Bible, the very Bible that tells them to shut up. How do they preach to 1 Timothy chapter 2 and 3? How do they preach to Revelation chapter 2? Do they just go through it and say, well this just doesn't apply to me? Look at Revelation 2 verse 19. This is the condemnation that Jesus gives to this church here. Look at verse 19. It says, I know thy works in charity and service and faith and thy patience and thy works in the last to be more than the first. A lot of good things said here, right? They have charity. They have a work ethic. They're servants. They have faith. They can endure. They have works. I mean, the last more than the first it says. Verse 20, notwithstanding, I have a few things against thee. That's a strong phrase there. Don't overlook that. When Jesus says, I have something against you. At that point, you need to open up your ears and listen to what he's about to say. You don't want Jesus to be against you, amen? Besides, notwithstanding, I have a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. So what was the condemnation upon this church? They were letting a woman preacher teach in the church. And above that, to teach fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. So let's talk about that first part first. They're suffering a woman to teach. By the way, parents, don't name your daughter Jezebel, amen? To teach. That's why we don't have Sunday school class. First of all, we don't have Sunday school class just in general, but if we did, we wouldn't have women Sunday school teachers. And look, my wife was a Sunday school teacher. I was a Sunday school teacher, but there comes a point where you see things like this and say, well, that's not right. We're not going to do that anymore. We don't have Sunday school class where the woman gets up and teaches a bunch of boys on how to be a man. Well, you know, how are you going to say that? They mean well. Whose responsibility is it to teach the children the Bible? It's their mom's. It's the dad's. Where? At home. You see, the church is for the local body of believers. It's for the man of God to stand up and preach the word of God, to give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine, to teach everyone not to be split up into different segments and different rooms so that some lady can come and preach. And by the way, most of the time, they're not even teaching anything. They're giving them candy, sugar, and I'm up for you for the afternoon, singing stupid songs, you know, doing things to just kind of wear them out, using up their 30 minutes of teaching time. And look, I'm sure there's ladies out there who mean well when they teach. They probably do teach some doctrine, but it's very far, few, and in between. Let me just be honest with you. But here's the thing. Why don't we just eliminate it all? Why don't we just have the preaching service and that's it? What's wrong with that? I'll tell you why people don't do that because the pastor wants to get up and preach for 25 minutes, not for an hour, or like I did, an hour and 20 minutes on Thursday. And so what they do is they want to preach for 25 minutes, but they want to utilize the other time because the people are not getting enough Bible content, so they have these Sunday school classes, which really, at the end of the day, it's like 10, if not 5 to 10 minutes of teaching. Because Sunday school class, you have fellowship, you eat donuts, you sing like three songs, you just shoot the breeze, and then it's like, all right, oh man, we're almost out of time. Let's go ahead and get into the Bible since we're already here. I was in an independent Baptist church for years, I know what I'm talking about. I was a bus captain, bless God. I was a Sunday school teacher. I saw it all. And it's just like, why doesn't the pastor just preach for like an hour instead? I remember, I think I told this, I don't know, some time ago, we went to Northern California reading. There's a church out there. We were out there with the tour group, and I was preaching, and it was a church of like really old people. It was a sweet church, like just a great church, but they're just older people. And quite frankly, the church is dying because there's no youth there, no young people. And I was going up to preach, and this guy comes up to me, this old, old guy, and he's like an OG, OG Christian, OGC. And he used to go to Beecham Vicks Church, which is the church that J. Frank Norris started. So he's an old timer. This guy was really old. Let me just emphasize that, okay? And he sees me, he's like, come here, come here, son. He's like, you preaching today? I'm like, yes, sir. He's all, you better preach for an hour, son. None of this 25, 15 minute, 30 minute sermon. Back in my day, they used to preach for two hours, and he just started, he started preaching at me. And I'm just like, yes, sir. He's like, I went to J. Frank Norris' church, and they used to preach for two hours. No one would be looking at their watch. No one's looking at their clocks. Nowadays they just want to preach a 15, 20 minute sermon. You better preach for an hour, boy. And I was like, yes, sir. Needless to say, I had to change my sermon, okay? But you know what? That's how it is. That's how it used to be. But you know, they'll say, well, you know, the retention of people. Have you ever heard that? A person's retention is only like 15 to 20 minutes. Yeah, because they keep watching television. So this is what you do, pastor. You preach against television. So you put that away, and then the retention goes up. Your attention span goes up. It increases. You're able to pay attention in church. But here's another reason for not paying attention to the preacher, because he's boring. That's why. You stand in front. I mean, you're listening to a guy, and you wonder like, is he reading it from off the page? Did he even study the Bible? What is he talking about? I mean, it's just like a motivational