Amen. Well, good to see you tonight. Praise the Lord. It's good to be saved. You know what I mean? Good to be going to heaven. Wonderful. And I'll tell you, we're not going to stay here, that's for sure. You know, people get upset when loved ones die, but God told us, as the disappointment of the man wants to die. God's warned us ahead of time. Now, He gives us all a different time. We don't all have the same time, but nevertheless, we're all going to die because we all have the penalty of sin upon us. Thank God, Jesus paid my penalty so I don't have to die and go to hell. I get to die and go to heaven all because He loved me. That's a wonderful thing. But I read a story today about a man who went in to see the doctor. Speaking of that, it seems like I go with the doctor. about once or twice a week now. I mean, you get older, that's what you do. I found out why they tell you to save your money when you're young so you can pay the doctor's bills when you're older. It's not so you can go on vacation or live retired and so you can pay for the doctor's. But he went to the doctor and got his physical. The doctor came out and said, man, I'm so sorry. I've got terrible news for you. You just don't have long to live. He says, well, how long do I have? The doctor said, ten. Well, 10 weeks, 10 months, what? Nine. I don't know why at my age it really shouldn't be funny, but it is. Anyway, I feel like that sometimes. Turn to 2 Corinthians 2. I want to help you tonight to understand some things. I want to help you tonight to understand some things. So if you'll listen on purpose, this is a little different type of message than what I normally preach. But then it seems like anymore all the messages that I preach are a little bit different. I don't have a set pattern to a lot of things. I've got some that don't even have an outline. And I've got some that have an outline, you can't tell it. And then I got some that got a definite outline. Then I even illiterate some, or alliterate some. That is, make them all start, every point, you know, start with the same first letter. I never have figured out what that does, but I feel real proud when I'm able to do it. You know what I mean? So I guess if I feel better about it, that makes it good. We're not going to alliterate anything tonight. We're just going to give you some things, some truths that if you get a hold of, no matter what goes on in the future, you'll... Brother Allison said it'd be like that. I want you to notice 2 Corinthians 2, beginning in verse 14. Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of His knowledge by us in every place. For we are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved and in them that perish. To the one we are a savour of death unto death, and to the other the savour of life unto life. and who is sufficient for these things. I want to preach tonight on a savor of death unto death, or if I was to give a subtitle to this message, it would be this, How Bible Preaching Produces Rebels. Let's pray. Father, we come to you now in the name of the Lord Jesus and I beg you tonight again for the filling of the Holy Spirit of God. I pray you'd take these truths and drive them home to our hearts. Lord, I thank you that you've told us about an awful lot of things that we go through in life way ahead of time. Even as you told the disciples, you've told these things before they came to pass or when they came to pass that we would know that you told us and warned us. Now, Father, I pray you'd teach us tonight Do a work in our hearts and lives. May we stay firm for you in our service for God. And where we begin to... Get that rebel seed in our own life and in our own heart. I pray, dear God, that we'll be quick to get it right with you. Have your way in every one of our lives, for I ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. Now, I know I can tell by the look on your face that that seems like a rather strange subtitle, how Bible preaching produces rebels. Because when you hear something like that, you think, well, then do we really want Bible preaching if it's going to produce rebels in some of our young people? And yet, you're missing the point on how Bible preaching does produce some rebels. It doesn't mean all rebels are produced by Bible preaching, but nevertheless, some are. We live in very frustrating times, seeing a number of young people and adults at Madison Baptist Church now, and in Madison Baptist Church area, who hate Madison Baptist Church. I mean people that I've been their pastor for 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 years. And the internet really brings it out. The social media, boy I'll tell you, I think the social media was made for rebels for the most part. I had somebody come and tell me a while back, this was a couple of years ago now, that there was another website out there concerning Madison Baptist Church. You know, there had been MySpace and then Facebook, and now they've got a myriad of other things that are out there as well. But I had somebody come and tell me, if you go on to Facebook, which I'm not going to do, I've not been on Facebook, don't want to be on Facebook, but they said if you go to Facebook, And if you put in as a heading for types or something like that, I don't understand the terminology, negatively affected by Madison Baptist Church. And I said, well, what are you going to find? Well, he'd take a screenshot of the page and all that. But there were nine members to this group, people negatively affected by Madison Baptist Church. That's the church that I pastor. Now, there were a lot of other individuals who had posted in that group, but there were nine who were the members of the group. There was one in that group that I'd never heard of. Didn't know who they were. As far as I know, they have never attended the church. I'm trying to figure out how they were negatively affected by Madison Baptist Church, unless, of course, it's because this person had met those other eight. I'm not sure, but perhaps that was it. All of them, obviously, when they were at Madison Baptist Church, they didn't like the standards. They didn't like it that we believed in holy living and living righteously before God and before man. And it's really hard to say, after looking at the picture of the website, their comments, it's hard to say how we negatively affected them when you consider the fact they didn't get what we taught them. If they didn't get what we taught them, then how did that negatively affect them? If it had been one thing, if they said, man, we followed what they taught us, and it's just ruined our lives, that wasn't it. But negatively affected by Madison Baptist Church. These same people, obviously, have never thought how negatively they affected us. how they hurt people that came to youth meetings, how they only caused problems and created great problems within the church by their mouth. It's funny, we negatively affected them even though they never got us our stuff, but while they came and were with us and we reached out to them and did all we could do to help