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

The part of the chapter I want to look at is verse number 17 where the Bible read. And from Aletus he said unto Ephesus and called the elders of the church. So in this chapter there's a lot of things that actually happened but it kind of takes a transition and here in verse 17 we see that Paul he calls the elders of the church specifically. So skip down to verse 26. Therefore I take you to record this day that I am pure from the blood of all men for I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God. Take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over to which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers to feed the church of God which he hath purchased with his own blood. For I know this that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you not sparing the flock also of your own cells shall men arise. Speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them. Therefore watch and remember that by the space of three years I cease not to warn everyone night and day with tears. And now brethren I commend you to God and to the word of his grace which is able to build you up and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified. So in this passage we see a lot of different things. We see in verse 28 he says that the Holy Ghost had made these elders overseers. So he's not talking to every single person. He's not talking to just believers in general. He's talking specifically to the elders, to the pastors saying the Holy Ghost made you an overseer of the church. And he says look grievous wolves are going to come in. He warns them about all these things. He's saying look I warned every single day not a day. And haven't we seen that at Vapour Baptist Church? I mean so many grievous wolves and people you know drawing people after themselves. But I want to focus on verse 32. He says and now brethren I commend you to God. Now the point of my sermon tonight is stay independent. Stay independent. Now the word independent is never found in the King James Bible one time. But we see we call ourselves an independent fundamental Baptist Church. So what do we mean by that? What does it mean to be independent and should we even stay independent? Well I believe very clearly the Bible teaches that Baptist churches should stay independent. Now what is Paul saying here when he says I commend you to God? If you look at the word commend in the dictionary it means to entrust, to deliver, to commit. So we see Paul is saying look I'm not going to be around forever. You're not even going to see my face anymore and there's going to be a lot of you know bad things that happen, a lot of grievous wolves. So who's going to watch over you? I mean you're the overseer of the church. Who's going to watch over the overseer? Who's going to be in charge? He's going to commend them to the Lord. He's going to say look here's how the authority structure is. The Bible then the overseer. There's nobody in between. There's not some pope. There's not some archbishop. There's not some pastor over the pastors. No. There's just the overseer and then there's the Lord. And the overseer is supposed to seek the Lord as the primary counsel. And we need Baptist churches, we need churches today to stay independent. Staying independent is very important. Go if you would to Acts chapter 14 verse 23. Now in the sermon we can take a couple different aspects. We could look at this in light of a church. We could look at this in light of ourselves. I want to kind of look at both. Let's kind of focus with the church first because that's what we're looking at here in scripture. Look at Acts chapter 14 verse 23. And when they had ordained them elders in every church and had prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord on whom they believed. So we see the same thing mentioned again. Once the church finally has an elder, once they finally have someone that's qualified according to the qualifications of a bishop of an elder, then they're saying look you're on your own. Now we're going to commend you unto the Lord and the Lord is going to be the one that guides you. The Lord is going to be the one that's going to be the overseer of you. It's not Paul. Paul was not the first pope. You know they want to say Peter was the first pope, but we see through Acts, Paul's the guy that's usually the one that's in charge. Paul's the one that's usually giving the instruction, but he's saying look no, I'm not going to be over you forever. I'm not going to set up Paul the second to take over you. No, the Lord is going to be the one that's in charge. Once we have elders in every church, once we've established a church, once they have a man that needs the qualifications of a bishop, then it's just going to be him being the overseer and Christ being the chief shepherd, the chief bishop of our souls. Go if you would to Hosea chapter 13. So what does independent mean? Independent in the dictionary says free from outside control, not depending on another's authority. It says free, individualistic. Another definition says not depending on another for livelihood or substance. So a church should not depend on another church to exist. Now in the case that maybe it doesn't have a bishop, maybe it doesn't have an elder, yeah, it's going to have that umbilical cord. But once they have the elder, once they have the bishop, once they are ready, Paul's saying I'm going to commend you unto the Lord now. Now you're good, now you've got someone that can oversee the church, now we're just going to commend you unto the Lord. But once that's taken place, we see they're not depending on someone else to exist. They don't need the other person, they're self-sufficient, they're self-supporting, they're self-reliant. The Bible says in 1 Timothy chapter 2, for there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. Not the Pope, not some other person, no, it's just the Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ is the one mediator between God and men. And that's how it should be in the church. I mean, according to the Bible, the bishop isn't supposed to be your Lord and your master and your king, he's just supposed to be someone that guides you. He's supposed to be an example unto the flock. He's supposed to lead and guide the church. That's what the pastor's supposed to be, that's what the elder's supposed to be. So my first point is don't set up a king. We see so many, the tendency of man today is to set up a king, to set up someone that's going to rule over them. They don't want to have the responsibility of being independent themselves. So they've got to set someone else up. Oh, we've got to get some other pastor, I can't, I don't think I can handle it, so we'll get some other pastor that will tell us what to do. We'll get some other church that's successful, we'll just follow their lead. We'll just do exactly what they tell us to do. I'm not going to think for myself, I'm just going to let him do it. We see this so much in the modern evangelical movement. The modern evangelical movement, what do they do? They start satellite churches, where they just have these like, you know, satellite pastors that are there, and they're really just dummies. I mean there's only one pastor at the church, and