Man, I appreciate that singing tonight. Brother Barry, I don't know if I told you, I appreciate the message. I got in a hurry last Sunday night. I don't think I did. I should have asked you to come out and shake hands and I didn't. So people could speak to you a little bit. I was in a hurry to get home and take care of my baby. So I got ahead of myself. And she's actually not my baby. She's my baby baby. So before we get started, a message. A few weeks ago, two or three weeks ago, some of y'all signed this paper to help. And I want to say again, I appreciate those that helped Saturday to go out and put out the door hangers. But this coming Saturday, we need some more help. And some of you signed up for Saturday visits. And that's one of the visits that we need you to help on. And this is to go out and actually knock on the doors. We've got about 100. See, we've knocked it down from 700. to a hundred so we can make it easier. We got them picked out where it looks like there's kids at, where to go to. We're going to try to sign some kids up for the last Sunday of the month. So we need to have a short meeting after the service tonight and if you signed to work for Saturday visits, you need to be up here. I've got your name up here and I know where you live. And if you think, well, I don't remember if I signed up or not, you did. Alright? So, if you will come up, we'll try to get most of those done this Saturday. And I think I told myself, I told somebody, I said, I hope to get at least 50. places found we found over a hundred so that's that's really good that's really good and so pray if you can't go you're not going you can pray for those that go out you can begin praying now to prepare the hearts you see God knows which doors will knock on already I got an idea which ones we're going to knock on. He knows exactly which ones we're going to knock on, who's going to be there, how many kids they got, and he can begin working in their heart to allow those children to come on the bus or, you know, they may decide we'll just come ourselves. That'd be great too. So remember that. We'll have a short meeting. And my wife is not going to forget this. If I forget at the end of the meeting, she is going to remind me that we need a meeting. Right? Baby, baby. She's got to now, doesn't she? Alright, so they got that said, alright. So, as a way of introduction, I appreciate the opportunity to preach tonight. You know, in the past I filled in, had done it really since I've been an associate pastor very much, but I used to fill in for pastors when they were out of town or whatever, and it was different. Because in those situations, you never know quite what to expect. The pastor's not there. And sometimes you may not know anybody else there, Brother Barry. You know the preacher, the pastor, he asks you. He's got confidence in you. But you don't know the people that you're preaching to at all. Well, one time, there was this preacher filling in. And he walked into such a church as that. And he noticed something very strange. He walked in, just like he walked through the door. And there was only one pew along the back wall. He said, that's strange. So he comes on up front and sits down and he's watching the people come in and that pew filled up and when it filled up, this red light on the back wall blinked on and that pew slid all the way to the front and another pew popped out from the basement. He said, that is different. So I said, sir, and it happened again. And it just kept happening. The whole church was full. The whole church was full. So he's preaching, you know. He's preaching. He sort of loses track of time. He's got a full church, you know. He's really wanting to preach to him. And he's preaching. And he looks on the back wall. There's a huge clock back there. And it's 12 o'clock. And when he sees 12 o'clock on there, he remembers this deacon told him, now we always get out at 12 o'clock. But you know preachers, Brother Barry. He had a full church, right? He's still going. He's going to preach. So, at 12.05 a red light came on the back wall and the platform dropped down to the basement and everybody went home. He didn't go back. The Woodturning Bible is the book of Galatians chapter 4 and chapter 5. We're going to read both chapters but not at the same time. If that's okay with y'all. That would be tongues, wouldn't it? It'd be plural. Galatians chapter 4 verse 13 and then Galatians 5 and verse 7 when we get to that chapter. But Galatians 4 and 13. You know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at first. And my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor rejected. but receive me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus. Where is then the blessedness you speak of? For I bear you record that if it had been possible you would have plucked out your own eyes and have given them to me." Now this is one of the verses where it's seemingly telling us that Paul's thorn in the flesh is bad eyesight or a disease of the eyes and so that's what he's talking about. Most likely he had bad eyes, but they loved him so much, they trusted in him so much, that if it would have worked, they would have plucked out their own eyes and given to him. So he would have better eyesight. And in verse 16, it says, Am I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth? So something happens between verse 15 and verse 