I was raised in a pastor's home and, you know, I shared with you this morning that I, at the age of five, I wanted to be saved because I thought, you know, I knew that everybody was wanting me to be saved, so I wanted to be saved. I wanted to do what everybody wanted me to be. And so I went through the motions of what most of us identify with being saved is. And I had, you know, I'd been raised, my dad was a pastor. We were faithful in church. That's all I'd known my entire life. And so I wasn't out into hard sin, what we would consider worldly, wild, hard sin. I was a sinner, just like anybody else is a sinner, but I don't have the testimony of being rescued from the clutches of the world, so to say. But nevertheless, I can look back down through my family history, and Brother Shannon, I can be thankful for that Bible being opened up and being shared with me. But sometimes what's more remarkable, and I know that I need to be thankful for God rescuing me, and I am, but sometimes I'm a little more overwhelmed at the stories of some of my relatives that he rescued that led to the rescue of myself. I hope I'm making sense tonight. My testimony, were I to share it, is wonderful, but we in our human standards probably would not call it a dramatic testimony. Jesus rescued me and that's about what it is. I'm thankful for that. But I was thinking back about when my dad got saved. And when his dad got saved, and did you know that my dad's family, I may have shared this here, I don't remember, but my dad's family, he was raised in Marion, Virginia, small town Virginia. And a Cuban preacher who was an evangelist, If I'm remembering the story right, he was from Cuba, which we send missionaries to Cuba. Is everybody understanding this? They sent a missionary to the United States. And somehow he came to the United States, wound up in Marion, Virginia, and had him and a local pastor were witnessing and soul winning and took my dad when he was a little fella, sat him in the backseat of their car right outside because they had stopped by the house to talk to the family. And my dad's sister, she was causing such a ruckus that they couldn't concentrate and be heard. So they went out to the car and those two men led my dad to the Lord. And I thought, man, for the God of this universe to orchestrate Somebody being sent from Cuba to Marion, Virginia to win a little boy to Lord so that later on he could fall in love with Jesus and serve God. And when he had a son of his own and children of his own, that he could tell them and show them from the word of God what it means to be saved. Now I'm starting to get a little overwhelmed at how good God is. And boy, I'm telling you, we have a lot to be thankful for. We have a lot to be thankful for, and I'm telling you what I'm thankful for the most right now, is that throughout time, throughout the pages of the Bible, in the span of time after the Bible was written, all the way into present day, one thing that characterizes Jesus and characterizes God that means the most to me is the simple title that He was known by. They called Him a friend of publicans and a friend of sinners. But friend, when they said that and it was written down in the Word of God, they were saying that as a derogatory term. This Jesus surely cannot be the Christ because He's a friend of sinners. Can you believe that? He's a friend of the publicans. Can you believe that? But my goodness, what they were meaning to be as a hurtful derogatory term is what I'm most thankful for tonight. It's what I'm most grateful for. I am thankful that He is love, and I am thankful that He is God Almighty. I am thankful that He is all-powerful and omniscient, omnipresent. I'm thankful for all of these things, but I'm most thankful that He is a friend of sinners tonight. Hey, and listen to me, he is your friend. Brother Dave, I believe the Lord started kind of working that over and he's kind of coordinated all of these testimonies and speaking to my heart a little bit. I'm thankful that he's a friend of sinners because if he was not a friend of sinners, he had never been interested in Josh Helton. If he was not a friend of sinners, he'd have never been interested in Gene Helton. If he was not a friend of sinners, he wouldn't have been interested in where Marion, Virginia was because you could pass right by and not even know it was there. Hey, I'm glad to tell you that he is a friend of sinners. Hallelujah, brother Adam. I don't know where you were in your life, but I mean, you were in a dark time. Your mother said you were in a dark time. I could see it all over your face that you were being reminded of just where it was God had brought you from. But tonight, I'm sure you've got a lot of things you're thankful for about the Lord. But you would agree with me. He's a friend of sinners. Hallelujah for him being a friend of sinners. Hey, and listen to me. It's not just about salvation. It's not just about salvation. It's not that He has saved me and expected me to be sinless afterwards. Oh, He wants