he rules all these little satellites all over the, you know, the city, maybe, you know, across multiple cities, and it's not biblical. We see once they have a qualified bishop, once they have a qualified pastor, they're supposed to be committed under the Lord. Right. Now you go do your thing. Why? Because if all the churches are under the governance of one person, it can go bad. That's what we see in the Bible constantly, when the king goes bad, the whole nation goes bad. Everybody goes bad. We see the whole northern kingdom goes bad, when King Jehoboam takes it. What does he do? He sets up two idols? The whole nation sits down. Ten tribes. And we're not talking about just a few people. We have twelve tribes trying to serve the Lord, ten tribes just gone. They're just ready to serve Balaam, and to serve the false gods, and to solve the golden calves. Why? Everything rises and falls on leadership, and the Bible says in the multitude of counselors, there is safety. There's safety, when you got twenty pastors all saying the same thing, they're independent. They don't rely on each other, they're self-sufficient, it doesn't matter what somebody else does, but they're all saying the same thing, hey there's safety in that message. But you know when there's just one guy, and he writes all the paychecks, there's not a lot of safety when they're all saying the same thing. I mean we know, hey the employee, he says what the boss says, of course he does, he gets paid by him. You know, you can't necessarily trust that always, and I'm not saying that everybody's, you know, that says, that agrees with their boss is bad, but the Bible says if a ruler harken to lies, all his servants are wicked. You know when you just corrupt the guy at the top, all the guys underneath are going to be wicked too, according to the Bible, as true as the day is long. We see when you corrupt the guy at the top, all the people under are going to be wicked or leave. That's basically the two options, if you have any kind of conscience, any kind of ethics, any kind of morals. Now have you turned to Isaiah 13, look at verse number 10, I will be thy king, where is any other that may save thee in all thy cities? And thy judges of whom thou sittest, give me a king and princes. I gave thee a king and mine anger, and I took him away in my wrath. Go to 1 Peter chapter number 5, according to the Bible, God did not want there to be a king over Israel. That was not his primary desire. His primary desire was for him to be the king and for them to just have judges in the land. Now what was the judge supposed to do, was the judge going to lord and rule over these people? No, he was just basically going to point to the Bible and say, hey, you're doing wrong. Hey, Deuteronomy says this, Numbers says this, the Bible says to dress like a man. The Bible says, you know, not to commit sodomy and to kill and to steal and to love thy neighbor as thyself. He's just going to point to the law and the law is going to judge you. The law is going to be the one that's over you. The law is going to be the one that rules. It's Christ that's governing. It's the Lord that's governing. It's not man. But what does a king do? King makes his own rules. King sets up his own statutes. A king has his own decrees that you have to obey. That's not the way that the Bible wanted it. God already gave us all the instruction and the rules he wanted us to live by. He didn't want us to have any extra ones. But see, the people, they wanted that king. The people, they get lazy, they get apathetic, they just want to just have somebody else do all the work for them. So they trust in oppression. The Bible says do not trust in oppression. What does that mean? When people are too lazy, they just let other people do the stuff for them. That's why America is a service heavy environment or economy. What is a service heavy economy? It's basically when people are too lazy to do the thing for themselves. So they pay someone else to do it. Something they're very capable of doing. Like how about cooking? How about making a meal? Why do we have a restaurant on every single, you know, corner? Because people are too lazy to make their own meals. So they pay for that service. And we see so many people today, they don't want to govern their own lives. They don't want to govern themselves. So they trust in the oppression of the government. They want the government to do all their, you know, statutes and their laws and their judgments for them. And they keep giving their liberties under the government so that the government can impress them even more and more and more because they're so lazy because they don't want to have their own judgment because they don't want to do anything righteous. This is what the Bible teaches against. People need to be responsible for themselves. They need to want to govern themselves. They can't be apathetic and when you are apathetic, you just want to set up the king. You just want to be lazy. You just want to hand over all the power. Look at 1 Peter chapter 5 verse 1, the elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ and also partaker of the glory that shall be revealed, feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly, not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind, neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being in samples to the flock. And when the chief shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away. So what I'm trying to get at is this point. Look, the pastor is not supposed to be just your lord. He's not supposed to be your king. He's not going to tell you everything to do. You should be making your own decisions. That's why, you know, a Baptist doctrine is called the priesthood of the believer. Look everybody that's saved in the New Testament is a priest and you should take the service of God seriously for yourself. You shouldn't just entrust it to somebody else. He didn't say, I'm going to commend you under the pastors. I'm going to commend you under the bishops. I'm going to commend you under the deacon. No, he's commending them under the Lord. And we ourselves to be committed unto the Lord. We shouldn't just let somebody else rule our spiritual lives for us. How does, what does this look like? Well, I had a family member one time. We were arguing about the preacher rapture. And this person says, well, I know the preacher rapture is true. And I said, how? Well, our pastor teaches it and there's no way our pastor could be wrong. I believe everything that our pastor teaches. Everything. Why? Because the person's too lazy, too apathetic to actually open the Bible and take responsibility for what they believe. So they just commend it under the pastor. And we see so many people today. They just get so apathetic and so lazy. They just want to give it to somebody else. No, you need to take responsibility for yourself. You need to be independent and you need to be committed unto the Lord. There's not another mediator between you and God, just the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord himself is going to be your intercessor. He's going to be your advocate. But you need to take the responsibility for yourself to know what the Bible says, to do what the Bible says. You need to be independent for yourself. No one cares