Good morning and welcome back as we spend another Sunday morning here in the book of Amos. This morning we're going to jump right in and dive into Amos chapter 6. So far we've looked at a lot through Amos. We've seen a lot of judgments and again as we get into it I'm going to ask you, like I've asked every week, if you would just imagine Amos talking to America. Just picture that Amos is speaking not just to Israel but to America. And let's not just read it and say, oh, these are bad things. Let's read it and say, oh, these are bad things. Is my life part of these things? Am I taking place in these activities? Am I participating in activities that I shouldn't? Whatever this is that we read about, that Amos is saying to Israel, you should not do. Am I doing these things? Or sometimes they're being judged for what they haven't done. Am I guilty of not doing these things myself? You know, we can't just look at it and pass it off as a book and pass it off and say, whoa, I'm glad I wasn't living in those days. No, we've got to say, look, if my life is guilty of the things that Israel was guilty of, the things that Amos is talking to Israel about, if I am guilty of these things, I have got to change or I will face the same fate that Israel faced. So this morning, we're going to start in chapter 6. So you've got your Bible. Open with me to Amos chapter 6, verse 1. And for those of you, I had somebody ask me today, what translation are we using? I am using the ESV. So if you've got your Bibles, turn with me to Amos 6.1. Woe to those who are at ease in Zion, and to those who feel secure on the mountain of Samaria, the notable men of the first of the nations, to whom the house of Israel comes. I want you to look at this. Woe to those who are at ease in Zion and to those who feel secure on the mountain of Samaria. What is the first thing we notice here? What is the state that Israel is in? Woe to those who are in ease at Zion. They were in a state that was well, all is well. Nothing can go wrong. We're living the life of luxury. Everything's good. Everybody's got two cars. Think about it today. Everybody's got two cars. Maybe back then, everybody had two donkeys, maybe a spare camel. But you get the gist of things. Here in America today, we could say, you know, look, everybody's got two cars. We got a TV in every room. We got open the fridge. It's full of food. The cupboards, we got food in there, snacks, drinks. You name it. Every child has their own bedroom. We throw it over here. Life is good. Everything is good. But nothing can go wrong. Look at us. We live in a way that we think nothing can affect us. Nothing's going to happen to us. Again, all is well. We think, you know what? Now there's people who feel fear, Terrence. Yeah, we fear that somebody may try to physically attack us, physically harm us. But God's judgment? No, we don't fear God's judgment in America. Why? Because churches are open every Sunday morning. We go to church Wednesday nights, Sunday nights. We do visitations. We pray before the meal. And we demand that prayer be in school. God's not going to judge a nation like that. You see, Israel thought the same thing. They were so at ease in themselves. They thought they were God's chosen children. God is not going to judge them. Folks, for some reason, and I don't know why, but we think in this country we are God's chosen country and that God will not judge us. And we're living at ease. Because we think we're doing what God really wants. We think by going and showing up at church on Sunday morning that we are doing what God really wants. We're at ease. Look around us. We're sitting in our pews at ease. We go home and the things we're involved in that are some are abomination to the Lord. You know, how many of us would gladly stand up and raise our hand and tell everything we do during the week? Or how many of us have stuff in our life that happens in our homes, in our offices, in our personal life that we would not broadcast in front of the church? Why? Because we're embarrassed. Why? Because we don't want people to know that that's the way we live. Yet we come in here and we act like everything is okay. But I'm not coming to tell you that you need to tell everything you're doing. what I am saying is we gotta realize that if our home life, if we've got problems there we got moral issues with our life we can't just come to church and expect all to be well church too long we have sat on on our rear ends and we have been lazy at sharing the gospel I don't mean a light gospel, gospel light If you want to be saved, Jesus loves you. I need the true gospel that God created man, man sent. I am a descendant of the first Adam and therefore I am in sin and I need a savior because I am a sinful man who has done sinful deeds. And I need Jesus Christ to be my Savior. Because Jesus Christ died on the cross for me. He came down and was born of a virgin. Died a cruel humiliating death on the cross between two thieves. And He rose again and defeated death. And He did it all for me. But we can't stop there and say, now you want this Jesus. But if you want this Jesus, you've got to believe that He is who He says He is and did what He said He did and that He is your Lord and Savior. And you've got to what? Turn from your wicked ways. You've got to take your way and turn your life around. You are not, we don't turn and you leap over. Okay? You don't turn over and you leap and you get saved. You are a new creature in Christ. You are a brand new creation. And you don't want to live the old way. The old is left behind. Folks, we've got to get to the gospel and preach the gospel. Instead of sitting around saying, all is easy. Church, we've got to be the church. We've got to look