will open our Bibles tonight. You turn to 2 Corinthians chapter number 12 and I'll catch up with you directly. I just want to say a couple of things before I get there with you. Most of the things we've been dealing with here we looked at what not to do, what we shouldn't be doing when we looked at Proverbs, and sowing discord, and strife, and all those various things. We And then we looked at some things that we can just practically do to help us in the Christian life to deal with, you know, various difficult situations. I actually set this to an alliteration, but I don't have it done. I didn't finish it, so I'm not going to give that to you. But just we looked at speak with purpose to try and edify the body, speak with purpose, cut it off quickly. We looked at not taking part in strife and meddling with strife, but don't let things get to that point. to the point where things have become a strife, a war, and leaving off contention. Here the whole story before judging we looked at that. Speak pleasant things. We got into that just a little bit. And we left last time we were together I believe it was Wednesday night. We ended up in Romans chapter number 15. We talked about from chapter 14, receive you one another even as God for Christ's sakes received us. And And so I want to follow up on that thought and finish up just quickly in 2 Corinthians chapter number 12. You know these are, let me get out what I'm wanting to say. Not that any of this is a negative, but it's that we view it negatively. So a lot of what I've been preaching has been to the positive. What are some positive things that you can do? And I think I ended that in Romans talking about you don't have everything right. And so that should help you in dealing with others, not to be too harsh with other people when you get a proper reflection on yourself. But that's never to say that we just overlook sin and just let things go. That's never, Brother Jones emphasized that even in his message this morning. Just because we believe that grace has positioned me in Christ as though I stand perfect and righteous, that doesn't mean that I'm free to live in sin down here. How are we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? Right? So, mortify your members therefore upon the earth. Bring your body under subjection. Right? Presented a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And so we looked at, we kind of ended with those kinds of things. And so I wanna pick up the other side of that matter because there is another side in which people have taken what I've preached in dealing with people in gentleness and goodness and not to be so harsh with people and try to be understanding and using righteous judgment and understanding yourself, knowing that you don't have everything right either. taken that to a degree that has never been met. There is always a balance in the Scriptures. And what will balance you back out is just staying in the Word of God. And so I want to do that, be faithful to do that in 2 Corinthians chapter 12 and we will just look at this instance for just a moment. But we'll look at 2 Corinthians chapter number 12 because what that does not mean is because I'm positionally placed in Christ and I have counted righteousness, imputed righteousness so that God has to my account credited me with the very righteousness of God without the law. Right? So that verse says, even to him that worketh not, that's not after salvation, that's before salvation. Even to him that worketh not, but believeth on him, right? And so that's before salvation. You don't work for salvation, you believe under righteousness, right? But faith will work by love. So that's before. But so that position that we have in Christ, so that positionally speaking, God has judged all my sins, that Brother Jones brought out again, all my sins were future before I got saved, before he died on the cross, right? When he offered himself without spot to God, all my sins were in the future. So past, present, and future, the blood, the continual cleansing power of the blood of Christ cleanseth all of my sin. I am righteous and holy in the sight of God positionally, right? I am perfect in the sense of my standing. I will never be any more saved. I will never be any more holy. I will never be any more righteous than I am when God placed me in his son, all right? Now that's positionally, that will never change. And so what I've been dealing with, though, is practical, right? Is life down here. Because the fact is, like Brother Jones brought out again, is the adoption is what we're waiting to wit to know the redemption of our bodies, which has not taken place because we're in time. It's as good as done. So we're saved by hope, and not a hope like, boy, I hope it happens, but just a hope that it's just any day now. It's going to happen. It's just a matter of time. That's the kind of hope that we have. And so our position one day, our practice will meet our position when we drop this robe of flesh and we take up and are raised incorruptible, the Bible said. And this mortality shall put on immortality, right? This corruption shall put on incorruption and we shall be raised and we shall be perfect and our walk matches our position and we'll be wholly complete and perfect in Him, not just positionally, but practically speaking. But while we are in the flesh and we have this body, we have practice, right? And so positionally speaking, we get born of God, God places us in Christ, imputes us righteousness. Now we're justified with the righteousness of God, which is by faith without the law. And now, then God turns right around though and says, now be holy. Be what you are. I've made you positionally holy and birthed you with a Holy Spirit. And I have a Holy Spirit that's teaching you to perfect holiness. Right? In the fear of God. So be what you are. You know, as saved people, when we sin, we're going contrary to what God made us, right? Be what you are. And what you are is holy. Don't know where that's coming from. So I have to stop quick. Whew, got it. That'll mess you up quick. I thought COVID, I thought that vaccine, sure enough done it, the government was tuning in through my DNA cells. Oh, forgive me, Lord. Maybe they are, I'm