for you like yourself. I mean, look, somebody else is not going to be your overseer, it's not going to be watching for you as much as you would for yourself, okay? It's important for ourselves to know what the Bible says, to believe what the Bible says for ourself. I read it in the Bible, I believe what the Bible says, not because somebody else is telling me, no, because I know what it says. The Catholic Church has tried to enforce this for centuries, trying to say you can't learn the Bible, you can't understand the Bible, we're going to teach it to you, just obey the bishop, just obey what he says. It's like the king. Don't set up the king. No, we're all supposed to be kings and priests in the New Testament. We're all supposed to be committed unto the Lord. We're all supposed to be independent and believe what the Bible teaches for ourselves. The Bible says in 1 John chapter 2, but the anointing which we've received of him abideth in you. And ye need not that any man teach you. But as the same anointing teach ye do of all things, and is true, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him. According to the Bible, you do not need man to teach you the Bible. If you cannot learn something from the Bible by yourself, it's false. Look, if someone has to explain to you some doctrine, and you're like, there is no way I could ever come up with that by reading the Bible on my own. That's a big red flag. That's a huge, whoa, how did they get that from reading this? How did they get the Nephilim and these 450 foot giants? I didn't see that when I was reading the Bible. It's talking about the wickedness of man, and how man was wicked, and how God was upset with man. It doesn't talk about these strange angels mating with women, all this wicked filth. How about the serpent seed doctrine? They say that Satan somehow is the one that conceived Cain. Lies! The Bible says that Adam knew his wife, and she bear a son. She conceived him to bear a son, and his name was Cain. Where was the devil in that verse? It's not there. And when someone has to interject things and add things to the Bible, and you could never see that for yourself. Look, I'm not saying that occasionally a pastor or a preacher might get up and read a verse, and you never really thought of it in that light, or compared spiritual with spiritual, that it couldn't be a new. Wow, that really fits, doesn't it? That's why we go to church. That's why we have pastors. That's why we have teachers. But you see, I could have gotten there if I compared those verses, couldn't I? Yeah. If I really studied a little bit harder, if I had known those verses, I could have came to that same conclusion. Whoa, I would never get there. I gotta carry my pastor in my pocket to teach me all these things. I need my commentary to explain all these things to me. No, now you're setting up a king. Now you're setting up someone that doesn't have the right authority in your life. Look, Christ is the authority in your life. And in the church, the pastor's over the church. The pastor's the overseer of the church, but he's not over your life. He's not gonna make all the decisions for you. He's not gonna dictate what you do in your personal life. He has no right to do that. We see, many people want this. Many people, they want the pastor to have all these counseling sessions. They want to come to the church, and they want to get there, and they want to say, where should I live? What job should I have? Who should I marry? My wife was mean to me yesterday, what should I say to her? My husband, he doesn't love me the way I think he should. He doesn't take me to the restaurants I want to go. He makes me do that. Will you tell him, Pastor, will you tell him not to be mean to me? Will you tell him to love me more? No, the pastor is not gonna dictate your life. The pastor is not to lord over your life. The pastor is not to be the king over your life. He's not supposed to come and make decisions and judgments between your marriage. Well, the husband was right in this situation. Well, the wife was right in this situation. No, he'll just tell you what the Bible says and say, look, you need to serve that out yourselves. Women, you need to obey their husbands. And everything is what the Bible says. So guess what? The husband's always right. Already settled. What the Bible says, I don't need to hear about all the junk. You know, a pastor or a preacher doesn't need to hear all the, look. But we see people, they want it. Why? Because they don't want to take responsibility for themselves. They just want to hand it to somebody else and say, you tell us what's right and wrong. You tell us how we're supposed to behave. You tell us where to live. You tell us what to do. You tell us what to eat. No. What? You need to take responsibility for yourself and be independent. Don't set up a king in your life where there isn't supposed to be one. We see the children of Israel, this is what they wanted. They desired that person to just tell them everything of the single thing to do. And even in America today, you might not believe it, but a lot of people would probably prefer a king over the democracy that we live in. We see so much turmoil and so much anguish and so much wickedness. But they'd probably say, we might as well just have a king at this point. I mean, they're Republicans, the Democrats, they're all wicked. Look, wrong. We need the Lord Jesus Christ to be our king. And even in the churches, we should not start up satellite churches and just have one pope, one pastor that decides everything for all the churches. No, there's safety in the multitude of counselors. No, there's safety when there are independent Baptists that are all saying the same thing that are just friends or just like-minded. Or maybe they're not even friends, but at least they're both saved. And they're still saying all the same things. Look, there's safety in that. Go to Hebrews chapter number five. And look, it's okay to disagree with a pastor. Look, it's okay to disagree with the church on little things. To say, I don't know if I completely agree with that opinion. The pastor, he was showing me some principles in the Bible and then he gave his personal opinion about the topic. And I don't know if I completely agree with his personal opinion. That's fine. Of course, we're not talking about core doctrines of the faith, the core doctrines of the church. Look, there's millions of churches to go to. Go to the church that you believe they're core doctrine. Why don't you go hang out with them instead of sneaking into a church and teaching false, wicked doctrine against their core beliefs. But of course, look, we're not supposed to just be in lockstep with the pastor either. Well, I'm gonna go exactly where the pastor goes and eat exactly what the pastor eats and wear exactly the same clothes and do exactly what he says and talk just like him. No, we're not supposed to be robots. Be an individual. The Lord Jesus Christ gave Adam and Eve the freedom in the garden to eat whatever trees they wanted of. That's how it is today. He gives us a lot of freedom. He gives us a lot of independence. He gives us the core principles, the core laws. If you're not violating God's laws, then you're not violating God's laws. It's that clear. Sin is a transgression