me to strive to that. He wants me to work towards that. He wants me to serve Him out of a debt of a love. But listen to me. He's still my best friend. The Bible says a friend is one that sticketh closer than a brother. We have one who is a friend that's closer than a brother. Hallelujah. The Bible says a brother is born for adversity and a friend loveth at all times. And that's exactly who he is. He is that friend who loves us no matter how good or how... Hey, you've not earned God's love. We get mistaken about that, don't we? We think we did a good job in church, that we've played the part. We get to thinking that we've sung well, we've given good, we've sacrificed. I mean, we've put ourselves out in some way in serving the Lord and trying to reach others. And we get to where we pat ourselves on the back, but you don't deserve God's love. I mean, let's just be reminded of this tonight that we don't deserve His love. And if He wasn't a friend of sinners, if He wasn't a friend of sinners, my, my, where would we be? I mean, it is a dark time, isn't it? It's a scary world we're living in. Little Noah over here. I mean, y'all are new parents. It's a little scary, isn't it? He said he's been sleeping all night long, no problem. Yeah, yeah, no, no, I'm talking about you, brother. Yeah, no, he's one night, the baby slept only one night through all night. I was like, how's it been for you? He said, I've been sleeping right through it. Don't bother me a bit. I'm playing. But, you know, it's a little scary having a newborn. I remember having a day, you know, and I was the baby of my family. So I was, you know, I was the one that they brought home and everybody else took care of. I never had that experience. And so I'd never had any babies in our home. And Leah, she had, you know, she had taken care a lot with all of her siblings. And so she was comfortable with babies. And I was like, I thought, you know, well, if I hold her wrong, I'm going to break this, this thing in half. You know? And I can remember them being like, OK, we're going to try to send you home. And this is with our first daughter. And I was like, uh, I'm not sure if that's a good idea. You know? I know that my mom can take care of babies. I know that nanny can take care of babies. And I believe that Leah knows how to take care of babies. But I mean, like, you're going to send a human being home with us? You know? Like, shouldn't we stay here for a few months until we get the hang of this thing? Part of me was a little overwhelmed at the thought of just how dark of a time it is. Just how scary because, Brother Dave, I had not prepared myself mentally to be a father until it was on me. You know what I'm saying? Mothers, you kind of have like nine months of preparation that you've got a human that's on its way. And us daddies, I mean, when the baby's there in the room, it's like, whoa, I'm a daddy. So it's a little bit different, but I can remember being a little overwhelmed suddenly as I held her and I looked into her and she was in my arms crying. I remember thinking, oh God, help us. And I remember early on, I began to pray for her before she was even born. We began to pray for her that God would save her. And now she's already been saved. And I've seen God do works in her life. I've seen God save my youngest daughter, Addie, and I've seen God do works in her life. And in this dark time, I still get a little worried sometimes. I still get a little nervous sometimes. I get nervous that they could be involved in something that would be hurtful or wrong for them to be a part of. And I pray for God to protect them. I pray for them to prepare themselves and for me as a father to guard them so that they can stay away from sin and the dangers of sin and the struggles of this world and the darkness of this world. But the truth of it is, it's overwhelming. But I can rest in the fact that they've got a friend who's always gonna love them. Who's always gonna be with them even when daddy can't be. Even when mommy can't be. They've got a friend who's a lot stronger than me. And he doesn't love them just because they're born into the Helton family. He doesn't love them just because they're related to the Davis family. He doesn't love them just because they go to church. He doesn't love them just because they said that they've been saved. He loves them just because he can't help himself. Just because that's who he is. He's a friend of sinners. He's a friend of sinners. Hallelujah. I recently listened to a book on Audible. Brother Shirley, my pastor, told me about it. He may have mentioned it while he was here, I don't know. The Last of the Giants. I don't know if he mentioned this book, it's a story about lumberjacks up in the north woods of Minnesota in that area. And if you, I don't know, I'm sure you can find it in a hard copy, but if you listen to books, you can find it on the Audible app, and it is worth your time to listen to. It's a story about a backwoods preacher who came in and began to began to be a preacher to