It's good to be with you again this morning. We've been here since Friday. We flew in from the Naples, Florida area. That's where we reside, to be a part of the Friday night RU program here. And then yesterday we had a program from 9 o'clock until 3 o'clock for the RU recovery program. And I believe it was a success, that everything went well, and prayerfully the content of what was given was beneficial to those that were here. Just to let you know, my name is George Crabb and my wife is in the back. Her name is Linda. And we travel for the RU Recovery Program throughout the year. I also am a physician. My specialty is internal medicine. with a subspecialty in addiction medicine, practicing out in Naples, Florida. I'm also the assistant pastor at Gospel Baptist Church in the Naples, Florida area as well. And so we enjoy doing what we do. The Lord has blessed immensely. And Pastor, thank you for the opportunity to stand behind your pulpit this morning and address your people. I take that very seriously. If you have your Bibles this morning, I want to talk to you about what I'd like to say are little things. Genesis 19, talking about the story of Sodom and Gomorrah and Lot and his family exiting the cities before they are destroyed. Just talking about little things that we have to be careful about in our lives. Look at Genesis 19. And I'd like to read v. 15-20, and then we'll have a word of prayer and get into the message this morning. It says again in v. 15 of Genesis 19, And when the morning arose, then the angels hastened Lot, saying, Arise, take thy wife and thy two daughters which are here, lest thou be consumed in the iniquity of the city. And while he lingered, the men laid hold upon the hand of his wife and upon the hand of his two daughters, the Lord being merciful unto them, and they brought him forth and set him without the city." And it came to pass, when they had brought them forth abroad, that he said, Escape for thy life, look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain, escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed. And Lot said unto them, O not so, my lord! Behold now, thy servant hath found grace in thy sight, and Thou hast magnified Thy mercy which Thou hast shown unto me in saving my life. And I cannot escape to the mountain, lest some evil take me and I die." Verse 20, "'Behold now, this city is near to flee unto, and it is a little city. O let me escape thither, is it not a little one? And my soul shall live.'" And I want to concentrate on verse 20 when Lot, escaping by God's grace and God's mercy from the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, is supposed to go to the mountains. That's where God wants him. But Lot argues with God, as we're going to see, and says, well, this is a little city. It's not a big city. It's not a big known city. But just a little city. And I'd rather go there, God, than to escape to the mountains. But before we get into it, let's ask God to bless our time together. Heavenly Father, we come to You in the name of Jesus this morning, thanking You for Your wonderful grace and mercy Thank You for Your love, Your forgiveness. I pray that You would meet with us, Holy Spirit, this morning. That You would just give us wisdom and understanding. Give me wisdom and understanding as I speak. And give these people wisdom and understanding in spiritual matters as they listen. I pray that You would help all of us make good, godly decisions this morning. Draw us closer to You. I pray that You would meet with us in a very personal and powerful way. That You would receive all the glory. That Jesus Christ would be uplifted. And Father, help us be very careful to give You all the honor, all the glory, and all the praise. For we ask these things in Christ's name. Amen. Now, if you'll take your Bibles and go to 2 Peter 2 because I just want to bring out a little bit about Lot and what was going on in his life, and then we'll get back to Genesis 19 in just a little bit. But according to 2 Peter 2, verses 6-9, we find that Lot, as the Bible says, was a righteous man. It says in verse 6, "...and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them with an overthrow, making them an example unto those that after should live ungodly." And it says here in verse 7, "...and delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked..." for that righteous man..." So we see here that Lot was a righteous man. "...for that righteous man dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds." So we see that from a standpoint in the life of Lot that he was positionally righteous. And that happens when you and I receive Jesus Christ as Savior. because we cannot earn our salvation, we cannot work for our salvation, it must be given to us as we accept what God has given to us in His Son, Jesus Christ. And when I accept, when I realize I'm a sinner, when I realize that I cannot save myself, but I realize that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, God Himself, paid for my sin on the cross, was buried and rose again three days later, and I reject myself, I repent, I turn from my unbelief, I turn from me trying to do it, trying to work my way, trying to do it my own way, and I turn to Christ by faith, then He saves me, and in God's eyes, I am positionally righteous because God looks at me through His Son, Jesus Christ. And that's what's going on with Lot here. He's positionally righteous. Ephesians 2.8-9, a soul-winning verse, For by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It's a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. But we see Lot is positionally righteous. He's a saved man in the eyes of God through what Jesus Christ did on the cross. But in verse 7 it says that Lot was vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked. And that word vexed in verse 7 means to wear down your soul or to expose yourself to things that wear us down. And because Lot was living in this environment and seeing and hearing on a day-to-day basis, it was wearing down his soul. And that's why we find Lot having difficulty. It goes on to say in verse 8 that also, in seeing and hearing vexed his righteous soul." That word vexed in verse 8, little different meaning, means to torment your soul. So Lot, by seeing and hearing, all that was going on around him was tormenting his own soul. So Lot had positional righteousness. He was right before God through Jesus Christ, but his practical righteousness, that day-to-day living for God, was suffering because of things that Lot was allowing into his life, not only through his eye gate, but through his ear gate, as verse 8 has to say. Seeing and hearing vexed his righteous soul. And so this is where Lot is when he's coming out of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Now go back to chapter 19 of Genesis where we just read here. And we see in verse 17 of chapter 19, God's distinct will for the life of Lot and his family. It says at the end of verse 17 that Lot and his family were to escape to the mountain lest they be consumed. That was God's definitive will for Lot to escape to the mountains. That's what God wanted him and his family to do. But in verse 16, we find that Lot lingered, didn't he? And while he lingered, So Lot lingered. In verse 18, Lot argues and Lot said unto them, O not so, my lord. I can't go to the mountains. But God definitively says in His Word that's what He wanted Lot to do, was go to the mountains. And then in verse 19, we find Lot begging God to let him go to this little city. It's just a little city. So it's okay. It's not a big city. It's not a renowned city. It's not a city that a lot of people know about. God, I know You want me to go to the mountains, but there's a little city that I would like to go to instead. And my friends, anything that is outside of God's will is wrong, even if it's just a little thing. Even if it's a little city. God wants you to go to the mountain. God wants you to do this. But God, I don't want to do that. It's just a little city. And because it's a little city, then it's okay. It is not okay. No matter what. If you just allow little things into your life that can take you away from the will of God, it's wrong. It's not good. God allows Lot to have his own way. as He does here in Genesis 19, allowing Lot to go to the little city. And God will allow you and I to have our own way. But He did this with the nation of Israel in the wilderness. Psalm 106.15 says, And He gave them their request, but sent leanness into their soul. God will let you do your thing, but you will pick up the tab like Jonah did when he had to pay his own way on the ship. Little things can get in our way and affect our walk with God, affect our relationship with God. We're children of God, but I believe by you being here this morning, you at least have somewhat of a desire to serve God. to do God's will. But we have to be careful. As Lot wanted to go, instead of to the mountains, to the little city, a lot of Christians are allowing a little city or a little thing into their life that is affecting the will of God in their life, and God is not pleased with that. And so I want to share with you some little things this morning that we have to be careful about. that we should not allow into our life, that we need to be vigilant about keeping these little things out of our life. Several years ago, I had a man that we put in the hospital. He had an extensive case of what we call cellulitis, which is infection of the skin structure of the body. It was of his lower leg, his foot and his lower leg. We put him on IV antibiotics to try to kill off the infection. But the infection was so bad for the first several days, I didn't know if we were able to turn this around or not. And I actually had to consult a vascular surgeon, because it was at the point where we thought the infection was so bad, it was so advanced, that this man might lose his leg. Thankfully, with appropriate antibiotic therapy, we were able to turn things around and the infection gave way to the treatment program. But what we found, this overwhelming infection in this man's leg started with a little sliver in the bottom of his foot that got that area infected. He was negligent in not following up with his doctor, allowing the infection to grow and grow and grow. But that whole thing started with just a little splinter in the bottom of his foot that gave us a huge infection in this man. So little things. Well, it's just a little thing. It doesn't matter. If it's not part of God's will, it's not going to be profitable for you spiritually. Just little things. So let me give you three little things that we need to be careful about in our Christian walk. Take your Bibles for the first one to the Song of Solomon. So that would be the book of Psalms, the book of Proverbs, the book of Ecclesiastes, and then you'll run into the book of the Song of Solomon. Chapter 2, verse 15. This is the first little thing that we have to be careful about not allowing into our lives. Song of Solomon. Again, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Solomon. Chapter 2, verse 15. It says, take us, the foxes, The little foxes that spoil the vines, for our vines have tender grapes." These little foxes, what they would do in the vineyards, they would eat the small, immature grapes that hung low off the vine, and therefore would not allow the little grapes, the immature grapes, to mature. And what happens is little things that we allow into our life can spoil our relationship