Not if you have a Bible today and you'd like to read along in our scripture reading. We're going to take a reading from the book of 3 John. And there's only one chapter there, so we'll read from this chapter. And I ask you pray for me this morning. I want to honor the Lord. Don't always understand why the thoughts that the Lord places upon my heart to preach, but I wanna try to be faithful and trust Him that He would speak to your heart. So we're gonna begin reading in verse one, and we'll read down to verse 11 as our focus today in the scriptures. says the elder unto the well-beloved Gaius, whom I love in the truth. Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth. For I rejoiced greatly when the brethren came and testified of the truth that is in thee, even as thou walkest in the truth. I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth. Beloved, thou does faithfully whatsoever thou doest to the brethren and to the strangers, which have borne witness of thy charity before the church, whom if thou bring forward on the journey, excuse me, on their journey after a godly sword, thou shalt do well. Because that for his namesake, they went forth taking nothing of the Gentiles. We therefore ought to receive such that we might be fellow helpers to the truth. I wrote unto the church, but diatrophies, who loveth to have the preeminence among them, receiveth this not. Wherefore, if I come, I will remember his deeds, which he doeth, prating against us with malicious words, and not content therewith, neither doth he himself receive the brethren, and forbiddeth them that would, and casteth them out of the church. Beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good. He that doeth good is of God, but he that doeth evil hath not seen God. I'll conclude our reading this morning. Struggled to come up with a title for this message today, so I just have a very basic one this morning related to our scripture reading, and that is how the church should treat people. How the church should treat people. As I typically do, I want to give you some context for this because to me, very often that is what helps me to understand and feel the fuller force of the scriptures is understanding what John is doing here and perhaps to some degree why he is doing this. In all of John's epistles, One of the things that he's doing, and the first, there are predominantly three groups today that we're gonna identify in this text that John does, and how the church should respond to all three groups, and they're all very different, very different responses. And we're gonna start with the last one that he mentions and work our way back today, because the last one that he mentions is one that is found in every single one of his letters that he's written in these epistles. In 1 John, he tells us, and I'm gonna turn there very quickly, in chapter two, he says in verse 18, little children, it is the last time, and as you've heard, the Antichrist shall come, even now are there many Antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time. They went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us, but they went out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. We scoot down to verse 26, it continues, it says this, says this, these things have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you or lead you astray. If you turn to the book of 2 John very quickly, He begins to tell us in verse seven, that's only got one chapter in it, so he begins to tell us in verse seven, for many deceivers are entered into the world who confess not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist. Look to yourselves that we lose not those things which we have wrought, but that we receive a full reward. Skip down to verse 10, it says this. If there come any unto you and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him Godspeed, for he that biddeth him Godspeed is just a partaker of his evil. And then we come to third John, and he begins to talk about a man by name named Diotrephes. And so we can see over the course of these three books that one of the things that the Apostle John is doing to these small churches that many have assumed are spread throughout near Ephesus in Asia Minor, that many of these are small churches in people's homes, and John is writing to them and he's beginning to recognize that within these small congregations are people whose aim is not what it ought to be as the Lord established his church. Now it's an unfortunate thing that often the institution of the Lord's church at a local level can at times be Deceived or at times can be divided as to what the aim of the local body of God's people was meant to be a Prerequisite to being a member of the Lord's Church That is something worth the church standing on and offending Whomever is necessary to offend is that each member be a born-again Christian who has a personal knowledge of Jesus Christ And we ought as a church to protect the integrity of the membership in making sure that God's people are the ones that are compiling or that are a part of the Lord's body. That no one as much as we're able to help it by hearing their testimony and discerning their fruit would come in because then we have a situation that can more easily arise, as is the case here with a man named Diotrephes. Here in a moment, we're gonna talk about brothers and sisters that he calls strangers, and it says that when they went out as missionaries, their aim was the exaltation of the name of Jesus Christ. That's where their heart was set. And I wanna say this morning that every single church in the world and every Christian that is a member of every church ought to have one singular aim, and that is to exalt the name of the Lord Jesus Christ in everything. We don't seek to gain members. We don't seek to have some quantifiable measure whereby we can proclaim to the world that we are seeing success. We don't seek to entertain ourselves. We don't seek to create all sorts of youth programs that would be enticing and fun. Our sole objective is the