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sober for they that sleep sleep in the night and they that be drunken or drunken in the night but let us who are of the day be sober putting on the breastplate of faith and love and for in helmet the hope of salvation for god hath not appointed us to wrath but to obtain salvation by our lord jesus christ who died for us that whether we wake or sleep we should live together with him wherefore comfort yourselves together edify one another even as also you do and we beseech you brethren to know them which labor among you and are over you in the lord and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love for their work's sake and be at peace among yourselves now we exhort you brethren warn them that are unruly come for the feeble-minded support the weak be patient toward all men see that none render evil for evil unto any man but ever follow that which is good both among yourselves and to all men rejoice evermore pray without ceasing and everything give thanks for this is the will of god in christ jesus concerning you quench not the spirit despise not prophesize prove all things hold fast that which is good abstain from all appearance of evil and the very god of peace sanctify you holy and i pray god your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our lord jesus christ faithful is he that call with you who also will do it brethren pray for us greet all the brethren with an holy kiss i charge you by the lord that this epistle be read unto all the holy brethren the grace of our lord jesus christ be with you amen let's pray dear lord god heavenly father thank you for this day lord thank you for your word and i ask that you would just feel past me here with your spirit as he preaches your word and fill us with attentiveness as we listen in jesus name i pray amen all right we're in first thessalonians chapter number five this evening and look down at your bibles verse 16 it says rejoice evermore pray without ceasing and everything give thanks for this is the will of god in christ jesus concerning you quench not the spirit despise not prophesying prove all things hold fast that which is good abstain from all appearance of evil and the title of my sermon this evening is negative connotations in the bible negative connotations in the bible now what is a connotation well it basically by definition a connotation is an idea or feeling that a word invokes in addition to its literal or primary meaning now words obviously have primary meanings but can often have various associations based upon the content context that it's frequently used in and you know sometimes people ask me like hey why is it that you guys don't use this biblical word for this specific topic or this specific phrase or these names you often stick with this why is that and i'm going to explain to you why in just a bit but just to give you an example what i'm referring to you know there's words in the bible we obviously understand the words of the lord are pure words right there's nothing defiled about the words but we also understand that words today even from the word of god can be hijacked by false prophets hijacked by false religions really polluted to it in a sense that the general population associates it with the false doctrine or something that is not biblical right now let me give you an example of this you know the word gay right isn't the word gay found in the bible and the word gay we obviously understand that it's referring to by definition means happy okay you know talk about the gay clothing and it's found in the word of god it's a biblical term but let's just be quite honest today okay in 2021 we're not going to go around talk about how gay your clothing looks you're not going to go around to the public population to some dude who's straight you know what i mean who uh is a normal human being and say hey you look gay today because they have a smile on their face why because today in 2021 gay the word gay is associated with sodomy and so obviously that word is taken on a negative connotation doesn't mean that the word of the bible is defiled it just means that today in 2021 that term has been polluted and therefore we don't necessarily use it as often because of its associations but you know there's words in the bible excuse me there's words that are not found in the bible that we use that really reinforce what we believe and i talked about those a couple weeks ago you know for example rapture that's not a word that you find in the bible but it's a great word to describe the second coming of jesus christ because of the fact that it describes the gathering together uh unto him perfectly and it's not a word that's found in the bible but we use it to describe something that we believe the word bible is not found in the bible believe it or not you know but we obviously know that when we're referring to the bible which simply means book we're referring to the book right the word of god you know how about the term trinity not a term that you find in the bible but it's such a great term to describe the father son and the holy spirit these three are one it's a great word to describe you know three persons in one god you understand and so we see that there's certain terms and terminologies phrases that maybe are not found in the word of god that we would use because they reinforce what we believe well you know in like manner there could be certain terms in the bible that because they've been polluted by false prophets different religions they can actually take away from our core beliefs okay not because their origins are bad but because someone has taken it and taught false doctrine and associated with something that's ungodly and not christ-like and therefore we want to stay away from those things so some words terms names or phrases have been hijacked and therefore i want to go over some of those this evening now turn with me if you went to hosea the book of hosea chapter number two hosea chapter two the title of the sermon again is negative connotations in the bible negative connotations in the bible let me give you a couple of