going crazy. How do you recover from that? I don't know where to go now. Are you in 2 Corinthians? Let's go to 2 Corinthians chapter number 12. And so here we have Paul. We see kind of the other side of things. I hate saying it that way, but just so that you know what I'm trying to say here. It's because people take these verses and we'll look at a little bit of that. Brother Nathan dealt with it not long ago, but I just want to cover some things again. And we see this great position that we have. And And so we automatically, or have the tendency, I shouldn't say automatic, but have the tendency, some do, to say it doesn't matter then how I live in my body because I stand perfect in Jesus. And Paul refutes that all throughout the Scriptures. And so we need to see now that it does matter for various reasons. And brother, did in Sunday school also. I don't remember how long ago that was. But for reasons for us to live righteous, and to do right, and to obey the Lord. So I want to just kind of pick up on that. Because Paul I believe was charged with being weak towards sin. The Jewish leaders of that day would charge Paul, as you're saying, just live how you want to, Paul. We don't need the law. And he tried to argue with them. I'm not destroying the law. I'm trying to tell you that if there had been a law given that could have produced life, then righteousness would have been by the law. And Christ died in vain. The law wasn't given to give you life. Right? It was telling righteous people, the law was not made for the righteous but for the ungodly and the sinner. Why? We looked at that in Romans 3, to show you your sin and that's exceedingly sinful. Because we have a tendency not only to sin but to make a lot of excuses for it. And so the law come, the transgressions that sin might be exceedingly sinful, and where sin abounded and sin revived and I died, grace did much more about it. And so He comes in and He says, also those that are saying that I'm weak. And I'm going to tell you something, I don't think just merely they were talking about He was a weak as in He was some sort of effeminate man. not what I think they were saying. I think they were charging him with his preaching of righteousness apart from the law, or apart from works. They were charging him with being soft on sin. And Paul and Jesus, neither one were soft on sin. God expects His people to live right. Right? And any church or any preacher that says anything different is not of God. Right. Any preacher or any person that advocates that you should just be okay with sin and everybody should just be happy in what we are. I'm happy in what I am positionally, but I'm not supposed to enjoy being in sin. Right? There's something in me that's saying, hey buddy, that's wrong. Right? You better get right. Right? Okay, so this other side of things, let's look at 2 Corinthians chapter number 12, just for a moment, verse number 19. let's go quickly through these because we're going to go back to 1 Corinthians. 2 Corinthians chapter number 12 and we're going to end this couple of verses here. Let's start in verse number 19, again, think ye that we excuse ourselves unto you. We speak before God and Christ, but we do all things dearly beloved for your edifying. Boy, what a good spirit to have. that we do, Paul including himself here, I do it with your edification in mind. That's a great spirit to have. Sounds like God's Church matters to Paul doesn't it? I'm the most important thing in my world that is why you are such a mess. Amen. Paul came last in his life. Boy, I wish I could do that more, but I know it's true, right? How to do that, which is good sometimes I find. Okay, Paul said, I do all things for your edifying. Verse number 12 now, for I fear lest when I come, which would be the third time, I come, I shall not find you such as I would, and that I should be found unto you such as you would not. Now here's what Paul said, here's what I'm afraid I'm going to find and this is not what I want to find when I come. Now, well let me not get into that. Paul had to care for all the churches. There's no more Pauls on the face of the earth. He was this one born out of due time. He had seen the risen Christ. There are no more. So when you get on Facebook and you get a request from the Apostle so and so, just go ahead and X them out and deny that one. because they're false, right? And so Paul had a special ministry and a special office. He was the apostle to the Gentile as one born out of due time. And Paul had a great love for the church. And so in a sense, Paul was a pastor. in a sense, like a missionary. Missionaries, when they go and establish their first church, their calling is not really to pastor, but it includes pastoring. Who's the first person that's going to pastor the church they establish? Right? And so Paul's laying out a pattern for men like me that should come after, and things that I should look for. And what I should look for in the church, I don't wanna come to church and find any of these things out any more than Paul did. So Paul, though he wasn't present in body as the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Corinth here, he wasn't present there because he was a missionary, he was going out and establishing other churches. He had the care of these churches, and he was ordaining elders in every city, and he was entrusting those things to faithful men, who in return trusted them to faithful men, and that's how we are where we are today. And so Paul said, here's what I want to find, here's what I established, and here's what I want to continue in the Church, and here's what I don't want to happen. I don't want to come a third time unto you, and I don't want to find this. I don't want to find that there be debates among you. He's already found out there is. Right? Say, well somebody was gossiping. Well he didn't condemn them as gossiping. And in fact he believed what was commonly reported among them. wasn't gossip. Somebody told Paul what was going on at Corinth and said, they are a bunch of carnal Christians. Not because they are going out drinking and fornicating, that's not carnal Christians. They are carnal because they are fighting and they are striving and they all think they are