Try that again. 2 Samuel 23. 2 Samuel 23. That song is a classic song at camp meetings. Boy, I'm telling you, that is a favorite. Amen. Good job, girls. And Philip. And Jesse. Yeah, and Jesse, yeah. My oldest son would get so upset because we'd sing and these girls did a great job and he's just standing like. Fortunately, he didn't switch over. He's still male. Second Samuel, Chapter 23. Second Samuel, Chapter 23. If you get the third Samuel, you went too far. Boy, did you go far. Second Samuel, Chapter 23. All right, we all there? All right, let's pray. Father, we thank you for what we've heard this morning. We thank you for these wonderful songs that we get to sing and the piano offering, offer to our Lord, we thank you for that. Thank you for what this day represents. It represents a time when, in our country's history, where we determine there are things worth fighting for. And as Christians, we know from the beginning there are things worth fighting for. And Lord, I pray this morning that you would bless our service, thanking you again for the vets that we do have here. Spirit of God, we pray that you would minister to every one of us. Father, give us something from thy word. All you've got to work with up here is a piece of dirt. And Lord, I just pray you'd take this clay vessel, this piece of dirt, and fill it with your spirit, your power, your passion, your words, your wisdom. Without you it can do nothing. Please give it grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Put a watch by its mouth and a guard by its lips. But Spirit of God, I pray you would stand behind this pulpit because I need you. And I pray you would sit next to us because we all need you to illuminate and help us to understand and speak to us and convict us whatever is necessary. We thank you Lord that you are our God. Thank you for this day. Lord bless our service now we pray in Christ's name. Amen. 2nd Samuel chapter 23 just a couple verses starting at verse 11 and says and after him was Shammah the son of Aji I believe would be the way you pronounce it of Herorite the Herorite and the Philistines were gathered together into a troop where was a piece of ground full of lentils and the people fled from the philistines but he stood in the midst of the ground and defended it and slew the philistines and the lord wrought a great victory in 1941 prior to december 7th our military was our navy was at the lowest enlistment rate ever we had The final tally for November of 1941 was just 7,257, far below the numbers that were needed. But it took only a couple of short hours on December 7, 1941, to change all of that. America and the American way of life had been attacked by the Japanese. So by the end of December, nearly 42,000 new recruits had joined the Navy. Officials were calling it a recruiting bonanza. In January, that number was 59,522. And by the time June rolled around, the groundswell of new recruits had reached nearly 200,000. And the Navy didn't look back. By the time the war ended in August of 1945, the Bureau of Naval Personnel recruited, trained, and sent off to war a total of 3,546,179 officers and enlisted personnel. Needed to man over 1,200 combatant ships, The service ended up putting to sea, both were numbers no one envisioned as possible in early 1942. Veterans Day, it's a day in which we honor those Americans that realized there were some things worth fighting for. I know that wasn't always, that wasn't the case with everybody. I know there was a time when there was a draft and you, many went into the draft not desiring it, but there's time we have now, which is a volunteer army, where people join because they want to do something. They join because there's something worth fighting for. But we thank all of you who, again, were in the military, that put on the uniform. You were in harm's way, and to this day, to wear an American Military uniform puts you in harm's way in this country, as we have seen in the last few weeks, and around the world. But you've chosen, people have chosen to do that because there's something worth fighting for. There was a fellow by the name of Carl Riddick. And Carl Riddick joined the Marine Corps May 28, 1942. And five months later, he was involved in the Battle of Guadalcanal. And he survived Guadalcanal, but he spent the summer of 1943 in New Caledonia with typhoid. And when he was released, he was assigned to the 21st Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division. And in his new unit, Reddick met and became close friends with a fellow Marine, Robert Glenn, who had signed up in August of 1942. And both Reddick and Glenn were headed to Guam. He was with the third wave of Marines that headed in. This was one of the situations where you hit the beach, where the LCVPs take a load of soldiers in, Marines in, and they get close enough to the beach where that front door drops, and these guys run out of that thing, and they hit the beach, and they try to stay alive, and they had an objective. The objective was to hit the beach. There was a mountain and a ridge in front of them. They were to take that