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

Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Welcome to Steadfast Baptist Church. It's great to see everybody here this morning. If we can go ahead and find our seats, we'll go ahead and get started. Alright, for our first song, we'll go ahead and start in song number 413. Song number 413. Stand up, stand up for Jesus. And everybody's singing out real loud on the first. Stand up, stand up for Jesus. Ye soldiers of the cross. Lift high his royal banner. It must not suffer loss. From victory unto victory. His army shall he lead. Till every foe is vanquished. And Christ is Lord indeed. Stand up, stand up for Jesus. The trumpet call obey. For to the mighty conflict. In this is glorious day. Ye that are men now serve him. Against unnumbered foes. Let courage rise with danger. And strength to strength oppose. Stand up, stand up for Jesus. Stand in his strength alone. The arm of flesh will fail you. Ye dare not trust your own. And watching unto prayer. Where duty calls for danger. Be never wanting there. Alright, great singing everybody. Let's all open it up with a word of prayer. Lord, we thank you so much for Steadfast Baptist Church. We just ask that you bless this church and bless this service. Fill this room with your spirit and help us praise you loudly and boldly, Lord. We love you and it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Alright, for our next song, let's go to song number 351. Song number 351. Tell it to Jesus. Song number 351. Everybody singing out real loud on the first. Are you weary? Are you heavy hearted? Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus. Are you grieving? Over joys departed. Tell it to Jesus alone. Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus alone. Do the tears flow down your cheeks unbidden? Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus, he is the friend that's well-known. You've no other such a friend or brother, tell it to Jesus alone. Do you fear the gathering clouds of sorrow, tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus. Are you anxious what shall be tomorrow, tell it to Jesus alone. Tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus, he is the friend that's well-known. You've no other such a friend or brother, tell it to Jesus alone. Are you troubled at the thought of dying, tell it to Jesus. For Christ's coming kingdom are you sighing, tell it to Jesus alone. Tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus, he is the friend that's well-known. You've no other such a friend or brother, tell it to Jesus alone. We have our service in soul winning times. Several soul winning times are regional, so if you'd like to go to any of those times, you can see any of our respective soul winning leaders. Also our church stats are down below, continue to please update our soul winning captains and lieutenants on soul winning. We have our list of expecting ladies, if you continue to pray for all of them. We have several there listed, so lots of ladies to be praying for. Also we have an additional prayer list for our church family. Please be praying for them throughout the week. Upcoming events, Pastor Anderson is going to be coming July 12th to preach for us. That is a Wednesday night service, and so even if you don't normally come on Wednesdays, please, please do consider coming on that Wednesday. He's not only a great preacher, but he's also been a great friend to us and our church, and really helped us a lot, and so it would be really nice if we could have a full crowd to come and support him. And of course it's a great time to invite people. I believe that, I think he told me his plan, he's going to be preaching through the Minor Prophets, and so I don't know exactly when he's going to end up landing on here, you know, when he comes over here, but I think that's the kind of the series he's going to go through, and so I'd encourage you to be here if you've never been here to hear him preach, or even if you have, please show up. August 17th to the 19th, we have the Mighty Men's Conference. There's a sign-up sheet in the hallway, please do sign up. It's a Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. We usually go out in the morning, so it is all day Thursday, Friday, and then Saturday morning. If you want to participate in all the activities, even if you can't make it though for the Thursday morning, you still can show up for Thursday night or Friday. On the sign-up sheet there kind of has like some different columns, just let us know if you're planning on going the whole thing, or just showing up at a particular point. We also have Pastor Bruce Mejia. He's going to come out and preach for us for that conference, and so that's really exciting to have him out here. He's going to be preaching that Friday night, and so that's Thursday. You'll have to suffer through a sermon for me, maybe a couple sermons. I don't know, last year was like two hours, I don't know how that happened, but I'm not anticipating that this year, but you know what? It's a Mighty Men's Conference, all right? So you have to be strong, you can't be like Eutychus and fall out the window, right? October 12th to the 15th is the Firebreathing Baptist Fellowship. So that's a conference that's going to be in the fall. We've kind of had it every other year, and we've had some different conferences in between, but this is going to be a great opportunity to hear a lot of great preachers all at the same time. We have my friend Pastor Aaron Thompson from Sure Foundation is going to be coming out here, and we also have Pastor Mejia is going to come back out here, Pastor Anderson is going to come back out here, Pastor Jimenez is going to be coming out here, which is also another person that's really helped us and really supported our church in a big way, so you want to definitely thank him. Also, Pastor David Berzins is coming out to preach for us as well, and so we have a big lineup. I'm really excited about this year's conference and this fellowship, so please, if you can, do attend that. On the back, just some church reminders and then a place for notes. That's pretty much all I have in regards to announcements. We'll go ahead and sing our third song, which is a psalm of the week, Psalm 146, and your separate handouts. Psalm 146, praise of the Lord. Let's sing it out. All right, Psalm 146, Psalm 146, singing out on the first. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. While I live, will I praise the Lord? I will sing praises unto my God. While I have them weeping, put not your trust in princes. In whom there is no help. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. His breath doeth forth, he returneth. His earthen that very day, his thoughts perish. How key is he that hath the God of Jacob pour his help? Whose hope is in the Lord? The Lord is God. Praise ye the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. With fruit, earth, and sea, and all that there is which keepeth true forever, For the oppressed, which giveth food to the hungry, the Lord moves them to prisoners. Praise ye the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. The Lord openeth the eyes of the blind, the Lord raiseth them back. Far, bow down, the Lord loveth the righteous, the Lord reserveth strangers. He relieveth the father of lips and widows. Praise ye the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. But the way of the wicked, he turneth upside down. The Lord shall reign forever, even thy God, oh Zion. Unto all generations, praise ye the Lord, praise ye the Lord. Alright, great singing everybody. Now with the offering plate you're being passed around, go ahead and turn in your Bibles. It's 2 Peter chapter 2. 2 Peter chapter number 2. It's 2 Peter chapter 2. 2 Peter chapter 2, the Bible reads, But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways, by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you, whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not. For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved unto judgment, and spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly, and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto those that after should live ungodly, and deliver just Lot vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked, for that righteous man dwelling among them in seeing and hearing vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds, the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished. But chiefly them that walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise government, presumptuous are they, self-willed, they are not afraid to speak evil of dignities. Whereas angels, which are greater in power and might, bring not railing accusation against them before the Lord, but these, as natural brute beasts, made to be taken and destroyed, speak evil of the things that they understand not, and shall utterly perish in their own corruption, and shall receive the reward of unrighteousness as they that count it pleasure to riot in the daytime. Spots they are and blemishes sporting themselves with their own deceivings while they feast with you, having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, beguiling unstable souls, and heart they have exercised with covetous practices, cursed children, which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Vosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but was rebuked for his iniquity, the dumb ass speaking with man's voice for mad the madness of the prophet. These are wells without water, clouds that are carried with a tempest, to whom the mist of darkness is reserved forever. For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness those that were clean escape from them who live in error. While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption, for of whom a man is overcome, of the same has he brought in bondage. For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning. For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them. But it has happened unto them according to the true proverb, the dog has turned to his own vomit again, and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire." Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. Father in heaven, I pray, Lord, that you would help us to be edified by the preaching of your word this morning, and fill Pastor Shelley with your spirit. Give him clarity of mind as he preaches your word to us. We pray for your hedge of protection over our church, and we love you. We thank you so much for the gospel of Jesus Christ. And it is in Jesus' name that I pray. Amen. Amen. This morning I am going to start kind of a series, and it's based on something that's kind of going on in pop culture. I think some people have heard about this, but there's a documentary that came out recently, and it's called Shiny Happy People. Who's heard about this documentary? Okay, a lot of people have heard about this. Well, you know, this particular documentary addresses the Duggar family, Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar. Who's heard of those people? They have 20 kids, they're on TLC, everything like that, okay. A lot of people are pretty familiar. They've heard about them. They may not have watched the show. Maybe they've watched all the shows. I don't know. I don't really care. But the thing is, this is pretty popular, and it's not necessarily something that's unique to the Duggars, or this documentary made about them. But really, there's a pretty big movement online to just attack fundamentalism as a whole. And sometimes they use derogatory terms like fundies, or they'll use other kinds of derogatory terms to kind of talk about the IFB, or independent Baptist, or, you know, a lot of these terms are pretty similar to the world because they don't even understand any of the distinctions. It's very difficult for them to understand distinctions. Although, while looking up, I found an article, and it said the new IFB versus the IFB versus the IBLP. And I was like, it was kind of an interesting article. But in this documentary called Shiny Happy People, they kind of addressed two big groups, the Duggar family and then this organization called IBLP. It's called the Institute in Basic Life Principles, okay. Institute in Basic Life Principles. Who's heard of that by any chance, IBLP? Now, IBLP is kind of a, it's kind of like an older organization as far as the timeline is when they were popular. I think they got really popular in the 90s and maybe in the early 2000s is when they were really showing how popular, you know, or how big they were. This movement specifically, they claim that like millions and millions of people have come to their seminar. And a lot of them would appear on the surface to be a fundamentalist or an independent fundamental Baptist, even though that organization specifically is non-denominational. So, I really wanted to kind of preach about this documentary because they address a lot of really important topics. And, you know, at first, I was just going to preach one sermon about it. But then as I was going through and writing all the sermons for it, I was thinking like, man, there's too many important topics here that just cram them all into one. So, I'm just going to kind of break it in the series and talk about completely different topics that this documentary touches on. So, this is just part one and you could just call it IBLP, IBLP. And I think it's important for us too to understand the differences between some of the movements and some of the groups of people outside of these walls and what our church is trying to do. Now, we were reading in 2 Peter, chapter number 2, and this is important to understand that, you know, there's some really obvious enemies out there, okay? And I mean like right out there. There's some really obvious ones, okay? And, you know, I'm not too, too worried about you guys getting sucked into that, okay? Because even if you did, I had no chance of helping you anyways, all right, if you get sucked into that. But there are certain movements out there, there are certain groups out there that are still satanic that are a lot more appealing or they might catch you off guard or suck people in. And I'll be honest, I feel like while it's not necessarily anybody in our church or has been part of our church has gone to the IBLP, I think people have fallen victim of a lot of these mindsets, ideologies, and some of these situations that we're going to talk about. And so, it's important to realize who's out there trying to draw you away. But 2 Peter, chapter 2, look at verse 1. But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways, by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. So, a couple things I want you to pay attention to in this particular chapter. Number 1 is that it says that there were false prophets among the people. Notice it wasn't, they weren't without the camp, they were among them. Also, when it talks about false teachers, it says they're going to be among you. So, according to the Bible, there's actually a threat of people that are going to look like you, talk like you, go in the same circles as you, maybe even at times come to the same church as you, but those are the people that are really the most dangerous, because they can draw away a lot of good people with them. You can think of certain men in the Bible, we talk about Korah, or we can talk about other people that were drawing people away from the congregation, and trying to get them away from Moses, trying to get them away from the church. And they do this because they just want influence, power, authority, greed. The Bible kind of talks about a lot of different motives here, but ultimately it's just selfish motives. And it says in verse 3, look at this, And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you. Now feigned, just as simply, think of the word fake, not sincere, deceitful. So, some people will give lip service to the right doctrines, but they don't believe them. And I believe this includes salvation itself. There are some people out there that are capable of giving lip service to the right gospel, yet they don't believe it. There's a pretty popular YouTuber that's a great example of this. This guy named Young Dawn Reborn. And this guy is twice dead, is what his name should be. Okay, Dawn Twice Dead. But this guy, for a period of time, was giving perfect lip service to the gospel that we believe. Saying it's faith alone, free grace, once saved, always saved, you can't lose it, repentance is a change of mind. Now, Young Dawn Reborn, he first said, you know, I don't know about once saved, always saved, started rejecting that, then he started rejecting repentance, then he started saying you could be sinless. Now he says Jesus is even God. Okay, here's another example, Tyler Doka. Tyler Doka giving lip service to the exact same gospel as us. And let's be real, many even people we know have visited that church, or were friends with that guy. People, some pastors made documentaries with him. I mean, there was a lot of people that talked to this individual, had some kind of relationship with him. And now the guy claims to be Jesus. Actually, he almost more claims that Jesus is him. Like, he doesn't even claim to be the second coming, or any... He denies the first coming, and just acts like he is the real coming of Jesus Christ. I mean, the most blasphemous thing imaginable for someone to get up and claim such a thing. So, you have to realize, just because someone gives lip service to the right gospel, does not mean that they're for sure saved. Of course, that's one of the greatest tests that we can use, right? And that's what we use when we go out soul winning. And let's be honest, it's 99% effective. I mean, 99% of the time, people giving you the right gospel are saved. But there are some out there that are liars. You know, somebody sent me a video of some, like, ex-sodomite or something, giving lip service to the gospel. And they're like, what do you think about this? And I was like, he's a liar. That's what I think. But here's the thing, whatever my personal opinion is about someone doesn't even matter. If I think someone's unsaved, but they're saved, guess what? They're saved. But you know, my personal opinion is that every single sodomite's unsaved. Through reading Romans chapter 1, through reading the scripture, and evidenced by the fact that every single one I've ever talked to is not interested in the gospel. There's something different about them. Look, I've talked to people that are, you know, in every other sin you can imagine and they want to get saved. But why do they never want to get saved? It's because they're reprobate folks, okay? Obviously, it's not that sin that reprobates someone. And I think in our culture today, it's going to be more likely and more possible that sometimes kids got confused, abused, taken advantage of, or weird things happen to them and they're not technically a reprobate and maybe some of them will get saved. But you know, even in abundance of caution, I'm not letting any ex-sodomites into my church period. You know, I mean, that's just not an option for me. That's not something I'm willing to play around with because 99% of the chance they're a liar about what they're saying. And even if they are, okay, I'm glad you're going to heaven, but you're just not coming here, okay? You can find, there's a million liberal churches that will love you, okay? So just go hang out with them. But let's be real. You know, let's not try to invite false prophets and false teachers and dandable heretics into our church thinking, well, but you know, they give lip service to the gospel. No, there's a warning here. And the warning is on purpose, okay? And notice that they want to take advantage of you and make merchandise of you. That is what the IBLP is. It's a merchandise making machine. Now, it was founded by a guy named Bill Gothard. Who's ever heard of Bill Gothard? Anybody ever heard of him? Okay, some people have heard of Bill Gothard. Bill Gothard formed this organization and it was originally just aimed for youth and young teens and then it just kind of evolved into the organization that it is today. And even if you don't know anything about these groups, it doesn't really matter because frankly, the points that I'm going to be making today apply to any organization that fits this bill. And here's how we describe this organization. It's a parachurch ministry. Now, here's the thing. I'm against parachurch ministries. And, you know, if there were a ministry that's not directly a church, I believe that it's healthy or the best case scenario for it to be under the leadership or authority of a church where a church still has some level of accountability for it. Otherwise, these ministries just always go by the wayside. They just turn into just terrible heretics or ecumenical or just problems all over the board because Jesus Christ did not ordain parachurch ministries. You know, he does want ministry to go forward. Ministry is important to Jesus. The gospel is really important to Jesus. And you know what institution he created so that could go forward? It's called the church. Okay, now look, I'm not going to limit the church on what it can do. You know, churches want to, you know, help oversee all kinds of different organizations or print