better than each other. They don't respect each other, they don't love each other. So, He said, I'm afraid that when I come a third time, I'm gonna find this there again. He's seen it before. He's dealt with it before. And he said, now I'm afraid that I've labored in vain and I've labored and labored, and I'm gonna find debates among you. I'm gonna find envying among you. I'm gonna find a wrath among you, strifes among you. backbiting among the people of God, whispering among the people of God, swellings and tumults in the church. And he said, I don't want to come to you and I don't want to find that out. And cause I also, I don't want to come to you and have to deal with it. That's what he's saying. I don't want to be found under you when I get there. I don't want to have to rebuke everybody and get, I'd like to come and let's shout it out for Jesus. That's what I'd like to do. But I'm not going to do that while you're doing this garbage. That's what he said. And so he said, I'm afraid I'm going to find these things and I don't want to find them. And here's the fact, pieces of them you'll find in churches. It happens because we're people. But Brother Jones gave us the answer today. You have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous. So, what he's saying here is, I'm not afraid that I'm going to find out you did it a long time ago, and I'm going to hold it against you even though you repented of it and got it right with God. That's not what he's saying. There are still active debates, and strives, and envies, and whisperings, and backbiting that is unrepentant of that people are still doing. That's what he said. And there's no need for that because Jesus stands ready to forgive you and cleanse you. All you got to do is get down and ask Him. Advocate with the Father. Now here goes Paul again. So if we're going to pattern the New Testament church, we're not going to pattern it after a bunch of new age heretics that want to try to make everybody more comfortable and try to make it more acceptable and try to glory and a bunch of things we ought to be ashamed of. We're going to pattern it after what Paul established. Paul established the doctrine of the church. And I was entrusted to Paul. So when I find out how to operate a New Testament Baptist church, I go to Paul. And here's what Paul did. Paul didn't say, well, we've all got problems, judge not. Come on. Don't judge people, you're supposed to love them. How many people want to vomit and haven't heard that? I want to throw up great Christian truths that get twisted and don't mean anything. What people try to make them mean makes me kind of sick to my stomach a little bit. That's not what the Bible said. The Bible didn't say judge not the way they mean it to say anyhow, right? And so what they'll charge you with is you gotta love people. You know what they'll say? They'll say, you know that church down there, that cult, all those crazy people down there at Tabernacle, they believe you ought to dress right. Guilty as charged. So when your big mouth goes running in the community and tells everybody that brother Boyer thinks Christians ought to dress right, guilty as charged. I sure do. unapologetically believe Christians ought to dress right. But I also think they ought to not fight each other and have strife and envies and divisions. And I don't think they ought to dress right according to what you think it means either. Right? Come on now. So I just want to go to the Bible where we get everything else, right? And so a guilty is charged. They just believe that you ought to live what you believe. Guilty is charged. What I don't believe in is mistreating you because you fell in one area that I feel is more important, though I fell in a lot of more areas that God thinks is more important than what you fell in. I don't believe in that kind of mess. What I do believe in is New Testament Bible discipline. The Bible speaks to discipline the church, that that's the church's responsibility to handle matters that are within the church, right? And we're expected to do so. We're expected to judge and we're commended to judge. Don't let anybody that decided not to read a Bible or read a NIV try to tell you what judging means, right? In fact, we're in the mess we're in because people have left off good biblical discernment. Right? It's not the people that have chosen to judge things as wrong that are causing divisions in the church. It's the ones that are living wrong that's causing the broken fellowship. God didn't withdraw his fellowship from me because he wanted to. If there's not fellowship between me and God, it certainly isn't God's fault. He stands at the door and knocks, is ready to come in and sup with anybody. I caused the broken fellowship because of my wicked ways. Right? that church down there. Listen, if you want good fellowship in the church, quit living filthy. Is that okay? Come on now. I mean, quit running everybody down. Quit having strives, and envies, and debates, and living in fornication, and idolatry, and all these various things. Listen to the Bible. If you want good fellowship, just stay in good fellowship with God, and you'll be in good fellowship with me. Right? Unrepentant sin is what's being dealt with here. Not folks that messed up one time and they don't even care about it. These are people that are openly rebellious and they're gonna do what they're gonna do regardless of what you think about it. That kind of rebellious spirit. It's like witchcraft. Rebellion, young people, is as a sin of witchcraft. It's wicked. Right? Now, I'm going to come to you and I'm going to find this going on and I don't want to find that going on. That's not what I want. I want there to be good harmony. I want there to be God's people loving on each other and supporting one another. I mean, it about choked me. I thought I wouldn't hardly stop crying when I seen these little five and six year olds down here with their arms on each other, down here on this altar praying together. That's the kind of thing I want to say. And that can even happen if you get some of these and you're guilty of some of these, just get it right, right? But it's not my responsibility to pat you on the back for living in