You know, if we're not careful, we go to church with that attitude. What's in it for me? What's in it for me? Now, what can I give? What can I serve? What can I do? But what's in it for me? And if there's not something in it for me, then I'm out of here. We need to really examine our lives about a subject in this text tonight of the hazy and covetousness that we're not looking at situations all the time and our friendships and our fellowships and our relationships. even with God, is not based about what's in it for me. Because that is the total opposite of Christianity. Christianity is a giving of ourselves to other people without any idea of what can I get in return. If we're not careful, we get drawn into and get to working within this realm of swapping out and trading favors and friendship and so forth. I want us to read our text tonight, and this will be a little different, but the Lord's really, really dealt with me about this subject. Verse number 20. In fact, I want to read verse number 15 and 16 before we get started. Verse 20, to give a preface. Now, you remember that Naaman had been healed by Elisha, And he offered him, in verse 15, you remember how much it was in verse 5, it was 10 talents of silver and 6,000 pieces of gold. How many would go for 6,000 pieces of gold? And 10 changes of raiment. This wasn't no little deal. In the 1980s, I checked it out, it was $20,000 worth of silver and $60,000 worth of gold in the 1980s. I would say that would be multiplied how many times by now? Because gold has shot up like crazy in the last few years. This man was willing to give 6,000 pieces of gold for his healing, which is a picture of our salvation. He was trying to buy salvation. Elisha was teaching him the great doctrine of free grace, that you cannot buy salvation. And so anyway, you get over into verse 15. After he had been healed, he said that he returned to the men of God, he and all his company, and Cain had stood before him. And he said, Behold, now I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel. There's a colon there, and he says, Now, therefore, I pray thee, take a blessing of thy servant. I mean, who does not want a blessing, especially a monetary blessing? Then in verse number 16, he said, But he said, That's a lie. As the Lord liveth before whom I stand, I will receive none. I'm telling you, that's a rare man of God. That's a rare man of God. He said, But you know what? He understood he was dealing with a Gentile You see a lot of people, they hear about free grace, but they still are taught doctrinally, and they still, in their humanistic thinking, think there's a catch to it. If I don't live good enough, or I don't line up with all the church so-and-sos, I may not be saved. There's got to be a catch in there somewhere. Then we get to verse number 20. After he left, and Elisha would not take anything from him, Verse number 20, But Gehazi, the servant of Elisha, the man of God, said, Behold, my master hath spared Naaman this Syrian, in not receiving at his hands that which he brought. But I want you to watch the phrase, But as the Lord liveth, I will run after him, and take somewhat of him. How many catches what he did right there? The first thing he did in justifying taking money from him. He brought God into it. As the Lord liveth. In other words, he begins to pray. He is to talk, talk using spiritual terms. As the Lord liveth. He's begin to justify it. Watch this. He doesn't have to justify to anybody else. All he's got to do is justify in his own mind why this is okay. And he starts justifying it by bringing God into the picture. So, verse number 21, Gehazi followed after Naaman. And when Naaman saw him running after him, he lighted down from the chariot to meet him and said, Is all well? And he, Gehazi, said, All is well. Now watch this series of lies in your Bible. My master has sent me. Lie number one. Elisha had not sent him. Same. Now he's going to go to lie number two. He's going to start saying stuff that Elisha never said. He's saying, Behold, even now there be come to me from Mount Ephraim two young men of the sons of the prophets. That is a critical element of this story. And the reason it is, is because he frames it out to be for young people. He doesn't frame it out to be for Elisha. He doesn't frame it out to be for himself. He frames that this gift is to be given for the sake of the young people. This is still being used in America constantly. Constantly. Okay? He says, uh, give them. Watch that phrase. Give them. It wasn't give me. He lied. I mean, he's lying as fast as he can think right now. He's carved out a story. Give them, I pray thee, a talent of silver and two changes of garment. He doesn't ask for the whole load. Just, you know, a good portion. Verse 23, And Naaman said, Be content, take two talents. I mean, I brought 20. I mean, I brought 6,000 pieces. Take two talents. And he urged him and bound two talents of silver in two bags with two changes of garments and laid them upon two of his servants, and they bare them before him. And when he came to the tower, he took them from their hand. Now that's Gehazi. He takes the money and their stuff, takes them out of the hands of the servant, doesn't go clear back to Elisha's house. He stops at a dropping off place. He took them from their hand, bestowed them in the house, and he let the men go and they departed. I want to just say something real quick tonight. If you can't be transparent or a ministry can't be transparent about the money it has received, it is wrong money. If you've got to hide who gave it and how much they gave, you better watch yourself. You better watch yourself. You're in deep, deep, dark water right now. Verse number 25, But he went in and stood before his master, and Elisha said unto him, Whence comest thou, Gehazi? And he said, Thy servant went no whither. He's still lying. See, once he just... Watch this. This is the danger. And by the way, this affects many areas of life. Once he justified... This is any sin. Once he justified this sin in his mind, Satan had him absolutely under his... He had him under his total control. And he just poured out the lies that was in his heart. And verse number 26, And he, Elisha, said unto him, Went not my heart with thee, when the man turned again from his chariot to meet thee? Is it a time, now watch all this, to receive, number one, money, and to receive, number two, garments, olive yards, vineyards, and