with God. Just as these foxes would eat the tender, immature grapes, not allowing them to mature, little things in our lives can hinder us in our relationship with God, allowing that relationship to mature and become sweeter and become more wonderful in our lives. Certain little things that can hinder our relationship with God, these little foxes that can get into our lives, is an unforgiving spirit. That's just one of them of many. An unforgiving spirit towards another brother or sister in Christ, or just an unforgiving spirit can be a little fox that hinders your relationship with God from growing and maturing. It can be simply a little fox of bitterness. a little fox of bitterness, a little fox of anger, a little fox of doubt, a little fox of mistrust towards our God that I'm not certain God is able, I'm not certain God is able to get me through this certain circumstance. But my friends, these are little foxes that can hinder the maturing of our relationship with God. So if you have any little foxes of this nature in your life, it is time to get those little foxes out so they can't nibble on those immature grapes, not allowing them to mature. We need to get them out of our lives so that we can have a more unique, more flourishing, a mature relationship with Jesus Christ. There needs to be nothing between us and God. Not even a little thing. Because those little things will draw us away from God. And we need to protect our relationship with God. It is the foundational relationship that we have in our lives. Linda and I have been married for over 30 years now. We'll be celebrating 31 years in December. And that's a key relationship in my life, her and me. But foundationally and the primary relationship that I have in my life is my relationship with God. You say, well, it should be your wife first. No, it should be God first. Because when I'm right with God, I'll be right with my wife. When I'm right with God, I'll be right with my wife and I'll be right with my children. And in fact, when I'm right with God, I'll not only be right with my wife and with my children, I'll be right with everyone else in my life. Because I'm first right with God. My vertical relationship is right, therefore my horizontal relationships will be right. We need to protect that relationship with God and not allow these little foxes, whatever they might be, to get into our lives, hindering that maturation process in our relationship with God. And how do we build that relationship with God? You spend time with God. You spend time with God getting to know God. You spend time with God through reading your Bible, studying your Bible, meditating on your Bible. Spend time with God in prayer. Spend time with God in church. Singing the songs of Zion. Hearing the teaching of the Word of God in Sunday school and on Wednesday nights. Hearing the preaching of the Word of God on Sunday morning and Sunday nights and on special services that you might have. Hearing the Word of God proclaimed on RU program on Friday night. The RU program is a wonderful discipleship program letting you get to know God in a more intimate, deeper way that will facilitate, that will help your maturation in your relationship with God. And not only do we need to spend time with God, as Linda and I, when we were dating, we spent a lot of time together getting to know each other, but we also did things together and we need to do things with God. Not only reading the Bible, prayer, attending church, listening to good godly sermons on CD or on the internet, whatever it might be, but also doing things with God. Serving God. Getting a ministry through your local church that you can participate in and put your life in. Having that service. Not only getting to know God, spending time with God, but doing things with God. That will help build that relationship with your Heavenly Father. But be careful. These little foxes can get into your life and they can basically stunt your growth, stunt your relationship from building and maturing with the Heavenly Father. Secondly, just turn back one book to the book of Ecclesiastes, chapter 10. This is the second little thing. The first thing is little foxes. You've got to be careful with the little foxes. They may not look dangerous because they're little, but they're dangerous. They can stunt your growth in the Lord Jesus Christ. But in Ecclesiastes 10, verse 1, The second little thing we have to be careful about, it says, dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savor. And here is the other little thing, so doth a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honor. The flies that he's talking about there, the dead flies in the first part of chapter 10, verse 1, make the perfume stink. And I think any of the ladies or men with cologne, if you found in your bottle some dead flies, I don't think you'd be spritzing that stuff on you. I think most, if you're in your right mind and sane, would probably discard that stuff. It would be of no use to you anymore. And the Bible takes that picture of what we would do if we found dead flies in our cologne or in our perfume or in our medicine. He says, so a little folly makes our reputation distinct. Just a little folly. Not a lot, but just a little folly. Just like the little foxes causes our relationship with God, it hinders our relationship with God, so a little folly will hinder or hurt our reputation for God. It's easy to become distracted, isn't it? This little folly can be when we start looking at the temporal instead of the eternal. When we start looking at the here and now instead of the hereafter, we need to have our eyes fixated on Jesus Christ and on heaven. But isn't it easy? It's so easy to let just a little bit of this earthly will and desire