rebellion. And if me and you don't have good fellowship because you're filthy, don't blame me. It's not because I'm judgmental in an unbiblical sense, it's because I don't want to be infected with the living. Right? I gotta be concerned with the lump. And a little leaven, leaveneth the whole lump. You go to some of these churches and they're just okay with everything, you can live how you want to, and leave the way you came, and everything goes, and nobody say nothing negative to anybody, nobody preach on sin, nobody call anything out. If you wanna live in that kind of stuff, you're gonna have to take with it the responsibility that that little bit of leaven is gonna infect the entire lump. Right? And it'll infect you too. So I'm gonna come and I'm gonna find all this stuff. And then when I come again, my God will humble me among you. That's not what he wanted to happen. God's gonna humble me among you, that I shall be well many which have sinned already. Now, Paul, have you not read what Jesus said, judge not? You're not supposed to judge people just because they sin different than you, Cody. Haven't you heard? You're supposed to love them. And by that it means, look, I like my sin, quit telling me what God thinks about it. That's in essence what they're saying. I'm not gonna change, you can just deal with it. Rebellion. Look at Paul, how judgmental and mean. You people that have sinned already. That sounds pretty judgmental in my terms. Is that not judging? You know what the word judging means? I'll give you the definition for it here. It means to distinguish, to decide, to conclude. And this is the manner in which we judge and prove all things by the Word of God. Right? I'm gonna show you some different things. I need to move a little bit quicker. So Paul said, I'm for your edification. I wanna speak those things that are edifying, building up of the body. And here's something that will build you up. If you don't repent of your sin, he's talking to Christians now, right? He's not talking to lost people. He's saying, you bunch of Christians are guilty of striving and debating and envies. Yeah, I saved people can do it, buddy. And he said, now you saved people. I expect more out of you. You need to get right. You need to repent of that. And if you don't, I'm gonna have to bewail. This is what that word means. Bewail means to cause them to mourn. That's what bewail means. I am gonna cause many to mourn who have sinned already. Now, you say, Brother Clarence, I don't believe none of this. Then when this thing's over, you call me on the phone and you describe to me in these verses that if Paul's in sin here or what? What are we reading here if this is not what we're supposed to do? Right? Everybody okay? Come on, why is everybody so down? I tell you what I'm going to do. God's called me to preach, and God's entrusted me with the gospel. I received it from no man. God called me, and I've been commissioned, and I'm sent forth in the power of God by the church, and I've been charged to faithfully to teach some sound doctrine and some sound words. And here's some sound doctrine for you. There ought to be Bible preaching in love against sin, yours and mine. And we're expected to repent when we're guilty of it, right? And if you're old enough to make a profession of faith in Jesus, you're old enough to repent of your sins the first time, you're old enough to repent after you get saved. Right? So I'm gonna cause many to mourn that have sinned already. Under the definition of a lot of people in our day, they'd have to say right here that Paul's in sin doing this. He should never expose and call out sin in people. You're not supposed to do that. You're supposed to love them. Am I right? Has anybody else heard this kind of garbage? I'm tired of hearing it. That's not what the Bible means about love. Young people, don't get that idea. That is not what love is. Love is not passively letting people rebel against God. Love, now, let me, I'm gonna, calls to mourn many who have sinned already. What crowd are you talking about? I'm talking about the ones that have sinned already and have not repented of the uncleanness and the fornication and the lasciviousness which they have committed. Here is a New Testament Bible preacher that is standing up saying, saved people who refuse to repent of uncleanness, I am going to preach in such a manner to cause them to mourn for what they've done. And that kind of preacher would be labeled a legalist today. You're not a legalist to just preach the Bible. A legalist says you've got to perform the deeds of the law in order to be saved. They don't even know what it means. A legalist is not somebody that expects saved people to try to perfect holiness. That's not legalism. That's just New Testament Christianity, Brother Petticoat. Hey, some of y'all ought to be shouting about this. And if any preacher had an ounce of character left in them that preached any different, they ought to step down from what they're doing. Bewail many that have sinned already. couldn't hardly do that in this day because most saved people are propped up by some preacher that doesn't understand the Bible and makes them feel good about what they're doing wrong. So, I'm uncomfortable here. You should be uncomfortable if you're saved living in sin. I would hope you are. I'm uncomfortable when I do it, Brother Nathan. Hey, Brother Ree, you preach like this 30 years ago they'd have been shouting in here. loved holy preaching. Even people guilty would have been shouting at it. They, preach the Devil out of me preacher. Now we're scared to death. Well you know some of our visitors may not come back. If our visitors don't like straight preaching they don't need to come back. Right? So chapter number 13 now He said, I'm going to bewail many that have sinned and have not repented of that mess. I'm going to cause them to mourn. He had a purpose to cause them to mourn over what they've done and not repent of. Boy, y'all would think me bad if I stood up here and said, I would love to cause you to cry for what you've done. You'd say, I was mean. Paul just openly admitted it. Why? Because he's mean and he wants to look better than everybody else? Absolutely not. You know why I can take that