honor and a responsibility. I appreciate the opportunity, I'm thankful for it. I know I'm preaching to friends, many of you I know your names, some of you I know your faces, and I probably get some of that mixed up, but we've been here in Indiana the last two years based out of Pastor Allen's church, Emmanuel Baptist Church in South Haven, and we're so thankful for him. He's been a wonderful friend and help and a mentor and a friend to me. Back when I was ordained to the ministry, and I was barely 25 years old. He drove to my ordination, and so he's been a friend for a long time, and now he's my pastor, so I thank God for him, and many of your faces I know, and thank you for praying for our family. I did bring some brochures. I have prayer cards, but I forgot them, okay? My wife's not with me. My wife's not with me, so half my brain is gone, and most of my brain is gone, but I did bring prayer cards on accident. They were in the trunk of my car, But I do, not prayer cards, brochures. My kids want me to get rid of all of them because the picture is two years old. They're all a lot bigger now. So I thank God for my family. It's a privilege to travel as a family, to minister as a family. I love it. We've enjoyed it. Do pray for us. Pray for safety as we go around. This year we were all the way out as far as Yellowstone country in Montana. Serving the Lord, brother, amen. Serving the Lord. Tell you what, it's beautiful country out there. We had a wonderful time out west, but then this fall we went as far as Connecticut, New Jersey. Even had a day off to see the Statue of Liberty. So we've been all over the place and we're just thankful for that. But we really would like to be here in Indiana. Thank God for pastors. And I know our brother said that we ought to be humble, and so we all try, amen? But let me just puff you up for a minute, okay? According to Ephesians chapter 4, the pastor is a gift to the church. you are all a gift to your church. And obviously we gotta stay humble, amen? But praise God that he chose to gift your church with you. And you are a gift to your church, so smile and say thank you, Lord. But also, I said that so I could say this, the evangelist is also a gift to your church, so please accept this gift at Christmas time. Okay, but you know on a serious note, it's a shame there are less and less evangelists traveling and part of that is there have been some fellas who've just burnt bridges and unfortunately I know that. I was a pastor so there were some fellas that I had and would never have again and if somebody called me I'd have to not recommend them. And so that happens. But at the same time, there are some wonderful men of God who are being used greatly. And sadly, if you're not having an evangelist, you are not allowing that gift to minister to your church. So it doesn't have to be me, but let me encourage you to book an evangelist. And there's some really godly pastors who have two revival meetings a year. Did you know that? Wow, there are some fellas who have spring and fall. And that's wonderful. Anyway, thank the Lord for churches who are doing the right thing and preaching the gospel. And my passion is to just come alongside the pastor. You know, evangelists don't bring revival in their suitcase or in their fifth wheel or whatever. But it's so encouraging when you get to a place where God's working. And Jesus said, my father worketh hitherto and I also work. And my thought is, I assume the Holy Spirit's already working at your church. Amen? Amen. My job is to find out what he's doing and partner with that and work where God's working and amplify what God is doing. And I've been on both sides of it now. So I know how it's like as a pastor, you preach on a certain thing all year long. And then the evangelist comes and preaches one message. And afterwards you hear them as they're shaking hands and they tell the evangelist, I have never heard that before. And you're thinking, really? Seriously? But you know, I'm thankful that God knows how people are wired. He knows that we need the line upon line, precept upon precept, we need that laid into our subconscious all year long, but then God does use a different gift, different face, to sometimes to detonate that truth. And isn't that what we're after? We're after God getting through to people. And so let me encourage you, don't just be the only gift to your church, let in some other gifts as well. Go ahead and turn to Titus chapter two and pray for me because I'm telling you, for several weeks I've been thinking and praying about what to preach here. And my heart was bent towards 2 Timothy 2.2. But our brother just preached it. And honestly, last night I was telling my wife, I can't preach that tomorrow. I don't know why, but that's not what I'm preaching tomorrow. And I'm thankful for the Holy Spirit, who can still kind of redirect. But I do have one little tiny thing to say on that point. And that is, as we just heard from Brother Carpenter, we've got a lot of vacant pulpits. We know that. But also, many of these vacant pulpits When they post their listing, wherever that's posted, they're asking for a bivocational pastor. Now, it's a shame that that's what they have to ask for, but in many cases, that's it. They have to have a bivocational pastor. And yet, could it be that God, through our ministries, could call men in their 30s, 40s, and 50s into the ministry? They already have a skill