sheep, and oxen, and menservants, and maidservants. Do you recognize what Elisha saw in the heart of this man? It wasn't just money he wanted. He wanted what money would buy. He was tired of being in the ministry and not having the farms, and the cattle, and the land, and everything else that he saw everybody have, and the dangers, and the servants, and people working for him. He saw him clear through. He saw what he was coveting after, that he wanted, what he was wanting to do with this money. Otherwise, he would have just listed the money only. When you get into verse number 27, the leprosy therefore, now this is the danger, now you better pay attention, the leprosy therefore of Naaman shall cleave unto thee and unto thy seed forever. And he went out from his presence a leper as white as snow. I say to you that although I would have a tendency to pass over this passage of scripture, it is the curse upon American Christianity today. This is the Gehazi curse, is the curse upon Christianity. There are multitudes and multitudes of lost people. We have lost our salt and our light in this nation as Christians because of our greed to have what the world has and because of our methods and motivations for getting money out of people and whether it's churches or ministries or whatever it might be. And it started back there in the TV evangelist days a lot, and actually radio days even before that, when they began to understand that because of people's natural sympathies and natural compassion and their desire to give, that could pull money out of people for all kinds of reasons. I submit to you this morning, tonight, that not only are churches guilty of this, but missionary organizations are guilty of this, that ministries of every type you can name are guilty of this Gehazi sin. And I want to tell you tonight, this is an area that God showed me years ago. I remember when we started our school here, we felt definitely led of God not to charge tuition. We got down the road five or six years, tough all the time. I mean, weeks when we didn't know how he was going to pay the bills. And we decided one year, well, you know what? I mean, we're doing all this, surely they can pay tuition or charge. And we began to charge tuition. Let me tell you something about that. That never worked and it never will work. Now listen, I'm not saying that some other church can't charge tuition, but we cannot violate what God told us to do here. We got in a worse mess than we ever got. And it wasn't several months I said, scrap it. If people don't want to give voluntarily, this is a ministry, and I'm responsible. God told me, don't charge, we can't charge. Now, I want to talk about Gehazi here for just a little while and this whole thing. The first thing is this, why did God judge this so severely? Why did God judge this so severely? Number one, it was because it perverted the doctrine of salvation of grace. And I'm telling you something, when God gave his son to pay for our sins, and then we come in behind it trying to pay for our sins or to buy our salvation, to earn our salvation, we have defiled We have perverted the doctrine of salvation, and we are sending people to hell over it. And God does not look at it lightly. It is a serious thing. You and I would think, on my land, why would God strike a man and his seed forever with leprosy? Over such, you know, I mean, everybody makes a mistake. What God is saying, you're perverting the gospel of Jesus Christ. You're perverting my son's death, birth, and resurrection. Salvation is by grace. Elisha had established that solidly in the heart and mind of this new convert, and now this false prophet perverts that. Salvation cannot be bought. There are no after-deals after salvation. Amen? There's no after-deals. I mean, I'll tell you what makes me sick is somebody telling you, well, if you haven't been baptized, you're not saved. Or if you haven't spoken in tongues, you're not saved. Or if you haven't quit this, you're not saved. And on and on it goes. And there's all these after-deals. And I think we ought to let the Lord sort out the after deals, amen? You know, it's kind of like what the old boy said one time, it's our job to catch them and then God will clean them. I believe we ought to preach, but if we'll preach the Bible and he's saved, the Holy Spirit will deal with him about stuff. And if he don't respond to that work of the Holy Spirit, then God will show eventually that man was not truly converted. Anyway, salvation is totally free. The Bible said that a gift blindeth the eyes. Now I want you to remember that passage of Scripture now, and that is a law principle in Exodus chapter 23 that was given to governments, that a gift blindeth the eyes. There is no place that a gift will blind the eyes more than in a church. And people are very aware of that, and that's why a lot of times preachers are given gifts and preachers are controlled by money so they blind their eyes and won't preach on what needs to be preached within the church. And after about five or ten years of that, that church is spiritually dead. The day that a preacher quits preaching on everybody's sin, and I want to say something flat out tonight, I want to get this settled. You don't, you may think you know me, but I will tell you something. I never potshot people from the pulpit. And if I have, I've done it two or three times in my life, but I've tried to make it right. I will not pot shoot you from the pulpit. I will not hide behind this pulpit. If I got something that serious, I'll come talk to you about it. All right. I'm telling you this tonight, we need to be really understanding that we ought not try to buy off preaching and buy off teaching of the Word of God by money or by favors. Now, it's fine to be good to everybody and we ought to be good to them. You folks have been better to me than any man would ever deserve. But I tell you, we must preserve in this church the freedom and the liberty that comes without financial pressure or that social pressure that can cause men to change the message of the Word of God. Now, Gehazi's problem was that the tenth commandment, thou shalt not covet. If you'll start with Eve, the first sin, and move your way through the Bible from Samson to David to right on through the New Testament to Ananias to Sapphires, every sin that you'll ever recognize in anybody's life, the base of it was covetousness. They wanted either money or their