these rough, tough, lawless lumberjacks at the turn of the century. And he went in and began to win them to the Lord, began to win them to the Lord. And there was one particular young man, he was so rough and tough, everybody was scared of him. And he was so good at fighting that they began to take him from different lumberjack camps and put him into fighting, and he eventually became a prized fighter. He held several titles nationally, and he was undisputed, rough and tough. And he got injured, and his health began to decline, and he had grown accustomed to a lifestyle of wealth. After he'd started fighting and once he could no longer fight, he had grown accustomed to that lifestyle of wealth, so he figured if he could not earn it in the ring, he would just simply take it from those that he deemed were corrupt. And he began a life of lawlessness. He began a life of stealing, coercing and hurting people, a life of sin and a life of wickedness. And he wound up running from the law. He was wanted in like, I can't remember, 12 different counties. There was a price on his head. And he began to go by an alias so that nobody would know who he truly was. And he was running from the law one night. He had robbed somebody and had gone wrong and the sheriff and his posse were onto him. And he was running away and he got shot. He happened to be close to his dad's house. happened to be close to his dad's house. And his dad earlier on, I can't remember, I think his last name was Sornberger, John Sornberger. And he was close to Mr. Sornberger's house, his dad. And earlier on when John had began to get wealthy and was being famous by prize fighting and gambling and a loose lifestyle, somebody had said, well, aren't you proud of your son? And he said, I don't have a son. He said, no, no, no, yeah, you do, your son is the one that everybody's talking about and he's become so famous, he said, that's no son of mine as far as I'm concerned, my son is dead to me. And so even his father was not a friend. He got shot that night trying to escape from the law and was passing by his old home place. And he crawled through the front walkway and crawled into the door and laid there a bloody mess. And he said, Dad, I've been wounded. I just need to lay here tonight and I'll leave. And his dad grabbed him by the collar and tossed him right out in the yard and said, no criminal is going to stay under this house. And so he lived out in the woods for a few weeks and healed up a little bit, went back around. Well, his luck ran out and he had to go hide out in one of the deepest lumber camps that there was at the time. And this preacher came to the camp that John Sorberger was in. And this preacher preached a message talking about that Jesus is a friend of sinners. And he began to preach the message about dealing with the prodigal son who had gone off to a far country. And let's face it, you can be as religious as you'd like to be, but in our hearts, at the very least, we've all been a little bit prodigal. Some of you may be there now, but some of you may be looking. It started somewhere. It started somewhere. I'm not talking about salvation now. I'm talking about after you're saved. You may be in that spot right now to where you're looking at the far country. You're seeing what's down there and it's looking pretty good to you because it does. It may be some of you young people. It may be some of you parents. You're looking over into what you think is the far country that looks a lot better, looks a lot easier, looks a lot more comfortable. There's nothing wrong with things being better. Can I say this real quick? There's nothing wrong with things being better. There's nothing wrong with things being comfortable. There's nothing wrong with that. But when it leads you away from God and the things that God has given you, you are heading in the wrong direction. And that preacher jumped up there in their bunkhouse and he began to preach about Jesus being a friend of sinners. And he shared that story. He shared that story about that prodigal coming home and the father stepping out, waiting for him and greeting him with a kiss. and throwing his robe on him, and fixing a feast, preparing a feast, and adorning him in rings, and fine things, and taking him back into the family. And John Sorenberger had heard enough. Now the men that were there in the camp with him, they knew who he was. They all gave him a wide berth because he was such a dangerous man. And he had thought he would try to stay in the shadows so that that preacher wouldn't recognize him. But when that preacher said that about the earthly father, the father of the prodigal welcomed him back in, he had had enough, and he got up and walked right out during the middle of the message. The preacher, he was a giant of a man himself, and he was not scared by John, because... And God just gave him leadership after he'd finished his message, he walked out specifically to find that man who had walked out during the service. And he went up and began to speak to