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David that saw and slain the Lord's priests, and David said unto Abiathar, I knew it that day, when the Edomite was there, that he would surely tell Saul, I have occasioned the death of all the persons of thy father's house. Abide thou with me, fear not, for he that seeketh my life, seeketh thy life, but with me, thou shalt be in safeguard. Let's all bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Thank you Lord for bringing us all here together on this Friday night to sing praises to you and hear your word be preached. Lord we ask you to please fill Pastor Thompson with your holy spirit as he comes forward to preach the message that you laid on his heart. Lord we ask you to give us all ears to hear and hearts to receive the message and Lord we love you and in Jesus name we pray. Amen. Amen. Well it's great to be back here again and I just want to thank Pastor Jones and his family for inviting us out here and happy anniversary. Amen. We made it a year. I can't believe it. I was betting the other way. No I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. Pastor Jones is doing a great job here and his preaching has been really a blessing and we thank you. Thanks everybody for coming out on a Friday night. I know everybody's probably worked hard this week. I'm only going to be preaching for three hours tonight so I hope you don't mind. But anyway so let's see. I met Pastor Jones. How long has it been? Miss Jessica knows. How long? Five years. We've been friends five years. I can't believe that. So I thought, you know, six months is best I'm going to get out of his friendship but no I'm teasing. Pastor Jones has been a great friend of mine. Miss Jessica, the kids. You know we started out just as like a soul winning group really and we kind of we met on Facebook you know and we started doing soul winning together and doing just little small events and you know then now here we are we're both pastors and you know God's blessed our churches both of our churches and it's just you know it's just gone by really super fast hasn't it? But I really am thankful to have great friends like the Jones family and all of you too. So we're going to be focusing on the first two verses here in 1 Samuel chapter 22 and the title of the sermon tonight is how to become mighty for God. How to become mighty for God. Let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father we thank you Lord so much for this great church. Lord I pray that this church would be here for many many many years Lord. I just pray that you bless this church Lord. Help it to grow and Lord just be with Pastor Jones and his family Lord and this congregation I pray Lord that it would just do mighty mighty works here in Boise Idaho for years to come. Thank you for one year Lord and let's pray a special blessing upon this church and upon your word tonight as it's preached and let's pray that you fill me with the spirit now Lord and give me boldness in Jesus name we pray amen. All right so let's look at verse number one tonight the Bible says David therefore departed thence and escaped to the cave adulum and when his brethren and all his father's house heard it they went down vither to him and everyone that was in distress and everyone that was in debt and everyone that was discontented gathered themselves unto him and he became a captain over them and there were with him about 400 men. So you see this is where David starts to to build you know his his kingdom basically. Now obviously Saul is still the king at this time. I just see many parallels in this story with kind of how like these quote unquote quote unquote new IFB churches have started right. So obviously when I say new IFB I'm an independent Baptist pastor Pat this is an independent Baptist church I just mean what we believe right. So when you say new IFB you know that we believe all the things you know that fundamentally Baptists have believed for years but you know you just kind of add on post-trib pre-wrath non-dispensational non-Zionist right and family integrated things like that soul winning you know because you know it seems like soul winning is kind of a dying breed and you know you should feel blessed you have a church like this to go to or you know the pastor sends you out to preach the gospel. So in this story David is kind of like so I kind of look at David like like a pastor here you know he he's on the run from Saul old IFB right. So and then you know his brethren the Bible says and all of his father's house heard it and they went down thither to him. So these people start to gather themselves to David because like David is a mighty man of God. He killed Goliath the Philistine. He killed a bear. He smote a lion grabbed it by the beard and said what's up sucka slapped it around I mean but he did all that through through his he was a humble man he's a humble man and he was a great man but you know when he went and fought Goliath the Philistine that really rose him to fame and then Saul started getting mad right that's kind of how the old IFB treats us right they get mad because you know we're doing something that they're not anymore and they just want to kind of continue to be a country club and you know Baptist like me Baptist like Pastor Jones Baptist like everybody in this room got sick of all the garbage teaching and all this other stuff and it's kind of like Saul started out good right and he did good and then he just said you know what I'm not going to follow the word of the Lord I'm not going to follow what God told me to do and then God removed him from being the king. Now he's still the king in name only and that's kind of how the old Baptist churches are nowadays they're kind of still the king or whatever but you know as soon as they die then it's going to just you know a lot of those churches are going to just die because you know what God's going to remove look once you lose your first love and once you lose doing the first works God will remove that candlestick away from that church and they'll cease to be a church anymore that's why independent Baptist churches are dying is because they don't reach the next generation. So Saul's kind of like the old IFB I guess in this story David's like a new IFB pastor right and people are starting to come to him right now look at verse two it says and everyone that was in distress and everyone that was in debt and everyone that was discontented gathered themselves onto him and he became a captain over then and there were with him about 400 men so now you see not only are his family members coming to him and and coming and gathering themselves together to him but also everybody that's kind of like the outcast and kind of like in new IFB churches we're kind of like the outcast right we're the ones that just like couldn't deal with it anymore we're distressed over the you know the graven images that they'll put in the church you know the nativity scenes right in the right in front of the pulpit um we're distressed about the fact that they're teaching all this false doctrine and you know just even the reprobate doctrine they like go miles out of their way to try to say that Romans 1 says something way different oh well Christians could become reprobates too what in the world are you talking about that's a new that's a new teaching that's a new cart but David had these men that were discontented and they gathered themselves together unto him and became a captain so the title of the sermon is how to become a mighty man or mighty how to become mighty for God well one of the things you know that you need to understand about these men these men became the mighty men of David didn't they and so 37 of these 400 people became the mighty men of David and so they're extra special warriors this was like a fighting force like none other that the world has ever seen but where do they start out at they started out as distressed in debt discontented and then years later we see the lists in first in first chronicles chapter 12 um we see that list where it says uh it names all the uh mighty men right and what they did so they started out as just regular you know regular people that were kind of having some problems and became this mighty fighting force and so but you know the first thing that they did so number one tonight the first