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you you you you Welcome to the second service, please grab your hymnals and let's start with him number 185 One hundred and eighty five will begin by singing my Savior's love 185 and you can stay seated of course 185 my Savior's love Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh All right Heavenly Father Lord we want to thank you for your love your great love that you've given us Through your son the Lord Jesus Christ Lord we come Before you this afternoon to once again just to hear from you to worship you to praise you Lord I pray that you lift our hearts full of joy Lord even if we don't have the best singing voices Lord I pray that our hearts will be open to you and you receive our praise and worship as a sweet smelling savour Well, I pray that your holy spirit will touch our hearts and minds keep us help us I have our folks and attention upon your word this afternoon Lord And please help us to take something from the sermons and to apply to our life that we can be a little bit more like Christ we pray this in Jesus name. Amen All right now So if you were here between services, you could have given me some recommendations for him Thank you, brother. So the criticism has been heard loud and clear. All right, we need to experience we need to sing different hymns All right. So if we there are certain hymns that you want to hear, all right, you gotta let me know Let me know ahead of time so I can prepare and we'll make sure we've got music for it But the next hymn, let's turn to hymn number 136 136 Master the tempest is raging one three six Master the tempest is raging The tempest is raging The billows are tossing high The sky is so shadowed with blackness No shelter for help is nigh Carest thou not that we perish How canst thou lie asleep When each moment so badly is read In a grave in the anchoring deep The winds and the waves shall obey my will Peace be still Whether the wrath of the sea Or demons or men or whatever it be No water can swallow the ship Where lies the master of the sea Or of ocean and of the skies They all shall sweetly obey my will Peace be still Peace be still They all shall sweetly obey my will Peace be still Master with anguish of spirit I bow in my grief today The depths of my sad heart are troubled Awaken and save my brain Torrents of sin and of anguish Swiggle my sinking soul And I perish, I perish the master O hasten and take control The winds and the waves shall obey my will Peace be still Whether the wrath of the storm tops sea Or demons or men or whatever it be No water can swallow the ship Where lies the master of ocean and of the skies They all shall sweetly obey my will Peace be still Peace be still They all shall sweetly obey my will Peace, peace be still Master, the terror is over The elements sweetly rest Of sun in the calm lake is mirrored And heavens within are pressed Linger of blessed bekeeper Leave me alone for more And with joy I shall make the blessed harbor And rest on the blissful shore The winds and the waves shall obey my will Peace be still Whether the wrath of the storm tops sea Or demons or men or whatever it be No water can slaughter the ship Where lies the master of ocean and of the skies They all shall sweetly obey my will Peace be still Peace be still They all shall sweetly obey my will Peace, peace be still What is it? 221 221 My father is rich in houses and lands He bought of the world, of the world in his hands Of rupees and diamonds, of silver and gold His coffers are full, he has riches are full I'm a child of the king, a child of the king With Jesus my savior, I'm a child of the king My father's own son, the savior of wind One's longed on earth as the chorus of heaven Our family is pleaded, our father on high That we may be his when he comes by and by I'm a child of the king, a child of the king With Jesus my savior, I'm a child of the king I once was an elf, a stranger I could A sinner by choice and an alien I could I've been a doctor, my name has been turned down They're here to prevent you from growing up now I'm a child of the king, a child of the king With Jesus my savior, I'm a child of the king Our tents or our cottages, why should I care? They're new in our palace, for we owe to them. So fetch them from home, and still I may see. All glory to God, our child of the King. Our child of the King, our child of the King. In Jesus my Saviour, our child of the King. How about we do one more favourite? Does someone have a favourite? Anybody? Give me a favourite. Give me another one. What's another one we want to sing? Yes Brother Michael? Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. I would have put any money that you'd say bow the knee. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Do we have a number for it Brother? 261. 261. One of my favourite hymns actually. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His wonderful face. And the things of earth will grow strangely dim. In the life of His glory and grace. Through death into life everlasting. Be cast and be followed with them. No for us sin, no for has no meaning. For more than for those behind. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His wonderful face. And the things of earth will grow strangely dim. In the life of His glory and grace. His Word shall not fail you, He promised. Believe Him and all will be found. Then go to the world that is thine. His perfect salvation to you. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His wonderful face. And the things of earth will grow strangely dim. In the life of His glory and grace. 2 Timothy chapter 3. 2 Timothy chapter 3. And brother Clive is coming for the reading. 2 Timothy chapter 3. Thank you brother. 2 Timothy chapter 3. This know also that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fearers, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof from such turn away. For of this sort are they which creep into houses and lead captive, silly women laden with sins, led away with diverse lusts, ever learning but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Now as Jans and Jamborees withstood Moses, so do those also resist the truth. Men of corrupt minds, reproachful, concerning the faith, but those shall proceed no further, for their folly shall be manifest unto all men as theirs also was. But thou shalt fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, long-suffering, charity, patience, persecutions, afflictions, which came unto me at Antioch, at Iconium, Lystra, what persecutions I endure, but out of them all the Lord delivered me. Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. But evil men and seduces shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived, but continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them, and that from a child thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Jesus Christ. All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. This, the man of God, may be perfect, thoroughly finished, unto all good works. Let's pray. Our gracious Father, we truly are thankful for your word, your instructions. Father, we ask you to take our preacher now, hide him behind the cross, help him to expand your word as just saith the Lord. And Father, we truly are thankful for your love, your goodness and your blessings. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you, brother. You know, as a child, going to church and hearing about Jesus and how he died for the sins of the world, I've always just generally had a love for people, and I still do. Like, I actually, I do love people in general, okay, in general. And again, it's mainly because I know how much God loved the world and that he gave his son to die for all of us, myself included. Like, I'm no, I'm not any more special than the next person in this world. And I've just, you know, I often think about how people are. Obviously, you know, man has been creating the image of God and, you know, God is looking for, not just to save people, but then looking for a fellowship and a walk, a close walk with mankind, even though we are sinners. And sometimes I think one wrong impression that we can have is, well, of course, we are to love not just our brother, sister, the Lord. We are to love the lost, of course. That's why we go soul winning. But, you know, we should not just put up and just love everybody all the time, actually. In fact, if you look at 2 Timothy chapter 3 and look at verse number 5, it says, Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Look at the instruction given to believers from such turn away. See, there are some people that God does not want us to be in fellowship with. There are some people that God does not want us to hang around or to be close by because these are toxic people. These are dangerous people. They'll harm you, you know. And we need to have this warning. Yes, you know, generally speaking, yes, we do love mankind in a sense, you know, understanding that they're dying without Christ, but there are some people that are just so excessively wicked, you've got to stay away from them, from such turn away. The title for the sermon this afternoon is, 23 Toxic Character Traits. 