from Paul? Because it's littered in our New Testament. Every letter that he wrote of his dying love for God's church. is the third time I'm coming to you. Chapter 13 verse number 1, at the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall be established, I told you before and I foretell you as if I were present the second time and being absent now I'll write to them which heretofore have sinned and to all other that if I come again I will not spare. Boy, that's tough preaching. Wish we had more of it, don't you? I miss that old-timey preaching that made, as one preacher put it, I didn't have enough hide left to close my eyeballs. I like that kind of preaching. You know why? Because I've been guilty of a lot of stuff as I've been saved. And thank God for somebody that loved me enough to preach against it and help me see the light. So verse number 3 says, since you seek proof of Christ speaking in me, which to you it is not weak, but is mighty in you. Talking about Christ. Christ is mighty towards you and not weak. Christ is mighty in you. And you seek proof of Christ speaking in me. I won't go into that more. Turn back to 1 Corinthians, and let's just see a little bit of what he was talking about here. preacher this is awful negative. Well go back the past six months and look at all the positive ones I've preached and get over it. We need to grow up a little bit in our day don't we? Hey, we've all got it. Let's just get down there where it's at. 1 Corinthians we see this, In chapter 5 we see some of what Paul, it's reported commonly there's fornication among you. Such fornication is not even mentioned among the Gentiles that one should have his father's wife. And you're puffed up. And if not rather mourned that he hath done this deed might be taken away from among you. Boy, that's mean. Well, that's what should happen to unrepentant rebellious fornicators in the church. That's just what the Bible said, not me. What, I mean, I didn't write this. Paul said, you should be mourning over that, and instead, you're puffed up about it. You know what kind of attitude they have? Look how much we love people down here at Corinth. We just let you do whatever you want to. It doesn't matter down here. And he said, your goring's not good. You shouldn't be happy about that. In fact, you should mourn over what's going on there, right? Come on now, don't die off on me. You should be mourning over that kind of stuff. We should be mourning over our sins, right? And you're puffed up about it. It's not a good thing. These people, they talk like it's the greatest thing in the world, and somehow they're more spiritual because they refuse to tell anybody that they're in sin. You shouldn't be happy about that, right? You should have mourned to the degree that the person doing that should be taken away from you. Now, if I'm misinterpreting something, somebody's got to help me out. I don't know how else to interpret this. Should we read it again? It's common that fornication is being committed. And unrepentant fornication now, and I can prove that by the second letter. But he's talking about a man that is just unrepentant of it, he's rebellious to it, and he's not repentant whatsoever. It's a different category of people. And he said, you're puffed up about it. And you've not mourned that he that had done this deed might be taken away from among you. For verily I, as absent in the body, but present in spirit, have judged already." Well, he's already broken Christianity 101, New Evangelicalism, New IFB Movement. What's the new ones where they're talking about? Recovering Fundamentalists. He's missed Recovering Fundamentalism 101. You're not supposed to do that, Paul. Quit judging people. He said, I'm not even there and I've judged it already. It's wicked and you need to get him out from among you. Come on now. I know it's tough and we don't like it, but this is the reality of it. Unrepentant sin among God's people who are rebellious to the working of the Spirit and rebellious to the working of God's church and they're in rebellion and they're not repentant, then they need to be dealt with according to the Bible and for a purpose and in love, right? In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you're gathered together and my spirit and the power of the Lord with you, to deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? You know why he's saying to do that? Yes, there's a purpose even among the lost world. Discipline is meant and exercised to try and bring about a result of a change in action, to correct the behavior, right? And he's saying right here to deliver such a one unto Satan, remove him out from among you because if he stays in there, he is going to infect like leaven and bread. He is going to infect the whole world. Say, no, everybody's welcome. Not saved people that refuse to repent and live in fornication. No, they're not. They're welcome to repent and get right anytime they want to. And as soon as they do, he wrote in 2 Corinthians right back, now confirm your love to him so he's not overtaken over much sorrow. Your glory is not good. little leaven, leaveneth the whole lump. Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump. As ye are unleavened, for even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us, therefore let us keep the feast, not with the old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. I wrote you an epistle, not to accompany with fornicators, yet not altogether the fornicators of this world, or with covetous and or with extortioners or idolaters, for then must your needs go out of the world." He's saying keep company. Now some people say, well, it's just talking about communion. I don't think so. I don't think it is. It's not just because it says keep company with. Put them out from among you. Right? That's not just communion time. And so anyway, he said, not to all the other fornicators in this world or other covetous, but now I have written unto you not to keep company. If any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or a covetousness, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner. Say, well, I've not committed fornication. Well, are you a railer? I've seen some railers, they can't hardly open their