some also of goodwill. The one preached Christ of contention, not sincerely supposing to add affliction to my bonds. But others of love, knowing that I am set for the defense of the gospel, what then, notwithstanding every way, whether in petition or in truth, Christ is priest, and I therein do rejoice, yeah, and will rejoice. So grace, and Father, Lord, we're thankful for the opportunity to be back here this morning, dear Lord. Father, we're thankful for your love and your grace, Lord, that flows like a mighty river, dear Lord, from the throne of God. And Father, we're thankful for the blood that stained the old rugged cross. And we're thankful today for Jesus who bled, died for us, and rose again the third appointed day with the promise to come back to claim us again, dear Lord. And Father, we're looking for the soon returning King. Father, I ask today that you take this message you've laid upon my heart, and Lord, open each heart to it, dear Lord, Father God, that they'll know, don't worry about me. But Father, we ask you, dear Lord, there'll be one here today that's not saved. Father, we ask you, save him before we leave here today, dear Lord. Place the old Holy Ghost conviction on him. Father, where they're sitting or where they're standing at this time, Father, we ask you, dear Lord, that you'll take this message and use it according to thy will, that you'll be found in all the honor and the glory for it, dear Lord. Father, we love you and praise you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen and amen. Man, what a life Paul lived. When you think about the things that Paul went through, would say that we should feel bad for the Apostle Paul. I have no doubt that some people in the church over there in Philippi, there was no doubt, Philippi, Philippi, however you like to announce it, I'm not gonna argue about the pronunciation of the church that's over there or the story of the city. But word had got back that Paul had been locked up. There was no doubt that some of those people going around there, Brother Barry, they was worried about Paul being in bondage. Paul was such a great influencer and had such the power of God on him, Brother Eddie, that when he was locked away, there was only him and a prison guard that was there. Now, somehow Paul had gotten word that this church that he loved so much had became upset that he was in bondage again. Now the only way that I could think a man could get news that's locked up in a dungeon by himself is that another sane person had to get in touch with him. So you see, when they put Paul by himself with somebody, he only had one thing he was gonna talk about. And I guarantee those prison guards that was holding him captive in Rome had heard the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. So word had got back, and there was no doubt that they were worried. No doubt that they were upset. They were like, our beloved Paul is locked up yet again. What are we going to do? How are we going to help him? Paul says, I want you to understand something right here, brother. The things which happened unto me have fallen out the furtherance of the gospel. He said, listen to what he's saying here. He said, because I'm going through what I'm going through, the gospel is now being spread more than when I was not in bondage. I take this as a request for you to understand that when you're going through something, it's to further the gospel. You might go through different things, like me and Cole. We've been going through infertility for 10 years now. But guess what? It has helped us grow in the furtherance of the gospel. We're able to help people. We're able to see things and talk to people in a different light. But no doubt, Paul was locked up again. I can see him now. What'd Paul get locked up for? I don't know. He's over there telling somebody that the wages of sin are death, but the gift of God is through Jesus Christ our Lord. I don't know, Paul's been locked up again over there. Maybe he was over there telling somebody that you must be born again as Jesus has commanded you. There's no doubt about it that Paul stood for what he believed in, and was it nobody, I mean absolutely nobody gonna stop that. His Damascus Road experience changed his life forever. It changed who he was. You know, Paul was gonna say here later in this epistle that he counts everything that he had before he was saved as lost, and everything that he has now that's gained in Christ. You know, Paul was a rich man. He didn't care about none of that. He cared about the furtherance of the gospel. He cared about taking it from the day he fell on his knees at the road to Damascus, when he was told that you would have to suffer for my name's sake, that he was going to send them out to the Gentiles. Brother Ben, he told them he was going to go out to all the world, he was going to tell people about the Jesus Christ. I could see him that day as he was praying there that day, and he was blinded for three days. And a man finally knocked at his door and said, Brother Paul, my name is Ananias, and the Lord in the sky sent me to touch you and open your eyes. And from that day forward, Paul had a mission. It was to go everywhere. He was sent to me and you. He was sent to the Gentiles. He was sent to the unworthy. He