And I want to take this tonight out of its immediate context, and it's an application to the nation of Israel of judgment, chastening, things that were coming to the nation. And the picture God paints here is a very horrible, horrible picture, by the way, and it did happen. Many of you know that when they, Israel was finally destroyed, they literally cut the bellies of the mothers up, ripped the, your Bible tells you they ripped the bellies of the mothers up that were with child. They took the children of those Israelite people and they dashed their heads against stones. They literally picked babies up by the heels and threw them against stones. The Bible speaks of these things, but most people aren't reading that part of history. But Israel saw the wolves come in. But I want to take this setting this evening and shift it over to you and I as believers this evening on the subject of how to kill an evening wolf. how to kill an evening wolf. It's not enough to recognize, when I started this message, I literally was just kind of putting, C.H. Spurgeon has a wonderful devotion on evening wolves. It's pretty short, but he's able to put a lot of stuff in just real quick. But there is a principle in your Christian life, and it's this, that evening wolves will come at you. And they have a purpose of Satan. And you and I need to know how to kill them. And I hope I can preach this tonight. Let's pray. Father I need your help. I stop right now Lord to ask you for help. Lord I pray for the anointing of the Holy Spirit that you would touch my lips my tongue Heavenly Father in my mind and my heart. Help me to preach and feed the flock of God. Help me Lord to give these folks something tonight that he helped them from now till they enter eternity. And I pray, God, that you help us to recognize the evening wolves when they come out. And I pray, Lord, that you'd help us to know how to kill them and how to keep them at distance and how to, Lord, keep from them destroying our peace and our joy and our victory in Christ. Oh, God, tonight help us know the evening wolves are mean and they mean business. And, Lord, I'm asking tonight that you'd preach through me and preach to these people. And, Lord, I pray that personally that I would take this to heart. For Lord, I need this message myself. Help me, God, tonight to preach. I pray in Jesus' name, amen. Nearly every evening at my house, if you have the windows open or outside, about the time at almost just before dark, and I mean nearly every evening, the coyotes will howl. Does anybody else have the coyotes howl? Boy, I tell you, man alive, the coyotes are thick in this country. Now, coyotes are not wolves, but they're close to, they're in the same, of course, family. and they have a lot of the same characteristics. I remember a few years ago, during the daylight, you don't, you know, you'll see a coyote once in a while in the daylight, you know, maybe it's not really that unusual, but in the evening, man, they come out in packs, and you'll hear them, they'll start yipping, and boy, all of a sudden, you think, good land, there must be 15 of them things out there. They're yipping, just everywhere, you know, and they come out in the evening. Now, there's a reason they come out in the evening, because they're an animal of darkness, And they know that if they're out much in the daylight, they're liable to get shot. But when a wolf has lain all day in its den and hiding, it gets very, very hungry. And by the time it comes out in the evening, it's ready to kill and devour things. And you and I, there's some applications I think we can learn from this. I was reading the story recently of some missionaries in Alaska. back in the 40s and 50s, and one of the stories in one of the chapters in that book was about a trip they took to another small settlement. He was speaking of a small town there in Mexico. They wanted to go try to take the gospel to a nearby town, but they had to take the dogs and their sled, and this missionary, he had finally got him one of these basket sleds, and he'd got him about five dogs together, and they took this trip. It was 40 below zero. You talk about a missionary determined to get the gospel somewhere. When you're getting your dogs up and put them on sleds and you get up in the morning and they had to travel overnight. It actually was a two day trip to this village to these Eskimos. Well, during the night as they were traveling and they had a little boy, little boy, they had a little Eskimo boy that kind of adopted with him. I think he was about five years old. They had him down inside the basket. all of a sudden they heard the wolves. And I didn't realize how serious this would be, but I guess if you have dogs and there's a pack of wolves at night, you can get in trouble very fast. And so he pulled the sled up and he hollered at his wife, his missionary wife said, throw me the gun. And she brought the gun up out of the basket and handed it to him. And so there was a patch of woods to the right And he said that they absolutely were just, it was like insanity. The howling, the growling, the barking, and the breaking. And he realized in just a little bit that they were not coming for them, that he could actually hear, it was either caribou or moose, that they had just downed, and they were literally tearing this animal apart. And he talked about the fact that if it had been daytime, they probably never would have even seen these wolves, but