thing that they did is they got behind a captain that they could follow now pastor Jones would be considered the captain of this church he's the pastor of this church and you know you know if you want to be a mighty person for God you know I don't want to say men because there's ladies in here also hey you can be mighty too ladies but what I want to say is number one is get behind your captain so you got to get behind your captain if you want to be a mighty fighting force because look everybody has a head over the top of them so my head is Jesus Christ the the head of Christ is God I'm the head of my wife my wife is head over our children well you know most of our children have moved out we got one we got Josh you know and so he's at home playing with the dog or something I don't know what he's doing no he's he's a good kid he's he's doing well but uh he's just turned 18 and he's still living at home and so uh he needs to find a wife and no I'm just joking he can stay as long as he wants he's our baby no I'm just joking that's what mom says anyway so so uh you got to get behind your captain because look what it says in verse number one it says and he became a captain over them and so look you know the Bible is you know there's the stories in the Old Testament for us and I'll get more into that later but um you know we can compare things in the Old Testament and and make a spiritual application that's what I'm doing tonight with these verses so so Pastor Jones will be the captain of this church and look you got to get behind the captain right you know in in football there's a quarterback everybody kind of he's usually the leader of the team he's the quarterback he's the one that's calling the plays he's making the throws he's doing all that and usually people get behind a quarterback as the captain of the team turn to first Corinthians chapter 11 verse number one now what do I mean by get behind your captain well that means that you're following after what he's doing okay and so the Bible teaches very clearly that we are to follow men okay and that's one of the criticisms that we get as pastors a lot is that oh you're following a man don't follow men you're not supposed to follow men well the Bible says something different my friends we're supposed to follow men as they follow Christ now look at verse number one in first Corinthians 11 it says be followers of me even as I also am of Christ so the apostle Paul what's he saying follow me follow me is he is he like trying to get worship there or something no he's just saying hey I'm a leader I'm an apostle why don't you follow me as I follow Christ see but if the apostle Paul stopped following Christ and he'd say okay well he's not following Christ anymore so I'm gonna not follow him so as long as pastor Jones here is following Christ and you know what you should follow his lead listen to what he has to say take his training take him take in his preaching and follow him as he follows Christ and you know what get on board with the programs here I'm sure that pastor Jones doesn't have multiple programs going on I think the main one is soul winning right so and then like some kind of wrestling class you guys are doing or something jujitsu you guys are beating each other up you know hey get behind him he's trying to make you mighty men in other ways other than spiritually too so but you know that's good I'm glad that you guys have that you know I'm sure you guys are doing homeschool things and things like that but get on board with the programs hey whatever program pastor Jones is trying to get you on get on that program and follow after him and you know pastor Jones goes soul winning go soul winning after his example so I heard you guys got a lot of people saved this week that's great you know why because you're following the leader and don't ever stop following your captain unless he's again not following Christ but I don't see that happening I don't see pastor Jones just stopping soul winning and sitting back and you know and saying you know what I've done everything that I could do you know what I'm just giving up he's not going to do that so let's see turn to Matthew chapter 4 verse 19 you know and if we're supposed to be following the captain the captain follows Christ what did Christ ask his disciples to do well in Matthew 4 19 he says and he said unto them follow me and I will make you fishers of men so the main program that's going on at this church and probably always will be the main focus of this church is going soul and you know what if you're not following Christ or if you're not going soul winning then you're not following Christ if you're not going soul winning you're not following your your captain and so you if you're not on the program you need to get on that program and get behind your captain so um let's see uh let's turn to first Corinthians chapter 14 and verse number 37 sorry to do this to you tonight but we're gonna actually look at some bible verses I know you're not used to that no I'm just kidding no I know pastor Jones uses a lot of bible but uh tonight we're gonna look at a lot of bible so don't get too sleepy on me all right first Corinthians chapter 14 verse 37 it says if any man think himself to be a prophet or spiritual let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the lord but if any man be ignorant let him be ignorant wherefore brethren covet to prophesy and forbid not to speak in tongues you're like pastor Thompson what are you talking about well you know one of the programs that you guys got going on here is a men's preaching night you know and the bible says that you should covet to prophesy that's the most important thing now obviously prophesying is talking it's not talking about like you know you're giving some it's not always something about the future okay it's it's it's called it just means preaching and so when you have a chance to get up and preach at this church look he doesn't have a lot of you know he doesn't have a lot of people different people coming in and preaching and you know what it's nice for pastors to get breaks every once in a while did you know that so I know that one of the main programs for having a men's preaching night is so you can develop preachers but hey guess what if you never write a sermon or if you just you know you flake off until the very end and then just throw something together look I know he still probably wants you to preach that thrown together sermon but hey why don't you just take a little bit of time take a little bit of time and pray and learn to preach you know he doesn't just have it for nothing he wants to teach you how to preach and you know what you should stop coveting after your neighbor's things stop coveting after money and trying to be rich and all this other stuff why don't you covet the prophesy you know and that would include soul winning but I'm saying come in covet the prophesy learn to preach so that you could give your pastor a break every once in a while you know or so you can start some kind of new ministry where the people are preaching at other different places and things like that hey get on the program so so and other what else can you do to get on the program well you can any do any tasks that would help around this building around this church now obviously it's it's small right now and you know but it's going to get bigger but you know if you have a big church mentality you know this church is going to grow and so any task you can do to help around here would probably be much appreciated now I'm not saying that nobody's doing anything I don't know what the situation is okay but anything I say wrong defer to pastor Jones he's always right amen so turn to Colossians chapter 3 and we'll take a look at what God expects of you like look we didn't just get saved to not do anything we got saved so we could work for the Lord right and you know obviously we got saved so we could escape hell and go to heaven for all eternity and things like that but God has a work program and you know what he pays well instead of coveting after things of this world why don't you covet to get some rewards in heaven and you know if you're not if you're not doing anything then you're not going to get any rewards it's just that simple you know you're going to be 45 someday like me and like you look back