to get into our lives, and that can hurt our reputation. It can hinder our testimony. We have to be careful and make sure that our eyes are set on Jesus Christ, not on finances, not on prestige or position or power, but on Jesus Christ, the author and the finish of our faith. This little folly can just be a little bit of laziness in our lives. Where we allow our passion for Christ to dim or lessen in our lives, we can start to become careless in our spiritual walk. We can start to become casual in our spiritual walk. This is a little bit of folly. Not a lot. Not a huge heaping helping of folly, but just as the little foxes can eat those grapes, so a little folly can affect our reputation, our testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ. I like to say, I said this over the weekend, or I think I said it Friday night as I was speaking, that when we start to become casual in our Christian walk, Casualties happen. Things happen. When we start to become casual in our Bible reading, in our prayer, our church attendance, our faithfulness, living the principles of the Word of God, when we start to become casual in those areas, allow a little folly into our lives, casualties will happen. Not only in my life, but with my family and even with my ministry. We have to be inattentive. We have to be very alert to what we allow into our lives. can affect our reputation or testimony. And I believe by you being here this morning, you have a testimony that you want to serve the Lord, you want to live for the Lord, and you want others to see the Lord in your life. We must be diligent. We must have discretion. Proverbs 2, verse 11 tells us, discretion shall preserve thee. Be careful what you allow into your life because it can affect your reputation. for the Lord. Even a little bit of folly, the Bible says. Not a big amount, but just a little bit can affect your reputation. So the little foxes can affect our relationship with God. A little folly affects our reputation for God. And then thirdly, take your Bibles to the book of Galatians chapter 5 for the third little thing that can affect our lives. The book of Galatians chapter 5. And we'll look at v. 9. The Bible says in the book of Galatians 5, v. 9, we've talked about the little foxes affecting your relationship with God, a little folly affecting your reputation for God, and in Galatians 5, v. 9, we're going to see a little leaven affecting your practical righteousness. It says in Galatians 5, verse 9, a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. In the Word of God, basically, leaven stands for sin. That's the picture that the Bible paints. Basically, for leaven, equaling sin. And just a little sin. It doesn't say a lot of leaven, but just a little leaven, a little sin, will permeate our entire existence. Sin doesn't just sit there and do nothing. It wants to expand, it wants to engulf every aspect of your spiritual life, every aspect of your psychological life, every aspect of your physical life. It wants to overwhelm you, and in many cases, it'll start with just a little leaven. Just a little sin, nothing big, nothing major that we would classify, but just allowing a little bit of leaven into our life can affect the entire being of our existence. You think about it, when that man that I used as an illustration earlier started with that little sliver, it was just a few bacteria that started that infection. But those bacteria multiplied, they grew, and they expanded over his entire lower leg. because they weren't just satisfied with just that little area around the sliver. They wanted more. And I like to say compromise or sin demands more compromise, demands more sin, and in a lot of cases, it'll just start off with something little, because sin, even though it's little, will eventually affect the whole person. because you cannot compartmentalize sin in your life. It's like if you were to go to a restaurant today or sometime this week, and you were to order something to drink, and the waitress or the waiter brought you your drink, and the glass that your drink is in is wonderfully clean, no problems whatsoever that you can see except At the bottom on the inside of that glass, you find a little booger. Down at the bottom of the glass. Just small. Real teeny. You can barely see it, but you can see it. Now what are you going to do? Again, for most people in their right mind, people that claim to be sane, you're going to not drink that drink. I wouldn't. I would demand a completely clean Glass for my drink. I'm not going to have that beverage that is in that dirty glass. And my friends, that's what a little sin will do to our lives. It affects the whole glass. It affects the whole life. Sin is a destroyer of our practical righteousness. Not our positional righteousness, because I am saved and secure in Jesus Christ. I am positionally righteous through Christ. But my practical righteousness, my day-to-day sanctification, being made more like Jesus Christ, is affected when I just allow a little leaven, a little sin into my life. What we do is we tend to justify our sin, don't we? Oh, it's okay. It's just a little bit. It's just a little thing that I watch. It's just a little thing that I say. It's just a little thing that I think. But it's not going to be satisfied with staying little. It's going to want to grow. And it's going to want to overwhelm. And eventually, it's going to want to control you. Not only do we tend to justify our sin, we tend to rationalize our sin. We'll call it something else to make it sound better, right? Just like abortion. We call it abortion, but I say, how do you spell abortion? M-U-R-D-E-R. But we call it other names to try to pacify us or not to allow it to have the sting that it should have. And we do