them and to teach them and boy, we sacrificed a lot for them, they've never considered the damage they did to us. Now, I'm not complaining about them tonight, that's okay. In the group, there were former Madison Baptist Academy students. There were MBC, Madison Baptist Church homeschoolers. And there was even a public school young person that was in the group. And you wonder, how in the world could they hate Madison Baptist Church with all that Madison Baptist Church poured into them? The camps that we took them to, Many times paid their own way to go to camp, how we took care of men when they were down and they were hurting and how we helped them in so many different ways. And yet they want to let the world know, you know, that is the world wide web. They want to let the world know that Madison Baptist Church somehow negatively affected them. Hmm. Well, what did we do? We preached the truth about salvation. Every one of those young people had made professions of faith, and even a couple of the other adults that have written things, they've made professions of faith at Madison Baptist Church. We preach the truth about salvation. We always sought to preach the truth from the Word of God, to give them the truth. We presented God as He's presented in the Scripture. We presented His righteousness and what He expects of us. What's interesting about that, as much as they hated us, we never hated them. and we've always just loved them. You know it's funny, when God called me to preach, I didn't think it'd be like that. I know I was naive. I know when God called me to preach, I'd only been saved for 2 1⁄2 years. But I was excited about Jesus. I was in a good church and a great pastor who loved me and had meant the world to me and helped me in a number of ways. And after being there for 2 1⁄2 years and just growing in the Lord, after all, I was brought up in a home of drinking and cursing. The only time hearing the name Jesus growing up was as a cuss word. And here I was in a Bible-believing church with a godly pastor. I mean, I was just happy as a pig in mud. I really was. And when God called me to preach, I thought, Wow, this is wonderful. I get a chance to serve Jesus. And I knew enough of the Scripture by that time to know that surely the world would fight me. Surely the world would not like what it would be that I would preach. They wouldn't like the gospel that I would preach. They wouldn't like the claims of God upon them and their need to be saved. They wouldn't like that. I understood that. And I understood that if we went out and knocked on doors to win people to Jesus, or at least try to win people to Jesus, that there would be people we would knock on their doors who would get angry with us, who wouldn't like it. I mean, we'd fight the devil and we'd fight the world. But you know what? Over the years, it seems like we've done a lot more fighting with the believers. I mean, the things that comes out of their mouth is what I expected out of the world. That's not the way I pictured it as being. And you know, it took a while for me to search out some things and try to figure out what in the world was going on. I thought, it's not supposed to be like that. But I don't want to be a sissy. Like I preached on last night, so I thought, well, I better get a grip. And I began to search the scripture because before we get too dismayed, and it's easy to get dismayed when you pour yourself into the lives of people. Remember, the Apostle Paul said, the more I love you, the less I'd be loved. There's a reason that he said that. If you look at the life of the Apostle Paul in Acts chapter nine, he gets saved. The first thing he wants to do is go down to Jerusalem and meet the church there, and he goes down to Jerusalem, and the church would have nothing to do with him. There was one man by the name of Barnabas who took him in and finally got him introduced to the rest of the church. But before that, the church wanted nothing to do with him. That had been a good time right there for him to have quit and said, Well, that's the way those Christians are. I'm done with them. But he didn't do it. He fell in love with Jesus. Matter of fact, you get over to Acts chapter 15, he gets into a squabble with Barnabas over John Mark. And he and Barnabas split up and go their separate ways. In Acts chapter 21, when the Apostle Paul comes back from his third missionary tour, and he brings an offering to the church that was at Jerusalem. He tells them about what's been going on in the Gentile churches, and the Bible says they rejoice. He gives them the offering, and then James the pastor says, Paul, we've heard some rumors about you. He doesn't ask if the rumors are true. He says, we've heard some rumors about you. This is James. This is the pastor of the church. We've heard some rumors about you that you're teaching people against the law of Moses. And here's what we want you to do. We want you, we got six men that are going to do a vow. We want you to go down there with them and we want you to go into the temple. Well, he does that. He's trying to please James. He's trying to please the church. They get down there. Somebody starts another rumor that he had brought Titus into the temple area. And so there's a big uproar and the Apostle Paul is arrested and when he's called to stand up before the authorities there, not James isn't there, the church isn't there, the six men that he went down there with, they're not there. He has to stand alone. This isn't right. That great church in Jerusalem, what's wrong with them? What's wrong with James? Where in the world is he at? You go to the church at Corinth. The apostle Paul started the church at Corinth, spent 18 months there. He won the lost. He had tremendous problems with believers. I mean, the church is just three years old. And he gets a note from Chloe about the problems that are going on. Now remember, this is a church that he started. He hazarded his life there. I mean, really, wherever Paul went, he hazarded his life. But he writes back to these people, and he discusses their problems in 1 Corinthians. In chapters 1 through 4, he rebukes them for being a divided church. I mean, they had little pockets of pride. This is my favorite preacher. This is my favorite preacher. They were on the outs with one another. And he says, for you are yet carnal, for whereas there is among you envying and strife and division, are ye not carnal and walk as men? And then you get to chapter 5, there was a man in the church who was actually committing immorality with his father's wife. And the church was proud that they were so open-minded, that they would have such openness to a person living in open sin. And Paul rebukes them and tells them to turn such a one over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. And then you get to 1 Corinthians 6, and he has to rebuke them because members of the church were going to law one with another, and that before the lost. Would you please tell me, what's the difference between going to a public court before the lost, to air your complaints between