and you think hey I wish I would have done more when I was younger because the older you get the harder it is to do work I don't know if you guys realize that or not but it's the truth so look at first Colossians 3 verse 22 it says servants obey in all things your masters according to the flesh not with eye service as men pleasers but in singleness of heart fearing God and whatsoever you do do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men so you're not working so that pastor Jones can go you know scratch your back and say oh you're doing such a great job you know you know you're you're on a gravy train with biscuit wheels you're just doing the best thing ever you're doing it because you want to serve Christ you're doing it because you want to serve the Lord and it says whatsoever you do do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men knowing that of the Lord you shall receive the reward of the inheritance for you serve the Lord Christ that's who you're serving today you're not serving pat I mean you are serving in the church but you know the ultimately the boss is God and he's the one that you should be seeking to please not man right so so what are some of the things you could do well I just was thinking of some of the things and I don't know this isn't an all-inclusive list but how about cleaning cleaning you know look you you get reward for cleaning too you get rewarded for everything that you do uh that you're working for God for so how about I was gonna say making coffee but you know you guys kind of got the coffee thing you got the weird carrot thing back there so you can make coffee it's just one cup at a time no it looks like there's another coffee pot back there too but I don't know if you guys do donuts and coffee do you do okay how about you know picking up donuts greeting visitors as they come in you know we're not just like supposed to have like clicks here where we don't recognize the new people that come in here you should be nice to people when they come in and you know that that's a it's a good work to do that I'm sure your pastor would appreciate you greeting visitors volunteering to be an usher helping to train new people in soloing and look if you're not if you can't train people in soloing maybe you need to learn how to go soloing so you can learn to train people right so titus chapter two turn to titus chapter two titus chapter two verse one and so this goes along with helping to train new people right look at this it says in verse one but speak thou the things which become sound doctrine that the aged men be sober grave temperate sound in faith in charity and patience so and I'll just say this apply this spiritually also not just people that are older men but how about you're older in the faith you know because some people are new in the faith and so remember last time I preached about you know not being a spiritual baby forever but some people you know when you get saved you're a spiritual baby at first so you could be still a baby in Christ and so I would just say that you know being an aged man could also be someone that's been saved for a while all right so and then look at the aged women it says the aged women likewise that they be in behavior as become with holiness not false accusers not given to much wine teachers of good things that they may teach the young women to be sober to love their husbands to love their children and don't we need that more in 2020 than we've ever needed it before we need some some women to teach the young women to be sober to love their husbands and to love their children because there's a lot of that not going on today and so what do we what do we need we need people to train people that are coming in and say set the example be a good wife be a good husband be a good child here and teach as the you know you elder ladies in the faith can teach the younger ladies that's what the bible says to do so here's your your verses ladies look look at verse uh the next verse down verse number five I put the font too low I can't even read the number there but uh to it says to be discreet chaste keepers at home good obedient to their own husbands that the word of God be not blasting so what does God want the elder ladies to do or the even the elder ladies of the faith to do he wants you to teach the other younger women to love their kids to be to love their husbands to teach them to be discreet and chaste keepers of the home you know and and that's definitely needed in 2020 hey we need some some ladies to teach the other ladies and to train other ladies so um you know and and let me tell you this don't be afraid to drink pastor jones's kool-aid all right his kool-aid is okay it's not going to kill you get on the program drink the kool-aid all right shine them shoes whatever you got to do and you know get on the program follow your pastor people on the internet are going to be emailing you what what are you going to what are you what's this guy talking about drink the kool-aid it's spiritual kool-aid okay anyway so but you know here's another thing have your pastor's back have your captain's back and that's very important to know for the pastor to know that the people have in the church have his back you know sometimes you got to make hard decisions sometimes you got to throw people out that are losers sometimes you got to kick people up because they're 11 that's infecting the rest of the church and you got to say hey don't come back all right you know if you don't believe and you're not on the program that we're on don't just come here and sow your little seeds of discord you know get behind the pastor and say hey you know what those people did need to go don't sit there and be a little crybaby don't sit there and be a little bleeding heart right right you know people are going to criticize your pastor people are going to you know they're going to talk crap about your pastor don't let them do it if someone's talking bad about your pastor just take them right over to pastor say hey pastor you know this guy's got something to say no i'm just joking but you know what if you're a secret i don't think there's any secret haters in here but if you are a secret hater why don't you just get out right now because you know what you're just going to get preached out of the door anyway you know you can only you can only handle it for so long before you start to cry just get out i don't understand why people that hate the pastor or hate the church or hate the doctor and just sit there and dig themselves in you know but really the reason why i think it is because they just want to do the work of the devil and i'm not saying that like everybody that leaves church on bad terms is of the devil i'm just saying that they're doing the devil's work okay so number one get behind your captain number two tonight to become mighty you must train to become mighty you must train so turn to first chronicles chapter 12 and we'll look at that list of the mighty men we're going to look at some of it anyway we're actually not going to look at the list of the mighty men we're going to look at what they did all right so just a couple things and we'll get back to that later on in the sermon about the names and the accomplishments they did but you got to train to become mighty you know david was already trained up remember he said well you know i beat the lion i beat the bear you know and this uncircumcised philistines going down and you know what i am not trained to use the armor i'm going to go with the training that i already have and what did he do he picked up five rocks and you know five smooth stones out of the brook and one of those sunk right between goliath's eyeballs and killed him they chopped his head off the sword and carried it around with them for a little while but anyway that's a different a different sermon right david was a mighty man he trained to be mighty right and he probably was throwing rocks and hitting trees and practicing with both hands before he ever slung that first rock at goliath you know that only rock that that killed goliath but you know these mighty men of god that we were talking about the ones that were you know just kind of this ragtag group that came to david in the beginning that 400 first 400 look at first chronicles chapter one what it says or first chronicles chapter 12 