set. They already have a life skill that they can take with them to that community. And not that it's easy to be bivocational, it's not. But there are some godly deacons who could be pastors. And maybe they should be. Because the guys coming out of these Bible colleges, by and large, will not take a bivocational position. They're brand new married. They're about to raise a family. And they're thinking, I can't do that. I'm barely surviving as a newly married guy. And so they're not taking these positions. Retired pastors who are looking for a place to be, they're not taking these positions because they're ready to retire. They're ready to maybe for health reasons, step back a little bit. And so these bivocational positions, in my mind, are ideal for laymen to step up as the Holy Spirit directs. and become pastors. And I know I don't have the gift of the apostle, we've got that clear, but Paul did tell Timothy and Titus, but particularly Titus, to go out and to ordain elders, bishops, pastors in every place. So there is a responsibility for pastors, evangelists, men of God to seek and pray and even initiate and prompt and try to find men to fill these spots. And so obviously the Holy Spirit has to do it, but let's pray for God to stir him up. I was just thinking, I gotta get to my message here, but my story goes back on my dad's side to my grandpa, Fred Barber. My dad knows Pastor Phelps. They traveled together back in Bible college in the church planting team, so they're friends going way back, but my grandpa, was saved in his 30s. He was out of the Navy, served in Korea, saved in his 30s, led to the Lord on the job site by a friend over lunch. left the Methodist Church, where he was teaching Sunday school, by the way. He was lost teaching Sunday school. Left the Methodist Church, went to the Baptist Church. Within a short time of being discipled, he was out shoveling snow in upstate New York. A lot of snow up there. And he was thinking about the phrase, feed my sheep. And the Lord said, Fred, you need to feed my sheep. And so he took his family with three boys, and he got his Bible training, and then his first church was in McConnellsburg, Pennsylvania, and without wasting any more time, I got to preach there two weeks ago. First time in my life I've ever been there. His first church, when he went there, it was a one-room schoolhouse, packed out with over 100 people in a one-room schoolhouse. He arrived at a church that was in revival, and the Lord used my grandpa to break ground and build a building. And so I got to preach there. The building that he built burnt down one year after he died in 1998. There was an electrical fire, burnt straight to the ground. I was preaching there two weeks ago, and they had a little historical booklet, and I was paging through it, and it had a paragraph about my grandpa. And it said this. It said, Fred Barber, it talked about him helping build the church, literally by hand, they built it by hand, laid the brick, the whole thing. But then it said, Fred Barber sensed the complacency in the congregation and said, I would be willing to burn this building to the ground if by doing so it would rekindle the fire and passion we once had in the old building. and he left after seven years, moved on, went to West Virginia, but interestingly, I read that from the pulpit two weeks ago, because that building burnt down 28 years later to the ground, and the people rebuilt it. But it's just, sharing that with you, it's an interesting part of my history, and it's just interesting how the Holy Spirit's at work in our lives. But he was 30-something years old when he got saved. And God made him a preacher. No one ever heard of him, but God used him to build a church. God used him for that moment in time. And that's where my history goes back to. So it was kind of fun to walk those grounds. And the one-room schoolhouse is still in the property right next to the church. Pretty cool. What would it take to get the passion back? Maybe he should burn some buildings down. I mean, what would it take to get the fire back? but we need it. All right, that's not the message. Please, Lord, help me. We're in Titus chapter two, and I'm gonna try to do something impossible in a very short amount of time. I'm gonna preach on the subject of grace. So I'm gonna need prayer for this. I feel like the Southerners. Y'all pray for me while I try to sing. Y'all pray for me while I try to preach. Titus chapter two, starting in verse 11, For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. looking for that blessed hope in the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. These things speak and exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee. I'm preaching this morning on real grace. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, We ask that you direct us through your word to know what you're talking about. Lord, we have our own thoughts, our own minds, our own context that we read in, but Lord, would you speak to us? And Lord, I pray that you would guide my words, that I wouldn't be unclear, but that your word would be clear, that you would bring balance and life and Holy Spirit fire to this truth. Lord, teach us and instruct us and give us wisdom in these days. Lord, that your grace and your godliness and your glory would shine, and not the wisdom of men. And we thank you in Jesus' name, amen. Real grace. I hate fake stuff. I hate fake leather. You get a leather belt, looks like leather, might even say bonded leather or something, but you know it's not real when after three or four weeks it cracks. And you get all the fibers of the stuffing on the inside. You thought it was nice, soft leather. Nope. It's fake. I don't like fake stuff. I like the real thing. I don't like skim milk. That's not real milk, OK? I know it came from a cow, but by that time, it's not milk anymore. That's fake. That's not the real thing. I don't like AI written or produced anything. Are you with me? If you're online at all, every space has been invaded by AI. And I saw a post. There was some picture of this beautiful country cabin. I mean, it was smoky and beautiful and cozy and a warm fire. It looked like this little cabin in the woods where you would retreat. And everybody's commenting, oh, what a beautiful place. I wish I could live there. But I looked at it, and I zoomed in. I said, there's something weird about this picture. You zoom in and you realize this isn't real. This is an AI-generated picture. I was looking at the stove, and the stove was an old, raw iron stove, and there was words on it. And I looked at the words, and it was like hieroglyphics. You know, the scratchings from the Lord of the Rings. It wasn't English. It wasn't a language. It was an AI-generated photo. So I typed, this is fake, y'all. All right, this is fake. I don't like fake stuff. Pretty soon, the news will be written by AI. It'll all be, I digress. But folks, there's false grace. There is a lot, if it's good, the devil's gonna imitate it. And unfortunately, because we get confronted with the grotesque or the subtle or the damnable, and I say that in the proper way, by the way, if you don't understand grace, can you be saved? If you don't understand grace, can you be saved? Salvation is by, thank you, alright. Salvation is by grace. And so if you don't understand grace, that is a damnable heresy, would you agree? You'll not make heaven if you don't understand saving grace. It's a false grace that sends people to hell many times. But the grace that we live by as Christians has also been counterfeited. And there's a lot of warnings in the scripture about it. Verse 11, it says, the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared unto all men. So first of all, let me say that the grace that saves us is the same grace that keeps us and grows us and draws us near to the Lord. It's the same stuff. It's from the same God. It operates the same way. The grace that bringeth, what's the word? Salvation. Well, that grace that brought salvation includes the gospel message. The gospel message in and of itself is grace. It's a part of grace, because the grace of God brings salvation. Well, the gospel message has good news and bad news, doesn't it? The gospel message talks about sin, and punishment, and the cross, and heaven. Okay, there's good news and bad news in the gospel message. If the gospel message no longer had the bad news, but only the good news, wouldn't it be a somewhat subtle, twisted perversion of the gospel message? Hey, who wants to go to heaven? Sign right here. That's not the gospel. Right? The gospel needs to be presented in such a way that the Holy Spirit can be a part of it. And in John chapter 16, Jesus told us what the Holy Spirit was going to do in relation to the gospel. He's going to convict of sin and of judgment, righteousness and judgment. So if the gospel is not presenting sin and righteousness and judgment, then the Holy Spirit cannot be a part of it. And if the Holy Spirit is not a part of it, you can't be born again through it. Because when you're saved, you are born of the, say it, Spirit. You can't be born of the Spirit if the Spirit's not involved in the message. And the Holy Spirit will not be involved in the message if the message has been tampered with. There has to be sin and righteousness and judgment involved in that gospel message. I think we understand that when it comes to the gospel. But the grace that perfects us and grows us as a Christian is in the same way balanced. It's gonna deal with sin, and righteousness, and judgment, and love, and mercy, and forgiveness, the whole spectrum. The point is this, God is balanced. This Bible is balanced. I thank God for preachers. You have the opportunity to preach to the whole council of God. One of the reasons why evangelists sometimes get a bad name is sometimes evangelists become so, so particularly focused on one or two important doctrines that we can get warped because we're not preaching through the entire Bible year after year. Okay, so that's a pitfall that sometimes can happen. We need the entire Bible to keep us balanced. But here's the problem, unfortunately, because this issue is controversial when it comes to Christian living, sometimes we can see, we hear grace and we think, uh-oh, danger. Compromiser. Uh-oh, new evangelical. Nobody uses that word anymore. Evangelical. Grace, for some good preachers, grace equals slippery slope. Now, that shouldn't be the case because real grace doesn't do that. False grace does. But because there's so much false grace being promoted by folks who have slid way into sin and way off the reservation of what we believe is right and biblical, that we, as pastors, what do we do? We want to protect. It's built into a pastor's heart to protect the flock. And so you protect them from false doctrine. And so the problem with the