nighttime, they'd come out of their dens. I wanna tell you something about I mean, literally, if you were walking through the woods tonight and a wolf howled, up in Montana, there's a place you can go. I forget what the name of it is. It's on the other side of the Yellowstone National Park. But there's a place you can go see grizzly bears. They have a great big... Has anybody been to that place? It's the wolves and the grizzly bears. You can go see them. Anyway, they have great big enclosures, and they have several grizzly bears there and several wolves. And those woods, I'll tell you, you talk about a lonesome, wild sound, that howl of those woods. And those woods right there, and they're great big things. Woods don't just get stuff that, woods also kill for pleasure, they just don't kill for hunger. Recently out in, I say recently, this past winter, out in either Colorado or Idaho, on a ranch out there, The wolves had killed 19 elk in one night. They didn't eat any of them. They just caught a herd of them and they just slaughtered them. And right now out in the west there's this great debate about the wolves letting them come back in. A lot of cattlemen, their cattle are being killed by wolves and sometimes they eat them and a lot of times they don't even eat them because they just, they've got, but they kill for pleasure. Wolves can strike fear. I guarantee if this old boy is walking through the woods and a wolf howled within a quarter mile of me, it would strike some fear in you. Just this week, a 16-year-old girl up in Washington was out with her six-year-old brother. And she was getting ready to do some scouting for some hunting. She had her bow with her. And her six-year-old brother had run in front of her. She saw that all she could see was the face of this cougar. And he was just a few feet away from her brother. And she hollered at her brother to run. And when her brother began to run back, she shot that cougar coming at him. And she wounded it. And her dad got a gun later and took him out there. And they finished it off and killed it. But she literally saved her six-year-old brother's life with a bow. I said to you this morning that just recently, a elk hunting guide out in Grand Tetons. was guiding a guide there, and a grizzly bear, two grizzly bears attacked them while they were quartering out an elk. And the guide was killed and actually drug off. They did not find him till the next morning. The bear, when the guy ran to get away and stuff, the next morning they found him. Let me tell you about predators. You can think they're nice if you want to, but they're not nice. They will kill. And so we're looking at wolves tonight. There's something they do. Now I want you to think about this. Wolves can strike fear in you. They come to kill and to devour and to distract and to disturb. Wolves, for sheep, we're called the sheep of Jesus' pasture. And wolves can really disturb a person's rest. They can disturb your peace. They can disturb your joy. They can disturb your spiritual health. They can disturb your spiritual growth because of not being able to rest and instilling fear in you and instilling doubt in you. And so I want these evening woods that we're looking at here to represent devils. Now listen to me tonight. I don't say demons, I say devils. And the reason I say that is because your Bible calls them devils. Well, there is a devil, Satan, but there are devils. And I'm telling you, the Bible says that even Satan goes about his roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. And the evening time represents something. It may be literally that you come home from work and the evening's your house and the wolves can come. It may be a time in your life when you're sick and you're just kind of gloomy and you're down and the wolves can come. It may be a time when you've had financial trouble and it's just a time of gloom in your life and wolves can come in the evening. Evening is when the sunlight is not there. There's a certain amount of darkness that has come in. As I said, it can literally be evening time. That's what they do out at my house. Or when the sun in your life is not bright. By the way, it can be later in your life. It can be when you're an aged person, older people. The evening of your literal life. The evening is when things cannot be seen very well. Darknesses kind of begin to settle over a time of gloom. And so tonight, I want to talk about some wolves that can come in the evening. Evening Woods. Now remember that in the Evening Woods, they're coming out hungry, they're coming out ravenous, they're coming out, they mean business. And I've experienced what I'm gonna preach to you tonight, and it's very real to me. Because I have left church happy, happy, happy, and by the next day, it seemed like Evening Woods had just ripped me up. The first thing tonight is a wolf of disappointment. You may be going through life and you had anticipation and hopes and dreams about things, but it didn't turn out like you wanted it to. You may have hoped for that job or hoped for that opportunity or hoped for this or hoped for that, and you're disappointed. The evening wolves of disappointment can come into your life, and I'll tell you what they'll do. They will devour your peace. They will devour the smile off your face, the joy out of your soul, and they'll not spare and they don't have any mercy. And disappointment is a very mean devil that can come and just put that in your heart, put