and see what it says it says now these are they that came to david to ziklag while he yet kept himself close because of saul the son of kish and they were among the mighty men helpers of the war they were armed with bows and could use both the right and the left in hurling stones and shooting arrows out of a bow even of saul's brethren of benjamin so these guys do you think do you think that if they could throw with both hands and they could shoot a bow with both hands i can't even shoot a bow with one hand i mean i can't a little bit but i'm not like good with it i'm not robbing it i'll just tell you that right now but you know what i haven't practiced a lot to some people you know they just love hunting and they worship hunting and you know hunting's okay i'm not saying anything bad about hunting but some people spend a lot of time drawing those bows back and learning to train and there's nothing wrong with that but do you think these guys trained to get this good at what they were doing yeah were they that good when they first started no so it's the same thing with people in the church with a new church starts and then all these people come and then you know you start to train to do the things to make you mighty someday all right and so you gotta you know and i'll just use this example and i know this is old mma stuff right but when i first started watching mma i watched uh i think it was forest griffin his his fight on you know whatever it's the last ultimate fighter show or whatever it was and i watched that i was like this is great right and so then like so that was when randy couture and chuck liddell were fighting you know they had their rematches chuck randy couture beat him up and you know chuck liddell knocked him out and then you know so it was like but there were great fighters at that time and there's a lot of you know i don't even i don't follow it so much anymore i don't even really know who the champions are right now but do you think that people in mma just you know they never train of course they train you have to train if you don't train you're going to get the crud beat out of you and you're going to look like a fool you know there's a lot of people that have come into mma and they think oh i can box you know but you know what mma means mixed martial arts okay and so you have to know jujitsu wrestling boxing and some guys have karate as their base or whatever but look ultimately you have to train to beat people up and you have to train to be a warrior and so just like in church work you still have to train to become a great church member okay and so these mighty men they didn't just become mighty by not training they had it's not like they could just shoot bows with both hands and throw rocks with both hands and you know fend off these armies with one spear you know because they just came to david no they did have to train and obviously god made them mighty also all right you can't you can't take the god factor out of it but if you want to be mighty for god you got to start training to be mighty so and one of the ways you can do that is well apply the preaching that you hear here's the problem with with you know preaching is that sometimes people don't soak everything in you're already making your shopping list you're already thinking about what you're gonna have for lunch because you're so hungry in between the services and that's all you can think about or you're so tired because you worked hard that day and all you want to do is just say oh if i could just sleep right now and look you're missing great preaching when you do that but you know if you're here and you're and you're listening to the preaching apply what you're learning you know apply that to your life because if you don't guess what you're going to lose that you're going to lose that knowledge and you're going to lose that experience that you get but you know a part of the training is being at church you know and listening to the preaching because god gave you your pastor god gave this pastor for this church for a time like this turn to ephesians chapter 4 and verse number 11 ephesians chapter 4 and verse number 11 the bible says this and he gave some apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers who gave them god gave them right it says what for the perfecting of the saints you know every time you come in and you hear bible preaching at this church god is trying to perfect you through that preaching of the man of god that he put here for you right and it says for the perfecting of the saints for the work of the ministry for the edifying of the body of christ it's not for no reason it's what you know look the ministry is work in case you didn't realize that you know people are like yeah soul winning rah rah rah rah but when you've been doing it for years it can get tough especially when you know you're in a non-receptive neighborhood and you're just like these mormons again brah you know they open up the door and they're just like hello and they're super weird we were just talking about it before the church started but pastor jones he's already knows they're mormon immediately when they open the door and uh you know just like no coffee pot they're mormons you know but uh but look god gave you bible preaching for a reason your bible reading is where you're going to learn a lot most of your doctrine right but you know to be perfected you should be in church you should be here every service you can be being perfected by the preaching of god's word by the man of god that he put here he gave your pastor to be here for you come and listen to him preach come and apply the preaching that he preaches to you and hey get on the get the soul winning down put hey it's great that you're going soul winning but hey get it down because you need to memorize the verses you need to be able to be sharp and be able to answer people sometimes people ask you some crazy questions and you're like hey if you don't know your bible if you don't know the soul winning verses if you don't know where to turn then you can have some jehovah's witness smoke you at the door and you don't want that do you you don't want to guess what have you heard of this verse you're like no then you look dumb and some person with weird eyes and a glazed over look just smoked you at the door so you got to get on the soul winning program and get it down pat turn to romans chapter 1 verse 14 romans chapter 1 verse 14 romans chapter 1 verse 14 the bible says this i'm a debtor both to the greeks and to the barbarians both to the wise and the unwise so as much as in me is i am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at rome also for i'm not ashamed of the gospel of christ for is the power of god into salvation to everyone that believeth to the jew first and also to the greek so what does paul say and he said you know what as much as in me is i'm ready can you say that today can you say hey i'm ready to preach the gospel in any situation at any door when any cult member comes to the door when any weird seventh-day avenue or or you know what else you got you guys got community church you know weirdos here that just you know it's all about the music and nothing's about the preaching those are almost just as dangerous you know they're going to see a rock concert that has like jesus mentioned every once in a while right and it's just super shallow church membership a bunch of zombies just dropping money in the offering plate really and then feeling walking out feeling so good i just feel so great you know what sometimes you need to walk out of church and feel really bad you need to walk out of church and go man i'm a scumbag i need to fix this i need to fix my life you know what it's pastor jones's job to make you feel like a scumbag sometimes but people just get upset but it's for your own good anyway i got off the uh gospel preaching there for a second but you know in order to be good and to get trained up at this church you've got to be here right you got to be here you need to show up in the soul many times you need to show up at for the church services so the bible says um let's see turn to hebrews chapter 10 verse 25 i'm trying to just give you some simple stuff here tonight but look you want to be mighty for god you should want to be mighty for god right i mean do you want to be mediocre