examples this evening in this regard number one how about when it comes to the name of god okay the name of god well look what it says in hosea chapter two and verse 14 we obviously understand that throughout the bible we have various names to call the lord right he goes by different names in the old testament you see that he's named jealous he is the lord he's god he's jehovah and the new testament we know him also as jesus christ right jesus said i am i am that i am referring to the fact that he is god himself now look at hosea chapter 2 verse 14 therefore behold i will allure her and bring her into the wilderness and speak comfortably unto her and i will give her her vineyards from thence in the valley of acor for a door of hope and she shall sing there as in the days of her youth and as in the day when she came up out of the land of egypt and it shall be at that day saith the lord that thou shall call me ish uh is she and shall call me no more bali for i will take the names of balaam out of her mouth and they shall no more be remembered by their name so what do we see here well we see that there was a time when god's people would call god bail now you and i know that bail has a bad connotation does it not i mean when we think of bail we think of balaam you know bail peor we think of the devil but here's the thing by definition the name bail simply means lord and so god's people would often call god himself bail because he is lord but what happened well the children of israel because they got into idolatry because they got into false religions and idolatry and they strayed from the ways of the lord they often would call bail a false god you understand so they basically took that term that was originally intended for god the god of the universe and they associated it with a false god and it became so polluted that god said hey don't call me that anymore i mean look at that it says in verse 16 and shall call me no more bali he says he's like i'm going to take that name right out of your mouth because you polluted it you've desecrated it and even though it means lord i don't want you to call me that anymore so it doesn't necessarily mean that the term bail means bad because we know that it means lord but because of its association with the false god god says don't call me that okay now today we have a similar situation right i mean think about this let me give you an example before i get into the main uh example here go with me if you would to philippians chapter 2 if you would philippians chapter 2 let me give you an example you know the the arabic language had great influence upon spanish and it is said that eight percent of the spanish language has arabic influence upon it i mean about 3 000 words in spanish have got that influence from you know from arabic and they've really enriched the language of the spanish culture the spanish language and let me give you an example of that you know uh the false god of islam is who who is it allah right well you know in spanish anytime an individual wants to say god willing they'll often say this even today ohala how many have ever heard that before okay in spanish they'll often say ohala and then it i mean christians we're talking about catholics say this and it's not because they adhere to islam it's not because they're muslim it's because of that influence that that language has had upon spanish and that's why they say ohala which means god willing because allah means god but here's the thing we're not going to say that today we're not going to call the god of the bible a lot even though it means god even though for some people it means you know maybe it couldn't mean the god of the bible we're not going to use that because it's associated with the false god god does not want us to use that name you understand now today we also have another situation when it comes to the name of jesus right today people want instead of calling him jesus what do they want to say oh yeshua right isn't this a popular term that you hear today where people say well don't call him jesus call him yeshua you know yeshua is his name and there's there's this whole movement called the hebrew roots movement that has the agenda to foment you know judaism and to judaize christians to get them to observe you know the sabbath to get them to partake of those old testament laws and bring them back under the law and really mitigate the importance of jesus christ now here's the thing the bible tells us that there's no name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved in the name that it's referred to as who jesus these are the same people that say well the the new testament was not written in greek you know it's written in hebrew jewish people wrote the new testament therefore it's written in hebrew that's so much that's so nonsensical folks okay to say that the new testament folks the vast majority of the new testament although yeah some were jews who wrote that you know the vast majority of the new testament is directed towards gentiles who spoke greek you know the church at ephysis how are they going to get a letter in hebrew at the church at ephysis when they speak no hebrew they only speak greek colossae galatians the churches that are found in the region of galatia corinthians all of these gentile greek speaking areas it's so stupid and nonsensical to say oh no it's all written in hebrew really folks the vast majority of people who are getting saved were gentiles these are not people who read and understood hebrew but you know what today we see we're seeing a resurgence of this teaching okay obviously we saw in the new testament we read through the new testament we see that pharisees are constantly trying to proselytize the gentiles and try to bring them back under the law we see that with the book of galatians where false brethren were creeping in unawares trying to get them to obey the law of moses and and stay under that old testament law that which was done away with we see that a lot but you know what today we see the same thing and there is a movement today called the hebrew roots movement that is seeking to try to get