exaltation of the name of Jesus. And we do that in our songs, and we do that in our conduct, and we do that in our speech and our conversation with one another. We do that together, and we do that separate. We do that as we raise our families. We do that in Bible study, in preaching, in every form and fashion. Our desire is that His name would be great among all the nations of the world and all the people that we could come to know. That is our aim. And in America today, it is just replete throughout so many Christian denominations, as well as can be in a missionary Baptist church, that we become divided in our aim of what we're attempting to do. We can try not to see the membership dwindle. We can try to do all number of things that have a an interest perhaps in our minds, but should never become the singular primary focus. It is Jesus that we want to be preeminent. My opinion and your opinion are not secondary, they're worthless in light of our overall objective. and I can disagree with people about certain doctrinal issues, and I can disagree with people on a whole number of issues, but I'll tell you one thing that unites my heart to many people who don't brand themselves as missionary Baptists is when I can see in their heart and their actions and in their life that they desire to exalt Jesus Christ, there is a brotherhood and a kinship that goes beyond just a denominational appellation. I want people who love Jesus Christ and who you can see in their aim and in their heart are seeking to exalt him. Here, there was a man, and this will sound familiar to some of you because some of you have been members of churches where there becomes one or two or perhaps a small group who perhaps in their own minds are doing the right thing. or perhaps they're not trying to do the right thing at all. And it says, John identifies them. He says, I wrote to you. Now we can see throughout the Apostle John's life that as if anyone could be considered a faithful servant of Christ over the course of what the biblical text shows us, John was one of those. And he had given his life, literally given his life, day in and day out, being a follower of Jesus during the ministry of Jesus, being a leader to the early church in Jerusalem, and then being spread abroad, being an elder among this new group that was meeting and forming congregations. He was instrumental in the propagation of the gospel all throughout the world. And he was writing to this group of people to help them multiple times. And there arose a man that evidently had some jealousy towards John because Diotrephes was not getting the attention that he wanted. Man, isn't it so many problems in a church started when things don't go the way I want them to go. And so I wanna try to cause people either informally in private conversation to take my opinion and run with it and try to impose my will upon the congregation privately or publicly. Diotrephes wanted the attention and he wanted his way and he was jealous that those people were looking to John and others as leaders. This desire for worship and attention caused diatrophies to reject John and to begin to spread bad words about John amongst the church in order to dilute the influence that diatrophies perceived John had in the congregation or in the congregations. So, verse 10, John confronts that head on. Now I want you to notice here, when a person becomes divisive, American culture says, run and just hope it goes away. And listen, if we love God's people and you are a leader among God's people, we do not have the right to run when battles, internal battles and struggles come. We cannot sweep things under the rug. We cannot hope they just keep taking care of themselves. And at the same time, we don't belligerently and aggressively attack them so as to create more harm and division. There is a right way to go about division in a congregation. And the first thing that John does is he acknowledges exactly what's going on. He says, Hey, I'm writing these letters and John is not letting them get to the people. He's not allowing the full weight of these truths to be received. And he's going about and he's accusing me with malicious words of doing things that are wrong. And so he's informing the people, this is exactly what's going on. He continues, and he says, but he's not content with just directing it towards me. You know, when somebody wants the preeminence, at first, it can seem like they're just directing their angst and their anger towards one person. But when we allow anger and jealousy in our heart to become present, and it does not get repented and purged from our own heart, listen, a little leaven is gonna leaven our whole heart. And so initially it might be directed towards one, but give it a little time, give it a little seasoning by Satan to be able to cause more division and more jealousy in the heart. And he says, he was not content to direct his anger and hatred towards me, but then he also did it to those brothers and sisters who would come in for the welfare of the church. There were others that were coming to help the church. and diatrophies, it says in verse 10, look at the last half of verse 10, it says, and not content therewith, that is to direct that towards John, neither doth he himself receive the brethren. We don't want them. We don't want them to come and teach us even though they have both the authority and ability to help us in our faith. and forbid of them that would, and casteth them out of the church." So, he's taking it to an extreme. He's saying this, not only do I not want them to come, but if you want them to come teach us, now I'm going to attack you and we're kicking you out of the church for even wanting other sound preaching and teaching to come to us. I think in the end, Diotrephes was wanting was not the church of Jesus Christ. He was wanting the church of Diotrephes. And oftentimes, churches will tolerate such a person for fear that perhaps they'll lose the membership, or they'll have some family members that the family is the core family of the