one another, what's the difference between that and getting on the Internet, the World Wide Web, where there's not only the lost, but the Muslims and the pagans and the heathens, and to air that stuff before an ungodly world, and they think somehow they're justified in doing it? I think not. He rebukes him about that. He has to straighten him out on marriage, divorce, and remarriage in chapter 7. Chapters 8 through 10, he has to deal with them about eating meat offered in sacrifice unto idols. A lot of people stop reading after chapter 8, and they think it moves on to another subject. But 8 through 10 is all dealing with that one subject. By the way, it's a subject we need to be familiar with. You can go to Costco today and you can find halal meat. Halal meat is meat that was sacrificed or the meat was killed in the name of Allah, the Muslim God. But there are a bunch of other grocery stores that have it that way too. Just look on the package. If it says halal meat, that's meat that God's people are not to eat. The Holy Spirit said so in Acts chapter 15. They were not to eat meat offered in sacrifice unto idols. In chapter 11, they didn't understand that even when we prayed, men and women were to look different from the neck up. The man's head was not to be covered, the woman's head was to be covered. And I thought God only looked on the heart. I didn't think God noticed any place else. He's God. Yes, He is God. He's not blind to anything else. And He says it makes a difference when you pray, how you look from the neck up. Then you get to chapter, well, the rest of chapter 11. They were taking of the Lord's Supper unworthily, and many in that church had died, and many in that church were sickly, and the reason was because they partook of the Lord's Supper unworthily. In chapters 12-14 this church had misused their gifts. And again it was part of their pride and he has to deal with them about that in chapters 12-14. And then you've got a 58 verse section in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. They were all messed up on the resurrection. They had listened to a bunch of false doctrine, and he has to straighten them up on that. And then in chapter 16, he takes up an offering. That's interesting. I wonder what kind of offering that ended up being. So he sends this letter to the church. This is his church. This is a church he started, a church he spent 18 months there. Well, evidently, according to the first part of 2 Corinthians, they get right about at least that man that was taken in adultery with his father's wife, and he commends him about that, about getting right about it. But then he also refers to a few things. There were still some people in the church that he started. people that he won to Christ who made some accusations about him. In chapter 1, verses 17 and 18, they accused him of vacillating. Now, if there's anybody who wasn't wishy-washy, it was the Apostle Paul. In chapters 8, verses 20 through 23, they suggested that he was untrustworthy. In chapter 10 and verse 2, they hinted that Paul was worldly. In chapter 10 and verse 10, they said he was of unimpressive appearance. According to chapter 10 and verse 10, Paul had contemptible speech. They didn't like his preaching. and they hinted so in chapter 11 and verse 6. Some even said he was unqualified to teach, chapter 11 and verse 5 and chapter 12 and verse 11, and that he lacked dignity, chapter 11 and verse 7. And some even suggested that the Apostle Paul was deceitful, 2 Corinthians 11, verses 16 through 19, chapter 12 and verse 6, and verses 16 through 19. That's a church he started. That's a church where he had won most of those people to Christ. And he not only had the problems that I talked about in 1 Corinthians, but he had people who didn't like the fact that he rebuked them when they needed to be rebuked. And so they're just throwing out charges. I've told people that all the preacher boys that have come to Madison Baptist Theological Seminary, I give them some rules. I call them allisonisms. And one of them is the Miranda rights for preachers. Anything you say will be used against you, period. Period. It'll be repeated, not like you said it, not in the context you said it, but it'll be repeated. You can count on it. And you'll be shocked at some of the people that'll do the repeating. You look at the book of Galatians. The book of Galatians is an interesting book. This is another group of people that the Apostle Paul personally had won to Christ. As a matter of fact, he tells them in chapter 4, he says, where is the blessedness that you speak of? Now, this is a book of rebuke because they had begun to believe some false teaching against being justified by faith. Now, there's a lot of false teaching that people are doing out of Galatians today. They're taking verses totally out of context to teach something that he's not even dealing with in the book. The entire book is about justification by faith. He mentions it in every chapter, all the way through chapter 5, even when he talks about the liberty we're with we have. I'm free, thank God, I don't have to do anything now to be saved. I'm saved by His grace, but because I'm saved, I'm to live like it. These people though, he says, am I become your enemy? Because I tell you the truth. I tell you what, every pastor has felt that one. I mean, it's amazing. People that you've loved, that you've preached to, that said amen to your preaching. Man who thought you hung the moon with your preaching, end up cursing you, all because you preached the message that stung their hide. It's alright if you sting somebody else's hide, but you sting their hide, and they don't take it so good. By the way, in chapter 2, he even had to deal, he had to rebuke Peter to the face, and Barnabas as well. That's the Apostle Paul. In the book of Philippians, we find Paul is writing from a Roman prison cell. And he tells us in verses 14 through 18, here's the great Apostle Paul. He's in Rome, writing back to the Philippian church, and he says, one thing that's happened because of my bonds, and I'm not quoting now, I'm just giving you a sense of what took place, is that some have gotten bold in preaching the gospel. Some were doing it simply to add to Paul's bonds. Here's a guy serving Jesus in prison for preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ, and there are some preachers back there who are preaching to make it tougher on Paul while he's in prison. But Paul says, I rejoice at least Christ is priest. My, what a spirit. I have trouble with that one right there. In chapter 4, verses 2 and 3, we find that Euodias and Syntyche were on the outs with one another. He has to rebuke them about that. In chapter 2 of the book of Philippians, an interesting thing. See, he was concerned about those Philippians. He had won those to Christ in Acts chapter 16. That's when he started the church. Won Lydia, won the demon-possessed girl, won the jailer and his household. And he says, Matt, I wanted to send somebody back to you. And then he explains why he has to send Timothy back to him