23, I believe there's 23 in this list. You could say there's 24 or 25, but just by my count here, I see 23. 23 toxic character traits. And what I want to do in this sermon, just these first few verses in this chapter, is to go through some of these traits and to help you, you know, like, generally speaking, I'm sure we want to be friendly, we want to have friends, right? And one important characteristic of a friend is to be loyal, right? Because sometimes your friend's not going to be in the best of moods, sometimes they're going to be having a hard time, and I believe it is good for a friend to be loyal. But there are some people that you're going to come across that you cannot be loyal. You know, God wants you to turn away from such people, have nothing to do with such people. But the issue is, you don't always know who they are. You're going to come across people in life, you don't know how wicked they are, you don't know whether God wants you to turn away from them necessarily. You know, it all starts gradually, you start to pick up red flags, you start to pick up characteristics, and you could have the wrong impression, well, I'm just going to be a loyal friend, I'll stick, you know, I'll stick closer than a brother with this person, but really, God is seeking that you will turn away from such people. So that's the point of the sermon today, and we start there in verse number one, second Timothy chapter three, verse number one. This note also, that in the last days, perilous times shall come. Now, why would there be perilous times to come? For men. Because of people. Because of the wickedness of people. For men. And we're going to have all these qualities, what are they? Shall be lovers of their own selves. Now, we're going to go, I've got 23 points. Normally when I preach a sermon, I've got three points, five points, seven points, usually at the max. I've got 23 points for you, so this is going to be a long snarner. We'll get through them quickly, some points I'll stick on longer than others, some things are self-explanatory, but the very first thing that you see there are these people that you're to turn away from are lovers of their own selves. Now, there are two elements that I want you to think about as we go through this sermon. Number one, yes, be careful of such people. They're harmful. Yes, God is asking you to stay away from them. But, some of these characteristics are in you right now. Some of these characteristics are in me right now. And if God is telling us to stay away from such people, then you need to get this out of your life as well. Because some of these things, like look at verse number two, lovers of their own selves, covetous, have you ever covetous? Blasphemers, proud, have you ever been prideful? Blasphemers, have you ever disobeyed parents, disobedient parents? Have you ever been unthankful? These are things that we can do. These are things that we have done. But these are excessively wicked things. God not only wants us to stay away from such people, but he wants us to get it out of our lives as well. And if we go through this list, you'll see that the list gets worse and worse and worse and worse as the verses go on. So let's start with the first one there. Now what is the point of love? Why has God given us the ability to love? Well obviously it's to show affection toward other people, isn't it? Isn't that why we love? To show affection to me, to love my wife, to show affection toward her, to show affection to my children, my church members, my church family, to show affection toward my church family. Isn't that the point of love? To love the lost, show affection to the lost so we can go out there and preach the gospel to them, so we can give them the good news of Christ. But these people, they love. They take the emotion, but they love themselves. What? Yeah, lovers of their own selves. It's the complete opposite. They love themselves. Now let me, if you can, keep your finger there and come with me to Romans 13. Let me show you the danger of loving yourself. Okay, the danger of loving yourself rather than loving other people. You can stay there in 2 Timothy 3 because obviously that's going to be a main text. But Romans 13 verse 8, I want you to notice a few words here. Romans 13 verse 8, please. Romans 18 verse 8. The Bible says, So we've been instructed to love one another, okay? For this, It is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Then it says in verse number 10, See, we don't need to know every single law. We don't need to necessarily know that you're not to steal or to cover up your neighbor or to murder because if you just had love, if you had the love of God toward your neighbor, you will automatically not do these things, you understand? If you had the love of God in you and you love your neighbor, you would not go and murder them. You would not go and commit adultery against them. You won't do such harmful things. So, if that's true, of course it is true, what about someone that loves themselves? You know what that tells me? If they love themselves, they don't love their neighbor. If they don't love themselves, they will murder. They will commit adultery. They will steal. They will bear false witness, okay? And they will covet, and anything else that's in that list. That's the problem. You know, do you have a friend that just loves themselves, that has no love for you? Oh, but they're my friend, I've got to stay loyal. Be careful. Now again, some of these things we have done. Some of these things, we have these characteristics, okay? I'm not saying just because you come across a covetous person, stay away from them, they're dangerous. No, all of these things are patterns. They're all little red flags that start to, you start to notice these things. This person has no love for anyone else, just themselves. They only care for themselves. That's a red flag. The next one there is covetous, okay? What does it mean to covet? To desire things that belong to another. Alright, instead of them being content with what they have, they're always looking at someone else, they're trying to keep up with the Joneses, right? And they're just like, I want that, I want what they've got. I'm coveting my neighbor's house, I'm coveting my neighbor's property, I'm coveting my neighbor's wife. Covetousness. Reverend, this is wicked. This is wicked. And I'll explain to you in a minute why it is so wicked, okay? But you start seeing these little red flags, just little red flags, okay? You can start taking note of these things. Because God wants me to stay away from such people, from such turn away. You know, very quickly, Romans 7, 7, it says, What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid, Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law, For I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. See, we get another way of, we get another description of what thou shalt not covet means. Thou shalt not lust. Don't desire the things that does not belong to you. That belongs to someone else. That is covetousness. That's the next red flag. Next thing we see in at least verse number 2 is boasters. What's a boaster? Someone that praises themselves. Have you ever come across people like that? They just praise themselves. I say, pastor, you do it all the time when you get behind the pulpit. You give us stories about your life, and I don't want, you know. I hope you know when I say some story, and I might be the hero of that story. I hope you guys realise I'm not, I'm just trying to give you a real life example of how God's word works. You know, and it's not, I'm not trying to boast of myself, I'm trying to boast of God's word. That, you know, if you follow his ways, he will bless you. Okay, that's really the point behind it. I've got nothing to boast of myself. I have nothing, honestly, you know, I, I don't just, I'm not just saying this. I think you guys are better than me. Like, all of you are better than me. I really believe that. I believe all of you are better than me. I've got nothing, you know, and if I've got anything worth giving, it's only because of