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Today's are filled with sorrow and care Hearts are lonely and drear Burdens are lifted at Calvary Jesus is very near Burdens are lifted at Calvary Calvary Calvary Burdens are lifted at Calvary Jesus is very near Cast your care on Jesus today Leave your worry and fear Burdens are lifted at Calvary Jesus is very near Burdens are lifted at Calvary Calvary Calvary Burdens are lifted at Calvary Jesus is very near Troubles so the Savior can see Every heartache and tear Burdens are lifted at Calvary Jesus is very near Burdens are lifted at Calvary Calvary Calvary Burdens are lifted at Calvary Jesus is very near Okay, let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. Lord Father God, Lord, we thank you for giving us a church to attend. We thank you for the salvation that we've seen today, Lord God. We ask that you fill Pastor Shelley with your spirit. We ask that you bless the rest of this night and the rest of this week, Lord. We love you. We thank you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. All right, if you would please turn your handles to page 439. Count your blessings. That's page 439. Count your blessings. That's page 439. When upon life's billows you are tempest-tossed, When you are discouraged thinking all is lost, Count your many blessings, name them one by one, And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done. Count your blessings, name them one by one, Count your blessings, see what God has done. Count your blessings, name them one by one, Count your many blessings, see what God hath done. Are you ever burdened with a load of care? Does the cross seem heavy? You are called to bear. Count your many blessings, every doubt will fly, And you will be singing as the days go by. Count your blessings, name them one by one, Count your blessings, see what God hath done. Count your blessings, name them one by one, Count your many blessings, see what God hath done. When you look at others with their lands and gold, You will find that Christ has promised you his wealth untold, Count your many blessings, money cannot buy, Your reward in heaven or your home on high. Count your blessings, see what God has done, Count your blessings, see what God hath done. Count your blessings, name them one by one, Count your many blessings, see what God had done. So amid the conflict, whether great or small, do not be discouraged. God is over all. Count your many blessings, angels will attend. Help and comfort give you to the journeys end. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your blessings, see what God had done. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your many blessings, see what God had done. Thank you so much for going to Steadfast Baptist Church. If you don't already have a bulletin, you need another one, just slip up your hand real quick. One of our ushers can come by and get you guys a bulletin. Looks like over here in the corner. We also have the announcement about the congratulations to brother Nicholas and Kim Faye Kenyiri on the birth of their daughter, Madeline Castilian. She was born October 28 at 4 21 PM, weighing seven pounds three ounces and measuring 18 inches long. So congratulations to them. That's really exciting. Almost finishing John 1 on the inside, we have our service. And so many times, as well as church stats, I'm going to see, is there any soul winning by chance that did not get reported? Two, there's soul winning captain that you need to get reported, just FYI. All right, one, okay. Who's that with? Okay, yeah. Anything else? Is that three? Was that your family? Okay. All right, keep up the good work on soul winning. Please, also, if you want to do extra soul winning, just please remind our soul winning captains and leaders of your totals and help them to capture that data correctly. Also, we have our list of expecting ladies. Please pray for them. We have our prayer list, our baby shower in honor of the coolies and their baby girl from 12.30 to 2.30 on November 19th. They're registered at Walmart if you'd like to get a gift. And then also the RSVP to Mrs. Milstud, please, just so that she can prepare for the event. If you'd like to bring a potluck dish or anything else to share, that would be also encouraged. Just please let us know. Texas chili cook-off tomorrow, and that is going to happen 5.30 if you want to be entered in the competition, bring your chili. We'll probably, we won't start eating until about six, just FYI. And all the young single guys will be right in line at 6.00, so I'm just kidding. And then also, we will have the competition, and then we're also just gonna have fun, fellowship. If you'd like to bring a card game, board game, or something like that, and dessert to share, please do. On the back, we have the church reminders. Please no running in the church for any reason unless you're told to by Pastor Shelley. That's your exception, okay? If I say run, you run, all right? No, I'm just kidding. Run for us, no. No playing on the stage. Children must be under the supervision of their parents at all times. The mother baby room is for birth to two years. And then specifically what that means is just the area for them to walk around and crawl in. We just want to make a safe space for them. And if you have older children, you can still take them in there with you if you need to. Of course, we don't want you to not be able to have your children with you. Please make them sit and pay attention to the service. Also, children should not be in the mother baby room if they're not with their mother at all times. Children are not allowed to be in the ice machine at any time or refrigerator. Please, if they need something, have a parent assist them. Or even just an usher. Ask an usher if you need something. Gliders are for nursing and pregnant mothers. Specifically, please don't even sit next to it unless you have a family member that is using it. Children should not be roaming the church during the service for any reason. And the church staff and ushers who are going to help us enforce those rules just to make sure our church is safe and is running smoothly. Arlington Soul Waning Blitz. We had 44 soul owners and 16 salvation, that is great. So praise the Lord for people that want to go out there and preach the gospel. And lots of opportunity to still get a lot of people saved. We had our Sunday Sundays today. And man, we had a packed house. We had a lot of people going soul-waning. And I'm really encouraged by that. And apparently I just need to give y'all treats and tricks and stuff and then you'll go out there and go soul-waning. Texas chili cock off tomorrow. November 5th is the music recital. November 10th is the Matamoros soul-waning trip. And we should have a sign-up sheet. Please do that because I need to book Airbnb's probably this week and start getting all the housing arrangements and everything set up. And then make sure we have our travel plans locked in. So you need to get that done tonight if you haven't already. So that way we can get it all planned. November 19th is the baby shower. November 23rd is Thanksgiving dessert fellowship. December 2nd, ladies Christmas party. I think that's pretty much all I have as far as announcements are concerned. Let's go ahead and go to our third song. We're gonna do a Psalm 147. Follow along in a little separate handout. Psalm 147, sing it out. Again, that's Psalm 147. 147. ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] ["Praise the Lord"] 1 John chapter three. That's 1 John chapter three. 1 John chapter three, the Bible reads, "'Behold, what manner of love the Father "'had bestowed upon us, that we should be called "'the sons of God. "'Therefore the world knoweth us not "'because it knew Him not. "'Beloved, now are we the sons of God, "'and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, "'but we know that when He shall appear, "'we shall be like Him, "'for we shall see Him as He is. "'And every man that hath this hope in Him "'purifyeth himself, even as He is pure. "'Whosoever committh sin transgresseth also the law, "'for sin is the transgression of the law. "'And ye know that He was manifested "'to take away our sins, and in Him is no sin. "'Whosoever abideth in Him, sinneth not. "'Whosoever sinneth hath not seen Him, "'neither known Him. "'Little children, let no man deceive you. "'He that doeth righteousness is righteous, "'even as He is righteous. "'He that committh sin is of the devil, "'for the devil sinneth from the beginning. "'For this purpose, the Son of God was manifested "'that He might destroy the works of the devil. "'Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin, "'for His seed remaineth in Him, "'and He cannot sin because He is born of God. "'In this, the children of God are manifest "'in the children of the devil. "'Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, "'neither he that loveth not his brother. "'For this is the message that ye heard "'from the beginning, that we should love one another, "'not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, "'and slew his brother. "'And wherefore slew he him, "'because his own works were evil, "'and his brother's righteous. "'Marvel not, my brethren, if the world hates you. "'We know that we have passed from death unto life, "'because we love the brethren. "'He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. "'Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer, "'and ye know that no murderer "'had the eternal life abiding in him. "'Hereby perceive we the love of God, "'because he laid down his life for us, "'and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. "'But whoso hath this world's good, "'and seeth his brother have need, "'and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, "'how dwelleth the love of God in him? "'My little children, let us not love in word, "'neither in tongue, but indeed and in