because he says, For I have no man like minded who will naturally care for your state. For all seek their own and not the things which are Jesus Christ. Can you imagine Paul looking around that church at Rome, the church that he had written to six years before in 56 AD, and had praised a lot of their membership in chapter 16? And now here he is in Rome as a prisoner, and he wants to send somebody back to the Philippians to check on them to see how they're doing, and he says, out of this whole church at Rome, he says, I have no man like-minded who will naturally care for your state. For all seek their own. Now get that. All seek their own and not the things which are Jesus Christ. What in the world happened in those six years from 56 AD to 62 AD where that whole church changed their attitude, where life became more about themselves? These were people that Paul had loved. In 1 Timothy 1, verses 19 and 20, he had a couple of his converts, Hymenaeus and Alexander, who were shipwrecked in the faith. In 2 Timothy 4, he says, Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world. We find Paul near death with all these years of service, and he's left alone. I don't know. I'm kind of glad. I'm kind of glad God didn't call me to be an apostle Paul. I don't know that I could have handled that. You look at all that he went through. How in the world these very people that he went to Christ. that he had had an impact on even the church in Jerusalem. He hadn't won those people to Christ, but he had come back to them bringing them an offering from his converts, and these people are complaining about him. Well, I'm one of those that look for answers. You say, how in the world can people be like that? Now, I know 1 John 2, 19 is an easy answer. Go ahead and turn there. I'm not going to preach on this verse. I just want you to turn there. I don't believe that it is the case in most of the cases, but it is true in some. He says in verse 19, 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. He said there could be some people go out and the whole reason they're going out is they weren't real to begin with. Now, that's reality. I don't believe that's the case of everyone who's gone out, but I do believe it is the case of some. I believe there's more to it than that. First of all, the same message, as we get back to the passage we began with, that's a long introduction, isn't it? That is a long introduction. But to get back to the passage where we started, the same message is the savor of life unto life, and death unto death. Someone said, and I don't know who or I'd give him credit, the same sun makes one piece of clay hard and makes another piece of clay soft. Some revel at the word, some get angry at the word. like the sun. Well, you got the parable of the sower, which is as really the parable of the sower in the scripture where he goes out and sows the seed on on four different types of soil. I like to call it the parable of the soil. Because you see, it's the same sower who's sowing the seed in each of the soil and the the difference in the production, what comes of it is the soil, not the sower. Because the same sower sowed the same seed on every bit of soil that was there. All of them received the same seed by the same person, had the same sun and had the same rain, all of that. But only one group brought forth fruit. Now take the first soil. The birds came and devoured the seed that was there. Whose fault is that? Was it the sower's fault? I mean, really, he gave each soil an opportunity to bear fruit from the seed, and according to the book of Luke, the seed is the Word of God. So each one of them, each piece of soil, had an opportunity to bring forth fruit. Well, the birds come, they take it away from the one. Is it the sower's fault? Has the sower done something wrong? that these people didn't bear fruit. No, no, not at all. Not the sower's fault. You've got in the third, by the way, the fruit is drying out. Was it because of the sower? I mean, it was in the rocky place. Is it because of the sower? No, it's not because of the sower. And the seed is not at fault either. What about the thorns? You see, there'd have been nothing there to have been taken by the birds, or to be choked, or to be destroyed by the pathway that was hard, or whatever, had the sower not come along. It's kind of like Judas Iscariot heard the same things Peter heard. Peter said to Jesus, Who shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life, and we believe and are sure that Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus said, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? But Judas heard the same words. Judas saw the same miracles. Judas was there when the 5,000 were fed. Judas was there when the 4,000 were fed. Judas was around when the dead were raised to life again. He saw it. Is it Jesus' fault? That Judas made the decisions he made? Wasn't Judas' fault, was it? You see, the same message is the saver of life to life and of death to death. Now, you've seen this happen in church. If you've gone to church very long at all, Preacher will get up. You'll have lost people. You have friend days. You have big days where you've got lost people here. And, man, you've been praying that people get saved. Preacher gets up, brings a message. And some people come forward and get saved. And some people leave lost. Huh. Went through a period last year where we had some longtime members leave us. And in each case, you know, basically, their complaint was they weren't getting fed. Now, this is funny because at the same time, we had some other people come in and join our church. And as soon as I hear about one leaving, one of these new people come up and say, Preacher, we haven't heard preaching like that in years. This is such a blessing to my soul. I just get fed every time I show up. Well, now, wait a second. They're both there for the same message. How can this one get fed and this one not get fed? Well, this one over here is coming to eat. This one over here is coming to judge. Somewhere, the Word of God, and what's interesting about this pastor, I've noticed this, is sometimes the people that get set up, get mad at this message, when I preached it four years before, they were saying amen to it. Preacher's fault. When the preacher preaches the same thing, the same truth, That's weird to me. The same message is a saver of life unto life and of death unto death. So that brings us to the second thing. It has to do with choices. Turn over to the book of Matthew, chapter 6. I want you to think now. You know, you go to church and you're around church long enough, and let's just say you start getting a little dissatisfied with some things. You look around, you see some people who are very satisfied and they're growing and they're lapping it up. Maybe the problem is you. You understand? It all has to do with the heart and I'm going to show you how. I'm going to show you how important this is in just a moment. But notice in Matthew chapter 6, Sermon on the Mount, verses 21 through 26. Man, this is basic fundamental 101 of