Christ. It has to be. It has to be Christ. But, boasters, they love to praise themselves. Now, is there something that we should boast about? Absolutely. You know, the Bible says in Psalm 34 verse 2, my, my soul shall make her boast in the Lord. Then it says the humble shall hear thereof and be glad. The humble. You know what, if you're humble as well, if you're not boasting, and you hear that we boast of the Lord, your heart will be glad. When we preach sermons and we just praise Jesus and we glorify God and we give him all thanksgiving, then those that are humble will be like, yes, Lord, praise you, thank you, I love being in church. We love to praise Jesus. It's all about our Lord. Boasters love to praise themselves. Look, you don't need to praise yourself. You don't have to, okay? Just, just let God praise you in return. Let God exalt you in return. You know, you just do what is right. You do what God wants and I promise you God will promote you. God will elevate you. God will bless you. And that's all the praise we need, don't we? Just the praise of God rather than the praise of men. But, boasters, they're like, oh, no one's praising me. I better praise myself. Another red flag. You're starting to notice some individual in your life and they've got this red flag. Another red flag. Another red flag. God, hold on. Another red flag. They're also like this. They're also like that in this list. Is this someone that I need to stay away from? You know, am I being a disloyal friend to break friendship with them? No, God wants you to break friendship with them. They're harmful people. Okay, so we keep going through this list. Now, again, have we boasted? I'm sure we've all boasted at some time. I'm sure we've all coveted. These are all qualities that we can have and, again, I want you to be challenged. Then I need to get this out of my life. Because if I have these things and somebody in church hears this sermon and then they interact with me and I come across as boastful, there's going to be a red flag in their mind about me. And it should be, by the way. It should be a red flag. That's why God's got these words for us, to warn us. The next one is proud. Proud is kind of like boasting, but being proud is kind of the opposite of humility, being humble. And it's sort of how you view yourself in the light of others. You know, someone that is proud will view themselves as more important than the people they interact with. They think they're a higher quality or they're a better person than the next. Anyway, pride is a common one. We've preached on pride before. The next one is blasphemers. Blasphemers. Blasphemy is basically offensive words used to insult God. Offensive words used to insult God. Now, I'm just trying to think about my life in particular. I can't necessarily think so much. I haven't really come across many blasphemers. You know, myself. Maybe you have. I don't know. Okay. But obviously they speak harshly against God. You know, they hate God. Have you ever gone soul winning? We've got examples. I've had many of these. Have you gone soul winning? They say, well, I don't believe in God. I say, well, why? Oh, because God did this and God did that. It's like, what? No, you do believe in God. You're just angry at God. You just maybe even hate God because of something that's happened in your life. It's not that you don't believe in God. You know, and they'll start to just, I don't know, just mock God. I've had some examples like that, you know, I can think of. But blasphemers, people that speak heart like negatively against God, speak against Him. And look, even just be careful. Even my own kids, you know, the oh my God. Please be careful with that. I know it's not necessarily blasphemy but you could be using the Lord's name in vain. I know it's such a trendy thing to say. I don't know why. It's something that's lingered in our vocabulary for some reason. But look, be careful when you use God's name. When you use God's name make sure you're actually speaking to God. Okay, not just trying to vent something off your chest using the Lord's name. But yeah, people that use offensive words insult God. These are blasphemers. The next one that we've got there is disobedient to parents. Now again, we've all disobeyed our parents, haven't we? I mean, surely every person can admit there's been a time, maybe multiple times I've disobeyed my parents. But the issue with this prayer, and the reason this is a major thing, you know, in the Bible is, like, I know sometimes we may disobey the government. I know sometimes we may disobey our bosses at work. Because it's just another, like, but our parents are someone that we love. Like, parents are supposed to be someone that you really care for. Your parents have worked hard and tirelessly to give you the best. Like, I didn't appreciate that when I was a kid. I didn't realise how much my parents worked for me to give me the best education they could and the best life and the best opportunities. Not until I become a parent and I realise I love my children so much, I want to give them everything they can, you know, give them every opportunity. You know, it becomes less about yourself, doesn't it? It becomes about other people. It helps you in life. But when children disobey their parents, you know, obviously they're throwing, like, to the people that love them the most, you know, care and protect them the most, they're throwing that in their face and saying, you know, it's not good enough. Despising authority is really the issue. You know, when children do not love their parents, when they don't learn obedience in their household, they're not going to obey the governments. They're not going to obey the bosses. They're not going to obey any authorities and, you know, they're going to struggle to obey the Lord God in life. The very first authority level structure they have, the very first experience is family. And this is how God's had it to be. You know, we saw in the morning how the father instructs the son and the son obeys the father. He does what the father says. You know, family is in the nature of God. And when you despise family, you know, you're despising God's nature. That's who God is. God has family in his nature. And we see the example of the father passing on instructions to the son and the son does what the father wants. Not my will, but thy will be done. And children need to learn now while you're young, not my will, but my parents' will should be done in the house. One day I'll grow older, I'll have my own family. One day I'll leave house and then I can do what I want. Okay, but learn to be under the authority and be obedient to your parents. It's amongst the list of all these other wicked things. It's serious in God's eyes when children disobey their parents. Next one there is unthankful. And this, again, comes together with covetousness because if you covet, if you desire what other people have, what problem does that create for you? Now you're unthankful. You're unsatisfied with what God has given you. Okay, we all have different portions in life. Some bank accounts are bigger than others. Some possessions are more than others. We're all different. Okay, God's given us these wonderful gifts. To me, even just living in Australia is such a blessing. It really is. Living in Australia is such a blessing. Compared to other places in the world, you have so much going for you Australians. Please don't take it for granted what God has given you. Be thankful for what God has given you. It's still a decent country. It's still decent. We can still be in church. We can still worship God. We can still sing praises. But unthankful. Again, because they're covetous, because they're always seeking more. They can never appreciate what God has given them. They can't appreciate their Lord in life. They want more and more and more. Never thankful. Children as well, by the way, be thankful. When your mother puts a plate, a dinner plate on your table, it might not be your favourite food, but mum's worked hard to get that together for you. Okay, thank mum. Be thankful. Learn to be thankful for everything that God has given you. Next thing is there, unholy. Unholy. Can you please keep your finger there and come with me to Leviticus chapter 10. Leviticus chapter 10, please. Leviticus chapter 10, unholy. Unholy. What does it mean to be holy? Separated. Set apart for God. My life ought to be holy. Not because I'm such a righteous, look how good this pastor is. My life ought to be holy because it ought to be given to God and not to this world. To God's will, to God's desires, not my will, not my desires. Hopefully my will is