We're back in chapter number 20 in your
New Testament Bible tonight.
Good to see you.
I hope that you have a wonderful weekend.
Trust that you did.
Good services in the church that you attended.
And I'm looking forward to the service tonight,
tomorrow night, and also Wednesday night.
Enjoyed so much the three services that we
were able to have last week.
Praise the Lord for the good spirit.
This is the third, as we've said several
times, this is the third of the staff
training revivals that we've done.
And it's the third one that I've done,
because this is the third one that the
camp has done.
But I believe this has been the one
that has had the best spirit.
Usually on the first night, you're filling me
out, I'm filling you out.
It's a little bit difficult to know what
to preach.
But the first night, I believe the Lord
just really gave us a good breakthrough, a
good time of a spirit of revival.
And then the next two nights, things just
wonderfully, wonderfully worked together.
And we just praise the Lord for the
good spirit.
And I appreciate your kindness, appreciate your compassion,
your hospitality towards me throughout the week.
I've enjoyed getting to know many, many of
you.
Able to go with Brother Raymond yesterday down
to his dad's church and also Cat Douglas.
They enjoyed that so much.
Good to have the Robertson family back.
Glad the Lord brought them back safely.
Glad Brother Duffy's able to be with us
tonight.
Hope it'll make him sick while I'm preaching.
Amen.
Acts chapter number 20.
That's all.
Stand, please, out of respect for God's Word
tonight.
Acts chapter number 20.
Let your eyes please fall to verse number
7.
Just a little while, we'll be turning to
2 Timothy, but that'll be in just a
bit.
Acts chapter 20 and verse 7, the Bible
says, And upon the first day of the
week, when the disciples came together to break
bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart
on the morrow, and continued his speech until
midnight, verse 8.
And there were many lights in the upper
chamber where they were gathered together.
And there sat in a window a certain
young man named Eutychus, being fallen into a
deep sleep, and as Paul was long preaching,
he sunk down with sleep and fell down
from the third loft and was taken up
dead.
And Paul went down and fell on him,
and embracing him said, Trouble not yourselves, for
his life is in him.
When he therefore was come up again and
had broken bread and eaten and talked a
long while, even till the break of day,
so he departed.
And they brought the young man alive and
were not a little comforted.
Tonight I bring you the simple message, why
are people falling out of the church?
Thank you very much.
You may be seated.
Let's bow our heads and hearts.
And let's pray and ask the Lord to
bless our time together tonight.
Now, thank you, Lord, for the day you've
given us.
It's been a profitable day, and for that
we're grateful.
But now, Lord, our hearts have come to
the time when we realize the devil's going
to discourage and distract us from listening to
the message of the Bible.
And so, Lord, we plead the blood of
Jesus Christ upon the devil, the demons, and
the imps of hell, that they would have
no control nor power in their service for
the next few moments.
Father, we pray the Spirit of God would
have full convicting power and sway.
We pray that Jesus Christ would be uplifted
and exalted.
We pray the Bible would be preached with
authority.
And, Lord, that you would help me tonight,
that you would empty me of myself.
Fill me with thy precious Holy Spirit.
And, Lord, I pray that I would not
deviate from the text of the Word of
God tonight.
But, Lord, you would stir our hearts.
But more than that, you would change our
hearts based on what we're going to hear
from the Bible tonight.
And I pray that this would be a
great challenge to us.
And, Father, you would help us to avoid
some of the pitfalls that we'll deal with
in just a few moments.
And we'll thank you for everything that you'll
say and do, for it's in Jesus' name
that we ask it and pray.
Amen.
Acts chapter number 20 is not only a
familiar portion of Scripture, but it's a very
interesting portion of Scripture.
The Bible says that here's the Apostle Paul.
He's gathered together with the disciples.
And by way of context, he's obviously with
other people as well.
The Bible says that he's meeting in a
third-story church building, if you will.
And there were many lights, such as there
are here tonight, in the upper chamber.
I don't exactly know how many people were
there.
The Bible does not tell us what Paul
was preaching.
But I know one thing.
When the Holy Spirit of God says you're
a long-winded preacher, friend, you must be
a long-winded preacher.
Because the Bible says that Paul was a
long while preaching.
Matter of fact, he was preaching so long
that another fellow decided he'd get himself a
little cat nap.
And the Bible says that Paul was preaching
up until the time of about midnight.
And here was this funny fellow with a
funny name by the name of Eutychus.
He was sitting up in the window, and
the Bible says that he fell asleep, and
all of a sudden he began to just
get a little daydreaming, and then his eyes
began to close, he began to breathe heavy.
And before you know it, pal, he was
catching some Z's, and he fell out the
window of a third-story church, and splat
on the ground, was taken up dead.
Now, you talk about in the middle of
a revival meeting how you can get things
stirred up.
Just push somebody out of the top of
the church, friend, that'll do it for sure.
And here's a man that fell out of
the church, and he went and got splat
on the ground, and the apostle Paul didn't
even miss a lick.
Read your Bible.
He just jumped right back down there.
He went down there, laid on top of
him.
He said, don't worry about this fellow, his
life is in him.
Brought him back from the dead.
Pulled the guy up there.
The Bible says, and the people were not
a little comforted.
That's a funny phrase.
You know what that means?
It means they were a lot comforted.
And here Paul, the Bible says, continued his
speech until midnight.
But the funny thing about this is, here's
this fellow sleeping in a window.
He falls out.
Paul goes down.
Never misses a beep.
Never even skips a point, if you will.
Raises him from the dead.
Brings him back.
And your Bible says, and my Bible says,
that he continued his speech until the break
of day.
Do you know what would happen to me
if I preached until 6 o'clock tomorrow
morning?
When I came back next year for Staff
Training Revival, that would be too soon.
That's exactly what would happen for him.
And here was a man that not only
preached till midnight.
Here is a man that preached all the
way until the wee hours of the morning.
And you talk about a man.
It never even says anything about his Cheerios,
his Wheaties, or his scrambled eggs.
He just packed up his Bible.
And he went on to the next meeting
and kept preaching the Word of God.
But here was an interesting man.
We could speculate tonight, by the way.
We could probably preach a silly sermon.
I've heard a lot of silly sermons.
But we could probably preach a silly sermon
on why was he sitting up in the
window.
I have no idea.
If he was the average person, the average
Baptist church, he was probably catching a smoke
while Paul was preaching.
But nonetheless, here he was sitting in the
window.
But yet the Bible says that he fell
asleep and he fell out.
I'm going to be honest with you.
I believe the physical condition, what happened to
Mr. Eutychus, is a great spiritual picture.
Because you know what?
We could sit here tonight and we will
not do it.
We could sit here tonight and we could
raise hands and we could have people stand
up and we could testify of people who
we knew at your college or in your
church or somebody that you knew well or
somebody that was even on staff one time
at this camp.
You can think of people right now who
at one time in their life, they seemed
like they were the faithless Christian you knew.
It seemed like they were on fire for
God.
Man, they were devouring the Word of God.
As Job said, I esteem the words of
my mouth more than my necessary food.
And man, they were church lovers.
They were God lovers.
They were soul winners.
They were separated.
And I mean, it seemed like they had
everything going and they had the power of
God.
And all of a sudden, something happened in
their life and you couldn't find them tonight
with a pack of bloodhounds.
Why is that?
Why is it that people fall away, if
you will?
Why is it that people seemingly fall out
of the church?
Why is it that all of a sudden
somebody can be so faithful and so God
-honoring and all of a sudden they get
backslidden, they get rebellious, they find themselves in
the hog pen with a prodigal son saying
to themselves, I wish that I would have
never left to begin with.
Even the slaves and the servants in my
father's house have it better than I do.
Why is it that people fall away?