church, and by offending that person, it'll cause that whole family to leave. But listen, what we ought to be more concerned with is not that family leaving, but God himself leaving. And if it becomes a church of diatrophies and a certain family or individual by bullying can cause the church and steer the church the direction it wants to go, then Christ's name is no longer preeminent. When we think of our worship services, we think our gathering together, if we're always having to look at the corner of our eye as to what somebody thinks, It's a problem. If we're sitting in business meeting and we're waiting for the one or the two voices to speak before we feel like we can have permission to express our own opinion, there's likely a diatrophy somewhere. I'm not accusing us this morning. I don't think we have that problem here, but I feel like it needs to be said. Because I don't want to have that problem. I want Jesus Christ to remain the focus, and I think he is right now. Here, he addresses it. And I think John was gonna come and he wasn't gonna back down. He was gonna do what Paul did to Peter when Paul came back in Galatians and he says, Peter got caught up in some wrong things and being preferential and being biased and setting an example that became contagious among that early church. He said this, when he did that and I saw it, I confronted him to the face. And the Bible teaches us that if it is an elder that is caught up in that, that it ought to be, he ought to be confronted before the whole church. That the whole church may see the example that if this man is trying to lead people astray, not to do it. Don't follow him because the damage is great. How do we treat people who are causing division in the church? Well, I'll tell you what we don't do. We don't pretend like it's not happening. In love, we stand firm for the name of Jesus Christ. That's the first group Paul addresses, how we should treat them. What about the second group? A few weeks ago, I discovered this, and it was a blessing to me, and that's one of the reasons I wanna share it with you. Starts in verse five. I believe this is talking about, to some degree, missionaries. Verses five through eight, five through eight. Some of the wording here is difficult, but it says this in verse five. Beloved, thou dost faithfully whatsoever thou doest to the brethren and to strangers. Now, I think who this is talking about, and I'm not gonna get into proving why I think that, but I think who this is talking about is that they were brothers and sisters that were missionaries. There were brothers who were doing the Lord's work. They were seeking, either through evangelistic efforts to go out throughout the Roman Empire and spread the gospel, or, as we see throughout the book of Acts, there were some men whose predominant role was once these churches or missions got established, they would go as those who had been grounded in the faith and taught those young churches and they would stay as long as was necessary until they could ordain men in that area to pick up the work. And so he's saying this, there are some of those brothers and sisters whom to you are strangers. You don't personally know them. But what you do know and what we're gonna find out in verse seven is that they are lifting up the name of Jesus Christ. That is their aim. And you have helped them. He says this in verse six. Which have bore witness, so these men and women had come in contact with John in some capacity and they had reported to John how these people he is writing to had treated them despite not knowing them. And he says, which have bore witness of thy love before the church. I really love this text. Here's why. Love has no preference. Love is unbiased. Love doesn't say, I really wanna see my children saved, but who cares about anybody else? A godly love. And as we expressed last week about a missionary's heart, it's one who loves as Jesus loves. It's loving not in just the kind of way that Jesus loves, but also the people that Jesus loves. And so here, the Apostle John is encouraging these people and he's saying this, they told me about what you did. They were ones who they expressed in some way that they were set on the name of Jesus Christ being exalted. And you had heard about them and you began to help them. And when they began to testify as to what you were doing, They kept saying, these strangers, these brothers and sisters that we don't even know, they're helping us and they're loving us. Now, I cannot think of an almost greater compliment, a greater form of praise that you could give a group of people than to say, those people that don't even know us Love us and look at the evidence. I think often about our posterity. We like to think here now. We like to think the next generation, our children and grandchildren. But what about eight generations from now? What about 10 generations from now? Do we love them? And are the things that we're doing set on our love and affection for those who will come long after us? And praise God, in this very church building, there were people who sat on, that stood upon these very floors and prayed and thought and strove for the well-being of generations yet to be born, and sacrificed that the name of Jesus Christ could be preserved in truth right here and right now. And some of those required men and women to stand up, even in this very church, to men like Diotrephes, who, when the church was not all together, navigated doctrinally in the right way, said, hold on a second, we have lost our path, and we need to come back to the truth. Aren't you thankful that there were brothers willing to fight for the truth, that we could hear it? Here, he said, these brothers and sisters, you loved them and you didn't even know them. I pray God would give us a deep love for that. I can tell you in my own heart, when I think about our Guatemalan brothers and sisters, when I think about our African brothers and sisters, when I think about the work Brother Garner is doing over on the other side of town with those people who