It's probably a two-part message. It depends. I got a funeral after this in Madison, so I can't hang around too long. But I do like funerals. But today I'm going to talk about, have I lost it? I do. I do like funerals. I really do. I mean, more so than weddings. You know, a funeral, I know how it's going to go. Right? A wedding, I don't know. Weddings are scary. If you've never preached a wedding, just preach one, you'll see how scary it is. But funerals, it's a good chance to share the gospel. And if you're in Leiden, you're gonna hear the gospel. I don't care what, we're gonna hear it. And you might hear it a couple of times. That's the perfect time to try to tell that. And people made a decision, you know, thank God you made the right decision. At your funeral, if you made the right decision, it's the best day of your life's the day you die. mean, I guess it could get better after that, but it's the best, the day you could step out of here into eternity to be in the presence of Jesus Christ in heaven, I can't, I just, I can't imagine how glorious that will be. Amen? So if you're afraid to die, you haven't thought about what's gonna happen to you. If you're afraid to die, first of all, get saved. Make a choice to trust in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. You make that decision and you have eternal life. Amen? It's a One guy told me, I told you about the guy last week who told me not to say Jesus, remember that? I was telling him about the Lord, he said, don't say that name. Don't say that name. I said, what name? He said, that name. I said, Jesus? Yeah, don't say it. I said, Jesus? I said, you're gonna say his name one day, you're gonna bow, confess he's Lord one day. Don't say J, he called him J.S., don't call him J, don't say J.S.' 's name. Anyway, Jesus is my savior. He is my Lord. Anyway, as a Christian, today I'm talking about have I lost it? Have you ever lost it before? Have I lost it? As a Christian, what can you lose? Huh? What can you lose as a Christian? Well, I could lose my 401k, the right person they elected. I mean, I could lose a lot of stuff. I can lose my car, I can lose my wife, I can lose 10 pounds. Come on, I can lose a lot. As a Christian, I can lose a lot of things, but there are some things I can't lose. But I can lose a lot of things. I lose my mind, right? Couldn't you? You ever get angry before? Justin coached in Georgia, the Georgia football coach. I don't know if it's true, but he pushed, I might be wrong on this, but he, you know, you're a football fan, he pushed a player somewhere other and then he didn't apologize. Am I right about the player? And so then they came to him and he said, this is George, which is a good, this is a good coach, a good, great coach. And he said, he just lost his mind. When he gets mad, he just doesn't, he's not aware of what he's doing. And so he sort of lost who he was and pushed the coach, pushed another player. I've never been that mad before. Have you? I mean, that's scary to think you get so mad you don't know what you're doing. I did not need to be around that person. Especially if they get mad. I mean, pow, I get shot or something. Have I lost it? You cannot lose eternal life. I'll share about that a little bit. But Ned, the one thing you can lose is your... I'm talking about scripture now. What'd you say, Elmer? Reward. It's not plural, it's just singular. Anyway, now let's examine this. Let's look at Scripture, because I figured this out this week, and I understand now, and I hope it will help you. It helped me a lot. You know, I can find an acorn every now and then. Or not, I found one. Now, I want to examine Losing eternal life looking at scripture, you know people say well you believe once saved always saved some people They don't believe that that's all kinds of reasons to believe different things about that. Let's just pick out a few verses Okay, let's just look at a couple of them go to Matthew 24 Matthew 24 and then the King James Bible Matthew 24 10 24 10 This is Jesus speaking with red letters in my Bible. And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. Here's a verse. But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. What's that saying? Make it real simple for me. Let's try that last verse. What's that say right there? Talk to me. What's it say? It says that you endure to the end, you'll be saved. Is that what the Bible says? Is that true? Well sure it is. Absolutely it's true. I'm going to explain it to you. You're going to walk out of the day with some knowledge of the truth. I promise you that. Go to Luke 8.13. Luke 8.13. I'll just let her find it for me. Luke 8.13. Luke 8.13. them that rock, or they which, when they hear, receive the word with joy? And these that have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away?" In time of temptation, they fall away. You ever been tempted and fall away? Go to Hebrews 6, Hebrews 6, 4. There are many verses that talk about losing your salvation. There are quite a few, and they're in the Bible. For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, saved, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away impossible to renew them again unto repentance, seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame." That's saying once you've saved, once you've tasted the goodness of God, once you fall away there's no more repentance for you. That's what the Bible says. What the Bible says. Are you confused? I'm going to fix it. Hang