Bibles or make Christian material or do all kinds of things. Go for it. But, you know, at the same time, many of these parachurch ministries are good intentions, but they end up just going into the trash. Some of them don't even have good intentions. Their whole goal was just to make merchandise of you. I personally think from Bill Gothard's perspective, he was always bad. He was always bad. And it makes a lot of sense when you think about what happened. Now, Bill Gothard, in 2014, approximately somewhere in that timeline, 34 women came out and said that he had taken advantage of them or abused them and had inappropriate relations with them. I think the majority of those were just inappropriate situations. I don't know exactly the details. I don't really care, personally. The board of directors at the time said that he had committed inappropriate behavior and they fired him. So, you know, it's one thing to be accused. I think every great pastor, probably even bad pastors, every pastor has probably been falsely accused of stuff. Even Joel Osteen probably gets falsely accused of things, right? But when your own board of directors is firing you, that looks pretty bad, okay? Because if they think that there's a problem and if they make a public statement saying, yes, there was inappropriate behavior, then that's pretty damning that there was some issues there. Does that mean every accusation made against Bill Gothard is true? Probably not. But at the same time, you know, he obviously had some serious issues. The man was never married and he never had children. And yet he's surrounding himself with young teenage girls as his personal secretaries and assistants and hanging out with them. I mean, the crazy thing about the IBLP is parents were literally just taking their teenage children and just shipping them off to this guy's organization for them to be alone with these individuals. I mean, that's bizarre, folks. Okay, I'm not going to be sending my 16, 17-year-old daughter to go be the personal assistant of some guy that's not married. First of all, just period. Let alone that's not married and has no children. Okay, that's just weird, okay? There's no way for me to honestly believe that any man has good intentions there. I'm sorry. You know, and again, you men, be careful who you surround yourself with. But it's like any grown man that's like, hey, I'm going to surround myself with a bunch of attractive young teenage girls. It's like, we already know why. And it wasn't because they're really good at being a secretary, okay? It wasn't because they're just so good at note-taking or whatever. No, there's a whole other reason. And you say, what's that reason? Okay, well, look at verse 14. Beguiling eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin. Beguiling, notice this, unstable souls. So, you know, the easiest people to take advantage of are young women. Young impressionable teenage girls are probably some of the most unstable in the sense that they're most easily taken advantage of. Very naïve. Don't know things. Will allow people to press boundaries and they may not speak up or say anything about it. And these bad, evil, false teachers love to prey on women and they love to prey on individuals. Now, I haven't gotten too much into the sermon yet, but go if you would to, let's go to Hebrews chapter 10 for a moment. We'll go to Hebrews chapter number 10. But I want to say this. You know, when we read Romans chapter number 1, I believe the Bible is clearly articulating that every homosexual is a reprobate, okay? And the only reason they are a homosexual is because they're reprobate. That's kind of what the text is just plainly stating. The fact that God gave them over under those vile affections. If they had, if it was a natural affection, God wouldn't have to give you over to it, number 1. If it was a natural affection, it wouldn't be called vile. Something had to change. And the Bible even says that. The women changed and it says the men left. Okay, so there was some event that happened in that person's life where something changed, something left, something happened and now they have an affection that's not normal and not natural. This is what the Bible would call, you know, a reprobate, okay? Now, I do not believe though that the opposite is true. I do not believe that every reprobate is a homosexual, okay? So, it's kind of like, you know, every bulldog is a dog but not every dog is a bulldog, okay? So, there's a lot of kinds of dogs out there. And I think the same goes with reprobates. There's lots of kinds of, there's special breeds of reprobates, okay? There's the Chihuahua kind, you know, they're really annoying, you know, and there's all kinds of different versions. And so, I don't want you to get confused because there can be a guy who is not attracted to men and yet he's still a reprobate. And I believe in 2 Peter, it's talking about a lot of men who prey on young girls and prey on young women. And I personally believe anybody that's a pedophile is a reprobate. But it doesn't mean that every single pedophile is only going to go after the same gender, okay? Sometimes they may only go after the same. It doesn't matter to me. In fact, I think sometimes some reprobates may not even have a perversion. They may just only be perverted doctrinally or messed up in other kinds of ways. You have people like Caiaphas or you have Pharaoh. There's no indication that these guys are perverts. They might be womanizers or they might like women but they're still reprobate. Judas Iscariot, there's no evidence that this guy is necessarily a pervert. He's just going after covetousness. Balaam, Balaam wasn't necessarily a pervert that we have any proof of. He just loved money. He just loved the wages of unrighteousness. Now, of course, the longer these people live, it's very likely that they're going to go that way and it's heavily linked. I'm just saying that I don't think all of those signs have to be present. So, if someone is teaching that Jesus is not God, that person is a reprobate. I don't care if they don't have to be a pervert for me to also put them in that category. I mean the people that have known the truth and seen the truth and then they say, I'm Jesus or say, you know, just deny who Jesus is. Those people in my opinion are just reprobate. Okay, obviously you can blaspheme Jesus. You can be confused about some things or say some stupid things and you can still get saved. But these people that, we're talking about teachers, pastors, religious leaders that are going this far, you know, they're people you want to stay away from. Okay, obviously in the Catholic Church, it's probably filled with a lot of reprobates, but obviously the majority of them are perverts as well. Okay, and we see that it's a tight coupling. It's very common for those things to be related, but I don't want you to get the idea that always is present there, necessarily. Okay, and we don't want to necessarily falsely accuse someone of something that's not even something that's legitimate. You know, if someone denies, you know, is an antichrist, just call them an antichrist, but you don't have to necessarily call them a pedophile unless you have proof of that, right? So we want to be consistent in our language and we want to identify the right issue at hand. Now when it comes to parachurch ministry, you know, first of all, what is a parachurch ministry? I don't know. And, you know, to the IRS, almost anything could be a non-profit. I mean, the Church of Satan is a non-profit organization that people can donate money to and is afforded all the same liberties as a fundamental Baptist church today. So you have the Church of Satan and then you have, you know, independent fundamental Baptist and then everything in between. But I would say that a parachurch ministry is one that's not scripturally founded. It's not a church according to the Bible. And, of course, the Bible has certain parameters around what a church is. It's not just a bunch of Christians just hanging out. That is not church. The Bible talks about having bishops. The Bible talks about how to behave yourself in the house of God and talks about an order and a structure. That's really important. You know, when people are just saying, hey, I'm a non-denominational parachurch ministry, that is not a replacement for church. Yet many people replace church with this IBLP parachurch ministry organization. Or there could be other ones. Focus on the family. People will get really excited about. And Colorado Springs is just, frankly, filled with parachurch ministries. The Dallas-Fort Worth area is filled with lots of parachurch ministries. You have things like TBN, you know, or CBN, or like all the different Christian broadcasting networks and televisions that you can listen to and you can tune into. But a lot of these are just parachurch ministries. They're not the television ministry of a specific church. They're just a random television ministry that just gets as many different Christian preachers to come on there and talk. Charles Stanley is getting up there and then, of course, his son Andy Stanley now is leading a church. But, you know, a lot of these guys have parachurch organizations and they're bogus. Ray Comfort of Living Waters Ministry. That's not a church-run organization. And you know what? It's bogus. The guy is a sideshow freak and he has no accountability and it seems like he's replaced church with his stupid ministry. And there's a lot of people out there that are replacing church with some ministry. I even grew up next to, I had a next door neighbor and there was this family that would come every once in a while because it was their grandmother. So I lived next to their grandmother. So on occasion they would come and their children were my age. So I was contemporaries with her grandchildren and they were missionaries to Africa. And it sounded cool. It sounded great. It's like, wow, yeah, you're a missionary to Africa and you're preaching the gospel and all this stuff. But then as I became an adult I ended up looking into what this family was a part of. They're not part of a church. They're just part of some ecumenical mission work group or something. They don't actually go and preach the gospel to anybody. They just build wells and hand out food and just build roadways and teach people how to speak English. And I'm like, you know what? That sounds great. There's nothing wrong with helping people. But you know what? That is not the work of Jesus Christ. That is not the church. The church is not going out and building roads and water. You know, that's what the government is supposed to do. Okay? I mean the government is supposed