slippery slope is it runs both ways. Did you know that? No one ever thinks about that. Yes, the slippery slope goes down, but it also goes up. And if you do any study about logic and the various logical fallacies, believe it or not, slippery slope is listed as a logical fallacy. even though experientially we've known people who've slipped, right? But here's the problem. If you simply say, whoa, this doctrine can lead down, let me back up the hill. That's another problem because now you're exiting the other way up the hill, and that's not necessarily any more biblical than down there. We need the Bible to help us with this. Because if we don't, as preachers, Our young men that we're trying to mentor will not stay with us. They will hear the siren song of grace from the big-name preachers, whether they're Calvinist, Reformed, or whatever they are, and they will read their books and listen to their podcast. Let me back up. They're already reading their books. They're already listening to their podcast. They're already hooked by this grace that's being preached, and all we want to do is say, don't read the author, don't watch that podcast, don't, but we've got to teach grace. What does it say? How can we be balanced? Because we're gonna lose those men, and we are losing those men, and the folks that are going off to Bible college are not coming back to our churches. And some of them have a heart for God, and they're gonna go out and plant the local big box church in your neighborhood. So what does the Bible say about grace? Well, it brings salvation. It's a message for sinners. Did you know that grace is God's kindness to people who hate him? Paul, not without knowingly, was fighting God. He hated the people of God. Grace is God's kindness towards the opposition. Grace is, without being redundant, grace is graciousness. And there's a lot of folks who talk grace who are not very gracious with anybody who stands for something. It's ironic. They're gracious with the other ones who are slopping around in the same slot, but they're not gracious for anybody who believes in a holy God. It's amazing how their grace doesn't produce graciousness. But at the same time, those who stand for right, those who have godly, biblical, wise standards that we live by and preach, and by the way, I'm cut from that grain and that's who I am, that's where I'm going. I believe in a holy God, I believe in living a holy life, and I believe that wisdom produces godly standards in your life. But unfortunately, some on the standards side also know nothing about graciousness among themselves and definitely among those. We've got to get back to what the Bible says. This grace that God is talking about saves sinners. And it's the same kind of grace that saves sinners that grows saints who are still struggling with sin. It's a gracious, it's a merciful grace. It's a gracious grace. It's a forgiving grace. It's a transforming grace. It's a patient grace. Has God been patient with you? Hallelujah, I'm so glad God is patient with me. Now I wanna go briefly just to look at both sides of this spectrum. We understand that grace can produce some false ideas that lead to compromise, but let's examine the other side. Go to, sorry, go to Romans chapter eight for a moment, and we will come back to Titus, Lord willing. Romans chapter eight. Verse one says, there is now therefore, or let me try it again. There is therefore now, no, say the word. Pause. Many of us are thinking that's talking about hell. Here's the problem. The verse is not talking to lost people. Sorry, it's not talking to lost people, it's talking to Christians. Should Christians be worried about hell? No. And Paul could have been talking about that, but he's talking to Christians, and the whole chapter is about Christians walking in the Spirit. The word condemnation just simply means guilty. It's when a judge says, based on the evidence and the witnesses and the testimonies in the court, I pronounce you, say it. guilty He's saying there is now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus Who walk now possible is those who are in Christ Jesus? Is that is that objective or subjective? You either are or you aren't saved, am I right? That's very objective. So you can sit here and say, yep, praise God, I remember when I was born again, that's talking about me. But he keeps going, he includes the objective of salvation and then the subjective of sanctification because he says, for those who are, there is no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, that's salvation, who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit. Are we saved by walking, yes or no? No, so that portion is talking not about salvation, it's talking about what? Sanctification. So whatever the condemnation is, it's talking not about hell, but about something that God will spare from the Christian who walks in the Spirit. You have to be saved, you have to be in Christ Jesus to even have the Spirit, right? So that's the baseline. If you're in Christ Jesus and you're not walking in the Spirit, guess what you're going to feel? Condemnation. But if you're in Christ Jesus and you're walking after the Spirit, guess what you're not gonna have? Condemnation. So, we already know that if you're in Christ Jesus, your eternal condemnation was absorbed at the cross. Amen? God no longer looks at you and condemns you. So if God's not the one who's condemning you, who is? In