ridge. And on that LCVP, there was a... One soldier pulled out of his helmet. He had a picture of his family, mom and dad and grandma and grandpa. And the other soldier said, you're not supposed to bring that. You don't want anything that connects you, the Japanese find that connects you to anybody else. He said, I had to bring it. It might be the last chance I have a chance to see my family. And other Marines on the LCVP did the same thing. They had the same thought. And when the door went down, You saw your buddies take three or four steps out into the water, get shot, and go down. And there you are running right past them, trying to survive, trying to get to the beach. Carl Reddick died on that beach. Reddick and Glenn were both two-year vets as Marines. Two-year vets. Okay? Reddick died at the age of 16. You want to do the math? Glenn was in this battle at the age of 17 so here you have two young men who enlisted so how did they get away with that beats me but they enlisted the age of 14 and 15 and you have to ask yourself what would cause a young man 14 years old or 15 years old that theoretically has his whole life in front of him who has his dreams and his visions of what he could do when he grows up and what he's gonna try to do and all that stuff, what could possibly cause a young man, two young men, to put all that aside to enlist and possibly lose their life and Mr. Reddick did? I guess you'd have to say there must be something worth fighting for. During the year after 9-11, more people enlisted in the military than in any single year since 1942. In total, 181,510 Americans enlisted in the active duty service that year. 72,908 joined the reserves, according to the USO. And we have a local hero. And we have a day every year that honors Pat Tillman. And if you don't know who Pat Tillman is, he was a football player. Played for Arizona State University, led them to the Rose Bowl in 1997. An undefeated season. Three consecutive selections to the Pac-10 All-Academic Football Team. First team academic All-American honor. You know what academic means, right? Not only could he play, but he had a brain. Graduate scholarship for academic and athletic excellence. Between games, he earned a BS in marketing. Graduated summa cum laude from ASU's prestigious W.P. Carey School of Business in three and a half years. Drafted by the Arizona Cardinals in the seventh round. And most people told him, well, you're not gonna make the team. You're not fit for the NFL. And by the end of the year, he set a franchise record for tackles for 224 tackles by a safety. That's impressive. But the day after the attacks on September 11, 2001, Pat told a reporter, quote, at times like this, you stop and think about just how good you have it, we have it, what kind of system we live in, and the freedoms we are allowed. A lot of my family have gone and fought in wars, and I really haven't done a blank thing, unquote. So in the spring of 2002, Pat married his high school love, Marie. And upon his return from their honeymoon, announced to the Cardinals he had decided to place his NFL career on hold to enlist in the U.S. Army with his brother Kevin. On the evening of April 22, 2004, Patch Unit was ambushed as it traveled through the rugged canyon terrain in eastern Afghanistan. His heroic efforts to provide cover for fellow soldiers as they escaped from the canyon led to his untimely and tragic death via, and the term they use is fratricide. We would call that friendly fire. Meaning the battle was so chaotic and things were going on and people were shooting and he got hit by one of his own men. What would cause a man who had made it to the NFL And if you make it to the NFL, you know you're gonna be pretty well financially set. And he also had a business degree, so whatever money he made, he would know how to make more of it. What would cause a man to turn his back on that? To put on a uniform and head into hostile country like Afghanistan? Not going there to die, but going there to put himself in harm's way and die if need be. And unfortunately, he died from friendly fire. These are illustrations of people who believed there was something worth fighting for. And of course, July 13, 2024, in Butler, Pennsylvania, where Emily and Eli live, was one of President Trump's stopping areas. And they had everything set up for him to give a speech and he began his speech. And at 6.11 p.m. he continued his speech and he just happened to turn to the right to point to a screen displaying the border crossing numbers when three shots rang out. And the Secret Service agents rushed to the stage and they piled atop the former president to shield him. Rally goers scream, crouch down, run away as heavily armed law enforcement officers surround the stage. Seconds after the first three shots, five more shots rang out in rapid succession. Video shows Trump getting to his feet, reaching with his right hand toward his face. We've seen the pictures of the blood smeared as it was running down his ear. So Trump will stand up and he pumps his right fist to the crowd and appears to mouth the