at culture. When culture and the Bible collide, we've got to throw culture out the window. I'm not saying culture is bad and we can't have any part of it. But when the culture and the Bible collide, we can't take the Bible and melt it around culture and say, I'm going to take the Bible and squeeze it in and out, in and out, and weave it in and out of culture so that you can't tell the difference. No, the Bible, you take the Bible and you run headstrong into culture and you challenge it. You don't mingle with it. You challenge it. Challenging culture is not running from it. But it's also not taking part in it. It's not taking part in the bad stuff. Folks, you can go out into work without taking part in culture. Do you understand that? You can do things and you can be in the world and talk to people of the world and have relationships with people of the world. But you don't have to do the things of the world. And we've fallen down that church. And we decided a long time ago that we were going to be like the world so the world would want to be like us. But that was bad thinking, wasn't it? Because if we're like the world, why do they want to be like us? Because they're already like us. Moving down in this verse, it says, They're also secure on their mountains of Samaria. You see, Samaria was on a mountain, kind of. And it was up here, and it was secure, and they thought, well, nobody can take this fortress. Israel is going to soon find out that that fortress, it could be taken. Folks, we do the same in America. Do we not do the same thing? We think that we are so secure that nothing can happen to us. Folks, We had a brief awakening of what could happen several years ago on 9-11. Look around at the disasters that have taken place over the last few years. The tsunamis. Earthquakes in different regions of the country. Katrina, right here in our own backyard in America. Just because we have the great infrastructure and the mighty walls does not mean that we can't be brought down to our knees, be it by weather, be it by God sending a storm, or a disease, or a plague, or God taking his hand off and allowing something like 9-11 to take place. Folks, we're only as pure as as close to God as we are, okay? The further away from God we get as a nation, the less secure we get. I don't care how many newts we got pointed at who, how many Star Wars programs we have, we're only as safe as we are as close as we are to God. I don't know that sounds right. The closer we are to God, the safer we are, the farther away we get, the less safe we get. Why? Because our security is not in weaponry. It's not in our knowledge. Our security is in our love for the Lord and his word. When we start going away from that and veering away from God and God's word, we veer away from our security. Moving to verse 2, it says, Pass over the Calvary and see from there. Go to Hamath the Great, then go down to Gath of the Philistines. Are you better than these kingdoms? Or is their territory greater than your territory? Look at these countries, is what he's telling Israel. Look at these great countries that were mighty countries at one time, had mighty warriors. Yet when they came out against God, they were destroyed. He says the Philistines. When we talk about the Philistines, who is the first Philistine that comes to mind of a mighty warrior? Look at the mighty Goliath. Israel was shaking in their boots. The army, the warriors of Israel. No one wanted to face this giant. And this giant stood and defiled God. And he blasphemed God and he cursed Him. And what happened? A young shepherd boy got up. And he said, basically, I don't care what you're saying about us. But you're defiling my God. And I'm not going to stand for it. I don't care how big you are. You're not bigger than my God. Folks, we've cowered down, haven't we, a little bit here. We need to be more like David, don't you? That's a whole other message. So I don't want to chase that rabbit, but we need to be more like David. And don't cow down. Say, I don't care. A-C-L-U. Whatever group it is. It's coming out against the church. It's wrong. Do what you want. But you're not bigger than my God. But God says, look at these great countries. They were destroyed. Israel I'll destroy them if they can be destroyed with all their might Egypt, you know, look at all the grace and they fall So can you So can you and again we can take that from Israel right to America America if we're not careful We can fall too Again, it doesn't matter how mighty we think we are with our infrastructures and everything. I If we're not careful, and I think we're walking on a tight, very thin sheet of ice right now, this country could fall right through. Just like the rest of the countries. People, if God doesn't come back in a couple hundred years, people are going to be looking at history books saying, what happened to that country? God blessed them and they turned around just like Israel did and America walked away from God. They walked out from under His blessings and were devoured by the lion that sits there waiting, ready to devour. Verse 3 it says, O you who put far away the day of disaster, and bring near the seed of violence." You see, they knew the judgment would come for time within. Eventually, Israel realized that sooner or later, God's going to come back. Sooner or later, there was going to be a judgment. But they just figured it wouldn't happen now, that it would happen later. That God's not judging us now. We do whatever we want to. Yeah, he's going to judge one day, but that's that's way down the line. I ain't worried about that. God's saying, look, you're putting it off. It's a lot closer than you think it is. Again, it's just so uncanny how you can take this