I want you to take your Bibles tonight,
please, where we will have the rest of
our message to 2 Timothy 4.
The book of 2 Timothy 4, I believe
there's a man here who can illustrate what
I'm trying to preach to you tonight.
2 Timothy 4.
You know the books of 1 and 2
Timothy and Titus are basically all three major
New Testament books.
They deal much with the local church, but
basically they have three qualifications.
Number one, they have the qualifications for preachers
and their wives.
Number two, they have the qualifications for deacons
and their wives.
And number three, they have the qualifications for
church membership and also the qualifications for church
dismissal.
But yet in 2 Timothy 4, we have
what I refer to as the swan song,
if you will, the going-out status, the
going-out song of the Apostle Paul.
He knows good and well that he's fixing
to go to the Roman chopping block.
He knows that down the steps of the
Empress' palace, his head is going to roll.
And he begins to say some things to
young Timothy.
Now, just for sake of an outline, I'm
going to outline for you several verses in
2 Timothy 4.
But it is not the outline that I'm
preaching on.
So when I preach for one or two
minutes, don't get excited, alright?
This is not the outline that I'm preaching
on.
Just for sake of introduction to build up
to verse number 10, let me give you
a simple outline and we'll alliterate what the
letters are.
Number one, I give you what I call
the realization.
2 Timothy 4, verse 1.
Would you look there?
Paul is writing, he says, I charge thee
therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ,
who shall judge the quick and the dead
of his appearing in his kingdom.
So he opens up by telling young Timothy,
Son, you one day are going to give
an account to Almighty God.
Everybody one day will stand before God in
one way or another, whether they want to
or not, whether they like it or not,
whether they believe it or not.
So he begins with the realization.
Based on that realization, he then gives, secondly,
the responsibility.
That responsibility is in verse number 2.
Look there, he says, Preach the word.
Be instant in season, out of season.
Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
Why, Timothy?
Please look at verse 3.
He tells Timothy why.
For the time will come when they will
not endure sound doctrine.
But after their own lusts shall they heed
to themselves teachers having itching ears.
And they, that's these people to whom he's
preaching, shall turn away their ears from the
truth and shall be turned unto fables.
But watch thou in all things.
Endure afflictions.
Do the work of an evangelist.
Make full proof of thy ministry.
Why?
Because number 3, what I call the readiness.
Look in your Bibles, verse 6.
For I am now ready to be offered.
And the time of my departure is at
hand.
I have fought a good fight.
I have finished my course.
I have kept the faith.
So Paul said, listen, I've lived my life
to the fullest.
He said, I've preached with all the zeal
and all the vigor I can muster up.
He said, I've led people to Christ.
I know they're fixing to kill me.
I'm coming to the end of a soul
-winning road.
He said, but I am ready.
Why?
He was ready because of verse number 8,
what we call the reward.
Look in verse 8, please.
He said, henceforth, or because of this.
Henceforth there is laid up for me a
crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous
Judge, shall give me at that day, and
not unto me only, but unto them also
that love is appearing.
Now, and dealing with all of this, he
says it's all worth it based on the
fact that one day we will be rewarded
at the judgment seat of Christ.
But notice, he then changes his tune, if
you will.
He then seemingly diverts and has an entirely
different set of circumstances that he's preaching about.
Look in your Bibles, please, at verse number
9.
All of a sudden he says, do thy
diligence to come shortly unto me.
That's what I call the request.
Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me.
He said, Timothy, I'm a little bit lonely
for fellowship.
I'm a little bit to the place where
I'm getting impatient and I know I've got
the Spirit of God that's with me and
I know I have other friends and other
people that love me.
He said, but listen, I'm a little bit
lonely.
I'm weary and longing to see your face
as a friend in Christ.
He said, would you please come and see
me?
That is the request.
Now, here's what I preach on tonight, the
reason.
Why did he make that request?
The Bible tells us, look at verse number
10.
For Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this
present world, and is departed unto Thessalonica, Cretans
to Galatia, Titus and to Dalmatia.
Only Luke is with me.
Take Mark and bring him with thee, for
he is profitable to me, Paul says, for
the ministry.
So, the reason for this request, the reason
that Paul said, son, would you come shortly
unto me?
Would you come quickly, fellowship with me?
Man, I've got to have a prayer meeting.
Would you come?
The reason for that request was simply, your
Bible says, for Demas hath forsaken me, having
loved this present world.
Now, we will not deal with other portions
of Scripture in the Bible where we read
about Demas for time's sake.
But if you write down sometimes, Colossians 4,
verse number 14, you will find out the
Bible says, Demas greeteth you.
He is mentioned there in the book of
Colossians at the end of the book.
Kind of the benediction, if you will, when
things are going out, the commencement exercise.
And he is mentioned there by way of
giving gratitude, by way of giving thanksgiving and
heartfelt devotion to the people of God.
So here is a man who no doubt,
according to the context of Scripture, was a
saved man.
Here was a man that not only knew
Jesus Christ as his personal Lord and Savior,
but here was a young man who was
able to be mentored and tutored by none
other than the Apostle Paul.
Outside of John the Baptist, who Jesus said
was the greatest man that ever walked forth
of the womb of a woman, I believe
the Apostle Paul was the greatest preacher, the
greatest pastor, the greatest evangelist, the greatest missionary,
the greatest author.
Here was the greatest soul winner more than
likely the world has ever known.
And Demas was under this great man of
God.
But yet my Bible tells me that the
love for the world that Demas had in
his heart, the love for the world that
Demas had in his life was so great
that he completely forsook the doctrines of the
Word of God.
He forsook that hot, fundamental Bible-preaching ministry
that he had with the Apostle Paul.
And he went from greeting the church to
not even going to church.
He went from being with one of the
greatest preachers that this world has ever known
who turned the world upside down and turned
every street corner in the Roman Empire into
a fundamental pulpit for Jesus Christ.
He went from that to absolute, utter devastation
and ruin.
And the Apostle Paul, with a broken, grieving
heart, says, Timothy, do thy diligence to come
shortly unto me, for Demas has forsaken me.
Have you ever read a verse like that
in the Bible, or better yet?
You ever seen that happen in somebody's life,
or you know somebody that you've prayed for,
and you know they're backslidden, you know they're
not right with God?
They know they're backslidden, they're not right with
God.
And here's what you think to yourself, because
I think it of myself.
How in the world can somebody go from
being faithful to God?
How in the world can somebody go from
devouring the Word of God, from praying, from
making all of these decisions?
Why is it that somebody can be so
on fire for Christ, coming to camp, leading
people to Christ, making decisions at an altar,
doing staff training?
Why is it that people can go up
like a rocket, and six years later come
down like a meteorite?
Why does that happen?
This message I must tell you quickly by
way of making a very long story very
short.
This message, when I was 18 years old,
was birthed out of a burden.
I was in Mexico, and I was there
just for the first time, and I've been
over there several times.
I was in a little town called Cuernavaca.
And when I was there in Cuernavaca, I
was not preaching as an 18-year-old
teenager.
I was a spectator at a big missions
conference.
I've been back several times since then and
been privileged to preach there.
But nonetheless, I was there.
I suppose we got there about Saturday night
or late, late Sunday night.
I can't quite remember.
The chairman of our deacon board, Brother Nevin
Wax, flew us over there.
And when my pastor was Dr. Tom Wallace
from Franklin Road, we all went.
And I was excited just to be there.
There was a young man whose name was
not Ronald, but it will be for my
message for the next few moments.
This young man, Ronald, was living at the
children's home with me, and he was a
good kid.
He really was.
I remember one night I preached at the
Pacific Garden Mission, the Nashville Rescue Mission in
Nashville, and I preached on 2 Corinthians 5,
17.
Therefore, for any man to be in Christ,
you know the verse.