this verse, who's the one doing the condemning? Well, it could be the devil. He's the accuser of the brethren and no doubt he certainly picks on preachers. He'll whisper, he'll condemn you. Oh yeah, he'll never forget your sin. He doesn't forgive it, he doesn't forget it. He'll bring it up. But I think more honestly, it's me. It's you. We condemn ourselves because we know as Christians, thank God I'm going to heaven. But boy, I didn't live right. And there's that sin, there's that guilt, and so we live under a sense of condemnation. And here's the problem. Those who walk in the flesh as Christians are never gonna have victory, and they're always gonna feel condemnation. And here's the problem. There are many preachers who live their entire life, ever since they got saved, they live under the cloud of condemnation. Sorry to refer to this, but my kids range from 14 down to four, so we have Winnie the Pooh. play in our house once in a while, okay? So, if that offends your conscience, please forgive me. But anyway, a good old Winnie the Pooh and Eeyore. Remember Eeyore? And there's a particular episode where everywhere Eeyore goes, there's a rain cloud over his head. Everywhere he goes. It's just raining on poor Eeyore. Splashing, lightning on him. Everywhere he goes. Of course, he kind of has that problem anyway. He always has a look of doom on his face. But the point is, there's a rain cloud everywhere he goes. Did you realize for many Christians, there's a cloud of condemnation over their head from the moment they wake up to the moment they go to bed, especially when they come to church. Because we preach, amen? We say, thus saith the Lord. We say God is holy and you're not. And all of that is true. But unfortunately, the people in the pew don't know how to process that unless the Holy Spirit's showing them. But it just becomes, whoa, I don't measure up. Whoa, I'm guilty. God must be angry at me. And I am convinced, not just as a pastor, but now as I travel, many, many Christians, if they were to be honest, would say, well, I know God loves me, but I don't think he likes me. Their picture of God is anger, a furrowed brow, a chastising father who is, oh, okay, all right, now you got it. Now, can he chastise? Yes, he does, but the Bible says he does it out of love. It doesn't feel good, it hurts, but we have a loving God. Believe it or not, he is not frowning at you 24-7. The devil hates you, your heart condemns you, but when you walk in the flesh, you're not walking in the right paradigm of truth, and so constantly you feel condemned. And here's what you do as a preacher. Here's what I've done. And I'll tell you, for the first three or four years as a pastor, I regret Praise God, he allows 25 year old pastors to experiment on real people. It's amazing. And you know what, they still can grow through our imbalances, praise God. But I look back at some of the ways I've preached and some of the ways I've tried to manipulate the people because I'm trying to take my sense of God is holy and I'm in trouble and they're in trouble too. You're all in trouble. I'm trying to offload that same, see that cloud of guilt that rested over my heart, I thought it was healthy. I was used to it. I thought it was necessary for holiness. I thought that cloud of guilt, I thought that condemnation was necessary for me to walk the line. So it's my duty to put that cloud over you. In fact, I like to have the sermon end and as soon as the invitation was over, that's the last thing that happens. No announcements. I want them to walk out with that cloud over their head all the way to the car. Let them simmer on that. Hope they can take that home for dinner. Amen? Maybe they'll come back Sunday night for once. I hate to say this, but many pastors, we are professional guilt trippers, and that's because we live under guilt, and we think we've benefited by it, and we are sure that they'll benefit by it. Now, guilt has its place, but remember the gospel has good news and bad news. It's not all sin and hell. Aren't you thankful for that? The grace of God is more balanced than that. But look what it says, and I have to run. Verse one says there's no condemnation, but look what it says further on. Look, it says in verse, verse 14. For as many as are led by the Spirit, they are the sons of God. This is showing the right way. This is showing how grace operates. Led by the Spirit. Picture that. The Holy Spirit comes along as the comforter and says, here, take my hand, let's go. Lead. Doesn't that sound gentle? Doesn't that sound like a loving relationship? Doesn't that sound like fellowship? It doesn't say driven by the Spirit. We think sometimes that it's the Holy Spirit's job to drive people. Now, look, I believe in hard preaching because God needs to give us more fire, not less. But that fire needs to lead to Christ and to grace. Remember, the gospel has bad news and good news, and the bad news actually does include some fire, doesn't it? A place of fire. So I'm all for the fire and the brimstone, but it needs to lead to grace. And here's the point. Grace says, if you'll take my hand, I'll walk with you. But I sinned. I know. Here, take my hand. But I just, but I'm unworthy. I know. Let's go. Let's walk. Don't we do that with our kids? Once upon a time I had a pastor's office. if you can call it that. It was more of a storage room, books, stuff for my babies, all that stuff. But I had a pastor's office, and