on. I'll fix it for you. And once I fix it, you're never going to forget it. Once I fix this, you're never going to forget it. Go to Ephesians 1.13. Ephesians 1.13. In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, in whom also after that you believed, you were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise." Okay? There's a lady in here that makes me chow chow. Best chow chow you've ever tasted in your entire life. Right, Kathleen and Rick? It is sealed in a jar. It's not going to go bad. It's sealed. What happens if you don't get a good jar sealed? What happens to what's inside it? It gets that old moldy, goopy stuff on top of it. But once it's sealed, it's sealed forever. All right? Go to Ephesians 4.30. Wait a minute now, I'm confused. You said we could lose it, but now I'm sealed. Let me ask you this. I know some of y'all got pressure cookers. Are you too young for a pressure cooker? You can't everything. That pressure, it seals it, doesn't it? It seals it. It's solid as a rock. I'd imagine the Holy Spirit could do a better job sealing than a mere pressure cooker, I think. And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. You are sealed until the day of redemption. the day you step into heaven. Romans 6.23, Romans 6.23, and I'll probably stop at this one, I got many of my, that's all, this one will be finished on this part. Romans 6.23, the Bible says, for the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God, God, is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. We have a gift of eternal life. How many times can you be born again? It's not numerous times, it's just one time. How many times can you become a new creature in Christ? Well, so, we read these verses, you can see why it's such a great discussion over, well, somebody says, yeah, it's a heresy, you can lose your salvation, you can walk away from God, you can turn your back on Him, and then other camp says, no, once you're sealed, once you're saved, once you will trust in what Jesus Christ did for you, that's why you don't have to do anything, because He did it for you. And so, then it's eternal life. Well, how can we reconcile these two positions? Because they're both true. Are you speaking out? Do you know the answer? Are you laughing? Aren't they true? Ain't what God said true? Everything he wrote is true. Well, how do you reconcile these? Is there a single really super-intelligent person in here that's thought about this? Or a woman? Or a man? Or a boy or girl? Let's think about it for a second, because I've got to play this, because you've got to get it. You ever heard of right division? Did you know? We believe in rightly dividing the Bible, 2 Timothy 2.15. Study to show yourself approved unto God, rightly dividing the word of truth, not to be ashamed before God. Every scripture that talks about losing salvation is not from Paul's epistles. They're all from the prophetic program for Israel. Every verse that talks about eternal security was written by Paul, the Gospel of Grace, which is our doctrine. We're not Jews. We have replaced Jews. Israel's going to come back and they're going to have a kingdom on this earth, a kingdom of heaven on the earth for a thousand years, and they'll reign here forever. According to the Scriptures, if you study, our eternal home is in heaven. That's why you get confused. That's why it's important for you to know how to rightly divide the Scripture. All the Bible is for you, but it's not all to you. Oh yeah, no it's not. Do you eat meat? Well, you're not following the Bible. Do you eat pork? That's God's food, man. Ain't it? I know there's gonna be pigs, there's gotta be pigs in heaven anyway. Yeah, but, well, You see, we all say these things. I don't believe in rightly divided. You're rightly divided all the time. You don't do everything God told Israel to do. You're out of your mind if you do that. Why do you waste your time on that? Why go in there being water-baptized? You'll be water-baptized, fine. It's a profession. It's an outward, how they say it? I used to say it, an outward expression of an inward change. That's not in the Bible anywhere. Nowhere in the Bible is that. Not a single place in the Bible. Where is it the Bible says to be saved you need to have an altar call and you come to the front and you accept Jesus Christ. Where is that in the Bible? Where is that? It's not in the Bible. You can get saved sitting right back there. You can get saved at the dumpster today. Your salvation is when you trust in what Jesus Christ did for you. He died on the cross, he was buried, and rose three days later. That is your ticket to salvation. Nothing else you can do. Saved by grace through faith, not of works. I'm not making a lot of people, but I remember thinking, I remember when I got baptized, I remember where it was, and there's a thing up there behind the whatchamajigger, and man, I said, man, I'm gonna get up in there, he's gonna dump me, and this is what, I'm gonna tell you how messed up I was, and all my sins gonna wash off in that water. You say, you're probably gonna say, I never believed that, and don't lie to me. That water had nothing to do with my sin being washed off. I'm not making fun, you can, we can baptize, whatever, but It has nothing, nothing to do with your salvation. We've been taught all these traditions of men that mean nothing. Just get you all jammed up. That's what the enemy does. He tries to get you all confused. Leave you to different