are struggling with addiction, and you learn that some of them get saved, is it not a desire of our heart that we could just help and give them at least a part of the advantage that so many here testified about this morning? How many people in the world could not testify to what we heard this morning? That they had a mother or a father who presented to them the Gospel, and a church that loved and embraced them. And when their mother fell short, and their father fell short, that there were other brothers and sisters in the church that loved them and grabbed ahold of them. And yet the truth remains that most of the world, even the brothers and sisters that we don't know, they don't have those advantages. And Paul, excuse me, John is commending these people. You loved those strangers and they're testifying about the love you showed them. Why did they love those strangers? Why were they so willing to give? Tell this in verse seven. I wanna back up to verse six real quick. Paul exhorts us in verse six. This is not the King James translation, but here's what it says. We need to now continue to support these people, these strangers that we don't know that are aimed at lifting up the gospel. We need to support them in a manner worthy of God. It's really important. I get up this morning, tell you stories about Africa. and it'll probably make you cry about how bad you feel for the deprivation of food, and housing, and clothing, and medical care, and all of those things, and if there's a place and a time, there's nothing wrong with us helping those people, but that is not what our objective is. We don't look to provide as our aim water for the thirsty and food for the hungry. We wanna help where we can. But if that subtly becomes the aim of missionary effort, if that subtly becomes the aim of local endeavors to help foster children and other addicts and other institutions, if that becomes the aim, we've strayed. The aim. Look in verse seven, I'll tell you the aim, then we'll go back to verse six. Here's why these people were doing this, these strangers, the Christians, they didn't know. Because that for his namesake, They went forth. Their eyes, listen, the rest of existence, there will be people hungry. There will be disease. There will be death. But there's a place that God has prepared where all of that, every tear is taken away. There's a place where people can know God in its fullest reality, come to know God. And so we labor not to provide food here, not to bring peace on earth here, but to bring peace into the heart of men and women, to bring provision of the soul that will sustain them come what may. and to help share a gospel message that will ensure them a place where all their struggles down here will be put to a permanent end. And these strangers were going out and they wanted so desperately for his name to be exalted. It tells us, those who don't go, Support them, help them in a way that is worthy of God. I think it's saying worthy of the objective that they're trying to carry out. That God's name be lifted up. And so what does that mean? Well, sometimes I don't think writing a check is the solution. Notice these people didn't say, you know what, we're really thankful for the good donation that was given to us. What do you say? Their testimony was that those people loved us. How do you love somebody? Well, I can tell you having taken mission trips, sometimes what people need is they're starving to understand more of God's word. They're happy with rice and beans. They're happy with a little hut. They don't know the life that you and I live, and they don't care to know it. What they do care to know is what is it that I can do in my life that will please God? And so sometimes what they need is teaching and instruction that you and I would take of our time and maybe begin a correspondence with them. Have you ever thought about maybe some of you that are gifted at teaching and writing, that some of the best ways you could exercise your spiritual gift that God has given you is to come into a relationship with people that are brothers and sisters far from here and take the time every single week to get on or to get on a Facebook call with them and spend an hour or two hours helping teach them the fundamentals of the truth. Isn't that a way for as much as I stand up here and wail against technology and the addictions of it, how much could we turn that for God's use and use it as a means to supply the needs of our brothers and sisters that at this very hour are strangers to us? What a gift. This week, I'm reminded of a young lady in Guatemala this week who felt so hopeless, she took her own life, member of the mission down there. Isn't that sad? Isn't that really sad that a Christian on a mission field could get so hopeless, take her own life? I wonder, this isn't a rebuke, this is an honest wondering. What if she needed love? What if she needed time? This isn't, don't take it as a, I'm not guilting anybody, I'm just making an observation about it. What if she didn't need $100 of mission support, but she needed to know that there were some women here in the United States that, hey, I just learned that I was pregnant, and I'm afraid. I'm messed up. I don't have parents. I don't have a support system. and for a group of people who are strangers to step in and say, oh, don't worry. We will love you. We will do whatever it takes. to let you know we love you and we care for you, and God has a purpose for you, and God forgives sin, and God can restore and can redeem, and that that precious child that you have is one worth bringing into the world to see what God's purpose may be. Loving them, isn't that a new way of American thought as in regards to missionary work? That maybe it's not traveling and maybe it's not writing a check. Maybe it's doing what Paul professed and was, excuse me, John was commending these people for. They loved strangers. And all the tools God has put at our access to love those brothers and sisters whom we will never benefit from serving. Paul says, treat them in