people to say well no it's not jesus use yeshua now let me say this yeshua is the hebrew name of joshua okay that's a biblical name yeshua is hebrew for joshua and jesus is derived from that name but hold on a second we live in america and we're speaking english okay and today in the united states of america because we speak english we're not going to call him yeshua because no one in here is a hebrew no one in here is jewish no one in here only speaks hebrew we speak english and the english form of that name you know isus in the greek new testament is jesus you see yeshua is not necessarily the problem it's everything that's associated with that name today in 2021 which is the hebrew roots movement and folks people try to make it seem as though oh no we're magnifying christ by you know calling yeshua and we are elevating christ by doing that but when you reach the end of that rabbit hole you see that they actually mitigate who he really is they put more of an emphasis on judaism than they do on jesus christ that's why folks every every christmas we have to battle this right you know we're celebrating christmas we have a christmas tree we're celebrating the birth of christ and you always have a christian out there some judaized christian so-called pseudo christian really they're saying oh christmas is a pagan holiday how are you going to call a celebration of the birth of jesus christ a pagan holiday that's wicked you know where that comes from proselytizing jews who have crept in unawares teaching judaism teaching oh it's not jesus it's yeshua right it's wicked okay it's a movement dedicated to judaizing christians to bring them back under the law look at philippians chapter two says and look folks here we believe in the name of jesus we preach jesus and him crucified when we go out there and we're preaching the gospel we don't we don't just talk about god we talk about more specifically jesus christ who's god in the flesh he is the word of god you see we never want to be so general to say well you have to believe in god in order to be saved obviously that's true we want to be specific and say no you need to believe on the lord jesus christ you know we're not in the old testament where that name was not revealed we're not like manoa who's just like tell me your name and the angel is like why ask and style my name seeing it is a secret referring to jesus right and the old testament was a secret but today it's revealed we know who the name of the messiah is we know who the name of the christ is and that is the name that we need to be preaching and defend look at philippians 2 verse 9 says wherefore god also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name that at the name of yeshua no the name of jesus every knee should bow of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth and every that every tongue should confess that jesus christ is lord to the glory of god the father so we see there that it's the name of jesus that we should be elevating it's the name of jesus that we should be preaching now go with me if you would to let's see here go to romans chapter 10 romans chapter number 10 and look folks the reason i make a big deal about that is because that is an issue it's an issue that you know they're these judaizers are trying to infiltrate churches even today to try to get people to elevate judaism and minimize christianity by this means right here and it's it's worked unfortunately that's why you have churches that promote zionism that's why you have churches that promote israel that promote zionism when the bible completely condemns that it says that we should have no we should not partake of that it says that judaism is part of the religion of the devil i mean folks it's called the synagogue of satan think about that for a second you know he calls it the synagogue of satan by the way jesus is the one who said that in revelation chapter 2 he calls them the synagogue of satan they would say they are jews and are not but are the synagogue of satan he's not a jew which is one outwardly neither is that circumcision outward in the flesh made of hands but he is a jew which is one inwardly and that circumcision is that of the heart and of the spirit whose praise is not of men but of god the bible says they're not of all israel who are of israel the bible tells us you know we understand that god recognizes people who are saved believers as being the true jews according to the word of god the bible tells us in galatians chapter 1 you're in roman chapter 10 it says oh foolish galatians who hath bewitched you they should not obey the truth before whose eyes jesus christ hath been evidently set forth crucified among you this only would i learn of you receive you the spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith are you so foolish having begun in the spirit are you now made perfect by the flesh have you suffered so many things in vain if it yet be in vain he therefore that ministereth to you the spirit and work his miracles among you do with he it by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith even as abraham believed god and was counted unto him for righteousness so he is rebuking those believers in the region of galatia saying why are you even giving into this judaic teaching here you know these pharisees who are coming in they're compassing sea and land to make one proselyte they're trying to get you to think that you have to obey the law of moses which has already been done away with you know that old covenant we are under a new covenant a better testament established about better promises if god is the one who's perfected you by the spirit what makes you think that you need to keep that by keeping the law folks therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law that's what the bible says but how about this roman chapter 10 verse 9 we use this verse all the time today as well right that if thou shall confess with thy mouth the lord jesus and shall believe in thine heart that god has raised them from the dead thou shall be saved don't you ever go out there soul winning saying you need to believe on the lord yeshua