16. And one of the things we find out in the Psalms, we say somebody got off the foundation. As a matter of fact, a bunch of them must have got off the foundation. They weren't staying on the foundation. In Galatians chapter 5 verse 7, You did run well, who did hinder you that you should not obey the truth? Verse 12, I would they were even cut off which trouble you. So somebody or some bodies was causing trouble and messing people up, and if we're not careful, we'll listen to people, we'll listen to Satan, we'll listen to the flesh, and we'll get off the foundation. And we won't have that same love for the church, and we won't have that same love for the pastor and the people of God that we had when we first came to Currytown Baptist Church and joined Currytown Baptist Church. But we need to keep that love and keep that respect and keep that desire to hear the word of God. Now these verses are referring to the Galatians returning to following the law instead of following grace. But we may follow after other things. It's probably not too likely that we would have a problem going back to following Jewish law. Because we don't know it very good anyway. I mean we don't know the Jewish tradition. So we weren't raised in it. If there's a Jew here, excuse me, forgive me. But we weren't raised in it, so that's probably not going to draw us back to that. But we were raised in things. We did have things in our lives that were wrong before we got saved. And if we're not careful, we will start, begin to move back toward those things if we don't keep the right perspective. They once held Paul in the highest esteem, but now something has changed. They are no longer trusting in grace and have lost their confidence in Paul. Now, using just as a springboard the things that Galatians were doing, I want to say this, that this is just a check-up type of message. This is not something where trying to preach to somebody or I know something's going on or anything like that. It's just a checkup. We need to check up in our lives and as we're again singing, as the song said, make sure we're staying on the foundation. So, in that respect, the Galatians no longer had the love for Paul that they had. They no longer had the respect for Paul that they had. I want to bring a message titled, How to Treat the pastor. Now I was talking with brother RJ earlier and I said, now brother RJ, a pastor can't preach this message. But I can. Matter of fact, I sort of feel like as associate pastor it's my obligation to preach such a message. Well number one, we need to love him. Now Paul said that in the beginning you treated me like an angel. You treated me like Jesus Christ. What happened? If we're not careful, we'll allow our flesh, or something somebody else says, or something that's happened in our lives, cause us to think that the pastor is preaching at us, or against us, or whatever. That's not the case. The pastor will preach what the Lord tells him to preach. Matter of fact, sometimes, as a preacher, it is a little bit difficult not to preach against what something you may know is going on. If the Lord says don't do it, you might be looking at the person and you know what they need to do but the Lord ain't giving you the freedom to preach that. So we need to love them. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 verses 1-11 Paul compliments the Thessalonians on their knowledge. In verse 2 it says for yourselves know perfectly And verse 11 says, even as also ye do. So you have knowledge of things and not only do you know what's right, but you're doing them. And when we know what's right, we have the obligation to perform what is right. But then in verse 12 he tells them to add something to that. Now I believe if Thessalonians need to add it to their lives, we need to add it to our lives. Verse 12 says, And we beseech you, brethren, to know them which labor among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love for their works' sake. Now you see, it's not just me saying it, but the Bible says it. We are to put forth a special effort to do this. Now we all love each other. We all should love each other. We should all esteem each other. But this says then which labor among you that are over you in the Lord and admonish you. That can be some of the hardest people to love is those that admonish you. But the Bible says we're supposed to make special effort to do that. need to love him for his labor among you now if you've been here any length of time there's probably something in your life that you can specifically look to and see a work that the pastor has done for the Lord that has helped you we are supposed to remember those things and we're supposed to love him for those things But most of his labor goes unseen. You only see a very small amount of the labor of the pastor. Pastoring takes a lot of labor, Brother Barry. It takes a lot of labor. And we only see part of it, but we ought to love him for that labor. With our pastor, it is obvious that there is a lot of labor. We need to love him for his position. He is over us in the Lord. Now, I like what I heard a preacher say years and years ago before I was even called to preach, much less an associate pastor. He was an associate pastor and he said, well, just what does associate pastor mean? well his daddy was the pastor so he said associate pastor means I do what daddy says so I do what pastor