a way, a manner worthy of God. I think you can really interpret it two ways. One, manner worthy of what they're trying to do, exalt Jesus Christ, or a manner worthy of the way you would treat Jesus Christ. Second group of people he addresses here is those brothers and sisters who we don't know. He's commending these people to just love. Aren't you thankful today that there is no limit on how much we can love people? We can give it freely. And we can give it, and give it, and give it, and give it. And let me say this, if you're just looking for personal satisfaction, you can even look at it, if we looked at it from a selfish light, which is not the way we ought to look at it. Let me ask you this, is it better to give or to receive? Is it better to hoard? Or is it better with the gifts God has given you to abundantly use them? I remember thinking one day, man, I had something. I don't remember what it was. I wish I could remember what it was to tell you. But there was something that I had. And there was an opportunity to use it for the gospel's sake, for the welfare of somebody else. And I was afraid it was going to be broken. Maybe it was a projector, something silly. And I remember just feeling hesitant. And the thought just struck me real hard. I don't want something to break from atrophy. I want it to break from overuse. I want dust to settle on it and it to be preserved real nice so that once every six months I could bring it out and use it and then I go tuck it back away safely kept from use. No, no, no. I want to use it. I want it to be used and used and used and for as many as possible to benefit. And if we take that from objects and consider the gifts God has given us, isn't it better for us to be exhausted from overuse of the gifts for the welfare of those in need than to sit back and hide those until an appropriate hour when we're well rested and we're well prepared to bring those out. I'd rather get up and preach and not be fully prepared than spend weeks and months preparing to cross every T and dot every I. Why? Because the gospel is need to be proclaimed from the rooftops and I must trust that the Holy Spirit is the one who's going to take it and use it as he sees fit, even if I deliver it imperfectly. These people were loving in a way that was worthy of God and he was commending them. And then John, this is our last one, he talks about a third group of people. That is a church, an attitude. We ought to just embody, especially on this Mother's Day, how appropriate for this Mother's Day to have this text. I have no greater joy. That's a statement. It's not hyperbole. I think that comes with perspective. I think it often comes with age. When you're young, you're thinking ahead as to all the things you want to achieve and accomplish and do. You get in the middle of it, and you realize, it's definitely not going to go the way I thought it was, but I got to try to swim through this and figure things out. You get on the other end of life, and the majority of the investment that you've made is past. Now, Your heart, and you can ask the grandparents in this room if this is not the case, that your mind at some point and your heart at some point begins to shift from what can I get and what can I accumulate and what can I do to how can I help those that are coming after me? I hope you know if you're an older person here today, your role in this church may be more important than what it's ever been. because now the voice of experience, this proverb tells us in the first three or four chapters of Proverbs, the voice of wisdom. Please, older people, hear this. The voice of wisdom today is found in a whisper on the street corners as deception and youthful ignorance is shouted for everyone to adopt. is screamed on the main line, on Main Street, everywhere. Do what makes you feel good. Do what makes you happy. Do what is self-interested. And all the American culture grasps to that. And you know what they're gonna find when you plant that seed in your life and you water it for 20 years and you begin to reap the consequences of a self-centered life. You know the end result because you saw your peers and you tasted that fruit yourself to some degree. And so what's needed? It's that still, small, steady, firm, unrelenting, repetitive voice of wisdom. You say, you know, I've said it once and nobody's listening. Say it again. When nobody listens, say it again. When nobody listens, say it again, and say it again, and again, and again. It's what Proverbs does. It's what Ecclesiastes does. You ever wondered why it's repetitive? because what the writer is anticipating is that we're gonna pick it up, we're gonna read it the first time, it's not gonna stick. Then the second time, the third time, the fourth time, and by the fourth time we read the same thing, just worded a different way, you know what we're gonna ask ourselves? Why is this writer repeating himself? And then maybe that voice will come inside of us, that spirit of God will say, well, maybe he repeated himself because you need to sit and meditate upon these words of wisdom a little more than what you did the first and second and third time. Maybe there's kernels of truth that are deeper than just the surface level that you have dug out. See, as older people, the wisdom is needed. But oh, then God grants a great blessing that John got to experience, didn't he? I mean, think of this old man, John, and think of yourself laying on your deathbed, being of old age and being able to observe after 40, 50, 60, 70 years of investment in the way of the Lord and in people who are trying to propagate the truth and in people who are lifting up the name of the Savior. and you have stood against the diatrophies, and you've helped the strangers, and you've invested in your children biologically and not biologically, your spiritual children, and your spiritual grandchildren, and your natural grand, and you've invested, and you've invested, and you've invested, and then you look around, and you see them walking in the truth. Now he didn't say