was sent to the ungratified. I'm talking about he was sent to this church over there in Philippi. I'm talking about he flipped that world upside down. There was a world upside down. I'm talking about everybody loved him. Everybody knew him. And now he's in prison for doing exactly what he wanted to do. Flip the world. I remember over there in the book of Acts, I think it's the 26th chapter, I do believe, I couldn't be wrong. But they were so worried about the apostle Paul coming to walk through. Because he said, I don't know if you've seen when he done over there, but he had flipped the world upside down. Church, I tell you, he might be in bondage, but the gospel was getting spread. He may have been locked up, but the gospel was getting spread. He had got the gospel into the palace. If you read the next verse, it says, and so my bonds, so that my bonds in Christ are manifested in all the palace. Caesar's wanted. There's no doubt Paul was locked up somewhere where Caesar can keep a real close eye on him to make sure he's not going to escape, to make sure nobody's going to let him out, to make sure nobody's going to pull him in. But what he didn't realize is what Caesar didn't realize here is what we've been learning in Esther, that the unseen things of God have finally moved in on the Roman Empire. And God now has placed his beloved apostle to the Gentiles right where he wanted him. Sister, he's letting them know, don't worry about it, I'm right where I need to be. right where I need to be. That man, Caesar, ain't heard the gospel yet, but by the time I'm executed, by the time they release me, he will know the glorious name of Jesus Christ, his Lord, because I've been locked up in this prison cell for a little while now, and his name ain't stopped going through the throne room of heaven along with y'alls, but I'm telling you now, Paul had a mission there. He wasn't locked up. Every time Paul was locked up, it was for a reason. And then our bonds, you know, we might not be physically like Paul, bound and chained in a dozen or in a prison, but we should too look at our but those bondages are not to hold them back. You know, a lot of times, brother Ben, we take our bondages and our downfalls and stuff that holds us back from being what we should be for Christ, but what Paul says here should make sure that everybody in this building, hair stand up on their neck, make them wanna shout the glory of God, because Paul's saying here, your bondages, which are in Christ, if you're saved, is not to hinder you, but it is to further the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's what we should wanna do in our lives. We should wanna further the gospel. But today, church, do you know what a lot of Christians do? We no longer further the gospel because of our bonds. They're not gonna like to hear me say what I gotta say. I don't wanna tell them about Jesus. I watched a video the other day of a man, he was talking about the rapture and how exciting he was to go for the rapture. But then he said, I had one fear that struck my heart. He said, me looking back and seeing my friends, saying, where are you going? Why didn't you tell me? Why wouldn't you let me know that there was a way that I could join you in the rapture instead of the torment that I'm fixing to go through? Church, if we let our bonds hold us back, if we let our bonds cage us in, if we allow those things to say I can't do anything anymore, then Paul here is telling you that you're wrong because your bondages are used by God and God alone to further the gospel. Does that preacher, what does Paul really want us to know here? First off, he said, in all the palace, in all places." That means everywhere. Everywhere the gospel was being spread. He said, and many of my brethren in the Lord waxed in confidence by my bonds. You say, what in the world? How could somebody be confident because Paul is locked up? Let me tell you why. Because Paul was on a move that most men of God, in fact, every man of God since him never got a hold of. Everybody was listening. with Paul this morning. I know we have youth in here and I know I'm not the Apostle Paul, but Paul was so good at preaching the gospel. The way Margaret's looking at me now is the way every child in this room would be looking at the Apostle Paul when he was talking to them. They would be fixed in, they would be listening, they would be driven by what he said. So these other preachers and men of the Lord were making themselves try to be like Paul but never could be like Paul. So what I'm trying to tell you now is It's Paul saying, in my bonds, they're not scared. They're fearless. They're able to go out and tell others when everybody just wanted to listen to me. If you try to be like your brother, sister in Christ. You're never going to be what God wants you to be. I had somebody tell me the other day, and I'll get into this a little bit more probably here in a few minutes. They said, I would have never guessed you as a preacher, Josh. I said, OK, that's your opinion of me. That's not my opinion. That's your opinion. What made you want to get into the ministry? I said, I am too. I grew up under old time preaching. I said, I grew up under living the lifestyle that you preach. I said, and I do that. I said, I don't run around