truth. "'And hereby we know that we are of the truth, "'and shall assure our hearts before him. "'For if our heart condemn us, "'God is greater than our heart, "'and knoweth all things. "'Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, "'then have we confidence toward God. "'And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, "'because we keep his commandments "'and do those things that are pleasing in his sight. "'And this is his commandment, "'that we should believe on the name of his Son, "'Jesus Christ, and love one another, "'as he gave us commandment. "'And he that keepeth his commandments "'dwelleth in him, and he in him. "'And hereby we know that he abideth in us, "'by the Spirit which he hath given us. "'Let us pray.'" Father God, we thank you for this opportunity to be in your house today. We pray that you just will bless the congregation and their families and our pastor and their families. And we just pray that you'll fill Pastor Shelley with your Holy Spirit and help him to articulate the passage here as he's planned. And we just thank you so much for the fruitful harvest yesterday with the soul-wanting marathon and also all the souls that were one today. And we thank you for your Son's precious blood and the free gift of salvation. And we pray these things in Jesus' name, amen. So the part of the passage I want to look at is here in verse number four, where the Bible says, whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law, for sin is the transgression of the law. And we have a really interesting phrase here at the latter part, kind of defining for us what sin even is. What is sin? And according to the Bible, sin is transgressing the law. And specifically, the law is whatever God says. Now, we have a lot of times in the Bible the word law is used and it references different things. And what I mean by that is kind of similar to the Trinity is, you know, we talk about God, we could be talking about the Father, we could be talking about the Son, we could be talking about the Holy Ghost. And even in some cases, the word God is used to denote false gods, it'll talk about a false god or it'll talk about the God of this world that's talking about the devil. So just like the word God can have a lot of different connotations, the word law also can have a lot of different connotations. Sometimes when we talk about the law, we're talking about just like the first five books of the Bible. We're talking about the Torah, which is, you know, the Hebrew word for law. It's not really a special mystical word, it just means law. Other times when we say law, it's simply just referring to a rule or a commandment or instruction from someone. Many times it's obviously God that we're talking about the law of God. But there could be laws of man, there could be laws of a particular individual. The law is just simply what's been stated as the rules, as the instructions. And when we think about sin itself, and I've kind of elaborated this on one of my Wednesday night sermons, but I want to explain this even more. When we talk about what is a sin, we have to realize that there's a difference between things that are inherently sinful and things that are sinful simply because they've been told to us not to do. There is a rule or a statute in place that causes it to be sinful. Now, the title of my sermon this evening is this, Inherently Sinful, Inherently Sinful. And really the goal of this sermon is to kind of help understand what sin is and what sin is not and how the Bible defines sin. Now, of course, the Bible defines it as whatever God told us. And really what you have to understand is that sin, most of the time, I find, is contextual, meaning that it is not an inherently sinful action. But there are some things that are inherently sinful. Now, what does inherently mean? It's kind of a bigger word. Intrinsically, okay, what does intrinsically mean? That didn't help me, Pastor Shelley. It means by nature or the constitution of a thing, to get an even more elaborate definition, it's more of the structure or composition of something. So to kind of give it in more layman's terms, something that's inherently sinful means that it's a physical act that is just sinful regardless of the context, regardless of how you define what's happening or the circumstances of that particular event. It's just something that should never be done, ever. And so that would be something that's inherently sinful. And what's surprising is how much sin in the Bible, like how many sinful things, the physical act is not actually sinful. It's just the circumstances or the context upon which makes it sinful. And of course, this is really important because it helps for us understanding that God views sin as usually more of an issue of the heart than just a list of rules of just things you just shouldn't physically do, okay? Now, I wanna go to a few places in the Bible. Let's figure out what's inherently sinful. Go to Leviticus chapter 20. Now we'll find out what's just inherently sinful. And look, you say, why are you going there? Honestly, because there's not very many sins that are inherently sinful. But there are some for sure, okay? So let's go ahead and explain some things that are just wrong, period. There's not a way to excuse it. There's not a way to try and pretend like, well, just if you love each other, then it doesn't matter. Look at Leviticus chapter 20, verse 13. The Bible says, if a man also lie with mankind as he lies with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination. They shall surely be put to death. Their blood shall be upon them. Notice in this verse, there is no explanation as far as motive, desire, willingness. Oh, well, what two adults do consenting in their own bedroom is no matter of concern to me. That's not what the Bible said. The Bible is just saying, hey, this is just gross. This is just wrong. This is just off limits. And so there's no way to contextualize this sin. This sin is an example of a sin that's just wrong all the time. It's always wrong. It's always been wrong. And it always will be wrong. It's not Old Testament. It's all Testament. It's every Testament. It's just always evil. It's just always satanic. Other things like that, look at verse 15. And if a man lie with beast, he shall surely be put to death and he shall slay the beast. Now, some people say like, oh, you're trying to say that those things are connected. Well, the Bible has them really close to each other, number one. And number two, the person that would do either of these is most likely willing to do the other. Like the same people that would do the one usually do the other or willing or don't think it's a big deal. It's all the same gross junk. But let me say this again. Here's another sin. Beastiality is not a sin upon which context matters. It is inherently sinful. Y'all are starting to figure out what we're talking about. Inherently sinful, just meaning it's always wrong. Look at verse 17. And if a man shall take his sister, his father's daughter or his mother's daughter and see your nakedness and she shall see his nakedness, it is a wicked thing and they shall be cut off in the sight of their people. He hath uncovered his sister's nakedness, he shall bear his iniquity. So you know, I don't care what laws New Jersey has, it's still inherently sinful. Okay, it's always wrong. I usually make fun of Kentucky, but I found out New Jersey's way worse, okay, folks? New Jersey is the incest. You know, you always like, why is New Jersey and New York so pro-incest? It's called Judaism. That's what it is, really, okay? And Judaism always brings the worst sin. But these are three examples of things that are just always wrong. Being with your sister or some close family member in that kind of relationship is just, you know, according to the Bible, it's like inherently sinful. Now, I will say this. This latter example is not quite like the first two in this context. There is a context in which this would have been sin prior to this commandment being given, okay? So there was a small timeline where this wasn't, but from then until now, now it's just inherently sinful, okay? So I wanna help, that's kind of like our sin to kind of bridge our gap. Now go over to 1 Corinthians chapter 11. The first two, there was never a time when it was even kind of possible to be right. This third one, it's now just wrong, period. But, and it's not like, well, now in the New Testament it's okay. No, pretty much once this commandment was given, it was always wrong. But wasn't there a time, technically speaking, when Adam and Eve conceived and they had children and they don't really have anyone else to marry and so they're forced to marry their sister? Now, here's the thing. Back then, it wouldn't have been as gross because there's not really anything to compare it to, right? I mean, obviously you're the first son and the first daughter. It's not like there's all these other options. It's not as weird, it's not as gross or whatever back then. And eventually it gets to the point where human population gets to a point where now God's just saying, hey, that's off limits. This shouldn't be the case. And of course we realize that that is no longer the situation. Even Noah's ark, I mean, if you think about it, even at that point, all the couples are already married and so they don't have to go down that road again. It's kind of like a one-time thing, a unique exception in essence. But you say, well, why is it an exception? Because God didn't tell Adam and Eve and his children that they weren't allowed to marry each other. So when did this thing become sinful? This particular sin became sinful when God gave this commandment. Before it was not a sin. Now it's a sin, and now it's a sin forever, okay? Sodomy, when did that become sinful? It was always sinful, okay? So that one's just inherently sinful. It was just always wrong. It was just always