2 Timothy chapter 4 and verse 1, the
Bible says, I charge thee therefore before God
and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge
the quick and the dead, and his appearing
in his kingdom, preach the word.
Be instant in season, out of season, reprove,
rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
For the time will come when they will
not endure sound doctrine, but after their own
lust shall they heap to themselves teachers having
itching ears.
They shall turn away their ears from the
truth and shall be turning to fables, but
watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do
the work of an evangelist, make full proof
of thy ministry.
Verse 6, please.
For I am now ready to be offered.
In the time of my departures at hand,
I have fought a good fight, I have
finished my course, I have kept the faith.
Henceforth, or because of this, henceforth there is
laid up for me, Paul says, a crown
of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge,
shall give me at that day, not to
me only, but to them also, that love
is appearing.
Please go back to verse 3 again.
The Bible says, 2 Timothy 4, 3, For
the time will come when they will not
endure sound doctrine, but after their own lust
shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching
ears, and they shall turn away their ears
from the truth and shall be turned unto
fables.
Tonight I bring you this simple message as
we end our series of meetings entitled, Dealing
with Dangerous Doctrines.
Thank you very much.
You may be seated.
Let's bow our heads and hearts and ask
the Lord to bless our time together tonight.
Dealing with Dangerous Doctrines.
Lord, thank You for the wonderful week that
we have had ever since Sunday school this
past Sunday.
And Lord, You've been faithful.
This is the eighth Bible preaching service that
we've had this week, and for that we're
thankful.
We've learned much.
We've studied much.
We've been challenged, stirred, and changed much.
And Lord, we thank You for Your many
blessings.
Thank You for those who are here.
Thank You for our members, regular attenders, and
those who are visiting tonight.
Thank You for them.
Give everyone safety as we dismiss in a
while.
But Lord, right now I pray that we
would not be distracted, nor be a distraction
ourselves.
We plead the blood of Jesus Christ upon
this service, that the devil would have no
rule and reign and grounds upon this service
at this time, but the Spirit of God
would have complete, convicting power and full sway.
Jesus Christ would be honored, uplifted, and exalted,
and the Bible would be preached boldly, unashamedly,
unapologetically, as in truth it is truly the
Word of God.
Lord, please empty me of myself.
Help me as I convey these thoughts that
You've so indelibly laid upon my heart.
And Father, when we leave in just a
little while, may we truly be able to
say that it's been good to be in
the house of God, with the people of
God, around the Word of God.
And Lord, we'll thank You for everything that
You'll say and do.
We know You'll do great things, for we
pray it in faith, and we ask it
in Jesus' name.
Amen.
You know, the Apostle Paul in 2 Timothy
4 is writing his swan song, if you
will.
He's kind of writing, as I said the
other night, the song just before the guillotine
takes off his head.
Now, the Bible tells us in 1 and
2 Timothy and the book of Titus, basically,
the entire books are written for three groups
of people or three qualifications.
Number one, it is written for the qualifications
of preachers and their wives.
Number two, it is written for the qualifications
of deacons and their wives.
And number three, it is written for the
qualifications of church membership and also the qualifications
for church dismissal whenever church discipline is biblically
necessary.
But nonetheless, Paul is writing, and he tells
young Timothy, what I want you to do
is boldly proclaim unashamedly, unapologetically, the precious truth
of the Word of God.
He says, I want you to open your
heart like the front door of your house.
I want you to open your mouth.
I want you to open your Bible and
preach the Word.
You will notice he did not say preach
about the Word.
We have a lot of preaching about the
Word in America, but very little preaching of
the Word in America.
You'll notice he didn't say preach around the
Word.
You'll notice he did not say preach the
Sports Illustrated, the USA Today or the Time
Magazine.
He simply said, straightforwardly and dogmatically, Timothy, I
want you, as the young pastor of the
church at Ephesus that Paul found in Acts
chapter 17, he said, I want you to
boldly declare, boldly preach and be a messenger
of the Word of God.
Then I want you to notice what he
said in verse number 2 as he's talking
about this great aspect and this great responsibility
of preaching.
He says, preach the Word, be instant, in
season and out of season.
You know, I was reading through my Bible
not too long ago when I came across
this portion of Scripture, and I thought, now
that's brilliant right there.
For the Apostle Paul, under inspiration of God's
Holy Divine Spirit to put that in the
Bible.
That shows us, pastor, that according to the
Bible, there is only two times in our
life, there's only two times in the ministry
of a preacher that he should ever open
his mouth and preach.
Did you know that?
There's only two times in the Word of
God that we are commanded to preach.
Guess when they are?
In season and out of season.
And I believe we need some in season
and out of season preachers 24 hours a
day, 7 days a week, to boldly proclaim,
thus saith the Lord.
But not only did he say, be instant,
in season and out of season, he continued
his thought.
Look what he says.
He says, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering
and, what's the next word in your Bible?
Doctrine.
Keep reading, please, verse 3.
For the time will come, and by the
way, it has long ago come, and it's
in America right now.
For the time will come when they will
not endure it means to hold on to
or to swallow, if you will.
When they will not endure sound doctrine.
What will they do instead?
But after their own lusts, shall they heap
to themselves teachers having itching ears.
And they shall turn away their ears from
the truth and shall be turned unto fables
or stories, literally the meaning means continuous, incessant
illustrations of life.
And so Paul says, Timothy, I want you
to be careful that you don't get wrapped
up in the affairs of humanity and the
affairs of your flesh and get wrapped up
in some type of false cult or some
type of false doctrine.
You know, as we preached last night, I
preached a little bit about false teachers, about
Benny Hinn and the rest of those crooks
on television.
It will not take you very long to
figure out that America is not only full
of false teachings, but America is full of
false doctrine.
And I'll tell you what bothers me.
What bothers me is that many of the
unscriptural anti-biblical doctrines have even opened up
the door and has crept into our good,
well-meaning, independent, fundamental, Bible-believing, soul-winning,
sanctified, separated Baptist churches.
And tonight there are four doctrines that I
would like to combat.
There are four doctrines that I would like
to preach on.
Now, the doctrines that I'm going to preach
on are in the Bible.
But the way these doctrines are being dealt
with in America is far from preaching the
Bible.
And it's happening in our Bible colleges.
It's happening in our seminaries.
It's happening in our Baptist churches.
It is happening in so-called fundamental churches
across America.
And I want to share these four doctrines
with you tonight.
Now, I do not preach this message primarily
to be controversial.
I'm sure there are some parts here that
can be rather controversial.
That's not my intent tonight.
I'm not looking for a fight.
I'm not looking to be a bulldog and
rip your head off and tell you what
I think about it.
That's not what I'm doing tonight.
But I want to use the Word of
God and I want to combat four things
that are going on in America that I
believe has hindered us when it comes to
really serving Christ and really in this area
of soul-winning, winning people to Christ.