I preached that.
While we were going home, he said, You
know, Greg, I don't believe I'm saved.
I need to be a new creation.
I don't believe I've ever been saved.
And so I talked to him.
Driving home, he bowed his head, bowed his
heart, got saved by the grace of God.
And I mean, it was almost like somebody
sprinkled 10-10 fertilizer on this kid.
I mean, he began to grow like a
weed.
I mean, he was rooted in the things
of Christ.
He was doing well.
And just before I went to Mexico, Brother
Norris, about two weeks before I went to
Mexico, I began to notice that there was
a little bit of coolness in his life.
I mean, here's a guy who was an
avid soul winner.
I remember one night we was driving by
this little place.
It's a little chicken restaurant now.
It was a little barbecuity restaurant at the
time.
They was building this little barbecue joint.
And we went passing by it, and these
guys were down in this big electrical manhole.
And I remember we drove by, and Ronald
said, Stop here!
Stop here, Greg!
So I pulled in there real fast, and
he got a stack full of gospel tracts,
and he started handing out these gospel tracts,
talking to these guys.
He said, Listen, if you touch one of
these wires, and it was hot, would you
go to hell?
I mean, he was zealous, buddy.
I mean, he'd talk to anybody about Christ.
Before we'd go to bed at night, we'd
get down on our knees, and we'd play
together.
And I heard him cry and weep for
his mom to be saved, and other people
in his family to be saved.
And I mean, here's a guy, he actually
thought that the call of the Lord might
be upon him to preach, and all that
God's hand was upon him.
And I said, Listen, just pray about it,
and let the Lord nurture that thing in
your heart.
And he really seemed to be doing well.
He was a good kid.
Seemed like he had a good head screwed
on his shoulders.
It was right.
He knew what he wanted in life, and
he was pleasing the Lord.
Now, obviously, he wasn't perfect.
Nobody is.
But nonetheless, about two weeks before I went
to Mexico, I started noticing that there's a
little bit of coolness in his attitude.
Some things began to change in his attitude
there at the children's home, and I kept
telling him, Listen, you have to change this.
You have to change that.
You have to change it.
It seemed like he was getting a little
bit more sneaky than normal, a little bit
more sneaky than usual.
And I thought to myself, Man, something's going
to happen.
I began to pray, and I began to
pray.
An overwhelming burden for this fellow, Ronald, when
I was in Mexico.
I was able to call back two times
when I was in Mexico.
I called back on Tuesday.
I called back on Friday.
Something like that, I believe.
But the first of the week, I called
back, and I mean, I'd only been gone
two or three days.
And I called back, and at the end
of the conversation, I told Brother Mike, I
said, By the way, I said, How's Ronald
doing?
He said, I was kind of hoping you
wouldn't ask the first time you called.
He said, I know I don't want to
ruin your trip there the first time to
Mexico.
He said, But we had to send Ronald
home.
He said, He went down to the barn.
He said, You know how he'd been slipping
around?
He said, He went back down there, and
he got to smoking again.
He said, He wouldn't give that up.
He said, He got to saying some things
you ought not say, doing some things you
ought not do, and this, that, and the
other.
He said, He just was rebellious.
He said, He just would not conform.
And he got all mad, and blew up,
and began to cuss, and spit, and holler,
and yell, and curse God and everything else.
And so he had to send him home.
And I remember I said, All right, Brother
Mike, I'll say I love you.
Goodbye.
And I hung up the phone.
And I was sitting under, I don't know,
it's kind of these little canopy-type things.
And we had this big old swanky high
-rise hotel.
You know, that's great to go outdoors, swim
and pool.
And I suppose it was about 6.30
at night.
Service started at 7 o'clock.
We just got through with dinner.
And I was sitting out there, and I
had my Bible as an 18-year-old
teenager.
And I remember I took my hands, and
I buried my face in my hands.
And I began to weep like a little
baby.
And I remember saying to myself, How in
the world can somebody be so on fire
for God?
How is it that somebody can be saved,
follow the Lord and believers' baptism, get in
the church, get in the Bible, hunker down,
begin to do what's right, win people to
Christ, love God, pray?
How is it that somebody like that can
end up being a demis and falling away?
The very next day.
The very next day, that morning when I
got up and began to have my devotions.
I do not believe in coincidence, but I
do believe in providence.
My devotions were in 2 Timothy 4.
And I began to read down through that
chapter, and my heart was still grieved, and
my heart was still broken.
I remember I got down to verse 10,
and immediately Ronald's name popped into my mind
as I thought to myself, For demis hath
forsaken me, having loved this present world, and
is departed unto Thessalonica.
I give you several points tonight.
We're through and we'll be done.
Let me give you this quickly, just a
diagram, very simply, for why I believe, when
I was an 18-year-old teenager, that
God gave me this diagram.
I believe it tonight just as much, if
not more, than when I began to preach
it as a teenager.
But tonight, let me give you several simple
points in what I call a diagram.
Sometimes I draw this, sometimes I write it
down, but we've got enough sense tonight, we
can write it down in our brain and
fly away from our Bible.
I want to give you something, and in
your mind, I want you to use it
as a circle.
In your mind, I want you to use
it circle-square, however you want to, but
a circle works a little better for the
diagram.
But I want you to use it a
circular motion tonight in your mind.
I want to give you several undeniable scriptural
points why I believe that people start out
well, as we're doing this week, but yet
maybe by the end of the summer, by
the end of the year, by the end
of the next three or four months, the
next three or four years, something like that,
they just kind of get to the place
where they're no longer living for God.
What makes a demis?
Number one, write this down.
First and foremost, we have a conversion.
We have a conversion.
Now please, beside the word conversion, just for
clarification purposes, you might want to write down
one of these words.
Choice, change, something like that.
Here's why I clarify that.
When I use the word conversion, I am
not speaking of a salvation conversion.
Now, the word conversion does not mean to
be saved.
The word conversion means to change.
For example, we do call somebody was converted,
alright?
When were you converted?
Tell me about your conversion experience.
That means a change, because when a person
gets saved, they do change according to the
Word of God.
But when I use the word conversion, I'm
using it in this context.
Remember Jesus looked at Peter, and He said,
Peter, when thou art converted, thou shalt strengthen
the brethren.
Now, was Jesus saying, Peter, when you get
saved, you're going to strengthen the brotherhood.
No, no, that's not what He's saying.
Why?
Because He's already talking to a saved man.
Was He saying, Peter, when you get saved
again, you're going to strengthen the brotherhood.
No, no, He wasn't saying that, because when
you get saved, you're saved one time for
all of time and for all of eternity,
sealed by the Holy Spirit of God, Ephesians
4.30. What He was saying, looking forward
into time, knowing that Peter would no doubt
deny Him, He was saying, Peter, when you
make your choice to make a change, when
you make your comeback, if you will, when
you are converted, He said, then you will
strengthen the brethren.
So when I use the word conversion, understand
I'm talking about a reasonable decision to want
to do what's right.
Here's what I mean.
Let's say we come forward this week.
Some of you have come forward.
Many of you came forward the other night.
I don't know what you told the Lord.
I know what I tell the Lord.
I don't know your heart, but certainly you
and God do.
But let's say you come forward and you
say, OK, God, I've not been faithful to
my Bible the way that I need to
be faithful to my Bible.
Not only have I not been faithful in
reading it, I've not been faithful in heeding
it.
Not only have I not been faithful in
reading or heeding, but I've not been faithful
in memorization.
And Scripture memory is a lost art in
the day and age in which we live,
but I believe it's Scriptural.
You should hide the Word of God in
your heart.
Why?
That you would not sin against God.
And so, let's say you make a decision,
OK?
I'm going to memorize the Bible.
Or, not all the Bible.
I'm going to memorize much of the Bible.