speech. Whereas God says, cry out loud and spare not. Lift up thy voice like a trumpet. Smite your thigh. You know, kick the pulpit. Slam it. Scream. Do whatever you gotta do, because that's what preaching is. Preaching yes, has Bible content, but it has the dynamic, right, of yelling and screaming, because at least you know when I yell and scream, you know that I mean business. When I'm preaching on sin, and I look right at your eyes, you wonder, is he talking about me? But you know, do you think anybody thinks that in other churches, where the preaching is soft? They're thinking about, they're playing, they're thinking about what they're gonna eat. They're thinking about what they're gonna do. I've been in church services where the pastor's preaching, and literally the guy goes like this. He's like. It's disrespectful. So number one, she was teaching, but then aside from that, she was teaching their people to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. Just unbiblical heresy is what's being taught here, okay? Just like today when they teach that divorce is fine. You can allow fornicators in the church. You don't have to excommunicate them. Give them a chance. Disciple them. Let them keep fornicating. It's gonna be a-okay. These are wicked things that women teach when they're giving up positions of authority. Let me read to you from Nehemiah 6 13, says, Therefore was he hired, that I should be afraid and do so in sin, and that they might have matter for an evil report, that they might reproach me. My God, think thou upon Tobiah, and send ballot according to their works, and on the prophetess Noah-diah, and the rest of the prophets that would have put me in fear, the Bible says. These are the women preachers who try to talk down on man, try to strike fear in the hearts of man, etc. Now go with me, if you would, to Acts chapter 2. We're almost done. I'm gonna skip some things here. So that's why I hate female pastors, okay, because most of them are just false prophets anyways. Bottom line. And look, if there's a prophetess out there, a female pastor who listens to the sermon and says, oh man, I'm doing wrong. I'm gonna step down. I didn't know about this. Okay, we'll give you a pass. You step down, you sit down, you shut up, and you let a man do it, okay, at that point, you get a pass. But the woman who listens to this and says, no, I'm still gonna do it, but God's hand is on me. Ha! Yeah, God's hand is on you to cast into the lake of fire. Now with that being said, you know, a prophetess or a female prophet, you know, is biblical because the prophesy means to preach. People think prophesy means to foretell the future, and to a certain extent, that's true, especially in the Bible. But even today, we foretell the future all the time using the book of Revelation, right? We foretell the future in light of the Bible. So we talk about future events, things that are gonna take place in light of what God says is gonna take place. But we don't receive some divine revelation from God outside of what the Bible says and teach that. That's stupid, okay? That's charismatic. Now what is a good example of a female prophet? Look at Acts chapter 2 and verse 17, it says, And it shall come to pass in the last day, saith God, I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. So what is a good prophetess? A good prophetess is one that soul wins, one that is out there preaching the gospel. They know the gospel, they know how to get people saved, et cetera. Now let me give you another example, this is Acts 21 verse 8 says, And the next day we that were of Paul's company departed, and came into Caesarea, and we entered into the house of Philip the evangelist, which was one of the seven, and abode with him. And the same man had four daughters, virgins, which did prophesy. Doesn't say that they were pastors, it says that they just prophesied, they preached the word of God. Now literally, you know what I think of when I think about this? How do we remember brother Philip? Didn't he have, he had three daughters, right? So it's kind of like that, minus one, but that's what it is. It's a man who had daughters who knew how to go and preach the gospel and see people saved. See, we're not against women preachers, as long as you do it out there, see people saved out there, as long as you don't do it here, I'm not against women preachers. Go to Luke chapter 2, Luke chapter number 2. See these ladies who want this position and be a pastor, what you need to do is just get under your husband's authority, win some people to Christ, and you'll fulfill that desire that you have of wanting to win people, of preaching the word of God, because that's your place. Acts 21 verse 8 says, or I'm sorry, Luke 2 verse 36 says, and there was one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Penuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was of great age and had lived with her husband seven years from her virginity. And she was a widow of about four score and four years, which departed not from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayer, night and day. And she, coming in that instant, gave thanks likewise unto the Lord and spake of Him to all them that looked for the redemption in Jerusalem. So what do we see Anna doing? She is speaking, she spake of Him to all them that looked for redemption in Jerusalem. So as a widow, she's out there just telling people about the coming Christ, telling people about Jesus. And you know what? It's an honorable thing to be able to do that. Oh, I want to go behind a pulpit though. I got things I can teach. I got biblical truths that I learned. Well, go to Titus chapter 2, if you would. Titus chapter 2. And look, ladies can get some pretty deep biblical truths. My wife, she gets a lot of good stuff. Her and I, when we talk, she learns things from the Bible. She teaches me. I learn from her. Sometimes I like to get her opinion on things