church life. He says, beginning in verse 21, For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. The light of the body is the eye. If therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness. Now look at this. No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other, ye cannot serve God and mammon. In other words, you can't keep a hand on the world and keep a hand on spiritual things. You can't do it. It's impossible to straddle the fence for very long because eventually, I mean, you start grabbing on to the world and you're going to find yourself, man, those claims of Christ on me, I don't like those anymore. The preacher's still preaching about service. He's talking about soul winning. My favorite program's on Thursday night. I don't understand. He expects us to be in church even on Sunday night when the Super Bowl's being played. It's just one night boy. I'll tell you when you're starting to have a fight with yourself about whether or not to go to church or watch a ballgame You are grabbing on to the world full bore and you're about to be yanked out But it's funny like when I got saved I fell in love with Jesus I started reading the Word of God I can remember before I got saved we'd started attending the church so that I could play softball with a church team and And so what I would do, I would slip into Sunday school, and then I'd go home before church. I'd filled my obligation. I'd been there for one service. I can remember we had a Sunday school teacher, and I understand this is back in about 1970. Back in 1970, very seldom did they have two football games on TV on a Sunday afternoon. There was no real ESPN showing all the football games. The major channels weren't showing them all. If you got one football game on Sunday, that was something. And if there were two, that was amazing. Very seldom did they have the double headers. Well, I was a big football nut. And I was a Detroit Lion nut. And if you're a Detroit Lion nut, you are a nut because I never won anything. And it's been that way my entire life. But I'm not one of those who's just a fair weather fan, man. I root for them even when they lose. Anyway, let's get back to important things. I remember to this day that Sunday school teacher standing up there. He says, you know, this is the Lord's day. He said, I want to encourage you folks in our class, you men, that this afternoon you go home from church And you eat your supper or eat your meal, your lunch. He said, instead of turning on the football game, why don't you sit down and read the Bible? And I thought, man, you're nuts. You are nuts. Why would I want to? I wasn't saved yet. Why would I want to sit down and read my Bible on a Sunday afternoon when there's a perfectly good football game on? But then I got saved. And you know, when I got saved, man, I couldn't get enough of the Bible. In the first couple of months after I got saved, I read through the New Testament five times. And you know what? As I began to grab a hold of spiritual things, my grip on the worldly things began to fade. I can tell you honestly, there has probably been not more than four football games in the last 30 years that I have sat down and watched in entirety. And I was a sports nut. Watched it all the time. It'd be hard. I was a great baseball fan. I love playing baseball. I used to love to watch baseball. I could not imagine right now sitting down watching a nine inning baseball game. Played by anybody. I couldn't do it. But now I don't mind sitting three or four hours to a church service. That'd be fine. I like that. You really are feeling show us which direction we're headed. You fall in love with the world, well, you're going to start letting go of the spiritual things. You fall in love with the spiritual things, you're going to start letting go of the world. You're going to have to. That's what Jesus said. No man can serve two masters. For either hate the one, love the other, or hold to the one, despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. You see, Demas had some choices to make. Demas had been a fellow prisoner with the Apostle Paul. He had been a co-laborer in the gospel. But the final mention of him in the scripture is, Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world. What happened to Demas? I'm sure that when he first started falling in love with the world, he had no intention of leaving Paul. But it's amazing, you can be faithful three services a week, faithful to every special meeting you have, you start falling in love with the world and you start thinking, what's missing in service? And then after you miss one, it won't be long, you'll be missing the second one and the third one. I had a man in one of the first churches that I pastored while I was going to Bible college, Pinewood Baptist Church. His name was J.W. White. Now, J.W. White, he and his boys had done a lot for fixing up that church long before I ever came as pastor there. But J.W. White had asbestosis and he finally had to have a quadruple bypass surgery, which he did not recover from. This was back in the mid-1970s. But I would see J.W. while I was preaching, I would see him sitting in the back row back here. And I'd see him stiffen up a little bit. Then he'd reach in his pocket and get out one of those nitro tablets, you know, and put it under his tongue. And then I'd see him relax. I said, you had another spell day, didn't you? He said, yes, I did. I said, J.W., if you're hurting like that, why on earth do you come? He said, well, I might as well hurt here as hurting home. You know why? That's where he was at spiritually. Who would have blamed him for staying home? I wouldn't have blamed him. Who would have blamed him? He'd have blamed himself. Hey, I admit, there's a lot of churches. When I go on vacation, I'm at church. I mean, when I go on vacation Sunday morning, I'm in church for Sunday school. I'm in church for the morning service. I'm in church for the evening service. I'm in church on Wednesday nights. And boy, you want to go into a lot of dead services, just go on vacation and go into churches on Wednesday night. There are a lot of them. The preacher will bring a little 15-minute devotional. The people come and sing two songs here. They're 15-minute devotional while their kids are playing Iwana in the back. And you wonder, why are these people even here? They're not getting anything. And the reason there's not many people there is because they don't get anything. Preacher doesn't want to have to work to bring three messages a week. Why? The world. It's choices. When we start fading, it's because we've begun to grab onto the other side. You can tell where you're at heart-wise like that. He says, love not the world. If any man loved the world, the love of the Father is not in him. What a powerful statement, what an indicting statement. He says in James chapter 4 and verse 4, the adulterers and adulteresses know you not that friendship with the world is enmity with God, whosoever therefore will be the friend of the world is the enemy of God. I didn't write that, God wrote it. Well, this