why because it has a negative connotation that's associated with the wicked movement to minimize the importance of who jesus christ is right it's associated with the hebrew roots movement that can be founded upon the false religion of the pharisees for what the heart man believeth unto righteousness but with the mouth confession is made unto salvation how about this you know the same movement will try to say hey well it's not just jesus it's rabbi jesus you guys heard that before rabbi jesus now rabbi means master okay but people who use the title rabbi for jesus they don't do it to reinforce the bible in fact if you were to ask them hey where's that in the bible they wouldn't be able to point it out and it's there multiple times you have it multiple times when when disciples are calling them rabbi mary's calling them rabbi different individuals who believe them on on jesus christ they're calling him rabbi because they're calling a master but yet you go to any hebrew roots moving person who adheres to that and say oh yeah so where's that in the bible they can't point to it why because they're not using it to reinforce the bible they're using it to reinforce judaism because they like to turn rabbi with the shawl and the you know and all that that's what they want gesticulate or whatever that's called john 138 says then jesus turned and saw them following and saith unto them what seek ye they said unto him rabbi which is to say being interpreted master where dwellest thou go to matthew chapter 23 matthew chapter 23 john 149 nathaniel answered and saith unto him rabbi thou art the son of god thou art the king of israel john 3 verse 2 says the same came to jesus by night and said unto him rabbi we know that thou art a teacher come from god for no man can do these miracles that thou doest except god be with him of course that's Nicodemus who is part of the pharisees now rabbi even though it means master we never want to use that because it has a negative connotation now look at matthew 23 verse 6 referring to the pharisees it says in verse 6 and love the uppermost rooms at feast and the chief seats in the synagogues and greetings in the markets and to be called of men rabbi rabbi but be not ye called rabbi for one is your master even christ and all ye are brethren the bible says so he's telling the disciples hey you make sure you don't fall under this whole cloak of the pharisees using this term rabbi you make sure you don't call yourself a rabbi for one is your master in heaven even christ so he's telling his disciples don't use this and if he's telling them not to use it for for themselves obviously he doesn't want them to use it for him either now look at john chapter 13 john chapter 13 he said well doesn't rabbi just mean master is it bad well how about just calling a master why do you have to use rabbi we don't want to use rabbi because it's associated with judaism which is something that jesus christ rejected in fact he told the pharisees that the kingdom of god was taken from them and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof so i don't know about you i want to disassociate myself from an organization that has completely rejected jesus christ and you know what one of the terms that that organization uses is rabbi but it means master we'll just call it master look what it says in uh john chapter 13 verse 13 ye call me master and lord and ye say well for so i am he didn't say ye call me rabbi he said no ye call me master and lord and you say well for so i am so what do we see here he's sanctioning those terms lord and master which is exactly what jesus christ is folks when the philippian jailer came to the apostle paul and said what must i do to be saved they didn't say believe on the rabbi yeshua and thou shalt be saved he said believe on the lord jesus christ and thou shalt be saved and paul i mean obviously in his early years he made a lot of mistakes but as he grew in the lord he disassociated himself with judaism to the point where he did not use those terms because they were polluted okay they no longer were sanctioned by god go to ephesians chapter four ephesians chapter four so look you know we never want to use this term yeshua now look if you're out there in those middle eastern countries and that's that's the name that they use then okay use it but here in the united states we don't have that okay in fact we have a greater problem which is the heber roots movement that uses that term to foment judaism we want to steer clear of that as much as possible nothing wrong with the name of jesus i just rather stick to that talk about negative connotations in the bible number one when it comes to the names of god how about this when it comes to the name of a pastor okay look at ephesians four verse nine now that he ascended what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth he that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill all things and he gave some apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers for the perfecting of the saints for the work of the ministry for the edifying of the body of christ so here we see that god is given specific men okay and offices of these men to be a blessing to the local body of believers right apostles those are done away with obviously but there's still prophets in the sense that there's still people that preach the word of god there's still evangelists of what we know today as missionaries there are still evangelists there's teachers and there's pastors okay now when you study this term pastor in the bible you'll see that there's different terms to describe this individual right you have pastor you have bishop you have elder you have the presbyterian and i often get asked this question hey how come you don't you know use those other terms i mean those are biblical terms right well i'll tell you why first and foremost i use pastor because pastor is something that is strongly associated associated with baptists or just actual churches okay even though elder and bishop and the presbyterian these are all biblical terms wouldn't you say a lot of those have already been polluted