things. So you can obviously find scripture to support losing eternal life. You can find scripture supporting. The problem is you have to know how to write to divide the scripture. And once you figure that out, you go, makes sense now. I'm not confused anymore. It took me a while to figure that out. Took me a while. Remember, like I told you, our doctrine is found in Paul's epistles from Romans to Philemon. That is where our doctrine is. The entire Bible, if you don't read your entire Bible, there's something wrong with you. All the Bible, that's how you understand who God is. But we don't follow the instructions he's given to Israel. That's not for us to do, right? It's just not important. We need to be following what God said to do. the gospels lead you to repentance and to salvation. When you hear the gospel, there are two ways to respond, correct? How many times did you hear the gospel that you responded negatively at first? Give me an idea. How many times did somebody tell you, I don't believe that? 50? Maybe 100? Right? How many of you, the first time you heard the gospel, you said, I believe it, I'm on board. The first time you heard the gospel, anybody in here, the first time you heard it, and said, that's for me. Not a single person. We've heard it, we've heard it over and over. That's why it's important to hear it. God ain't gonna give up, he's not gonna give up on you. He won't, he really won't do that. You hear the gospel, you either say, yes, I believe it, or no, I don't. Right? Only two ways. There's two ways to go. If you say no, then at that point, your eternal destiny has now become where? Huh? You said no. No. It's hell. It's hell. It's in the Bible. And then the next thing that's going to happen is you're going to have the white throne judgment, which is not where you want to be. Amen? That's determining the degree of punishment you're going to have while you're in Hell. If you say yes, then your eternal destination has been established. Where is it now? Heaven. And then you will appear before the judgment seat of Christ. Not for your salvation, but where He determines what your reward will be. I've said reward so many times, I got corrected this week on it. It's just reward. It's just a singular reward. I'm probably going to talk about that next week. It's a good thing. It's a good thing. People think hell's a black hole, I'm just out in space. No, the Bible's pretty plain on what hell is. It's going to be hot, it's going to be painful, and it's going to be torturous for eternity. I never thought about this. Remember we preached on it. Everybody's going to get a new body. I believe we're going to be raptured before the Tribulation. That's what I believe. You can argue that. I'm not going to argue with you. We'll be raptured and then at some point we're going to be established, have a new body. Because see, this body can't go to Heaven. It won't work up there. We're going to get a glorified body to be up there in Heaven with Lord Jesus. The people that are going to hell to white throne judgment, they're going to get a new body as well. Why do they need a new body? When it won't burn up. You paid attention, don't you? They can get a new body, too, that's fire-proof. Make pain-proof. It'll never be destroyed. Eternity. They'll experience that. And nobody has to go there. When Jesus Christ died, he died for every single, the worst of the worst, he shed his blood for the worst of the worst human being that's ever lived. His blood paid for all their sin if they would trust in what he did. get to choose. You get to choose. So at this point, I'm going to focus on just believers. From this point forward, just believers. I'm not talking about the lost anymore, I'm talking about believers. Amen? Remember last week we talked about wisdom, the application of knowledge, it's how you receive knowledge and you apply it. Remember, right there, I ain't got it with me, but in your phone, you have more knowledge, there's more knowledge in your phone, you can't even comprehend it. You have access to all the knowledge in the world on your phone, even artificial intelligence on your phone. You carry it in your pocket all the time. You leave home without it, you think you're naked. Have you all left your home, going down the road and left your phone at home and go, oh my God, oh my, oh, I gotta go back, gotta go back. My phone's at home! Oh, gosh! Oh, what am I going to do? We're going to keep on at our house. I've received too many compliments. When we have gatherings at my house, I can't control my family's houses. But at my house, I control it, as long as I live there. And of course, I'll live there till I die, apparently. But when you come over there, you don't bring your phone in. Your phone stays. We're not doing that anymore. It went in a wonderful time. Otherwise, we'd be all sitting around. with the TV, got the big-screen TV going on, football game or something, and we got three or four on the couch over here, the chair, and you know, you can look at it sometime, every one of us look at the phone. Everyone, we can't say any word, we're all looking at our phone. There's something wrong with that. You may not think it is, but there's something wrong with that. Nobody's saying a word, we're all looking at our phone. You put it in your pocket, you're looking at it. Anyway, y'all, you live your own life the way you want to, but as for me and my house, come to my house, leave your phone in the car. We're all