to make sure that people are getting fed and food and water. That is not the responsibility of the church. Yes, did Jesus occasionally feed people? Sure. But that was a miracle. He wasn't saying like, hey guys, any time you're around 5,000 people just pull out a couple loaves of bread and fish and feed everyone. In fact, in 1 Corinthians he's rebuking the church for even bringing food to the church, bringing their own supper. And he's like, hey, don't you have houses to eat in, to eat and drink? Why are you coming here and shaming them that have not? Why are you coming here and partaking and having dinner and having food? Because church is not a meal. It's a spiritual meal but it's not a physical meal. Church is not just this random institution where we get to decide whatever and whenever we want. No, there's specific guidelines for church and God wants us to not forsake church. Now here's the thing. If me just hanging out with a couple of saved people is church, that would be hard to find anybody that's forsaking that. Are you in an insane asylum in solitary confinement? I mean that's the only way to get to that point. But look what the Bible says in Hebrews chapter 10 verse 24. And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching. So we see the congregating, the assembling of ourselves is something that some people are going to forsake. And how are they going to forsake it? By going to IBLP, by going to Living Water Ministries, by going to one of these just extra biblical parachurch ministry organizations wretched by Todd Friel. You know, just whatever organization instead of getting plugged into church. And the parachurch ministry movement honestly is a pretty novel thing. It's not necessarily always been the way it is right now. I mean in times past there's kind of just church. There hasn't been this explosion of all these online ministries and YouTube ministries and parachurch ministry organizations. Yeah there was things like the Salvation Army and yeah there's always been some groups outside of the church. But there is just a litter of parachurch ministry organizations that exist in this world today and you know what? I'm not for them. I don't care if they call themselves Baptists. I don't care if they put world missions as the name of their group. You know what? I am for the local church and I believe that we need to show up at the local church and not forsake the congregating of ourselves. Why? Well one thing is that real church makes you normal. Real church makes you normal. Because you're challenged on the things that you say. You're challenged on the things that you believe. You're challenged on how you dress. You're challenged on almost every area of your life. Whereas people that don't go to church at all, they actually start getting more extreme and weird. Because if you're only hanging out and again most social interactions once you become an adult may be only your work or just some of your friends. But you know a lot of times you hang out with people that already believe a lot of things like you. And so it's really easy to get into a small echo chamber and just start getting weirder and weirder, more extreme, more crazy. And what actually kind of brings you back to a sense of normalcy is being around a lot of people. Being around people that aren't just like you and being around people that maybe you wouldn't even necessarily have hung out with on purpose. And let's be honest, in this room not everybody in here was just like best friends. Not everybody in here has the same interests. I mean some people in here like baseball, okay. Some people like coffee. Some people like ranch. Some people like all kinds of crazy things. Some people like McDonald's. I mean you're like, hey, you want to go with me to McDonald's? No. But you know what, just being around all these different kinds of people, old, young, different nationalities, different ethnicities, different countries, all kinds of different things like that. It helps make you actually normal. When you're around only people like you, you start getting weirder and you start getting more extreme. You know, it actually, it kind of helps recalibrate who you are. Whereas if you go to these little cults called like the IBLP or whatever, they often start making people weirder and weirder and weirder. They get a more extreme and they don't have any real layer of accountability often and of course this ministry is frankly just trying to make money off of them anyways. You know, it wasn't free to show up to this IBLP thing. How much money did I charge you this morning? You know, an earful but you didn't have to pay anything, right? The IBLP, you'd have to show up, you actually had to pay for these seminars and they were bringing in so much money at the height of their organization. In 2001, they brought in $41 million. So, and that's according to their taxes so we don't even know how much they brought in. But I'm just saying like I looked at their, it's public information, you can look at their tax return. On their tax return it says $41 million and total income for 2001. So, I mean these people were bringing in some serious dough and bringing in a lot of contributions. But of course in order to get that kind of a following and get that kind of money, you have to water things down. And that's why it's a non-denominational organization, even today it still is, it still exists. I looked up the four board of directors and of those four, two of them I could find were active pastors. And here's some things about the IBLP, none of these pastors are King James only, at least on their own admission, like their own statement. They don't have any statement about being King James only. I think the organization mostly uses the King James probably just because of copyright. Because if you use any other Bible version they'll sue you and charge you all this money. So, the only one that you can use for free is the King James Bible. So, a lot of times organizations like this will use it just so they don't have to deal with all those copyright legal issues. But of this group, you know, one of them graduated from the Southern Methodist University. Another one is the pastor of Crossroads Community Church. The other one came from Bible Baptist Church, he pastors that. And the other one is Western Conservative Baptist Seminary. So, it's kind of just all over the map. I would say that this group is a lot of Baptists, but it's not only Baptists. And, you know, I personally, from a church perspective, I don't want to yoke up with non-Baptists. Now, I'm not saying that I wouldn't be friends with these people. I'm not saying I might not attend the same events as these people. But, you know what, I don't really want to yoke up with Methodists and yoke up with non-denominational community churches. And just form this organization where we have the lowest common denominator that's going to appeal to the broadest audience and we get $41 million coming in every year. Because, of course, when you yoke up with these people, you know what they're going to do? Drop the King James. They're going to drop the hard preaching. They're going to drop the Baptist standards. They're compromisers. Frankly speaking, what is non-denominational? It's still a denomination. It's just a compromise denomination. Because anybody that's been to a non-denominational church, they're all the same. They're all the same. It's just, you know, you've got the fancy one and the less fancy one. But they're all basically the same. And in fact, you know, the church that I grew up in was a non-denominational church. They have an organization called like TFAC or something like this where they essentially try to offer to every church out there, pay us money and we'll tell you exactly how to be like us. And they have just tons and tons of churches that are on their bankroll, on their payroll, asking them, hey, tell us how to be exactly like you. And guess what? They're exactly like them. And they're everywhere. They're spreading everywhere. I don't want to be yoked up with every non-denominational church out there, every Methodist and baby baptizing, baby sprinkling, you know, lose your salvation. I mean, you're going to just join up with a bunch of heretics is what you're going to end up doing. And this IBLP, again, it's not church. It's a seminar where they want to give you these seven basics to life. And basically, once you incorporate these seven basics, you're going to be successful. And I wrote them down. I'm not going to go through all of them for sake of time. But number one is they say, here's your seven basic principles, design, authority, responsibility, suffering, ownership, freedom and success. When you learn all those seven basic principles, you're just going to be successful. If I learn success, I'll be successful. Yeah. OK. But, you know, I don't remember reading that in the Bible. I don't remember like, hey, Jesus said, hey, there's only seven basic principles. And if you get all these basic principles, you're going to be good. Now, there's a lot more to the Bible than just seven basic principles, number one. Number two, it doesn't seem very basic since you have to go through like 20 or 30 hour long sessions to learn all these basic principles. I think they missed what the word basic means. Hey, I got something really basic I want to tell you. It's going to take 20 hours. Is that OK for me to explain that to you? You'd be like, that doesn't seem very basic. Right. They use these words just to allure people in and draw them in and teach them, hey, this is how you're going to have success. These seven basic principles. And look, I'm sure a lot of them are based on the Bible. Because, you know, when we talk about these people with feigned words making merchandise of you, it's not like the things that they're saying are wrong. It's they don't believe them. It's not that what they're saying is bad. It's just they themselves aren't actually exercising their own words. It's like the Pharisees. And Jesus Christ literally even said to the Pharisees, hey, all they bid you, observe. He didn't say, hey, what the Pharisees are saying is bogus here. Sometimes he did. Sometimes he did. But a lot of what they were saying was right. It was just the fact that they were hypocrites that was one of the biggest issues. And what's a hypocrite? One that says and does not. So most of the problem with the Pharisees was not what they said. It was the fact that they were hypocrites. Now, of course, they did have some leaven in their preaching. Jesus did warn and said to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. But at the end of the day, you know what? Most of these