it was a good place to counsel sometimes after church. It's amazing how many times you get hauled in after church to counsel, talk to people. And my kids knew they should knock before they come in. But did they? No. Why? Because that's daddy's office, and my toy is in there. So boom, the door comes flying open. My kids come busting into the office. Because why? I'm there. I'm their dad. Hey, buddy. OK, grab your toy. All right. Could you close it on the way out? Thanks. Now, it happened a million and one times. That's OK. Those are good memories. Point is, wouldn't it be weird if I had a knock at the door? Come in. Who is it? It's my son. Well, come on in. He opens the door, peeks in, gets on his knees, grovels, crawls to the desk. Now, Daddy, I have a question, but before I do, I have some sins to confess. This is weird. You know, yesterday I didn't really do my homework, and instead of folding my socks, I just shoved them all in the drawer. And after he unloads his chest about various weird things he's been doing that I didn't know or care to know about, then he says, okay, dad, can I sit down now? Yeah, have a seat. This is weird. Go ahead, sit down. Well, dad, I was wondering, you know, after school today, could I go and play with my friend? They're gonna be down to the baseball. Look, would that be weird? Pastors, would that be weird? We do that to God every day. He's our Father. But we live under condemnation so deeply that we knock on the Holy of Holies, we straighten our tie, we say, okay, before I can even pray, I'm gonna have to have a deep cleansing session. By the way, I'm not minimizing the need to confess sin. When God brings it up, you confess it. I'm talking about this paranoia of, I've gotta be just right. I've gotta be just clean. I can't even pray with power until I get all these things done. Wait a minute. Some of my most powerful prayers have when I've been most unworthy and I just fell on my face and I claimed the blood of Jesus Christ. I said, oh Lord, you know what I am. You know what a wretch I am, but Lord, help! Lord, I'm calling on your name by your blood. Lord, would you do this work in their life? I just come busting into the throne of grace. Aren't we told to do that? Come boldly before the throne of grace. Why? The blood of Jesus. Now look what it says here in verse 14. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. Interesting, do you act like a child or a son? Do you want your church people to act like children? We make them act like children. Say how? We use childish motivations on them. Keep reading. Verse 15. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage, say the next word, again, to fear. We got saved from the spirit of bondage to fear. Realize the lost world is in bondage to fear. They are motivated by fear. Fear of a God they don't even know. Some cases they don't think about God, but they're at least afraid of death. They're all afraid of that. And the devil uses superstition in the religious crowd, right? The religious crowd is constantly motivated by fear. I gotta do it just right to appease the gods, or I gotta do it just right to make God smile on me. Fear always leads to bondage. Let's use another word for bondage. What's the word for that? Slavery. Doesn't sound like fun. When we got saved, we were delivered. The chains fell off. Not just to hell, but also to sin. But not just to sin, my chains fell off to the whole religious system that keeps people in chain in sin. That's the rudiments of the world, as Paul called it. The whole system is designed to keep you locked in chains to sin. And it leads and drives people with fear, fear, fear, fear. Now, we need a healthy fear of God. The Bible talks about fear. Fear is a foundational thing, the fear of God. The Bible says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but it didn't say it was the fulfillment of it. The fear of the Lord is like an on-ramp that gets you on. The fear of the Lord lays the foundation, but once the foundation is built, now it's time for Christ. See, Christ is the fulfillment of wisdom. fear by itself. You can even have Moses and the mount that smoked and trembled in the fire and all of that shaking. It was pretty scary. Did it produce a good result? Yes or no? So fear is good if it's the fear of the Lord, but even in the fear of the Lord, as beautiful as that is, that's only foundational. You need the fear of the Lord. Preaching on sin and hell produces a certain fear of the Lord in a lost person. We might call that even repentance, where they turn and say, oh Lord, save me, right? So the fear of the Lord is necessary, but that's not where we stop. All right, and so what we have is this. You have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear. Rather, you have received the spirit of adoption whereby we cry, Abba, Father. So look at this. The world system motivates through fear, and that's bondage. God's system motivates through relationship. of a love relationship of a father who has brought me into the family. Adoption means I don't really belong. I've been brought up into the status of full sonship by God's grace. Hallelujah. And therefore I can have an intimate relationship and no longer do I have to be driven with a whip, but rather I can walk hand in hand with my Lord with spiritual maturity, and with my Bible open, and with a heart of humility, and under leadership to my pastor, all of that is part of