mouth without tearing somebody down. Hey, we'll go out here and witness, try to invite people in the church, and you're working against us, because you can't shut your mouth long enough to say anything good about anybody, and all you do is tear the church down. No wonder they don't want to come. You're a railer. And you know what the Bible said to do with railers? Put them out from among you, just like you would the fornicator. I think maybe we put up with too much sometimes. And I think we've laxed in our judgment on some of these matters because we've all been guilty of so much we don't want to hardly judge anything. Amen, preacher. Now, I'm not trying to be mean, I'm just trying to be biblical. But I'm gonna tell you something, in me, I have a tendency just like what those people preach, we're just supposed to love everybody, and not say anything, and not be negative. I have that tendency too, but we've gotta stay in the Bible. And the Bible takes this matter of holy living among saved people very serious. Right? Now, what if a church stood up a rebellious fornicator and put them out of the church? You know what people would do? They would bad mouth till the cows come home how mean and judgmental those people are. And Paul's telling them to do it. So, I'm just not going to believe that. Well, you can be an unbeliever if you want to. Just believe the Bible. Come on now, anybody got any other ideas of what this means? This is very simple language here. Fornicators and covetous people and idolaters. That language is written in people that are actively engaged in that kind of situation. And then in the second chapter, he said of those that have not repented already. So that must mean the ones that have repented, he had no intention to cause them to mourn over what they did. I have no intentions of trying to hurt a family or hurt somebody that's committed adultery. If you repented of that thing and you got it right, then praise be unto God. There's nothing in me that wants to bring up any dirt on somebody or cause anybody any pain. The preaching is aimed at those that are actively embracing and engaged in the behavior. Paul said, those that haven't repented, those that had repented, you better thank God that God's forgiven you. Hallelujah. Right. God forgave you. Who would I be not to forgive you? Okay, I'm going quicker. Don't keep company with this crowd. Verse number 12 said, for what have I to do to judge them also that are without? Nothing. We don't judge them that are without. Do not ye judge them that are within. You know what the judgment's being dealt with here? Not the judging to decide or to draw a conclusion. It's the judging meant to sentence. We do that within the body, right? So we judge in the sense we draw conclusions, we come to a logical decision about a matter, knowing the Bible and the Word of God, but then we pass sentence upon, we judge in that sense those that are within the church, those that are within the body, right? But we don't judge them that are without, because He just said He'd have to come out of the world. We have no business with them. You know why? Verse number 13, them that are without, God judgeth. We're not supposed to judge. I don't know how you even interpret this chapter with that kind of belief. So not only does it say we are supposed to judge, and He the Spiritual is supposed to judge all things, the Bible even clearly sets up for a judging council. Look at the next chapter. Not only does it exhort you to judge, to pass sentence within the Church, it exhorts you obviously all throughout the Bible to come to draw a conclusion. But this in this instance is talking about judge a matter in the Church to exercise a sentence. And then He evens so much and goes so far as to tell you how to do it. and says, the least esteemed among you, let them judge the matter. Now, how would you like to be if I came to you, Brother Nathan, and I said, we got a matter in the church, we need you to judge it? I guess I'm the least esteemed, is that what you're saying, Brother Glenn? I'd hate to be the guy they pick for this, wouldn't you? Look at it so we just don't believe what I'm saying. Dare any of you have a matter going against the law with brethren, right? Know you not, verse three of chapter six, that we shall judge angels? How much more things that pertain to this life? If then you have judgments of things pertaining to this life, set them to judge. What? We're supposed to judge not. them to judge who are least esteemed in the church. Is there not a wise man among you? Is there not one that's able to judge between his brethren? It's going to be impossible if he can't judge, isn't it? Now we've got to pretty much go you say, well, I don't like that church, they preaching it. Listen, that's just Biblical preaching. Paul said, when I come to you in my preaching I'm going to preach and I'm going to deal with this matter of unrepentant sin in the Church. That's what he dealt with in this chapter in 2 Corinthians chapter 12. Now I'm going to give you these things and I'm going to be done tonight. I'm not going to be able to finish obviously again what I wanted to. But this has just been on my heart so let me give you this before we go home. I usually make this a whole message, but I just want to give this out because there is a lot going around that people will, if you were to say something, I'll use it for instance, if you say anything against the sodomites and you put that out there, you know who is going to come after you? It's not going to be the sodomites. I've never had one sodomite ever attack me for what I stand on in this Bible, never one time. I'm not saying they wouldn't, I'm just saying it's never happened to me. I could not count on two hands how many supposed Christians have attacked me for standing against it. What's happened? You know what, every time they come to me with, and I'm done. You're not supposed to judge. You're supposed to love them. I am loving them by judging them. that's what they miss. So I want to give you this just in Matthew 7 I've already preached this I'm not going to do it again. Matthew 7 warns against hypocritical judging I think I've broke that out before and talk about you know making judgments