I'm going to heed to the Word of
God.
I'm going to read the Word of God.
I'm going to study.
I'm going to have a devotion.
That's stuff that we know.
That's stuff you learn in Bible college.
That's stuff you learn in high school.
That's stuff your moms and dads teach you.
So we know that.
OK, let's say that there's something that we
don't need to put in our life.
Let's say there's something we need to take
out of our life.
Let's say there's a habit that's unscriptural.
Let's say that there's a habit of gossip,
or maybe there's a habit of lying, or
maybe there's a habit that we won't get
into all the ramifications.
You know certainly what the Spirit of God
lays His finger upon.
But you come forward and you say, OK,
dear God, I am making a choice.
I am making a conscious effort that I
am going to either, number one, put this
in my life, or, number two, take this
from my life.
That's what I mean by the word converting.
We make choices every day.
But we're always making choices like that.
We make choices to do right.
We make choices to do wrong.
You know, it took me a long time
to figure out in evangelism that you can
preach, preach, preach, but people are going to
do what people want to do.
People are going to do what they want
to do, when they want to do it,
with whom they want to do it, why
they want to do it, and where they
want to do it, because they're people.
You see, we make decisions every single day
of our life.
You make a decision to get up whenever
you want to hit the S-N-O
-O-Z-E button, or the snooze, if
you will, when that thing's going, eh, eh,
eh, eh, eh, and you don't want to
get up, you make a decision to either
turn it off and stay in bed, or
get up immediately, and get your clothes on,
get ready, and go out today.
So we always make decisions.
That's what I'm talking about with the word
convert.
You know, here's Demas, he did that.
Demas made a decision sometime in his life
that he was going to walk around with
the Apostle Paul.
Demas made a decision sometime in his life
that he was going to do what was
right, he was going to hunker down, he
was going to be a preacher, if you
will, he was going to not let anything
deviate him, he was not going to let
anything discourage him, divert him from the path
of righteousness, from the highway of holiness, and
he made a conscious decision to do what
was right.
I see that all the time.
You see people in a revival meeting, they
come forward, they make a decision, here's what
bothers me.
You go back the next year, or two
years later, and those same people that made
a decision for Christ are no longer keeping
that decision.
Or you go back and you can't even
find them in church anymore.
I know you go and knock on the
door and you can't find them.
You know, you see them peeking through the
blinds, you know they're in there, but they're
not going to come out because they know
who you are.
And I mean, you can't get them to
come to the house of God, you can't
get them to come to church, but yet
at one time they were faithful people to
the meeting.
I mean, man, they loved the evangelist the
most when he came to town.
And man, they pat him on the back
and they prayed for him, carried him out
golfing, whatever it was, and now you can't
even find them.
Why is it that people can make choices,
that people can have these conversion experiences and
then completely go back on everything that they
told God that they would do?
Well, secondly, I give you this, not only
the conversion, but the climax.
You see, every time you make a decision
for Christ and every time I make a
decision for Christ, there's always what I refer
to a sweet spot.
There's always a sweet time, if you will.
For example, we'll go back to the Bible
illustration because it's easy to illustrate.
Somebody says, okay, I'm going to begin to
read my Bible the way that I should.
I've not been reading the Word of God,
I'm going to read it.
I've not been obeying the Word of God,
I'm going to obey it.
I've not been memorizing the Word of God,
simply I'm going to memorize it.
So what do they do?
They begin to either stay up later at
night to get some extra study, or they
take a little part out of their day
so they can get some extra study.
Maybe they just lose a little extra sleep
in the morning and they get up a
little bit earlier, allow the alarm clock to
go off, and they begin to study.
And they begin to feed themselves on the
Word of God.
And they begin to feast upon the Word
of God.
And they begin to memorize and devour Scripture.
And you know what?
There is always that climactic point every time
you make a decision.
Somebody says, man, I'm going to let the
Lord help me put this thing on the
altar.
I'm going to kick this habit.
I'm going to get rid of this habit.
And I'll be honest with you, for a
little while, man, it seems sweet.
You know, I call them camp experiences.
You know what happens.
You've been to camp, but most of you
have worked at camp for several years.
You know what happens?
These kids come here, especially during Junior Missions
Week.
I mean, these kids don't know anything about
God.
They don't know anything about the Bible.
They don't know anything about holiness.
They don't know anything about heaven.
They don't know anything about hell.
That's a slang word to them.
All they know is a Hollywood God and
some kind of Charlton Heston Moses.
That's about all they know.
But yet, they come and they hear the
Bible line upon line, precept upon precept, here
a little, there a little.
And they get the teaching and the preaching
and the admonition of the Word of God.
And what happens?
Many of them get saved.
And then many of them begin to grow
throughout that week.
And they learn more about the Bible.
And they're like little spiritual weeds.
And they're all excited.
And you know what happens?
When they first came here, they didn't even
want to be here.
I mean, they're walking around, their lips all
hanging down like a bunch of shoelaces.
And they're mean and cantankerous and mean.
And they're wicked about things.
And especially during that week, you're going to
have a lot of things you have to
deal with.
I mean, they got some mouths on them
sometimes.
I mean, they're mad about this and mad
about that.
And you know what happens when they leave?
They get on the bus.
Big old watermelon tears well up their eyes.
And they begin to weep.
And they hug their counselors.
And they don't want to leave.
And they're so excited.
And they get on that bus.
And man, they're giving each other high fives
for the Lord.
And man, they're jumping around.
They're memorizing Bible verses.
I call them camp experiences.
You had them when you was a teenager.
Man, you'd leave the camp.
You'd leave a camp like this.
And you'd leave the Wilds or the Bill
Rice Ranch or Triple S or Southland, something
like that.
Man, you'd leave that camp.
And you'd walk out of that place and
you'd say, Wow, man, I'd say that was
so wonderful.
Why is camp so wonderful?
Because you get people out of a normal
atmosphere.
So you pull teenagers away from the television.
You get them away from their normal friends,
except they're youth group friends.
And you get them away from the normal
routine of life.
They're out of school now.
You get them away from maybe a job
that they might be having for the summer.
You even get away from their family, which
is good sometimes.
And you kind of put them in a
spiritual container.
You kind of put them in a little
greenhouse.
And then you bring them here and we
preach to them.
And we pray for them.
And we love them.
And we help them.
And we feed them.
And we give them games and all of
these activities.
And man, we got all these things for
them and all these skits and all this
stuff.
And we all put all this stuff in
here over and over and over.
And we preach and preach and preach and
preach.
And they get saved.
And they get right with God.
And they make these decisions.
And man, they leave different than they came.
And they're all excited.
I call them mountain top experiences.
We all have them.
I mean, adults have them.
Junior age kids have them.
The junior mission's going to have them.
Teenagers are going to have them.
Family week's going to have them.
There's always a climax whenever you begin to
make decisions for Christ.
You know, storytellers do the same thing.
People that write good books.
I'm not a whole big reader on, you
know, a lot of books.
I like to read certain books that I
enjoy.
But, you know, I'm not a big reader
on novels and all this kind of stuff.
If you are, that's fine.
But you know what novels do?
You know what these books do?
They always start out with the introduction.
All the new books, underneath the word introduction,
it says to be read.
The reason it says that is because most
people don't read it.
They want to get to the back of
the book and they want to see who
shot J.R. And they want to find
out who did it.
Was it the maid or was it the
butler?
Was it in the bathroom or was it
in the church lobby with a candlestick over
the monkey wrench?
And they want to figure out who did
it, why they did it, when they did
it, where they did it, and how they
did it.
That's what everybody wants to know.
Everybody wants to get to the back of
the book.
But, before we get to the back of
the book, we begin to get into the
plot of things.
First couple of chapters.
First couple of pages.