together, and anything bad happen, remember, y'all remember a long time ago, y'all had a phone at home and it rang? Yeah, hey, the phone's ringing. Or you ever, where I live, you could pick your phone up and you have to make sure somebody else went on it. Y'all remember that? And they might say, hey, you know, Velma, can you, I gotta make a real quick call, because you hang up, because you can let them talk whenever, you know. You try to pick it up real quiet, so they won't go click. What are they, ooh, what are they talking about, right? Y'all remember that, don't you? Yeah, you don't remember that, do you? Oh, you do? And we'll work out fine. We didn't have to have microwaves. So anyway, we'll still be all right. So, the Bible says God's will for you is what, man? In 1 Timothy 2, 4, His will for you is what? To be and to... My candy's gone, it's all cleaned up. Got candy. To come to the knowledge of the truth. God wants you all to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. Not a truth, the truth. He is the truth. That's what He wants. Too many Christians here, I think, Too many Christians get saved and that's it. I'm in. I'm good. I feel good about where I'm going and I don't have any problems after this. I'm finished. I'm done. That's so far from true. You're not saved by works, but as a Christian, there are works you should be doing. You should be doing. Amen? I don't believe you lose your salvation at all. After salvation comes this little process called wisdom, godly wisdom. Godly wisdom. I'm having, well I don't say this yet, I'm having to make a decision that will affect my life now to the day I die. I'm having right now to make that decision. And so y'all know me, well some of you do, have I researched it at all? I mean, I could, yeah, I've studied, I've prayed, I've YouTubed, of course you know anything on YouTube is true, right? I mean, because they're professionals, right? That's what they do. I've talked to people who are in that profession, I've had a couple of Zoom calls with people in that profession, you know what I'm talking about. And I never got peace. I had never, and I need to make my decision, but it's something inside of me just, it just, I couldn't get peace. I have learned one thing in my life. If I don't have peace, I don't do it. If you don't, if you can't, you might not understand what I'm talking about, but if you're not settled in here, don't do it. What's that guy that, what's that politician in North Carolina that a lot of people didn't like? Jesse Helms. I don't know anything. Anyway, he said when he comes into Congress, If he didn't know, couldn't understand what they were doing, he said, I voted no, I was right 75% of the time. That's probably true. If you don't understand it, just no. If they can't explain it to you, just say no. You're with people running for office now, they can't explain it to me, so just say no. What's she saying? Word salad? Anyway. And so I couldn't figure this out. I talked to everybody, I studied it, and I told Brent, I said, Brent, I can't, I don't know what to do. Leave it alone, leave it alone. Well, Friday, I was in there, I'm talking about wisdom, I'm talking about wisdom. Give me wisdom, help me apply, I got all this knowledge, I don't know what decision to make. And I had my mind sort of made up, and then it got changed around, but I still wasn't feeling good about it. Friday, about 11 o'clock, something hit me, and I got my answer. clear as a bell. I got perfect peace, I made the right phone call, and I took care of business. If you know personally, I'll tell you personally, I'm not from the group here, but here again, that wisdom I received would not, maybe wouldn't work for you, because I'm not you. Y'all ever, people ever tell you about, hey, take this herb, and man, it'll give you energy and you'll feel good. or whatever, take magnesium, oh, man, you take magnesium, you this and that, right? You've heard, well, you do it, don't do anything. Did they lie to you? No, it did for them. We're all different people, right? And so don't, you can't apply, but I'm telling y'all, if you're in here today, if you're trying to decide something and you ain't got it all worked out yet, just don't do anything. Wait till you get a piece about, because you know what's amazing? How many of y'all raise gardens? How many of y'all grow marijuana? Question. Can you look at your plant and say it needs something? Not your marijuana plant, any kind of plant. Your tomato plant, whatever. Can't you go, the leaves, something It needs something, right? That's important. So where's the problem with my plant? Where is the problem probably taking place? Don't overthink this. What'd you say? Oh, candy for you too. The problem is probably in the roots. It ain't getting enough water and nutrients or something bad in the soil, you know, whatever, I don't know. You can look at people. You look at people, you can say, there's something wrong in the root. I can look at people and see them, I go, there's something wrong in the root. Something ain't right, because you can't don't care how good after you are, if I'm around you long enough, you can't hide pain. We're gonna see it. We're gonna see pain. We're gonna see something going on inside of you that you're struggling with. You're gonna see it. Amen? You want to be by yourself. You don't smile anymore. You're starting to hit the bottle a little bit, and do different things, and don't come to church like it used to. You see these things. There's something wrong with the root. There's something wrong. Your foundation, something's wrong with your foundation. It ain't getting up in your spirit like it needs to. You're starving yourself some way. That's what I believe. I really believe that. Today I want to sort of modify one of my teachings a little bit. I'm not, I'm not, you know, y'all know when I'm wrong when I tell you that, right? This isn't wrong. I don't think that I'm going to modify it just a little bit because I saw this today as I've studied. The Bible says to study the word, to show yourself approved unto God, rightly divided, not to be ashamed before the Lord. Turn with me to 1 Corinthians 2. 