the Lord's will as we mature and grow and become more Christ-like. But unholy. Now I want to show you this here in Leviticus chapter 10, verse number 8. This is the first time the word unholy comes up and I want you to notice a few things. And the Lord spake unto Aaron saying, so the Lord is setting, is putting into place the Aaronic priesthood. You know Aaron was the first high priest and then his sons would follow in that. Would follow in that priestly line. And then after Aaron would pass away, he would be passed on to the children, etc. etc. etc. So Christ is, or the Lord is explaining this process. And it says here in verse number 8, and the Lord spake unto Aaron saying, look at verse number 9, do not drink wine nor strong drink. God is telling the priests, don't drink alcohol. Okay? Nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die, it shall be a statue forever throughout your generations. God is telling the priests, if you go into the tabernacle drunk, you could, that could be the end of your life. Don't be surprised if you don't walk out of there. Like God, that's how angry God is about this. Drinking alcohol. Then he says in verse number 10, that ye may, this is the reason why I don't want you to be drunk. This is why I don't want you to be under the influence of alcohol. That ye may put difference between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean. You see, when you're under the influence of drugs and alcohol, you can't tell the difference between holy and unholy. Obviously drinking alcohol is unholy. And you're bringing that to the tabernacle of God. The tabernacle eventually became the temple. And what is the temple of God in the New Testament? Right here. If the priests were not allowed to go into the temple drunk, do you think God wants this temple drunk? Of course not. Look, I know Australia, you know. It's just one of these other alcohol-driven societies. You know, the Aussie beer or whatever. You know, we've got to put that aside, brethren. That's going to mess up your judgement. It's not holy. It'll make you unholy. It'll corrupt the temple of your body, of which the Holy Spirit lives within. Unholy. And look at verse number 11. That ye may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the Lord hath spoken unto them by the hand of Moses. My job as a pastor is to teach you all the statutes, all the commands, all the testimonies of Christ in his word. But how can I do it if I'm drunk? How can I do it if I'm under the influence? How can you do it to your children if you're under the influence? Unholy. Listen, our society is very unholy. You know, any celebrations, they're getting themselves blind drunk. They don't even know when to stop. I mean, you shouldn't even start, to be honest. Young people, again, don't start. Don't drink this rubbish. It'll mess up your mind. It kills your brain cells. It's toxic. Okay, it's dangerous. The Bible describes it like venom, like the venom of a snake. It can kill you. I mean, God may very well kill you. Unholy. So you can see, as we keep going, it kind of gets worse and worse and worse. You start to notice these people go, wow, that's a red flag. He's a bit of a boaster. Seems to just love himself. Doesn't seem to love his own family well. Doesn't seem to love my friendship. Seems like I'm the one always giving the love and I get nothing in return in this friendship. You know? Start to pick up these little things and I want you to be, look, I know we can be bleeding hearts. I am. I admit, one of my areas is I think I have a bleeding heart. I just love people and I love them to my detriment sometimes. But God's instructed us. There are some people you've got to, from such turn away, have nothing to do with these people. Okay, because God knows it's going to affect you. God knows it's harmful towards you. He knows that it's going to be a negative influence towards you. His son, his child. Come back with me to 2 Timothy 3. We've gone through 8 character traits already. Okay, we've got another, what's 23 take away 8? Another 15 to go. Alright, look at verse number 3. This one's really interesting. Without natural affection. What does that mean? The Bible says that there are some affections that are just natural to everybody. You know, nature itself teaches you these things. Like, obviously, if I'm married, natural affection is to my spouse. Obviously, I'm going to love my spouse. Obviously, if we produce children, you don't have to be told to love your children, surely. Surely, it just comes naturally. You know, you see this little defenseless child and you say, wow, I brought this forth. I'm going to love and protect this little one. These are natural affections. Okay, but these people are without natural affections. Look, like I said, you may even develop natural affections towards your colleagues at work. Just, you care for them. You know, even though they're not saved, but, you know, you work with them. You want them to do well in life. You know, you want to succeed. You interact with them. You know, you start to just naturally care for people that you come across. Associates and colleagues. And, of course, as Christians, you know what else is natural affections as a believer? That we love the Lord. Right, I mean, wouldn't you say that? I mean, if God loved me so much, he'd give me his son, wouldn't it just be natural for me to go, thank you, Lord, for the salvation. Oh, man, I love you in return, Lord. And I love God's people. Isn't that natural? I may not always get along with God's people, but I'll tell you now, I love God's people. You know, I may not always get along with another believer, but I still want them to do the best they can for Jesus Christ. I still want them to go to heaven and be greatly rewarded by God. You know, it's all for the kingdom's sake. That's natural affections. Turn with me to Romans chapter one. Romans chapter one. And while you're turning to Romans chapter one, I'm going to read to you from Colossians chapter three, verse two. In Colossians three, two, the Bible says, set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. So, again, as a believer, the new man within us, the natural affection, God says, look, set your affection on things above. God, heaven, eternity, yeah? The great mission, the great work that he's given us to do. But I want to show you some things here in Romans chapter one, verse number 26. Romans chapter one, verse number 26. And I'm not going to go into great depth here, but it says here in verse number 26, for this cause, or for this reason, if you want to read it that way, God gave them up unto vile affections. See, it's good to have natural affections. It's just human being. There are some people that have vile affections. Look at this. What are these vile affections? For even their women did change the natural use. So, again, unnatural. They changed the natural use. This is not natural. Into that which is against nature. You see that? Against nature. This is not what a normal person thinks. This is not what a normal person desires. These are vile affections against the natural use, against nature. Verse number 27. And likewise also the men. Look, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lusts, one toward another, men with men, working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of the error which was meet. What is this teaching? Homosexuals. Homosexuals do not have natural affection. It is not normal for a woman to lust after a woman. It is not normal. It is not natural for a man to lust after a man. These are vile affections. Vile means dirty, disgusting, filthy, against nature. This is not normal. If I were to see a man walking around a speedo, I'm like, I don't want to look at that. Get out of there. I don't want to look at that. Right? But these people know it's like, whoa. Don't even want to think what they think, to be honest. I don't even like preaching about this stuff because it makes me sick. Look at verse number 28. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient. We'll go into this a little bit later on, but I just want to show you men after men, women after women are not natural affections. They're not. It's vile. It's against nature. This is not what normal humans... Okay, if you watch the media, you're going to think 30% of the population are homosexuals. It's like 2% or something like that. And they say as much as 5%, but you know what? This agenda has been pushed down kids' throats in schools. And I'm sure kids, just to be trained, you're like, oh yeah, I'm a this or I'm a that, but they're not really. They're just going with the flow. They've been kind of forced into this situation. I feel sorry for little children. Oh, man. Parents, think twice before you put your kids in school. Just think twice. Be protective. They're going to hear so many things. I don't even know. I don't even know how I got through school. I don't know how little kids now of this generation are going to go through school. Be careful. Be careful. You know what else is against nature? Men who want little children. Pedophiles. Pedophiles. How? You know what natural affection is? You care for little children. You know, I care for my children, but I also care for the children in this church. Look, no pedophiles and no homosexuals are allowed in this church. Please. Do you love the children in this church or do you not? There are plenty of churches that will accept that, those kind of people. Let them go there. Keep the trash away from us. Let's protect the victims, protect the innocent. That's natural. Pedophiles. Man. They love to creep into churches. They love it. They love it. Because they think, well, church is a place where everyone just trusts each other. So I'm trying to warn you. God's given us these red flags. So if someone in church starts to have these red flags and you start to notice these things, come to me, please. I'm the pastor of this church. I'm accountable to this church. You start to see behavior that is just not natural. Let me know, please. We've got to do something about it. Or at least I'll preach some awesome sermon that will drive them away. Okay, if we start seeing these patterns developing someone. Psychopaths. You know, psychopaths, one of the main characteristics of a psychopath is someone who is unable to have empathy. They're unable to understand what other people are feeling. So because they can't understand what other people are feeling, they can't develop compassion to what other people. They're without feeling. They're without natural affections. Psychopaths. If you have someone that has a psychopath in your family, stay away from them. From such turn away. They're dangerous people. Homosexuals, pedophiles, psychopaths. This is not normal. Okay, this is not normal. I know the world's telling you it's normal. Accept it. No, it's not. Without getting too far down that track, back to 2 Timothy 3, please. But I want you to just keep in mind that God gave them over to a reprobate mind. We'll touch upon that a bit later as we keep going. We have to verse number 3. So without natural affection, truce breakers. Truce breakers. What's that? Well, what is a truce? A truce is usually if you're in conflict with someone. Let's say you go into war against another nation and you have an agreement where you go into ceasefire. You're going to stop fighting. That's a truce. So we might have a conflict and then we make peace. Say, look, let's just put that aside. We shouldn't be continuing this argument. Let's just forgive each other. Let's just move on with life and just try to be at peace. Yeah, these people will agree to a truce, but then they'll break that truce. You know, they'll agree, yeah, yeah, yeah, brother, no more fighting. And then all they want you to do is that you would stop attacking them and they'll continue attacking you. I've come across people. I didn't realise until I read the Bible. I had people like this. They would say, you know what? I have a conflict with someone, right? This was like obviously not so much as a pastor now because I'm much more mature than I used to be. But someone would say, oh, you know, Kevin, please forgive me for what I've done, but I still think you're an idiot. Am I supposed to forgive you or are you still attacking me? I don't know. Do you want a truce or do you want to keep fighting? What's the issue? Oh, I'm sorry, Kevin. I'm sorry, but you know, you're still X, Y and Z. You're still, what? Are we trying to have peace here or are you going to keep fighting? I don't understand. There's kind of this thing, oh, yeah, yeah, I'm all for truce, but they'll break it. That's another red flag. The next one there is false accusers. Have you ever been falsely accused? It doesn't feel very good, does it? False accusers are when allegations are made about others that are not true, okay? Have you ever been falsely accused for things and you just wonder why? Why has that been said about us? Why has that been shared? You know, generally, there must have been some misunderstanding. They must have misinterpreted something or they just hate your guts and they're just really lying against you. You know, sometimes, you know, again, I feel like I've matured in the Lord. I feel like I... False accusations don't really bother me that much anymore. I tell you now, when I was younger, they bothered me a lot and usually, your first instinct is to just go on the defence and defend yourself and defend your reputation and to combat, you know, but I've actually learnt over the years just to let it go, like let them falsely accuse you. I'm not saying that's always the solution. There is a time to defend yourself, don't get me wrong, but one thing I've just learnt that works really well, or just can let them and show them that it doesn't bother you, like, well, whatever, you can believe that about me if you want. It doesn't bother me. I'm going to go about my life and just serve the Lord. I mean, the Lord hears what they're saying about me and sometimes, when they see that you're not bothered by them, they'll make greater accusations, like crazy things that are just even more ridiculous than they were, just trying to get the attention, trying to bother you. What I found is that eventually, they get found out for what they are. Like, you don't even have to defend yourself. You don't even have to fight back. Just let them go. Let them talk. Let them accuse you. You know what? And just somehow, you just trust the Lord. Vengeance is yours, Lord. Like, I'm not in any immediate threat with these false accusations, so I'm just going to let them continue. I'm going to let them manifest, show themselves for the weaker people that they are. And the next one is incontinence in that list. Incontinence. Incontinence basically means lack in self-control, easily offended, you know, upset. They get upset and angry over the smallest issues. You know, you feel like you're walking on eggshells every time you come across someone. You're just uncomfortable. You're like, what am I going to say? Maybe I'll try to break the ice and tell a joke. It's like, just not self-control. Just, you know, you don't know how to deal with people. It's like no matter how you interact with them, they get offended. They get angry. They get upset. No matter what happens. Incontinent. Next one is fierce. Fierce means basically someone that is overly aggressive or violent or cruel. Okay, they just want to cause harm. They're very dangerous. Think of a fierce animal. Now, a fierce animal you kind of think would be just on the attack ready to go, ready to, you know, people can be this way too. Just waiting for an opportunity to attack and to hurt and to, you know, overly cruel. Verse number 14, sorry, not verse number 14. Next one, verse number three, sorry, but characteristic number 14. Despises of those that are good. I don't get that. Like, honestly, if you guys do good, if you do well and the Lord blesses you and rewards you, I am so happy for you. Honestly, if I just see someone, you know, you get a pay rise. You do well on your job. You know, someone gets married. Someone has their first child or has a second child. I'm so happy for you. I'm like so excited for you. You know, for you just doing well. You got soul and you win a soul. I'm excited for you. Praise God. Well done. Not really. When someone does good, it gives me joy because there's so much wickedness. So just to see someone do good makes me happy. But some people, when you do good, they'll hate you for it. You're not attacking them. You're not hurting them. You're not shoving it in their face. But you just do good and they hate you for it. It bothers them. It bothers them that you do good. Again, they'll mock your Christianity. They'll mock your faith. You know, they'll laugh at you for not drinking the alcohol. They'll laugh at you for not taking the drugs. They'll mock you for being a virgin, saving yourself for marriage. They'll laugh at you for being at church on Sundays and midweek services. You know, you do good and they hate you for it. Again, red flags after red flags. Look, I don't know how many red flags you need. Look, if you start to notice four or five of these things, I'm telling you at that point, you better step away from that person. You better break