says that's my job title okay and my job description I do what pastor says but that's what we should do when we're admonished and we're asked to do something that's what we should do that's what we all should do we should love him for his vision for the church Now, I've known some pastors. I don't know, personally know any pastor or don't really know any pastor that has a, puts more effort into having a vision and then fulfilling, helping us to fulfill that vision for the church than our pastor does. It's not just simple, let's go here and let's do that and let's go here and let's do that. He's already planned on it, he's prayed on it and he's done his best to figure it out. When something needs doing, our pastor doesn't just have an alphabetical list and say, okay, let's see, Mr. A did this and Mr. B is up next and I'm gonna get him to do that and Mr. C, no, he prays about it and he asks and tries to find something that we can do that he knows we can do and prays about it that and that we could do that we could best the best one for the to take care of the problem or to fulfill the need and then we should love him and show that love by following and doing you know you can say you love anybody But if you ignore them all the time, if you act like they didn't say anything all the time, if you don't do anything ever for them, that's not showing love. That's showing love for self, really. You are teaching your children how to follow or not to follow our pastor. They are going to see what you do. As young children, They, you have a large part in doing what their mind sees as correct. A parent can do the absolutely wrong thing and the child thinks it's right. There are things that, now, I don't mean this in a bad way, there are things that when I was growing up, my dad did certain things a certain way. I thought that was the way to do it. There's no question in my mind. That's how you do it. Brother Kenneth, If a fuse went out in the fuse box, if you didn't have one, you put a piece of copper pipe in it and that fixed it. That ain't the right way, is it, Relican? That ain't getting good at all. I know one that was in there for years. Fortunately, the wiring was good, brother. If the fuse went out one time, something caused it, didn't it? You can figure that out. So, when you have children watching you, Learning from you, you should show them the right way. You are teaching your friends and neighbors how to or how not to follow the pastor. People are watching you. We don't think about it, but there's always somebody paying attention to what you are doing. There's people in the church paying attention to how you are treating the pastor. We should love him and then we should respect him. Psalms 105 15 Touch not mine anointed and do my prophets no harm. God does not call a man to preach without anointing him to preach. I did learn this at a young Christian age not to touch the anointed of God. David, in the Bible, would not harm Saul or even speak against him. Saul, as you may remember in the scriptures, was in the cave. David was in the cave. It was dark. And David was close enough to take a knife and cut part of Saul's robe off. and showed it to him later, showing him he could have killed him easily. And Saul was seeking David to kill David. But he showed him, I'm not going to harm you. And it shamed Saul. And later, he took the spear from beside where Saul was sleeping. He could have run him through with the spear, but he did not do it. He didn't do it because he was afraid of Saul. Not because of his friend Jonathan. Not because Saul was once good to David. Not even because Saul was king. It was because Samuel had anointed Saul with oil to declare that God had chosen Saul to be king. Now David had also been anointed. He was anointed to be the next king. Saul was still king. Sometimes young preachers may get the idea they know more than the pastor or they know more than this other preacher. The pastor is the pastor. There's one pastor. One. When Saul had been defeated, he fell on his spear, and when he didn't die, he asked an Amalekite to come and kill him, and he did. Well, I got verse 14, but I don't know what chapter it was. I didn't write that down. And David said unto him, How wast thou not afraid to stretch forth thine hand to destroy the Lord's anointed? And David called one of the young men and said, Go near and fall upon him, and he smote him that he died. And David said unto him, Thy blood be upon thy head, for thy mouth hath testified against thee, saying, I have slain the Lord's anointed. David was very serious about the anointed man of God. Now, no one is going to fall on you for disrespecting the pastor. I don't know what God may choose to do to correct you. Do you? So, you don't know. You don't know. Just like God chose Saul to be over Israel, He chose Paul to be over the churches in the New Testament, 1 Corinthians 11, 28. Beside those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches. Just like God had chosen Saul to be over Israel, He chose Paul to be over the churches, God chose the pastor to be over the local church. That's God's design, God's plan. It's not just some man come in here and say, I think I'm going to gather a bunch of people and hoard over them. But it's God's way of doing things. And just like the people did respect Paul and should have continued to respect him, we should respect our pastor. 