evil. So we kind of have this idea of something that is kind of inherently sinful now, but there was a point where you could contextualize it. So maybe it's not entirely inherently sinful, but the first two are for sure, inherently sinful. Now again, here's another sin that you would think of as being inherently sinful, but it's kind of like that first one where there's examples or there's circumstances where it's not. Now 1 Corinthians 11 is a chapter about hair length, and the Bible makes it real clear men should have short hair and women should have long hair. But look at 1 Corinthians 11 verse 13. Judging yourselves, is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered? Does not even nature itself teach you? That if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him. But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her, for a hair is given her for a covering. So according to the Bible, women should have long hair. But I wanna go back, go back to Deuteronomy now, all the way back to Deuteronomy and look at chapter 21, Deuteronomy chapter 21. Obviously, no baby comes out of the womb having long hair. I mean, what is a baby girl gonna do about this? Some baby girls do, okay, but most of them don't have really any hair. Some have a decent amount of hair. But virtually speaking, no baby comes out with long hair. So that's something that she has to grow into, right? So is it really a sin for a baby to not have long hair if she's a baby girl? No, of course not. That would be silly, okay? And someone that tries to think that is like probably a Pharisee or something, okay? Or a weirdo or a freak. But is it lawful, or was there a circumstance or a context in which a woman would have short hair? Well, look what the Bible says in Deuteronomy 21, verse number 12. Then thou shalt bring her home to thine house, and she shall shave her head and pare her nails. Actually, the Bible has God literally commanding women to shave their entire head based on a specific context. It was a foreigner that they took over and they're taking this woman, they like her, they wanna make her his wife. And so they had to get rid of all of her hair for a time being. It was still a shame, but obviously God's permitting it. So you have to understand that even having short hair for a woman is a contextual sin, in the sense that it depends on the circumstance. Now, most women here are not a captive of their husband, okay? They willingly marry their husband, they're not a foreigner, so this wouldn't necessarily apply. So now, of course, that's not really the case. What about an older lady, her hair started falling out or doing whatever, you know, that's for her own discretion to decide what she's gonna do. What about a cancer patient, you know? Obviously there's gonna be circumstances, there's gonna be a situation in which a woman cannot perform this particular action, and so therefore it's not an inherently sinful action, it's a contextually sinful action, okay? Go to Hebrews chapter 13. This is similar to a lot of other sins, you know? The Bible, I believe the first commandment that we read in the Bible is to be fruitful and multiply. But some people just aren't able to have children, some people are just sterile or infertile or something like that, or maybe they can't have many children. I don't think that you're in sin because you can't do that action that God's wanting you to do. Now, of course, what would be sinful is not trying. What would be sinful with women not having long hair is them not trying to have long hair, right? So of course, you have to understand that God is gonna speak in an ideal manner and give you the standard, but then based on the circumstance and the situation, you know, he's not gonna hold something against you that's out of your control. You know, that's not how the Bible works. How about other sins in the Bible? How about a man, John Doe and Jane Doe, this is a woman, and they decide to have carnal relations? Well, whether or not this action is a sin is dependent upon the context of these people. If they're unmarried, it's fornication. If one is married, but not to the other person, it's adultery. If they're both married, it's adultery. If they're both married but to each other, there's no problem. But here's the thing, the physical action is the exact same. It's the same person, the same girl, doing the same thing, but for whatever reason, the thing that makes it different is the context around it. And look at what it says in Hebrews 13, verse number four. Just to make this clear, marriage is honorable in all, and the bed undefiled, but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge. So according to the Bible, it's not that, oh, well, we love each other, is the issue of whether or not it's sin. It's not whether you like each other. It's what makes it a sin or not is if you're married or not. That's it. And it's interesting because if you think about it from an atheist perspective, marriage wouldn't even make any sense because it's all the exact same actions. It's all the same things. Why is it that it's different? It's because we don't live in a atheistic world. That world doesn't exist. We live in a world with God, and we all have in our hearts written the law of God, and we all know there's a difference between committing fornication and being married to someone. And just like Adam and Eve felt no shame when they were alone in the garden, unclothed, is the same way that a husband and a wife feel, whereas those who are not married know there's something wrong with it. There's something going on in the conscience. There's something going on in the mind. They know there's something wrong. So again, it's not that that action is inherently sinful. According to the Bible, it's a great blessing. It's a wonderful thing if it's in the right context, if it's in the right circumstance. So we see here that God blesses. Go to 1 Timothy 4. If you're right here, just flip back left a little bit. So we're kind of reading. And look, this is an important understanding because it'll help you distinguish the difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament. It'll help you understand what's right and what's wrong. And it'll also help you realize that God is more interested in the motivations of your heart than a bunch of physical actions. You know, God didn't put us on here to just be robots and just do physical actions. No, it's always the circumstance in the context around those actions that matter. God is more concerned with your heart than anything else. That's the only thing that really matters. And most sins, apart from a few really vile ones, are really only sinful based on the context. It's not an inherently sinful action. Most of the very inherently sinful actions are limited to the most vile, disgusting, reprobate type things that a normal person would never do anyways, okay? Here's one that's interesting. First Timothy chapter four, look at verse four. For every creature of God is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving. For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. Now go back to Leviticus chapter number 11. Go back to Leviticus chapter 11. So what is the Bible saying when he says every creature of God is good? It's in the context of the fact that in the Old Testament there was dietary restrictions that were imposed upon the children of Israel and those dietary restrictions were of a symbolic nature. They had a symbolic significance. Because you have to understand when Noah got off the ark, God told him he could eat all the creatures. So it wasn't like eating a particular animal is inherently sinful, otherwise God would have never let Noah do it. And he would never let us do it. So there's nothing wrong with eating certain creatures on this earth. But at a particular time in history, it was a sin for you to eat a particular animal. And in Leviticus chapter number 11, it gives us a lot of different animals. But I want to kind of focus on one for just a second. Probably one of the tastiest of the animals, okay? Now I want to look at verse number seven. The Bible says, The swine, though he divide the hoof, and be cloven footed, yet he cheweth not the cud he has uncleaned you. So according to the Bible, in this verse you are not allowed to eat bacon. You're not allowed to eat sausage, no ham, no pork chops, nothing. And I've actually heard a New Testament preacher get up and preach on this, preach real hard on this, Joel Osteen. You think I'm joking? Joel Osteen got up and preached that you shouldn't eat pork, and that you shouldn't eat swine. Now in First Timothy four, the Bible says that some people would teach this. It's a doctrine of devils, though. Isn't it interesting? The one thing that Joel Osteen preaches against is the one thing you don't have to preach against. It's like, he's like, I got enough courage to preach against something this morning, and then you preach against bacon? Come on, buddy. Like, what kind of world are you trying to run here? It's like, I almost got on board with Joel Osteen until he preached against bacon. Now here's the thing. I had bacon this afternoon, okay? A lot of it, it was good. Who had bacon today, all right? I see. Now, who felt bad about eating that bacon? Exactly, exactly. Why? Because it wasn't a sin. There was nothing wrong with it. And you're like, well, wait a minute. The Bible says don't eat swine. Yeah, because here's the thing. There's a different context. We're in the New Testament, and God said, hey, those dietary restrictions no longer apply. Every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving, for it's sanctified by the word of God in prayer. So according to the Bible, you know what? I don't have any problem eating bacon. You know, I never eat bacon and feel like kind of weird about it, or kind of off about it, or like I did something bad. Why? Because it's not inherently sinful, folks. And