We begin to make Frank and Susie and
Johnny and Billy Bob and all these people.
We begin to meet the characters.
We begin to meet the cast, if you
will.
And we begin to learn about this person.
We begin to learn about this person.
You know what they're doing?
They're building.
And I mean, they're building and they're building
and then we get into the plot a
little bit and things get a little bit
thicker and things get a little bit thicker.
Then all of a sudden it starts getting
exciting, buddy.
I mean, they're taking you up the hill.
And I mean, that thing's a-climbing, that
thing's climbing.
And I mean, you're reading.
And I mean, your heart's just a-pounding
and you want to stay up and you
can't put the book down.
And you'd rather read it than eat.
And you'd rather read it than go to
sleep.
I mean, you're reading and reading.
And they carry you all the way to
the top.
You know what they're doing?
That's a climactic part of the book.
Man, they know that's what sells.
And so they bring you all the way
to the pinnacle.
And boom, drop you off the other side,
the end.
And the ones I hate say, to be
continued.
Those bother the devil out of me, but
nonetheless.
They bring you all the way to the
top.
They give you the climax.
They give you the pinnacle.
And then it goes off.
Same thing happens in the Christian life.
Man, we get these pinnacle points, if you
will.
Man, I'm telling you, after a week like
this, man, we're filled.
And I mean, we're overjoyed and the joy
bells of God are ringing and things are
going well.
And we can endure the cold taverns at
night.
And we can endure this.
And we can endure all these trials and
temptations.
And all of these hard, hard testings, suffering
for Jesus.
I can't get that.
Because man, we're so filled with God.
And we're so filled with the Spirit.
And we've heard preaching.
And we've made decisions about our Bible.
And we made decisions that we were going
to be prayers.
And we made decisions that we were going
to be soul winners.
And filled with the Spirit.
And like I preached on the other night,
to get rid of the bitterness and the
divisive spirit.
And man, we're so excited.
It's a climax.
But let me tell you where most people
forget.
That's number three.
The combat.
You see, we begin to make these decisions.
These choices.
These changes.
These conversion times.
And then every time we do that, it
always peaks out.
And man, it is exciting.
I mean, the Bible's never been so sweet
before.
Like, you've never been reading the Bible.
And all of a sudden, you come across
something.
You've read it 55 times.
And all of a sudden, it's just like
the Spirit of God pulls up, grabs you,
and pulls you down to the Bible.
And says, look at there, son.
You've never seen that before.
And I tell you, that happens whenever you
have those climaxes.
And God begins to speak to you.
The Spirit of God begins to lead you
in all truth.
All of a sudden, you enjoy praying.
And it seems like God's answering your every
prayer.
Meeting your every single need.
And it just seems like things are going
well.
And you've never been so close to God.
Then all of a sudden, you realize number
three, what I call the combat.
And that's where most people foul up.
And that's where most people mess up on
the diagram.
Because every Christian normally wants it to stay
on the climaxing point.
You see, most Christians want to stay on
the mountaintop all of their life.
Man, they want to stay up there when
it's so easy to spring out of bed
and read the Bible.
They want to stay on the mountaintop where
everything's going well in the family.
And everything's going well in the marriage.
And they want to stay on the mountaintop
when, man, it seems like when they pray,
it's always wonderful.
But I'm going to be honest with you.
The Christian life is not a cakewalk.
The Christian life is a warfare.
We're in a battleground.
You know, this year, or this summer, what
you're going to be dealing with.
I don't know if Brother Mick's already got
all the curriculum he was working on the
other day.
We're going to be dealing with these young
people with the sword of the Spirit, and
the helmet of salvation, and the shield of
faith, and the breastplate of righteousness, and the
belt of truth, and the shoe shod with
the preparation of the gospel of peace, praying
always.
We're going to be dealing with Ephesians chapter
6 with all of these armaments, if you
will.
We have this great adversary, the devil.
And the Bible says, put on the whole,
not some of it, put on the whole
armor of God, that ye may be able
to stand against the wiles of the devil,
having done all to stand.
And I'm telling you, the devil's going to
fight you this summer.
The devil's going to fight you for the
rest of your life.
He's going to fight you in college.
He's going to fight you in your marriage.
He's going to fight you in your friendships,
in your relationships.
He is always going to fight you.
And I'm telling you, we are in the
biggest battle of our lives.
Somebody says, well, I don't know if I
like violence too much.
And I'll be honest with you, I don't
either.
But if you're going to make it in
the Christian life, if you're going to truly
be able to sing victory in Jesus, you're
going to have to pull out the big
guns, friend, and you're going to have to
fight, fight, fight, because this world is after
you, and the devil is after you.
But I'll tell you, as I preached last
year of the subject, why don't you just
drop dead?
The devil in the world is not your
worst enemy.
Your worst enemy is sitting in the pew
right beside you.
And before you punch your neighbor, I'm talking
about you, friend.
You are your own worst enemy.
You are your own worst problem.
And I'm telling you, if you don't get
you under trouble, if you don't learn to
combat your flesh, and if you don't learn
to combat your passion, and if you don't
learn to combat your desires, you can forget
about singing and meaning victory in Jesus, because
you're not going to have any victory in
your life whatsoever.
And I'm telling you, most people foul up,
because they forget about the fact that we
are in a warfare.
You know, Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15,
31, I die when?
Daily.
Notice he didn't say I die weekly.
I die monthly or bi-yearly.
Notice he said every day of my life,
I wake up and my feet hit the
floor, and I look myself square down in
the eyeballs, and I say, Paul, drop dead,
son.
You're not in control today.
God's Spirit is.
And I shake hands with so many Christians
who are completely overruled.
They are dictated and dominated and driven and
directed by the flesh.
When according to the Apostle Paul, we should
die to our flesh, and we should be
directed, dictated, dominated every single day by the
precious Spirit of God.
For the Spirit is willing, but the flesh
is weak.
And did not Paul say in Romans 8,
In me?
That is in my flesh.
Well, it's what?
No.
Good thing.
I'm telling you, we're in a warfare.
We're in a great battle for the mind.
We're in a battle for the heart.
We're in a battle for the body.
We're in a battle for the souls of
these teenagers and these young boys and girls
who will be here this summer.
And most people want to stay on the
climax, but they forget about the combat, and
they lay down the sword and the shield,
and they put up the guns and the
holsters, and they quit fighting, and they get
to the place where the fighting is so
rough, they're tired of fighting their flesh, they're
tired of fighting their passions, and they get
to the place where they completely give in,
and they dry up, and many people I
meet all across this country, because they have
given up in the combat, they are as
dry as last year's bird nests, they have
no joy, they have no peace, they have
no assurance, and they wake up every morning
of their life as empty as a burnt
out volcano.
They are completely, completely powerless because they quit
fighting.
You know what happens when you give up
in the combat?
Number four, what I call the collapse.
Now you notice, if you're drawing the diagram,
if you're just writing it down, later on
you can go back and connect the dots,
la, la, la, la, la, alright?
But nonetheless, you have to converge in time.
When you make a choice to change, whenever
you make that choice, you say, dear God,
I'm going to do what's right, and you'll
never convince me in a million years that
Demas did not have a sincere heart to
serve Christ.
He was serving the Apostle Paul, helping him,
doing everything he could, and in that he
was serving Almighty God, preaching, teaching, admonishing, giving,
going, whatever he had to do.
But yet there came a time in the
life of Demas when things were sweet, things
were fine, and because of the sweet times,
because of the good times, he was sidetracked
by the combat.
You see, it's not always easy to read
your Bible like you think it is.
It's not always as easy to pray like
some people make it out to be.
It's not always easy to give.
It's not always easy to go.
It's not always easy to have a spirit
filled, be love and compassionate towards people.