nothing wrong with them necessarily i mean when we read in the bible we know that it's not referring to catholicism when we read bishop but hold on a second today you have catholicism and they have the archbishops and guaranteed any individual in this world who has any knowledge of the catholic church when you mention bishop they think of the catholic church they don't think of independent fundamental baptists you know and if you do have someone within christ you know christianity or anything close to christianity that uses bishop it's typically some church that is greedy of filthy lucre you know bishop whatever pastor who's some false prophet who denies the trinity or something you know bishop td jakes i don't know if that's what he calls himself but it's often people who try to elevate themselves right as being some some great spiritual leader who has all these powers and they want they're trying to make money off the flock of god so these often are largely associated with false religions bishop being one of them first timothy three verse one says this go to first timothy chapter three let's look at it and by the way pastor really in its most literal sense and i'll explain this just a bit simply means someone who feeds the flock that's all it means which is a great title to use because that's exactly what the pastor is supposed to be doing right it's feeding the flock of god now look at first timothy three verse one this is a true saying if a man desire the office of a bishop ha that's how everyone else sees it he desireth some filthy lucre ha no he desires a good work a bishop then must be blameless the husband of one wife vigilant sober of good behavior given to hospitality apt to teach so we see it's a biblical term okay and it's used to describe someone who is doing a specific job a work and of course it goes to those qualifications of that bishop also known as the pastor but as i mentioned this is largely associated with the catholic church and that's why we don't use it i don't have on the invites you know bishop bruce mahia because you know what a lot of people if they would see that like oh this is like a missionary baptist church ha that no it's not because sometimes those churches teach a false doctrine false way of salvation and i don't want to be associated with that okay you know i don't want people to think that we're you know these leaders who wear long robes like the catholic church does was jesus christ condemned he said in luke chapter 20 verse 46 beware of the scribes which desire to walk in long robes and love greetings in the markets in the highest seats in the synagogues in the chief rooms at feast the bible says so obviously we don't want to use this term now when in a church setting in the context of teaching the word of god when i use bishop you know what i'm talking about if i'm quoting it from the bible you know exactly what i'm talking about but when describing to an unlearned individual who doesn't know anything about the bible what a bishop is if we're to call ourselves bishops that would obviously confuse them because it's taken a nick a negative connotation with it go to luke go to uh third john if you would third john third john look at the bible says in third john verse one towards the end of your bible there third john verse one says the elder unto the well-beloved gais whom i love in the truth beloved i wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health even as thy soul prospereth now what's another term that is used for a pastor elder that's a great term now why is elder used to describe a pastor well obviously elder means someone who is older right but when in reference to a pastor it's referring to someone who's older in the faith obviously you could be referring to an individual who in age is older but more specifically or in tandem with an individual who is spiritually mature this is why in first simothy chapter three it specifically says that if a person is a novice he shouldn't be a pastor because he can fall into the snare of the devil right but if he's a pastor he shouldn't be a pastor but an elder is someone who's been around the block someone who has wisdom has experience has lived life a little bit has kids is married has dealt with these issues they they rule their house well and therefore they're able to rule the house of god that's why the bible uses his term elder okay first timothy 5-1 says rebuke not an elder but in treat him as a father and the younger men as brethren verse 17 says let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honor especially they who labor in the word and doctrine verse 19 against an elder received not an accusation but before two or three witnesses so we see over and over again elder is associated with a pastor a spiritual leader of the church it's a great term because it's the insinuation there is that it's a mature person you understand someone who's mature in the lord been saved for a while okay but hold on a second i'm not gonna go out there and call myself elder mahia right why because what connotation comes with elder mormons right i mean you see them on their little tricycles and they got their little badge they're like i'm elder you know so and so i don't want to be associated with that you know it's a biblical term it's in the bible we know what it means but we don't want to use it because unfortunately it's been polluted by the mormon church yeah yeah you know to to to uh describe these pansy little leaders on bicycles use a car you know get some long sleeve shirts for crying out loud i don't want to be associated with that okay i remember uh years ago how many of you guys remember proposition eight you guys remember proposition eight so back in my old republican days you know our church was like really like pushing this this this thing's like we gotta vote you know we don't want homeless to get married and all these things and um so a lot of conservatives which not wouldn't just be you know christians or baptists it'd be mormons catholics all these other ones you know they're obviously against gay marriages as well and so they're voting well