of the law. If someone's gonna tell you something's a sin, they better have a Bible verse to show you that that's a sin. Otherwise, it's their opinion. Look at Hebrews chapter number five, verse 12. For when the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again, which be the first principles of the oracles of God. And it becomes such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat. For everyone that uses milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. Now this is an important point. The Bible's saying, look, it's not good to just be a babe forever. Look, you need to keep growing in the Lord. You need to keep getting more Bible, learning more doctrine, being self-sufficient. He likens these people unto being babies. What does a baby do? A baby can't feed itself. A baby relies on his parents to feed them. And this is what a lot of people are like spiritually. They're just relying on their pastor to feed them. They can't feed themselves. They're so independent, they have no independence. You see, this is not the life of a Christian, but so many people, they want to be a baby forever. They just want to go and get in their highchair and put on their bib and I want food, I want food, daddy, give me food. This is what most Christians are like. It's pathetic, it's sad. He's saying, look, you ought to be teachers by now. Can you imagine a grown man sitting in a highchair at the restaurant? You'd be like, what's this guy doing? He's like, I want food, I want food, give me a drink, I want my cup. That's how ridiculous it is for a Christian to be in church for 10, 20, 30 years. They don't even know anything in the Bible. They don't even know the Chordotrons of the faith. They can't even quote one verse. They can't quote John 3.16 for you. That's sad, that's pathetic. That's what the Bible's saying here. Look, you ought to be teachers by now. But you have neither one teach you again. Look, the Bible's making it clear that's not right. We need to be growing, we need to be independent. And it's dangerous when you're in a church full of babies. Because babies are going to whine and cry and complain, and you're never going to get, what, the strong meat. But you can't set a steak in front of a baby. They can't eat it. I love to eat steak. I love to eat strong meat. It tastes so good, but if I'm in a church full of babies and they're all crying, whining, wanting milk, that's all you're going to get. Why are these pastors only preaching the plan of salvation? Because they've got a bunch of toddlers and babies in the audience and the pews, and they can't handle the strong meat. They can't handle the word of God. When somebody opens the Bible unto them and preaches the clear doctrines of the Bible, explains all the stories and the parables and gives them all this, they don't even understand it. They don't even know what he's saying. So you can't preach it. The Bible says, look, that's not right. That's not for a church. The pastor should be feeding the people. He should help them grow. They should be growing in the knowledge and the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ, and they should become men. They should not stay babies forever. This is important so they can be independent. Look, the goal, why do you feed your child? Why do you teach them things? So they can leave one day. I know it's hard for parents to believe, but at a certain point, you eventually want your kids to leave. You're eventually like, no, you need to go. You need to find a spouse. You need to get a job. Get your own place. Look, that's the point of teaching your child. That's the same thing with a pastor. He should be trying to train up the people to serve the Lord better. What's the purpose of a pastor? To help other people serve the Lord. To help them figure out, how can you serve the Lord better? How can I help you get there? What can I teach you? What can I help you do? What can I lay down in my life? How can I feed you to help you grow to serve the Lord? And when nobody's growing, there's a problem. Either the pastor's not teaching or the people are unwilling to listen. And we see apathy, they just wanna set up the king. Just tell us what we're gonna do. We're happy being in the playground forever. We're happy being in the daycare. We're happy with all the toys and the fun and the bells and the whistles. No, it's not right, it's sin, I believe. Go to Luke chapter nine. My second point, not only do we not set up a king, not do we need to make sure that our church is independent, we're independent, we need to support your church. Support the church you're going to. Support the church that you're in. We see there's a tendency sometimes from people to support a church they don't even go to. Well, I've been going to this church three times a week, but all I can talk about is some other church. It's all the things that this other church is doing and all their programs and all the works that they're doing. No, you need to support your church. That's how the churches are gonna stay independent. It's when the people rally together for their church, for their people, for their pastor. This is very important. Look at Luke chapter nine, verse 49. And John answered and said, Master, we saw one casting out devils in thy name, and we forbade him, because he followeth not with us. And Jesus said unto him, Forbid him not, for he that is not against us is for us. Look, the disciples, they're like, well, he's not on our team. Should we cast him aside? Should we tell him no? Look, no, he's independent. But he's on the Lord's side, isn't he? He's preaching the Lord Jesus Christ. He's doing good works. Jesus Christ said, no man by the Spirit of God called Jesus Christ accursed. Look, nobody's gonna be going out doing good works for the Lord, and they're wicked. If they're on the Lord's side, even though they're not part of your church, hey, just God bless him. Let him go do his own thing. We need to be paying attention to what we're doing, where we're at, how we can help our brothers and sisters in Christ, how we can help our church. We need to be an evangelist for our church, not for some other church, not for somebody else. This is how we get these denominations and all these popes and all these archbishops and all these satellites. All the satellites are just pointing to the main campus. Why don't you point to where you're at? Why don't you point to your church? Why don't you point to your pastor? See, we need to have our own convictions, because when you don't support your church, then the church doesn't have a leg to stand on. We see, when you have a church, it shouldn't just be clicking the download button to the main church's doctrinal statement. It should have its own doctrinal statement. It needs to be independent. We see all these satellite churches, what do they do? They just have one doctrinal statement. The Southern Baptist Convention, they just have one doctrinal statement for all of them. It's the Baptist faith and message. And you go to all these churches that are just completely scattered across the United States, you go to their doctrinal statement, it says, we subscribe to the Baptist faith and message, you know, the 2000 version, or the 1969 version, or whatever version, and you see all these churches, they just have