that friendship. Walk away. Okay, don't feel bad about it. God told you from such a turn away. God told you. Okay, just be obedient to the Lord. He knows. You know, and He gives us this list and He gives us this list because we don't always process these things very well. I've shared with you many times, I want to think the best of people and I think that's a good attitude to have but then it can blind me from other issues and so I need a list like this so I'm like, all right, Lord, what am I looking out for again? Oh, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Oh, wow. I've got to walk away from this person. Can you please turn to Proverbs 4, Proverbs 4, verse number 14. Proverbs 4, verse number 14. So when you do good, there are people that take it as a personal attack. It makes them feel horrible about themselves even though that's not your intention. It's not about them, is it? You're just doing good. You're trying to please the Lord. You're trying to do what's right in life. It took me a long time as a child to accept. There are people that are just so wicked and we'll read about here. Proverbs 4, verse number 14. Enter not into the path of the wicked and go not in the way of evil men. It's the same instruction from such turn away. Don't hang around these people. Verse number 15. Avoid it, pass not by it. Turn from it and pass away. I mean, look, one, two, three, four. Four away, avoid it, pass not by it, turn from it, pass away. I mean, surely one of these phrases will get to you and you, okay, better not hang around these people. Verse number 16. Look at these people. For they sleep not. They can't sleep except they have done mischief and the sleep is taken away unless they cause some to fall. They only sleep happy if they've made other people sin, other people to fall, other people to do wicked things. There are people like this in the world, believe it or not. I still have a hard time processing this. Verse number 17. For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence. Remember they're fierce? But the path of the just, and Brevin, this should be you, is as the shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day. You know what? Today you ought to be shining more than you did last week. Today you should be shining more than you did last year. More and more. And then verse number 19. The way of the wicked is as darkness. They know not at what they stumble. This is why they hate you. They love their darkness. And you come along, you're doing what's nice, you're doing what's good, you're just pleasing the Lord, but you're like the shining light in darkness. Have you ever just tried to go to sleep and there's just a light that's annoying you? Like, I want to be in darkness, I want to sleep, and the light's in your face. That's how you are to these people. And the more you do good, the more you'll look more like Christ, the brighter your shining will be, and the more you're going to annoy these wicked people. And they're just going to try to figure out how do we tear this person down? How do we get them to sin? How do we get them to destroy their testimony? Look from such turn away. Turn away from these people. Have nothing to do with them. God's telling you to do that. God will bless you for doing so. Back to 2 Timothy 3, verse number 4. Traitors, so one who betrays. They may befriend you just to backstab you. It's like Judas Iscariot. Try to be a friend to Jesus just to backstab him. Just to sell him out. Traitors, you know what traitor is. Let's keep going. Hedy? Hedy is someone that makes rash decisions. That's what it means. I don't really have to look up this word. I wasn't really familiar with it. But someone that makes rash decisions or is impulsive. Someone that's impulsive. They just make decisions like that bang. I hear from different people and be like, well my husband just decided to sell the house on me and I had no idea. And now we're living in the middle of Australia somewhere. That was a bit impulsive. You should have checked with your wife. You should have talked about it. Prayed about it together. The impulsive person does not think of the consequences of their actions. Because they care for themselves. It's just what I want. Just impulsive behaviour. It's like if I just turn around and this afternoon, guys are announcing I'm going to step down from the church. I'm just going to move to, what's a good place to move? Northern Territory with my family. By the way, kids, surprise. We're going to Northern Territory. And you guys can just work out church. Just sort it out. I'm impulsive. I'm not thinking about the consequences. I'm not caring about other people. Yeah, so that's heady. And then the next one is characteristic number 17. High-minded. High-minded is basically, again, being proud. Like I'm higher than the rest of you kind of thing, right? One who thinks very highly of themselves. And when I think of this, I think of someone where the Bible describes as the holier than thou. Holier than thou. I'm so holy. My family was so good. And you talk bad about other people in the church. Again, I've met people like this in church. I don't like it. You know what? If you're truly holy, praise God for you. Just please the Lord. Do that. You don't have to tear people. You know what? If you're truly holy, then you'll care for the people that are not at your level. And you'll try to encourage them and edify them and love them and support them. But these high-minded people, they tear other people down because they want to be seen as, you know. I hate it so much that I can't, maybe I don't know. Again, I'm just another man. I'm just another sinner. I'm another man just trying to do the best I can with what God has given me. I'm nothing special. The office of a pastor is special, you know, but me myself, I'm just anybody else for everyone, honestly. Just, you know, I did the best I could to keep the qualifications of a pastor. You know, gone through the process and just trying to serve the Lord as best as I can. But I said before, I'm not joking. I see you guys as better than me. You're God's people. You're God's children. You're part of the royal family. You're covered by the shed blood of Jesus Christ. You're righteous before Him. You know, to me it's just a privilege and honor to be able to serve you in the capacity as a pastor. You know, I don't like high-minded people holier than thou. You come across people like that and, I don't know, like my wife's not in church today because she's not feeling too well. You know, people in church sometimes are like, well, where's the pastor's wife? We're at church. Where is she? Yeah, and then when you're pregnant and you're having a hard time and now you know what it's really like, then you disappear and you're not saying anything. I'm not having to go to anyone here. I'm just saying, that's what happens. I'm not talking about my wife necessarily. Things that people say about pastors who have given sacrificially, who've done the best they can and are just human beings, you know. Pastors can be high-minded. Be careful not to elevate your pastor. What's the word? On a pedestal. Don't put your pastor on a pedestal. You know, we honor the office. Yeah, we honor the office. It's an office that, you know, God has instructed in His word. There's nothing wrong with the office. There's plenty wrong with the man behind the office. So high-minded. The next one there is lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God. Lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God. Now, obviously, we all like to be pleased. I think this needs to go together. Lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God. Because there are some people, like obviously when we come to church, we come to love God, to worship Him, to serve Him. The reason I became a pastor is because I love the Lord. I love my Lord. So I want to do the best I can for Him. But there are some people that will get into ministry, not because they love the Lord, but because they love pleasures. They get into the ministry because they see the dollar signs. They think this is one way to make money. Or this is one way to steal money. Or they want the title. They want to be seen as lifted up, as high and holy and all this high-mindedness. They want that authority. They want power. It's not loving the Lord. They don't get into the ministry for loving the Lord. There are many, many preachers, many, many pastors that are like this. To them, they get into the ministry for money, for authority, for power, for a title. I'm the pastor. Look at me. Or they see opportunities to take advantage of people. They see