what makes it sin is the context around that particular instruction, that particular commandment. So go back to the New Testament. Go back to Hebrews, chapter number nine. Go back to Hebrews, chapter nine. That's an important illustration. Now, of course, we could spend all day explaining this, going back and forth and looking at all the different commandments, but I want you to realize the principles here so then you yourself can figure out what's right and what's wrong, what's sin and what's not sin, or understanding what's clean and unclean. You know, we're supposed to examine the animal and look at his hoof and how he ate his diet to determine if it was right or wrong. And just in that same type of precise manner, we too are supposed to evaluate our lives and the decisions that we make and say, oh wait, this isn't chewing the cud. You know, hey, it's dividing the hoof, but it's not chewing the cud. You know, what is that picture? What is chewing the cud even picture? Reading the Bible. You know, of course, it's kind of like meditating on the word of God, thinking about the word of God. So the swine was a dirty animal because he didn't have any Bible. And it makes me think of modern day Christianity, which is a bunch of swine because frankly speaking, hey, yeah, they separate themselves in the sense that they divide themselves, they go to church, but you know what? They don't have any Bible. They don't know any Bible and they don't live by any Bible. And so they're really just the same as the world. They're still just as disgusting and unclean as the world because they don't have the cud. They're not chewing the cud. They're not chewing the word of God. And so that's not something I'm gonna have fellowship with is swine, spiritually speaking. Of course, if he's cooked and put on my burger, you know, I'm gonna have a lot of fellowship with that. Okay? Hebrews chapter number nine, look at verse number eight. The Holy Ghost, this signifying that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing, which was a figure for the time then present in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices that could not make him that did the service perfect as pertaining to the conscience, which stood only in meats and drinks and divers washings and carnal ordinances imposed on them until the time of reformation. But Christ being come and high priest of good things to come by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say not of this building, neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. So the book of Hebrews is written in the context of two Jews, or the Hebrews, because they had a sacrificial system that they used to observe in the Old Testament. And the author of Hebrews is trying to explain to them, hey, we don't have to do that anymore. All of that was just to lead us up to the time of reformation. And you say, what's the time of reformation? Well, look what it says in verse number 11. But Christ being come. So what is it that changed or reformed the Old Testament was the gospel of Jesus Christ and how he performed all of those pictures, all of the Old Testament sacrifices and all the blood atonement and all the different things that were going on, the fact that he's the priest, entering in the high place, offering blood on the mercy seat, all of that was fulfilled in Jesus Christ when he literally took his blood up into heaven and sprinkled it on the mercy seat. And so he did that for us one time. So now all of those different rules found in the Old Testament are no longer imposed on us. They've been reformed, they've been changed. For the law being changed, okay, as the Bible describes it, there must also, I'm sorry, for the priesthood being changed, there must also of necessity be a change of the law. So according to the Bible, not only did the priesthood change from Aaron back to Melchizedek, which is the Lord Jesus Christ, the law changed from having all these cardinal ordinances imposed on us to no longer applying anymore. They've been fulfilled, spiritually speaking, so I don't have to observe them. Because people will always say, oh, you Christians are hypocrites. And I get voicemails all the time and emails all the time saying like, oh, do you trim your beard, Pastor Shelley, hmm? Do you eat shellfish? Well, no, because it's gross. Do you wear woolen and linen garments, hmm? Actually, you said, do you wear mixed fabrics? Well, that's the NIV, and I don't care what it says. But you know what, I don't wear a garment of woolen and linen, okay? But I would, just to prove a point, because you know what, that is not, that is not a rule imposed on me right now. Now, it'd be a dumb garment because those two fabrics don't mix well, and that was the whole point of that instruction, because it's just like faith and works for salvation, it doesn't mix. The woolen and the linen garment. So not only were they physical carnal instructions that you literally had to observe, they pointed to spiritual pictures, and the spiritual significance, maybe things that Christ fulfilled, or things about the future, you know? The separation of the unclean animals and the clean animals was the picture of the Jews and the Gentiles. But now that we live in the New Testament, there is no division, there is no separation. We've been made all one in Christ Jesus. So you say, well, why is it that you eat bacon then? Is it because you just decided, ah, nuts to it, I don't want to do any of the Old Testament anymore? No, because there is a literal instruction in Hebrews 910 that says, which stood only in meats and drinks and divers' washings. Now, why I get mad about this is because people want to just throw the entire Old Testament out on a whim, and then they'll be like, oh, well, you don't eat bacon, or you eat bacon and stuff. It's like, yeah, because the Bible literally gave me a new commandment saying it's fine. But you know what it didn't say? It didn't say throw out the death penalty. It didn't say throw out the book of Leviticus. It didn't say, oh, yeah, those things that were inherently sinful, go ahead and keep doing those. Or now they're fine or something. No, no, no, all those things didn't change. Yeah, the law changed, amen. You know what, it didn't just disappear. It didn't stop being the law. It didn't stop explaining to us what things are good and bad. Killing someone was still wrong. Murder is still wrong. Disobeying your parents is still wrong. And I don't have to have a New Testament commandment to believe that anymore, just like I believe printing marks on your body is still wrong. Getting a tattoo is still wrong. And I thought about it at first. I thought this was inherently sinful. But I guess in thinking in hindsight, God puts marks on people's bodies. So I guess there is a context in which that is not even inherently sinful. You know what, it's not for me to do. And it's not something that God wants me to do. Oh, well, you're bringing us back under the law. No, no, no, it was always there. I didn't get a new provision that's been changed. And the way I explain this to people is I say this. When I was 15, according to the state of Texas, it was not lawful for me to go around and drive a vehicle by myself. I had to wait until I turned 16. If I was 15, I had to have my dad or my mom in the car in order to drive with a temporary license or a permit or whatever you can get where you can still drive, but you have to have an adult with you in the vehicle. But then when I turned 16, you know what, I could drive without another adult in the car. And my first night driving, I got a ticket. So now it's interesting, my dad said, if you ever get a ticket, then I'm taking away your driving privileges for a couple of weeks. And I went ahead and got that the first night. So that was really stupid of me. But, hey, all of a sudden I wasn't able to drive again. I went from not being able to drive to being able to drive to then not being able to drive again all in the course of like 24 hours. And you say, how does that make sense? Well, because of the context. First of all, Texas was saying no. And my dad was saying no. Then I turned 16, Texas and my dad was saying yes. But then the next day, my dad was saying no. And guess what, it was wrong then. Just like in the New Testament, it's like, okay, well, I have the Old Testament saying no and the New Testament saying no. Then it's a no. They're both saying yes. Then it's a yes. I have the New Testament saying yes and I have the Old Testament saying no. Then it's yes. Because the New Testament triumphs the Old Testament. Just like, hey, oh, now it's a new rule. You know, my parent could give me a rule and then change his mind or change the rules later. Like, I sometimes tell my children, go to your room. But then I say, you can come out of your room. It wasn't confusing that now that old rule doesn't apply. Well, you said I had to go to my room so now I can never leave. No, no, no, it's not that hard. Just like God can give us an instruction and then the instruction could evolve or change or be reformed or fulfilled or whatever circumstance or context you want. But let me say this. If you believe that there is an Old Testament rule that doesn't apply, you better show me in the New Testament where it says that exactly. And then vice versa, if you somehow think that something does apply or doesn't apply, I mean, you have to have it in the Bible because the Bible says faith come by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Also, you can't make things up. Well, I just think this is wrong. Where does it say that in the Bible? Nowhere. Why still think we can do this? But the Bible says no. If I have Old Testament saying no and the New Testament's silent on it, it's still a no. Why would God have to give you the Old Testament? Think about how big the Old Testament is. And then say, you know what? Just to make sure you realize that it's all still legit, I'm just gonna give you a whole nother copy of the Old Testament and the New Testament. You're welcome. I mean, that's not a very efficient God. That's not a very efficient New Testament. Basically, all he's doing is coming and updating. You know, when Elon Musk took over Twitter, okay, on Friday, he doesn't necessarily have to come in and just give everybody all the old rules again. He can just say, hey, here's the new rules. He doesn't have to tell you everything that is the same. He can just say, hey, keep doing what you're doing and then if I give you a new rule, that's the new rule. Not that everything else has been abolished. Just like God, when he gave us the New Testament, he didn't give us the New Testament to say everything Old Testament, forget about, not important, doesn't matter, no, no, no. It's to help us understand what did change and of course, he gave us those exact answers. Go to Colossians, chapter number two, Colossians. Not only do we have Hebrews saying this, we have Colossians saying this. So it's not like I have one passage to tell me to eat bacon. I have at least three because you got Hebrews. We already looked at 1 Timothy and we have Colossians. Now, I'm sure there's probably even more. I'm just bringing up a handful, okay? But you know how many I needed? One and I was on that train, okay? I wasn't even gonna put in my chili, all right? Colossians, chapter two, look at verse 14. Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross and having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it. Let no man therefore judge you in meat or in drink or in respect of a holy day or of the new moon or of the Sabbath days, which are a shadow of things that come, but the body is of Christ. So, you know, no one's allowed to judge me in my bacon consumption. I'm allowed to eat bacon and feel fine about it and feel great about it and have no problem. And the Bible is saying, look, this was contrary to us. And man, you know, it's like, as cool as it would be to have gone back to the Old Testament, the bacon thing would have been kind of a bummer. It's like, do you have bacon wrapped filet? It's like, nah, just filet. It's like, okay. Well, I'll take a baked potato with butter, bacon, oh, we don't have bacon, huh? It's like, oh, bacon and eggs? Eggs. It's like, what kind of place is this? We got lamb chops, meh, you know. I mean, you gotta realize this is contrary. They were like, eh, this doesn't feel right. But, you know, it's supposed to motivate them to realize, you know, we don't wanna be separated from bacon, just like we don't wanna be separated from the Gentiles, we want them to be saved. Okay, we wanna sanctify them and bring them in and cleanse them up, and we're Gentiles anyways, all right? But also notice in this passage, it says of Sabbath days. Now, I've had people judge me on this. I've had literal family members get mixed up on this junk, and they're all like, well, when's your Sabbath day? And I'm like, what do you mean, when is my Sabbath day? You know, I was like, I don't get to determine when the Sabbath is, FYI, number one. Okay, the Sabbath's the last day of the week, so that's Saturday. I said, whether you like it or not, the Sabbath is Saturday. And it's like, and guess what? I don't observe the Sabbath like the Old Testament instructs me to. You know, these people that usually can tell me about how wonderful they are and how much they observe the Sabbath, they're probably not even observing the Sabbath correctly, number one. But number two, you're not allowed to judge me on that. I'll work on Saturday. Oh, well, my Sabbath is Sunday. I work on that day, too. In fact, I don't even know that there is a day that I don't work. But it's not because I don't care about the Sabbath. You know what, I love the Sabbath. I go out and preach the gospel every single week, and that's me preaching the Sabbath, because the Sabbath was the picture rest, resting in Jesus for salvation. Now, I do personally believe taking a day off is healthy for you. And I'm sure that that principle is still there, and it probably makes sense, just because God says, six days shall thou labor. Okay, so obviously, a long period of time, people were, you know, taking the Sabbath rest. Jesus took a Sabbath rest, obviously, during his ministry, because he's still under the Old Testament law. So it's, and he still worked really hard. And you know, sometimes you get more done when you take a little bit of a break. You take a little bit of a rest. So I think that it's healthy for people to take a break. You know, it's funny, in America, people have a two-day Sabbath. It's like Saturday and Sunday. It's like, well, that's not even biblical, either. But you know, these hyper-spiritual Christians wanna tell me about their little Sabbath-keeping, when really, them telling me about their Sabbath-keeping is actually in violation of this. And I would say this, your heart's not even right towards the Lord, because you think you even have to observe the Sabbath. If you think you have to observe the Sabbath, I am gonna say you're sinning by keeping it. Now, if you wanna keep the Sabbath because you just genuinely, like, I just wanna take a day off on Saturday and I don't wanna work, go for it. I think that's fine. If you say, I wanna take Tuesday off, go for it. If you wanna take every day off, you can do whatever you want, but I'm not gonna pay your bills, all right? But at the end of the day, don't tell me that you have, like, we have to keep this day. How dare you work on Saturday, Pastor Shelley? Or how dare you work on my Sabbath day? How dare you not take a Sabbath day? No, no, no, you're wrong. You're wrong by imposing that or thinking that that is some kind of a statute or some kind of a mandate. And really, to me, I believe that that would be a sin and try to enforce that on other people, as articulated in this passage. So this Judaizing doesn't really help. Go to James, chapter four. And you have to realize that things that are sin aren't even necessarily just straight things mentioned in the Bible, because what the Bible does is it gives you big commandments that encompass lots of things. In fact, the entire Old Testament is summarized in one word, love. And then you have the two great commandments, loving the Lord thy God and to love thy neighbor as thyself. The Bible says upon these two hang all the law and the prophets, meaning every single sin is in violation of loving God. Not only that, every sin is in violation of loving God and loving your neighbor. So every single thing you could ever do that would be in violation of loving your neighbor and loving God is a sin. But of course, the Bible gives us a lot of really explicit commandments to make sin exceeding sinful, to make it more abundantly clear, hey, this is wrong. It's kind of like church even. It's not like I have to say horsing around, running around and doing these things is wrong in the church. If I didn't even say it, it's still wrong. You shouldn't be doing it. But by me saying it, it's making it more abundantly wrong. It's making it more clear that it's wrong. Just like when I hang out with my friends, they're not like, hey, I wanna give you a list of rules about hanging out with me. Don't spit on me, don't punch me, don't kick me. And it's like, they didn't have to tell me that for me to know that it would've been wrong for me to do that to them. But of course, if they tell you and then you do it, it's even worse. So it's the same thing with the Bible. God is not only just telling us these things are wrong, they were wrong anyways. Because they're in violation of loving God and loving your neighbor as yourself. Look at James chapter four, verse 17. Therefore to him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not to him it is sin. Not only is sin just breaking God's rules, according to the Bible, it's even just not doing good things. I mean just, if there was something that you knew was right or something that was good and you should do it and you decide just not to do it, just to be lazy or just to be a selfish person, according to the Bible, that is sin. And it's not, think about this. The action is doing good or just doing nothing. By doing nothing you could be sinning. Why? Because sin is most of the time contextual. It's circumstantial, it's based on what's going on. And really what makes this event sinful is whatever's going on in here. Because who decided or who realized that it was something good? You did. By you realizing it was good and then not doing it, it became a sin on you. This is why God often holds people to a higher standard when they know more. To whom much is given of him shall much be required. And so the essence is, you know, you go to a fundamental Baptist church where you go to church for times a week and you hear a lot of the Bible being preached, you're more likely to commit sin than people that don't go, in the sense that you know more, there's more opportunity to you in general. And God's gonna hold that against you even more. And it's important for you to realize that, yeah, it's great to learn all this truths and all this knowledge, but it's a two-edged sword because when you don't do it, it's gonna be way worse for you. You need to be a doer of the work and not a forgetful hearer. I wanna show you an example of this. Go to Proverbs chapter number three, go to Proverbs chapter number three. So we've been trying to find out what's inherently sinful. And again, you know, from my understanding of the Bible, and you can probably point out some more, I didn't go to every single one, but there's not very many sins that are just inherently sinful. Most sins in the Bible are based on the circumstances of that sin. Think about even the death penalty, and thou shalt not kill. It could be the same two individuals. It could be the executioner and it could be the person being killed. If he does