12. Remember, this is important, all right? Stop. This is very important for you to hear this part. Remember, this is true what I said. I said some of us go out and we try to talk doctrine to non-believers. And I know if you went to look, you could say, you know, he's a Christian, she's a Christian. You don't know. You don't know. There are a whole lot of people who say they're Christian who aren't. That's what I believe. They may believe they are, but they're not. And so I've said, you can't go out and try to talk doctrine, explain to them, even rightly dividing, if they're not Christians, because they don't have the Spirit of God living in them, they'll never understand it. So they can't understand, and so we spend a lot of time trying to convince people who aren't even Christians about even rightly dividing the Scriptures, and they don't understand it, and they fully own you, blah, blah, blah, like a guy I was witnessing two weeks ago. There's no way, I mean, there's no way I could explain Scriptures to him. I went right back to the Gospel with Jesus because he didn't want to hear that. I've never had anybody tell me before, don't say that name. I've never heard that in my life. Don't say that name. That's, to me, it's almost demonic. That's the devil saying don't say that, because they know the power of that name. But I used to say, and I still believe that, we need to talk to people, make sure they're born again. If somebody asked you if you were born again, you'd get mad. You probably ain't born again. I'd bet money on that. Not a lot. Are you born again, Gary? Yes, I sure am. I'm proud of it. How do you know? You're going to go to heaven when you die? Absolutely. How do you know? Because I believe in what Jesus Christ did for me on the cross. If that makes you angry, you better check. See, I wish all of y'all loved me. I wish y'all would just love me. I mean, love me, love all. I mean, that was my dream. But you're not. But that's not my goal is for you to love me. My goal is to tell you the truth. And sometimes the truth, I don't like the truth. Do you like the truth all the time? No, I don't like it all the time. But the truth's still the truth. No matter what, no matter what. The truth, if this comes out of this book, this King James Bible, it's absolute truth. The part about being saved, it's true. You just have to know how to rightly divide it. First Corinthians 2, 12. First Corinthians 2, 12. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God, that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the holy ghost teacheth, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned. I've always looked at the natural man as being just the unsaved. I don't believe it anymore. You can be a Christian and be a natural man, a carnal Christian. When you receive wisdom, when you're trying to look and get wisdom from God, you can not receive His wisdom. Like I could be reading from the Bible right here. I could be reading something that you don't like. Right? And I'm not receiving that. Well then you are a carnal Christian. You are a natural man because you're not receiving the Word of God. It's what the Bible says. Or you can receive like, oh man, I'm not sure of it. That is what it says. That's a spiritual man. You receive the spiritual. So see, my point is you can be born again and you can still, can you be a carnal Christian? That's a fleshly Christian. Can you be that way? Come on, can you be a carnal Christian? I'm gonna ask you, if you are, can you be one? Well sure you can, it's all in the Bible. when Paul went to Corinthians and he went to Galatians the whole thing he was trying to grow up you guys you listen to the wrong gospel your women are shouting in tongues in the church that's something to tell you about you know talks about women be silent in church that's talking about speaking in tongues that didn't mean you don't come to church and talk think how crazy that'd be bible says women be silent in church well I gotta sit in church can't say a word that's crazy the church was out of order he didn't say He's trying to correct the church that's gone crazy on him. That's what Corinthians and Galatians are about. He's trying to fix the church. Come on, y'all, straighten up. One guy's sleeping with his stepmom, right? Ain't that wrong? Yeah. Y'all said the guy come to church. He's sleeping with his stepmom. You can't do that. Turn her over to Satan. It turned out later in the Bible, he came back fine. He cleaned up and came back. Amen? We've got to understand some of these things. You can hear God's wisdom, you can listen to it, you can read it, but you don't necessarily have to go along with it. God's wisdom is what you really want. A carnal man pertaining to the flesh, sensual pleasure opposed to the