wife or their possessions, Ahab and Jezebel, you name it, you name the situation of the Bible, and I will show you at the bottom of it that the love of money is the root of all evil. Follow the money. followed the money trail, so it was a spirit of covenants. The first thing it did to him was cause him to disregard spiritual privilege and advantage. This man was unbelievably spiritually privileged and advantaged in that he had been called to be a servant of one of the greatest prophets of all of Israel's history. Elisha, he was with, watch this, this is how dangerous covetousness can be to your life. He was with Elisha every day, he watched him, he learned from him, and yet, he had wickedness in his heart based upon covenant. Could somebody please get me a drink of water real quick? The second thing is, he was discontent. The Bible said, Godliness with contentment is great gain. Great gain. You can be around great truth. You can be around great goodness and yet have wickedness in your heart. Covenants is a very deep, subtle, latent sin. Let me tell you what I just some personal things that I've observed over the years. I think that it behooves us to study people that were in the same work that they're in, and I've studied preachers and I've studied preachers families. And let me tell you what I've heard out of more preachers' kids' mouths than anything. We never had anything. If I were you, I'd be careful about saying that about your growing up, but we never had nothing. That might be coming from a heart that says, I'm bitter because I never had everything, and I'll, bless God, I'm going to have it before I leave this life. My kids are not going to grow up like I did without anything. You know that might be the biggest blessing of your kids' life that they didn't have everything they wanted. I can't see that it's doing a lot of kids much good that they had every little thing that their mom and daddy could buy for them. It might be a blessing to you. You can be around great men. You can be around great truth and great goodness and yet not have it in your heart. You can be in a good environment and yet have a bad heart. You can be in a bad environment and yet have a good heart. Secondly, he not only disregarded his spiritual privilege, but he was disrespectful of four people. Number one was Elisha. He misrepresented this man. Elisha had said, no, we don't take gifts. We're not making appeals. Brother Queen said something this morning, and I'll say it again before I get done. Not one time, but I know of in all the Gospels, nor in the word of God, Does it show where Jesus Christ made an appeal for funds or money? Nor did he ever charge for any of his services. He never subtly poked people for an offering. You watch that. I say to you, if we're going to be like Jesus Christ, let's quit poking people for money. Let's quit acting like it all depends on the money. We need the power of God in our lives way more than we need any money. Brother Paul, I sure do thank you. I don't know what happened, but it was ripping out of me, buddy. I appreciate it, and I thank you. Now listen to me tonight, I ain't mad at nobody, I'm just, I'm serious about this subject, okay? Alright. First of all, he misrepresented Elisha. He misrepresented him, he maligned him, and he dirtied his reputation. That's one of the most pitiful things I've ever seen in my life. For him to, as Elisha's servant, to jump off and run up there, and then tell him that Elisha sent him to line up and dirtied his reputation, dirtied the ministry. He traded on Elisha's good name. And the Bible said a good name is readily chosen and great riches. I know I shouldn't get upset, but I'm just not that spiritual yet. One of the things that has bothered me over the years is somebody use this church, somebody go to this church and they go out and do something stupid and then trying to settle things down. Well, I go to Liberty Faith Church, Reg is my pastor. And I've had it happen. And I don't think it's right. I ain't worth a flip, but I'll tell you what Jesus Christ is, and I don't think you ought to use the church, and I don't think you ought to try to use the church as a basis to try to get yourself out of trouble with when you've been wrong. Y'all just say, I'm responsible, and don't hook the church to it, and don't hook everybody else to it. Second of all, he was disrespectful to Naaman. Naaman was a new convert. Can you imagine doing a brand new convert that way? Perverting his understanding of the Gospel, Well, okay, yeah, they really do want money, don't they? He was damaging a brand new believer, which Jesus said, if you offend one of these little ones, it's better for you to have a millstone about your neck and ground the depths of the sea. He was offending the little one. And not only that, but watch this vulture. He saw him as prey. As easy prey. Did you know these hucksters, that's the way they look at people. They look at people as prey. Widows. I'm going to say something. Let me tell you something. You better be careful how you're dealing with widows. I'm leery of anybody that gets too close to widows, especially if widows have family. You need to leave them alone. Because I'm going to tell you something. There are people who think so deviously, you cannot imagine. I just recently have had to deal with a situation where some relatives are trying to get 80 some year old widow they may petition the court now to have her declared incompetent and named all of her assets to be transferred to their control Including down to her pickup that she drives every day And they are not her children because she doesn't have any children And I'll tell you something else. You get these letters in the mail from ministries wanting you to fill out a will? Wanting them to send an agent to you to help you fill out an estate planning situation? Who do you think they're looking out for when they send? And by the way, do they send their letters and their appeals? Do you have any children? Because if you do, we're sure that you want them to be their inheritors, you know, so we don't want to bother you. Jimmy Swagger got into a lawsuit by a family out in California because basically in the kids' eyes, he swindled their mother out of all their money. And by the way, they won the lawsuit. This has been years ago. He had more problems than women problems. He also was disrespectful of Naaman's servants, the people that was around Naaman. He