false teachers and false prophets are going to say things that sound good or on the surface right or have some biblical precedent. But the problem is, because they're not really a legitimate church, they're a lot of times just faking it. Go to 1 Timothy, chapter 1. Go to 1 Timothy, chapter 1. And you know what I really don't like about this IBLP and the Duggars and how this documentary portrays it? They kind of just lump everybody together. Like, oh, all fundamentals are like this. All independent Baptists are like this. All even Christians are like this in some regards, which most Christians are like, we're not like them. But of course, you know, you look at the Duggars and their conservative family. They have a lot of children. The women are dressed like women. The men are the leaders in the home. And they emphasize the Bible. They emphasize clean living. They emphasize purity. They don't want their children going around, whoring around. And on the surface, to most people, they probably would think that we're the exact same. They would say, like, the new IFB or Pastor Shelley and his family are no different than the Duggars. And yet, when I looked at this documentary, or the IBLP, but, okay, how about the fact that this documentary talks all about them and all the things they think are important, but you know what they didn't talk about? King James only. Is that like me? Not talking about King James only? Here's another thing they don't talk about. Salvation by faith. Here's another thing they don't talk about. Church. Here's another thing they don't talk about. Biblical pastors. Here's another thing they don't talk about. Soul winning. Here's another thing they don't talk about. Hard preaching. Oh, it sounds just like me. If you subtract everything that I'm like. I mean, pretty much every basic principle that our church stands on. I mean, here's our basic principles. Salvation by faith. King James only. Church. Biblical pastors. Soul winning and hard preaching. There's design. Authority. You know, when you come to our church, I doubt you're thinking design. Okay? You probably, you might be thinking suffering. Okay? But, I mean, it's just like that's not the things that I'm emphasizing at this church, or that we should be emphasizing, or the Bible's emphasizing. You know, the Bible's not emphasizing success in this life. It's emphasizing serving God. It's emphasizing being a servant. Not seeing how much money you can get, how much political power you can get. Yet, the IBLP is mostly focused on carnal success and taking over government institutions. So, you know, frankly speaking, we're not the same at all. We're really not even close. And when it comes to salvation, you know, I looked at the IBLP website and it's just so generic that it sounds right. So, I don't know, but I would venture to believe a lot of people in there are not saved, considering the fact that they're yoked up with Methodists and everything else. But the Duggars, they have a website and you can go to it and it talks about how to be saved, how to get the gospel, and it's real lengthy. The first three points are just basically about how their sin and Jesus died and all these different things. And then part four says this, what now? So, it's like you've heard the gospel and we've talked about salvation. Well, what do I do now? How do you get in on this salvation? Do you have to go on a long pilgrimage? Pray a certain prayer? Give a certain sum of money? Try harder to be a better person? Feel a certain emotion? The amazing truth is that God offers this priceless gift of salvation to us by grace. That means that we don't have to earn it. In fact, we can't earn it. One helpful way to think of grace is God's riches at Christ's expense. Ephesians 2, 8, and 9 says, for by grace you have been saved through faith and this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. Notice they're not King James only. We are saved by grace, not by our merit. It is to be received as a gift to the unworthy, not as wages we've earned by good behavior. And I read that, albeit it's not King James, but I was like, wow, this sounds great. I mean, this is wonderful. Then I kept reading. Okay? And true faith is more than just a one-time experience or an emotional high. What? True faith is a lasting conviction of who Jesus is and what he has done for you. True faith sees Jesus as worth more than all the world and even life itself. True faith is willing to give up everything for him if need be. And then they quote Matthew 16, says, true faith trusts Jesus with life and with eternity. Oh, so it's not just trusting him to go to heaven. You've got to trust him with your life now. True faith sees Jesus for who he is as Lord. It recognizes his right to rule as king of the universe and our creator. So I have to have faith in him for him to have the right to rule? I'm pretty sure he has the right to rule, period. Whether or not I have faith in him. True faith involves repentance. Repentance is, quote, turning away from self-rule and submitting to Christ. I read earlier in this, do I have to try to be a better person? It was like saying no in theory and then now it's saying that I have to turn away from a self-rule and submitting to Christ. It is turning away from sin and turning to God because it believes him and trusts that he is better than the temporary pleasures of sin. You know what? How many people do you think you have to argue with that, you know what, God is better than sin? I just think sin is better. You know, it's like, I mean, how many Christians or even so-called Christians are going to make that proclamation? God the Holy Spirit comes to live within all who believe in Jesus with this saving faith. And it just goes on blah, blah, blah. It's like, it sounds great and then all of a sudden it just sounds like trash. And it usually is because it's coming from an unsaved mind, that's why. It's coming from unsaved hearts. I don't know because I've never spoke to the Duggars, so I don't know what their personal testimony is. I don't know if every single one of them is unsaved or not, but I'll say this, it looks bad. It looks bad, okay? And when it comes to the qualifications of a bishop or of a pastor, you know, it's important that they're a good example in every area of life. That's why you have the qualifications. Because if we could just let any bozo like Bill Gothard get up and teach, well, then we wouldn't need 1 Timothy chapter number 3. But you know what? God doesn't want just any yahoo or any rando to get up and start teaching the Bible. He doesn't want women getting up and teaching the Bible, it's really clear. And what does the Bible say in 1 Timothy chapter 3 verse 1? This is a true saying. If a man desires the opposite of a bishop, he desires a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behavior, given to hospitality, apt to teach. So the pastor is supposed to be a man that's married to a woman. This is not optional. And notice it even says one wife. Of course, there's a lot of interpretations of this. I think there's multiple applications, but the one most prevalent in our society is someone that's not been divorced. Someone that's not having multiple wives in this life. And yet there's many pastors today that are divorced and remarried. Greg Locke. Greg Locke should never be a pastor and no one should ever go to that guy's church. The guy is a bozo. And I don't care if he's right on every doctrine, he needs to step down. Because he's wrong on this doctrine for sure. He's wrong on the qualifications of a bishop. Also, someone that is not married is not the person you should get marriage advice from. Let me say this again. Someone who's not married is not the person to get marriage advice from. Bill Gothard. Why? Because they have no idea what they're talking about. It's just foreign to them completely. It's stupid to allow them. Obviously, there were men in the Bible like the apostle Paul, not married, speaking by the mouth of the Holy Ghost where he talks about marriage. Sure. And you know what? Single people can quote the Bible all day long, but I am going to take zero marriage advice from them. None whatsoever. It is foolish. It makes no sense. And not only this, I'm not talking about just people that aren't married. People that don't have a successful marriage also are off limits, off the table. Someone that's been divorced do not get marriage advice from them. I don't care. I'm trying to be really frank with you. I don't care whose feelings I hurt. They are not the person to get advice from. Now, they might get advice to tell you, like, don't get divorced. If you want advice about how bad divorce is, ask a divorced person. If you want advice on how to have a successful marriage, don't ask them. Find someone that's successful and ask them about that subject. Just like someone that tells me, you know what, Pastor Shirley, I've never done any computer programming in my life. Oh, will you tell me how to do it then? No. They would have no idea. What if I met someone and they said, hey, do you speak Spanish? No. Will you interpret this part of this Spanish book for me? No. That would be stupid. It makes no sense. Just like asking someone that's never been married, hey, what do you think about this scenario? What do you think I should do in this part of my life with my marriage? They have no idea. It is the dumbest advice ever. Why would millions of people go to Bill Gothard for marriage advice? That is the dumbest thing that someone could do is go to someone that's not married and ask for them marriage advice. I don't care. The least esteemed in our church that's actually married and has stayed married, they're way better than Bill Gothard could ever dream of. I would rather ask an unsaved person that's successfully married advice on marriage than a saved person that's not married because you just have no idea what's going on. That's why the Bible puts this parameter on here because the pastor should not be someone that has no idea what's going on in marriage. He's going to affect so many marriages in the room. He's going to affect so many relationships in the room. And, of course, from Bill Gothard's perspective, he preaches a very calloused, very male-centered idea of marriage and relationship. Why? Because he's never been married. Because he just has no idea what's going on. And people that have not had any experience in any particular subject matter should just keep their mouths shut when other people are talking about it. It's really dumb. And I don't understand why people think that they can offer advice in a subject matter they have zero experience in. But it would be just as cool to go on