spiritual. versus a spiritual man. Do y'all think I could be a carnal Christian sometimes? Huh? Who thinks I couldn't be? Because you're full of turkey. Couldn't you? See, we all could do that. I could read his word and not receive it. I don't believe that. I don't go along with that. Right? If I want to be that way, then I'm not receiving His Word. We can all be carnal. I'd probably be carnal before the day's over with, trying to satisfy my sensual pleasures. We're going to go, where are we going to go, Bobby? To O'Shuggers? O'Shuggers? I'd probably get too much to eat in Eden, North Carolina, after the funeral. I don't eat, it don't matter, go and get you another one. I mean don't think it's just super bad, but I mean we're talking about God's Word. When you talk to somebody and you show them how to rightly divide the Word, and you're playing as Israel and Jews versus Gentiles, you read the Scriptures, you show them all how it's written up, and they don't receive it, I would suggest to you that they're being carnal. Because they don't want to see the truth. I want you to show me truth. Show me truth. I've got God living in me and I can make my mind up. I don't care what my mama told me and my grandma. I don't care what preacher doodad told me. The problem is we worship men. I have done that. That's why I was in the church long because I worship the man. That was so wrong of me to do, but I've done it. Don't y'all ever do that. Please don't do that. The man will always get let down. And then what happens? I'm done with church. I can't believe he slept with his girlfriend or with some other guy today. Who knows what it is. I'm done with church. It's over. I'm never going to go back. Because you look at the man. Don't you understand? The enemy's trying to destroy the church. Surely you see that. Just because you're a Christian does not make you spiritual. Right? just because you're spiritual does not make you a Christian, right? Right? Be aware of that. Be aware of that, please. When I was charismatic, I had a lot of different things going on. We did all kinds of stuff, but that's just how it was. Had to learn. Sometimes you got to learn. Can you tell a carnal Christian from a spiritual Christian? Could you tell a carnal Christian from a spiritual Christian? I told you a while ago, yeah, you can. I can look at somebody's countenance. And something I'll do too, if I'm not feeling good about me, I won't look at you. I'm just telling you the truth. I'm not mad at you, I'm just mad at me. When I can't look at you in the eye, if I can't look at you in the eye, and you can't look at me in the eye, there's something going on. I'm here to help you, not to make you feel bad. I mean, just be aware of this. You look at the plant. You look at the plant. That plant don't look right. That plant smells funny. That plant's got the smell of alcohol coming off of it when it normally shouldn't have, right? I'm trying to help you, please. You can tell. Just look at the leaves. It means something's wrong with the roots. Smile's crooked. Face don't look right. Always working late, never get home on time. What are you doing? I played that, I did that work so many times. That's all a lie. I just on my way home, stopping at all the places along the road. I never cheated on her, but I, well, in a way I did, but not with a person. Had all my pit stops to make before I got home. Come home, I was so tired. Oh, y'all leave your daddy alone. He's just so tired, let him rest. No, I was, I needed rest. Blame it on working late. Y'all ever done that? Don't confess right now. You might not really have to work as many hours as you think you do, but I understand it. I've done it. I've done all the tricks you've done. I'm no different than anybody in here. Trust me on that one. Trust me on that one. The problem today is we really, it's hard. It's hard today to have a group of believers together. I'm thankful for you guys, because I do think you accept the truth. I do think you hear the truth, and at least you meditate on it. At least you consider it. You don't just shut it down. So I don't know about that. That's why the Bible says, study the Word to show yourself approved. It's on you to make that decision. That's my responsibility to you, just tell you the truth. 1 Corinthians 3, 1. 1 Corinthians 3, 1. Paul said, and I, brethren, could not speak to you. Okay, brethren, who's he talking to, brethren? Who's brethren? Believers. He's not talking to lost people. Church members, Christians, and Christians, I could not speak to you as spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk and not with meat, for hitherto you were not able to bear it. Neither now yet are you able to bear it. For you are yet carnal, for as there is among you envying, strife, divisions? Are ye not carnal, and walk as mere men?" This is Paul, remember I told you, he's addressing the out-of-order Corinthians church. He's trying to help them. You guys are all out of order. I mean, I'm still feeding you milk. I couldn't, I wanted to give you meat, but you can't even handle the meat. So I got to keep giving you milk, like your babies. That's what he's talking to the Corinthian church about. Surely you see that. Carnal man, natural man, spiritual man gets meat. Carnal man, give him some milk. He's still having to feed the Corinthians milk because they cannot handle the meat. If you don't receive wisdom from God, if you don't receive God's Word as out of the Bible, I don't