for god do you just want to be a bench warmer i made the team dad but i never do anything i just sit on the bench you go boy oh yeah you're like the cheerleader you're like the dude cheerleader on the on the cheerleader squad you know what i'm saying you don't want to be that person you don't want to be me i'm a mediocre christian yeah i'm a bat you know you can everybody there's all different types of christians but do you want to strive to be the the loser christian that never goes to church that never applies to preaching that never goes soul winning no you want to strive to be a mighty person of god a mighty man or a mighty woman of god hebrews 10 25 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 well guess what the day of christ approaching is closer today than it was yesterday did you know that or the day before that or the day before that look every day we're getting closer to christ coming back so as i say go to church less as you see i just can't find a good church that's what these people say hey you know what you can find a good church you just might have to travel somewhere to get to it and why would you want to live your life in mediocrity in some lame-o church you know saul baptist church you know and and keep going to that when you could go to a church like this a church like our church in vancouver washington church like pastor meneses church a church like the church in fresno a church like faithful word baptist church there's lots of great churches you can go to and you know why would you want to be mediocre and you know what if you keep coming to this church three times a week you're not going to be mediocre that's right put in the training i'll read this for you um we need to be found faithful okay i'll just read this verse for you first corinthians 4 2 you can write it down or you can turn there if you want really quick i'm just going to read one verse says moreover it is required in stewards that a man be found faithful and you know what we're stewards of the mysteries of god we're stewards of the truth and every person in here is a steward of some kind in this church but you know the bible says it's it's required in stewards that a man be found faithful are you faithful to church are you coming every service you can are you making excuses as to why you can't come well you know i'm really tired tonight you don't think your pastor's tired but he's still here pastor jones can't just say you know what i'm just gonna have miss jessica preach i'm really tired yeah she'd probably get up and preach a good sermon too but she's not supposed to do that right so but here's the thing you're gonna get better and better the more you come to church here and look it's required of stewards that a man be found faithful are you faithful are you faithful tonight and that's you know i don't know who's faithful he didn't say guess you know hit these people because this dude doesn't come to church enough he didn't say that to me i just i just know some people you just some people have problems being faithful sometimes and look it's preaching like this that's going to get you faithful it's preaching like his preaching that's going to get you faithful come here ready to learn ready to train ready to get it done so um also when you are training you're going to need a sword you know what's the sword that we're supposed to use i mean back then these mighty men of god they had swords they had shields they had you know all you know the bone arrows and the rocks and everything else but you know our weapons aren't the weapons that they used back then that's a picture spiritually of what we're supposed to do today you know it's a battle that we're in it's a war that we're in and you know what we need to get out there and be ready to battle and guess what if you're not trained then you're not gonna be able to battle you're going to get shot first off you're going to get smoked by some mormon at the door you're not going to know your bible like you should and so look at ephesians chapter 6 verse 17 i mean smoke by you're not you're not going to get like shot by them i mean like i mean they're gonna make you look dumb because you're not using this this is our sword right here this is the weapon that we fight with all right we have a spiritual armor that we're supposed to put on like a shield of faith yeah need the shield of faith don't you look at ephesians 6 17 though it says and take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit which is what the word of god hey don't go out soul winning without your bible you know every once in a while it's all right to forget your bible but not every single time right hey get your bible like you know just like get like some kind of one of those packs those things that you can you know those european man bags you can get one of those or a lady's soul winning bag or whatever you can get a fanny pack i saw a fanny pack the other couple like last week i was like oh that's that's back huh it's not back for me anyway to each their own but look we got to have the bible as our sword and we need to use it and we need to get skillful at using it you can't just pick up a you know you can't just pick the bible up and just start chopping people up with it unless you know it okay so you need to be able to chop some people up you need to be able to chop up these false prophets you need to actually hey can are you at the point where you can anticipate like what if pastor jones brings up a point what bible verse that he's going to hey that's when you know you know your bible really good is there like oh i know where they're going with this one you know and these are the easy verses you should be able to know where i'm going but maybe not now but later you should and so if you're training and you're getting skilled the word of god hey turn to the verses you know how i learned the bible how to where to go and the order of all the books by flipping in my bible when my pastor was telling me what scripture to go to don't just sit there and put your bible in your lap and don't turn to the pages i mean if you're turning to the pages guess what you're learning where the books are you're like where's palms at where's the book of palms i think it's in the middle of the bible somewhere no it's songs but and that's when someone said it was uh my wife's aunt she was like i've been reading the bible i was reading the book of palms last week i'm just like wow okay well at least she's reading her bible right she knows the book of palms but anyway so hey you need to have your sword you need to get skilled with it that's part of your training folks that's part of your training and you know what we can't forget about preaching the gospel i know i brought it up but here let's bring it up again look at verse 15 it says and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace so you know what if you're missing the shoes of preaching the gospel then you're missing part of your armor and you're going to get destroyed in battle it's part of the christian life it's not optional people are like well i just don't have the gift of going door to door i just don't have the gift of evangelism look there where do you see the gift of evangelism in the bible it's not a gift it's something we're supposed to do go ye he said he told it to all of his disciples and to the gent and to the ones that come after them we're all supposed to be soul winners we're all supposed to go to the to the doors and look you know some people learn slower than others i get that but be trained go out soul winning quit being weak go and preach the gospel it's not as scary as you think it is it's fun you know you you build a camaraderie with your soul winning partner you talk you talk a bunch of smack about the last person's door that you knocked on it was really weird yeah then you pray before you get to the no i'm just kidding but there's some really weird stuff that happens out soul winning some really interesting look and really we don't even tell all the stories that we have when we go soul winning because a lot of times we we do it so much we just forget and then like you'll remember like some weirdo that you talk to and they believed in aliens or whatever but we need to have our feet shot that's part of the armor of god having the shield of faith having the sword