the sodomites in long beach they're like oh man we're gonna find if we find people out you know doing visitation we know how you guys dress we know how the mormons dress we know how the baptists dress we're gonna come and beat you up you know you're like so we we we went out on saturday's when we would go do sony dress exactly the way we would typically dress shirt and tie i mean we had the parted hair i mean baptists right the mormons they started putting on their long sleeve shirts you know because i don't know maybe they thought like you know that the sodomites are more would more readily attack mormons than baptists because we weren't even sweating they were like yeah right okay yeah sure right but the mormons were freaking out and i remember going out like so many of them we would like laugh at the mormons like look at these guys hey where where's your short sleeve you know elder and they would even take off their badges their little name tags because they didn't want to get beat up and it wasn't even going to happen okay but here's the thing is like you know when it comes to elders it's a biblical term but we don't want to use it because it's been polluted it's been tainted when we're speaking to an unlearned individual when we say unlearn we're not talking about a stupid person okay unlearn just basically means they're not educating the ways of the lord they don't know the things of god okay they can't point to you in a verse in the bible to describe what an elder is when we're talking about to an individual like that we don't want to use those terms because it's associated with mormonism how about presbytery right first timothy 4 14 says neglect not the gift that is in thee which is given thee by prophecy with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery now presbytery is simply like church leadership that's what it is but we don't use that today why because it's associated with calvinism and we reject calvin we reject all five points of calvinism so that's why we don't use that there we use the term pastor because a pastor is someone who feeds the flock of god now obviously there's the nomination non-denominational churches that use that term but folks by and large it's often associated with our brand of christianity okay conservative or whatever you want to call it you know right wing fundamental christians this is a term that is often associated with that group of people and that's why we use it and again the pastor simply means someone who feeds okay go to jeremiah chapter 3 i'm going to read you from first peter chapter 5 and verse 2 the bible says feed the flock of god which is among you taking the oversight thereof not by constraint but willingly not for filthy lucre but of a ready mind now here's the argument that people will bring yeah but pastors only use like once in the new testament so why even use that you know bishop is used elders use more often you know by the way another group that uses elder is the house church movement okay and we're not for that either because the house church movement is an organization that rejects church leaders they want to have many elders okay they want to have a board of pastors a board of leaders folks this is not the biblical model okay now again i was saying you know people often bring this argument well pastors only found once in the bible yeah but here's the thing is that the term pastor literally means to feed so often when you see it in its verb tense in the original language you'll see it as pastor being used as to feed the flock okay look at jeremiah chapter 3 and verse 15 it says and i will give you pastors according to mine heart so this is important god is promising the children of israel to give them pastors according to his heart basically what he deems to be a pastor that is exactly what he's going to deliver to the children of israel which shall feed you with knowledge and understanding so what is the pastor associated with an individual who feeds the flock of god with knowledge and understanding it's constantly teaching the flock of god preaching the word being instant in season out of season teaching them the ways of the lord teaching them doctrine you know giving attendance to reading to exhortation to doctrine saving his congregation from you know lies and false doctrines and seducing spirits and doctrines of devils this is what a pastor is supposed to do but let me say this you know today bishop doesn't have that connotation elder does not have that connotation persbyterian does not have that connotation but a pastor does go to matthew chapter 3 matthew chapter 2 talk about negative connotations in the bible in regards to the name of god in regards to the name of a pastor the title of a pastor but let's talk about this how about when it comes to our gospel presentation okay now when it comes to our gospel presentation we pretty much have it set how it is that we do it right i mean we use the roman's road we have a set of verses that we use we even have specific terminology that we stick with because we know that it works well okay we've been at this for quite some time and i i'm when i say we i'm referring to independent fundamental baptists i mean we've been at this for quite some time we've we've perfected this matter of soul winning to a certain extent well we basically we've been very successful at it okay now here's the thing is that you know there's certain terms in the bible that are great terms biblical terms when when it comes to soul winning but here's the thing they've been polluted and what i mean by that how about the term repent right repent is a great word i use repent when i preach the word of god even repent of your sins you know we use repent in different contexts as the bible permits obviously but when it comes to soul winning we do not use that when we're out there why because the word repent has received a negative connotation that when people hear it they automatically associate it with repent of your what sins and that's not what we're supposed to do when we're out there because we know the bible does not teach you have to repent of your sins to be