mean in somebody's opinion, out of this written Word, if you can't receive that, then you're probably on the carnal side. If you can receive it, or at least you're trying to receive it, how many times have you read your Bible and didn't understand it? Hundreds? Hundreds of times. But you didn't say, ah, phooey, right? If it's stuff I didn't agree with, what I did when I was charismatic, I said, skipped it. I said, well, I don't know what that means. I skip it. Well, that's not cool, is it? It's all good. There's no lies in your Bible. Too many of us try to misapply, twist it around, make it fit what we believe, and you're going to be in trouble doing that. Let the Bible say what it says. Don't modify it. Don't take it out. Surely don't get some other version which is just bastardized God's Word. There's only one official Word of God. It's the King James Bible. Use that, that's why it's the most wildest soul book in the world. And the first thing he does is come in and give you different versions. There'll be a, the King James is the only Bible that's not copyrighted. Me and Will can go out here today, we can go down here to Collinsville Printing, which used to be down there. We can print King James Bible and sell them. Ain't gotta ask anybody's permission. Don't pay anybody a dime. This is the only Bible I can do. Every other Bible, I gotta pay royalty to print it. Nobody owns God's Word. If that ain't enough to convince you, there's something wrong with you. Every other Bible is copyrighted. You gotta pay somebody a royalty to print it. Can you handle the truth? A baby can't walk, can he? Can the baby take care of himself? Feed himself? I'm not here to be your friend. I want you to be my friend. I'm not thinking of anybody in this room, so let's just clear that out. I'm not thinking of anybody in this room, anybody that goes to this church. You know what? I just ain't gonna go back over that church. I'm just not getting fed. You know what you are? I want to use different adjectives, but I'm not. You were asked the word before. You are a baby. You're nothing but a baby. You're nothing but a crybaby. I'm not getting fed. I could go to any church in this county and I could get fed. I might not like it. They're going to say something that I agree with, something that lines up with the word probably. I went to the Catholic Church one time and it blessed me. I'm not gonna go back because I don't think, I don't know what the anyway. But something happened, it was amazing to me how they displayed something. It was awesome. Awesome. But you can learn. I'm not getting to stay in. Grow up, grow up, grow up. You got the Bible right there, read it. Please don't get yourself deceived on that. The devil's just got you all tricked up. This ain't a self-help study. This ain't a pat on your back. As a matter of fact, this ain't a step on your... I don't want to step on your toes either. I just want to give you the Word. Just give you the Word. Some people, they get pats on the back. I could say the same word. Some of y'all be going, I got that right. And some of y'all be going, oh, that hurt. See, the same word slices and dices. Depends on where you are. I don't mind being cut up. I really don't. I got too much to lose. We'll talk about it next week about reward. You have no idea. My salvation is secure. I don't know about yours, I know mine is. I know what I believe. He knows my heart too. Can't be pulling punches, saying something different. What do you got to lose? As a Christian, what do you have to lose? The Bible says the stuff you see ain't gonna matter. Right? Your house means nothing. My TV means nothing. My garden means nothing. Especially after those deer. Had my garden all going good, had my raised beds going good, full of stuff. Walk outside. It's just as smooth, it's just as smooth as that floor right there. I cried. That's a lie. I wanted to cry. All that time I spent. Glory to God. How do you know if you're a carnal Christian? How would you know it? How would you know it? Got any idea? It says right here, it's talking about being strife, division. Are you not carnal, walking as men? For why, I once saith, I'm of Paul. Another says, I'm of Apollos. Are you not carnal? Who's Paul? Who's Apollos? But ministers by whom you believe, even as the Lord gave to every man. Paul says, verse 6, 1 Corinthians 3, 6, I have planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. Neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth, but God that gives the increase. He that planteth and he that watereth are one, and every man shall receive his own reward, not plural, according to his own labor. Don't follow a man. You can't follow a man. Next we're going to talk about, what do y'all think when the Bible says, I planted a pile of water and God gave the increase? What do y'all think that's talking about? Who wants to embarrass themselves? You're afraid, aren't you? It ain't talking about the gospel. We'll do it next week. That's what I always thought. Amazing. Hebrews 5. Hebrews 5. 