opportunities to commit fornication or adultery. Oh, you're having problems with your husband? Oh, yeah, come talk with me in the office privately. Even in independent fundamental Baptist churches. Again, the pedophiles. They love to get into the church and get into some position. Find, you know, win the trust of a family, gain access to children. Parents, be careful. We're never going to have Sunday school in this church. Never. You look after your own children, please. Look after your own children. This is Sunday school. It's Sunday and we're learning. This is Sunday school right here. What else? Verse number five. It says, having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof from such turn away. Having a form of godliness. Now, of course, we're commanded to live godly. We're commanded to live like, but these people have a form of godliness. Meaning, they're not really godly. You know what I'm saying? It's a show. It's pretend. I know. I've seen people like this. They come to church, hallelujah, praise God. You know, it's like, but your life is different. You know, you can say all the right words. You can put on the Christian show. But your life, once you learn about that person's life, it's like, what in the world? A form of godliness but denying the power thereof. So, they say one thing, they act one way, but their life has no power that they've spoken about. Again, this just happens in churches. It's like, you've got to put on the show, you've got to impress the pastor. You've got to show why you're the most righteous family in the church. I mean, I'll just be honest, it's happened in my churches. Oh, pastor, you don't know. My family, we never watch the television. Then why do your kids keep talking about TV shows they watch? I mean, kids are kind of like, they're a bit dangerous, aren't they? You've put on a show. Just don't say anything. Why? Why even show off? Why do you need the praise of men? Why do you need a form of godliness but denying the power thereof? That's what I think of. I think of someone that says and puts on a show, but their life is completely opposite. Or you start to see the cracks, you see the lies. They praise God for this and that, but it's not even true in their life. I'm not against TV. Just be careful of the shows you watch. There's plenty of no good, it's very few and very few things that are worthy of watching, but just be careful. Just be careful, you know. You don't have to show off. You don't have to put on a form of godliness. Why don't you just realise the Christian life is little by little, line upon line, precept upon precept, improve yourself gradually. And then it says in verse number six. For of this sort are they which creep into houses. When people just show up to your house uninvited, that better be a red flag to you. Why are they here? Why did they just turn up? Look, I understand in the old days when the telephone, we just had one telephone in the house, right? But today there are so many ways to communicate. So many ways to communicate. Like I understand you're passing by and you've not seen a friend for so long in the old days and you can't communicate very well. And you're like, you know, let's just pass by and say hello. We haven't seen them in a long time. I understand that. But today there's no excuses. To these people they love to creep into houses. They want to overstep their boundaries. They want to get in your face. They want to tell you how to run your life. I don't want to do that. Come to church, I'll preach the Bible. Okay. And by the way, having a form of godliness but not the power of what we saw before. You say pastor, you do that all the time. You're constantly preaching of God's word but your life is not always perfect and you're right. You know, when I get behind this pulpit, I'm not preaching Kevin's standard here. We're preaching the Bible without compromise. And guess what? When we do that there are going to be times in my life that I don't measure up to what I'm preaching. Why would you want to come to church and meet Kevin's standard? We want God's standards. We want what God says. We're going to hear it. And sometimes I offend myself. Do you believe that? I do. Sometimes I'm like, I'm preaching this but I know I fail in this area. But I'm going to preach anyway because it's God's word. It needs to be said. It needs to be heard. But yeah, if I was just preaching my standards and then like, yeah, of course that would be a form of God. I don't want a form of godliness. We want to hear the truth of God's word. We want to hear what is godly, what is right, what is holy. Man, if I could only preach on the things that I'm right on, I'm not going to be hearing much Bible. I would just be telling you the stories and jokes and a lot of churches are like that by the way. A lot of stories and jokes. Just tell people what God says. But anyway, I went back. Creep into houses. Why do they creep into houses? To lead captive, silly women laden with sins. They're trying to find the vulnerable woman, the silly woman, led away with diverse lusts. Look, some people are just so wicked. They want to walk into a house. They want to run the show and they want to take other men's wives or daughters. This should be a red flag to you immediately. Someone wants to overstep into your boundaries, overstep your mark. Again, we're getting worse and worse and worse and worse. Okay, so we keep going through this list. Look, you need to learn to say no to people. Oh, I'll just turn up to your house. No, no thanks. You have to. Because they'll keep it. I want to go, I want to go, I want to go. Look, stay away from me. That's a big red flag. I want to think well of you. But if you keep pressuring yourself to be at my house, I'm thinking bad of you now. What do you want? Trying to find some weakness in my family. Trying to find some vulnerability, some leverage that you can use against the pastor or some leverage you can use against some other family in the church. Be careful. Be careful, brethren. It's in God's Word for a reason. Yeah? Oh, I just mean well. Well then, wait for an invitation before you enter someone's life. So again, we're at the end of verse number six. Leave captive silly women laden with sins, let away with diverse lusts. That's why people get into the ministry, you know. They think they've got power. They think they can just enter someone's family and just take whatever they want. Horrible, horrible people in the ministry. Horrible pastors. Horrible pastors, brethren. Be careful. Just because they're an independent, fundamental, Baptist, King James only doesn't mean it's a good man behind the pulpit. Just believe it, please. If you've been around churches long enough, you know what I'm saying is true. I'm never going to invite myself over to your house. I know how serious it is. I never want to privately consult your wives. Man, you better be there. And if a wife has said something to me, the men know that I've gone back to tell you. I want nothing. The only woman I'm going to talk privately to is my wife. Verse number seven. This is really scary as well. Ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Now, I want to read verse number eight, but it says here, Now as Jannes and Jambres, we've stood Moses, so do these also resist the truth. It's not they don't have the truth. They resist it. Okay? They're never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. And I've got so many examples that I can think about in my life and so can you. Some of you have shared with me. Where, you know, someone's messed up in the gospel or they're messed up on who God is. They're messed up on just black and white, fundamental, important, most important things. And you show someone, look, salvation's by grace through faith on the finished work of Christ alone. All you need to do is trust what Christ has done for you. Call upon the name of the Lord and thou shall be saved. And they kind of get it, oh man, this whole time I thought it was works. And you're like, praise God, they finally see it. Then you go and talk to that person a month later. And they're like, yeah, I still think you've got to do the works. And look, that first time it's alright. Okay, well let me go through that again. Let me just make sure maybe the first time it wasn't clear, I can understand that. Okay? And you go through it again and you go through it again. It's like, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You see them a month later, you know what, no, I still think I've got to do my works to get saved. Have you ever come across people like that? It's scary. They never, like, the simplicity of Christ, they