book and that thing they say is Israel. He can be saying to America, Look at us today. We know that sooner or later something's going to come. Especially the church. Look at the church in America. We believe that there is coming a day when God will come back and judge His children. I don't care whether you believe it's post-rib, pre-rib, mid-rib. We believe that most, for the most part, and well, any true Christian church believes that God is going to come back for His children. Right? And that one day there's going to be a judgment. He said, oh well, we don't really believe that there's going to be a judgment. Oh, so and so's church doesn't believe that. If the church is teaching that there's not going to be a judgment in the end of days, then that church is a heretic. It's preaching heresy and it's not a true church of God, okay? Because the Bible clearly teaches that Jesus Christ is coming back and He will judge. But we look at it and say, that's going to be so far off. Friends, look around us. I don't think that's so far off, OK? And again, I'm not saying this morning, standing here saying that I know when he's going to come back. He may be 10,000 years from now before he comes back. But I say, looking at the Bible, I think it's very near. Look at the Bible and you compare the Bible to modern day events, and I think it's very near. But who knows? It could be longer. But we can't look and say, well, it's going to be way out here. Why don't we do that? Why don't we look and say, well, it's not coming. The reason I think is because we've done so much stuff. So much immorality is involuntary right now. We're so caught up in it. And God hasn't came down and judged us yet. So we kind of get in the back of our mind thinking that, oh, if he hasn't done it yet, he's not going to do it. Well, what is it? I think it was Frederick Nietzsche. If I'm wrong on that, it was Nietzsche or it may have been Rousseau, I think it was Nietzsche that said that God is dead. And folks, that's the way we kind of think in the church today when it comes to God's judgment, isn't it? That he judged once long ago, but God is dead now and he doesn't judge anymore. Folks, God is alive and well. And he still sits on the throne and he still judges those who turn their backs and walk away from him. So we can't get caught up in thinking that God is some distant God that's not going to come down and come back and judge us. And we look at verse four, it says, Woe to those who lie on beds of ivory and stretch themselves out on their couches and eat lambs from the flocks and calves from the mists of the stall, who sing idle songs on the sound of the harp, and like David, invent themselves instruments of music, who drink wine in bowls and anoint themselves with the finest oils, but are not grieved over the rumen of Joseph. Look at those three verses right here. I read them all because they all kind of go together. But in verse four, we see, what's he doing? Finest foods and furnishings, what he's talking about. All the luxuries, basically. You got all the luxuries here, all the, the dressings of your house, your furnishings. The nice furniture in the house, you lie on the nice beds, you got all the luxuries in the world. You don't care about anything else. Your focus is on gaining more of these luxuries. Because that's what you think your self-worth is in. How many of us think that? We think our self-worth is on what kind of furniture we have in our house, how many TVs, what kind of TV we have. We've even gotten to a point now where if it's not an HD TV, It's unacceptable to us. We can't live without these things. Everybody's got to have them. Friends, I'm going to go ahead and tell you. First of all, you can live without a TV. I've lived for years without a TV in my house. And my kids have lived for years. Some of them have lived their entire life never knowing what it's like to have a TV in their house. You can live without a TV in your home. But we think that we can't. We've got to have all these fine things. And then he says, we sing idle songs to the sound of the heart and other instruments. And I don't want this verse, we can look at it and say, well, we're singing songs that have nothing to glorify God. But this verse goes a little bit deeper than just songs that glorify God. It's not saying we shouldn't listen to secular music and only go to Christian music. That's not what this is saying. This is saying that people are just so caught up in their entertainment. You see, in the days of Amos, one of the key forms of entertainment was music. And he is saying that you're so caught up in your entertainment and not just, you know, that doesn't really glorify God at all. It's just idle entertainment. That you just You can't do anything. You live for that entertainment. And folks, if that is not America, I don't know what is. Look at what we're doing. We feel ourselves. How many people go out on a Monday morning or whenever it comes on, American Idol, and the next morning everyone is talking about it. There's so many shows out there that first of all are ungodly. And we as Christians have no business watching them. It is absolute filth. Yet we do watch them. And that's all we can talk about the next day. Yet we never fill our minds with God's Word. Looking at church, how many shows do we watch during the week? We don't pick up the Bible and read it, do we? No. We don't pick up other things and read it. that have to do with God? No. It's stuff that just fills our mind with idleness. Even stuff that's not necessarily filthy. We fill our minds with it and it takes our time away and we can't be used by God because our time is so much over here. Video games are a key prime example of that. There are