I believe if we're going to have a
burden for people, I believe if we are
going to win people to Christ, don't you
think we should do it scripturally and we
should be sound in what we do?
And so the Bible says we should be
sound in our doctrine.
The word sound means firmly fixed, firmly fit,
or firmly founded.
And so Paul says, don't just have any
doctrine.
He says, I want you to have sound
doctrine.
Now, a lot of people say doctrine's not
important.
You've heard that.
Let's just all get together in a football
stadium.
Doesn't matter what you believe.
Doesn't matter your denomination.
Doesn't matter what you believe about the Bible
or what Bible you use.
It doesn't matter where you go to church.
It doesn't matter how you act.
It doesn't matter if you believe there's a
heaven, if you believe there's a hell.
You can be a Baptist, a Charismatic, a
tongue speaker, a Pentecostal, a Methodist, an Episcopalian.
You can be a dog barker.
You can be a Mormon.
You can be a Jehovah's Witness.
You can be anybody you jolly well please.
Let's just all get together on love.
Now, there's nothing wrong with getting together on
love.
I believe in love and I believe in
unity, but I do not believe in unity
at the extent of forsaking strong Bible doctrine.
I believe doctrine's important.
I believe the reason we've been here this
week, the reason we have Sunday school, Sunday
morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night prayer meeting and
Bible study is so we can study the
sound doctrines of the Word of God.
So, when people say doctrine's not important, the
word doctrine means teaching.
So, what we are saying is that the
teachings of the Bible, from Genesis 1-1
to Revelation 22-21, apparently, the 1189 chapters
in the Bible must not be very significant.
And you know that's a joke, for the
Word of God is in fact the unashamed,
unapologetical Word of Almighty God.
It's God's Word, not Greg's Word.
It's not Faith Baptist Church's Word.
It's not Calvary Baptist Church or Sheldon Iowa's
Word.
It is God's Word, and I believe that
we, as preachers, that we as God's people,
that we as leaders in the church, as
people that want to be right, I believe
we should do as Paul said, handle the
Word of God not deceitfully, but we should
handle the Word of God, which must care,
rightly dividing the Word of truth.
So let me give you four doctrines tonight
that I believe is wrecking and destroying the
fundamental movement.
Doctrine number one.
Regeneration without repentance.
Did you hear me?
Regeneration without repentance.
We are living in a day when people
have de-emphasized the Bible doctrine of repentance.
Now it's a bad thing when people in
hell tonight believe in repentance, but we've got
Baptist preachers around this country that won't believe
in it.
I want to remind you, the first message
that John the Baptist ever preached, the first
message that fell forth from his mouth was
in Matthew 3, verses 1 and 2.
In those days came John the Baptist preaching
in the wilderness of Judea and saying, repent
ye for the kingdom of God is at
hand.
And repentance is something that has been downplayed,
but ladies and gentlemen, according to my Bible,
if there is not a time in someone's
life when they see themselves as a hellbound,
hellbent, hell-deserving sinner, and they are willing
to turn from their way and turn to
God's way, if there never comes that time
of a change of mind in their life,
they have never been what the Bible calls
born again.
Now, regeneration is the work of God, but
that does not make repentance a work of
man.
Somebody says, well, I thought we were saved
by grace, and the Bible says, whosoever will,
let him come and take of the water
of life freely, Revelation 22, 17.
It does say that.
But that does not, ladies and gentlemen, make
repentance a work.
Let me tell you what I mean.
Did you know that grace is given to
you by God?
You don't work up grace to get saved.
God gives you His grace.
Did you know that faith is given to
you to be saved by God?
You don't work up faith.
God gives it to you.
Ephesians 2, 8, 9.
For by grace are you saved through faith,
and that not of yourselves.
It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast.
So the Bible says that grace is given
to us by God, and faith is given
to us by God.
But can I remind you what 2 Timothy
2, 25 says?
In meekness, instructing those that oppose themselves, if
God peradventure would grant unto them repentance to
the acknowledging of the truth.
You see, here's the Bible truth when it
comes to salvation.
Here's the Bible truth when it comes to
me responding to the Gospel.
He gives me the conviction I need, the
grace I need.
He gives me the faith I need.
He even gives me the ability to repent,
but yet He will not twist my arm
around my back and make me repent.
But repentance is a part of the Gospel.
Can I remind you that Jesus did not
say, believe the Gospel and repent.
Can I remind you Jesus said, repent and
believe the Gospel.
Why did He say that?
I'll tell you why.
Because if you don't repent, if you don't
change your mind about your sin, if a
person does not change their mind about their
false beliefs, they will not believe the Gospel.
So basically, repentance is a cleansing time, if
you will, for the mind.
Jesus said, if your thinking is not changed,
if you're not willing to turn to Christ
because you're sick of your sin, if you're
not willing to admit the fact that you
are lost, He said then you're not going
to believe the Gospel.
Can I remind you what happened in Luke
chapter number 16 and verse 19?
The Bible says, Luke 16, 19, there was
a certain rich man, which was clothed in
purple and fine linen.
And he fared sumptuously every day.
And there was a beggar named Lazarus, which
laid his gate full of sores, and desiring
to be fed with the crumbs which fell
from the rich man's table, moreover the dogs
came and licked his sores.
And it came to pass that the beggar
died and was carried by the angels into
Abraham's bosom.
The rich man also died and was buried,
verse 23, and in hell he lifted up
his eyes.
Being in torment, he said to Abraham, afar
off, and Lazarus in his bosom.
And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have
mercy on me.
Then said Lazarus that he may dip the
tip of his finger in water and cool
my tongue, for I am tormented in this
flame.
But Abraham said unto him, Son, remember that
thou in thy lifetime receivest thy good things,
and likewise Lazarus' evil things, and now he
is comforted, and thou art tormented, and beside
all this there is a great gulf fixed
between, so that they cannot come from thence,
and neither can they come from hence.
And basically he said, listen, there's separation.
I can't come to you, and you can't
come to me.
Then he said, I pray thee therefore, Father,
that thou wouldst send someone to my Father's
house, for I have five brethren, lest they
also come to this place.
Abraham said unto him, If they hear not
Moses and the prophets, neither will they be
persuaded, though one rose from the dead.
And he said, Nay, Father Abraham, but if
one went unto them from the dead, they
will repent.
And tonight the people in hell believe that
there must come a time in your life
when you are willing to turn from your
way and turn to God's way, and it
bothers me when people in hell believe Bible
doctrine, but Baptist sitting in church pews and
Baptist preachers in pulpits won't believe in Bible
doctrine.
And ladies and gentlemen, there is no such
thing of regeneration without repentance.
Can I remind you that Jesus put a
premium on repentance?
You know what He said in Mark 6?
In Mark 6, He came to His disciples
who He split up two by two.
He did that for various reasons that we'll
not get into, but He was sending them
out two by two.