that in your mind, things that you think, well, it didn't turn out like I wanted it to, and you're disappointed. You're disappointed in people. You're disappointed in circumstances. You're disappointed in the Lord. You're disappointed in the church. You're disappointed in your spouse. You're disappointed in your parents. You're disappointed in your children, whatever it may be. But disappointment comes, but generally speaking, just disappointments. But I want to tell you how to kill the wolf of disappointment. Listen to me. The Bible says, for God's sheep, Romans 8, 28, that all we know, that all things work together for good to them that love the Lord and the called according to his purpose. Disappointment is a mean, vicious wolf. Let me give you another wolf that comes out, and that's discouragement. How many in here, it's like Reg Kelly, sometimes you have to fight discouragement. I have to literally fight discouragement. It is not just normal for me to be always buoyant. I've had people come up and say, oh, you're just always happy. No, I'm not always just always happy. I'm not always buoyant. I'm not always up. Sometimes I'm down. But discouragement is a wolf. And the wolf of discouragement gets to howling at you. And he'll tell you there's no use to keep on. You're just too well to quit. There's no hope in the future about this thing. He can discourage you. And I want to tell you how to kill the wolf of discouragement. The Bible said when David faced the wolves of discouragement, by the way, at night he was sitting out there and his own men spake of stoning him. The wives have been taken. The children have been taken by the Ziklites and all them people. And David was just in a literal mess of life and everything was going wrong. Everything was going wrong. And the Bible said they did this. He encouraged himself in the Lord. If you want to kill a wolf of discouragement, you're going to have to learn how to encourage yourself in the Lord. This is the honest truth. You're going to have to take the sword of the Spirit. Take the Word of God and learn how to encourage yourself in the Lord and kill that wolf. That wolf will come. He'll walk right into your house. You may be sitting in your chair. You may be driving in your rig. You may be laying on your pillow. And that wolf of discouragement, that wolf of disappointment come into your life. Let me just tell you something. I don't know why, personally, that I have to fight this. I just do. But this morning I went out and I took a cup of coffee and I sat on the patio. And this week, I just had to fight off discouragement. I don't know, I got back from Canada, and it was just like there was this gloom settled over me, and just this, I mean, just this despondency settled over me. And I was sitting there, and I looked out across the yard, and literally, it looked like a million diamonds, the dew on the grass. The sun was hitting that, and I looked at that, and it was just like the Holy Spirit said, Reggie, I've given you a million diamonds to enjoy this morning. You don't need to be discouraged. You don't need to be despondent. You don't need to be disappointed. And I'm going to encourage you to do this. Get your Bibles out. Read a lot of the Psalms. You kill discouragement with the Psalms. Read about David. Read about Abraham. Read about the people that went through those times when it seemed like everything was lost. And God will help you. There's the wolf of despair. The wolf of despair. I'm telling you, talk about a mean wolf is the wolf of despair. 2 Corinthians 4, Paul said, we are troubled on every side, yet not distressed. We are perplexed, yet not in despair. Despair means to give up on God. Let me tell you something, we don't need to give up on God. God never gives up on us, and God's not giving up about anything, and we don't need to give up about anything. We don't need to be into despair. I'm gonna tell you about life. As long as Jesus lives, there's hope. And He's alive forevermore. And there is hope. And I'm just telling you, I've lived long enough and had enough experiences of things to know that sometimes it can look like, well, and then there's just no hope. this situation, but there is hope. There's always hope. Christ is our hope, the Bible said. And to kill that wolf of despair is very, very important. Don't let him take you down, because I'm telling you what the whole idea is, is to knock you off your Christian life, to keep you from growing, to keep you from being effective, to keep you from having any joy in your life, to keep you from having peace, to keep you from having the love of God in your heart. Now, I'm going to give you a bad wolf tonight that needs to be killed, and that's the wolf of doubt. The wolf of doubt. The Bible tells, I want to give you, I want to show you how powerful the wolf of doubt is. In Genesis 37, 33, Joseph's brethren had taken him, you know, and sold him off down into Egypt. And then they took his coat of many colors, and they killed a kid of the goats, and they took his coat and they tore it up and covered it with blood. And then they took it to Jacob. Now listen to this. They took it to Joseph's father, and when they showed him that coat of colors, it had been dipped in blood and so forth, you know what he said? Listen to it. Joseph, without doubt, is rent in pieces. But did you know something? That was not true. Now what wolves of doubt will do is come and cause you to doubt God's love. He'll