was disrespectful to the people of that nation, but fourthly, he was disrespectful to God Almighty. He said in verse 20, I will run after him. I want to ask us tonight, you know what the Holy Spirit asked me when I read that? Reggie, what are you running after? What are you running after? As we said, the lie was carved and it was clever. My master has sent me saying, we've got some young preacher boys that need help. I mean, you know, it's really tough getting through the sons of the prophet school and sometimes married, got kids and they're young boys and boy, they need help, you know. And have you ever noticed? There's a guy that I've seen me and Karen been in the motel. I've seen him and he's ruined. But he's got the he's when I think he's always African orphans. What's his name? He's just his whole show is about. You might know him. No, I tell you something. I have pity and compassion. I'm all for helping. But I'm going to tell you something, I'm very leery of people when they overemphasize the children and constantly put pictures of those children in front of you and constantly hitting you up for money to help those orphans. Quiet in here. And we need to be careful that what we're giving to is the real deal. The youth, the poor, the sick and the orphans are used to vacuum out money from folks. Naaman gave more than was asked. That's what many people will do. You catch people, let me tell you something. People, there's a reason that people, hey, we're going to get to this pretty soon. Lost people will give to those kind of things. And they're glad to do it and excited about doing it. And I'll tell you why pretty soon. It was cloaked and lit in religion as the Lord liveth. Never was there any indication that it was for him only and that he was going to divert that money for his own personal uses. Proverbs 16 8 Proverbs 28 6 and so forth all the time the Bible gives you warning about better to be Content with what you've got than to have riches and trouble with it But the exposure came when verse 25 when he said when he said thy servant went no Lascia said where you been and he just kept lying and he kept lying to cover it up now There's some things he lost And I'll give them to you real quick, and then I'm going to give you some thoughts. And God just spoke to my heart. We're going to go through things. We're going to answer some of these questions I saw this morning. If you want to write these down, or just let's do them. Number one, he lost his health. God said, you're going to be a leper. He lost his honor. For all of history, he is now remembered as a man who lied out his teeth under a religious cloak. He lost his home because it said his seed forever. He lost his holdings because you know what I'm going to guess? Is that Elisha had that money returned to Naaman. I don't think Elisha let it go. He lost his happiness. Can you imagine what he felt in his heart the second Elisha said, where did you go? Where have you been at, Ehazi? Can you imagine the sweat popping out on him? The instant that he justified that in his mind, he lost his joy and his happiness. And he lost his helpfulness. Because the Bible said in the last part of that verse, he went out and that's it. His ministry was over. He lost his helpfulness of life. I want to give you some thoughts on giving to ministries and receiving in a ministry. Ministries, churches, servants of the Lord, because there's a lot of different things out here. Right here in this church, we have a school. Vanna operates a Bible camp. We have various things that we do. And I'm telling you, we need to be careful about what we're doing. The Bible said a gift blindeth the eyes. What does that mean? That you need to be real careful about taking money because it'll blind your eyes to what's going on and it'll stop you from dealing with situations that you ought to deal with. The Bible speaks of the deceitfulness of riches. How do riches deceive us? It causes one to... Now, this is just one thing and this is a whole message on its own. But first of all, riches will cause you to think that God is blessing you when He's not. Let me tell you something, if riches is a symbol of blessing, then the Sodomites are probably the most spiritual people in America, because they are some of the richest people on the planet, and come from some of the richest families in America. Riches are no indicator of spirituality. In fact, the Bible teaches opposite of that. Hath not God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith? So riches, but riches can cause you, and I'm telling you, you say, Richie, how do you know that? I've experienced it. But I'll tell you, I've been doing good. When I've done good financially, you know, I just have a tendency to think everything's fine with God. When I've deceived myself, and just the opposite may be true. It's hard to handle money, folks. It's hard to handle money. Deceitfulness also causes you to be self-sufficient, and you quit depending upon the Lord like you used to, and you're not as close to God as you once were. It can deceive you. Now, I don't believe, we should never accept money from those who are, and here's getting back to why do these people give? We should never accept money from those who are trying to ease their guilt, quieten their disobedience, and the rebellion of their sinful life. This is what a lot of it's about. Did you know that a lot of these scammers, and we can rationalize this in mind, know, they're very subtle, they understand that there are people out here who either were saved in a back sled or are not saved at all and hate the church, but they're wanting to give to something to ease their conscience and lower the guilt in their soul. And they know they're out there and they know many times they're loaded. And so they've learned how to work them. Before we take or receive in this church, now you can't control everything because you don't know everybody's situation, nor do I, nor do I want to know, but I will tell you there's a basic principle we ought to lay down. Before we receive or take money from anybody, I want to know something. When we get letters, when we get letters from people, I've had letters and emails that says, we're not in any church right now. We don't, or we don't feel like our church is using the right Bible, or we're not agreeing with our church, so we'd like to send our tithe here. You don't let people that belong to another church send their