It's not always easy to be kind and
non-divisive.
It's not always easy.
It is a fight.
It is a battle.
It is a continual battle.
And whenever we give in to the combat,
I meet so many people, and so have
you, and you can name them tonight, although
we will not, who have collapsed on God
in their castaways.
They are the used-to-be's and the
has-been's.
I've met so many people.
I used to be a Sunday school teacher.
I used to be a preacher.
I used to be a song leader.
I used to be this, and I used
to be that.
What happened?
They gave in to the combat.
They completely collapsed.
And you know what the Bible says in
Proverbs 24, v.
10?
If thou think in the day of adversity,
thy strength is small.
Now, can I remind you, Greg Locke didn't
write that.
David didn't even write that.
The wisest man that ever walked the face
of God's green earth wrote that.
Solomon.
And Solomon said, when you get in the
thick of things, when you get in the
battlefield, which you're going to be in for
the rest of your life, every single day
you're going to have to fight to the
day you die, or to the day we
go home in the rapture.
You will have to fight.
And the wisest man in all of the
world says, if you give in during the
adversity, if you faint, if you fall, and
by the way, he said the just man
falls seven times.
He didn't say the just man fell once,
twice, three times, or six.
He said the just man fell seven times.
Seven, the number of perfection or completion.
It means he kept getting up.
He fell, but he got up.
He learned from his mistakes.
He learned from his past.
He let it be not a stumbling block,
but a stepping stone.
He fell down and got up.
He fell down and he got up.
He didn't collapse, but he stayed in the
fight.
He stayed in the combat, and he kept
on going for the glory of God, and
he kept fighting, and he kept plugging away,
and Solomon said, if you faint when things
get rough this summer, he said, thy strength
is small.
And I know a lot of people that
talk real big, but their strength's real small
because they give up in the day of
adversity.
They give up in the day when it
gets tight on them, if they will.
This morning, I received an encouraging email.
You remember last year when I was here,
I think it was last year, maybe in
the first year I was here to do
the staff training revival.
I preached the message, when things aren't good,
God still is, out of the book of
Job.
And I'm telling you, if anybody ever had
it bad in the Bible, it was a
man by the name of Job.
These health and wealth morons that get up
on TV and say, when you're saved and
right with God, you'll never have financial trouble,
and you'll always be well, and you'll never
be sick.
They must have tore the book of Job
out of their Bible.
There's 43 chapters of it.
We find out that Job had a hard
road to go.
He didn't have the bottom fall out of
his boat.
Both ends of the bottoms of his boat
fell out, friend.
But yet, my Bible said that he stayed
true to God.
God honored him, and God blessed him.
But I got an email this morning.
A guy wrote me, and I think he
goes to Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Missouri,
you know, BBF school.
And he wrote me this morning, and he
said, brother, I guess it was this morning,
but I got it this morning.
He said, brother, I just got through listening
over the Internet to the message, when things
aren't good, God still is.
And he said, listen, I've been going through
some trials.
I've been going through some hardships.
I've gone through some heartaches.
And he said, man, I listened to that
message, and it was encouragement to me.
And he said, I just want to stay
in the fight and just want to keep
on going.
And I'm telling you, what an encouragement to
me that is.
But there's a young man that wants to
stay in the fight.
There's a young man that's not going to
give in.
There's a young man who is going to
stay with it, come what may.
And I say to you, we don't need
any more collapsed seeds in the church of
Jesus Christ.
Kemp Shatech don't need any more collapsed seeds.
Your Bible college don't need any more has
-beens, any more tragedies.
We have enough of those already.
We should stay in the fight for the
glory of God.
And I'm telling you, we should fight our
flesh.
We should fight this world.
And it is going to be a continual
battle.
I mean, all of the time, we are
going to have to stay there.
It's not going to always be easy.
It's not always going to be fun.
It's not always going to be rosy-posy.
Oh, there are those climactic times, but normally
the times that are climax are small, but
the times that are combat are constant over
and over and over and over again.
I remember when I was a kid, I
suppose I was probably at this time, about
this age, about seven years old.
My brother's five years older than me and
he's in the military.
He's kind of one of these big old
macho guys and he's always been good at
karate and boxing and just whooping people upside
the head.
But when I was seven years old, my
brother, he begged my mother to let him
be a boxer.
He wanted to grow up and be a
professional boxer.
And my mama said, No, no, I want
no boy of mine having a nose that
is bigger than his brain.
She said, No, no, you're not going to
have your face beat in.
She said, You can forget that.
And my mom would never let my brother
be a boxer.
But you know what?
Here I was seven years old.
Here my brother was twelve, thirteen, something like
that.
And he had this ambition.
He had this desire for a couple of
years.
You know what he'd do in the bedroom?
He'd be laying on the bed.
We shared the same room for years and
years.
I'm so deprived all my life, but we
shared the same room.
He'd lay in his bed at night.
He didn't have his hands like this and
he didn't have nothing on the ceiling.
He'd go, I thought, You moron, go to
sleep.
You're bugging the devil out of me.
And he just kept doing it over and
over.
He'd run down the road.
You'd see him down the road.
He'd be getting into the air.
I'm thinking to myself, What is this guy
doing?
And he was just tainted.
He wanted to be a boxer so bad
he could taste it.
Now, there are other boxers that can taste
things like Mike Tyson, like people's ears and
things like that.
But nonetheless, you ever watch boxing on television?
I remember when I was 14 years old,
Mike Tyson was going to be doing it.
I don't know who he was fighting.
He was fighting some big old burly white
guy who I wouldn't have dared get in
the ring.
Of course, I don't know if I could
run around for five minutes and make $10
million.
I might be able to do it.
But anyhow, I might let him bust my
nose one good time for that much money.
But nonetheless, I remember we went over to
my friend's house and we got in there
and they had this big screen TV and
they must have invited 70 people over.
This guy was a police officer.
He was well known in town.
I mean, all these people started coming over.
And then they were down there.
Boy, they had the popcorn.
They had the Pepsi.
I mean, it's just going all over the
place.
That place was all smoked up.
All these bunch of people in there sucking
on their cigarettes.
And I remember Mike Tyson got up on
that screen.
Bing, bing, bing.
They rang the bell and he went out
there and knocked that joker out in 34
seconds.
I thought to myself, that was a waste
of my time and that was a waste
of my money.
But you ever watch boxing much?
Boxing interests me.
It really does.
Now, obviously, you think I'd get in the
ring with anybody.
You're crazy, friend.
I'm not getting in the ring with anybody,
okay?
I mean, they'd knock me out for sure
and I'm not much of a fighter.
I never have been.
I suppose if I had to, I would.
But you ever watch boxing much on TV?
The other night, you know, I did a
little illustration.
So we're going to do a little illustration
right here if you would.
But, you know, I was watching these guys
on boxing.
Sometimes we go to these hotel rooms and
we ain't got our trailer with us.
And you see these nuts.
I mean, they get out there just for
the sake of money.
They come walking out there, you know.
In the blue trunks and in the red
trunks.
And they got these guys.
They always got this Goliath guy.
They always got this little itty bitty miniscule
rat looking guy.
And so they bring him out there.
And they have this little joker get up.
And then he gets that big old microphone.
He starts talking.
And everybody's cheering.
Everybody's hollering.
Everybody's yelling.
Boy, they got it on ESPN.
And they got it on all the primetime
pictures.
NBC, ABC, Health Box Office and Fox and
the rest of them.
They're all carrying it, man.
They're all excited.
Them guys come out there.
They got these great big old overweight gloves.
And let me tell you what happens about
the fourth round.
I like to see it every now and
then, by the way, if it's a good
fight.
I don't care nothing.
If it goes 14 rounds, you know.
I like one that goes about six rounds.