make you want to doubt your salvation. Try to tell you you're not really saved. Try to tell you that God doesn't exist, that the Bible's just some man-written book. I mean, there's all kinds of junk that they'll bring to bring doubt into your life. I want you to take your Bibles to Matthew chapter 14 tonight. I want you to keep that passage of Scripture in Matthew chapter 14, how powerful doubt can be. Did you know that it caused Jacob for years? I want to tell you how mean this wolf is. It, doubt, the wolf of doubt, took the joy out of that man's life for most of the rest of his life. Everybody with me tonight? I don't know who needs this tonight or who may need this next week, but I can promise you if God had me preach this tonight, we're going to need it. You can mark it down in your day book. I want to show you how mean that stinking wolf of doubt is. When he came to Jacob with that coat of color's rent and blood in it, it took the joy out of his life for the rest of his life. He said, I will go to my grave. Whenever he did, even after he had Joseph, it so poisoned him. It just vacuumed the joy out of his soul. that even when he met Pharaoh and he asked him about things, he said, he said, asking about his life, he said, few in evil have been the days of my life. Doubt can destroy the joy. I mean, you talk about a mean wolf, cause you to doubt God's love and God's care and God's provision and God's promises to you. I don't think I'm doing a very good job getting this across, but Matthew chapter 14 and verse 31, the Bible said this, Now, this passage of Scripture amazes me, because Jesus had come to the disciples walking on the water. Okay? That's verse number 25. Verse 26, when the disciples saw him walking on the water, they were troubled, saying, It's the Spirit. And they cried out for fear. But straightway Jesus said unto them, Be of good cheer, it is I. Be not afraid. And Peter answering him said, Lord, if it be thou, bid me come upon out unto thee on the water. And he said, Come. And Peter was come down out of the ship. He walked on the water to go to Jesus. Now I want you to watch this wolf of doubt come. But when he saw the wind boisterous, there's that wolf of doubt. He was afraid and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus fleshed forth his hand and caught him and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou what? Doubt. Now I want to tell you what the wolf of doubt will do. He'll rob you of seeing victory and seeing things in your life that you, I literally believe this. that we do not see nothing of what we could see because of this wolf right here. I'll show you. Go to Matthew 21. Go to Matthew 21. This wolf of doubt. Matthew chapter 21 and verse number 21. Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, if ye have faith and what? Doubt not. Doubt not. Doubt not. What's Hebrews 11, 6 say? He that cometh to God must what? Believe that he is and that he's a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. I want to tell you something tonight. I've been thinking about this all week long. We was up there in Canada, and I'm telling you, if nothing else, it was God letting me know that everybody in this church is a missionary. Whether you realize or not tonight, you are just as much of a missionary as that man that got up here behind this table. Every person that's involved in this church, interested in this church, laboring in this church, cares about this church, prays in this church, gives, works, labor, you are just as much a missionary as that man and his wife right back there. One time we knelt together at church and asked God to enlarge our coast. God has done exceeding abundantly beyond all I ask or thought about that. We're reaching people around the globe. I'm telling you, we're reaching people around the globe tonight. And I'm telling you, sometimes I think, well, boy, there ain't nobody in Norwood likes me. And you know what? The evening will come, and all he can do is show you the people that don't like you. That's all you can see, just the negative side of everything, the bad side of everything. And that wolf will just so focus you to where you just doubt, but don't tell you it's like God said to me, Reggie, I just brought you up here to show you what I'm doing. that you don't even know about what I'm doing. And I want you to know something. When Satan tries to tell you that it's not counting what you're doing doesn't amount to anything, he's lying to you. That's a whoop. That's an evening whoop coming to try to distract you and try to cause doubt in your mind. Go to Mark chapter 11. I want you to see this one, then we'll go to another one. Mark chapter 11, verse number 23. Now this is important because you're going to go out this week, let me tell you what causes doubt in a lot of people. They pray about things and it doesn't happen and then they doubt that prayer even works. Let's be honest. How many of you ever struggled about the issue of prayer? Look at verse 23, for verily I say unto you that whosoever shall say unto this mountain, be thou removed and be cast in the sea, and what? What's the first thing God says after you've said that? What is it? And shall not doubt in his heart. Let me tell you something I believe with all my heart, that God wants to do greater and mightier things than we can ever imagine. The big problem is we doubt in our hearts. That evening wolf will come and devour what we could have done for the Lord. what