it. But I say, Lord, what's next? Okay, Lord, well, that's gonna be hard. Okay, Lord, I'll do it. Amen? And you walk led by the Spirit. And when you walk like that, guess what you find? No condemnation. Not because you're perfect. No, no, no. Because He graciously has loved and shed His blood and brought you into the family. And because He is right there with you, leading you, guiding you, enabling you, and helping you. That's why there's no condemnation. It's not that I shouldn't feel bad when I sin, because I do. But right away, you know what I do? I've learned, I praise God, he's teaching me, to look to the blood and say, oh Lord, thank you for the cleansing of your blood. Let me take your hand. Let's go, let's walk. Lord, help me to walk. Because that relationship keeps the air clear. Now, it's his love for me and my love for him on the foundation of a healthy fear of God. You follow that? But there's this love relationship that is the secret sauce of Christianity. that people have forgotten about. Okay, this is the extreme of what I might call law-focused Christianity. I don't wanna use the word legalism, because it's so inflammatory and so misunderstood. Let me just say, it's possible to be a Christian and have a wrong balance, a wrong focus. And God wants us to bring us back to say, wait a minute, this can be a relationship. Unfortunately, as pastors, we have not permitted our people to grow into maturity because we keep using the tools that keep them immature. All we know how to do is twist the screws and crack the whip. That's all we know how to do. It's going to have to be an extra dose of fear and we're going to have to crank down the limitations. We're going to have to raise the standards to the point where they're perhaps even absurdly high. That does happen. Am I wrong? I know all of us are balanced in our own eyes. Everybody else is not. That's how it works. But it is possible out of a sense of, I'm gonna make them do right, I'm gonna try to produce godliness, I'm gonna keep them away from sin, and we try to focus on rules and laws, which in and of themselves aren't wrong, but they don't produce the real thing. And then we have kids, and I gotta hurry up, but we got kids and teenagers and children who grow up in this system, and they don't catch the heart, unfortunately, because their hearts are wicked, just like ours. And some of them will go on to Bible college and make us proud, but others are gonna say, I'm sick of this! And then they hear the sweet sound of grace, but it's not coming from our pulpits. It's from the Christian bookstores, which don't exist anymore, but the Christian authors, the podcasts, and if they don't reject Christianity altogether, because sadly, many of them are, I've got some folks that I know that aren't even the same gender anymore. They've rejected everything from good families. But they run into the sweet sounding arms of the false grace, but it's fake. It's fake. Turn over to 2 Peter, and let me tell you how fake it is. And by the way, 2 Peter and Jude, they read so similarly, I think they were kind of collaborating or something. They did know each other, I'm assuming. They read each other's scriptures, amen? 2 Peter reads very much like Jude in the way it describes this particular problem. 2 Peter 2.1. But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among the people." And I'll stop. When I read false teachers, I'm assuming it's talking about bad doctrine, denying the virgin birth, et cetera, right? But when you keep reading, you find out he's not talking about that. He's talking about a particular false doctrine. Who bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them. Stop. Say, well, there you go. They deny the deity of Jesus Christ. Well, that's possible, but that's not what he's talking about. They're denying the Lord that, say the word, bought them. Whoa, these might be Christians. And when the Lord bought them, Bible says that Jesus would come into the world, they shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their. So why did Jesus buy them? Why did he go to the cross? Well, to take us to heaven, of course. Wrong, that's a plus. That's the cherry on top. Jesus saved you from sin. When you have a doctrine that makes it easy to sin, you are denying the whole reason Jesus died. They are denying the Lord that bought them, not by denying His deity, not by denying the virgin birth, they're denying His agenda. They're denying what He stands for. Do you realize when He hung on that cross, He was taking the ultimate stand against sin, against this world system. He died to it. He became sin for us. that knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. Jesus took the ultimate stand against sin and worldliness. Would you agree? And when you have a doctrine of grace that makes it easy to sin, you have denied the Lord Jesus in that sense. Does that make sense? That's what it's talking about. I know it, because keep reading. Verse two, and many shall follow their pernicious ways By reason of him, the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. And it goes on talking about covetousness and having eyes full of adultery. Turn over to good old Jude, you know, chapter one. Hurry, hurry, hurry. Look how Jude puts it. Jude, verse four, for there are certain men crept in unawares who before of all ordained to this condemnation ungodly men, look at this