is why pastors have to be careful what they feed their people. And that's why people have to be careful who they hang around, who their friends are. That's why Romans chapter 16 and verse 17 says, mark them, which cause the visions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned, and, do you know the rest of the verse? Avoid them. Mark them, avoid them. Now, in this great technological age in which we live, where the most important thing in the lives of even many believers is how many friends they've got on their Facebook page. Well, if I take my name off of theirs, as I'm not their friend, they'll take theirs off mine, and that'll cost me a friend. I'll tell you, I don't know where they came up with the idea of friends, but their definition of friendship is not God's definition of friendship. If you don't like their rebellious comments, you're afraid, oh, I'll just hurt their feelings, and they won't want anything. Mark them, which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which you have learned, and avoid them. Now, I'm not making up scripture here, am I? That's Bible. But you see, that Bible is either a saver of life unto life or of death unto death. And that will be determined not by the truth of the passage, it will be determined by each individual's own heart by where they're at. Now that's why God says this. Turn over to the book of Proverbs chapter 4. This is a powerful passage of scripture. Proverbs chapter 4 beginning at verse 23. He says in verse 23, keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life. Now admittedly, Jesus said in chapter 22 of the book of Matthew, he said that thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. I'm to love God with all my heart soul of my first commandment here He tells me I'm to keep my heart with all diligence why I can lose it I'll remind you that as great a king is what David was Solomon came in and stole the hearts of the people of Israel That's what the Bible says Bible says he stole their hearts You got to keep your heart There are people want to get your heart got to keep well, how do you keep your heart? And he says, you have to do it diligently. You've got to work at it. Your heart, it may be right tonight. You've got to work at keeping it right for tomorrow. Bible says, our heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? Jeremiah 17, 9. So I've got to keep my heart. Notice what he says. Here's how you keep your heart. Keep the heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life. Put away from thee a froward mouth, and perverse lips put far from thee. If you want to keep your heart, you've got to keep your mouth. You get that? You've got to make sure you don't have to say everything you think. As a matter of fact, the Bible says it's a fool that uttereth all his heart. You don't have to say everything. You better be careful what comes out of your mouth. The psalmist prayed this way in Psalm 141 verse 3, said, Why? Because I want to keep my heart. I don't want to lose my heart. I've done a lot of marriage counseling over the years. And one of the things I've learned in marriage counseling is by the time they come for me for counseling, they've already talked to a lot of other people about the faults of their mate, which means they've lost their heart. So one of the first things I have to work on to get them back together again is they're working on their mouth. Because as long as they continue to talk negatively about their mate to other people out loud, their heart's going to be set away from their mate. And no matter what their mate does, they'll never be pleased. And so at our church, people laugh when we talk about the list at our church. I say, all right, here's what I want you to do. I want you to go home. I want you to come back in three days. And I want a list of 25 things that you like or love about your mate. Now I have to I usually put the other way love or like and I say now you'll probably run out of love real quick because But what I've already heard You're not going to have a whole lot that you love but are at least things that you appreciate I don't care if it gets down to the things like this. I thank you Lord that my My husband can see I don't have to lead them around the house. Yeah, great. All right. I mean, sometimes that's where it gets down to. When they've been talking negative about their mate, it's hard for them to come up with some things. And so and I say, I want you to come up with a list of 25 things that you love or like about your mate. And then every day, three times a day. And I want you to write down the times that you do it. I want you to go over that list out loud. And here's how I want you to do it. You start out with, I thank you, Lord, that my husband, now maybe it's, he has nice wavy hair. Okay. I thank you, Lord, that my husband is able to work a job and keep a job. I thank you, Lord, that my husband brings home a paycheck. I thank you, Lord, that my husband has helped to provide a nice place for us to live. Might say Lord. I thank you that I love my husband's smile now if it's a gal then obviously it's for his wife He'll have to come up with those things and then three times a day out loud They have to go over that list out loud talking to the Lord They do it once in the morning once in the middle of the day and the third time they're to do it just before he gets home from work If it's the man, she's he's to go over it just before he goes home from work So that by the time they get home, all they've had come out of their mouth is positive concerning their mate. And they are forbidden during that time to talk about any of their mate's faults, husband or wife, with anybody. They've already lost their heart. I'm trying to get it back. And if you're going to get it back, you've got to be careful what comes out of your mouth. It's that way with church. It's that way in your relationships with other people. You have to understand, what comes out of your mouth can steal your heart if you're not careful. And that's what Jesus said, both in Matthew chapter 15 and in Mark chapter 7, that it's not that which goes into the body that defiles the body, but that which comes out of the body. Then notice, the second thing he says to do here is, let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight ahead. In other words, be careful what you see. That would not just mean be careful what you read. Matter of fact, there's a great verse right there to put on your computer. You get that? That verse, you apply that, it'll keep you out of pornography. You've got to be careful what you see. Or you'll lose your heart. By the same token, if you're going through your wish list of things you'd like to get for yourself, watching all these pictures of things that you can't afford, you'll end up start living for those pictures and those things you can't afford than living for the Lord. You've got to be careful what you see. And then the next thing that he says is, ponder the path of thy feet and let all thy ways be established. Turn not to the right hand or to the left. Watch