But I mean, they're both just in it
for the blood.
I mean, just knocking each other out.
I mean, just sweat on each other's face.
And I was watching.
I don't know how long ago it was.
But I was watching this boxing guy.
And this guy was in there.
I mean, he's winning on this guy.
You know what the trainer always did?
This guy would run over here.
He'd come over here and sit.
You'd see this guy.
His eye must have been that big.
I mean, his eye was swollen up like
a cantaloupe.
And I mean, his lip was all busted
up.
His teeth looked like they was about to
hang out.
And he couldn't hardly even keep that thing
in.
His coach came over.
He put that thing around his neck.
He said, all right, boy.
Started rubbing him in the shoulders, you know.
Started beating on him like this.
Started squirting water in his face.
And they said, you're going to be all
right.
He said, you just about got him.
He didn't just about have that guy.
That guy was about to knock your stinking
head off.
I mean, his head was swollen up about
this big.
And they got over there.
And they put that stuff there.
And they said, OK, you got it.
Amen.
And he got this.
And he wiped off his face, you know.
And he said, just get in there and
beat the socks off that guy.
You know what that guy did?
He went in there and knocked that joker's
head off his shoulders.
I mean, he went in there and cleaned
that dude's clog in the same round.
You know why?
Because I believe, although this guy was just
about down for the count, although this guy
had just about had it and the lips
were swollen, and the brain was swollen, I
believe the reason this guy got in there
and won the battle is because he had
somebody behind him on the sidelines just encouraging
him to go on for the glory of
God.
Now, please let me just say this as
we move to our last point as we
close.
I do not excuse the fact for why
people give up in the ministry or on
the things of God.
Don't excuse it one bit and think it's
wicked, think it's vile.
For the Bible says we should be steadfast,
unmovable, always abounding in the work of the
Lord, 1 Corinthians chapter 15, verse 58.
But I'm going to be honest with you.
I think the reason a lot of people
give up on God, I think the reason
a lot of our colleges, a lot of
our camps, excuse me, a lot of our
churches are full of demises is because we
don't have any people in the corner that's
rooting them on.
You know what our problem is?
We're always looking for the worst in everybody.
We're always looking how we can hold up
our noses and if it was to rain,
we'd drown in five minutes for sure.
We're always looking for the bad things about
people.
But we're always looking how we can do
this and how we can scheme here and
how we can always look better.
I remember a guy came to Ambassador one
day.
He preached on finger-pointing, 45 minutes.
Finger-pointing, finger-pointing, finger-pointing.
I don't remember his text, but I remember
his illustration.
And he said, just remember when you point
your finger, you got three more pointing back
at you.
Simple thought, but you know what?
A lot of times we do a lot
of finger-pointing.
And we see a brother or sister who
has fallen into sin or they've fallen some
way and they've fallen away and here they
are and they're bloodied and they're bruised up
and then the devil just beat them to
death.
And we come up to them and we
say, Ha ha, I told you so.
I told you that was going to happen.
Didn't listen to my counsel, did you?
And we're the world's worst about stepping on
those who are hurting.
And I want to remind you what Galatians
chapter number 6 says, If a man be
overtaken in a fault, you who are spiritual.
That should be you and that should be
me.
You which are spiritual, restore such a one
in the spirit of meekness.
Did it considering thyself, lest thou also be
tempted.
And greater than Greg Locke has fallen.
And greater than you has fallen as well.
I'm telling you, if we're going to have
a lack, if you will, of people that
are collapsing, people that are giving up and
people that are giving in, we're going to
have to have some people on the sidelines
that are rooting them along.
Some people that kind of pick them up
and help them along.
Hey, you're going to have some buddies, you're
going to have some friends, you're going to
have some guys and you're going to have
some girls this summer that I mean get
to the place where they're just about ready
to drag their feet.
We're going to have somebody just come along
in spirit and just pick them up and
help them a little bit.
Pray for them.
Encourage them.
Put the weapon back in their hand and
say, jump back in the fight, I'm behind
you all the way.
I'm telling you, that's what we're going to
have to have.
But a lot of people, because they're in
the fight and it seems like they're there
by themselves and they're getting whooped by the
devil and they're getting whooped by the opposition,
they're getting whooped by the adversaries, they throw
in the towel and they collapse.
And you know what happens when they collapse?
I'll give you this lastly and we're through
carnality.
Notice if you've drawn it there in your
notes or wherever, you will notice that you
start with a choice.
Lord, I'm going to do what's right.
Whenever you do that, man, it climaxes and
goes through the roof.
I mean, it's exciting.
It's like a ride in a recreational world
somewhere.
I mean, it's exciting.
And then all of a sudden when you
have the climax, it begins to die out
because just around the corner, you realize the
combat.
The combat comes and you start fighting.
And at first, man, you're excited about the
fight.
And I mean, you're whooping and I mean,
you're going in there and you're throwing the
punches and throwing the blows and you're beating
yourself down.
And you're reading and you're praying and you're
giving and you're going and you're sweating and
pressing for the glory of God.
But all of a sudden, it begins to
get to the place where it's too heavy.
And you just can't carry the load anymore.
And you quit pressing and you quit straining
and you quit doing all of these things.
And you collapse and nobody's there to encourage
you.
Nobody's there to lift you up.
And you return to the very carnality that
you asked God to get you out of
the beginning.
And I meet so many people that live
on this vicious cycle of life.
They say, Lord, help me.
And they go right back to the very
thing they asked God to help them.
Have you ever met people like that?
Sure you have.
Lord, please help me do this.
And with Your strength and by Your grace,
I'll implement this in my life.
And six months later, they hadn't done it.
They prayed that God would help them to
be a good student of the Word of
God.
Six months later, they hadn't read their Bible
in just about that long.
It's dusty and the pages are not even
tattered and torn because they've been reading through
them, because they've been weeping and praying over
the Word of God.
Not even been reading it.
And I remind you, the Bible says that
you better not even make a vow if
you're going to make one and break it
because God takes vows and promises very seriously.
And I meet so many people that live
on this vicious cycle.
It's just like a chariot wheel.
It goes and goes and goes.
And I meet so many people with no
joy, with no peace, with no love in
their hearts whatsoever.
They're never going to do anything for God.
All they do is spin their wheels.
They talk and talk and talk and talk
and talk, but their talk and their walk
never match up because they never stay in
the fight.
And if you want to be a collapsed
seed, if you want to go back to
the very same hog pen, if you will,
from which you were hewn, as the Bible
likes to give the illustration, as the same
dog, excuse me, ladies, that returns into his
vomit according to the Word of God.
Hey, I'll tell you, if you're going to
be something like that, it's because you gave
in on the fight.
You see, if there's one point in this
outline that you ought to circle, that you
ought to memorize, that you ought to put
bedded within your heart, it is that simple
little point, combat.
Because if you're ever going to stay away
from the carnality, if you're ever going to
stay in there and hunker down and not
back up, pack up, slack up or shut
up until you've been taken up by the
glory of God, if you're ever going to
do anything for Christ, if you're ever going
to glorify Him, you are going to have
to stay in the combat and fight with
every single bit of strength that you have
in your body.
I remember this past November, I suppose it
was, I was preaching in Minnesota.
I told you about that little church I
preached in the other night in the garage.
And I went, I had a Sunday off.
I was supposed to be a certain place
way on the other side of Minnesota and
it was snowed over five or six feet
and so we couldn't go, so I called
my buddy and he said, just come preach
in the garage on Sunday.
Late that night he took me down to
Pillsbury and I went over to Pillsbury and
I was supposed to be preaching Monday and
Tuesday in chapel.
It was the week before Thanksgiving this past
year.
And I remember they put me in the
little cedar home, whatever it was.
They put me in that nice big old
room where all the speakers stay and where
some of the staff's in there.