1 Timothy 5, 19, Against an elder receive not an accusation, but before two or three witnesses. That tells me don't even listen or talk about the pastor. I just don't talk. but don't listen either. Now, I think I've been associate pastor long enough, I don't have to worry about listening to it. Nobody tells me anything, Shane. Nobody comes to me and says, you know what the pastor did? I don't hear that. But if you hear, you shouldn't listen either. Men, be careful when you are disrespecting one another. Because that's the way men talk, right? I've heard this lady telling a joke and said, women never say things like this. I'm probably going to get in trouble. But she said, my husband says, well, big Zankeus, he did this or that. She said, could you imagine a woman saying that about another woman, putting big in front of her name? And she said, well, big Zacchaeus don't mind it because there's another Zacchaeus and his name is fat Zacchaeus. And men will laugh. Don't try that with the women though. So men, when you're doing that, be careful not to disrespect the pastor. Listen, there are certain things that I believe is okay amongst men, but you got to be careful. I would rather stand back three feet from the line than to stand close to it and accidentally cross over. Listen, the pastor is not going to say anything. But is God happy with what you see? There was once some preachers, they decided to play a trick on a pastor. When the pastor was out of town, they had it set up with the desk clerk to make him believe he didn't have a room reserved. Well, it went on and another pastor come in, and the desk clerk not only did that, but she told that pastor, you have a room, but your wife's not on here, this woman's on here with you on your room. That's not good. Could you imagine what that could have done? So we have to stand back from that line and be careful that we don't cross it. Like I said, the pastor's not gonna swoop down on you like a hawk for not doing something right or disrespecting him. Sort of got ahead of myself. Let me back up a little bit. Like I said, that was wrong. Hebrews 13 and 17, obey them that have the rule over you and submit yourselves for they watch for your souls as they that must give account that they may do it with joy and not with grief for that is unprofitable for you. Now we have our pastor and staff have certain policies and things that we go by and try to follow That one, we don't hurt people's feelings. Two, we don't hurt the cause of Christ. And they're there for a reason. So, when we break those policies, like the pastor's not going to come in and jump on you, you know, and browbeat you for it. But we need to follow those policies. If he does say something to you, it means you're pushing the envelope pretty good. Don't disrespect him by trying to make him feel guilty for saying something to you. Hey, if you're doing it, if you're going against the policy, if you're doing things you know is not right, just admit it. Say I'm sorry and mean it. And then we need to trust his preaching. Now, I'm preaching to Currytown members, okay? If you're a member that means you joined the church. You went through a new member class. It was explained to you what we believe. You heard his preaching many times before you joined. And you trusted his preaching. Hopefully you wouldn't have joined. So you have to continue to trust his preaching as long as he's in the Word of God. And he's always been in the Word of God. Ezekiel 3.17 says, Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel, therefore hear the word at my mouth and give them warning from me. And that's what our pastor does, is give us warning to follow the word of God. so when we we need to trust that that's what he's doing and we need to follow the Word of God and we need to know that he's preaching the Word of God but the preaching of the Word of God will give us power to follow the Word of God trust it even when it's against your pet sin so what why is it called pet sin? well What's a pet? A pet is very compassionate and caring for you. They will do literally anything for you no matter what. They are very loyal and will always come back even when you've neglected them. Pets are great friends to have and will do everything to make you smile and won't give up until they have. If you have a pet, they are a Great best friend. They are great companions for everything. If you need anything, your pet will be there with you through the ups and downs. If you're sad, just call your pet and they'll be a shoulder for you to cry on. So what's a pet sin? Something that is very compassionate and caring for you. Your pet sin would do literally anything for you no matter what. It is very loyal and will always come back even when you've neglected it. Your pet sin is a great friend to have and will do everything to make you smile and won't give up until it has. A pet sin is better than a best friend. It is a great companion for everything. If you need anything, your pet sin will be there through the thick and the thin. If you are sad, just call on your pet sin and it will be a shoulder for you to cry on. Now then, who is God? Someone who is very compassionate and caring for you. He can do literally anything for you. Nothing is impossible for Him. He is very loyal and will always come back even if you've hurt Him. God is a great friend to have and is able to