it in guile, it's murder, it's wrong. If he does it just on a whim, it's wrong. If he does it outside the law, it's wrong. You know what, if he does it according to law as a capital punishment, it's fine, it's right. And I would even say this, if he knows, if our state knows that it's right to put murderers to death, and they know that it's good, and they decide not to do it, to our state is a sin. It's actually wicked not to put people to death. It's, we're sinning all the time. I mean, there's so many people that should be executed in our society that are not being executed. Rapists and child offenders and murderers and all kinds of people. And you know, it's sick. There's this stupid commercial that was put out by I think Eric Swalwell, some stupid Democrat that hooks up with Chinese spies. But anyways, he put out this commercial of this family sitting down and they're having a meal, and all of a sudden the police knock. And they're like, open up! And this lady opens up and like, lady, you're under arrest. And it's like, why? For committing abortion. And they're like, arresting this lady, and she's like, that's between me and my doctor! Or whatever. And then everybody's crying and then they leave. It's a really unrealistic looking commercial. But it's like, all the Democrats are like, better vote blue or this'll happen to you. And it's like, that's not even actually what it should be. Because if a woman brutally murdered her baby, she shouldn't be arrested, she should be put to death. That's what should really happen. Now of course, you know, they're not gonna put that commercial out there. Because they'll be like, oh, that's just the extremist. You mean the Bible? Yeah. You mean, I mean, think about it. And they always try to paint it as like, this innocent little family. You know, it's funny, in the commercial, the lady has like a three month old baby. And I'm thinking like, what lady has a three month old baby and just committed abortion? That's not even possible, really. Because she just gave birth. Plus, why is she wanting to murder children when she has a three month old baby and like another kid? And, let's be real, who's really getting the abortions here? Mothers of two? Or is it like cracked out horrors in the ghetto that have no children? Probably that's the more realistic scenario. And why don't they show the commercial of a woman just brutally murdering and savagely destroying an innocent baby while it's crying and blood and just all the gruesome evil that's happening and then saying, this is what Democrats want. Come murder babies with us. I mean, that's the real commercial. That's what really happened. And why would you want no punishment for that person? Why would you want to say, oh, that's between her and her doctor? Whether she just brutally and savagely murders little babies. You know, that's disgusting. And there are still states in this country that have abortion way, like really far into the pregnancy or they want it. I mean, some of them want it like 38 weeks. There is plenty of babies that are born before that. Full term looking, healthy human beings. They want to just savagely and brutally destroy and murder. You know, the doctors that do that, it's not even a question whether they should be put to death. Put them to death. And it's frustrating. I see all these conservatives and Republicans, people like Steven Crowder and stuff like that. And they'll get up and be like, oh, we're not advocating for punishment to these women. It's like, I am. Now, of course, I don't want to make it retroactive, perhaps. But hey, as soon as it becomes a trigger law, let's make that trigger law for the mom, too. Not just the doctor. Let's get rid of it. And then these brazen reprobates, they get out and their icon or symbol is a coat hanger. What kind of a gruesome, disgusting, filthy person has their literal symbol of their movement as a coat hanger? What kind of a disgusting freak? Oh, well, let's not arrest these people. What? Who would not want them to be arrested? You know, I believe that we should get out there and speak the truth on these issues and not like water down conservatives and Republicans get up and be like, well, we don't want any kind of punishment. We just want to sue people. I know why you want to sue people, because you just love money. That's why. Who came up with that, lawyers? It's like, hey, us lawyers decided instead of actually putting people to death, why don't we sue them? Let's make everything a lawsuit. I wonder who wins in a lawsuit. Only lawyers. Let me explain something to you. You lose a lawsuit, your client still has to pay your attorney's fees. You could be the worst lawyer ever and you still get paid. What kind of weird profession is this? I mean, lawyers, they're just a bunch of blood-sucking creeps and freaks. You know, it's like whenever Jesus is like, hey, this is kind of approaching the lawyers, he's like, woeing to you, lawyers. Let me get on you guys, too, for a moment. It's like you could totally lose and give your client bad advice and do wrong, wrong, wrong, and you still get paid. How does that even make, what other profession is like that? And where is the refund button for lawyers? It's ridiculous. And you usually don't even know what you're getting. You just have to pay and then hope that something good happens. It is a disgusting, filthy racket. The Bible doesn't have all these punishes. Get a lawyer. Pay billions of dollars to not get any justice whatsoever. I mean, it's a speedy judgment system that actually makes sense. And we should believe in that and we should champion that and get rid of all these stupid lawyers. We don't need them. Of course, we need people to understand the law, but we don't need the lawyers to have to do all this. God's law is fine enough. Now, I had you turn to Proverbs chapter 3, look at verse 27. Withhold not good from them to whom it is due when it is in the power of thine hand to do it. Does that remind you of James chapter number 4 when it's saying, hey, when you know to do good and you do it not, to him it is sin. It's just saying, hey, when you have the opportunity to bless someone or do good unto them, you're supposed to do it. But again, isn't that circumstantial? I mean, you could think of other places in 1 John when the Bible is talking about rich people giving their money unto the poor. And of course, if you don't have any money, that commandment's not for you. You have to understand that not every commandment is for you. There are certain commandments for men. There are certain commandments for women. There are certain commandments for married men. There are certain commands for unmarried men. There are certain commands for children. There are certain commands for grandparents. There are certain commandments for everybody that are based on the circumstances of the situation. There are commandments for poor people. There are commandments for rich people. There's commandments for tall people. There's commandments for short people. There's commandments for everybody in all kinds of circumstances. I mean, there's commandments about dwarfs and stuff. I mean, there's commandments about everything. But that doesn't apply to you if you're not. So you have to understand about the instructions of God is we want to think about the circumstance and the context of them. Go to Romans chapter 14. And I want to kind of finish on this last point. But all of this to say this, what is actually sin is way, way more about what's going on inside than it is a bunch of physical actions. And so we have to sit and evaluate our hearts and our minds and our affections and try to decide what's going on inside, because that's how God's going to judge us. I think that's also why the apostle Paul is kind of saying, in some of his epistles, that there's no way for us to even really know who's going to be rewarded the most or who's not or how God feels about things, because everything's interpreted by the heart. Even 1 Corinthians chapter 13 talks about, hey, if you give your body to be burned and you have not charity, it profit is nothing. I mean, you can give all your goods unto the poor. People would be like, wow, that guy's going to get really rewarded. But you know what? You blow a trumpet about it, no reward. You could go out soul winning and it'd appear like you're doing a lot of good work, but you're Judas inside. That's hard to figure out. It's hard for us to know. We don't know what's going on inside of people all the time. And we don't really know how God's going to reward people. Think about the poor widow woman who cast in two mites. If it wasn't for Jesus telling us what happened in that scenario, none of us would have any idea that she was going to be one of the richest people in heaven. None of us would have any idea. And if we looked at Ananias and Sapphira who gave this giant portion of money to the Lord, we would have thought, like, wow, they're going to be really rewarded. Now, after they were smoked dead on the spot, you're probably like, eh. But think about it. I believe that Ananias and Sapphira are in heaven. And I believe that poor widow woman's in heaven. One gave a giant amount of money to the church. One gave virtually nothing to church, like two nickels, folks. And one is going to have great riches and the other one is going to suffer loss. Why? All of the circumstance around that particular event. There are going to be people that went to a church like ours their whole life and get almost no rewards in heaven. And there are going to be people that didn't even go to a new IP church at all, and they're going to be greatly rewarded in heaven. Now, I believe that those are exceptions to the rule. I think that most people greatly rewarded are going to be going to churches like ours. And most people not going to churches like ours are going to have jack squat when they get to heaven. They'll get there. But