One of the reasons is so that they
would not have to go by themselves.
And so two guys were going this way.
Two guys were going this way.
The Bible says they were to take three
things.
Number one, one change of clothes, a script,
or the Old Testament mosaic law, if you
will, and a staff.
He said, Don't take another change of clothes.
He said, Don't take any other books.
Don't take any food.
Don't take any money.
He said, You're itinerant.
He said, People will take care of your
needs along the way.
Now Jesus said, I'm going to give you
a message to preach to the nations.
Now follow me.
Jesus did not yet give them that message
in Mark 6.
But before He gave them the message, He
told them what would happen if the people
did not listen to the message.
He said, Fellas, disciples, if you go to
a city and they receive you, it will
be well with that city.
He said, but if they will not listen
to the message that I'm going to give
you, if they will not heed to the
Bible message, the sound doctrine that I'm fixing
to teach you to preach to them, Jesus
said, Then what you do, fellas, is you
walk out to the edge of the city.
You know the story well.
He said, You walk to the edge of
the city and dust your feet off.
And He said, When you shake the dust
off the bottom of your feet, you walk
away and don't you ever look back.
And He says, the nation, the town, the
city, the country, the county, however you want
to call it, however big, however small, the
individual, He says, the people or persons that
will not heed to this message, He said,
whenever you shake off the dust of your
feet, proclaiming the judgment of God, He said,
in the day of judgment.
We're talking about the judgment to the nations.
He said, in the day of judgment, He
said, those people will be judged greater than
those sins of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Now, friend, whenever God likens somebody to Sodom
and Gomorrah in the Bible, you know His
long suffering and mercy has worn out and
He's just about disgusted.
Can I remind you, we meet Sodomites or
Sodom and Gomorrah crowd in Genesis chapter 13.
Not very much is said about them except
the fact that Lot pitched his tent toward
Sodom and he had no business doing that.
But we then find the full-fledged mess
in Genesis chapter 19.
And the Bible says these Sodomites were so
steeped in their sin, they were so steeped
in their immorality and their ungodliness, that when
the angels, you know the story so I'll
not preach on it, when the angels of
God reached forth their hands and smote the
men with blindness, you know what the Bible
says?
It says so that they wearied themselves to
find the door.
Now, can I ask you a bold question
tonight?
If you're doing something you ought not be
doing and somebody sticks their hand out of
a door you're on Thursday night visitation, you're
talking about Christ and so somebody opens up
the door and they stick their hand out
and say, and all of a sudden you're
blind as a bat going backwards.
Do you think you're still going to try
to get in their kitchen?
I don't believe so.
I believe you're going to turn around and
find the car for him.
But my Bible tells me, when those angels
smote them with blindness, those Sodomites, those homosexuals
were so steeped in their sin that they
still wearied themselves to find the door.
We know what happened.
The fiery wrath and judgment of God came
down in fire and brimstone and slew all
of them.
And most Bible historians and scholars believe that
this very moment at the bottom of the
Dead Sea there's a place that was actually
real at one time called Sodom and Gomorrah.
So we know that God's patient wore thin
with perversity.
We know because of the perversion of man
with man and woman with woman and men
and ladies with beasts and children and pedophiles
and the rest of that garbage and trash,
which by the way is going on in
America, we find out that God was so
angry about that that He destroyed them.
So you can see that the judgment of
God upon Sodom and Gomorrah was very severe.
But can I remind you, He just told
His disciples, the message that I give you
if these people will not repent, if these
people will not listen, if these people will
not change their minds, if these people will
not believe, He said that in the day
of judgment I will judge them greater than
the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah.
So God means business in Mark 6.
And then the Bible tells us Mark 6
in verse number 12.
And they went out and preached that men
should repent.
Jesus said if they don't heed to the
message of repent and believe the gospel, then
in the day of judgment it will be
greater for them, being judged if you will,
as a whole, as a nation, than that
of the sins of the wicked, perverted Sodomites,
the homosexuals in Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis
chapter 19.
Furthermore, the Bible proves our point.
And by the way, a man could preach
for a long, well over an hour or
two just on the subject of repentance.
Because I believe with all my heart we
have downplayed it.
I heard a preacher not long ago say
this.
He said, well, the word repentance is never
mentioned in the gospel of John.
If you know anything about Matthew, Mark, Luke
and John, you do know that the book
of John is the most evangelistic of the
four.
And he said because the word repentance is
never mentioned in the gospel of John, obviously
repentance is not necessary for salvation.
I want to remind you the word God
is not mentioned in the book of Esther.
That doesn't mean He's not there.
I want to remind you that the word
rapture is not mentioned anywhere in your New
Testament, but we still believe in the soon
coming of Jesus Christ.
I want to remind you that the word
Trinity is never used in your Bible, but
yet we still believe in God the Father,
God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
So to say that the word is not
there does not imply does not imply the
fact that the meaning is not there.
Because by the way, guess what?
Every time Jesus spoke to somebody in the
gospel of John when they were saved, although
it does not say perhaps that they repented,
you can see the repentance proved in their
life.
You see, repentance is not a one time
deal.
Repentance is a lifetime deal.
Jesus talked to Nicodemus.
He changed his life.
Jesus talked to the woman at the well
of John 4.
It changed her life.
And she became a super soul winning saint
right that moment.
And the Bible says she went back and
told all the men of the city, come
see a man that told me everything I've
ever done.
He is not this the Christ.
And I'm telling you, when a person gets
saved, because they have had their mindset changed,
it changes their direction.
God gives them a new heart, new goals,
new aspirations, new desires, and I believe that's
exactly what Paul meant when he said in
2 Corinthians 5.17, if any man be
in Christ, he is a new creature.
Furthermore, Paul was preaching one day in a
place called Mars Hill.
He was preaching up there.
He was walking around.
He began to look at these people.
A lot of them were learned and some
were not so learned.
He looked at them and he said, you
know what?
He said, I beheld your devotion on the
way up here this afternoon.
And he said, I even noticed that you
had a sign that said to the unknown
God.
He said, that God that you so ignorantly
worship, he said, let me declare Him unto
you.
And he began basically in the book of
Genesis and he preached about the mighty supernatural
sovereign grace and power of Almighty God.
But you know what he said in Acts
17 verse number 30?
And the times of this ignorance hath God
weeped at.
But now commandeth all men everywhere to repent.
Ladies and gentlemen, you will have to cut
out, you will have to take a spiritual
backhoe and dig many portions of Scripture out
of the Bible to try to prove to
me, God, yourself, or anybody else that repentance
is not necessary for salvation and there is
no such thing as regeneration without repentance.
If a person never sees himself as lost,
they will never see themselves as saved.
Now, there's much more we could say about
that, but we must move on.
Number two, not only the first doctrine shall
we deal with and hit head on, regeneration
without repentance, but number two, there's also a
doctrine going across our land that would simply
be this.