do whatever it takes to make you smile. If you know God, He is better than a best friend. He is a great companion for everything. If you need anything, God will be there with you through your ups and downs. If you're sad, just call on God and He will be a shoulder for you to cry on. Now the problem is, your flesh will try to get you to replace God with your pet sin. God did this for me. Well, I haven't felt Him lately. But my pet sin's right here. It'll always be there. It'll always be there. You don't have to worry about your pet sin leaving you. Now you can get away from it, but it ain't gonna leave you. The reasons we have pet sins is we don't have enough of God in our lives. Your pet sin loves your idle time. Your pet sin loves your idle time. You get rid of your pet sin by getting rid of your idle time by spending more time with God and doing more for God. You stay busy for God and your pet sin will get smaller and smaller and further away. So I just don't have enough time to do any more for God. Do you have a pet sin? Then you got plenty of time. You just don't realize how much God can do through you. We need to stay busy for God. I read a long time ago, a lady was complaining just how bad she had it. This was wrong, that was wrong. She was neglected, all this. She comes to the pastor, she said, what can I do? And he said, well, Mrs. So-and-so, has been down and she needs something to eat. You go fix her something to eat. Well, how is that supposed to take care of anything? I'll do it. So she did it. The pastor called her about a week later. And he said, how are you doing? She said, I'm doing fine, Pastor. Right now I ain't got time to talk. I'm cooking with this person. I got to take this over here to that person, that over to that person. She was fine. She was doing something for God. It doesn't have to be a missionary in China. Just do something for God. And then we need not only trust his preaching, but we got to listen to it. What good is it to do if you don't listen to his preaching? Proverbs 13.10, only by pride cometh contention, now that would pretty familiar with that part of the verse. Let's listen to the last part of that. But with the well-advised is wisdom. So how do we get well-advised? Preaching is a good way to get well-advised. We need to be in every service that we can to be well-advised. You miss a bunch of services and then something happens to you, or you get off on track, or you get off the foundation, probably because you missed a bunch of services. Ezekiel says, give them warning from me. That's what the preacher's doing. He's warning us. And when he's preaching, he's giving warning from God and instruction from God. And then during the preaching, don't be a distraction. Now, this is a pet peeve of mine. Of course, I see it from up here. Alright. Now, the preacher's been preaching 35-40 minutes. and five or six people go out and he's not done and that's bad enough but then he says when you hear the name Susan don't get up except Susan okay you know he's about to give an invitation and if you Waited this long for whatever need it is. You need to go out that door. You can wait till he gets done. That's the reason the bus leaves after the last prayer. Right? Don't interrupt an invitation especially. Don't be moving around unnecessarily. If you need to go to the restroom, especially if it's late, just listen to it out there. They might be giving you an invitation when you come back in. Children talking is a distraction. But what's five times worse than that is adults talking. Most preachers can get over children talking. But sometimes adults talking will distract the preacher. Any preacher. Cell phones. From my seat, I see a lot of cell phones. And there's not anybody in here that's got a cell phone that doesn't know you don't need to be on your cell phone. And if you are intentionally, I'm going to say this well, If you are intentionally on your cell phone, you are not at that moment in the will of God. You could be causing a lost person to die and go to hell just because there's something on your phone you want to see. You have to think about these things. You have to realize, you know it, Like I said, if you're old enough to have a cell phone, you know you don't need to be on that cell phone, and you know that it is wrong to be on that cell phone. Now, when he is preaching, don't correct the pastor when he has misspoken something. Now, I've only heard that once here. I have other churches where I've heard it more. Listen, he may misspeak, maybe he says the wrong chapter, maybe he says the wrong verse, the wrong word, the wrong name. Everybody knows it, just like you. You don't have to tell everybody else that he did it. And they know what he really means. And you knew what he really meant. That is a very distracting thing to try to correct the pastor while he is preaching. I preached almost a whole sermon, and I know I said it at least 20 times, the book of Adam. You ever seen the book of Adam, Brother Barry? I think it's called Genesis. But I didn't say Genesis. I said Adam. Nobody said a word. But I did turn around and see the guy behind me sort of smirking a little bit. I said, what did I do? He couldn't help it. It was pretty funny. Besides, when you correct the pastor, it's very embarrassing when he was right after all. You're wrong. I have heard that too. I have heard people try to