many, many video games. I love them. I grew up loving video games. Friends, if we can get so caught up in video games. Not necessarily a bad video game, but we get so caught up in it. Especially, it used to be when I was growing up, if you spent two or three hours on a video game, you could beat it and win. Now it takes days and sometimes weeks and months to beat a game. I know grown men who come home at night and spend three and more hours on the video game system trying to win this game. And they wonder what's happening to their family. They say, well I'm not really doing anything wrong, we're playing a good game here. Yeah, but you're taking the time that you could be instilling God's word into your family, into your children, loving your wife, but you can't because you're so engrossed in this video game. Even fiction books, reading. Look how many books I love to read. I read all the time. But we need to be reading things that are edifying us. That are lifting up God. That is strengthening and growing our relationship with God. It's okay every once in a while just to read something for fun. It's okay every once in a while to watch a movie. To play a video game. I'm not saying it's not. But when we get so caught up in these things that it's all we live for. Even though they're not bad, they take all of our time away. whether it's fluff fiction, and every time I say that, somebody says, what do you mean by fluff fiction? That's fiction that really doesn't, it's not bad, but it doesn't lift up God. So again, I'm not even gonna go into the thing we shouldn't be watching, but just the fact that we gotta guard our time. And then he says, who drink wine in bowls and anoint themselves with the finest oils, but are not grieved over the ruin of Joseph. Folks, these are gluttonous. We wear the finest clothes, have the nicest perfumes, and the adornments. All these. How many of us? We look at our tables every night. Folks, in America, in so many households, we probably throw away more scraps than most people get to eat in a day. We can't go out of the house without our makeup and our perfumes and our colognes, our hair gels. And again, I'm not knocking and saying all these things are wrong. But we've adorned ourselves so much. And from our finest foods, our furnishings, our luxuries, all of our entertainment, all these things. Coming to this last part of verse 6, it says we do all this Yet, you're not grieved over the ruin of Joseph. He's telling Israel, all these things you do, Israel, all these parties and galas you have, and you're not grieved over the ruin of the house of Joseph. America, all these things we do, and we are not grieved over the ruin of our church. I've said it already a couple times as we went through this study. We've got to get out of our mind that the church is just America. Folks, we are, again, I'm telling you, church, if you are a Christian, a true Christian, you've been saved by the grace of God, you are, I don't care what country you are on earth you are a citizen of, you are first a citizen of the kingdom of God. Before you are a citizen of this United States of America, you are a citizen of the Kingdom of God. And every other person who is saved by the grace of God, they are a member and a citizen of the Kingdom of God. And before we are citizens of our countries, we are citizens of the Kingdom of God, and we are all in this together. So folks, we've got to look at our lives, myself included, and say, what are my brothers and sisters going through over here while I am living the life of luxury? What can I give up over here maybe so that I can help them out over here? Maybe I can give up a meal eating out every week to help them. What if I don't have to have the nicest clothes, the nicest this and that? You know what? Why don't you go home and tell your family, look, we're going to give up this, this and this so that we can start giving out and helping the missionary that's over here. We're going to go over here. We're going to give this and this so that we can open a church up. We can donate and help open a church in this country so that some pastor can go and preach the word of God. You want to see the church start moving again? It's not going to come from a book. or a program, it's going to come when we realize that we are one body all around the globe. Again, I'm not up here about class envy. If you're wealthy and you're spending your money the way God wants you to, then God bless you. But folks, We are living this life of luxury while our brothers and sisters are suffering. We can't even pray for them. Much less lift up and cut something out of our life to help them out. Verse 7 says, Therefore they shall now be the first of those who go into exile. of those who stretch themselves out shall pass away. See, those who refuse to heed the warnings, basically what it's saying is the leaders, those who are living this life, they're going to be the first of all to fall. America, we are having a grand old party, aren't we? We are living it up. But God says there's a day coming when the party's going to end. We don't want to hear these warnings. We're going to be like the prodigal son. Living in the plush life of his father. Living with all the blessings. One day the blessings ran out. And he found himself doing what? went from having everything he'd ever want, all the friends, all the fun, went from all that way up here, folks, to way down here, begging and pleading for some pig scraps. Folks, is that where America is gonna have to go to? Are we going to have to go to begging and pleading God to send us some pig scraps? If that's what it takes to turn this country around, I pray that's what happens. I don't want judgment to befall us any more than