we could have been for Jesus Christ. And he'll chew that thing up. I'm telling you, this is powerful. Second Timothy chapter two says, when we pray that we're to lift up holy hands without wrath and without doubting. He that cometh to God must believe. I'm telling you, doubt is a vicious devourer of victory. Then there's the wolf of disbelief. Again, as I said in Hebrews 11, 6, but without faith, it's impossible to please him. For he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he's rewarded them that diligently seek him. Unbelief is killing. Unbelief, not only you can't get saved with unbelief, but you can't do anything for God. You've got to believe God. You have to believe God. The Bible said Abraham staggered not at the promises of God. I want us to stop and pray, because I'm struggling about this message. I really am. I mean, I'm just struggling. Just to be honest with you, this is probably one of the most important messages you may ever hear in your life, and I'm doing a poor job of bringing it, but I'm going to say something to you. I want us to get a hold of this. I want the Holy Spirit to preach this down deep inside our hearts tonight, to not let these wolves steal and rob us of victory in Jesus Christ. There are so many people out here, let me tell you something, us preachers need it so bad. There's so many discouraged preachers, so many discouraged missionaries, it's not even, you can't even count them. But what's happening to them, the evening wolves are coming, and they're devouring their faith, and devouring their trust, and devouring their victory in Christ. Lord, we come before you this evening, and God, I can't preach nothing, but you can. And I pray, God, tonight, that you'll help us to realize that when these wolves come, During, Lord, the dark times of our lives, the darkness of our hearts and minds and the darkness, Lord, of our lives, when they come out in the evening, Lord, when nobody else is around, Lord, I pray that you help us to recognize them and, Lord, help us to know that we don't have to put up with them, that our Good Shepherd is there, our Great Shepherd, our Chief Shepherd is there. And, God, I pray tonight that you help us to draw close to you. And Lord, to use the sword of the Spirit and know, Heavenly Father, that as your sheep, we are not defenseless, that we're protected. Thank you, God, that no wolf is ever gonna take a sheep out of your fold. But God, they can sure discourage us, and Lord, defeat us, and fill us full of disappointment, and God, and despair, and I ask you, God, to help us tonight, to not doubt, but to believe you against all odds. Lord, help me to preach tonight, and the Holy Spirit, just preach what we need to each heart, in Jesus' name, amen. I want to give you another wolf that comes, and that's distraction. I deal with this continuously. A wolf of distraction can be killed by Matthew 14, 30, when it says, when he saw the wind, he took his eye. You know what happened to Peter in that scene that we read a while ago? When he took his eyes off of Jesus Christ, he got distracted. Let me tell you, the wolf that comes a lot, it gets distracted off what really counts. I've watched this over the years. Now, listen to me tight. I'm just telling you, when people get out of sorts, it's because they got distracted. You know what really counts? It's somebody getting saved today. And I get really bothered when people get all out of sorts and all bent out of shape about little stupid stuff. Can I tell you, you're not the first person ever dealt with stupid stuff. And you cannot, and I've told people after you've heard me say this, when you're going, I realized this week, that Satan and I had done exactly what I told you people not to do. I said, you're going down the road of life and you're on your journey. You're walking with the Lord and a chihuahua dog or a German shepherd comes up out of the driveway. Don't chase him back down the driveway very much. Throw a rock at him, throw a stick at him, kick him, shoot him if you have to, but keep going. If you're not careful, you're distracted and you're off down on some little old lane back down there chasing that dog. He runs at you, you chase him, he runs away and comes back at you, and you're totally off track of what you ought to have been doing because you're distracted. Satan wants to distract you. That's what these evening woods, they'll distract you. I mean, tell you what, if you's asleep and the wood's coming up here, you can't rest. Think about this. If something keeps you up all night, You're not resting and you're distracted. That's going to affect your health. It's going to affect your ability to perform in life and do what God's called you to do. Well, there's the wolf of distraction. Then there's the wolf of double-mindedness. James 1.18 says that a double-minded man is unstable in all of his ways. God wants us to be single-minded. That's a wolf of double-mindedness. Then there's the wolf of dishonesty. In 2 Corinthians 4.2, the Bible said renounce the hidden things of dishonesty. We need to learn to confess to God and be honest with God and be honest with ourselves. James 4, 7, 4, 8 says, draw an eye to God and he'll draw an eye to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts. You're double-minded. A double-minded man is unstable in all his way, and the wolf of double-mindedness will absolutely rob you of victory in Jesus Christ. Then there's the wolf of deceit. Deceit. What