here, showing up to the gathering. That's not what he said. Anybody can show up to church. These people were walking, living a life in the truth. I love it, I love when you see a person take ownership of their own spiritual life and their main consultation begins to be God's word and prayer with the Lord. That's where they begin to realize that the source of their greatest strength and help comes from. They look to spiritual leaders, they should. The Bible commends that. They should look to their parents. They should look to elders in the body. But I love it when you can see someone's heart turn and say, I have to know. what this says and what it means and how to live thereby. And I need the power of the Holy Spirit himself to convince my heart of it and show me how to do it. Paul, or excuse me, John, I keep saying that. John said there is no greater, no greater joy. But you know, this is not the first time he said that. Look at second John. Here's what he said in verse four. I rejoice greatly that I found of thy children walking in truth as we have received a commandment from the Father." You see, this time when he said it, it's almost like he had come and he had preached the truth and they had accepted it and they had begun to build on it and then he left. And he began to do other things and likely entrusted other teachers to continue the work. And then he says, I was glad when I found out, when I came back and found out. You're walking in the truth still. And now he hadn't been able to get to them for a while. And he heard of these people trying to come in and deceive them. And he says, you know what? There's no greater joy than to know. you're still walking in the truth. Children do not walk in the truth through osmosis. They don't come and sit on a pew and absorb everything once a week and then magically walk out and their life is gone. is one that their predominant desire is following the Lord. Can God do it? Certainly He can do it. But is that the pattern He leaves behind in Scripture that we ought to seek forth? No, absolutely not. So what do we do? I think there's a third thing in this that I want to pause for a moment and mention that we mentioned a little bit earlier about mothers. You know, there can be and idolizing a family, there can be an idolizing of mentors, there can be an unhealthy worship of man. And we need to avoid that and resist it. We don't need to promote our children to the point that they think they're the center of the world and that they're special above everybody else. They're not. I mean, I like that, but they're not. God loves everyone equally. and God has a purpose and a use, but their failure to employ themselves for the cause of God will in no way stop or slow down what God desires to accomplish. That's a humbling thing to me. God wants to use me, but he doesn't need me. He's not desperate. There can be this fear that by acknowledging anyone or anything, that somehow we're worshiping man. We don't need to worship man. But at the same time, we don't need to neglect, to acknowledge, and to honor, and to do what John says here in a paternal fashion. I am so pleased that you are walking in the truth. And I'll echo that this morning to all of our young people who are striving to walk in the truth. I am pleased by that. I am thankful that you get out your Bible during the week and you read it. You're striving to be here during church services, that you're asking questions, that you're wanting counsel. That's a good thing, and you need to continue to pursue that course of action. Because I can say for myself and I can say on behalf of many of the older ones in this church, there is no greater joy than to know that you are walking in the truth. That you wanna know that you care about who you should marry. That you need help with rearing children. That you need help in marriage to be a godly husband and a godly wife. And I wanna press those who are not walking in that way, start. Start. It'll feel foreign to you if you haven't done it. And there's likely repentance needed on your behalf. If you've not been walking in the truth and you've been at diatrophies, maybe not in the middle of the church, but maybe in your own life you've been at diatrophies, you seek pleasure and preeminence in your life. You need to repent of that. It's a gross, horrible sin to want preeminence of even yourself. That I wanna be happy, and that's what matters. That's a sin. You need to repent of it, and it's a cancer, and it is going to destroy your life if you let it keep metastasizing. Repent of it, ask God to help sanctify you, change the desires of your heart, set yourself amongst a company of people who will help you and who will rejoice when you walk in that way. And when you become a diatrophes in your heart and somebody says, hey, hey, your focus is misaligned. When wisdom begins to shout from the rooftop, a fool clogs his ears. A wise one says, let me hear. You know what a wise counselor does? They don't do that in order to destroy. You know, when something builds up and builds up, I'm trying to finish, but this is important. When you notice a behavior of a diatrophies, There can be this anger that builds up that becomes a resentment and a bitterness, and you're just waiting for the opportunity to pounce and crush the person. Don't do that. There is no value in tearing down somebody for the sake of tearing down. Jeremiah showed us with Jerusalem that the goal was to tear down in order to rebuild something better. That's what a mentor does. He says, listen, you're misaligned. but here's the right way, and let me help you to walk in that way. This morning, a divisive person, a stranger, and a young one walking in the truth, that's who John is addressing. And I hope, I really hope you'll take and you'll look at these scriptures. They're important, and I want my heart to reflect. These aren't groups of people that are talked about a whole lot. I hope our hearts will reflect the wisdom and instruction that John gives us. I found it helpful to me. I hope it is to you.