an interview for a job where it requires 10, 15 years experience and you have zero. And they start asking you questions about it. You're going to look like an idiot fast. You're going to look like a fool very quickly. And the same happens when married people hear an unmarried person talk. You're like, wow, you sound like an idiot. And here's some advice. When every single married person disagrees with you, you're wrong. You don't understand what you're talking about. Just like if you said, hey, here's 10 people that speak Spanish. Read this sentence and they all read it the exact same. And then someone that doesn't speak Spanish, what does it say? I think it says something different. He's wrong. He's an idiot. He doesn't know what he's talking about. And let me tell you something. Bill Gothard is an idiot and no one should have ever listened to him. And how dare he sell a seminar giving advice on marriage when he's not even married. Talk about making merchandise of people. This is foolish. Very stupid. Let's keep reading. It says a bishop then must be blameless, the husband and wife, vigilant, sober of good behavior, given to hospitality, apt to teach, not given to wine, no striker, not greedy, a filthy looker, but patient, not a brawler, not covetous. Oops, he failed on that one. You know, if you just care about people and you love people, you'll just give them all the great truths for free. You won't sell it to them. You won't have a need to make money off of that information. Because you'd rather people have the information and have successful life than to make money. Well, I want you to have a good marriage but only if you give me $20. I'd like for you to fix the problems in your life but, you know, I kind of need 100 bucks for that. It's like the person that just loves people is just like, hey, here's the solution. Here's how to help you. Here's how, you know, here's how you can fix this particular relationship. And, you know, the pastor's not supposed to be the one who's going to hold anything back because he needs money or he wants money. Just like, you know what, I'm not going to compromise on any doctrines in the church just to keep people in this building, just so we can have a high payroll or something like that or have a lot of money for the church. You know what, that would be wrong of me to hold back on any doctrine, no matter how popular or unpopular it is. What does it say in verse number four? One that rules well his own house having his children in subjection with all gravity. The Bible puts a requirement, I believe very clearly, on a bishop having children. Children is a word that's plural. Have you ever noticed that? It doesn't say child, it says children. So I believe the pastor should have at least two children that are capable of being faithful. Otherwise, this is just making a mockery of the Bible. And, again, why would I want to get advice from someone who doesn't even have children on how to raise children? I'll tell you, people that don't have children, they talk such a great talk. Oh, boy, if I had children, they would be in shape and be in line and they would do everything that I say. You know what they sound like? Drill sergeants. People that don't have children. And, of course, that's exactly what these freaks like Bill Gothard sound like. Bill Gothard teaches and preaches some kind of like a military style organization to run your family, breaking the will of your children, extreme child punishments, all kinds of crazy things. We're going to talk about that in more detail. That just needs to be a whole subject, a sermon by itself. But let me tell you something. Of course, someone that doesn't have children has no idea. They have absolutely no idea how hard it is, the right balance, how to have love and nurture towards that child. And, you know, I don't even have older children, so when people ask me advice on teenagers and stuff, I'll still give them advice, but I'll tell you, hey, I may not have the right advice here. You should ask other people that have teenagers because I'm not going to get up and pretend like I already know how to parent teenagers when I don't have any. It's stupid. That's foolish. You know, that doesn't make any sense whatsoever. How can Bill Gothard get up and teach people how to raise a wife and children when he has none? Also, it's not, again, it's not saying having him, it's having faithful children, meaning they're actually obedient and they follow your instructions. You know, if you can't even get your children to obey you, why should you be in charge of adults? That doesn't even make any kind of sense. You know, when you can't even change your own diaper, why are you the President of the United States? I don't know. You know, it doesn't really make any sense, does it? Okay. And when it comes to the pastor, hey, if the pastor is a failure as a family man, if the pastor is a failure in marriage, if the pastor is a failure in his household with his children, he's not allowed to be the pastor. He shouldn't be the pastor. It's not the best scenario. And as you as a congregation do not go to someone that doesn't have children or doesn't have a wife or has a bad marriage or has bad children and get advice from them on family. Do not do it. That is a bad idea. And it will ruin your relationship and, frankly speaking, how to work out for the Duggars. Let's talk about it for a second. Because the Duggars were heavily involved in IBLP. They were considered the model family. They both spoke at these conferences. They've given their opinion on parenting to all kinds of different people. Plus, just their television show as a whole was just to model their parenting and model their way of life. Well, they have 19 children. The oldest is Josh Duggar. Now, you may have heard of this guy. Josh Duggar has been found guilty of possession of child images that he shouldn't have and is in prison. Not only that, his own sisters went on national television and admitted to everyone that he had touched them inappropriately when they were in their youth. Not just anybody, his own sisters. And, of course, they were, you know, shamed about that. And, of course, I guess dad loved putting his daughters on show for everybody so he could collect all kinds of money. What kind of a sick dad parades his molested daughter on television so he can get a paycheck? That's prostituting your daughter, folks. But you know what? You reap what you sow, don't you? You prostitute your daughter on national television. You tell everybody how she's been molested. And then guess what she does? She joins up with a bunch of anti-Christ to make a documentary exposing you. The same person. Jill Duggar. Jill Duggar is someone who was broadcast on national television as having been taken advantage by her brother, didn't get a dime. And, in fact, part of the documentary series, it makes it clear that the dad was the only one getting paid even when his children were adults and married and out of the house. He was still the only one getting a paycheck. So, you know what they did? Hey, I'll get a paycheck. I'll go on and get paid to do these other interviews and go on every talk show you can think of and write books and expose you guys. Because you know what? Train up a child in the way you should go and when he's old he will not depart from it. Hey, you train up a child to be exploited on television for their whole life and guess what they do in adulthood? Exploit themselves and their family on television for money. Way to go. Yeah! Well, you know, I think that they're Christian. They're saved, right? Okay, well, how about the third? So that's the first two. So far, really successful, huh? First one's a pedo in jail. The second one's exploiting her own family for money and making documentaries against her own family. Number three, Ginger, she married a guy from Master's Seminary. Master's Seminary. This is John MacArthur Seminary and they go to John MacArthur's church. Right out of the fire, right out of the firing pan to the fire. I mean, that's not saved. People going to John MacArthur's church are not saved, folks. The lordship damnation guy. Wow, really successful. The fourth oldest. Well, I think I might have, I'm sorry, I misled you on one point. Because John and Janna were the second oldest. They were twins. I forgot about them. I skipped them. I think Ginger was like, I'm sorry, Jill and Ginger were like third and fourth. But some of the eldest, okay, Jessa and Janna are also daughters of theirs. So, basically all the eldest daughters that are adults and they're grown, the top ones, they all now wear pants. Which, here's the thing, they raised them on national television making such a big deal about their daughters wearing only dresses and skirts. And now, almost all of them that have the option themselves, they've all rejected that. So, how well did they do as parents? Hey, Jim, Bob and Doug, tell me about y'all situation. How y'all doing? Well, one kid's in jail for being a pedo. The other one goes to John MacArthur's church. Another one now is just making expose documentaries against us and won't talk to us. Oh, and all of the girls wear pants now. Sounds like he's really successful. Let's model our lives after them. No, that's stupid. But you know what? We as independent federal Baptist, we're not trying to showcase our family on national television and exploit our children for money. That would be someone that's wicked trying to make merchandise of his family. And look, I don't even think these people are saved. They certainly failed. Why would I ever want to get any kind of advice from these individuals? Not only that, instead of going to church, you know what they do? They go to the IBLP every once in a while. And then they have house church with Jim Bob who gets to just teach us. Well, guess what, Jim Bob? You don't meet the qualifications. And guess what, Jim Bob? No one ordained you. And guess what, Jim Bob? I know you have 20 people or 21 people in the room, but it's not a church. It's a family. You know what? There's a difference between a family and a church. But Jim Bob goes out. He baptizes his own niece. He's doing his own thing. You know, it's the house church movement. And let me tell you something. Beware of these house church people. I've met them. I've seen that they look normal. At first, you're thinking like, oh, wow, it's a big family that seems nice. They seem like us. But then eventually, really, you figure out what they're like. And they're like these duggers. And they're just repent of your sins, hardcore work salvation. They don't like church. They don't like pastors. They preach against biblical pastors. They preach against