these wolves want to do is cause you to be dishonest about things, cause you to be deceitful about things. The Bible talks about deceiving our own selves. I'm telling you right now, the wolf will rob you of truth. I'm telling you, I see this so much time. Then there's the wolf of dullness. In Hebrews 511, the Bible says about you, you're dull of hearing. You can walk into church and there's just a dull spirit. I'm going to say something tonight, and I realize that this is what bothers me. Let me tell you why a lot of preachers pastor a while and then they're gone. Pastor a while and then they're gone. It's extremely hard to be fresh and filled with the Spirit week after week after week after week, service after service after service, and to have something fresh and new out of the Word of God. I'm going to tell you right now, you've got to work at it. I don't know about anybody else, but for me, it does not come natural. It does not come easy. I literally have to get into the Bible and beg God for food to feed the flock. And I watch something. And I know that sometimes I wonder, you know, I don't know how people put up with me. I'd hate to come and sit at every service and listen to me. But sometimes I can look out in the audience, and especially in some of our teenagers, I see dullness. They're here, but they're not here. That's a wolf getting you. That's a wolf getting you. You watch that wolf. dullness of hearing. That brings deadness. And then there's the delay, the wolf of delay. Well, someday I'll serve God. Someday I'll do what God asked me to do. The wolf of delay. Always, the Bible said, boast not thyself of tomorrow. The Bible says, while it is called today, we don't have a promise. Whatever we're going to be doing for God, I don't care if you do this, whatever I'm going to be doing for God, I better be doing it. I better be doing it. I better be on it. And I don't know, there's something in me. Then there's the wolf of defilement. The wolf of defilement. If any man defile the temple of God, I wanna give you a verse tonight, listen to this. If any man defile the temple of God, him will God destroy. Be careful what's going on in your heart and your mind. Be careful what you're looking at, what you're listening to. Be careful you do not defile the temple. If we were to come here tonight, let me just tell you something. Ain't nobody in this church house, you wouldn't put up with it. Somebody come in here tonight and said, we're gonna have a beer party in here. and we're gonna play cards on the communion table. How many put up with that? That's just this building. Your heavenly father says this, there's a wolf of defilement. He says, if you defile your temple, now listen to me, your body is the temple of God. And he said, if you defile that, him will I destroy. I'm gonna tell you something, God ain't putting up with his children defiling their body, defiling themselves. Defilement is very, very serious business. Don't put stuff, don't defile this temple. Don't put stuff in it. Don't let stuff come in your windows of your soul, your ears or your eyes or whatever it is that will defile you before the Lord. And then there's the wolf of defamation, slander and gossip. The wolves will come. Listen to this verse in Psalms 101 verse number five. Who so privily, in other words privately, slandereth his neighbor, him will I cut off. That's the Bible. You privately slander your neighbor, God says, I'll cut you off. Don't let the wolves come at you. Do you know why it's hard sometimes to love people you go to church with? Because you know them better than other people. And if you knew the people that you think you like real well, as well as you know the people you go to church with, you wouldn't like them either. The Bible said in Proverbs 10, 18, him that hideth hatred with lying lips and him that utteth a slander is a fool. Do not allow the wolf to come in and cause you to slander people. I'm just gonna tell you something, I've lived long enough now, I've seen that verse, I have, I literally, that verse is absolutely true. Psalms 1015, whoso privilegedly slandereth his neighbor, him will I cut off. God's not joking. And I don't want that wolf to get you. And I don't want that wolf to get me. Then there's the wolf of disobedience. 1 Samuel 15, to kill that wolf, you take Samuel 1 15, it says, to obey is better than to sacrifice. Obedience. That disobedience is a wolf that will keep you from seeing God work in your life. And I'm telling you, just pray that God will give you a spirit of obedience to the Lord. And then finally tonight, there's a wolf of discord. Turn your Bibles to Proverbs chapter 6. Proverbs chapter 6. The wolf of discord. Verse number 14. I'm going to, remember me telling you about the bearer story that this guy that just got killed out in Montana? They had his picture on the news. He's probably about 30, 32, 33 years old. Nice looking guy, just as American looking guy as you can imagine. You don't guide elk hunts without being pretty tough to start with, okay? That bear killed that man and drug him off. And I'm using bears and wolves tonight, the same deal. But what really knocked me out was the comments of some people out there. It was unreal. The liberals who said this, basically, he got what he deserved. They literally said that the bear had more right to that force than he did. There was a woman who got on there and said, it was the bear's territory, he shouldn't have been