John. And he said something along the lines, did you not like something that was said? He said, yeah, preacher. He said, what you told was a lie. It doesn't work that way. He said, I've been to the far country. I've eaten with hogs. He said, I've eaten with the hogs. When I came back to my daddy's house, my dad grabbed me by the cuff of my collar and tossed me outside. He said, so don't tell me about a father taking his son back, because that's not how it happens. And the preacher just said, well, you went to the wrong father. Because our father is a friend of sinners. Boy, tonight, I am so thankful that my Father is a friend of sinners. I'm so thankful that He had mercy on me enough to save me, but more so that He would want to keep me, because that's what He does. He's a friend of sinners because He's willing to keep you. He's willing to keep you. I promise you, were Josh Helton to have the power to save anybody in this room, I would possibly do it. But if I saved you, I promise you, if you ever did anything that I did not like, I would automatically unsave you. Are we not all that way? If you were to do something kind for somebody and find out that they had Neglected you, or even worse, done something wrong to you in return? Would you not think, well, how about that? There I go doing something kind for them, and here they are talking bad about me behind my back. See if I ever do anything good for them again. That's how we are. But not God. Not our Father. Because He's a friend of sinners. Not only is He willing to save you, He's willing to keep you. Hey, listen, we ought not get over that. We ought not get over that. Maybe tonight, I don't know. I don't know how the Lord's... I've had two messages today that I'm going to get to preach some other time. Maybe when I'm here, I don't know. But I've got two messages. I mean, they were in the holster. I had worked on them already. But this is what I believe the Lord had for us tonight. Maybe you just need to be reminded that Jesus is a friend of sinners. He's a friend of sinners. You ever heard that old song that speaks of him as being a friend of sinners? I'm so glad tonight that because he's a friend of sinners, he was willing to save me. And he's willing to keep me. John chapter 10. John chapter 10. He's called the good shepherd. He's called the good shepherd. You know what that shepherd has to do? That shepherd has to humble himself and go after little lowly old sheep. But he goes after those sheep because he loves each and every one of them. And He says this, My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And no man is able to pluck them out of My hand. My Father which gave them Me is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father's hand. Now, I may have misquoted that, but I do know the fact that He can keep you. He can save you, but He'll do more than save you. He'll keep you. Say, keep me for what? Keep you so that you can stay in his service. Keep you so that you can bring praise to him. Keep you so that you can tell others about him. Keep you so he can enjoy a fellowship with you. Hey, listen, because he's a friend of sinners. You say, well, I've fallen out of fellowship with God. Now you can fall out of fellowship with God, but listen to me, you can never fall out of grace with God. You may not be in perfect fellowship with God, but it won't be because He's not there. It's because you've willingly said, no, not right now. But you can never, you can never fall out of God's grace. You wanna know why? I'll give you a Bible verse. The Bible says, I do not frustrate the grace of God, for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain. We cannot keep ourselves in the grace of God because it is a free gift, because he's a friend of sinners. He's a friend of sinners. And so because of that, I can always walk in the grace of God. Now we ought to, hey, listen, hey, we ought to recognize that we're sinful. We ought to recognize that we're sorry. We ought to recognize we've not deserved him. We've not deserved his mercy. We've not deserved him keeping us in his grace. We ought to recognize those things. And when we recognize those things and remember those things, it ought to drive us to have a fellowship with God. And so we ought to walk with that one. who is a friend of sinners. I'm afraid that we forget it though sometimes. Not that he's a friend of sinners, we always can be like, oh yeah, that's who he is. I'm afraid it just doesn't mean anything because we think we're somehow less sinful. We get a little bit of religion on us and we feel better about who we are. God cleans us up a little bit, brings us from a dark field, Brother Adam, where we're lost in ourselves and lost in our situation. He brings us out of that, but it's real easy to forget where we are. Hey, listen, it'd be real easy for me to forget just where Josh Helton would have been had it not been the fact that he sent somebody from Cuba to Marion, Virginia in the USA to reach a little Helton boy there. because I know who I am