just can't even see what's simple. They resist the truth. I've really, there's one family I'm thinking about that we used to visit them, you know, kids used to play with their kids and, you know, and like, I just want to have family. I don't always want to talk about the Bible. I mean, the Bible's good, but, you know, I'm also interested in life and what are you up to and, you know, how the kids go in and talk about other things as well, not always God's word, but every time we go and visit, it's like, I just want to check with the gospel again with you. And I still think the Bible's, what about this verse in the Bible? This one sounds like you can lose your salvation. Well, I'll explain that. Alright, well, now that I explained that, you get it? Okay, cool, cool. Let's talk about other things now. And then we visit again. It's like, you know, I still don't get salvation. Can you please, like, what? Are you sure you don't have to, like, clean up your life? No, look, let me show you these verses again. And then you go and it's like, you know what? Salvation by belief alone, faith alone in Christ, I can't accept that. And I turn around to Christian and say, look, we're not visiting this family anymore. They're ever learning, never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. I just don't get it. They resist the truth. They've heard the truth, but they don't want it. And again, I don't get this. I don't understand that mentality, but again, another red flag. Again, worse and worse and worse and worse. This person is not saved. Only the man, only the spiritual man can understand the deep things of God. Only a believer with the help of the Holy Spirit can open God's Word and understand it. If you can't understand salvation after it's been explained again and again and a person keeps resisting and resisting and resisting, brethren, that's a scary time. Never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Do you believe that? There is something that can never get saved. There will never be God's people because they resist the truth. Look at verse 8 again. Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth. Now, I've got the final two points here. Sorry for going over time. Men of corrupt minds, so their minds are corrupted. Okay, dishonest, impure, no integrity is kind of the idea there. And then finally, reprobate. Remember that word reprobate? We looked at Romans chapter 1, the homosexuals. It said that God gave them over to a reprobate mind. Reprobate concerning the faith. Reprobate concerning the faith. Now I'll quickly read to you from Jeremiah chapter 6 verse 30. It gives us the definition of reprobate. Jeremiah 6 verse 30 says reprobate silver shall men call them because the Lord hath rejected them. Does God reject people? Yeah, that's what reprobate means. They first rejected God. They first resisted the truth. Okay, then God says alright. Whatever that line is, whatever that line looks like for God, I don't know. I'm not going to pretend I know exactly what that line is. But at some point God says alright. Now I'm giving you over to a reprobate mind. You're rejected by me. Look at that sentence again. Reprobate concerning the faith. So concerning the faith, they are rejected. What must we do to be saved? Must have our faith on the Lord Jesus Christ. They are rejected from having their faith on Christ. They cannot believe. Not that Jesus did not pay for their sins. Of course he did. He paid for the sins of the whole world. Not that God has not given them opportunities to get saved, to hear the gospel. But they rejected God. So God rejected them. And brethren, homosexuals, pedophiles, these people without natural affections, we saw in Romans chapter 1, they've been given over to a reprobate mind. They are reprobate. We should have nothing to do with such people. From such turn away. I don't care if it's your uncle. I don't care if it's your cousin. I don't care if it's your nephew. Have nothing to do with such people. That is the biggest red flag on this list. That is the only red flag you need if you know someone's like this. They cannot believe. God's rejected them. I've never heard this before. The Bible's full of this information. Really, when you think about it. It really is. I mean, remember, if a man blasphemes against the Holy Ghost, what does the Bible say? That he won't be forgiven in the world to come. There are certain things that somebody can do where God says, alright, I'm done with you. You are so wicked. You've rejected me too many times. I'm done with you. And the by-product for a lot of people, not everybody, but a lot of people is the LGBT community. They are reprobate. They've been given over to unnatural lusts. Their mind has become reprobate. They're reprobate concerning the faith. They can't even believe. Not that they can't understand it. They just can't believe it. They're reprobate concerning the faith. And then last verse there, in verse number nine. But they shall proceed no further. For their folly shall be manifest unto all men as theirs also was. Verse number nine is important. Because you may come across someone like this on this list with multiple red flags. And you'll be like, I've got to take this person down. I've got to do something to stop this person. You know what? God says from such turn away. The best thing for you is to just get yourself away from that person completely. And leave it in God's hands. Because in verse number nine it says, They shall proceed no further. For their folly shall be manifest unto all men. They will eventually show themselves to everybody that they are wicked, depraved, people that nobody should have anything to do with them. They're going to destroy their own reputation. Destroy their own name. You leave it in God's hands. You leave the vengeance unto the Lord. And you just turn away and say, Lord, I'm leaving it in your hands. That's the best thing. Don't go and start fighting against these people. Hey, they're fierce. They're truce breakers. They're without natural affection. You can't deal with these people. Leave it in God's hands. You just turn away. So Brevin, I'm preaching this as a warning to you. The title was 23 Toxic Character Traits. Look, you notice one little thing in the early list. Don't worry about it too much. We're all sinners. But you start to notice a pattern. And especially as it gets toward the end, these great-ass things. Please be alert. Be aware. Okay, don't be naïve like I've been much of my life. There are people that are excessively wicked, seeking to hurt you, and the only right thing, even though it may not seem like the right thing, but God has instructed you from such a turn away. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, I want to thank you for this list of characteristics, Lord, that you've helped us to just be able to determine and make the best decisions we can. Lord, we are friends and family and people that we may be associated with from time to time. God, give us wisdom, Lord. Lord, it's hard for us because we don't have your knowledge. We don't know men's hearts, Lord, and we don't even know our own hearts sometimes. So, Lord, I just pray that you'd instruct us and, Lord, give us the... Lord, we don't want to just reject everybody, Lord, that has some weird tendencies, Lord, but, Lord, that you just help us to be able to know when we should be a friend, when we should be loyal, when we should have mercy toward people, but also, Lord, when we should just turn away and have nothing to do with certain people. Lord, we need your wisdom, and, Lord, thank you so much for your word for guiding us into all truth. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, please take your hymnals. My apologies for going over time. 303, please. 303. It was 23 points. Not too bad. But hymn number 303. I don't know if that's the one I wanted to sing, but anyway. My faith looks up to thee, hymn number 303. My faith looks up to thee. My faith looks up to thee, Thou Lamb of Calvary, Savior divine. Now hear me while I pray, take all my guilt away. O let me from this day be holy, from this day be holy divine. May thy rich grace impart strength to my fainting heart, my zeal inspire, as thou hast died for me. O may my love to thee grow old and change, bless me, I live in fire. While life's dark days I tread, and graves around me spread, be thou my guide. Did doctors turn today, wipe sorrow's tears away? O let me ever stray from thee aside, when hands life's friends would dream, when death's cold silent stream shall o'er me roll. Bless Savior then in love, fear, and his trust's river, O bear be safe above our ransomed soul.