here preaching things that I'm going to do with my daily life, brother babe, because that makes me a hypocrite, and I'm going to be judged double for that in my life. It's judgment day. Everybody always talks about you get double the rewards, but guess what? You also get double the punishment, right? They forget that part of the Bible. And he's like, well, we don't see you as a preacher. And I was like, well, that's your opinion. I was like, but I grew up under the old ways, just like a lot of y'all did. I understood the old ways. I believe in the old paths, but not all the old ways, Brother Mary. And I've been clear with y'all on that. I believe in the old paths that the Bible speaks about, but not all the old ways that man has spoken about. And I said, if you really want to understand a lot of things, you need to get into your Bible. You need to read it for yourself. Because if you only believe what the man tells you, then you're not going to believe what God is trying to speak to you through the old paths, not the old ways. They was like, well, have you ever been nervous? Let me tell you this. I told him, I said, I preach in a tent meeting every year with four of the best preachers I've heard in my lifetime. I said if I went in there thanking that I couldn't have preached like them or I couldn't do them, I said I would fall flat on my face. I'm not Alan Morris. I'm not Ron Peel. I'm not Kenneth Hammett. I'm not David Hendricks. I'm Joshua Cook. And that's who I have to be. I have to be that. I can't compare myself to other preachers. I can't compare myself to what's going on over there at different churches. I can't compare myself when I see churches start flourishing and growing and growing like wildflowers all over the place. I can't sit there and become envy and strife. Somebody said that in here. I think that Paul wrote that. Paul write that church, I think he said that some indeed preach Christ even of envy and strife. So there was preachers out there, Brother Barry, that were preaching Christ, but downing the Apostle Paul. And this day and hour that we're living in, we would like to say Paul said, if they want to live in jealousy, let them live in jealousy. If they want to live in envy, let them live in envy. If they want to live in strife, let them live in strife. But I'm telling you right now, God has given each one of you that saved a gift today, and he's telling the church in Philippi here that if you start being envy, if you start living in strife because this person sings better than you, or this preacher preaches better than you, or this person's able to do more than you're able to do, it is not your fault. You need to stop it and back away from it. If God gave you a gift, you have no reason to be jealous over anybody else's. And I believe Paul said that he gave all men a gift. Every one of us have a gift in Christ and only that we can bring it to our full potential. But we have to stop being jealous of our brothers and sisters in Christ. I couldn't imagine a man being jealous over the way that I preach because I don't think I'm that good at it. I tell people that all the time. I don't think I'm that good at it. I've heard people that preach 20, 30 times better than me. But I can't live that way. If I think, man, I wish, when I was first called to preach, some of y'all was at my ordained service. They said, I have some mighty big shoes to fill, Brother Bill Cooks. I said, yeah. I said, the thing of it is, I can't fill these shoes. I have to fill my own. That's right. That's right. Yeah. The problem is, that's like Joe Arthur. He couldn't be Billy Kelly. That's right. Brother Terry Lawson, he couldn't be Billy Kelly. That's right. He shouldn't have been sent like that. They had to become their own. God didn't call you and save you and change you for you to stop witnessing the people that you know that you can only reach. I tell people all the time, God called me. He called me. I have no reason to be jealous of any other man. I love seeing when churches, I'm talking about, like Paul says, I rejoice in them. I rejoice when people, when I see people like Fellowship, one of our dearly beloved churches that we love to fellowship with, they just got a new church band. I said, praise God for it. Brother Ricky and them seem to be doing great down there. Every time I talk to them, they're talking about how wonderful things are going at the church. I praise God and rejoice with him. I had a preacher friend of mine tell me one time that he was talking to another preacher, and they asked him about how many they're averaging. Now, if you ever ask me that, I will answer honestly. Don't get jealous of me because our averages are higher than yours. That's not my fault. And he said, I answered honestly. He said, we're averaging about 90 to 100. He said that other preacher looked at him, he said, how does it make you feel that we only have five people in service this morning? He said, I don't know what you want me to say to that. That other preacher was living in envy and strife. He was jealous of what was going on at another church. But church, if we would stop and concentrate on what's going on here and stop worrying about what's going on everywhere else, God will allow us to flourish and grow. But there are preachers out