the exact same statement of faith. Well, there's a problem there, because all you have to do if you're the devil is corrupt that one statement, corrupt that one church. And it sounds like a cult when all these churches just believe exactly alike. I mean, they just have exactly all the same beliefs. That sounds lazy, that sounds apathetic. You mean you're a Baptist church and you don't even have your own beliefs? We just believe whatever they said. We just believe whatever they put on their little pamphlet. Even though, if you go to the Southern Baptist faith and message, their plan of salvation, conveniently, they leave something out. Oh yeah, the resurrection. If you go to the Southern Baptist conventions, Baptist faith and message, and their plan of salvation, they never mentioned Jesus Christ being raised from the dead. They never mentioned the resurrection, not even one time. You know what they do mention? Turning from your sins. Repenting of your sins is a requirement of salvation. They have four separate points about salvation. Don't even mention the being rose again. How about 1 Corinthians 15, which says, look, if you don't have the resurrection, then you don't have the gospel. You're not saved. You're not believing in vain. Look, the resurrection is a key component of the gospel. We have verse, Romans chapter number 10, verse nine. What? We have to believe in our heart that God raised him from the dead. If you don't believe that, you're not saved. You have a different Jesus, you have a different gospel. Look, that's damnable heresy. Just leave that out. But how many churches, they just go on the website and just, oh, we just subscribe to the Baptist Faith and Message 2000. How lazy, how apathetic. And I guarantee they don't, most, a lot of them don't, wouldn't say they believe that. Obviously they say they believe in the resurrection. But look what kind of heresy and wicked false doctrine can creep into these churches just from them being lazy, not from being independent. We see the Catholic churches, what do they do? Their doctrinal statement comes from the pope. Whatever the pope says, ex cathedra even. I mean, if the pope just says something, hey, that's what we believe, that's not safety. That's not being independent. That's not being committed unto the Lord, that's being committed unto a man. Being committed unto a denomination. Being committed unto this pope. That's wicked. We need to have our own convictions. We need to not pay so much attention to what other churches are doing and have our own beliefs. Everything you believe should be because you believe it, not because somebody told you. No, I read that in my Bible. I know verses, I can support that. I believe it because what the Bible said. This is your final authority, not some doctrinal statement you downloaded for 50 bucks or from the Catholic church or from the SPC, which just takes out the resurrection from salvation. Daniel Harris is wicked. That's why their main leaders, I believe they're all reprobates and snuck in wicked people. That David Platt, he's the president of all the international missions board. This guy's a hardcore Calvinist. This guy preaches lordship salvation. This guy doesn't believe in easy believes him. He attacks easy believe ism. He attacks salvation by faith. And he's sending out all the missionaries for the entire nomination. All the Baptist, which is the largest denomination in the world of Christians. Of Christians, obviously Catholics are bigger, but of Christians, Baptist is no one's nomination. This guy's over all the missions board. The statement of faith just takes out the resurrection. This guy is sending Calvinists and all kinds of wicked people to these countries to just suffer. Never preach the gospel, never get anybody saved. And they're like, look at all the affliction they did, because they were in Africa and it was so awful. Look, it's not the gospel. That's not real persecution. That's not real suffering. Go to Proverbs chapter 26. People get so obsessed though, even my church, that I grew up in Texas. Well, I didn't grow up there, but I started going to another church. I grew up in Texas and I was going through an independent Baptist church there. And this church is just obsessed with other churches. All they can talk about is West Coast Baptist Bible College. All they can talk about is Heartland Baptist Bible College. They're just focused on some other church, some other ministry, not even their own. That's not being committed unto the Lord. You need to be focused on yourself. You need to be focused on your own ministry. Nobody's going to do great works for God, focused on somebody other than themselves, focused on some other ministry. No, you need to be focused on the people in your people. People in your people don't even care. They don't care what's going on in California. They think California is weird and wicked. They don't care about the stupid Bible college or these other churches. They want you to care about them and tell them about your ministry and how you're going to help them serve the Lord and do things to them. They want to be independent. That's why they came to an independent Baptist church. We need to stay independent, not be so focused on some other church and all the things they're doing. Look, if somebody does something great for the Lord, praise the Lord. I'm not saying you can't be excited when somebody does a great work. I'm not saying that you can't be excited for other churches. I'm not saying you can't be friends with other churches. But if you are constantly just focused on some other church, it's wrong. You need to be independent. You need to be focused on your people, on your ministries, on what you're doing. Look at Proverbs 26 verse 17. He that passeth by and meddleth with strife belonging not to him is like one that taketh a dog by the ears. Look, the Bible's saying, look, when somebody else is in strife, when there's problems in some other church, when there's problems with some other person, why are you getting involved in it? I mean, if it doesn't involve you, don't meddle with it. The Proverbs is true. I didn't make that up. It's saying, look, if there's strife not belonging to you, don't get involved. Don't try, oh, I need to intercede in that. But we see this is what happens with the denominations. This is what happens with these churches when they set up all their satellite churches. If a problem happens at the satellite, well, we gotta get the main church involved, the main pastor involved, we gotta get the pope involved, we gotta get all these other people involved. They have nothing to do with it. They have no dog in the fight, but they're gonna go grab that dog by the ears and they're gonna get bit. Look, even in marriage, you need to be an evangelist for your spouse. This is clear as a principle in the Bible. If you're gonna get married, the person that you should be talking about is your spouse. But we see so many people today, they're focused on someone else. I was constantly around men, they're just like, oh, did you see this movie with so-and-so in it, and oh man, look at this celebrity and this singer and this actress, and man, if I was a celebrity, I would wanna be married to this person and I would wanna do this. What about, look, you need to