finish what he was saying, and that's not what he's saying. Use the gift God has given you. Jeremiah 3.15, and I will give You pastors, according to my heart, which shall feed you with the knowledge and understanding. The pastor is a gift from God. It's okay to share your problems with him, but not every problem. Respect his time. Respect his time. You don't need to call him at 11.30 p.m. and tell him you stumped your toe. Don't do that. It's okay to share your victories, but you don't have to tell him every good thing that happened to you either. There are some things that he would be glad to hear about. Not 11.30 at night, but respect his time. But realize that God has given you the pastor to help you and then support him. Support him with attendance. Now, once, of course, we joined the church before we ever had any children, but as our children grew up, no one in my house ever said, are we going to church tonight? Never. Support him with finances. Now, opinions on how you should financially support a pastor are only limited to how many people you ask. You get everything. I used to work with two guys. Neither one of them in church. This is one of them's idea. The church supports the pastor and he should not work outside that for any reason whatsoever. He should have faith to live on what the church gives him. Well, in some cases, that is true. He does have enough. But in a lot of cases, that's not the case. As a matter of fact, in some cases, he'd starve to death. But there's nowhere that you can get that out of the Bible. The pastor can work outside of what the church does for him. The other guy I worked with, The pastor should not take money from the church, he should work like everybody else and make his own money. So you got that on each end of the spectrum and you got everything in between. But we should support our pastor the best that we can. Now let me, I'm just gonna throw this out there to you. Now then, on Sunday mornings, on the campus, there'll be about 200 people here. Now then, if there was a CEO of a company that had 200 people, how much money would he probably make? Now, we don't pay our pastor that much, but I don't see anything wrong if we did. What he's doing is a whole lot more important than the CEO of that company. I mean, I don't know why people have opinions they have, But I don't see, there's no job more important than the pastor of a church. Now, I'll say this, I know there are preachers that take in too much money. They're millionaires if not billionaires. And that shouldn't be the case. Because they're not doing anything with that money. They don't need that money. support him with encouragement I sometimes think about this I know that I usually go out and I'll shake hands and he's shaking hands and I hear some people tell him you know good sermon whatever and that's good they should and then I won't do it because I've been shaking hands and I forget to do it and I feel bad about it but we should tell the pastor that sometimes I'll just have to remember at a different time to tell him that was a good message Tell him you appreciate all he and his family does for you. You say, well, I don't know anything in particular that his family has done for me. They have allowed him to do what's necessary to pastor this church. A pastor does not just work Sunday and Wednesday nights. He doesn't just put in 40 hours a week. it puts in a lot more hours than that so his family is sacrificing him and in a lot of cases they have actually done things directly for you but they have sacrificed him for you and then support him with prayer prayer for his pastor for our pastor and for his family so like I said we just need to think about how we are treating our pastor. We need to follow what the Word of God says about it. Not just, you know, whatever we think is right, but what does the Word of God say about how we should treat the pastor. Well, I didn't preach this message to get anybody to come to the altar, but maybe there's something on your heart you need to come, Ms. Susan, if you will come and play for us. Maybe there's something else on your heart. Something I said, whatever. You need to come to the altar. Come. Maybe you're here tonight. Never receive Christ as Savior. If you come forward, we'll take the Word of God and show you how to be saved. And I know when I put it like that, it's sort of a blunt. So what do you mean I've got to get up in front of everybody? Well, this is sort of blunt too. But when a person stands before the great white throne of judgment, they'll do it in front of everybody. We'll close out in just a minute. Lord, we thank you for the word of God that you have given us, Lord. Thank you for your instruction, Lord, that you give us on how to treat the pastor. Lord, help us to follow that. Lord, we may relegate that to the back of our minds sometimes, Lord, but it needs to be constantly upon us how we treat the pastor. Lord, I believe it would help each one individual, and I know it would help the church as a whole. Lord, if we treat the pastor correctly. Lord, I know we do try to here at Currytown, but from time to time as individuals, we may do things, Lord, that are not the way that's supposed to be done. Lord, help us to do it correctly. Help us to support him, love him, respect him, and listen to him, and listen to his preaching. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.