Conversion without conviction.
Now, I need your help tonight in my
Bible preaching message, okay?
How many of you in this room tonight
believe that as God's people we have a
personal responsibility to tell people about Jesus Christ?
Now, by the way, I'm not commanded to
win the world.
I'm commanded to tell the world.
I'm not the Savior.
I'm the one that God uses.
Some sow, some plant, some water, but it's
who?
God that giveth the increase.
1 Corinthians 1.
But how many of you in here believe
that we have a personal responsibility to witness,
to let the redeemed of the Lord say
so?
How many of you believe tonight, according to
this Bible, many, many times, that we have
a responsibility to win people to Jesus Christ?
Would you put your hand down there if
you believe that tonight?
Alright, now put your hands down.
You know what?
You're exactly right.
And if you have any form of doctrine
that nullifies your responsibility as a soul winner,
you might as well junk that stuff because
you can be assured it may be Sports
Illustrated doctrine, but it's not Bible doctrine.
We have a responsibility to win people to
Christ, but I'm going to tell you something.
At the expense of being misunderstood tonight, please
understand, I have seen a trend that bothers
me in fundamentalism.
We have over-emphasized man's responsibility in soul
winning and we have de-emphasized the Holy
Spirit's responsibility in soul winning.
Let me tell you what I mean.
I believe that we should knock on doors.
I believe that we should pass out tracts.
I believe in confrontational preaching, confrontational witnessing.
I believe in speaking to people.
I don't think you just walk up to
them and say, Hey buddy, did you know
there's a hell and you're going there unless
you repent and get saved by the grace
of God.
Now, you've got to start a little slower
than that.
You know, you don't just beat the guy's
head off with the Bible.
You don't do that.
But you know what?
We could go out tonight.
We could knock on every door in Stacy.
I don't know how big Stacy is, but
it probably wouldn't take a whole long time
to knock on every door, but if we
were to knock on every door, did you
know we could go out tonight and we
could have family-sized King James Bibles.
I mean big ones.
Big, big, big, big ones.
Large print editions.
And we could go out and the fellas
could loosen their ties.
And I'll meet you.
We could go out there, the kids, the
teenagers, the men, the ladies, all of us.
And we could knock on every door.
We could have family-sized King James Bible,
large print.
We could pull our glasses down.
We could loosen our ties.
We could kick off our shoes.
We could get red, white, and blue in
the face.
We could holler, scream, rant, rave, pray, preach,
yell.
And we could beg Stacy to get saved.
We could beg people to get saved by
the grace of God.
We can drag them down out.
They can shake hands, sign cards, stir baptismal
waters, but here's the truth of the Bible.
We can beg and plead and pray and
preach all we want, but if the Holy
Spirit of God doesn't first put that person
under old-fashioned conviction, they're not going to
get saved no matter what you say.
And I'm telling you, we have so far
gotten away from old-fashioned, heaven-sent, heartfelt,
Holy Ghost conviction.
I want to tell you something.
If you have never been under conviction, hear
me, you have never been saved by the
grace of God.
You may have heard a spooky story.
You may have heard something that jerked some
watermelon tears out of your eye ducts, but
I promise you, you didn't get saved by
the grace of God.
Now, I believe that four-year-old kids
can be under conviction.
Conviction is that time when the Spirit of
God shows you your need for Christ and
shows you that you do have a need
to turn from your way and turn to
God's way.
Now, down south, we have what we call
the Bible Belt.
Everybody ever heard that terminology, the Bible Belt?
Well, let me set your mind at ease.
If we have a Bible Belt, bless God,
it needs a new buckle, that's for sure.
There's no such thing as a Bible Belt.
I don't care if it's in Tennessee.
I don't care if it's in Alabama.
I don't care where it is.
There is no such place as a Bible
Belt.
I was telling Pastor and some of the
other men in the church, if you take
a mathematical compass, one of them little drawing,
little deals, and Brother Andrew, you know about
them things, you probably use them to draw
with your graphics.
I don't know anything about it.
But if you take one of them little
compass looking deals and you stick the needle
on Nashville, Tennessee, middle Tennessee, where we live.
Did you know if you stick that needle
right there in Nashville and you draw with
a pencil or a pen on a mount,
100 miles, a great big 100 mile circle
in any direction around Nashville, in any direction.
Now, that's going to take you into northern
Alabama and southern Kentucky a little bit, but
most of it's going to entail middle Tennessee.
100 miles from the central location of Tennessee,
Nashville.
Did you know there are 50,000 Baptist
churches 100 miles from Nashville, Tennessee?
I didn't say 50,000 Church of Christ
and Baptist and Mormon and all that.
No, no.
50,000 Baptist churches.
45,000 of them.
Probably ought to shut the door because they're
not preaching the Bible anyhow.
But 50,000 Baptist churches within 100 miles
of Nashville, Tennessee.
And you know what?
Nashville's going to prevail quicker tonight than she's
ever went before.
And I'm going to tell you what has
happened in Nashville and what has happened around
the world.
We have got the idea that we can
just go out and we can just talk
to people and they can be saved any
old time.
And you know what happens if you go
down south and knock on the door and
you say, have you ever been saved?
Here's the big one down south.
You ever been born again?
Oh yes, I did that when I was
7, 11, 14, 22, and 37.
And he said, no, no, no, you've got
to unexplain everything these people have ever learned.
I am done asking people when they got
saved.
I'm done with that.
Now up here it may be different, but
down south you say you're saved?
Oh yes, I'm saved.
How did you get saved?
Well, I spoke to my dead grandmother last
night on the edge of my waterbed.
Now you've been eating too much pepperoni pizza
before you went to bed.
That's what your problem is.
You didn't take some Maalox and Burt to
get over that stuff.
But I promise you, you didn't talk to
some dead grandmama, and that's not what saved
your soul.
There's one thing that saved your soul, and
it's faith in the precious red royal blood
of Jesus Christ.
And you'll hear every single excuse that comes
down the pipe.
And every time Dick and Harry got another
experience and got some other thing with their
eyes flipped and whipped back in their head
and they barked like a dog and shimmied
up a tent pole.
And down south, everybody's been saved.
Everybody's been born again.
I am done asking people when they got
saved and when they got born again.
I'm going to start asking pastor.
I'm going to say, why don't you tell
me when you got under conviction?
Why don't you tell me when the Spirit
of God put you under conviction and showed
you that you were lost?
Why don't you tell me, mister?
Why don't you tell me, ma'am, when
it was that God's Holy Spirit worked you
over and showed you from the Word of
God that you had broken God's law and
that you needed to be saved?
I believe that may get this world's attention
just a little bit more.
We're dealing with rebels in America.
I mean, we are dealing with rank heresy
and radical reprobates all over America.