tithe to this church. That's wrong. The Bible said, bring your tithe into storehouse. That's the local church. If you can't get all that. Now, what about somebody that's not in fellowship anywhere and they're wanting to get their tithe somewhere? I don't know, but I'm going to tell you this in my spirit. I'm cautious about it. I'm real cautious about it because I don't often times know the story. You know, the truth may be that the old boy just got through preaching on some sin of that guy's and he's all ticked off and he ain't telling me the whole story. He's just telling me what he knows will sound legitimate to him, but he's trying to ease his conscience. Well, I'm giving tithes to Liberty Faith, and my church is over the internet now. So you internet folks listening to me right now, I'm preaching to you internet folks right now. We're not your local church. You don't send your tithes here. If you want to be part of this local church, move down here, start coming to church here. But I'm not peeling money off some church that you ought to be giving to, and you ought to get it right, or find a church where you can tithe to. All right? Now, I believe that. I'm telling you something. In fact, I know it. I want to tell you something. God's blessed this church because of the way we've handled money and the way we've taken money in this church. Now, here's some questions we need to ask people before we receive money of them. First of all, are you tithing in your local church? Are you a member of a local church? Now, let me tell you something to lay a foundation for that. Jesus Christ is not coming after the ministry. Jesus Christ is coming after the church. He died for the church. He purchased the church with his own blood. And I'm telling you, son, if you want to make preachers mad, just preach this. I will get emails on this one. I promise you. This burns people up. Okay. Number one, have they tithed in their own church? Number two, are they regular in their church? Are they faithful to any church? Or are they just popping once in a while? Are they living right? If they're not living right, and they're not in fellowship with God, what are they giving money to us for? What's the motivation behind it? Are they in known and open rebellion against the will and Word of God? Are they living in known and open rebellion against the Word of God? These are questions we need to ask before we say, oh yeah, bring it in. Money will be a great area of temptation for ministry. Tremendous area of temptation for preachers, for workers in the Lord, for churches and for ministries. Who they take it from and how they take it from. Now I'm going to make a confession to you tonight. When I started preaching, I was well aware of the average poverty of a preacher. The preachers just, by and large, they may be a few super rich ones, but by and large, they don't make much money. Let me tell you something, you can go preach your Bibles all you want to, but you'll do good a lot of times, pay your gas and your so forth, and people have been good, but a lot of times the churches just don't have much. They just don't have a lot to give. So you can't go and you don't go worrying about it. But I'm telling you this much, I'm going to confess something. I purposed in my heart that unless God led me different, that I was going to work to support my family, All right. And not get myself in a position where I would be tempted to go, well, let's back off of this issue because this is making people mad. I mean, listen, folks, you would not believe all the stuff I've had told me in the last 30 years. You would not believe. I mean, you just blow your mind about it has about blowed mine. And but I made up my mind that I did not want to get myself into a financial position where I was so desperate to take care of six children and my wife. that I would back up on preaching what I knew God wanted me to preach. For that reason, I determined that, you know, if God allowed me, He may not allow me, but Lord, unless you tell me directly different, I'm going to do some work out here. I'm going to try to earn a living so that I cannot get myself in that position. Because I'm going to tell you something, I'm not a strong person. I'm just as weak as anybody else. And I'm just as susceptible to temptation. And can I tell you something? Reggie Kelly's flesh likes money as well as your flesh does. And don't think this old saying money talks doesn't have substance to it, it does. It's real easy to justify taking money from people. In the world, now I'm going to say something, don't get offended here, but I'm going to give you an illustration. I don't know whether it's true or not, I'm a history buff, you know that. I read this in some history writing and I fell over backwards when I read it. But it's a great illustration of what's going on in the church world and preachers and ministries. Winston Churchill was at a gala, state event supper. one time, and he wasn't an angel. He might have been a great leader at a certain time in history, but Winston wasn't a great, he wasn't your average Sunday school teacher, okay? And it is said that he was placed in a seat besides a nice-looking woman. During the course of the supper, he leaned over to her and said, ma'am, would you go to bed with me for ten dollars, but in English terms? Would you go to bed with me for ten dollars? And she responded by puffing up and saying indignantly to him, and I'll try to quote it, I'm offended that you would think that I could be bought so cheaply. What kind of woman do you think I am? And Winston Churchill in his normal wit said, man, the kind of woman you are has already been established. We're now negotiating the price. You see, what he saw was that she did not say, I'm not for sale, sir, and I'm going to have my husband talk to you right now, not after the dusk supper, and get her husband in there right now. When she said, huffy and elegantly, that I can't be bought so cheap. See, this is where we're at. Now, I asked a question, one about $20,000, and I wanted you to say, is it right for a person to take $20,000 wrong, or can he take $20 wrong? You see, sometimes it gets to be the amount. Because there's an old saying, every person has their price. Should we take tithes to people who are not part of this work? I don't believe we should. I don't think we should. I think we ought to tithe to their local church. Amen. Now, there's two things