anybody else does. But if that's what it takes to bring this country back to God, then God take our prosperity. Our prosperity is not worth walking apart from you the Lord God is sworn by himself declares the Lord the God of hosts I adore the pride of Jacob and hate his strongholds and I will deliver up the city and all that is in it first of all he could swear by none greater could he the Lord God is sworn by who himself there is nothing greater that God could swear by than God's name alright There is nothing. So when he's swearing by his name, God is saying, look, this is important. Because there is nothing greater that I can swear by than what I'm going to tell you. You see, Israel prided itself with its glorious things. Again, we've already talked about it. And they were just so prideful of that. Look at all that God has blessed us with. He's given us all this land. And they were just so proud of that. You know, we're not proud of America. We don't say, look at us, look at our tall buildings, look at our mighty road systems. Look at our lush landscapings and our immaculate neighborhoods. Look out here in our parking garages at all the nice fancy cars we drive, all the nice restaurants. Look at this, we even paid $4 for a cup of coffee. Friends, that's not just wrong, that is just plain out stupid to pay $4 for a cup of coffee. But, look at us. I know every time I say that somebody's going to come up in a minute and tell me that I just don't know how good their coffee is. Save it, okay? That's my opinion. That's not... That's not a revelation from God about the coffee being stupid to pay that much. That's just my opinion. But... Again, we say, look at all this stuff we have! What's God say? I will deliver up the city and all that is in it. Folks... I don't care what we've got. How nice it looks. God's coming, when he says he's going to deliver it up, he's going to deliver it up. He can bring the buildings all the way down. This is the God, you remember, that moved mountains. Or better yet, this is the God that created the mountains. All the materials that these buildings were built with? God's who created them. God. All the material the roads are made out of? God. It was every piece of matter God created. God can do whatever he wants to with it. He can bend it, he can move it, he can tear it out, he can make it as a boat and it's gone. People say the first law of thermodynamics says that matter never ceases to either, you can't create matter or you can't destroy matter. Well guess what? When God decides he wants to destroy matter, God can violate that law and he can actually destroy matter. That is the God we serve. He said, If ten men remain in one house, they shall die. And if one of one's relatives, the one who anoints him for burial, shall take him up to bring the bones out of the house, and shall say to him who is in the innermost parts of the house, Is there still anyone with you? He shall say, No. And he shall say, Silence! We must not mention the name of the Lord. For behold, the Lord God commands that the house shall be struck down into fragments. and the little house in the bits. Folks, there's going to come a time when we're going to be like that. That we're going to be like these people in this house. We're going to say, you know, we don't even want to hear the glory of the Lord. Not because we're mad at it, but because we're so terrified of it. Right now, we'll walk out and we can shake our fists in the face of God. At church, we're just as guilty as the world of walking out and shaking our fists into the face of God. How many churches in here, God says we cannot, God says that women are not to be ordained and leaders in the church and be over men and teach over men in the church. Guys, I don't care how unpopular that is, that is what the Bible says. And yet we shake our fist at them and say, God, we don't agree with that. so many things we shake our fist at God because we don't like what he says we think it's interfering with our life and we shake our fist at God we're not going to be doing that for long there's going to come a day when we're going to be so terrified because God's going to show himself and show who he is and we're going to realize the God we serve is the almighty God of the universe he will bring judgment it says both on rich and the poor You're not going to be rich enough to hide from it, nor poor enough. Be rich enough to buy yourself off, and poor enough for God to have mercy on you just because you're poor. Alright, God's going to bring judgment to all. All! You know, God, we've talked about it several times, that God detests when the poor is taken advantage of. And we can look all through Scripture, but folks, we have fallen into this concept in America that God, just because you're poor, God wants to reach out and He's going to help you. the poor. When you are poor, it doesn't matter whether you're poor or rich. When you're living in a moral life and you walk away from God, He is not going to bless you. Just because you are poor and you're living in a life of sin, God is not going to reach down and just shower you with blessings. When this judgment comes, it's going to be on the rich and the poor. This next verse here, it says, The horses run on rocks. There's one plow where there is oxen. plow there with oxen. But you have turned justice into poison and the fruit of righteousness into wormwood." Folks, what we are doing in this country is as though we are plowing up a rock. That we're running a horse race across a rock. You see, that's what he says. Do horses run on rocks? No. Does one plow there with oxen? Plow where with oxen? On the rock where the horses were supposed to be running. No. Why? Because it's pointless. You