I believe we could take a supersonic video
camera and we could drop it down to
the fiery depths of hell and it would
not scare most of the people that I'm
preaching to across America.
But I'm telling you, like nothing else in
all the world, man, when the Holy Spirit
of God puts somebody under conviction, they know
they need something.
They know they need to be saved.
And I'm telling you, we have over-emphasized
our preaching, our witnessing, and our gospel tracts,
and we are so scared not to lead
somebody in a prayer because, you know, I
tell you, if they don't get it now,
they may never get it.
But I'm going to tell you what, I
believe there's going to be a whole lot
of Baptists standing one day at the judgment
seat of Christ who picked some green fruit,
who tried to rush somebody through a prayer,
whether it be a child on the bus,
whether it be in a door, or somebody
in a rescue mission, or somebody in a
jail cell, or somebody that came forth, and
they weren't quite ready, but they said, oh,
let me just run you down the Roman's
Road.
I'm telling you, the Roman's Road is great,
but it's wonderful to see somebody under old
-fashioned conviction.
And I'm telling you, when you run somebody
down the Roman's Road and just pray with
them for the sake of praying with them,
that's usually why they don't last.
You better baptize them that night because, bless
God, they won't be back for six more
years.
But when the Holy Spirit puts somebody under
conviction, and you get a Holy Spirit convert,
not a Greg Locke convert, those kinds stick,
friend, and they stay with the church for
a long time.
They make good tithers, amen.
They're the best kind of Christians I have
in the church.
Good tithers, amen.
And I'm telling you, ladies and gentlemen, regeneration
without repentance, it's a myth.
Conversion without conviction, it's a myth.
Let me tell you something that bothers me.
When I was seventeen years old, I flew
to Chicago, Illinois, and I got off the
airplane, and I went and preached at the
Pacific Guard mission.
Actually, I'm sorry, I was eighteen years old,
and I was fixing to be a senior
in high school.
I graduated about a year or so late,
a year and a half, because of my
background that I won't get into.
But nonetheless, I got off the airplane.
They let me preach two or three of
the night in the overflow crowd.
At 6.30 in the morning, on Saturday
morning, I got to preach at 6.30
in the morning to about 350 people.
And that's an ungodly hour of the morning
to be up, much less preaching the Bible.
But nonetheless, I was preaching to them.
On Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, they took me
street preaching.
I didn't know what street preaching was from
a rubber spare tire on the side of
the road.
They said, we're going to go street preaching.
I said, what's that?
They said, you'll be Bible screaming people when
they walk by.
And I said, wow, that sounds pretty good.
And so we got a little box, and
we get out there.
Go say the Lord.
They put me on the subway.
They put me right in the middle of
the street.
Well, about the last day, we were going
street preaching.
We did that for a while.
Then they said, well, let's split up and
let's do a little bit of evangelism.
Let's do a little bit of track passing.
I said, yeah, that'd be fine.
And I'd passed out some facts before then,
but I'd never seen guys zealous like this.
I mean, these guys were zealous.
I mean, they'd pass out a stack of
gospel tracts.
I mean, they'd go anywhere.
And so we all had these big old
packs of tracts, had them in our pockets,
and all over the place had these little
patches on our back and around our hips.
And so we're passing out these tracts just
all over the place doing those street preaching.
And I'm with a guy, and I'll call
his name William.
His name wasn't, but for sake of illustration,
it will be.
I was with William, and he was walking
with me.
He was about, oh, maybe about three years
older than I at the time.
So this time, he's probably 20 years old,
21 years old, something like that.
And so we're walking around, and we walk
by kind of a low-income type of
area there in Chicago, Illinois, one of the
backside, one of the kind of little alleyways.
And, you know, I'm walking around, and I'm
a little bit nervous about this.
You know, there's gangs driving by, people honking
a horn and screaming and hollering, graffiti all
over the place.
He said, come on.
He said, I know some of these guys.
He said, let's go over and talk to
them about tracts.
I said, all right.
So we walked over there.
Gospel truth.
If I've ever told the truth to the
pulpit, I'm telling you right now.
We walked over there, and there was a
banister about this high, about our face.
It was where the basketball court started.
We were just kind of standing in one
of these little viaducts, little sewer-like, little
ditch-type things, you know.
It didn't have any water in it.
It was kind of empty and dry.
So we stood over there, and he said,
hey, boys!
He gave a big old whistle like this.
All these boys come walking over here.
Must have been 25, 30 of them.
It's a bunch of little kids.
I mean, there's anywhere from 6 years old
to 15 years old.
Maybe 18 years old, something like that.
Just a bunch of them.
25, 30 kids.
They all come running over there.
And this guy, William, turned and looked at
me, and he said, watch this.
He pointed out a bunch of gospel tracts,
and he started handing them all out to
them fellas, and I thought, man, this is
pretty good.
We're going to be a chance to preach
these fellas.
I was preaching over the Bible.
John chapter 3, just read back and go
at it.
He said, how many of you fellas would
like to go to heaven when you die?
I mean, we didn't even get to shake
hands.
I mean, they're all up here.
We're down here.
Well, most of them raised their hands.
A couple of them just kind of, ah,
man, them crazy preachers.
Hey, whenever I start dribbling basketball, spin on
the finger, shooting the basketball, going back, shooting
the hoops again.
So he said again, how many of you
people want to go to heaven when you
die?
All these little kids.
Oh, me, me, me, me, me, me, me.
God's on His truth.
This is exactly what He did to every
one of them.
He said, bow your heads.
All of them bowed.
That's all He asked them.
You want to go to heaven when you
die?
They all bowed their heads.
He said, repeat after me.
Dear God, dear God, normal sinner, normal sinner,
please come to my heart and save me,
please come to my heart and save me.
Take me to heaven when I die.
In Jesus' name, amen, amen, amen.
We walked away, and buddy, he pulled out
a card out of his pocket.
Pulled out a card out of his pocket.
And there's little boxes, little boxes all over
that card.
He started check-marking about how many people
he thought prayed to sin or prayed.
And he said, brother, we must have got
20 or 25 on the day.
Woo!
We must have got 20 or 25 on
the day.
And you say, that's a pity.
That is a pity.
But you know what?
Bible colleges are teaching our preacher boys how
to win souls the same way all over
this country.
And I'm telling you, there was 20, 25,
maybe 30 kids that bowed their hearts, knew
nothing about breaking the law of God, knew
nothing about sin, knew nothing about being born
again, knew nothing about being saved, but they
were rushed through some little prayer.
Hey, if you just rush somebody through a
prayer and get them saved, then we can
have more parakeets in heaven and we can
have people in heaven.
You can make a parakeet say anything.
We've learned the parakeet principle when it comes
to soul winning.
But let me give you this third one.
Everything's been kind of smooth up until now,
okay?
Don't let me lose you on this third
point, alright?
This third point gets me in more trouble
than any other point I preach on whenever
I preach a message like this.