church. They preach against all these things. And they might pretend like they like you or with you, but you know what? They're a liar. And then when push comes to shove, you figure out what they're really like. Just like the duggers, they need to shop for husbands. You know what? You can find a lot of these families. They'll go out and shop for husbands. And go steal some weak men away that'll go and just be their patsy. And of course, you look at these women that were from the duggers, they're the star. Their husbands are just playing second fiddle to these ladies who now put the pants on, telling them what to do, going on the interview. And every time they do the interview, they don't care what the guy has to say. They're like, tell us, Ginger or Jessa or whatever the girls are. They're the ones running the show, running the household. But you know what? These people that are a product of the IBLP are rotten fruit. Bill Gothard was rotten fruit. These individuals are rotten fruit. Why would I then want to skip church and go join a parachurch ministry? It's full of rotten fruit, folks. Don't think that we're the same. Don't think it's kind of the same. It's way different. They want to look like us and act like us so that the way of truth is evil spoken of. And that's the verse that just really just rang in my head when I thought about this situation and these people. But look at verse 12 for a second. The Bible says, Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children in their own houses as well. Also, the deacons are in the same category. And notice they have to be doing it well. It doesn't say just doing it. It says doing it well because you can rule over people poorly. It's called Joe Biden. It's called the United States federal government. It's called lots of different people that are out there that are ruling really poorly. The Bud Light marketing campaigner is ruling really poorly. If you want to destroy your company, hire. They'll help you out real fast. Look at verse 15. But if I tarry along, thou mayest know how the oddest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. Notice that we're supposed to behave ourselves in a specific setting. It's called the house of God. And you know what? We're in the house of God right now. Not because of this building, because we are gathered and assembled together. It has nothing to do with the building and has everything to do with us being gathered together and us being assembled according to scripture and trying our best to have all of the things that are necessary. A biblical pastor, biblical evangelists, biblical deacons. You know, we have order and structure to the service. We don't let everybody get up and say whatever they want. You know, we only let so many people speak. And of course, it's important that we're running church according to the scripture, not just our own wishes, wants and desires. And these IBLP people are really infiltrating a lot of churches with bad ideology. Go to 1 Kings chapter number 20, 1 Kings chapter number 20. And if you learn anything, if there's just one thing you walk away this morning that you've learned, I just want you to learn this. Don't get advice from people that have no experience. Don't get advice from people that have no experience. And don't get advice from people that have bad experience. This is the worst person to get any kind of advice from. And if you're someone that is very inexperienced, what you should learn to do is shut your mouth. You know, a lie who just couldn't shut his mouth. And you know what? He sounded like the idiot that he was. And people that don't know what they're talking about always sound like idiots. The Bible tells us the only way to fix that is to shut your mouth. And when you're quiet, sometimes people think you're a lot smarter than you really are. And what fixes that for us is your mouth. And we're like, oh wow, he's a lot dumber than I thought. He must be from Florida. Something like that. But I'm telling you, when... Hey, some Florida people moved and they were better. You can take the man out of Florida, but you can't take the Florida out of the man. You know what I'm saying? First Kings chapter 20, look at verse number 9. The Bible says, Wherefore he said unto the messengers of Ben-Hadad, Tell my lord the king all that thou didst sin for to thy servant at the first I will do, but this thing I may not do. And the messengers departed and brought him word again. And Ben-Hadad sent unto him and said that God do so unto me and more also, if the dust of Samaria shall suffice for handfuls for all the people that follow me. So there's a conflict between the king of Israel and Ben-Hadad. Ben-Hadad's just trying to take advantage and extort and blackmail the king of Israel. And at first he says, Have my wives. And he was just thinking like, Have Kamala Harris. Have Amber Heard. Have whatever you want. But then he's like, Then I'm going to take everything that's pleasant in your house. He's like, You can't have my gun. You can't have the things that I like. So that was the last straw. So Ben-Hadad's now saying, Alright, there's so many people with us. We're going to win the battle. And he's talking trash. And then this famous verse in verse 11. And the king of Israel answered and said, Tell him, Let not him that girdeth on his harness boast himself as he that putteth it off. And that's an important thought and principle in the Bible is don't brag about something that you've never accomplished. Because if you've never accomplished it, you don't even know if you're actually good at it or not. And until you've actually tried it or gone through it, you have no idea what you're talking about in many cases. So, you know, the best parents in the world are ones that never have children. Okay? Why? Because in their own mind, they're a legend. You know, Man, you don't even know how good my children would be. And it's like often a lot of these people probably would not do so hot. And I've seen a lot of people, they talk a lot of smack and then they get married and they have kids. And then you're thinking like, Wow, your kids run your life. Does your wife run your life? You know, you can talk a big show. But until you actually are doing it, we don't know what you're like. No one knows what you're like. But I know this, you don't know what you're talking about. Period. And we should just get away from the Bill Gothards and all these other individuals. You know, I also don't want to hear from Ray Comfort how church is supposed to run since he doesn't go to church. All these people that hate Jesus want to tell us what being a Christian is like. How about become a Christian and then we'll talk? Maybe. Probably not. Have you even read the Bible? No. We'll talk, right? Go to Proverbs chapter 25. Go to Proverbs chapter 25. Don't tell me what Christianity is supposed to be like when you haven't even read the Bible cover to cover. You don't even know. Don't tell me what I should do for soul winning when you don't go soul winning. I mean, this should just be common sense stuff. But everyone is usually guilty. Everyone is an armchair quarterback. Everybody thinks that they could coach better than their favorite NFL team. Everybody thinks that they would be a better play caller than the quarterback on the field. Everybody thinks that they are a better driver than everybody else. But let me be honest, we're often deceived by what's going on. Teenagers think they're smarter than their parents and it's almost never the case. And in fact, from just general wisdom, it's always that they're not. But you think that. Proverbs chapter 25, look at verse 14. Who so boasts themselves of a false gift is like clouds and wind without rain. You know, when you see clouds and wind coming, you change your behavior. Right? You may change your clothes. You may decide not to go out. You may not, if you're in agriculture specifically, you may decide not to do work in the field just as a result of the rain. Or you may cover things up. But what happens when it ends up not raining? Don't you kind of look silly? What if you put on all the rain gear and you have an umbrella and it doesn't rain? Don't you kind of look silly? They kind of tricked you. They kind of deceived you. And it's saying this. Someone that gives you advice that doesn't know what they're talking about will often make you look like someone in full rain gear when it's not raining. And here's the thing. They could change people's behavior and ruin their lives by telling them something that's not even true. Well, if it was my kid, I would do X, Y, and Z. So, they try X, Y, and Z and it fails. But you know what? That parent has to live with the consequences where the single person doesn't. So, they don't actually realize how bad advice that was or how foolish that was. You know, it's like, well, if I was a parent, my kids would just be standing there, yes sir, yes sir. And they would do everything that I say. But you know what? That kid may end up growing hating their parents because their parents were so strict on them. And they never gave them any love and affection. And they never gave them any grace. And they end up becoming a psychopath just like this IBLP. Maybe they turn out to be Josh Duggar. And you don't really even know what those consequences are until you actually have your own children and you try to experience it for yourself. Look at verse 19. Confidence in an unfaithful man in time of trouble is like a broken tooth or a foot out of joint. Look, when someone's already proven, hey, divorced and remarried, Greg Locke, he's an unfaithful man. Why would I then put confidence in an unfaithful man? That's silly. That's a bad idea. You're already spelling yourself, you're setting yourself up for all kinds of disasters. Go to chapter 12. And I'm almost finished this morning, but look, these parachurch ministries are garbage. They're a joke. That is not what our movement is. Our movement is not some seminar. We're not selling it. We're not just setting up shop and telling people things that we have no idea we're talking about. No, we want qualified bishops and evangelists and deacons. We want people that have read the Bible tons of times. We want people that are actually successful in marriage and successful in child rearing to get up and tell you how to do these type of activities. Not just some yahoo off the street that thinks he's smarter than everybody. And that's what you get in a lot of times these men preaching classes. You have young single guys getting up and preaching stupid things. I heard a guy get up and he's talking about home birth. He's single. And I'm thinking like, you have no idea what you're