of the spirit having the helmet of salvation and having your feet shod that means your shoes on right not sitting over in the corner but on your feet and so and i mentioned about the things in the old testament being written for for us for now we'll turn to first corinthians chapter 10 i'll prove that to you right now uh first corinthians chapter 10 verse number eight see we're supposed to take the stuff from the old testament and apply it now we're we have the the ability to look back at all the past things in the bible and we we like i was preaching about this last night that the apostles didn't know everything we know everything because it's written down but we didn't get the commentary you know what i mean the holy spirit's commentary on some of the things they didn't have that jesus would say something to them they'd be like duh was it because i didn't have any bread with me and i was like no it's the leaven of the pharisees i'm trying to warn you about the leaven of the pharisees are you listening do you understand what i'm trying to tell you right now is it because we didn't take bread it's like no but anyway here first corinthians chapter 10 look a droid of serpents neither murmur ye as some of them also murmured and were destroyed of the destroyer what's he talking about he's talking about old testament stories that we're supposed to learn from in the new testament now look what it says in verse 11 now all these things happened onto them for examples and they are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come guess what we're part of the people that the ends of the world are come we're living in the last days that's what the bible teaches not the last last days necessarily but we're living in the last days we're living in the last times jesus came in the last times okay so um but what's it say that these things in the old testament were written for our admonition they're written so that we can learn the spiritual truths of them second i'll just read this for you ii timothy 3 verse 16 says all scripture is given by inspiration of god and is profitable for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction and righteousness does it say some scripture says all scripture well that was just to the jews no all scripture is given to us for ins by inspiration of god is profitable for doctrine and reproof for correction for instruction righteousness why that the man of god may be perfect thoroughly furnished unto all good works hey god wants us to know the bible and he wants us to know even the old testament the new testament and we need to realize that there's a lot of stuff in the old testament we might not understand but there's a lot of stuff that we need to take and apply that spiritually but obviously it's not up to your own private interpretation okay so but you know we need to be trained we need to follow the captain of our church which is the pastor and we need to train to get to become mighty right so number three tonight it's my last point it's only got five or six pages with it but just kidding number three tonight get into the battle once you get trained you need to get hey you can even get into the battle before you get fully trained have you ever heard of on-the-job training yeah sometimes people just won't listen to instructions so you got to do it i'm one of those people that like have to get my hands on it too and be told like 50 times and you know so and read the manual some people learn by reading i learn by all three but a lot of times i can't get my wrap my mind around something until i put my hands to the work yeah right like oh that's what you're talking about people are just like talking about sprockets and you know this this and that and and temperature whatever you know whatever it is that they're trying to teach you i just i can't take it in like that i have to have my hands on it and so once you get the training in you know start getting into the battle you know we should already be in the battle but you know once you're fully trained you should be in the battle right so and we're always going to be learning new things you know we're always going to be learning new things as christian new doctrine look the more you read this book the more you're going to understand you read it once and then you know the the third time through you're like yeah i see what it's talking about where it says that the jews are no longer god's chosen people amen you know if you just read it for what it says and quit letting some dispensational dirt bags tell you how it goes no just read it for yourself what church we're at oh his pastor jimenez was preaching and some guy had like a he was reading along and he was mad right and when he was reading along he he was checking the commentary of the study bible that he was reading you know look just read look this does there any study bible in here no it's just the bible itself i don't need some unsaved devil's opinion on what the bible says hey why don't you let the holy spirit guide you amen but this guy got up and walked out because he's just he's talking about dispensationalism so you know pastor made him mad a couple people got up and walked out of the service you know and hey sometimes people are going to do that and when pastor jones is like well don't come back get behind him right so so get in the battle number three so you've gathered to your leader you have his back you're going through the training you're becoming mighty and you know what's going to happen when those things happen is that numbers are going to increase people are going to come people are going to get in they're going to say hey this is a fired up group i want to be part of this and more people are going to gather to the captain more people are going to gather to this ragtag group of of soldiers right and so let's look at let's look back at our text verse in first samuel chapter 22 let's look at verse number two again so we need to get in the battle so it says and everyone that was in distress and everyone that was in debt and everyone that was discontented gathered themselves unto him and he became a captain over them and they were with him about 400 men so 400 men that's how much he started out with okay now look at first samuel chapter 30 verse number nine first samuel chapter 30 verse number nine so so what happens well david leads well david's doing everything he's supposed to be doing david is not killing saul who's god's anointed so like he went and cut the skirt off of his shirt or whatever and then he felt bad about it you know he went he could have killed saul anytime he wanted to and his mighty man that were with him were like hey i'll stab him once that's it that's all it's going to take and he's going to be done but david wouldn't allow that to happen you know it's kind of like us with the old ifb we shouldn't just completely you know there's still some good old life be churches out there that are still doing god's will and hey maybe they're not on board with everything that we're on board with but you know what there's still some good churches out there there's still some soul-wanting old life be churches and you don't want to completely destroy them right just destroy the ones that are like sam gipp you know the witch of andor um just preaching total bogus heresy because these guys that are like repent of your sins i don't mind destroying them but if it's god's anointed and he's just messed up on some stuff then you know cut him a little bit of slack but anyway the point i was trying to make is that the numbers are going to increase uh look at first samuel chapter 30 verse 9 it says so david went he and how much 600 men that were with him and came to the brook besor where those that were left behind stayed but david pursued he and 400 men for 200 abode behind which were so faint that they could not go over the brook besor so even though 200 had to stay behind he still did have 600 men and those guys were gangsters too they're just tired right so those guys were still battle-hardened and everything they just maybe need to work on their stamina right just like an mma match some guys they just they burst out they use all their energy right away but then they don't realize that that dude's just as gangster as they are but he's in better shape you know it's called cardio so you know anyways