Now, I don't mind being quoted.
I just don't like being misquoted.
I don't mind being understood.
I just don't like being misunderstood.
So please understand me before you write me
off.
I'm not going to preach heresy.
Just follow me, alright?
Bad doctrine number one, regeneration without repentance.
No such thing.
Bad doctrine number two, conversion without conviction.
No such thing.
Bad doctrine number three, salvation without surrender.
Say, what in the world are you talking
about?
Salvation without surrender.
Are you preaching that people are going to
be perfect?
No, no!
I do not believe when you get saved
you'll be sinless, but I do believe when
you get saved you'll want to sin less.
And I do believe we have raised a
generation of people that because we believe this
badness in the eternal security of the believer,
and we do, they think because they got
their fire insurance, because they got an escape
route and ladder out of hell, they think
they can live any way they jolly well
please, and they think they can use the
grace of God for lasciviousness.
And friend, I'm going to tell you, if
what you got did not change your life,
what you got did not save your soul.
And we are living in a day when
people think they can live any way they
want to and still be saved.
I had a lady come to me one
day.
She is of the Pentecostal persuasion.
I'll not be rude, that's just what she
was.
She came to me and she was a
little bit upset.
Now you know she's upset.
I've been married for five years and I
know when ladies are upset, but nonetheless, she
came to me and her hair was going
from either side.
You know what, when a guy walks when
a guy's upset, he just kind of walks
stiff neck, you know, walks like this.
But when a lady's upset, I mean that
head's just a fly.
And I mean that hair was flying around,
you know, flies all over the place, get
in her face and everything else.
She walked up to me and she said,
Brother man!
And I said, yes ma'am.
May I help you?
I just got through preaching on the Prodigal
Son.
And when I preach on that message, I
have a couple different titles for the message,
Amen, depending on who I preach it to.
But nonetheless, when I got through preaching that
message from Luke 15, Some Considerations Before You
Pack Your Bags, it deals with about 10
or 15 minutes on the eternal security of
the believer.
So she came to me and she said,
I'll tell you what you Baptists believe.
Ever had anybody tell you what you believe
before you tell them what you believe?
She said, you Baptists believe that you can
be saved, you can make your profession live
any way you want to.
And she said, you still got it.
You're going to heaven.
She said, I don't believe that's scriptural.
I said, you know what?
I said, I don't believe that's scriptural either.
Her mouth fell open about like that.
And she said, what do you mean?
I said, that isn't what I believe.
I said, I believe a man makes a
profession and goes out and lives like the
devil.
He never got saved to begin with.
I said, because I don't believe a saved
man bless God, wants to go out and
live like the devil.
I said, I believe God will clean him
up.
And Paul said, such were some of you,
but ye are clean, but ye are washed
through the Word which I have spoken unto
you.
And she said, well, I'll tell you one
thing about this eternal security business.
She said, I don't know a whole lot,
but I know one thing.
She said, one of us is wrong when
it comes to this thing.
And I said, yes, ma'am, I know
more than that.
I know which one of us it is.
I said, because when the Bible says a
person is saved, they are saved not for
five minutes, not for five days, but they
are saved for time and for eternity.
I can swing over hell in a rotten
cornstalk, spit the devil in the eye and
sing Amazing Grace.
I've got my salvation for him, and I'm
not worried about losing it, but that does
not give me a license to live wicked.
That gives me a license to live holy,
righteous and godly.
And I believe we have raised a generation
of people that know nothing about the lordship
of Christ.
I do not preach lordship salvation.
I don't think when a person gets saved
they have to know everything there is to
know about Jesus Christ being Lord.
They don't have to know all the dispensational
truths and the seven dispensational break-ups in
the Bible as C.I. Schofield tells us.
And they don't have to know the hermeneutics
and the homiletics.
And they don't have to know the minor
prophets and the major prophets in Genesis 1
-1 through Revelation 22-25.
And they don't have to know that there
are 791,328 words in the Bible and
31,101 chapters or verses in the Bible
and 1,189 chapters in the Bible.
They don't have to know all that.
They don't have to know that God flung
the stars in the sky and breathed into
man the breath of life and man became
a living soul.
So when I preach on surrender and submission,
that's not what I'm dealing with.
I don't think you have to know everything
that there is to know about the Lordship
of Christ when you get saved.
But when you get saved, you won't have
any problem with Jesus Christ being Lord of
your life.
And I tell you, friend, we are living
in a day when people do not want
Christ to rule them.
But whether you want Him to be Lord
or not, He's Lord already.
Some of these teenagers...
It'll happen this summer.
It happens all the time.
We go to a camp and I'll preach
somewhere and my wife and I'll be somewhere
and some young person will say, Brother Love,
I made Jesus Lord of my life.
I tell you what, that excites me.
I know what they mean.
But you know what?
You don't make Jesus anything.
He was Lord long before you and I
ever came around.
And He'll be Lord when you and I
and our pea-sized brains are dead cold
and six feet in the ground.
He is Lord.
Philippians 2, 5-11.
Let this man be in you, which was
also in Christ Jesus, who being in the
form of God thought it not robbery to
be equal with God, but made himself of
no reputation and took upon Him the form
of a servant and was made in the
likeness of men and being found in fashion
as a man, he humbled himself and became
obedient unto death, even the death of the
cross.
Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him and
given him a name which is above every
name, that at the name of Jesus every
knee should bow, with things in heaven and
things in earth and things under the earth,
and that every tongue should confess that Jesus
Christ is Lord to the glory of God
the Father.
Like it, love it, bump it, jump it,
mark it, pay rent.
He is Lord tonight whether you want Him
to be or not.
And I tell you, ladies and gentlemen, there
is no such thing as salvation without salvation.
Now, I do believe that change is gradual.
I'm not saying a person's going to change
overnight.
I've had people approach me and they say,
well, you're saying a Christian can't get drunk?
I didn't say that.
I believe a Christian can get drunk, but
I don't think a Christian can stay drunk.
I believe a Christian can fall into immorality,
but I don't believe a Christian will be
continuously, incessantly immoral.
Because I believe there's something inside of a
person called the nature of Christ, the sweet
Holy Spirit of God that will convict them
and show them that they need to get
right.
Now, let me tell you something that really,
really flusters me.
Something that really, really bothers me, if I
can be negative for a moment.
I've tried to be positive tonight, by the
way, but if I can be negative for
a moment, here's something that bothers me.
It bothers me when preacher boys in our
colleges are taught this, and I know they
are.
They walk up to a door.
Some guy comes to the door.
We'll call him Joe Blow Beer Belly, alright?
So Joe Blow Beer Belly comes to the
door.
He's got a big old beer belly.
He's got a Budweiser in his hand.
Hey, you want a Budweiser?
No, bud, you'd be wise to leave it
alone.
But anyhow, he's got a Budweiser in his
hand, and he's been rolling his dope, smoking
his Marlboro cigarettes.