there that preach in envy and strife. There's preachers out there that even though the Bible says it's wrong, And that's the truth. Bible says it's wrong, but they like to talk about it. There's no doubt there's some preachers out there right now that was there, if Paul was still living, would be talking horribly wrong about Paul, because Paul would be preaching against what's going on behind their pulpit, what's going on in that building they call a church. That's like this morning, we're in a fellowship hall. Sanctuary's down there, but the church is still here. But he said Aaron's striving. But the thing that really got me about this is those And I looked at this and preachers can find fault in Paul. Preachers can find fault in Paul and they get back to Philippi. That means preachers can find fault in Joshua Cooke and they can get back to friendship. That's that Indian stripe. I tell Cole all the time that she had a great example of a pastor's wife really helped set her in the right direction. But I also told her, you can't be Sister Cook, you gotta be Sister Cole. She can help get you on the right path, but you can't change, cause she'll never be Sister Cook. She'll always be Sister Cole. Just like I couldn't be Brother Bill, I had to be Joshua. We gotta stop being jealous over things, it's going on. I guarantee they was jealous he was locked up in a dungeon by himself. In bondage, they was probably happy about it. Matter of fact, he said they were happy about it. He said they was excited about him being down there. They probably thought they was bothering him. They probably thought they was upsetting him. They probably thought that everything that was going on was getting back to him and he was upset about them talking. But Paul says what then, notwithstanding, even every way, whether in prison, or in truth, Christ is preached. He said, hey, let them preach in envy. Let them preach in strife. Let them preach everything they want to preach about. Let them say everything about Paul they want to say as long as Christ is preached. And I don't believe Paul would write that if they were blaspheming the word of God. I believe they was preaching truth. I believe they was preaching the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. I believe they was preaching the doctrine. I believe they was preaching the theology. I believe they was preaching everything that Paul had taught them, everything Paul had given them. But Christ was being preached, brother Eddie. He said, don't worry about what they say about me, as long as Christ is being preached. Paul never made his ministry about Paul. Friendship Baptist Church, as long as I'm here, when I make the ministry about them or myself, it has to be about Christ. We start making it about the money, we start making it about the dinners, and we start making it about the singing. I love good gospel singing, but if we start making our services about the singing, we are gonna fall, we're gonna go down, we're gonna be, it's gonna get bad. And we're gonna be in envy and Now most of y'all know I'm not big on female preachers. I don't believe in them. Never will, never have. I believe the Bible speaks against them. I was reading something last night when I was studying this. Man, this should make you feel horrible about yourself if you don't know the truth. I was sitting there reading and Dr. Ironside was in California and he was walking and the people with him were walking beside of him. One of the guys with him, Brother Kenneth, said, man, it's a shame that that woman's over there over there preaching. Dr. I said, he said he stopped, Brother Barry, and he looked right at the man and he said, no, what's a shame is there's not a man to take the place. But Christ was being preached. We look at the wrong things sometimes. There was a time even when Sunday school teachers like Sister Cook and being a female was frowned upon. Look, if we focus on the wrong things, Christ will not be preached. Paul says, I rejoice in it. He said, I rejoice in those people out there, the ones that's talking bad about me, Brother Perry, the ones that's out there putting me down, the ones that's out there using the doctrine that I gave them because I am the apostle to the Gentiles. They wouldn't have got it without him, Sister Tammy. And he said, those that are putting me down, those that are running ragged on me, those that are laughing at me and my bonds, those that are treating me like I'm a nobody, I rejoice with them because they are preaching Christ. He said, hey, let him talk about me. Let him put me down. Let him run me over. Let him back the bus up and run me back over. As long as Christ is being preached and souls are being saved for the kingdom of God, let him do it. Amen. He said, because Christ is being preached. He told the church at Fifth High, you need to stop worrying about me and realize what's really going on over here. It's not about Paul being locked up. It's not about me being in this dungeon. It's not about me and my bonds, but it's about Christ being preached. It's about Christ being preached. How many of you today have stood up and told somebody the truth and let Christ be preached? Paul said, don't you worry, don't you bat an eye, don't you worry about me anymore because I'm sitting down