these guys didn't have the cardio to stay but my point is is that it started off with 400 men they were doing all the right things david was doing all the right things and it increased to 600 you know and david you know i i don't have time to turn there but it says you know this is when when all their children and their wives got stolen and they left those guys to go pursue those amalekites that were that had taken their their women and children and it says the people were ready to stone him right you know what david did he encouraged himself in the lord incur you know he encouraged himself in the lord he didn't worry about what was going to happen did they stone him to death no and sometimes you know as leaders we make decisions that aren't popular and sometimes we'll make decisions where maybe we make the wrong decision you know and the people are ready to stone you all right but you know what pastor jones encourage yourself in the lord in those times and you'll get through it right so look at uh so we had we went from 400 men to 600 men and out of those those 600 37 of them were the most mighty the ones that are listed in the scriptures turn to second samuel chapter 23 second samuel chapter 23 see these guys go from being small in number to bigger in number but the mighty men those are the guys that train the hardest see there's always going to be people that shine brighter than others even in the kingdom of god you know there's different stars you know even you look up in the sky different stars shine brighter than others you know it's just the way it is you know this isn't like a bernie sanders church where everybody's the same right so there's gonna be people that rise up and do more than other people and that's what these mighty men were like and so even if you're not counted with the 37 you're still one of them you could still be a mighty man or a mighty woman of god right so but these guys attained a little higher so look at second samuel chapter 23 verse 8 the bible says this these be the names of the mighty men whom david had the tachymite that sat in the seat chief among the captains the same was adino the esnite he left up his spear against 800 whom he slew at one time he was the he was the top dog he killed 800 people by himself at one time you're like that's impossible well think about this though god is behind them all right god is also helping train them up and teaching them you know david said he teaches he teaches my fingers the war or my hands the war my fingers the fight right so god also is part of this do you think david hit goliath right between the eyes all my all on his own i don't think so i think god you know saw a man that was ready to stand up and fight for him and said you know what i'm not going to let this philistine mock my god and and talk trash about him i'm going to let you know because maybe david does kill him maybe he hits him some place else maybe he hits him in the throat or whatever but he he hit goliath right between the eyes yeah i mean he just nailed him with the best shot ever so think about this if if a man one man can slay 800 by himself he's not doing that all in his own power he's doing it through god's power and that look as a warrior here as a trained person in god's army you know what you gotta you're gonna have to use some faith you're gonna have to have god behind you also to do these great feats so this guy killed 801 time he was the chief all right and look at nine verse nine it says and after him was eliezer the son of dodo the aho height one of the three mighty men with david when they defied the philistines that were gathered together to battle and the men of israel were gone away he rose and smote the philistines until his hand was weary and his hand quave onto the sword and the lord wrought a great victory that day who's to say we're on a great victory that day the lord did right but he used that man who was trained up he was one of the first 400 or maybe part of the second you know it doesn't say what what number they came out of but we know this the the lord wrought a great victory that day through that man who allowed himself to be trained up you know and and applying it today you could be like that guy spiritually okay maybe you just go get 800 people saved for your whole lifetime maybe you become a pastor and start a trip somewhere i don't know but you know you can do great things through god and god will give you that great victory so uh look at verse 11 it says and after him was shama the son of aegi the hero right and the philistines were gathered together in a troop where was a piece of ground full of lentils and the people fled from the philistines but he stood in the midst of the ground and defended it and slew the philistines and what's it say there and the lord wrought a great victory so we have to understand that god is also in in this plan it's not just you doing it on your own it's not just you training you know in sports or whatever else it can't just be you training you know but you know especially like makes martial arts it's kind of a sin you know you got a lot of coaches or whatever i keep bringing that up but you know it's it's a good picture of it so and because they were warriors right so but you know you still you're fighting single battle but maybe your coach is barking orders at you knees knees you know or whatever you know elbows elbows you know because sometimes like when you're in the middle of the fight you're like you're all freaking out and you're not sure what you should do maybe your training has been fully kicked in at that moment but your coach sees what you're doing what you're doing wrong you know and so they coach you through it that's kind of like god he will give us instruction he'll give us the things that we need um he'll guide us through if we follow him with all of our heart he's going to guide us in our lives so uh look it says uh where am i at second samuel 23 verse 13 says in three of the chief 30 chief went down and came to david in the harvest time under the cave of abdulam and the troops of the philistine pitched in the valley of reverend so i actually didn't mean to put that verse in there so let's skip down to verse 18 okay so it says an abishai the brother of joab the son of zariah was chief among three and he lift up his spear against 300 and slew them and had the name among the three so he didn't get 800 but he did slew he slew 300 and so he had his name among the three so he was still a bad dude right he was still a tough guy and look at verse 19 it says was he not most honorable of the three therefore he was their captain howbeit he attained not to the first three benaniah the son of jehoita the son of a valiant man of kebziel who had done many acts he slew two lion-like men of moab he went down also and slew a lion in the midst of the pit in time of snow so it's just the bible's just giving us these details of how tough these guys are and these lion-like men of moab and then look what it says next this guy was pretty bad too it says and he slew an egyptian a goodly man and the egyptian had a spear in his hand and he went down to him with a staff and plucked the spear out of the egyptian's hand and slew him with his own spear so he was a pretty bad dude right and so look we can go out and slay lion-like men of moab but look we're talking about spiritually okay so those hard cases to win to the lord those hard cases that you really have to dig into the scriptures and sometimes it's going to be a battle that is is harder than other battles right and so spiritually we can also attain to these high levels so so and again this is the greatest fighting force that ever lived on the face of the planet there's no doubt about that and they were well trained but they also no army could i don't think any army could defeat those guys because god was on their side you know god can do a lot with a little bit right god can do a lot with a little bit i mean look what he did with gideon yeah you know he he had 32,000 troops at first then he was whittled down to 10,000 and then with 300 people you know destroyed the midianite army with 300 people god because god's going to do a lot with a little bit right turn back to first hamil chapter 22 verse 1 says david therefore departed thence and escaped to the cave adulum and when his brethren