Hello and welcome to our broadcast. As I make this broadcast this morning, it is actually just after six o'clock on January the 1st. We're facing a brand new year, and we're going to look at facing the new year. Stay tuned for our program. I was looking this morning in Deuteronomy 11, verse 12, where it says, The eyes of the Lord are upon the land from the beginning of the year, even unto the end of the year. The Lord was talking to Israel then and saying, Look, I care. And it says, The Lord thy God careth. And we need to understand. that as we face this year of uncertainty, and there probably has never been more uncertainty in the world than there is right now, both in the political world and what we would call the religious world, we are living in what the Bible calls perilous times. He said that perilous times would come. Now back in First Chronicles chapter 12 in verse number 32, there's a verse there that talks about the men of Israel. They were men of understanding to know what they needed to do. A little simple word, do. To do is to perform an action. It is to work on something, to bring it to completion. It is to act or behave in a specific way. Do. Simple little words in the Bible a lot of times. Proverbs 6 and verse number 3 says, Do this now, my son, and deliver thyself. Do this now, my son. Do it. Proverbs 31, 12 says, concerning the virtuous woman, she will Do you want to do something? Ecclesiastes 9 and 10 says, Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might. Now, to do it is to perform an action, to work on something, to bring it to a completion, to act or to behave in a specific way. Do it. Do. It's first mentioned in the New Testament. Jesus said it. He said, Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. He could have just said, blessed are they which hunger and thirst after righteousness, but he didn't. He put that little word do. It's an action. It's a performance. It's how we behave. The last time the word do was mentioned in the New Testament is in Revelation 22 and verse number 14. And it says, blessed are they that do his commandments, that do them. Now, he didn't even say keep them. That's important. Keep them is to hold them, hang on to them. But that's not enough. Do them. Blessed are they. that do his commandments. Peter, he said in 2 Peter chapter 1 and verse number 10, if you do these things, you shall never fail. If you do these things, now you would be wise to get into that chapter and see what those things are that he was talking about. This is Peter's final message and in 2 Peter 1 and 14, He said, knowing this, shortly I must put off this my tabernacle. Moreover, he said, I will endeavor that ye may be able after my decease to have these things in remembrance. And he says in chapter two, in chapter one, in verse number 10, rather, to do, to do these things. And in verse five, he says, give all diligence to do these things. Interesting that that's the same word that Jude used in in Jude chapter one and verse number three when he says to give diligence and in both cases they said give all diligence to do these things. Do these things. For Jude it was contend for the faith. Peter, he says do these things and he lists them here in verses five through seven and I'll just run them off for you. It's faith and virtue and knowledge and temperance and patience and godliness and brotherly kindness and love or charity. It's translated here. Now, he said, if, if, that's a big word, if ye do these things, ye shall never fall, if ye do them. Well, there's a good idea. Take that portion of Scripture and use it as a foundation for the beginning of this year, and to your faith add virtue, and to your virtue knowledge and temperance or self-control, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love. There's a challenge for the new year. It would be better to get that portion of Scripture and work on that than sit and watch some stupid thing on television for three hours. In any event, you will either do it or you won't. If you do these things, you shall never fall." Fall for what? For the apostasy. He's talking about the fact in 2 Peter 2 and number 1 that false prophets will be among the people, and he said they'll also be among you. He said, and they will bring in their damnable heresy. What's a damnable heresy? Well, it's a heresy that says it will damn you. What will damn you? Well, this new thing that has been brought in by the leaders in our fundamental, so-called fundamental movement, that says you don't need to repent. you don't need to repent, that's a damnable heresy. Jesus said, except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. So this new doctrine that they're promoting in our movement these days that says you don't have to repent, what does God call that? He calls it a damnable heresy. Peter even warns here that this damnable heresy will be promoted by Christians. It says that they will deny the Lord that bought them. That word bought has been translated redeemed three times. And so within our camp of what we would call Christians, and even what we would call the fundamental movement, The Bible says in the last days, people that are actually bought, redeemed, are going to be presenting a damnable heresy. Well, we're there. It's happening right now. Let's wake up and see what's going on around us. It's happening before our eyes. And so it says in verse number three, many shall follow their pernicious ways. We read in chapter 2 and verse number 15, they have forsaken the right way. And so Peter's final words here in 2 Peter 3.17, he says, Beware, lest ye also, being led away, fall from your own steadfastness. He said, you need to beware. Well, the Bible says in Isaiah chapter 59 and verse number 19, when the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him. Lift up a standard against him. Well, we're to lift up a standard. The enemy has been coming like a flood into our churches in the past few years in a very alarming rate, and we can be sure the tide of compromise will flood even more in the new year if we do not lift up a standard against him, we will lose our young people. Now, the word translated standard in this verse is not referring to how we dress, or what