where you go. So you got to watch what you say. You got to watch what you see and you got to watch where you go or you'll lose your heart. And I don't care who you are. If I don't watch where I what I say and watch where I go and watch where what what was the other one? Yeah, that one or one of them. You got them. You're right there. They're right there. What you say, what you see and where you go. If I don't do that, I'll lose my heart. Do you get that? You'll lose your heart. You see, there's a lot that we're the same about. There's a lot more spiritual than that. You don't keep your heart with all diligence. You know, there was a time when kings went forth to battle that godly King David, he didn't go to battle. It was a time when kings went forth to battle. The palace isn't a bad place to be, is it? The problem was it wasn't where he was supposed to be. I mean, he didn't go down to some filthy, dirty movie cinema shop. He's in the palace. It's the king's palace. Yeah, but it's a time when kings went forth to battle. His army was at battle. Where's the king? In his palace. Uh-oh, he shouldn't be there. Just being in the wrong place, even when it's not a bad place, being in a wrong place can be danger to your heart. And what happens in the palace, he walks out on the patio, he looks over the city and he sees Bathsheba bathing on her housetop. Now, don't get mad at Bathsheba. As far as she knew, David was at the battle with her husband. David shouldn't have been there. And what happened? Lost his heart. That's what happened. Anybody here can lose your heart if you're not careful. Then once you lose your heart, suddenly that word that was precious to you now is convicting and very uncomfortable. And now I'd rather not hear it. The preacher's probably going to preach on that again. Let me give you a third thing that it has to do with. It has to do with self and sin. It has to do with choices. It has to do with the fact that it's a message of life unto life and death unto death, but it has to do with self and sin. I want you to turn to Genesis chapter 4. Genesis chapter 4. I'm trying to help you. I'm not pointing fingers at people who've left Madison Baptist Church. Man, I love them. I pray for them all the time. We had a man in our church. who was, matter of fact, we had given a lot of money to help them in a lot of different ways, and he started missing church. His family still came. One day, he was out riding his bicycle. A dog ran out in front of him, and he took a tumble. He's about 6'10", tall guy. His bike goes down. He goes flying. He breaks his left leg, his hip, and his left arm. Obviously, he's not going to be doing any work for a while. He has to have surgery, pins put in, all of that kind of stuff. He gets taken back to the house where he's going to be basically bedridden for a while. That next service, we took up an offering for him. We gave him over $7,600, one offering, $7,600 to help them be able to pay their bills. When he started getting better, his family would help get him into the car, bring him to church. But as soon as he got completely better, he started looking for another church. And it wasn't long, once he found the place he wanted to go, he got his family there. And I talked to the pastor the other day, and he said, you know, I don't think I can help that brother. He's not faithful there either. What happened? He lost his heart. I've gotten to the place. I don't know what you're like brother savage, but I've gotten to place when we still help people out but I'm so used to giving somebody three five seven thousand dollars to help them out of a trouble and have them leave us six weeks later the last time I did that I gave I gave this family fifty five hundred dollars and From Madison, but we took him an offering form And they were hurting. Man, they had bills to pay. This guy had hurt his knee really bad. And I handed him the check and I said, you know, I really hate to give this to you because you'll probably be leaving us now. You know what? He's not there anymore. You're thinking, man alive. Maybe the way I need to put it is, I'm going to give this to you in $50 increments. Every Sunday you're here, I'll give you $50. And here was a guy who used to sit there and say, amen, amen. Man, he ate it up, all of that. Now there's not a good thing he can say about us. And our people sacrificed for him. But notice in chapter 4, of the book of Genesis. The Bible says in verse 3, and in process of time, it came to pass that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering to the Lord. And Abel, he also brought of the firstling of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering, but unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? And why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, underline this phrase, sin lieth at the door. Now, God had told them at the end of chapter three, told Adam and Eve, there's no doubt with the slaying of the animals to make them coats, that the sacrifice that God wanted was the shedding of blood. Cain and Abel, when they bring a sacrifice in, Cain brings of the fruit of the ground. He doesn't bring a blood sacrifice. Abel brings of the first of the flock. Abel is obeying what God said. Cain is not. Now, Cain is still bringing something to God, and he thinks that he ought to be accepted just because he's bringing what he wants to bring. The Bible says God had respect unto Abel's sacrifice, but he didn't have respect to Cain. And how did Cain respond to that? He got angry. What did God do? What did God do to make him angry? You say, Well, God wouldn't receive his sacrifice. Well, he already knew God wouldn't receive his sacrifice. I got news for you, friend. You don't have a say. I don't have a say. God says, this is the way it is. This is the way. Walk ye in it. This is it. If not, sin lieth at the door. Now, he has a choice to make, doesn't he? What's his choice? I'm going to stay angry. I said, all right, Cain, sin lieth at the door. And we read a little bit later after he kills his brother and God pronounces the curse upon him. He says, my punishment is greater than I should bear. Well, whose fault's that, Cain? Whose fault's that? Preacher's fault? Well, the preacher here's God. Well, we get mad at the people who deliver God's message because now it's stepping on our lifestyle where before it didn't step on our lifestyle. You've got a guy like Ahab. He comes across Elijah. Now, Elijah always was faithful to give him the Word of God. And when he meets Elijah, he says, Hast thou found me, O mine enemy? Hey Ahab, that's the best friend you got right there! He's told you how to get right with God. He's trying to lead you in the way of the Lord. What's your problem, Elijah? But a little bit later, when Jehoshaphat is getting ready to go out into battle with Ahab, and Ahab has his false prophets, his emerging church leaders, out there saying, Go up and you'll prosper. Go up and you'll prosper. And Jehoshaphat says, Isn't there a prophet of the Lord here? Ahab says this, Yeah, there's one guy, but I hate him. Why