phrase, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. Look, that word even sounds bad, doesn't it? Lasciviousness, I can hear the hiss of the devil in it. So what does it mean? Well, put it this way. The devil takes grace and he turns it into grease. There is a slippery slope. It exists. Many people have done a slip and slide all the way into muck. Am I wrong? And the devil takes grace and makes it greasy. makes it a false idea that makes it easy to sin. Well, God loves me. God'll forgive me. You know, it's not a big deal. We don't have to be legalists, and they use that word so they can jump into sin. And I'll tell you what, if your version of grace makes you comfortable with things that used to bother you because the Bible talks about it, But now you do it, and you're having an ease of conscience, and you can sleep just fine. If your version of grace makes you embrace the world that crucified Jesus, if your version of grace makes you enjoy sin and make little disciples of sin, that's lasciviousness. It's false grace. And because it's so reprehensible, that's why there's the crowd over here that's trying to be safe from all of that. but they've run up the hill and shut themselves into cloistered, small little monasteries of people who agree with them and shoot bullets at anybody who doesn't, but they know nothing of the grace that brings Christlikeness. Is there an answer? Yes, there is. Let's hurry, and I gotta get done. Titus, back to Titus. How does it describe it? First of all, grace is a teacher. Verse 12, grace teaches us. And I won't keep reading, because you know the verse. And that means, pastors, you're part of this work of grace. Because isn't it our job to teach? That's what we do. Hallelujah. You are part of God's work of grace in the people in your church. We need to teach them what's wrong. At the end of this passage, it says, these things exhort and rebuke with all authority. We even have the right to rebuke. It's our job to teach. I'm glad that grace comes from a God who is a teacher. I'm glad the Holy Spirit was sent as the comforter who comes alongside. And he doesn't just teach from a lectern, but Jesus came right down in among us. He's now God in us. He's the kind of teacher that doesn't just show you what to do, he walks with you in it. Amen? He's the ultimate mentor. The grace of God teaches us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we can live soberly and righteously and godly in this present world. So the grace of God teaches us. Secondly, the grace of God motivates us. with heaven. See, the problem is all this worldly stuff, it's focused on our kingdoms and our traditions and our connections and our, the fear of man and all, and over here, pleasures and money and all that stuff, but who's focused on heaven? That's a small crowd. Grace leads you to remember that Christ is coming back, the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior, Jesus Christ. Grace makes you look up. Grace always focused on Christ. And by the way, Christ is balanced. Did you know that? He's perfectly balanced. And if we were consumed with Jesus and his soon return, that would keep us happy and holy. Believe that? Grace will make you happy and holy if you're focused on Jesus and his soon return. And then it motivates us through the cross, who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto himself of peculiar people, zealous of good works. Grace always makes you look up, and grace makes you look back to the old rugged cross. And you see that cross, and you remember, I'm a wretch, but Jesus died for me. And we sing about the old rugged cross. And that love of God flows fresh into our hearts, and it makes us cry, Abba, Father. It makes us cry, Lord, how can I serve you? It makes us say, Lord, I want to be holy. It makes us say, Lord, I'm on your team. I'm not on the world's team. Because you're absorbing, you're receiving that love that flows from Calvary. All the grace we're talking about flowed from Calvary. It's amazing how people on this side, they talk about grace, but they don't remember how much it cost. See, when you walk with Jesus and you get the balance on grace, you are consumed with Jesus and the cross. And Jesus walks that line of perfect love. At the cross, he condemned sin. And at the same cross, he receives sinners. I don't know how to find the perfect balance. I'm probably way off in some areas. But I wanna get to Jesus, because he's balanced. And I wanna point my people to Jesus. And I don't wanna always resort to the bullwhip. I want to teach them to grab his hand and walk without that condemnation, to learn the joy of fellowship. That's what I want. And folks, that takes risks, because they might slip and slide. They might. Might have to go fetch him. But by God's grace, we have to get into Jesus, and he's balanced. That's where real grace is. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, help us. Thank you that salvation is possible because of your grace. And that same grace that saves us will make us like Jesus. You're gonna teach us gently, biblically, and guide us by the Spirit at our own pace. Lord, thank you for your mercy. And Lord, you're gonna inspire us with heaven. You're gonna remind us of the cross. And Lord, I pray that whatever our nuance of application, we would keep Jesus at the center, that you give us wisdom with one another, that we'd raise up young people who love our Savior. Oh Lord, help us, we pray in Jesus' name.