I'm just trying to help you understand that for you personally, you individually, what really matters is going on here and here, not just a bunch of just, am I doing the actions or whatever. Romans chapter 14, look at this, verse 10. But why does thou judge thy brother? Or why does thou set it not thy brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written, as I live, say at the Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give a count of himself to God. Let us not therefore judge one another anymore, but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block or an occasion to fall on his brother's way. Now, if there's any verse that should terrify you in the Bible, I personally believe it's verse 12. So then every one of us shall give a count of himself to God. This is why I personally believe when it talks about judgments, that it is an individualistic situation. The Great White Throne judgment might take forever, but we have forever, so it's OK. But think about this. When we have the judgment seat of Christ, you're going to stand in front of Jesus by yourself to answer for yourself. No one else gets to talk for you. No one else is going to intercede for you. Pastor Shelley isn't going to hold your hand. Your mom and dad aren't going to hold your hand. Your spouse isn't going to hold your hand. There will be no one but you and Jesus and what you did, for all of your awards. And what you did, it's either going to be burned up and have just be nothing, a pile of rubbish, a pile of ash, or it's going to be gold, silver, and precious stone, and you're going to get a great reward. But you know what? You can't hide. You can't fake it. You can't procrastinate and be like, oh, last minute, I'm going to get it in here. You know, you have to understand, you will do this. This is going to happen. This is a reality. This motivates me to want to serve God. Because I would be embarrassed right now if I had to stand there and feel like I haven't done enough. I want to do more. I want to get more stuff prepared. I don't want to go yet. I want to see what I mean. I would think like, man, I don't feel like I've been working hard enough or doing enough. And you know what, we need to do more for Christ, not less. But there will be a day when everything you've ever done will finally get judged. So it's kind of meaningless for me to judge you right now. Because it doesn't matter, and I don't even know. It would be pointless for me to sit here and try to guess at what's going to happen. But be known, whatever is going to happen is going to happen. Whatever you did, it will be revealed by fire. And that fire is going to reveal what kind of people we really were and what kind of works we really had. So there's no point in me judging you or judging each other. We just really shouldn't worry about that. Now, of course, judging is in the context here. What is the context of how profitable a Christian you are, your works, things like that? Of course, we're going to still make judgments about each other. If one of us is being really sinful, we might warn each other. We might love each other. There's a context to judge. But this context is an aspect of things that are not crystal clear in the Bible. What have we been learning? Certain things are not inherently sinful. Hey, someone's involved in sodomy or bestiality, we're going to judge. Okay, but isn't there a lot of things that we've seen in the Bible now, though, where context actually defines what's going on? Someone's sleeping with someone and they're not married, okay, we're going to all judge you. 1 Corinthians 5 tells us that, right? But there's going to be a lot of things in people's lives that we don't really know what's going on or what's happening, and we should just stay out of it. You know, there are plenty of things in the Bible that are crystal clear, and then there's some things where you kind of have to use your own discretion about, kind of have to decide for yourself. I'm not going to go around and just pick people apart for this discretionary field. We want to keep it to the things that we just, here's a known fact. Here's the clear boundaries of the world. Now, of course, as a pastor, I try to set a lot of expectations here and preach what I believe people should be doing, just so you have a good example, you kind of know what to do. But when people don't follow my example perfectly, I'm not going to rip them a new one, because frankly speaking, you know what? I'm reading this passage and realizing there's no point in judging you about that. What is the example of this? What kind of meat you're eating? What kind of, now of course, you know, we don't put beans in our chili here, we get this, all right? But if you put beans in your chili at home, I'm not going to call you a heretic, you know, at home. I come to your house and you serve me beans and chili in it, I'll just eat it. Now you bring it here in church and I'll throw it in the trash, okay? So you know the expectation. But I'm not going to sit here and I'm not going to be like, well, this family, I was going to invite them over, but they put beans in their chili. You know, it's like, nah. It's like, that's silly, right? But there are some examples in the Bible where it's kind of discretionary what's happening. The Apostle Paul in this context is talking about eating meat sacrificed in the idols. And of course, that's a bigger deal back then than it is now. But there's still some applications we could take to this. Me personally, you know, I'm not really tempted with this and in our culture, it's not as prevalent, but there is still potential where this could happen. And I've preached on this in the past, but I think halal meat would be an example of this. And if you don't know what halal meat is, essentially it's where Muslims will slaughter an animal with their head facing Mecca and they slaughter the neck while they yell like, Allah, some stupid thing. And then they basically have to prepare the meat in a particular way that makes it halal. Okay, halalala meat, okay? But you'll see markets that say halal meat and you'll see whatever. But you know, that was sacrificed to their false god, Allah. And so I don't want to eat that. But what the Bible is saying is, let's say I had a Muslim friend, coworker, neighbor, and they invited me to their house to a barbecue and they halaled their goat or whatever in the backyard and I didn't know about it. If they serve me meat, I'm just gonna eat it. I'm not gonna ask any question. But the problem is, if we were there and we kind of have a suspicion or we know and there's other people there that know that I know, then I'm not supposed to eat it because I don't want to wound their conscience with what the Bible says. Again, then I believe it does become a sin at that point. Go, if you would, to 1 Corinthians, chapter number eight. 1 Corinthians, chapter eight, let me explain this to you. So it's interesting how sin is actually defined based on your own knowledge and the knowledge of other people. Look at 1 Corinthians, chapter eight, verse seven. Howbeit there is not in every man that knowledge, talking about the fact that there's one God. For some with conscience of an idol, unto this hour eat, it has a thing offered unto an idol, and their conscience being weak is defiled. But meat commended us not to God, for neither if we eat are we the better, neither if we eat not are we the worse. But take heed, lest by any means this liberty of yours become a stumbling block to them that are weak. For if any man see thee, which has knowledge sit at meat in the idol's temple, shall not the conscience of him which is weak be emboldened to eat those things which are offered to idols? And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish for whom Christ died. So what Paul is explaining is this. If I go to a Muslim's house and the Muslim prepares his meat halal style and then just gives it to me and I eat it, that's not a problem because I didn't ask and nobody knows. But if it's brought up in my presence, I know. They say, hey, just FYI, we got some real good halal burgers for you. And then I decide, well, look, halal doesn't exist. It's a figment of their imagination. So I'm just gonna eat anyways. Technically I have that liberty. But what I could do by eating that anyways with the knowledge that it was halal meat is cause this person who's not saved to think, oh yeah, he has respect unto my god or to my false god because he's eating halal meat. Whereas by me refusing that and saying no, I'm not gonna eat meat that was sacrificed to halal, I'm basically helping him realize this guy's a false god, I shouldn't be worshiping him. So even though I know in my mind this guy's, halal doesn't exist. False gods don't exist. There's only one god and when I eat this meat, I'm eating it to god. But he's gonna think I'm actually having any kind of respect or acknowledgement of his false god and I end up emboldening him or weakening his conscience. Because inherently, the law's written inside your heart. You know that eating some kind of a meat sacrificed to a false god's wrong. So everybody would have started out realizing like, oh wait, this is weird. You're, you like cut this animal and said, ah la la la, whatever, and then appointed it mecca? That was awkward, you know. I don't know if I wanna eat that. But of course you do it over and over and over and then it's like nothing. Then you don't feel bad about it. There's nothing weird about it. But you know, the Bible is making it clear that if I do this, I could cause him to have problems or I could even tempt another brother in Christ who's just, maybe there's another brother in Christ in the room, sees me eating halal meat and thinking like, oh, well then it's no problem or there's no issue with that or, and he just starts doing it even more, more often than me. And it just causes them to do this worse. What would