because she has wisdom. Now here's the thing, she's not going to lead our house. She's not going to tell me, well, I don't think you should preach that. I think that's wrong. At that point, it's wrong. But does that mean that she can't receive something from God in His Word that maybe I didn't see? We're not talking about basic doctrines here. Figurative, symbolic things, things that she learned from a book that she's reading in the Bible. And she tells me, hey, I saw this. And I'm like, well, I've never seen that before. That's awesome. That's great. I'm going to take that and take credit for it. You know, she comes up with great ideas. She reads a lot of things in the Bible and I love having conversations with my wife. It's great. It's awesome. Because women are going to be students of the Bible. You know, you have Huldah, the prophetess, the wife of Shalom. And this is the famous one that she dwelt in Jerusalem in the college. And we get on her a lot. But the Bible actually says, verse 15, you're in Titus chapter 2, I'm going to read to you from 2 Kings 22, and she said unto them, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, tell the man that sent you to me, thus saith the Lord, behold, I will bring evil upon this place and upon the inhabitants thereof, even all the words of the book, which the king of Judah hath read. Now, nothing wrong with the fact that she knew what she was talking about. You know what was wrong? Is in verse 14, it says, so Hilkiah the priest went unto Huldah the prophetess. So we have like a pastor going to some lady and saying, hey, what does God's word say about this? And Huldah is just like, well, this is what the Bible says. So it's not wrong that she knew the Bible, it's wrong that the priest who's supposed to know the Bible was going to her to learn the Bible, okay? Now, the female prophet is a student of the Bible, she's a soul winner. She can teach biblical roles in light of the Bible. This is one of the greatest things that a woman can teach. Look at Titus 2, verse 1, but speak thou the things which become sound doctrine, that the aged men be sober, grave, temperate, sound in faith and charity and patience. The aged women, likewise, that they be in behavior as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things, that they may teach the younger women to be sober, to love their husbands, not leave their husbands, to love their husbands, not criticize their husbands, to love their husbands, not throw them under the bus, that they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children. Oh, snaps, verse 5, to be discreet. Now what's the opposite of being discreet? A loud mouth. A loud mouth, boisterous, cantankerous woman that would want you to just dwell in the corner of a house top or in the wilderness, in the desert, yeah. He says, be discreet. The women are to teach other women, hey, you shouldn't be a loud mouth. That's what he's saying, right? You should be discreet. Don't be a loud mouth, be discreet. You don't have to opinionate on everything. You don't have to get on Facebook and just blast every single person on Facebook, right? Getting kind of quiet in here. Is this First Works Baptist Church? Yeah, I think it is, right? Last time I checked. Oh, I'm staying on this. Be discreet. Don't be a loud mouth. Don't go out criticizing everyone and have this stigma that that's what you're known for. Amen? Or is this wrong, did I misinterpret this? Maybe discreet means be a loud mouth, right? To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, look what it says here, that the word of God be not blasphemed. So when a woman is a loud mouth, okay, or a loud typer, you know what God says? You're blaspheming the word of God. Because a woman without discretion is like, what does the Bible say, like a swine with a piercing, right? A jewel, jewel in the snout of a swine. That's rough. God said that. He said, you know what, your lack of discretion reminds me of someone who, a swine with a jewel in its nose and its snout, man, that's savage. You blaspheme the word of God when you do that. Why? Because you're not being a proper representation of what a godly woman should be. Let me just say this. I don't believe we have anybody like that in our church, in case you're like, you know, you're about to have a seizure right now because you're wondering if I'm talking about you. There's no one in here who I think, oh, man, you're like a swine with a jewel in your snout. No one in here like that. But you know what, I run into a lot of women who are, you know what they do, they blaspheme the word of God. Oh, you just want like ladies to just be like these chase keepers at home, discreet, you know, yeah, yep. But look, doesn't it say they can't teach? Who do they teach? They teach the younger women. You know why? Because older women have lived life, they've made mistakes, they've had successes, and what they're capable of giving to the younger ladies is to say this, hey, I see you doing something that I used to do, it's probably not a good idea for you to do that. This is a good way for you to please your husband. Do this instead. Let me teach you how to love your husband. Don't nag him, right? Don't nag your husband. Make him his favorite meal. Point number one, don't nag your husband. Point number two, make him his favorite meal. Point number three, don't nag your husband. Point number four. See point number one and three. They're able to do that. And you know what? I don't believe in this happy wife, happy life thing. I know they rhyme, I don't believe in that at all. Happy husband, happy life, yeah. My wife keeps me happy, guess what, the household is going to be A-okay, it's going to be great. Because if not, it'll just cloud up and rain. You know, the people who say happy wife, happy wife, happy life are the ones who are literally living just to make their wife happy, just to have a good home. And look, I'm not