511. Here's how you determine if you're a carnal or not. Hebrews 511. The Bible says, of whom we have many things to say and hard to be uttered, seeing ye are dull of hearing. But when for the time you ought to be teachers, but you still need somebody to teach you again, which be the first principles of the oracles of God, and are become such as have need of milk, not of strong meat. You see this milk thing, meat thing, milk thing, meat thing. You're still a Christian, but you just don't milk. Sometimes I think I'm just on maybe heavy cream. Anybody get that? you know, half and half is better. But sometimes I wonder if I can handle meat. I'm not talking, I'm talking about me, much am you. For everyone that uses milk is unskillful in word of righteousness, for he is obeyed. but strong meat belongeth to them that are full of age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil." I want to tell you that I believe you can determine where you are in your Christianity. Carnality versus spirituality is how you discern good and evil. Oh, I know the difference. Really? How much gray area you got in what you believe? Sometimes I got a big gray area between what's good and evil. Sometimes I don't. Sometimes it's a big gray. Well, that ain't, that's all right, right? That ain't no big deal. I remember when Allison was dating Adam a long time ago, he was in Tim Manning's house, and so Allison would go over there and she'd leave a car there. She never spent the night there, but she'd leave a car there, and so she said, Dad, I don't know. Should I leave my car there? I wanted her to figure it out. She says, you know, I shouldn't because that would give the appearance of evil. So she moved her car someplace else. Even though she was doing nothing wrong, the Bible talks about the appearance of evil. So she parked the car over here. You could say, that's what I mean, the gray area. Oh, I ain't really doing anything. We got a lot of stuff like that. We do a lot of things. All pastors talk about, it's not, you know, it ain't really that big a deal if you drink a beer or whatever, you know, whatever. The Bible doesn't talk about being a sin. but a 12-pack is, right? So where's your gray area? Is it 3? Is it 6? You see my point. Where's your gray area between good and evil? If your speed limit is 55, when does it become evil? 75? Or 65? I mean, you're breaking the law. I mean, yes, I break the law, but I'm just saying, where is the point for you? Well, I never hit my wife, but boy, I grabbed her by the arm one time where the good left, I'm just talking, okay? I left a really big bruise on her arm where I squeezed her arm real tight. See, where's your area? I mean, I shouldn't be putting my, Right? Everything ain't black and white. My salvation, your salvation is black and white. There's no gray area at all. There's none whatsoever. You believe that Jesus Christ died on the cross. The King James is the only Bible that talks about how he died. First Corinthians 15, let's do that and we'll close. First Corinthians 15, make sure you see this. 1 Corinthians 15, verses 3 and 4. For I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received, Paul's epistle, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures. And he was buried, he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. The King James, as far as I know, and I'll stand corrected, is the only Bible that says how Christ died. Every other version says that He died. I think it's pretty doggone important to know how He died. He didn't die on a car wreck, He didn't die of food poisoning, He didn't get His head chopped off. How He died was on the cross, He was crucified. That to me is vitally important. If you believe that, if you believe that, you have eternal life. You have eternal life. of knowing Christ. Knowing Christ is what enables you to know the Scripture and enables you to receive God's wisdom. Knowing Christ is your first step in you being able to receive the wisdom from God and to be able to know the Scriptures. God has not written a book that you can't understand. He even told the apostles, he helped set things from there, remember? And then he said, now I can reveal more to you. God, Jesus told it to the apostles. He couldn't tell them everything at first. They couldn't handle it. They can't handle the truth. And so He told them over time. And He finally got to the point He revealed more and more to them. Same way when you read your Bible. You read it, you'll get more and more stuff out of it. If you read it. If you study it. If you study it. So we'll just stop there, this today, and we'll finish up next week about what you could lose. Amen? Father we thank You for Your Word. It's absolutely true, there are no mistakes in it, there are no errors in it. And Lord help us, Lord help each of us in here. All of us have been taught different things, and we've heard different people say different things, and we know some of us are older, some of us are younger. But Father, my heart's desire, and I pray that everybody in here, they will search Your word for the knowledge of the truth regardless of what somebody said on TV or what somebody said, whatever it is, Lord. we know that Your Word, Your Word is the source of all knowledge. And I pray, I pray that every person in here, they don't have to get up, they ain't got to come to the front, but if anybody's listening right now, and you have not determined that Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior, you've never acknowledged how He died on the cross, how He was buried a three days later, rose from the dead. Father, I thank You that His dying on the cross paid for all of our sin. His resurrection of the dead is how we receive eternal life. Father, I thank you. Glory to God. I pray that if anybody hears this, they will make the right decision and choose life. In Jesus' name we pray. Everybody said amen. Amen. Amen. Glory to God.