when you have a beam in your eye you need to be able to see clearly so that you can help others. I'll give you the verses Matthew 7 Mark chapter number 9 this is talking about spiritual discernment we need to know the kind I I'm going to do it quick and you can write it down if you want to because we've got to go home. John 7 chapter number 24 talks about judging righteous judgment. Well in context you know what he's talking about there. He said, I've made somebody whole on the Sabbath and you've talked about the rest and the rest does not trump a life. He said use good spiritual judgment in the spirit of the letter. Right? You're not supposed to rest and let somebody else die and drop off in hell. If I called you on the phone on a Sunday and I said, Brother Tyler, I need you to come over here and I need you to help me. I need you to pray and help give some scriptures to one of my family members. I need your help today. And you say, well, I'll come tomorrow, but today's the Lord's day. That's not righteous judgment, see. And that's what Jesus was teaching in chapter number 7. But also the Bible says to abstain from all the appearance of evil. You're going to have to make a judgment, 1 Thessalonians, as to what is evil to know what to abstain from. You're going to have to look at something and judge that that is wrong and I'm not going to be a partaker of it. Right? There's nothing mean about that. John chapter number 12. We know that in the Bible talked about when Jesus said, neither do I judge you, and He talked about that in John 12, 47, and verses number 47 and 48, because His purpose at that time was not to judge, but said, the words that I speak will judge them. It's not that they're without judgment, but my purpose was to come into the world to save the world, right? that there wasn't going to be a judgment, there obviously is. So let me give you these quickly. We must judge between brethren, 1 Corinthians 6, 5 we just covered. We judge preaching in 1 Corinthians 14, 29. We judge preachers in 2 Corinthians 11, 1-4, and discerning, making, drawing conclusions. Works of darkness in Ephesians 5-11. We judge spirits in 1 John 4, chapter number 1, know the spirit for they are not all of God. We judge ourselves 1 Corinthians 11-31. We judge other believers sins in 1 Corinthians 5-13. We judge all things in 1 Corinthians 2-15. And we judge angels in 1 Corinthians 6-3. And we judge elders that we rebuke before all that others may fear in 1 Timothy 5. I'm trying to give you some ammunition against this ungodly crowd that tells you not to judge anybody. So when you get the feeling, because you're living filthy and nobody wants to hang around you, it's not my fault. It's your decisions of what you have done has broken our fellowship, not mine. Right? Now, I've done this, we don't judge motive and intent, we cannot. We don't judge scruples, they're nonspecific. Romans 14, 1 Corinthians 10, Colossians 2, motive and intent, 1 Corinthians 4, 1 through 5. Beware of false prophets in Matthew 7. James 5, we must first judge a man to be in error that he needs converting before we can ever attempt to restore him. Romans 16, commands us to mark and avoid those that are teaching contrary to the Word, right? Mark and avoid them. going to have to make a judgment. 2 Timothy 3, 5, we're going to have to turn away from certain ones. You're going to have to make a judgment. You're going to have to judge them to be wrong and you're going to have to judge to turn away. 2 Timothy 3, 5, 2 Thessalonians 3, 6 says to withdraw yourself from every brother who are disorderly. That's another judgment that's going to have to be made. Withdraw yourself from somebody. Judge that they are wrong and stay away from them. That's contrary to the love that these other guys teach out here. Don't fall for that junk. Romans 12, 9, we're to abhor evil and cleave to that which is good. We're going to have to judge what's evil and judge what's good. 1 John 4, 1 is to try to judge and to test. And 2 John 1, 10 says to receive not a man. You're going to have to judge a man not to receive him. Right? I know this is quick, but maybe you can go back and let's do it later on. So it's our responsibility to judge and to rebuke and correct. And I won't give you that long list just to spare you that little bit of time. But I'm going to give you some examples quickly. I know you're tired. Let me do it quick. Paul judged the sin on the church. He wasn't that. And we just looked at that. He named Phagellus and Hermogenes in 2 Timothy 1.15. Called them out by name. He said not to eat with a certain man, 1 Corinthians 5. He rebuked Peter to his face openly and publicly in Galatians chapter number 2. He named Alexander, named his business, and named the location of that business in 2 Timothy 4.14. He named Demas publicly and is preserved for us in our Scriptures. And you and I know his name today as Forsaken Paul, having loved this ungodly world. Somebody had to make a judgment that he had fallen in love with the world and was ungodly, and pass the sentence upon him as a believer. He named John Mark in Acts 15 because of Acts 13. John the Baptist judged Herod as a fox. Jesus judged a woman as a dog. So that's not what He was saying, it's exactly what He said verbatim. He called the righteous. Now, don't let me leave out the next part, better great faith. No, that's not what I'm talking about. The religious generation He called them vipers, judged them as vipers. Nathan rebuked David, 2 Samuel 12. John named Diotrephes in 3 John 9. Samuel wrote 2 Samuel exposing David for his sin. Moses, Peter, and Jude all exposed Balaam. Hanani named Jehoshaphat. Lydia didn't mind being judged. And it said, if you've judged me, then come eat with me. Didn't bother her at all that they judged her. Don't judge me. Lydia didn't mind you judged her or not. Sarah judged God, and God never rebuked her, didn't even mind that he did so, Hebrews 11. God says to judge him, Isaiah 5.3, and David welcomed it, Psalm 141.5. Now, let's go home on Philippians chapter one. Can we do that? I know I've been a long time preaching, somebody's about to fall out the window. Now, what happens is these great spiritual truths, and I think a lot of the crowd