be an evangelist for your spouse. You chose to get married to them. You chose to commit your life under them. Why don't you talk about them? Why don't you get excited about who you are married to, who you did choose to be with for the rest of your life, and keep your eyes only under them. We don't need to be an evangelist for other people. I'm not gonna be an evangelist for some other woman. That's wicked. I'm gonna be an evangelist for my wife. I'm gonna be content with my wife. I'm gonna talk well of my wife, of who I chose to marry. We see it's wicked when you're just focused on somebody else. Same principle I believe applies to their church. If you're so in love with some other church, go to that church. Get married to that church. Go and be there and support them. We see if you're gonna be somewhere, if you're gonna choose to walk in the doors, support your church. Be a part of your church. Be excited about their ministries, even in your own lives. Go to Romans chapter 15. I think it's never appropriate to talk about some other woman in front of your wife, or ever. I shouldn't be talking about, well, I think she's really attractive and I would love to be married to her. Never do it. Never, you know, you might have that temptation, you might have that thought, other people might do it. I would just say, well, I love my wife. I'm so glad I'm married to my wife. I think she's the most attractive woman I've ever seen. That's what should be coming out of your mouth for. Romans chapter 15, look at verse 17. I have therefore aware of, I make glory through Jesus Christ in those things which pertain to God. For I will not dare to speak of any of those things which Christ hath not wrought by me, to make the Gentiles obedient by word and deed, through mighty signs and wonders by the power of the Spirit of God, so that from Jerusalem and round about until I hear him, I have fully preached the gospel of Christ. Yea, so I have strived to preach the gospel, not where Christ was named, lest I should build upon another man's foundation. But as it is written, to whom he was not spoken of, they shall see, and they that have not heard shall understand, for which cause also I have been much hindered from coming to you. So Paul is saying, look, when I went out to go preach the gospel, I did not try to go onto some other man's labors. I had not tried to go where he was already preached. I'm trying to preach to the unreached people, to the people that haven't gotten the gospel. You know what these churches need to do? Independent Baptist churches, they need to try and find the unreached people. Find people that somebody hasn't reached them. Try and minister to the people that haven't been reached, that don't have the gospel that you can clearly preach to them. Don't just go around trying to pick up somebody's crumbs. No, go find your own fruits. Go go out and try and reach the lost yourself. Paul, was he focused on the people that were already reached by Peter and Papa John? Sometimes he messed up. Sometimes he went back to Jerusalem, and he's trying to, you know, he just keeps on running into the wall. Oh man, they just don't wanna hear, they just wanna hear. But every time he goes to the Gentiles, they're receptive, he's getting lots of people saved. Look, these independent Baptist churches, we need to try and go reach people that haven't been reached. Find new ways, new avenues, new highways and hedges to walk down and up. Look, we need to try and get the gospel to the whole world. And the most important thing is to try and reach the unreached. People that don't have the gospel, the people that have no hope, that we can go and preach the gospel unto them. That should be our focus. Look, we need to make sure that we're not setting up a king. We need to make sure that we're supporting our church and that the church is supporting itself, its own ministries. It's not focused on somebody else's ministries. We are gonna focus ourselves on trying to reach people that aren't reached. Why did Faith Board of Baptist Church North get started? To reach this area that hasn't been reached. We're not trying to plant a church in Guadalupe where we've knocked the door seven or eight times already. No, we're trying to go in an area where it hasn't been reached. Reach these people. We knocked on the door, me and Steve knocked on the door of a woman. And we said, hey, we got a church that's just down the street. He's like, well, we got another one in Tempe. She's like, I'll never go to Tempe. She's like, I love the Lord, I love Jesus, but Tempe's too far. I mean, people are like that. They need a good church to go to, do they not? I mean, should we just, well, if they're not willing to drive an hour and a half in traffic both ways, you know, then they shouldn't be able to have to go to church. But we should go start a church by their house. Go start a church that they can come to, that we can help them serve the Lord. Look, the point is to reach people that are not being reached. Go to John chapter 21. My third point is that we need to follow Christ first. Now, it's not that much different than the first point, but it's kind of a different view. We don't want to set up a king. What do we want to do? We want to follow Christ first. We want to make Christ our king. We want to make the Lord Jesus Christ and his word our final authority. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not on thine understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths. Look, we're supposed to let the Bible be our final authority. Let Christ be first in our lives. Let Christ be the one that's ruling over you and your guidance. The lamp unto your feet. Look at John chapter 21, verse 21. Peter seeing him sayeth to Jesus, Lord, what shall this man do? Jesus saith on him, if I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me. Then went the saying abroad among the brethren that that disciple should not die. Yet Jesus saith not unto him, he shall not die, but if I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? He's saying, look, don't get wrapped up in what other people are doing. Follow the Lord. You just can worry about it yourself. Stay independent. Don't be so worried about what all the other disciples are gonna do. Why aren't you worried about what you're gonna do, Peter? Peter, you're the one that decided to go fishing. You're the one that affected all the other guys that go fishing. You're the one that's not doing what I told you to feed my lambs. You're the one that's not doing what I said to feed the sheep. Why are you so focused on John? Why are you so focused on what somebody else is doing? Why don't you focus on yourself? Why don't you take care of the bean that's in your own eye before you try to cast out the mote in your brothers? Why don't you be focused on what you're supposed to do? Because ultimately at the end of the day, you are the only person you can affect. You're the only person that you can make all the decisions for. You are the only one that can decide if you're gonna believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And you can't force someone else to believe. You can't force someone else to work for the Lord. You can't force someone else to serve the Lord Jesus Christ. Why don't you be an example? Why don't