He beats his wife, beats his kids.
I mean, kicks the devil out of his
kids every night before they go to bed.
He's a drunkard.
He's a fornicator.
He's an adulterer.
He's filled with pornography in Hollywood.
Never goes to church.
You can't pull his big toenail off and
get him to come to church on Christmas
and Easter.
Wicked, don't read his Bible, won't pray, won't
carry his kids, won't carry his wife to
church.
I mean, wicked, wicked, wicked, wicked, wicked.
So they knock on the door.
Here's what they've been taught.
No matter what happens, keep the line of
conversation open.
And so he starts to slam the door.
I ain't worried about none of you Bible
preachers.
He starts to slam the door.
They stick their foot in the door and
say, wait a minute, sir, wouldn't you like
to go to heaven when you die?
How many people do you actually think when
you ask that, they're going to say, no.
How many people do you think are going
to say that?
Not a whole lot.
There may be a few.
And of those that would say that are
probably a reprobate incapable of being saved.
They've already committed the unpardonable sin.
They're not going to be saved anyhow.
But most people, when you say, would you
like to go to heaven when you die,
most of them are going to say, well,
sure, I'd love to go to heaven when
I die.
And so here's what they do.
They kind of con him in.
They say, okay, I want you to pray
after me.
And here's what they do.
They bow their heads and they say, dear
God, dear God, I know I'm a sinner.
I know I'm a sinner.
Now, sir, make sure you mean this.
I know I'm a sinner.
I want to go to heaven when I
die.
I want to go to heaven when I
die.
Please come to my heart and save me.
In Jesus' name, in Jesus' name, amen, amen.
Sir, did you mean that?
I meant that.
No, no, no.
Did you really, really mean that?
I meant that.
Did you mean it with all of your
heart?
I meant it with all of my heart.
All right, God bless you.
So they leave.
And so they pull out their ink pen,
they pull out their paper, and they say
out, what was that guy's name again?
Oh, yeah, Joe Blow Beerbelly.
And so they write down Joe Blow Beerbelly.
They go back to chapel.
They get up and they have the microphone
shoved in their face and they say, the
Lord allowed me and Jim Bob to lead
Joe Blow Beerbelly.
You know that drunk down the road, that
wicked guy?
And he allowed us to pray with him
and lead him to Jesus Christ.
And everybody says, oh, hallelujah, glory to God,
he's the best soul winner in the whole
school.
Stop even giving people time to change, don't
you?
So six days go by.
Six weeks go by.
Six months go by.
Six years go by.
Joe Blow Beerbelly still drinks his beer, still
smokes his dope, still sucks his cigarettes, still
beats his family, still never reads his Bible,
still a fornicator, still adulterous, still ungodly, still
won't go to church, still is just as
wicked as he's ever been.
And there's people out there rejoicing that old
Joe Blow Beerbelly got saved.
And I'll tell you one thing, if he
did, he didn't get what I got.
That's for sure.
And I'll tell you, I believe we've cheapened
salvation in America.
We have cheapened the grace of God.
Hey!
Salvation is free, bless God, but it ain't
cheap.
It cost the Lord Jesus Christ His precious
blood on Calvary's tree.
And I believe we have taught people to
trample through that blood and telling people they
can live any way they want to, and
that's not true.
There'll be a change, a dynamic change in
somebody's life.
Hey!
If what you've got can't take you to
church, I promise you what you've got can't
take you to heaven.
And I'm telling you, friend, I believe there'll
be a change in somebody's life.
I've had a well-meaning evangelist, a good
evangelist, a man that I respect highly in
the ministry, love him, pray for him often.
I'm not going to give his name, because
many of you in this room would know
him.
He is well my Savior.
I praise the Lord for every soul He's
ever won.
But he knows that I preach this way
sometimes, and he doesn't.
He preaches that it's a sin problem, not
a salvation problem.
You can basically live any way you want
to.
And here's what he asked me.
He said, Brother Locke, I was saved when
I was four years old.
Count them, one, two, three, four.
I was saved when I was four.
I said, I believe that.
I believe in all my heart somebody can
be saved when they're four.
The Robertson family that travels with us, little
Aaron Robertson, he was saved, I believe, honey,
when he was four, something like that.
And so I said, I believe you can
be saved at four.
And he said, well, you're always preaching that
God changes lives and you've got to surrender
and all this and submit.
He said, what did God save me from?
He said, He didn't have to change my
life.
He said, I was four years old.
He said, perhaps He had to save you
out of all that.
I said, okay.
I said, when I got saved, I was
saved out of juvenile delinquency.
I said, I was saved out of smoking
dope, out of drinking some booze with my
friends, out of smoking my cigarettes, out of
being stupid, and out of being just a
rebel and hating mom and hating dad and
hating God and wouldn't go to church, wouldn't
read my bio.
I said, I was saved out of the
world.
I said, I was saved out of Hollywood
and out of just rap music loving it.
I said, that's right.
I was saved out of every bit of
that.
I said, have you ever done any of
that?
He said, no.
I wouldn't know what a marijuana cigarette was.
It rolled up and dropped in my lap.
And I said, you see there?
I said, there's the difference.
I said, God saved me out of all
of that.
That's how He changed my life.
I said, God kept you from ever getting
into it, and that's how He changed your
life.
And I don't care if they're four years
old or 104 years old, I believe in
surrender when a person gets saved by the
grace of God.
I believe it will be the process.
Let's not get sanctification and salvation messed up.
Now, salvation is one-time, instantaneous submission, sanctification,
separation, surrender.
That takes a process.
That takes a time.
I understand that.
I believe in giving people time, but I
believe with all of my heart, ladies and
gentlemen, that the people that sit in our
church pews, they are rebellious to the Spirit
of God.
They have never been saved.
They talk about all the things that they've
done in the past.
And I think what a whole lot of
people need around America is a good old
-fashioned dip.
And I'm not talking about the baptismal waters,
and I'm not talking about snuff, amen.
They need to get saved by the grace
of God.
They need to be born again.
And I believe salvation always equals surrender.
Can I give you this and we'll be
through and we'll go home?
Number one, regeneration without repentance.
No such thing.
Conversion without conviction.
No such thing.
No such thing whatsoever.
Salvation without surrender.
No such thing.
Now, let's talk about God's people for a
moment.
Happiness without holiness.
No such thing.
People are like, well, you know, brother, like,
if I just, if I had a lot
of money, I'd be happy.
Well, if you had a lot of money,
you might be happy for a day.
You know, there's a big difference between happiness
and joy.
Happiness is based on my circumstances.
Joy is based on the fact that I've
been saved by the grace of God and
not you, me, the devil, or anybody else
can do anything about it.
That's joy.
That's why Paul could write about joy in
Philippians chapter 1, 2, 3, 4 that we
preached on the other night.