in the Bible, tithes and then there's offerings. Should we take their offerings, which is above their time? I want to tell you something. First of all, if they're not in church, faithful church, and as far as you know, not living in rebellion, I don't think we take their tithes, period. And then the offering, I'm not against offerings. Bless God for offerings. They're wonderful. But only if they're tithing in their local church. If that person's not tithing in a local church, that tells me they're not in fellowship with God's people where they're at. It tells me they've got problems in their life, and why are we taking offers from them when they're all messed up? And why do I want to be used as the devil to soothe their conscience, and ease their guilt, and ease their slide into hell if it's a lost person, and make them feel good about themselves because I gave. If we know, that's one thing. If we don't know, that's another. If you don't know, you don't know. But if you know, that's another thing. The wicked, the ungodly, and especially the backslidden, are all looking for a ministry where they can give. That's a fact. They're looking for ministry. You say, Reggie, why would those people want to give? Number one, tax write-offs. If you think for a minute that people with money do not constantly search for ways that they can deduct their taxes, they do. So it's a natural given. That's number one. Number two, to ease their conscience. I've mentioned that repeatedly tonight. They feel guilty. They want to give. Number three, they want to buy off conviction. They balance what they gave against their sinful lifestyle. But I gave this, I did this. Number four, it oftentimes silences rebuke. A gift blinded the eyes, but a gift also will silence the rebuke. I'm going to tell you something. You're made out of a different place than anybody else is made in this building. If you say that when somebody gives you a gift that you will take the stand that you would have took had they not given it to you. Right. God will allow us to be tested. Will the ministry, the person or the work where they're giving, continue and still reprove and exhort with all long-suffering doctrine, or will they remain silent on issues that they know the person is guilty of? Number five, buying influence. Many people like to buy influence, and they do it through giving of money. Number six, it strengthens their self-righteousness. Strengthens their self-righteousness. Taking funds from those who are not in church, who are backslidden, or they're unsaved, or in open sin only greases their slide to hell. And how often has Satan whispered in their ears, when the Holy Spirit dealt with them, how often has Satan whispered, yes, but think how much money you've given to the work. When we don't believe that the heart is desperately wicked and deceitful above all things, who can know it, we're deceiving ourselves bad. There is no depth of depravity that the heart cannot take and justify and rationalize sin in. But here's one of the big things. Great opportunity is lost. Great opportunity is given when money is rejected and refused like Elisha did. Why? When somebody offers you money, and you sense in your spirit, or you know in your spirit things are not right spiritually there, The first question is, why won't you take this money? That is your opportunity that God has given you to lovingly and kindly and yet firmly say, we want to run this ministry and this work in accordance with not only the letter of God's Word, but the spirit of God's Word. And we cannot take money from sources that are knowingly living outside the will of God. God does not support His work with ungodly, ways. He never has, and he never will. You say, Reggie, give me a scripture for that. In 1 Samuel chapter 15, the prophet Samuel told Saul, Behold, to obey is better than to sacrifice. God's saying, I would rather you get right with God than give all the money you'll ever have. And in fact, what did it do to Saul? It ruined him. That day, he reached out and grabbed hold of Samuel's garment, but he lost the kingdom that day. You say, well, wait a minute, Reg, he didn't lose it that day. He was still king for quite a while. Yeah, but in God's sight, ordained, it was over with. Yeah, it took a while for him and his son to be killed on the battlefield, but it was over. And it was because he thought sacrifice was better than obeying the Lord. Obedience is better than sacrifice. Remember in the book of Acts, where the apostles said, thou thoughtest that the gift of God could be purchased with money? Remember the apostles, what they said, thy money perish with thee. Where's that old apostolic biblical attitude in the church today? Thy money perish with thee. No, it's constantly beating people down. I heard about pastors going out to people's houses wanting to see their tax returns. I promise you something tonight from this pulpit. I will never be at your house to ever ask you to see your tax return to see if you've tithed. It's between you and the Lord, and He knows what you're doing. And if you're not, that's between you and God, and I don't care. But you won't have to worry about me coming to your house checking on your tax returns. Oftentimes, People are bitter at the church or bitter at a work, the ministry that they were involved in in the past, and we should never take money from them. The church is Christ's bride and it is a body. It becomes a divisive, dividing principle. Acceptance from the ungodly defiles the gospel. Now, we talked this morning about some areas here. I'll give the first one I want to ask you. Someone sends a letter addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Reg Kelly. Nice cards inside, and they said, you don't know us, but we've been listening to your CDs for three years or whatever. We were almost on the verge of divorce. Our children were in rebellion. And God has used your preaching and the ministry there to bless us and our homes together. And God has turned our lives around. And He's blessed us financially, and you'll find a check enclosed as just a token of our appreciation for how God has used you in our lives. We'll forever and eternally be grateful for the way God worked through your preaching in our lives. And I'll open it up, and there's a check for twenty grand. And the question I ask you this morning, and I want to answer, is should I take it? No. For me to take that would be theft. Okay. It