here in this prison cell and I'm rejoicing with her. He said, I'm having me a shouting. good time down here in this Roman prison. Every time I get news from the Holy Spirit of God, when Paul talked to Jesus himself, he probably would have came. Jesus probably met him in the dungeon, said, Paul, another soul was saved out there, even though they were preaching in envy and strife. He said, they're trying to add this to my bondage, brother here. They're trying to get me worse than what I am. But he said, as long as Jesus Christ is being preached, I rejoice with him. I rejoice. I rejoice in Christ being preached. I rejoice when the little kids sing about Jesus Christ. I rejoice when I hear somebody just telling somebody about Jesus, whether he's a preacher or just somebody who goes sits and just a member of the church and just goes tell somebody about Jesus. I rejoice with them. The problem is we quit rejoicing because we allowed the envy and the strife and the jealousy get to us to where we quit. I'm telling you right now, them other preachers can run me down all day, but as long as the Bible commands me to love them, I will love them. I know a woman one time got upset at the preacher about something he done. I told her, I said, one thing we're not gonna do is we're not gonna talk bad about him. We're gonna pray about him. Just because you don't like what he done doesn't mean we're going to down him. We're going to pray about it because we're still commanded to love him. You can hate me all you want to, but I'm going to love you because I'm trying to get into heaven quicker. And the longer we keep fighting each other, we're not going to get there. It's going to take a little while to get all this worked out. But if we would have just listened to Paul, if we would have listened to what Paul said, if we would have listened to what Paul said here, I'm talking about if the church would have got a hold to it a long time ago, held it in and lived by it, Brother Berry, we would get there sooner because even though they're talking bad about me, even though they're treating me bad, even though they're treating me wrong, even though they're out there doing bad things, but Christ is being preached. I'll rejoice with you. You think angels care who leads a soul to the Lord when they go rejoicing? You think those saints around the throne of God when they're shouting Hosanna to the highest really cares about who preached that night? No, you know the only thing that matters is that their name, the Bible says the only thing that we should rejoice in is that your name is written in the Lamb's book of life. That's what he told the apostles. He said, don't be happy because you can step over serpents and cast out devils. He said, don't be excited that you have power that other man's don't have in my name. But he said, what you need to do is you need to rejoice because your name is written. in heaven. Hey church, if we quit trying to be better, if we quit trying to be greater, if we quit trying to do all these things and talking bad about all these other people, and we focus on rejoicing with them, it sounds hard don't it? It will be hard for Paul. Paul said they can talk about me, run me down, say what they want to say about me. You can get mad at me today. You can run off. You can go out here to other churches and run me down, talk bad about me. Say all you want to say about me. But as soon as I get news that Christ has been preached and a soul has been saved, I will rejoice with you. I'm not jealous over any preaching. That's something my mentor really taught me. Something I remember so much about. I know this sounds weird, but I don't remember him much as a grandpa. He was my grandpa, and I loved him. I grew up with him. But when he became my mentor, he became so much more. He could have done wrong, and I probably would have looked over him. That's how much I loved him. I know that sounds bad, but that's just how much I loved him. But he always taught me, you have to be yourself. And he faced the same problems that I faced. in the ministry, thinking people just don't like you. Thinking people just upset with you all the time. And those are games that, don't let some of these ministers act like they don't go through stuff like that, because I promise you they do. But even those ones, I feel like have done me wrong. I don't want to stand here and be in envy and strife with my brothers and sisters in Christ. I don't want to talk bad about you. I don't want to put you down. I want to rejoice with you. Because Brother Eddie, you know, when we get to heaven, I've heard some people say that I don't like going over there because, you know, maybe a couple of black people, a couple of Hispanics come to church. Maybe something like that, man, or somebody somewhere else from a different country goes to church there. I say go rejoice with them. When you get to heaven, there won't be no white heaven, there won't be no black heaven, there won't be no purple heaven, there won't be no green heaven, no Indonesia heaven, no Ethiopian heaven, no Indian heaven, no Mexican heaven, and only be one. And that's the kingdom of God that was bought by the blood of Jesus Christ. And we should rejoice in that together. We should rejoice. Also in that church in Philippi.