And I preached on what makes Paul tick.
Keeping your eyes on the prize.
He had the joy of Christ.
He didn't write from the Hilton High Rise.
He wasn't in the Holiday Inn Express.
No sirree bob.
He was in a stony, cold jail floor
in a Roman province.
But yet he had joy.
People say, well, I'd be happy if I
had better friends.
I'd be happy if I had another spouse.
I'd be happy if I had a bigger
bank account.
I'd be happy if I had a Rolls
Royce or a Lexus or a BMW.
I'd be happy if I had a Harley
Davidson.
Amen.
I'd just be happy.
Now, I'm going to tell you what will
make you happy as a child of God.
Money's not going to make you happy.
Friends aren't going to make you happy, but
living for God will make you happy.
You see, we've got this idea in Christianity
that we can do what we want to
do and we can still be happy.
No, you can't because the Spirit of God
will make sure you're miserable, friend.
And you just try to be saved and
live in sin and see what happens.
God will take you to the woodshed and
He'll wear you out.
I mean, He'll show you you're wrong.
He'll put you in the lion's den.
He'll put you in the fiery furnace.
He'll crank down the vice grips.
I'm telling you what, ladies and gentlemen, He
knows what He needs to do to get
His people right and you will never be
happy until you first want to be holy.
And holiness is a forgotten doctrine in modern
-day Christianity.
Somebody says, Doc, what do you think about
American Christianity?
I think it's far too American and not
enough Christian.
That's what I think about it.
Because we've quit preaching the holiness of God,
the sinfulness of man, and that God still
requires man to be holy.
Leviticus 11 44, Be ye holy, for I
am holy, sayeth the Lord God of hosts.
Somebody says, well, that's an Old Testament verse.
Well, for you Old Testament lovers, God liked
that verse so much, He repeated the same
one in 1 Peter 1 16.
Be ye holy, for I am holy, sayeth
the Lord God of hosts.
Isaiah chapter number 6 and verse number 4,
the Bible says, Holy, holy, holy is the
Lord God of hosts.
And I'm telling you, we did a good
old-fashioned dose of the holiness of God
like never before.
And I'm telling you, God's people will never
be happy until God's people first have a
desire and a passion to want to be
holy.
You'll never be happy.
You'll never be fulfilled.
People have the idea, well, you know, you
people are so narrow-minded.
They say, brother, be a little more open
-minded about life.
I know some people are so open-minded,
their brains fell out years ago, amen.
And I'm telling you, I don't need to
be open-minded about what God Almighty's already
been closed-minded about.
He tells us to come out from among
them and be ye separate, sayeth the Lord,
and touch not the unclean.
I got a new message.
I've been preaching to teenagers.
It's on the back table.
It's called, Oh boy, there they go again.
You know, that's what some young people think
whenever we preach on separation.
Oh boy, there they go again.
That's all they can preach on.
How to dress, how to walk, how to
talk, what to listen to, what to watch,
what to wear, how to spit, how to
wear your hat, how to wear your clothes.
And they say, Oh boy, here they go
again.
But I want to remind you, it's a
commandment to come out from among them.
It's a commandment that we don't look like,
act like, dress like, and walk like this
world.
It is a commandment that God's people are
peculiar and that God's people are different.
You know, sometimes we read that word peculiar
in the Bible and it scares us to
death.
We think the word peculiar means that we've
got to carry around a Bible that's about
this big.
And we've got to have big old bell
-bottom britches and we've got to have them
pulled all the way up to our chest.
And we've got to have a polka-dotted
tie with a striped shirt and big old
thick Coke bottle glasses.
And we've got to walk around and say,
Glory to God, peace on earth, goodwill toward
men.
No, He said be different, not stupid.
There's a big difference between the two.
And I'm going to be honest with you,
we're supposed to be peculiar.
Hey, I'm not supposed to be like this
world.
You know why I don't dress like I
used to dress?
Because I've been saved.
You know why I've got a new song
in my heart?
Because I've been saved.
You know why I don't talk like I
used to talk, hang around the people I
used to hang around?
Hey, by the way, I could still do
all of those things tonight.
Did you know that?
Now, that'll part your hair right down the
middle, will it not?
I can tonight, as a preacher of the
gospel, still live the same way I lived
before I got saved nine and a half
years ago.
The difference is, I just don't want to
live that way anymore.
Because God's changed my heart.
God's changed my life.
He didn't give me heart surgery.
He ripped out that old defrayed heart and
threw it down to the flames of hell
where it belonged and put in within me
the nature of Christ.
A heart after the things of God.
And I'm telling you, you'll never be happy
until you first learn to be good.
Somebody said, well, does God really require for
His people to live right?
Well, get your nose out of the newspaper
and put it in the Bible.
You tell me.
Yes, sir.
Read Bob over and over and over again.
He tells his people to do right.
As Dr. Bob Jones, Jr. used to say,
I used to tell him the joke earlier
in the week how he used to keep
his dentures in.
They thought he just kind of hollered like
that and it got more volume out of
his mouth.
No, he's keeping his teeth in his mouth
is what he's doing.
But you know what he'd do?
He'd say, do right, do right, do right,
till the stars fall.
What was he saying?
No matter what happens, no matter if the
movie house, the crack house, the white house,
the church house, or your house, he said
just keep on doing right.
Just keep on living right.
Keep on living holy.
And I'm telling you, happiness without holiness is
a doctrine that is not in the Word
of God.
But being holy, being righteous, having the blessings
of God upon your life, and then being
happy is definitely a Bible doctrine.
Psalm 1-1.
Blessed is the man, or happy is the
man.
Well, blessed means happy.
Don't you want to be happy?
Of course you do.
So here's how you need to be happy.
Blessed is the man, or the woman in
context, who walketh not in the counsel of
the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of
sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the
Spirit.
His delight is in the law of the
Lord.
In his law doth he meditate day and
night.
He should be like a tree planted by
the rivers of water that bringeth forth his
fruit in his season.
His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever
he doeth shall prosper.
What did Paul tell him?
I charge you therefore before God, the Lord
Jesus Christ, who shall judge both the quick
and the dead, and in the period of
the kingdom preach the word.
He is an in season, out of season,
reprover, rebuke, and resort with all wrongs, suffering,
and doctrine.
For the time will come, it's here tonight,
when they will not endure sound doctrine.
But he to themselves, teachers, having each in
years, and shall turn their hearts from the
truth, and shall be turned unto fables.
But what did he tell him?
Watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, and
do the work of an evangelist.
And I believe these are the four things
that need to be dealt with tonight in
all around America.
Regeneration without repentance, no such thing.
Conversion without conviction, no such thing according to
the Bible.
Salvation without submission, no, no.
You will submit to the Lordship of Christ.
He wants to be your Lord.
And happiness without holiness, no such thing.
If you're not happy tonight, it's because you're
not holy tonight.