you be an example unto John? See, I don't care what John's gonna do. I'm gonna serve the Lord for the rest of my life. I hope he does likewise. I hope he sees my example of deciding not to go back to fishing, but going to fish for men, to go serve the Lord. If we had more people that were independent, deciding I'm just gonna serve the Lord and be a good example, you know what, a lot more work would be done. But what are people, they're constantly looking over their shoulder, what's John doing? You know, is John gonna go to church? Is John gonna go out soloing this week? Is John gonna pray? Does John memorize the Bible? Does John study? Does John do, I mean, why do you care what John's doing? Follow without me. John could be a false prophet. You don't even know what John's doing. You don't even know what John believes in his heart. What if they're all focused on what Judas was doing? You think that would've been a good workout for him? Who cares what Judas is doing? Follow the Lord. You'll never be disappointed by following the Lord yourself, by reading the Bible for yourself, by memorizing and praying and serving the Lord and raising a godly family and following God's commandments. You won't be disappointed for you doing it. Don't be so focused on what other people are doing. Focus on what you're doing. Go to 1 Corinthians chapter one. Leaders need to lead. That's the importance. We need the Baptist churches to be independent so they can lead. We need good leaders. We need good examples. We don't need one leader. We need lots of leaders. We need lots of people going out and doing the charge. Jesus Christ didn't send out one person to preach the gospel. He sent out many people to go out and preach the gospel. He had the 12 apostles, he appointed seven of the other. Also, he appeared under 500 brethren. He then gets, you know, appointed the apostle Paul. We see other people constantly mentioned. We have Titus and Timothy. We have all these people throughout the Bible. God's using a lot of people. We need a lot of people. We need a lot of leaders. We need a lot of people that are going to be, I'm going to be independent. I'm going to serve the Lord. I don't care if Peter goes and, you know, forsakes the Gentiles and eats with the Hebrews, you know? I'm going to serve the Lord. I'm going to preach the gospel to the Gentiles. I'm going to withstand Peter to the face. If he goes that way, look at 1 Corinthians chapter one, verse 11. For it hath been declared unto me of my brethren, by them which are the house of Chloe, that there are contentions among me. Now this I say, that every one of you say it. I am of Paul, and I am of Apollos, and I am of Cephas, and I am of Christ. Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? Look, we need to not be so focused on some other person. Well, what's our past? I'm a Pastor Anderson. Well, I'm a Pastor Berson's. Well, I'm a Pastor Donnie Romero. Well, I'm a Tyler Baker. That sounds like a Paul's problem. You better get that fixed. But look, we're not supposed to be of some person. I'm of Christ. And whatever Christ says, that's what I'm going to do. Look, man will disappoint you. And you know what? There's going to be a pastor that we think's like-minded that you look up to that's going to be a Judas, that's going to be a false prophet. And if you're of that person, look, you're going to fall hard. But you know what? If you're of Christ, you're not going to fall. You're not going to stumble. If you have your focus on what Christ is doing, that's where your focus should be. That's where your mission should be. That's where your heart should be. You should be independent. Don't get so dependent on other people because they'll bring you down. Look, man will disappoint you. And we need to have healthy boundaries in our life. It's OK to have authority. You're always going to have authority. You're always going to have people you need to look to. Paul said, be followers of me as I am of Christ. Look, it's OK to follow somebody that's running towards the Lord Jesus Christ. But you have in your heart and you know if this guy turns aside, I'm going to keep going. I'm going to keep running in the right direction. It doesn't matter what he does. And there should be healthy boundaries in your life. You shouldn't believe things about the Lord Jesus Christ, the core doctrines of the faith, just because some man said it. You need to believe for yourself. You need to open the Bible and know what the Bible says for yourself. You need to know the verses. You need to be independent. You need to be able to support your faith by yourself, not just having somebody else teach you. Here's some good boundaries. I'm not going to ever leave my wife alone with some other man. It doesn't matter how much I like the guy. It doesn't matter how much trust I have in the guy. I'm not going to trust that situation, period. I'm not going to leave myself alone with some other woman. Why? Because it's not a good position to put yourself in. It's not a place that you should go in. You should have healthy boundaries for your life. There are certain areas of your life that you just don't trust other people, even though they're good people, even though you like them. Look, I'm not going to trust some stranger with my kids. I'm not going to trust hardly anybody with my kids. It's like me and my wife may be a parent, maybe. Look, you just don't put certain people in certain situations. And you know what happens? Then you don't lose the things that you're not willing to lose. I'm not willing to lose my wife. I'm not willing to lose my kids. I'm not willing to lose certain things in my life. So I'm not going to trust them to somebody where something bad can happen. Look, there have been a lot of people kicked out of faith-aware Baptist church. I've had them over at my house. I've eaten meals with these people. What if I decided, oh, I should leave them with my kids, thinking nothing bad could ever happen. These people are great people. They love the Lord. Look, you never really know. And if you never put somebody in that position, then they can't make that mistake. And you can't make that mistake. We need to be careful where we put our trust, and we need to have healthy boundaries. I like accountability. I don't like it when somebody's making decisions where they're putting too much trust in me, where they're putting too much accountability in me. I'm saying, whoa, what are you doing? You don't even know me. And you want me to like watch your kids and do all these things with you. I don't feel comfortable with that. Curious, you're too trusting. If you trust me that you just met, that means you're going to trust a reprobate one day. That means you trust a Judas one day. You're going to trust someone wicked. I know I'm not wicked, but I know if you're too trusting of me, you're going to be too trusting with the wrong person too. And you know, this happens a lot with people dating. It's this weird phenomenon. There's a lot of whorish women out there. And the thing that young men don't understand is that whorish women like every guy. So she just meets a guy that she's never seen before and she's willing to go all the way with the guy on the first date. Look, she's willing to go all the way with a lot of guys on the first