saved now they'll often point to these scriptures look at matthew 3 verse 1 in those days came john the baptist preaching in the wilderness of judea and saying repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at him and they'll say look john preached this jesus said repent why don't you guys say repent i'll tell you why because ray comfort always uses the word repent and he's talking about cleaning up your life and letting go of your sins and stop sinning or be willing to stop sinning in order for you to be saved and that is a false doctrine it's a false doctrine right repent is a great word and you know what you didn't have people like this back in these days obviously you had people teaching a false gospel but you never had anybody teach using the term repent and perverting it to mean repent of your sins to be saved that's why people could use it in these days they knew what it meant when they would say repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand they understood that when jesus was preaching repent and believe the gospel they knew what it meant they knew it wasn't like oh man is he telling us that we got to stop like stealing and we got to stop you know gluttony we got to stop fornication and adultery they knew exactly what it meant because at that time that word was not polluted okay people knew exactly what they were talking about but look folks today 2021 you tell any unsaved person out there hey you have to repent in order to be saved folks that would make that would be true right they would have to repent because repent in the bible when talking about salvation is repenting from dead works and placing your faith toward god it's not trusting in what you originally trusted in for salvation and turning to the lord and trusting in him you're repenting of what you're formally trusting in and trusting on jesus christ so that would make perfect sense but to us but to a lost world that term repent has been polluted it's been defiled and any unsaved individual guaranteed 90 percent of the time when you go out there and you tell them to repent automatically in their minds because of false teachers and false prophets they automatically think oh that means i gotta stop sinning i gotta stop doing this and that you know therefore we don't want we don't want to so we don't we don't want to use that word when we're out sony ax 319 says repent ye therefore go with me if you would to ax chapter 19 ax 319 says repent ye therefore and be converted that your sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the lord luke 24 46 says and said unto them thus it is written and thus it behooved christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations beginning at jerusalem oh you're disobeying jesus then because you're not saying repent you're disobeying him because he's he told you to repeat to preach repentance yeah but here's the thing when we're going out there sowing we're literally causing people to repent without using the word repent right folks one of the things that i do when i'm out there preaching the gospel and when i ask someone hey what do you have to do to have eternal life if they say i got to do good work so i got to be a good person i got to be baptized i got to do you know x y and z i take them through the gospel presentation and once they readily admit that what i what i showed them is right then i follow up with this question now do you see that this is completely different than what you originally had answered so you understand that you're actually changing what you believe originally because originally when i asked you you said you have to do good works be baptized but you see that the bible is actually teaching you something completely different and you're changing to that view and they'll say yes you know what that is repentance right it's called repentance right they're they're having a change of mind in regards to what they believe what it takes to be saved okay not from their sins not from x y and z not from their drinking or smoking simply from what they believe in so we can get people saved without using that term and when jesus said that repentance should be preached among all nations that's exactly what we're doing okay look at acts 19 verse 4 of course this clarifies the message that john was preaching when he said repent he said in verse 4 then said paul john barely baptized with the baptism of repentance saying unto the people that they should believe on him which should come after him that is on christ jesus so the bible specifically telling us here that when he said repent it clarifies to us in acts 19 4 that what that meant was believe on jesus christ but you know people understood that they knew that it was a change of mind they knew that that would that's uh what it meant but today again it has a negative connotation we don't want to use that morass one okay go to james chapter two james chapter two here's my last example here talk about negative connotations in the bible how about when it comes to the name of our church you know hey i was baptist born again because i wasn't baptist born because i didn't you know grow up in a baptist church but i was baptist born again that's where i got saved in a baptist church and you know what i'm gonna be baptist dead i'm always gonna be a baptist why because baptists are often associated with zealous christianity zealous preaching soul winning holiness separation and the right doctrine has always been this way has always been this way folks you ask anybody in christianity about baptist they'll tell you the same thing even if they don't like us yeah i remember my uh one of my relatives went to the doctors one time and he said that his doctor was was a christian i think he was a calvinist or something and they started talking about you know what church he went to and he's like yeah i go to i'm an independent fundamental baptist and he says oh baptist he's like those are basically like the true christians today the guy the guy told him that now obviously there's other christians outside of independent fundamental baptists but what he's saying is like you guys