and all of his father's house heard it they went down there to him everyone that was in distress and everyone that was in debt and everyone that was discontented gathered themselves unto him and he became captain over them and there were with him about 400 men so again they started out small but became great later on and they had a great captain and they gathered to him what made the men of god what what made these mighty men mighty was the fact that they trusted in christ or you know they trusted in god and you know they they had you know god had their back just like they had his back just like they had david's back you know i didn't tell i didn't have time to get into the story about how you know those three mighty men went and cut themselves through a philistine army just to get david a drink of water that's how loyal they were to him yeah and then david poured out his like i can't believe i had to do that those guys are crazy you know but you know they had his back you need to have your pastor's back they got trained you need to get trained and god can make you mighty also and you know what you've got to want it though it's just not going to come to you easy you know in anything that you do in life you want to get good at your trade you want to get good at your job you want to get good at being a mother you want to be good at being a good child you gotta you gotta want that kind of thing you've gotta want it you've gotta want to be spiritual and if you don't want to be spiritual guess what you're not going to get spiritual turn to second crithia chapter 10 second crithia chapter 10 verse 3 the bible says for though we walk in the flesh we do not war after the flesh so again this is a spiritual battle that we're in verse 4 says for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through god to the pulling down of strongholds casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalted itself against the knowledge of god and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of christ and having in readiness to revenge all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled look as spiritual mighty men of god and mighty women of god our look our weapons of warfare are not through the flesh we're not going to go out and get a fist fight and get a bunch of people saved okay we have to have a spiritual fist fight okay we have to have a spiritual battle and that battle is with a sword that's the word of god it's not a real sword okay so that's not going to get us anywhere and god will give us power he says that we're our weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through who god just like the mighty man says the lord wrought a great victory that day well just like when we have our spiritual battles that we win god is behind us and rot and he rots a great victory in us that day how are you able to get six people saved last week well you went out and he wrought a great victory right you know and then pastor jones didn't attain to the to the spiritualness of the six no i'm just kidding he got two right you got two but you know what i'm saying like every every battle is going to be different you know you're going to go through you're you know you're going to like just someone was saying they got a catholic saved and they never heard the things was it hard to get that part who's that got the catholic saved was it hard to get her saved no it's easy sometimes the battles are easy but sometimes you have to like go back to genesis adam and eve you gotta go through the law the prophets the judges the psalms you know sometimes it seems like you have to break out the whole bible and those are the great battles that god will allow us to win ephesians chapter 6 verse 12 says we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities against powers against the rulers of the darkness of this world against spiritual wickedness in high places realize this our enemy is the devil and his minions that are over cities and towns and everything and there's it's a spiritual battle that we can't we can't see them you know but god guides us and tells us what we got to do to win those battles you know and it's not it's not a physical battle it's a spiritual battle we wrestle against the and there's a lot of spiritual wickedness in high places there's a lot of spiritual wickedness in this world period right now and look we're this church right here is there any other so many churches in this city pastor jones yeah see you're all alone here and and you know you got it might not be 400 gathered together but you know it's 30 something 40 something but that can build into this mighty spiritual army and you know going past so this is the one year anniversary this is the time to say hey you know what going past this you know you always have goal you'll always want to set goals for yourself as a christian how can i be better next year than i was last year how can i get better what am i lacking those are questions you should ask yourself from time to time like where am i at spiritually do i need to start right reading my bible more have i am i am i slacking in my prayer time am i slacking in in my soul wanting time am i slacking in my bible memorization these are things that we need to think about and apply to our life and next year after this you know this next year this church should be better than it was last year and those things are going to happen if you follow this little recipe here so i'll have you turn to the last verses that we're going to look at tonight and you know i've said all this talk about battles and all this other stuff but you know what none of it matters if you're not doing it through faith okay and there's been a lot of all these great battles that happened in the old testament they were still wrought of god but they were done through faith look at hebrews chapter 11 verse 32 it says and what shall i more say for the time would fail me to tell of gideon and of barak and of sansen and of jephthah and of david also and samuel and of the prophets who through faith subdued kingdoms wrought righteousness obtained promises stopped the mouse of lions quenched the violence of fire escaped the edge of the sword out of weakness were made strong wax valiant in fight turned to to flight the armies of the aliens and i'm not talking about ancient aliens okay women received their dead raised to life again and others were tortured not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better resurrection and others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings yea moreover of bonds and imprisonment they were stoned they were sawn asunder were tempted were slain with the sword they wandered about with sheepskins and goatskins being destitute afflicted tormented of whom the world was not worthy they wandered in deserts and in mountains and in dens and caves of the earth and these all having obtained a good report through faith received not the promise god having provided some better thing for us that they without us should not be made perfect so look god did mighty and great things by faith okay that chapter that whole chapter is about what is done by faith and you know what there's a there's a lot of great things done and that's the only way that's going to happen is by faith all right so how do you become mighty for god well number one you got to get behind your captain number two to become mighty you got to train all right and number three you got to get in the battle all right so let's pray heavenly father we thank you lord so much for this great church lord i pray you continue to grow it and lord that they would continue their spiritual journey lord and lord that this time next year god that this church would be even mightier and greater than it is right now and it's already a great church lord we just thank you for pastor jones thank you for his family lord and their faithfulness and we thank you for all the faithful members that have stuck by pastor jones aside and lord there's been some of the hard things that they've had to deal with this year but lord you've gotten them through everything and lord i pray now that the leaven is gone that you just increase the faith of this people increase the numbers of this church and lord help them to do great and mighty works and and and thrive in spiritual battle in jesus name we pray amen