date. You're not special. There's nothing special about you. She has a problem. And look, if someone that just met you wants you to watch their kids, they have a problem. There's something wrong with that person. You need to be aware of that situation. We need to not just put too much trust in people, no matter who they are, no matter what the situation is. We need to have healthy boundaries in our life. We need to be independent. Good X chapter 10. We see there's so many failures. There's people they want to be of Paul Chappell. I want to be a Jack Schreiber. I want to be a Peter Ruckman. You know, there's so many people that have so much pride in being a Ruckmanite. They're like, oh, I'm a Ruckman. You know, Ruckman's so cool. He could draw all these pictures. Yeah, and he believes that, you know, babies aren't babies until they take their first breath. What a weird, wicked false doctrine that is. The guy who one of his ex-wives threw herself out of a car because she hated the guy so much. I mean, he's so great. Look, we need to not be focused on the man. We need to focus on the man Christ Jesus. We need to focus on the Lord, focus on the Bible, being independent. Don't get so wrapped up in some personality, in some person. Let's support your church, support your pastor, support the people there, but don't make it a cult. Don't set up the king. Let the Lord Jesus Christ be your king. Let the Lord Jesus Christ be the one that you're following and when someone goes astray, well, I'm good because I'm still on the Lord's side. Hey, I'm still going to serve the Lord. If the church goes bad, I'm going to stay good because I'm on the Lord's side. Look at Acts chapter 10, verse 25. And as Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him and fell down to his feet and worshiped him. But Peter took him up saying, stand up, I myself also am a man. But when people give you too much honor and too much respect, you just say, stand up, I'm a man. We see so many people today, they'll get worshiped. And instead of saying stand up, they just take it. Cause it feels kind of good. Oh man, that was a really good sermon, wasn't it? I know, that was really good, wasn't it? Nobody could probably preach that good again. I mean, yeah, this is the best church ever, isn't it? I mean, I'm probably the best pastor ever, isn't it? People will take those compliments, won't they? And they love them and they like them. It's dangerous. When somebody is giving you too much praise, too much honor, when the tension has taken off the Lord Jesus Christ, you need to say, hey, wait a minute, buddy. You need to stand up. We're serving the Lord Jesus Christ, I'm just a man. It's not about me, it's not about my program. It's about the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm just trying to help you get on the Lord Jesus Christ program. He must increase, but I must decrease. That's what the godly man would do. What about people like even Jack Hyles? You know, if you go to his church, they have a huge graven image of Jack Hyles right there on the campus. You need to throw that thing in the fire. You need to, you know, ground it up and put it in the water and make them drink it. Maybe they'll think twice about doing it again. That sounds terrible. But look, it happens. It happens where man gets worshiped and the godly pastor need to say, whoa buddy, no. You need to worship the Lord. Let Christ be your king. Follow Christ first. That's the person that should be getting all the glory. That's the person that's giving all the praise. Go to Ephesians chapter number five. And then flip over to Acts 22 and that'll be the last place we turn. Second Corinthians, I'll read through in verse 12, it says, for though I would desire to glory, I shall not be a fool. For I will say the truth, but now I forbear, lest any man should think of me above that which he seemeth me to be, for that he heareth of me. Paul said, look, I don't want anybody to think of me above what he should. And you know what? You should have respect for your pastor. You should have respect for the deacon. You should have respect for men and the Lord. You should have respect for your fellow brethren. You should pay honor to whom honor is due. But you better not think above that which you're supposed to of that man. If you're thinking above what you're supposed to, you need to get in check. It's about the Lord, it's the Lord's program that we're on, it's not some man. It's not Paul Chappell's program. It's not Jack Treiber's program. It's not Peter Ruckman's program. It's not the Pope's program. No, it's the Lord Jesus Christ's program. It's not some man's program. Ephesians five, verse 23, for the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church. And he is the savior of the body. Who's the head of the church? It's Christ. I'm gonna keep that as the focus. Christ is the one over the church. Christ is the one that's the king. Christ is the one that we're following. Christ is the one that makes the rules. The pastor's just the overseer. The pastor's just the example. The pastor's the one trying to get you on Christ's program. I'll read for you in Acts chapter 14. It says, and when they had ordained the elders in every church and had prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord on whom they believed. Look, we need to be independent. We need to be commended unto the Lord as individuals and as a church. And when we ever see ourselves falling away from that, not being as independent as we need to be, putting too much reliance on man, putting too much trust in somebody else, look, we need to bring that back to ourselves and say, I'm not that apathetic. I'm not gonna be that lazy. I'm gonna realize I need to take responsibility for myself. I need to take responsibility for what I believe. I need to take responsibility for my church. Look, a church's success is based on the people. And if all the people's heart is in somewhere else, in some other church, in some other thing, the church isn't gonna succeed. Look, the people's heart needs to be here. The people's heart needs to be on serving the Lord on the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at Acts 20, verse 28. Take heed, therefore, unto yourselves and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood. Look, the church of God was purchased by the blood of Jesus Christ. Let's give honor unto whom honor is due. And let's be independent for Christ getting the glory, Christ getting the honor. That's why we're independent. We're independent because we wanna take emphasis off man and put it all on the Lord Jesus Christ, who with his own blood purchased the church. He's the one that's over the church. He's the one that has the pre-emance. He's the one that should get all the honor and the glory and the praise. Let's close in prayer. Thank you, Father, so much for everything that you've given us through your son, Jesus Christ. Thank you for the blood that was shed on Calvary so that we could have a church. Thank you for being the one that will guide us and lead us and be the head over the church. I pray that we'd always keep our focus on you and that we could be independent and self-sufficient so that we give more honor and glory and praise unto you. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.