that, do we not? Or, in many cases, we just deny it. We'll live in denial. Oh, I've got this under control. This little thing is not going to bother me. I've got sin under control. No, you don't. Several years ago, I was in the emergency room talking with the emergency room doctor, and there was glass across the entrance of the emergency room And a car drove up and literally now, I'm not lying or embellishing, I'm telling you the dead honest truth, the back door of the car opened and a body was dumped in the entranceway and the car sped off. And so the people of the emergency room or the emergency department went out and picked up the body. It was a 19-year-old young man who was still living. brought him into the emergency department on a bed. I was there with the emergency room doctor and we started to work on this young 19-year-old man. During the time we worked on him for a few hours, he had what we call a code blue, where he stopped breathing and his heart went into a rhythm that would not allow life to continue. So we coded that young man three times. where we had to put him on a breathing machine, and we had to, what we call, cardiovert, or give him electrical shocks to try to get his heart back into a life-sustaining rhythm. We finally stabilized him, and he went to the intensive care unit under my care, and no one came to visit him except one person, his mother. I vividly remember in the time that I spent in the intensive care unit taking care of that man, his mother sitting beside him with her face in her hands, rocking back and forth, saying, Jesus, please save my boy. Jesus, please save my boy. I can hear it like it just happened this morning. During the three days, the man developed Amongst other things, pancreatitis, inflammation of the pancreas, and peritonitis, which is an infection of the lining of the abdominal cavity. Both very serious things. As well as, just a few days earlier, we had to code him three times because he stopped breathing and his heart basically stopped. After three days of taking care of him in a very intensive manner in the ICU, he died. Nineteen years old. And the mother was there when we pronounced him dead. In his drug stream, there was an enormous amount of alcohol and cocaine. So he was using alcohol, using drugs. That all precipitated this event. And I asked the mother, because we had been able to formulate some type of a relationship over the past three days, And I asked her, do you know how this all started? How did this all start that culminated in a 19-year-old young man being intoxicated with alcohol and cocaine leading to all of these medical complications that eventually led to his death? And you know what she told me? She told me it started with a little drink at the age of 12 that his dad gave him." Just a little drink, Pastor. Not a 12-pack. Not a pint. But just a little drink. And that set off the course of events over seven years that ultimately led to this man's death. Just a little drink. That's what she told me. Her words. She said, Dr. Crabb, it started with a little drink that his dad gave him. So my friends, don't allow the little foxes to interfere with your relationship with God maturing. And don't allow a little folly to affect your reputation or your testimony for God. And please, don't allow a little leaven, a little sin, just a little bit. No, I don't want a little bit of sin in my life. I don't want a big amount of sin in my life. I want no sin. I want to be clean before God. Because that little leaven, that little sin will affect your practical righteousness for God. And so it's time, as you examine your lives, to get the little things out of your lives. God told Lot, I want you to go to the mountains. Lot said, oh, there's a little city. That'll be acceptable, God. I don't want to go to the mountains. I don't want to do Your will. It's just a little city, so it's acceptable. But it's not acceptable. Make sure there's no little foxes in your life. Make sure there's not a little folly in your life. And make sure there's not a little leaven in your life, a little sin in your life, so that you can progress, that you can prosper spiritually as you continue to walk and work for God. Let's pray. Father, I thank You for this time that was given to me to preach Your Word. We want to thank You for Your Word the wonderful principles we find in the Word of God. I pray that You would speak to each heart today that is present, that we will drive out the little foxes that might be trying to enter into our lives, that we would not allow even a little folly or a little leaven or a little sin in our life so that the will of God may be done in our life that you would be glorified in our life, and that we would have the proper testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ. And Father, if there be one here this morning that does not know Jesus Christ as their Savior, they're uncertain where they would spend their eternity. I pray, Holy Spirit, that You would work in their heart right now, tug at their heartstrings, knock at their heart's door, And Father, may they seek out Your wisdom, Your understanding, so that they can come to the knowledge of Jesus Christ as Savior. I pray that they would make that decision this morning. The most important decision they'll ever make is what they're going to do with Jesus Christ. And I pray that they would accept Him this morning. So I pray again that You would work in the hearts of Your children and in the hearts of those that may be lost, that they would come to know Christ as Savior. I pray that again your will would be done and through all that is done in the next few moments that you would receive all the honor and all the glory. For we ask these things in the name of Jesus. Amen.