do you hate him? Never says anything good about me. And that, of course, is Micaiah. And so they go and get Micaiah. Micaiah comes in, and amazingly... See, there's some things we don't get in just reading the verse. We don't get necessarily the tone. Because the first thing Micaiah says, Oh, king, go up and prosper. Well, it sounds just like the other guys. I think he probably said, yeah, go ahead, King, go on up. Yeah, you're going to prosper. Right. But Ahab, but you know, when he said that, Ahab knew. He knew that wasn't the truth. He said, how many times have he told you? Tell me the truth. He said, all right, you're going to die. See, I told you! I told you! That mean preacher! We have a saying at Madison. It's this. If you get on 72, Highway 72 in Alabama, you get on 72 and head west, you're going to end up in Athens. Unless you turn off. But you get on 72 and head west, You're going to be in Athens. Now, if I see you driving down Highway 72 and people say, where are they going? Well, I can tell you this, they're headed toward Athens. I don't have to be a prophet. I just know that's where you end up if you go west on Highway 72. And you know, when I see people doing certain things like getting out of church, they're no longer serving the Lord, they're dropping out of ministry, I know where they're headed. And that's where they're going to end up if they don't turn off of Highway 72. Well, that preacher, he's just so judgmental. No, he just knows where 72 goes. He just knows what dropping out of ministries, what dropping a standard. He just knows where that leads. He's just trying to help you so that you don't end up in Athens. I don't want to end up in Athens. Scary stuff right there. That's why in 2 Timothy 4, he says, I charge thee therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead it is appearing in his kingdom, preach the word. Be instant in season, out of season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering in doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine. But after their own lusts shall they heap unto themselves teachers having itching ears. I know because my heart's desire has been to preach the truth that when I hear somebody say, well, we're going to start going over there. I like their preaching better. I know this. He's not preaching on things that they need. The reason they're having trouble with the preaching now is they've decided, you know, I've put my hand out here in the world. It feels pretty good. I think I'd like a little more of this. You're going to love one and hate the other. You can't love them both. That's reality. A saver of death unto death and of life unto life. Jesus warned Simon Peter in Luke 22, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not, and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren. Every Christian needs to realize, Satan desires to have you. If you've got a zeal for the Lord, he wants to steal it. He doesn't mind you just sitting in a pew. If he can take away your fire for God, your love for your church, your service for the Lord, whether it be Sunday school, bus ministry, whatever it is God may be having you to do, if he can get that away, he's got a victory there. And the thing is, once you get away from those things and you start feeling guilty, and you've got to do one of two things. Either get right and get back and vowed, or you've got to justify what you're not doing. And once you start justifying what you're not doing, you don't get off that path. And eventually, it leads you out. How in the world can Bible preaching produce rebels? Because it's a matter of choices. The same preaching. Brother Jimmy Tedder is a good friend of mine. Brother Jimmy Tedder still pastors. Church he started almost 50 years ago in Victory Baptist Church in Shelbyville, Tennessee. Tremendous preacher. I've never heard him lay an egg. Just a tremendous preacher. And he got up at a preacher's fellowship one day and he said he was preaching one Sunday, bringing this message, preaching against sin and so on. He said we had a family visiting there that Sunday. The guy came forward at the end of the message, he said, we want to join this church as long as you preach like this, we'll be with you. He said seven years later, he knew it was seven years because he did what I do, I always write down the date that I preach any message and where I preach it. Seven years later, he preached that message again. Going out the door that day was that man shaking his head and he said, if you're going to preach like that, we're leaving. What happened? What happened? Their love changed. They started getting a hold of some other things that they found that they loved more than what they had loved before. You see, the same preaching can be a blessing or it can be a curse, depending on where our heart's at. So when I hear things that stirred my heart before, and now I just kind of, I don't know that I like that. I have to say, wake up, Mike, that doesn't sound good. I must be allowing some things that I know better than to allow. I need to get it right today. I don't care how long you're a Christian, you're going to see this played out over and over again, and it never fails. So what should you do? Hey, let it be a reminder to you, that could be me if I get careless. Lord, help me to keep my heart with all diligence. Help me to watch what I say. Help me to be careful about what I see. Help me to be real careful about where I go. This is vital for my Christian walk. Let's bow our heads. Father, I pray you deal with our hearts tonight. May we allow the Spirit of God to look deep within our own hearts. Lord, and preach us for people to think about other people that they know, but for each one to consider themselves, and to be able to recognize in their own hearts when things are beginning to change, and that instead of blaming someone else, blaming the church, blaming the pastor, blaming the deacons, blaming a Sunday school teacher, Lord, they'd recognize that's a symptom they better get a hold of now. Lord, please deal with our hearts tonight. Deal with our hearts tonight. Lord, I want every bit of this message to be a saver of life unto life. And it would be if we'll pay attention. But what it is will be determined by where we're at and what we're getting a hold of. Have your way in every life tonight in Jesus' name. Let's stand to our feet. Stand to our feet, heads bowed. If you're not saved tonight, I'd like you to come and take Christ as Savior. But for every believer here, He's warned us in the scripture. The Apostle Paul had people that loved his message and people that turned against him because of the same message. Jesus had disciples that loved his message and had another disciple that betrayed him for the same message. God please, I pray there'd be believers tonight who would reaffirm their commitment to their God. to stand for the word of God, do a work in our lives, I pray in Jesus' name. Amen. With heads bowed, as the pianist plays, God's dealing with your heart, some decisions you need to make. You just step out right now.