kind of music we listen to, or what way we cut our hair. It is referring to raising up a banner, a standard. That's what they did in a time of war, and that lets everyone know where they stood. Numbers 2 and verse 2 says, Every man of the children of Israel shall pitch By His own standard, put up your banner and let people know where you stand. Every man shall do that. Now, we have an alarming flood of compromise in our so-called fundamental movement, and I want to emphasize the fact that when I'm talking about a fundamental movement, I'm not talking about a fundamental church. What we need to do is make sure that we keep the compromise that is coming in like a flood from our so-called fundamental movement. We need to keep that compromise from coming into our local churches, and we better start sandbagging if we want to protect our young people from the apostasy of the hour because it's coming in like a flood. The two greatest false doctrines that have flooded into our movement in recent years is the denying of the teaching of Christ concerning repentance and the rejecting of the scriptures concerning the doctrine of separation. The time has come for the sincere pastor to protect the church from our movement. Hosea 4, 6 is still in the Bible. The Bible says, my people are destroyed for the lack of knowledge. Pastors, if you're listening to this broadcast today, you better educate your young people to the facts of life here, or you're going to lose them to the movement. Now, it says again in 1 Chronicles 12, and verse number 32, that the children of Ishakar, which were men that had understanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do. Now, there's that little word again, to know what Israel ought to do. The situation in Israel at that time was very serious, mainly because the leadership of Israel, like much of our leadership today, was in a mess. Their leader was dead because of his disobedience, Saul, that is. It says, so Saul died, chapter 10 and verse number 13 and verse number 14. It says, and so Saul died for his transgressions, which he committed against the Lord. even against the word of the Lord, which he kept not, and inquired not of the Lord, therefore he slew him." He just went his own way, did things the way he wanted to do them. Well, the enemy was attacking, they were coming in, and the Philistines, it says in chapter 10 and verse 1, fought against Israel. Israel had a lot of men, and they had a lot of machinery. We read in chapter 10 and verse 2, they are armed with bows, verse 7, they were men of war, fit for the battle. Verse 23, ready and armed for the war. Again in verse 24 it says that. Verse 33 says they were expert in war with all the instruments of war. Again twice in verse 35 and 36 it says they were expert in war. Verse 37 says with all manner of instruments of war. They had their men of war that could keep rank it says in verse 38. but they needed something more. They needed the men that had understanding to know what Israel ought to do, to do something, to do it, to do something. Remember that the word do, what it really means is to perform an action, to work on something, to bring it to completion, or to act or behave in a specific way. Now as we face this age in which we're living and we come into another year of apostasy that is coming in like a flood, we need to understand what we ought to do. It says in 2nd Timothy 3 and 1, this know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come, and the perilous times are upon us. We're living in a time of Anarchy, as far as the world is concerned, everybody is doing that which is right in their own eyes. The world is filled with anarchy. The Bible says it would be like that at the end of the time. When it comes to the Christian world, we're living in a day of apostasy among God's people, and we need to face the fact that the majority of what we call Christianity is apostate. Apostasy is simply turning from revealed truth. In the 60s, I saw what we call the evangelical movement promoting apostasy, and now, over 40 years later, I am witnessing our fundamental movement promoting apostasy at an alarming rate. Leaders who call themselves fundamentalists are now turning from the revealed truth, like the Bible says it would happen. What we call Christianity, fundamentalism, is turning into the fables that we have in 2 Timothy 4 and verse number 6. We are living in the Laodicean age that was prophesied in the book of Revelation. We need to understand that. So as far as the world is concerned, we're living in a time of anarchy. As far as what we call Christianity is concerned, we're living in a time of apostasy. But the Bible says there is a remnant. There always has been a remnant from the days of Noah right on through to today. It says in Romans 5 and 11, even so at this present time, There is a remnant, but our greatest danger today is the possibility of apathy among the remnant. We have anarchy in the world, apostasy amongst Christianity, but when we have a remnant, and we do, our greatest concern here is that we get apathetic and we just don't get too concerned about what's going on around us. Apathy is a loss of concern for taking our responsibilities. In Israel's day, Israel's remnant was hiding in caves when the flood of apostasy came. 7,000 had not bowed the knee to Baal. However, they were nowhere to be found when Elijah faced the enemies of God all alone. Not only the people in general, but the prophets. There was 100 prophets that had not bowed the knee to Baal. Where were they? They were cowering in a cave somewhere. If our remnant does not take a responsibility seriously, we will go into captivity with the rest of the apostasy that we call Christianity today, when the enemy comes in like a flood, and we better not let that happen. So what we need to do is to determine that we are not going to let the apostasy that is flooding out of our movement into our churches. We need to know the facts, and we need to face the future. We need to do things God's way as we start this new year. Well, this is an introduction to the next series that we will be doing on understanding the times in which we are living. Be sure and tune in for our next program.