saying don't make your wife happy. Make your wife happy. That's your responsibility. But you know what? If she has a bad day, things should not just crumble apart. You just say, I know you're having a bad day, let's go get an In-N-Out burger, you know, go cry it out. We're still going to church. We're still doing this, we're still doing that, whatever. Alright, anyways, go to Proverbs chapter 31, we're done. Women can teach the Bible. They can teach it to the ladies in our church. And listen young ladies, young married ladies, you better give heed to these older ladies. They have wisdom. You know? Don't wait for them to come to you, you go to them. Say I need some advice, I need some counsel on this. You know? And by the way, don't say I need some advice and some counsel because my husband is so ungodly, he does all these wicked things or whatever and he just doesn't. Don't criticize him. You approach it from a stance of, you know what, I just need to be a better wife. I want to excel as a wife in my role. Put some advice that you would have for me to do. Don't bad mouth your husband. That's another thing I need to get on. Do not bad mouth your husband. We had a lady here a little over a year ago, which ironically her name was Deborah. She got thrown out of our church because she turned aside after Satan. How many remember that woman? How many of you had an encounter with that woman? How many of you, when you had that encounter, you said, I don't know if I want to come back to this church? I'm not kidding you. And I'm not exaggerating either. Those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, ask the people who do know what I'm talking about. I'm not exaggerating at all. She would have conversations with people in our church before and after service and just call her husband a reprobate. He's wicked. He's evil. And this is what she would say. Oh yeah, he's a reprobate. But if you were to witness to him, he would go along with it. He would act really nice. He'd act really nice. He'd go along with it. He'd act like he'd get saved or something. Basically what she's saying is this, is he's probably normal. And honestly, when she would initially say that, I'm like, wow, maybe he is a reprobate. But then when I got to know her, I was like, man, this guy's probably the nicest guy in the world. That poor soul. She would go around literally and all she would do was criticize her husband every service. Every service. And look, when we threw her out, when we took the trash out, I literally had people call me and say, thank you so much for doing that. That lady would call me and criticize her husband, criticize you, criticize different people in the church. All she did was just make my life miserable. Multiple people told me this. What was she doing? She was blaspheming the word of God. So it's time to take out the trash. Here's the last thing is that a female prophet, her main audience is her children. Amen? Proverbs 31, 1 says, the words of King Lemuel, the prophecy that his mother taught him. That's awesome right there. King Lemuel, he's like, let me show you what my mom taught me. Hey, ladies, you want to preach to someone, preach to your kids. Preach to them. That's your audience. According to Deuteronomy chapter 6, you're going to teach them the word of God, teach them the reprobate doctrine, teach them end times Bible prophecy, teach them about the Trinity, teach them about Jesus, teach them about everything. You're going to teach them. That's your audience. That's the best audience you can have. Why I want the church? Then you have wicked motives then. Because any normal woman is satisfied with changing the lives of her children. I mean, think about some of the greatest pastors of all time. You understand that they all had moms, and all their moms had a major impact in their lives. I mean, think of Pastor Anderson. You know, when I think of him, I'm like, man, I want to meet his parents. When I initially, I was like, I want to meet, who are the people that raised this guy? And you see him, and you're like, man, you guys did a great job. I always think of the parents of the men of God in our movement and think to myself, wow, they probably didn't think that their kids were going to amount to what they've amounted to now. But you know what? They still plowed away and taught them Bible and taught them doctrine and taught them principles. And you know what? It's an amazing task to accomplish. It's an amazing achievement. So don't undermine your position as a mom and say, well, it was just my kids. Yeah, but here's the thing. Your kid could be like the next pastor, the next Jack Hyles, the next Pastor Anderson, the next Pastor Jimenez, the next man of God who does a great exploit. That's how you got to see it. So it's not like, oh, you just can't have any influence whatsoever. No, in fact, you could have the greatest influence. And what's sad is that they don't have a whole lot of influence when they come behind the pulpit. Really, the major influence that women can have is when they actually teach their own children. Those are the only female prophets that God approves of and that I approve of. Not against women preachers, just against women pastors. Amen. Spire, hasn't I? Word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for your word. Lord, thank you for godly women. I'm thankful for women who, when they hear something like this, it doesn't bother them. They take it, they agree with it, and they apply it. I pray, God, that you'd help us. Lord, as our culture becomes more degenerate, as it goes further to the left and into areas that are just anti-Bible, just accepting things that are just unbiblical, Lord, I pray that you'd help us to shine brightly and help our women, help our men to fulfill their roles, Lord, so we can represent you and the Bible well. And in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Song number 119 as our last song.