on it. The bears were there first before humans were. All this kind of stuff. Well, thankfully, there's a guy who wrote back and said, you don't live too far from there. You're on their territory, too. I mean, I'm to the point of where liberalism is a satanically madness. It is. It's over-the-top craziness. Reprobate. They think backwards. But I'm telling you, there were several people who Literally, one of them said that they were glad for what happened. Because they need, people don't need to be out in the forest, they need to be left to the animals. And they were glad that that happened. And I'm like, where in the world are people at? And anyway, Proverbs chapter 6, verse number 14. Everybody there say amen. Let's begin with verse number 12. A wicked man walketh with a froward mouth. That's another thing. He winketh with his eyes, he speaketh with his feet, he teacheth with his fingers. Frowardness in his heart. He deviseth mischief continually. And here's what he does. Here's this whoop. He soweth discord. Verse 15, therefore, shall his calamity come suddenly. Suddenly shall he be broken without remedy. And then God says in verse 16, these six things doth the Lord hate, yea, seven are an abomination unto him, a proud look, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift to run into mischief, and false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among the brethren. And I just want us tonight just to get this concept down. I don't know about you, but I can maybe lay my head on my pillow tonight and all of a sudden it's like a wolf comes and says, I'll just tell you, it's kind of like a discouragement. You're doing more damage than you are good. You've tried to serve the Lord and it just, you know, you wasted your life. You think the devil won't tell you that, he will. And I don't know, I can't, I'm having a hard time expressing myself tonight. But here's what I want to principle to get in this church tonight, every one of you. There's gonna be evening wolves coming. And they're mean. And they'll disturb your peace. They'll create fear in you. They will rob you of your joy. your spiritual growth, and you learn how to kill them. I'm going to tell you about the wolf. They need to be killed. Wolves need to be dealt with. You don't go out and say, well, I'll just play with that wolf and I'll make a pet out of him. He'll eat you for supper. And we need to learn how to fight and conquer evening wolves. And I, again tonight, am using that illustration of these wolves as devils that will come. I literally have been driving down the road before and just sensed satanic spirits attacking me. If you knew how often that Satan taunted me with, you ought to quit, you ought to quit, I'm going to tell you something. There's something I'm figuring out. That the farther I go and the more I do for the Lord, the more active he is in trying to get me to quit, to stop, to blow me out. Because he knows at this point, It could do more. Two years into my ministry wouldn't amount to much. 36 years in my ministry, now I'm realizing how many people across the United States or Canada or wherever it may be would say, what happened? The older you get, the evening woes. If somebody in this church house tonight, Brother Lakey, I'm gonna use you for an illustration. Can you hear me okay? Are you hearing me okay? What would happen to you tonight if that man came to church and he said, raised his hand and said, Brother Reggie, I want to say something to the church. And he stood up and said, I just want to make an announcement. This is my last time to come to church. I've decided I don't, I don't, I don't, I believe it's all a fairy tale. Believe it's all a joke. I'm going to tell you that the older you get, the evening woods, the farther you go in your Christian journey, you expect the evening woods to come after you. That would hurt a lot of people, wouldn't it, Gene? It would affect a lot of people. So understand, yeah, the evenings when it's maybe 11 o'clock in the morning, but it's evening in your soul. Maybe there's darkness and gloom and just a time when you're down. Be careful about that. I want to say this to you, and I'm not, again, you, please take this Bud, you got to understand that I wove into this book that I wrote a lot of spiritual stuff. And one of them is, when that girl comes back from the airport, She's driving by herself. Her mother and her new stepdad's gone on their honeymoon, and that grandma's gone back to California, and she's found out that boy's dead. She's by herself. She's coming down the road, and it's raining when she left the airport. She's headed back home. And if you read that passage of scripture, you're gonna get a really good taste of the evening wolves coming. They came at her with every lie you could possibly come up with. And her last thought before she got to the house was, there's a gun in the house. Evening woods mean business. I just hope this helps you. Boy, I've had a hard time preaching. I hope, I've had a, I don't, I figure the devil don't like this message, is what I figure. I want to tell you something. Evening woods can be killed. Shoot them. Don't have no mercy on them. Go get your Bible. If you have to, turn to John chapter 10 and read about the Good Shepherd. Read Psalms 23. McKinley, don't entertain no evening woods. I love you. Pray for each other that we'll keep the evening woods away. Boy, it just seemed like something's missing. I don't know what it is.