could get dicey, but here's the catch to it. Your preaching and the ministry and the work. What does that tell you? That it's this church. It's the church. And if I took that money, put it to personal use, I would feel like, now maybe you wouldn't, but I would feel like I had just stole from this church's labor that you folks are doing a lot of the work. You're doing the giving. You're doing the work and I'm taking the credit for it and then somebody sends a big fat check like that and I take it, I would consider it to be absolute theft and I'd probably fall out of the bed with a dead heart attack at night. That's just how scared I would be to take it. Now, if that person wrote this and said, Reggie, We've appreciated your preaching. We know all about giving to ministries, but the Lord has placed on our heart that we want to give individually, personally to you and Karen. We don't understand why, but God has instructed us. And it's not about the ministry. It's not about what the church is doing. I don't know. I'd have to look at that. You're not going, I don't know, boy. But you know what? There's a lot of things in life God didn't write down in the Bible and say, now, Reggie, if you were to receive it... But you know what? In my spirit, I have to check and say, you know, is it me? Should I be rewarded for this? No. Aren't we a body? You know, in all honesty, I mean, it's a hard question, because I'm going to tell you something. I ain't never got one of those checks, but if I got one, maybe I'd change my theology. I don't know. And would it be a test? While I'm living, it'd be a test. But I'm telling you in my heart tonight, you watch this, I'll probably get a check this week. Watch this one here. Here's another question. A church, refuses to post the amount of funds received in tithes and offerings, and where and to those funds were dispersed and spent on. People in the church are wondering and asking, you know, what's the church do with its money? Is this a legitimate concern of the people? Sure it is. Anytime there's not open transparency and you can go back on the bulletin board somewhere, I never even look at it. That's not that I'm not interested. I just don't look at it. But Mona prints out every month, where every check, all the money goes to. People have a right to know that. It's not that it's God's money, but you know something? What's wrong with transparency? What's wrong with being open about it? What have we got to hide? You know? The other part about it is that it would be the stupidest thing in the world for a preacher not to do that. That's one reason I'm not able to write checks here. I don't want to write checks here. I don't want anybody to say, well, you wrote that check. I might have told him to, but I didn't write it. But here's what I'm saying. It allows a cloud to come on my life. He's not being transparent. We don't know what's going on with the money around here. That's a legitimate concern of the church. And when a ministry is not transparent, don't give to it. Don't get to it. You've got problems already, okay? Now, we're going to go down. I've got three or four more here. A person has won the lottery of $365,000. They come to the church and say, God has laid on my heart to give half of what I won to the church. Should we take it? Come in here. Raise your hand that we should take it. Raise your hand. I don't see a hand in the building. Alright, why not? Tell me why. Okay, then why is it okay to take money from other sources where they're not right, where it's not right? Not. See, what we're not careful, we'll categorize stuff. Well, that's okay. But on all that, not okay. But still not godly, still not of the Lord. A drug dealer breaks in $20,000 a month. He has a brother-in-law who runs an orphanage. He offers to give $25,000 of the work should the orphanage accept it. How many once started an orphanage have a brother-in-law that's in the drug business? But can I tell you something? It's easy to sit in church tonight and talk about, oh no, we shouldn't do that. But if you're not careful, the spirit of Gehazi would come over you and you'll justify, well, you know, God's sovereign and God's, God's just collecting his bills and he's just, God just used this amazing situation. And you'd be surprised, because I'm going to tell you something, the spirit of Gehazi will just, as the Lord liveth, I'm going to go after that. Elijah just wasn't thinking. He took money from him. And as the Lord liveth, I'm going to go after him and get that. If you're not careful, I'm telling you tonight, listen folks, I love money as much as any of you do, and I'm telling you something, it's easy to talk, but when that's laying on the table, you better be careful. Next example. A Christian children's home is doing a great and compassionate work with kids who come from horrible backgrounds. The director of the children's home has an uncle. who was mad and bitter at the local church because the preacher preached against smoking years ago. He had left the church bitter at the preacher over smoking. The uncle died and left $60,000 in his will to the orphanage home, should the orphanage take it. Getting a little bossy, ain't it? Now, you can disagree with me, and I won't hold it against you, but I don't think they should take it. I think it would dirty the ministry. I think the people in the church would then look at that ministry and say, you know something, that man wouldn't even tie it to local church, but you took his money. He was bitter at God because of what he had done. And it would also tell relatives. Well, you can kind of buy your way through your bitterness. I personally wouldn't think you should take it. Oh, Brother Dennis, you'll love this one here. A church Christian school is in desperate need of better facilities, classrooms, equipment and funds and so forth. One of the families in the school has a grandpa who really appreciates what the school is doing for his grandchildren. He is very wealthy. He tells the school director he wants to give $100,000 to do whatever needs to be done to supply their needs. The director tells the pastor, and they rejoice and go out and eat dinner together. They're so happy. They rejoice in God's provision, but learn later that week that the man is not married to the woman he is living with, should the school Take the grandparents' money of the grandchildren that are in the school. I don't think so. At all. That's