would not go and plow a garden. I think about it, around here, one of the biggest pieces of rock we have is Stone Mountain, Georgia. Or Mount Rushmore, if you're not familiar with that. Would you walk up there and just start plowing away on there expecting to plant a garden? No. Why? Because it would be pointless. Folks, that's what we're doing in the church, I think today, so much. What we are doing is so pointless. It's like we're plowing on a rock. We're not getting anywhere. We're bringing people in left and right, but the church is not having any effect on the culture. Why? Because we're bringing people in just to bring them in. We're luring them in. Folks, yes, I said it. We are luring people in with great marketing schemes. Folks, God does not need a great marketing team to bring people through the front door of your church. You hear me? You don't have to have the right kind of carpet. You don't have to have the right kind of music. You don't have to have the right kind of program. The right kind of people standing in the right kind of way outside the door to welcome people in. Folks, what you need to bring people into your church is the Word of God being preached from the pulpit. Not watered down. Don't stop at certain points so you don't go the whole way. But the Word of God boldly, with a holy boldness, being proclaimed out of the pulpit. And people will come into the house of the Lord. Folks, church, we are not responsible for salvation of people's souls. Let me say that again. We are not responsible for the salvation of the souls of people. We are responsible for preaching the gospel, preaching God's Word, and letting God do the rest. When we are faithful to preach God's Word, He will be faithful to transform lives. He will be faithful to bring people in. Folks, we don't have to have a 20,000 member church in order to be effective in a large community. We've got to have a church that is faithful to God, and God will take that church, and He will use it in a mighty way. We've got to take the marketing schemes and throw them back out the door. And bring the Word of God back into the church. For what we're doing right now is just like we're plowing on a rock. A hundred years from now, if God is not here, we'll be doing the same thing. Why? We can bring people in all day long. We can create a perfect marketing scheme that's going to bring people into the church. But we're not transforming their lives. Just tell them, oh you said a prayer, you're saved, come on and join our church. We're not transforming lives. He says, You who rejoice in Lodabar, who say, Have we not by our own strength captured Canaan for ourselves? For behold, I will raise up against you a nation. O house of Israel, declare the Lord the God of hosts, and they shall oppress you from Lebohamath to the brook of Areba. Israel says again, Have we not captured on our own strength Folks, church, we've come to a point where we think now we can do all this stuff on our own strength. We can create this program, that program, this program. That's why we're going through all these marketing campaigns and marketing schemes. And you look and you go to a church conference and it's more like you're going to a business conference. Why? Because we're trying to do something without God. We've kicked God out of the church. You talk about kicking God out of the school and needing God back in the school. We've kicked God out of the church and we need God back in the church house. We're trying to do stuff on our own strength. And folks, we can't. Go around and look, I'm guilty, I've been guilty of doing I don't know how many hundreds of times. Giving an altar call after I've preached. And almost to the point of manipulation to get people to come down front. Folks, we can't manipulate people. That's saving people on our own strength. And guess what? I can't save anybody. When I manipulate you with my own ways and tell you you were saved because of what I am telling you, I have lied to you. And I may have very well condemned you to hell because you think you're saved and you're not. Folks, There have been numerous people in the last 30 years in this country that have been condemned to hell by God-fearing preachers with great intentions. But we've grown tired of waiting on God, and we decided to go and see how good we could grow our church ourselves. Friends, we can grow a congregation very large by ourselves. But without God, we cannot grow a church. And there's one thing we've got to remember is we've got to turn back to the Lord. Turn back to the Lord in His ways. We say, how do we grow a church? How are we supposed to preach? How are we supposed to play music? How are we supposed to do this in church? How are we supposed to do that in church? Go to Lifeway. Go to any of the bookstores around here and you'll find shelf after shelf that answers these questions. Folks, we don't need one shelf and one book. That's the Bible. Sorry, I get a little passionate up here sometimes and knock my mic off, but we can go to the To the Bible and find every answer to those questions And folks, that's what we've got to go back to. Oh, there's many good books out there folks We put the good books and we build a wall around the Bible with good books So that we can't even get to it anymore We gotta tear down that wall. We gotta say, how am I supposed to preach? Let me go to the Bible. How am I supposed to hold a worship service? Let me go to the Bible. How am I supposed to be a priest in my home? Let me go to the Bible. Folks, we've got to take the Bible and make it the centerpiece for God's church once again. Before music and programs and all this stuff, the key element in a church should be the preaching of God's Word.