even with Him. And so it would do us well to remember tonight and to let it stir us to draw close to Him. I believe we're back to that. I believe we're back to getting close back to the Lord and Him reminding us one more time this evening, hey, He's drawing you to Him because He's a friend of sinners. He's a friend of sinners. Let me ask you this. You know anybody who's lost? You know anybody who's lost? Or maybe they've not said, hey, I'm lost. But you got a pretty good idea just by knowing them a little bit. They don't know Jesus. You know what it's real easy for us to do? And I'm not jumping on you because I've been here too often. I've been here way too much. I look at them and think, well, they shouldn't be doing that. I can't believe they'd act that way. I can't believe they'd say something like that. And it's like I'm shocked that a lost person would be living a sinful life. Instead of judging their sinful life, I'm telling you what I ought to be telling about my friend that rescued me. I ought to be telling them about my friend that changed my life. I wonder, I just wonder, maybe God would send this message tonight to maybe remind some of us to tell others about him. Because if it's truly valuable to you that he is a friend of sinners, then why would we not tell other sinners the change that he can bring? You know what happened to John Sorenberger? Let me tell you what happened to John Sorenberger. That preacher told him, said, you went to the wrong father, because our heavenly father is a friend of sinners. And John Sorenberger that night, outside in the woods, in the north woods, at a lumberjack camp, called out to the friend of sinners. And our heavenly father brought him home, spiritually speaking. He got saved that night. You wanna know what he did? The next night at chow, the next night at chow, he took it upon himself to tell the other men, the way I used to talk ain't gonna go on anymore. And the things I used to be a part of, I ain't gonna do them anymore. And I'm gonna change. And he said, and I don't wanna hear anybody else give me any grief about this change. As a matter of fact, you all need to change too. And he began to openly declare that he had met someone who was a friend of sinners. And he began to tell those rough and tough and wicked men that there was someone who loved them, that had given their life for them, who wanted to save them. And he began to tell them the good news of Jesus Christ. And it wasn't long until the preacher that had led him to the Lord Said, I tell you what, I'm heading to this other camp over here. I want you to go with me and tell them what you've had happen in your life. Tell them about this friend of sinners. And it wasn't long until Brother John Sornberger, who had once been a prize fighter and a known outlaw and a gambler and a man of a wicked lifestyle and a loose lifestyle, he began to travel from camp to camp Standing up and having all the attention of those men because they respected him for his physical power and how scary he was He began to tell them about this friend that he had met and he became a preacher and began to win Thousands to the Lord because he preached one simple message Jesus a friend of sinners He said, did he preach other things? He may have preached other things, but what he became known for, he began to hold meetings at churches. He would hold a meeting at a Presbyterian church, a Methodist church, and a Baptist church, all in the same town, all in the same week. He'd take turns and he'd preach at one in the morning, preach at one in the afternoon, preach at one at night, and they'd have revival in that whole town. And he'd preach over and over and over again about Jesus being a friend of sinners. You say, well, that probably wasn't a real revival. Yeah, get off your high horse, because I guarantee it, it was a real revival. Because anytime somebody meets a friend of sinners, which is Jesus Christ, things are going to change for the glory of God. And so he began to preach about this friend of sinners. You know what happened to him? Not only did he begin to preach, God changed his lifestyle. He began to have other men that got saved come and follow him around. He started doing the same thing. He'd have them testify for a little bit, and it wasn't long until they was preaching, and there began to be a whole network of preachers traveling those lumberjack camps and those small towns up in the woods of Minnesota and Michigan. One day, he went back by that little town where he'd grown up, Went back by that house where his daddy had tossed him out in the yard. Went back by that father that he had thought would never have him. And turns out, turns out his earthly father had gotten some help when he heard that he had met a heavenly father. And they began to be reunited as a father and son should be. You say, what is that? What caused that? What was that? I'll tell you what it was. It was a friend of sinners. having mercy on man. Let's stand to our feet with our heads bowed and our eyes closed.