that's against this is because people have done this kind of stuff right here in the wrong spirit. And that is a lot of the reasons why I'm having to get up here and do what I do, is because a lot of people have been treated that way, and so what they did was blamed the truth of it, blamed the method instead of looking at the truth. And I don't agree with the methods of some people. People are not to be mistreated, and belittled, and ridiculed, and made to feel. That is not at all the spirit in which Paul has ever dealt with anything in this Bible. And I certainly don't want to either. I'm just more upset at people that they attack me as being judgmental and not to judge when they're actually the ones doing the judging. And I'm not ashamed, I judge people, I'm judging you. When I go home and you call me about something, or I find out you've done something, in my mind, I'm judging whether or not that's right. I'm trying to judge where you are spiritually, so I know how to pray for you. I mean, these are good discernment. You're not supposed to just look at people and say, well, I don't wanna judge them. You better judge what they're doing, if you're gonna spend your time with them. Pray for good spiritual discernment. Philippians chapter number one, verse number nine, just quickly. And this, I pray, that your love may abound. Boy, I need some of that, don't you? I need my love to abound. But I don't want the wrong kind of love to abound. Read this carefully, and we're going on. I know it's been a while. Read this carefully. I want your love to abound. I pray that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment. Well, I thought it was not loving to judge. Is that not what's taught, folks? Come on, we are taught that it's not loving to judge and that's contrary to the Bible. He said, I want your love to abound and I want it to abound in judgment. You know what he's talking about with that knowledge? The more you grow in Christ, the more you get in the Word of God, things that you used to think might be okay are not okay, and things you thought were wrong are kind of okay, and the Bible brings you along in its knowledge, and you learn how to love people properly, right? And this is how we're gonna, here's how I want this judgment, here's how I want the knowledge, so that your love can abound, the right kind of love, you gotta have knowledge to go along with it. And I want you to be able to make the proper judgment. Here's what he said in the next verse, that you may approve things that are excellent, that are more worthy, that are better, that you may be sincere and without offense to the day of Christ. So I want your love to abound in knowledge and in all judgment so that you may be able to approve things that are more excellent. I don't want you to, that word approve means to discern. I've got that down here somewhere. But so that you can discern between good and evil. I want you to be able to know the difference in what's right and what's not right, what to be around and what you shouldn't be around. That's why I want you young people as you grow in the Lord, I want you to for yourself be able to in the knowledge of the Word of God make the proper judgments out of love that's conditioned in knowledge to make the proper judgments to approve what's excellent and what's right and what's wrong, what's good and what's evil, right? Don't be like in Malachi when God said, you've wearied me because you say everybody's okay with God, even the evil. Chapter two and chapter three of Malachi. I don't know about you, but I'm just glad I got a Bible. It keeps me balanced. Right? And I'm done, we could go into, Ephesians 4 and Proverbs talking about the timing and in the manner in which we do it in love and all of those things. But I just wanted to kind of look at that because I don't know if I go a week without somebody having something to say about how I try to live my Christian life. Somebody that, oh, you're taking it too far or, you know, And you know what, you're gonna have to come to the place that you just get in this book for yourself, get your convictions out of this book, get your knowledge and your temper, and if you want your love to come out, get it out of this book and stand on the Word of God. And then, when you do that, you don't have to apologize to anybody for anything, because it's right here in the Word of God. It's not my opinion. See, when I make a judgment of somebody, And I say, that's wrong. That person's wrong for doing that. When I make that decision, do you think I enjoy doing that, being made of the same thing they are? It's the Word of God that judges it right and wrong. I've just got to go with the Bible, right? So it's not unloving to call things out, to name things, to preach against things. In fact, it's very loving to do so. And if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for everything. So discern and approve what's excellent, and you're gonna have to judge in order to do that. And don't let nobody make you feel bad for it, okay? Now, let's forego an altar call tonight, Brother Reed. I'm just going to pray, and then I've got to open the doors of the church, and then we'll take care of that matter. Lord, we love you tonight. Thank you for the Word. I pray that my words that have been spoken here tonight would be able to help people to see that we're not the ones in the wrong just for making proper judgments. I certainly want to be long-suffering, and loving, and understanding, and forbearing one another in love, and all those things, and I believe we do that, Lord. And I want to continue to do that, but I certainly don't want to get in a place, Lord, where I have compromised the truth of the Bible, and I'm afraid to stand up for anything that's right. I just pray You'd help us to be strong, and be courageous, and bold in the faith, and We thank You for all You do, what You have done, what You shall do. Thank You for the Word of God that keeps us straight, Lord. Thank You for correcting me in ways and places in my life that I have been wrong as a preacher and as a Christian, certainly. Thank You for always being faithful to do that. We love You, Lord, and thank You for all You do. In Jesus' name, amen and amen. All right.