not even hard. It would be wicked. What that school would be absolutely doing at that point would be moving out from underneath the umbrella of faith, operating on faith of the holiness of God that God will provide for His work and His time and His way. But He will not do it through ungodly means. They should wait on the Lord. In fact, they could bring a curse upon that school. Oh my, we'll finish up here with this one here. A person has been placed in charge of a trust fund upon the death of another. The giver, who is now deceased, has indicated that certain funds and certain assets were to be given to a certain ministry. Although some funds were received, the person in charge never reveals the content of the trust to the ministry recipients. Should the person who is operating the trust be transparent and open and tell the recipients the whole truth about what was left in the trust for them. Is it wrong for this person who's in charge of the trust not to reveal the amount? It is wrong, and here's why. Because he is leaving a cloud of suspicion that he never dispersed at all. And here's another problem with it. Anytime someone is not... How many of you would like to do business with a trust company who wouldn't disclose to the descendants what was in the will. See, it's the same thing. It shows that there's not transparency and openness in the heart. By the way, these are things that people are dealing with and ministries are dealing with on a frequent basis. It's not unusual. It's not uncommon. And I've been amazed as I've went through Elisha's life and how much stuff I wanted to jump over, but how much stuff God said, wait a minute, slow down, I'll show you something. So, I want to encourage you tonight, giving or receiving of money or assets should never violate the letter nor the spirit of God's word. Whether we're on the giving end or whether we're on the receiving end, it ought not violate. Just think about this. Let's say that five or six of you people just made me mad and I left church. And I just start tithing to some other church. But I ain't going to church nowhere. And I'm so mad at you people, I ain't going to tithe here. I ain't going to give that place. It happens all the time. You can always expect in the ministry, You can always expect God to allow Satan to tempt you to accept funds and or provisions for the ministry from ungodly people and ungodly sources in ungodly ways. You can expect that temptation. I'm telling you, God will back up and he will let things come in and he will test you what you'll do. He'll show you what's in your heart. God will never violate his will or his way or his word to provide for his work. And God has never asked the world to support his work. Never has. Never instructed the world to provide for his work. And we need to have faith in God. As I said a while ago again, I want to repeat that if you check in the Bible, as far as I know, and Brother Queen mentioned this this morning, Jesus never made an appeal for money that I know of in the Bible. Isn't that amazing? And yet churches are known all over the country for squeezing on people and ministries are squeezing on people all the time. Well, there's a verse that you ought to always remember when you're tempted. The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. God is not broke. George Mueller said that God's work done in God's way, in God's will, will never lack for funds. And if it appears that there's funds lacking, it's because God is not ready to move forward with that project at this time. So I want to just encourage you tonight as a church, let's take heed to these things both on both sides, both on the giving And both on the receiving end, because I don't want to bring a curse on this work. Okay? Yes? I can tell you that mushrooms will pervert the gospel here. Don't you think I don't remember who hands me a bag of mushrooms? You know something, we're all fallen creatures. And it really doesn't matter about, we might have a lot, we might have little. Having a lot doesn't exempt you from being tempted to, you know, be swayed by that. And what I just want to encourage us tonight is that, you know, Well, when you talk about God judging man with leprosy and his seed forever, that's pretty serious. And when you see that motive, you know, and you see and you start connecting that to all this went on and so forth. And I know that those seven, those seven hypotheticals, they're hypotheticals. I don't, to be honest with you, I don't like hypotheticals. Those aren't really hypotheticals because a lot of times they're real situations that people get hit with. But I don't like hypotheticals generally because hypotheticals oftentimes are not realistic. A lot of hypothetical questions and they set people up to pervert doctrine. So I'm real careful about hypothetical questions. But anyway, anybody else got anything you want to ask about mushrooms or anything else? I will tell you this, Brother Don, I've been to revival meetings where people have slipped me money. And you can just tell by the look on their face. They know that money, how a man receives and handles money is the determining factor. They're checking you out. And sometimes I don't even believe they're being maliciously mean. They just, hey, I'm going to find out who this guy is real fast. I don't care what he's preaching behind that pulpit. What he'll do for money and the way he'll act for money is who he really is. And they're right. And I'm not always saying they're mean people do that. Okay. Let's stand and go home. Thank you so much for being here tonight. I want to tell everybody something tonight. Tell myself, we never have to lie. We never have to cheat. We never have to deceive. We never have to try to figure it out differently than what God would have us to make it in life. God will take care of us. Amen? God will take care of us. Lord, thank You for this evening. Thank You for Your Word. Lord, there ain't no book like it in the world. I pray God that we'll heed what we've heard tonight. I pray God that we'll lay it to heart. And I pray, Lord, the truth about it is, Lord, tonight I'm just standing here thinking, preach something like this and probably get tried in the next couple of weeks. So, Lord, help me that when that test comes, Lord, to think back to Your Word and let Your Word guide my feet. Let it be a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. We'll see y'all Wednesday night.