be some other examples of this? Because eating the meat sacrificed and idols is not something we typically indulge in. I believe one of the things that would be similar to this is Halloween, celebrating Halloween. Now I don't worship any false demon or god or anything like that and I'm not celebrating that. But what if I go and my kids and I, we get fine costumes, nothing that's like demonic. You know, we dress up like superheroes or a baseball person or something or a hockey fan or we dress up like normal costumes and then we go to our neighbors and do trick or treating. There's technically nothing wrong with that probably in like a liberty perspective. There's nothing inherently sinful about that. But what it could do is it could embolden other Christians or embolden other people that aren't even saved to think like, oh, no problem with this. Now I'm gonna basically get out the Ouija board or now I'm gonna dress like a demon or now I'm gonna do this weird sinful thing you're emboldening them to celebrate Halloween by you celebrating it. That's why I don't even wanna participate. That's why I don't even wanna dress up on October 31st. That's why I don't even wanna do anything to try and encourage anybody to celebrate that wicked holiday even if me and my family aren't doing anything wrong. Because I don't even wanna give the appearance of evil and I don't wanna cause others and by me kind of even just emboldening others, it's like a sin to me. It's like, where's that commandment? Again, we're understanding the principles here that sins aren't even necessarily always just a straight word line or word item, line item. It's sometimes just what's going on here and here and what you're doing and causing others to be emboldened. Here's another example of this. Words are not inherently sinful. Now I know that that just like blows people's minds. People will freak out on you about this. But I'm just gonna say it again. Words are not inherently sinful. And you know this is true because if I said a bad word, quote, unquote, in a language you don't speak or that you're not familiar with, it would be meaningless to you. Also, little children have no problem saying every bad word you could ever think of when they're a little kid because they don't realize it's bad. They just say whatever, okay? Whereas kids even know that it's wrong to lie, steal, and everything like that just right out of the womb. They don't have any problem realizing it's bad because it's something that they know is a sin, okay? But what if, me knowing that, I just use every quote, unquote, cuss word known to man just all the time, regularly, it could be a stumbling block unto other people, couldn't it? And it could cause other people to start just saying whatever. Really just how you use words in general could be a sin because if I start speaking derogatorily about other people or other pastors or saying weird things, even if I don't use the cuss words, I could embolden other people to be critical and complain and murmur and embolden other people to say all kinds of different things. So we have to be careful the things that we do and the things that we say and how we present ourselves, not just for ourselves but how we affect the brethren. I don't wanna get up and just, you know, that's why after even using some choice words in a particular sermon, I got up and said, hey, look, I'm not saying say these things. Find the pulpit, don't do it. This was a very specific example for a specific purpose on a specific time, right? Does that mean that it's inherently sinful? No, it's not. I don't believe that. Otherwise, I wouldn't do it or I would tell people that it was just wrong. But you also don't wanna embolden people to start going carte blanche into a weird direction or start using weird language. Here's my personal opinion, even on cuss words or expletives is that they should be used in rare circumstances to denote significance. Now, again, I'm not talking about words that are perverted and filthy. Those things, you know, they're talking about bedroom actions or something gross like that. You probably should just never use those ever. But we're talking about words that are expressions of, you know, extreme versions of like damn or something similar or talking about dung and use other words that are similar to that. You know, but here's the thing that's important about this. If I use the cuss word, everybody would feel different all of a sudden. Like, you know, if I just started yelling what we consider cuss words in our society, everybody, like the hair on the back of the neck might start sticking up, your heart starts beating a little faster. You just feel a little bit different, right? Because imagine, what if we were having a fellowship and just everybody's kind of talking and then just all of a sudden, Pastor Shirley just starts screaming, you know, a bunch of expletives. Wouldn't everybody kind of like stop, pause, and look and assess the situation? Yeah, you'd probably be like, what's going on? That's actually a good thing because then it helps you identify an extreme situation. What if someone pulled out a knife? What if somebody was attacking? What if someone got severely injured? What, you know, all these types of scenarios, you actually do want all of everybody's attention. Whereas if you use expletives every other word, then all of a sudden it doesn't even work. Now all of a sudden it's white noise. And so people that are like that and cuss like a sailor, as they would say, you're really just ruining your vocabulary. You kind of look like an idiot and it doesn't benefit in any scenario. Whereas, you know, you yell out one of those real quick and everybody's like, what's going on? Is everything okay? Is there a problem? Or think about it this way. If an intruder breaks through the door, I want to communicate to him in the most extreme terms as quickly as possible that this is not a good idea. I don't want to be like, tsk, tsk, nay, you know. No, I'm going to say other things to him, okay? That'll make it really clear where I stand and what's about to happen. That's if my gun doesn't do the talking for me first. But I'm just saying, you know, in that situation, you might want to use some choice words to communicate a real clear message. Oh, is that sinful? No, I don't believe that at all. Because, you know, what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to get this person away and out and say like, stay away from me. Whereas if I use some queer, effeminate tone and wording, it may not have the same effect. It may actually put my wife and family in danger. Where if it's like, you know, I'm going to something your head off, you know. It's like, whoa, you know, this guy's serious, right? So that's why it's important to understand, hey, everything is sin based on the context, the circumstance, virtually speaking. There are things that are inherently sinful. We get that. But what really matters is what's going on here and here. What's the reason you're doing the things you're doing? Why are you saying things that you say? Why are you eating the things that you eat? You know, you're supposed to do all things for the glory of God. And when you're not doing things for the glory of God, we have to reassess our actions, our behaviors, and try to decide, you know, is what I'm even doing a sin or not? Because sin is not always just, well, here's Leviticus. Sometimes it's based on what's going on up here and here. And we want to do our best to make sure we're always loving God and loving our neighbor's self. Of course, if it's sin, it's going to be a violation of loving God or loving your neighbor. But that doesn't always spell it out for you. Sometimes we have to think about that and use our hearts and use our minds, use our brains. And let's, this holiday season, instead of going worshiping the devil tomorrow, have fun with the brethren and eat chili. And not cause a stumbling block for our brethren, not cause them to be emboldened to do even worse things or weirder things. But let's encourage and embolden our brethren to serve the Lord. Let's close in prayer. Thank you, Heavenly Father, so much for this chapter, for the word of God, for helping us get a better understanding of what sin is and what sin is not. I pray that we would be led by the Spirit and that we would always check our hearts and our minds and the motivations for our actions, that we would not just try to look at sin as a checklist, but rather we'd look at it as a heart that has a desire to love God and to love our neighbor as ourself. And in Jesus' name we pray, amen. All right, in closing, if you would, please grab your hymnals and turn to page 405, the banner of the cross. That's page 405, the banner of the cross. On the first. There's a royal banner given for display to the soldiers of the King. As an ensign fair, we lift it up today while as room ones we sing. Marching on, marching on, for Christ count everything but loss. And to crown Him King, toil and sing beneath the banner of the cross. Though the foe may rage and gather as a flock, let the standard be displayed and be no is full as soldiers of the Lord, for the truth be not dismayed. Marching on, marching on, for Christ count everything but loss. And to crown Him King, toil and sing beneath the banner of the cross. Over land and sea, wherever man may dwell, make the glories tidings known. Of the crimson banner, now the story tell while the soldier claim his own. Marching on, marching on, for Christ count everything but loss. And to crown Him King, toil and sing beneath the banner of the cross. When the glory dawns is drawing very near, it's hasting day by day. Then before our King, the foe shall disappear and the cross the world shall sway. Marching on, marching on, for Christ count everything but loss. And to crown Him King, toil and sing beneath the banner of the cross. Good job, you guys are dismissed.