are like the real deal and folks that's not just for this era it's always been that way folks i mean come on jesus's cousin what's called john the baptist right but i love that association and here's the thing the world might have a negative connotation for that but here's the thing because what we believe matches up with what the bible says i'm all for it amen but how about just church the church in general you know we call ourselves an independent fundamental baptist church not a temple you know there's baptists out there they call them you know they call themselves you know temple baptist or whatever right folks the temple first of all was a literal building that is no longer sanctioned by god in the new testament can you can you read your bible you know the temple in the new testament is the body is the body of the believer right that's what the bible says you know the church which is literally a term that's used in the bible multiple times scores of times is the local body of believers that's what god calls that local assembly calls it a church doesn't now does he call it a congregation absolutely does he call it an assembly yes and in fact look at james chapter 2 verse number 1 it says my brethren have not the faith of our lord jesus christ the lord of glory with respect to persons for if they're come unto your assembly a man with the gold ring and goodly apparel and they're coming also poor man and vile raiment we won't read for the rest of the chapter there but there in verse 2 it talks about the assembly talking about the church that's gathering there together when we read that we understand that it's referring to a church okay but we don't use that today because of the fact that you have the assembly of god right you have congregationalists okay you have these different denominations that teach a wrong way of salvation that utilize those terms and have false doctrines attached to those churches but when you talk about a church it's like okay now you're narrowing down what you're all about and when you put baptist fundamental and independent in front of it then you really narrow down okay this is this is the good deal right here and then when you put new in front of that oh man that's like specific there now you're now you're in you're in good standings all right amen you hit the jackpot that's funny i remember um i don't know if it was i was preaching through to the book of james or revelation but i was talking about james chapter 2 and of course the judaizer you know said this is like oh you're so stupid you don't even know greek and all these things he said don't you know that in james chapter 2 when it says assembly it says synagogue in the original language it's like so this is actually referring to jews because you know you know dispensationalists are majorly zionist right so they don't believe that the book of james is for us they say that's for the 12 tribes scattered abroad and it's only for jews it doesn't apply to us and the proof of that is james chapter 2 because assembly and the original language says synagogue okay well here's the thing is that synagogue means assembly that's just it and the proof of that is that in matthew 6 26 it says behold the fowls of the air for they sow not neither do they reap nor gather into barns now the term gather there in the original language is synagogue so answer me this are these birds jews or what right hey your heavenly father feed at them so look what's the what's the moral of the story the moral of the story is that synagogue simply means an assembly it's an assembly that's why jesus in revelation chapter 2 had to specify said the synagogue of satan okay but notice that the new testament writers when referring to churches did not call them synagogues they didn't use synagogues they used ecclesia church why because synagogue now had a negative connotation attached to it it was attached to a false religion of the pharisees could no longer be used because in that part of the world during that time people knew what a synagogue was they knew what was taking place there and christians knew this is now where the things of god are taking place this is now what the word of god is being preached god jesus christ said you know thou art petered upon this rock i will build my synagogue no my church okay but you know synagogue simply means gathering simply means an assembly so you know thank you king james translators because they got it right amen it's an assembly and you know what i'm sure they put assembly there instead of synagogue because they understood the synagogue had a negative connotation and they don't want to confuse the reader they understood what the new testament writers were talking about when they penned this down do you see how important connotations are positive connotations negative connotations and there's good things in the bible good terms in the bible but sometimes over the years they become polluted not to say that we can't use them in the context of a of a church we're not preaching the word of god you know your ears have matured you understand these things but when it comes to displaying these teachings to an unlearned world we should not use these terms because it'll confuse them due to the fact that they have a bad connotation with them amen inspire heads and have a word of prayer father we thank you so much for your word and thank you for the the depths of your word lord i pray god that you continue to help us lord to understand these things and we know that the words of the lord are pure words there's nothing to fath about them but people can't corrupt the word of god you've said that within your word and even today that's true sometimes certain terms and words have carried a negative connotation and we should abstain from that lord if if they've taken it down a path that's not biblical help us to abstain from all appearance of evil by not associating with those things and help us to associate with words and terms that reinforce our biblical convictions not take away from it we love you so much lord and we thank you pray these things in jesus name amen please turn your soul