talking about. Shut your mouth. And look, if you were single and got an opportunity to preach, isn't there subjects other than home birth that you can talk about? Like, I don't know, sowing or something. Like, why don't you talk about something you actually know about, right? Instead of getting up and talking about subjects that really would probably terrify you. You might even pass out. We don't even know. Some men are squeamish in those situations. Proverbs chapter 12 verse 15. The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but he that hearkened of them to counsel is wise. Look, when every single person in our church is telling you something different, you're just wrong. Look, there are interpretations that I have of scripture that I know some people don't agree with me on. And that's okay. But you know what, if every single person in my church was like, Pastor, I think you're wrong on this issue. Then I should seriously take a look in the mirror and say like, I'm probably wrong. Because the Holy Spirit is not just going to tell everybody in this room something completely different than me. And so it's important that you check yourself. Look, when every single parent is telling, you know, a person that doesn't have kids the same thing, you're wrong. When every single married person is telling a single person the same thing, you're wrong. You don't know what you're talking about. Hey, when every single person that's successfully married is telling this person that's struggling in their marriage what they should do, do that. Don't do what the divorced person did. Don't do what the person that's struggling in this area. Hey, if you're a young man and you want to make good money, find people in the room that are making lots of money and ask them what to do. Don't ask another single guy that works at Wendy's how to make money. Hey, I'm really struggling for a job. What do you do? I work at Wendy's. Cool, man. Let me tell you what to do. It's like find someone that's actually good at making money and ask them what to do and take their advice. And when every single person that's actually successful in life has the exact same statements, they're making the same points and you're disagreeing with them, you're just the fool that's right in his own mind. You're a legend in your own mind. You know what? You're a fool. Because what does church do? It makes you normal. Whereas these people that go off on their own and they only talk to people that are extreme like them, they start getting really weird. That's why it's also important for single people to hang out with married people and married people to hang out with single people. We all kind of help balance each other and figure out what life is really like. Go to Acts chapter 20, this last place I'll maybe turn. Look, when every single pastor disagrees with you, you're wrong. Like that's stupid. When it's like, hey, me and all of my friends and even just anybody that's a Baptist would disagree with you, you're wrong. Okay? When all the soul winning leaders of the church are saying you're wrong on soul winning, you're wrong on soul winning. Look, we didn't just say like, hey, let's just get this random guy to be a soul winning leader or captain or lieutenant. No, no, no. We picked guys that are great at soul winning. Whereas there's sometimes people that just show up and they're weird at soul winning. And they're doing all, they're like talking about the Shroud of Turon, you know, and you're just like, what do you, they're like, hey, I can get people saved from the book of Ezekiel. And you're like, no. This is a bad idea. It's like, look, when the soul winning leader is telling you that all of them are agreeing, when the pastor and the wise men in the church all agree, like shut your mouth up and just accept what they said. Acts chapter number 20 is the last place I'm going to have you turn. But again, if we look at the Duggars, they failed this. They're in the parachurch ministry, house church movements, Jim Bob's going out and baptizing people. And you know what, this is just not what scripture leads us to. And of course it doesn't shock me the guy doesn't believe, you know, free grace gospel. He believes this turning over your life and turning over your, surrendering and all this other junk, all this other garbage that's not a part of the gospel. Yeah, should we do that? Sure. Has anybody ever done that successfully? No. That's something we're all working at. But you know what, a lot of people have successfully gotten saved. And you know who's a bad person to get advice on how to get saved from? Unsaved people. Like Jim Bob Duggar. Like John MacArthur. Like anybody that's mixed up on this junk. But hey, you know, they taught their family a lot of Bible and had a lot of devotionals. Please do this. I'm not against you as the man of your house, sitting down with your family, read them the Bible, teach them what the Bible says. Hey, as the man of the house, you know what, you set the doctrinal standard for your house. I don't. So if you disagree with me on something, you know, obviously you're right in your household, okay? For your children and for your wife, you know, and that's okay. That's okay for you to have differences from the pastor. You know, don't bad talk the pastor. Don't bad talk church. Don't go around and make a problem out of church. You know, if my kids and I went to a church and we disagreed with the pastor, I would tell my kids don't tell anybody else about, don't talk about this subject. You know, if someone asks, you know, just talk with me about it or something. We don't want to cause a problem necessarily. But at the same time, you know, you should be careful that even if, even though you have that authority, if every other person is telling you something different, maybe you're wrong. Okay? But look, sit down, read the Bible, figure out what the Bible says, pray with your family, sing hymns, memorize the whole thing. But don't call it church. Don't replace church with that. Don't think that I don't have to go to church now because I did such a thing. No, no, no. What does the Bible say in Acts chapter 20 verse 28? Take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers to feed the church of God which he hath purchased with his own blood. Jesus' blood purchased something. It was this right now. Do not throw it away. Do not replace it. It is irreplaceable. What's the cost of this? The blood of Jesus Christ. That is way more than any building or anything else could ever be a price tag put on. I mean, church is precious. God loves church. You know what God loves? Jesus loves being in this room right now with us when we sing unto him and we read the Bible and we're reading scripture and we're believing scripture and he's laughing with us too, okay? He likes our jokes about the sodomites, all right? I already know because he laughs in the Bible, folks, all right? And he's laughing at them every single time, okay? He's here with us. He's enjoying the service. You know what? If we didn't meet together, there wouldn't be a church for him to show up at. There's a church for him to show up right here. Jesus Christ is with us in the room, okay? And he wants us to have the church service because he purchased it with his blood. Don't take it and tear it down and turn it into a parachurch ministry with Bill Gothard and just idiots and fools that don't even know what they're talking about. That is not church. Just like my business, if I had a separate business or go to a restaurant, that's not church. If some of you families go out and have lunch today, that's not church. That's you having lunch, okay? This is church. Don't replace it with anything. It was purchased by Jesus. Look at verse 29. Verse 29, for I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things that draw away disciples after them. Doesn't that tie back to what we thought about at the beginning? The false teachers among you. And there's going to be people like Bill Gothard in the future. There's going to be people that come from these house church movements who come from their own little parachurch ministry movements. And they're going to try and attract you to come to their church. Like, hey, you know, church is far away. Why don't you come to my house church instead? And we'll just read the Bible together. We'll have a private Bible study. You know, Wednesdays is far. Why don't you just come and we'll just do our own thing. You know, hey, you haven't been baptized? Hey, we'll just go in my lake in my backyard and I'll just baptize you. Stay away from these people. They're freaks. They're freaks and many of them are false teachers. And their only goal is to just draw disciples away after themselves. You know what? Anybody going against church is an enemy. And you know what? Church is the thing that we need to elevate and support and it was bought by the blood of Jesus Christ. And you know what? I will defend the church. Let's close in prayer. Thank you Heavenly Father for giving us the church, this opportunity to be gathered together. Thank you so much for this congregation. I pray that you would help to protect us from people that want to take advantage of us. That want to lie to us. That want to draw us away and destroy us. Destroy our families. Destroy our children. Destroy our minds. Get us to stop serving God. I pray that you would help us to recognize the difference between the fakers and those that have the sincere and true love of Jesus. I pray that you would help us to expose the wolves and that people would not be offended when someone is exposed. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Closing, let's go to song number 363. 363 wonderful words of life. 363. Everybody sing out real loud on the first. Sing them over again to me. Wonderful words of life. Let me more of their beauty see. Wonderful words of life. Words of life and beauty. Teach me faith and beauty. Beautiful words. Wonderful words. Wonderful words of life. Beautiful words. Wonderful words. Wonderful words of life. Christ the blessed one gives to all. Wonderful words of life. Sinnerless to the loving call. Wonderful words of life. All so freely given. Who leads us to heaven. Wonderful words. Wonderful words. Wonderful words of life. Beautiful words. Wonderful words. Wonderful words of life. Everybody sing it out real loud on the third. Sweetly echo the gospel call. Wonderful words of life. Offer pardon and peace to all. Wonderful words of life. Jesus only savior. Sanctify forever. Beautiful words. Wonderful words. Wonderful words of life. Beautiful words. Wonderful words. Wonderful words of life. Great singing everybody. We're all dismissed.