And I remember I went in there and
I got ready for bed and I was
sitting there and I was reading.
And all of a sudden I heard something.
I couldn't figure out what it was.
It kind of spooked me at first.
It was going, just about like that, just
kind of interval.
And I thought, man, they've got a gas
leak in this room.
They're fixing to blow me sky high, but
I started to get a little nervous.
So I started looking around, just about like
that.
So I walked to the door and the
bathroom was right across from my room where
I was standing and I thought to myself,
there's some guy in there using more hairspray.
He'll never be able to wash out of
his head.
And I went in there and nobody was
in there, but I kept hearing it.
So I got to looking around.
Lights was out and I'd get a little
eebie-jeebie, you know, I'd get a little
spooky looking around.
And so I looked and there's this door,
about five steps, and down here there's this
little light.
You know, you see the silhouette of the
light coming around the side of the door.
It's dark in there.
And on the door you can kind of
see just a little bit.
It said men's locker room and gym, something
like that.
And I remember I thought to myself, okay,
I'm about to get into something here I
probably don't want to get into.
So I snuck down there, you know, and
I opened up that door.
And here's this guy laying on this working
bench, you know.
He must have 350 pounds on his chest.
He's going...
And this big old burly guy's over him
saying, just one more, buddy.
Just one more, buddy.
And I thought to myself, if we had
some people like that in the church, if
we had some people like that at Camp
Chatech, hey, just one more, just keep on
pressing.
We need some pressuring this summer.
We need some people that are willing to
sweat for the glory of God.
Some people that are willing to bleed for
the glory of God.
Some pressure, some pressers that are good under
pressure, who are willing to...
and not keep going back and back and
back and back and keep having to be
rebuked about the same things and keep living
in the same backslidden condition.
But no, they stay in and they fight.
I'll give you this and we're done.
There was a man by the name of
Leonardo da Vinci.
Leonardo da Vinci, as you and I know,
according to history, was probably one of the
world's greatest painters that we have ever known
anything about.
He was wonderful friends with a man by
the name of Michelangelo, who you know to
have painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.
And over in Europe many, many years ago,
Mr. Leonardo da Vinci was approached by certain
people to paint what you and I affectionately
know as the Lord's Supper.
No doubt, the Lord's Supper historically has been
the biggest billion dollar seller picture of all
time.
It's a wonderful picture.
You study the history behind and the workings
in the mind of Mr. Leonardo da Vinci,
you will find out it took him almost
ten years to the day to draw the
picture of the Last Supper.
You've seen it in churches, you've seen it
in schools, you've seen it in just all
over the place.
You've seen it in homes.
I've seen sculptures of it, all kinds of
things.
But it took him about ten years to
draw it.
He began to draw some of the room
and some of the lighting, some of the
shading that was there.
He wanted to make sure that he was
meticulously careful with the text that he began
to read throughout 1 Corinthians and other places
in the Bible.
Wanted to make sure he was scriptural.
But he also wanted to make sure to
give the picture more of effect.
He wanted to use people as the characters
of his picture to kind of get their
acts of compassion and the lack thereof.
Well, the first person he drew was Jesus
Christ.
Pretty good place to start.
He wanted to put Him in the center
and circle and center everybody around the Lord.
So he went out in the streets with
a hefty sum of money and he began
to ask, is there anybody here that would
exemplify the characters of Jesus Christ?
And back in those days, Christianity was a
little bit more open in the streets, if
you will, if it was than it is
now, and a little more accepted.
And people tried to live righteous, and people
tried to live holy, and they said, oh,
we know of a man.
We know of a man by the name
of so-and-so.
You will find him.
And they found him in what we would
refer to as basically a rescue mission or
a soup kitchen.
And he was in there working, helping people.
He was a good, upstanding church man.
Had a wonderful family.
Loved God.
Loved the things of God.
Loved the Bible.
He was very compassionate, fella.
And so he approached him and he said,
sir, I'll be rather candid with you.
I want to pay you a large sum
of money to use you to paint a
picture of the Lord Jesus Christ.
People told me about your acts of kindness,
your acts of mercy, your acts of love
and compassion.
And I believe you would perfectly exemplify that
which I'm trying to show in the character
of Christ.
Can I use you to live in my
home for five weeks?
You'll have to separate yourself from your family
throughout the evenings, as you say here, but
I'll feed you and clothe you and I'll
room you and I'll give you not only
a good place to stay, but a good,
hefty sum of money, and I want to
use you.
And he said, sure, I'll be glad to
do that.
And they shook hands on the deal.
And for five weeks, he studied this man's
character and he drew the picture of Christ.
Then it was time to draw the apostle
Peter.
He went and found another gentleman.
He began to draw Peter.
Then he began to draw Andrew.
He began to draw the other man in
the picture.
And then he got to the place where
he was drawing the fruit.
He was drawing some of the fruit there.
And again, he was drawing some of the
background and some of the shades and some
of the lighting and adding just a little
bit more decor to the table, making sure
that everyone's robe and everyone's garment was in
the right place.
And the last person he decided to draw
was a man by the name of Judas
Iscariot.
He thought to himself, I'm going to have
to find somebody.
I'm going to have to find somebody that
is sneaky and conniving and evil and just
be rather open and honest with him and
pay them so that I can draw them
to use as a picture of Judas Iscariot.
And so he went and after all this
time, he was about maybe seven to eight
years into the painting by this time because
there was still some touch-up work that
needed to be done.
He wanted to make sure that it was
just perfect and just right.
And so he went out into the streets
and the highways and byways and he began
to talk to people.
And he found just the man who he
thought he'd be looking for.
He found a man whose family had deserted
him.
He had nobody that loved him.
He was a mean man.
I mean, just a wicked old cuck.
Ungodly.
Curse God, curse man.
The only person he loved was himself.
He was just kind of a guy that
was a loner.
Kind of a guy that was kind of
a hermit.
Kind of kept to himself.
Just kind of straggling, nasty.
But yet he was a conniver.
He was a man that was a thief
and a man that was ungodly.
We know according to the Bible that Judas
was the same way.
And by the way, whenever Jesus said, one
of you tonight will betray me, they did
not say, Lord, is it Judas?
They said, Lord, is it I?
He had the same message and the same
mannerisms as the rest of them and they
were very surprised.
And so yet we realize that he betrayed
the Lord Jesus Christ for thirty pieces of
silver.
He went out and hanged himself and according
to the Bible, he was the son of
perdition.
He went straight to hell.
But nonetheless, he went out and found this
man after hours and days of searching.
He said, sir, I'll be rather candid with
you.
I'll pay you a hefty sum of money.
Live in my home for five weeks.
I'll study your mannerisms and study your life
as I've done many other people for this
painting.
And I want to use you to draw
the picture of Judas' spirit.
Will he accept it?
And this man accepted it readily for he'd
do anything for money.
He was greedy just like Judas was.
For five weeks, he studied the life of
this man.
This mean, wicked, bitter, cantankerous man who had
withdrawn himself from all the world.
Through this picture, after ten years, the picture
went into circulation.
Ten years after it went into circulation, history
tells us that Leonardo da Vinci came down
with a disease and he was just about
ready to die.
He was upon his deathbed.
It came out twenty years after the painting
began its very first little dot.
Twenty years after it was born and birthed
in the heart of Leonardo da Vinci to
draw the Lord's Supper.
And ten years after it had been into
circulation, it finally came out that the man
to whom he used to paint Jesus Christ,
and seven or eight years later, the man
to whom he used to paint Judas Iscariot,
were in fact, ladies and gentlemen, the same.
There was a man in history who gave
up in the fight.
And I say to you, if you don't
want to be a demon, you're going to
have to stay in and fight for the
rest of your life.