words fight twice to supporters. Prompting loud cheers and then chants of USA, USA, USA. And about two minutes after the shots, Trump turns back to the crowd and again raises his fist right before agents put him into a vehicle and take him to a local hospital. There are things worth fighting for. There are things worth fighting for. And so we look at the text that we just read about Shammah. In 2 Samuel 23, starting at verse 11, it says, and after him, now the him was Eliezer, mentioned in verse 9. Eliezer was also a hero. He also did some heroic things. But we're going to talk about Shammah this morning a little bit. It says, after him was Shammah the son of Agee the Herorite, and the Philistines were gathered together into a troop where there was a piece of ground full of lentils. So this small little village had a field, you might call it down south a truck patch, maybe bigger than that, and it was full of lentils. And that apparently was a mainstay in their diet. Back in the day, we tried to eat lentils, they're good for you. And we made lentil burgers and we made lentil soup and stuff like that. And after a while, it's like, let's not do this anymore. And I don't know if I would do what Shamgard did to protect that field of lentils. Not, not, wouldn't have been my thing, but he did, and he understood what was going on here. So it says, there was a piece of ground full of lentils, and the people fled from the Philistines. All the other soldiers, the people, here come the Philistines and they all take off. But look at verse 12. But he stood. Boy, if you want a text to preach, you young preachers and old preacher, if you want a text to preach, that'll preach right there. But he stood. He stood. Why did he stand? Because everybody else was running. He stood because everybody else was running. He stood by himself because everybody else was running. But he stood. Boy, that's a great text right there. You could preach that. but he stood in the midst of the ground and defended it and slew the Philistines and the Lord wrought a great victory so here's one man who realized this property need to be protected say well did he just like lentils you have to understand what's going on here if you don't defend that little farm called little patch you don't defend that The Philistines are going to come and they're going to take all that stuff for themselves. Then they're either going to burn that land or they're going to salt it. So why would they salt it? You salt land and you're not going to grow on anything on it for a long time. Virtually they were destroying the ability of that village to be able to eat. So why didn't they just go to Walmart? I don't know, maybe it was closed. But that's what's going on. And Shaman knew if the Philistines get this, these people in this village are done. And understanding the importance of that property, he stood to defend it. And it's an interesting property. It's believed to be the place where Samson slew a thousand Philistines with the jawbone of an ass, which is Judges 15. And it had that name. Josephus tells us that the place where they were gathered together was called the Jawbone. That's the name of that field. And Shammah said, I've got to defend it. He was heroic. He was courageous. He took a great risk. He defended the field. Because he believed there's some things worth fighting for. I'm gonna preach you a little bit this morning about some things worth fighting for, if you didn't catch that already. There are some things worth fighting for. And I believe our country is something worth fighting for. Now we've discussed the difference between what our role is in Christian nationalism, we've discussed that. But our country is worth fighting for. Tom Licata of the Ethan Allen Institute, a few years back, writing about a couple movements. If you remember the CRT movement and the BLM movement. And he stated, he said, these things are Marxist in origin. CRT being a derivative of the German Marxist Frankfurt School and member Max Horkheimer's 1937 essay titled Tradition and Critical Theory. That wasn't made up by anybody in this country. That was German Marxism. And one BLM founder on record stating that they were trained Marxists. He didn't just say they were Marxists. They were trained Marxists. And fortunately, both of these movements are on their way out for now. But there'll be more. And these things have to be spoken against. You're seeing a rise in socialism. And that last election where Dumb Dummy or Dumb Commie, whatever his name is, was elected the mayor of New York City, a devout socialist. Supported by Bernie Sanders, a devout socialist, and AOC, a devout socialist, although she probably doesn't even know what it means. Socialism is seen as the bridge between capitalism and communism. The major difference between socialism and communism is in the method of takeover. Socialism and progressivism, you hear about progressives, when you see progressive or hear progressive, just think socialist, okay? Believe that it can centralize all control of the individual, land and industry by peaceful but gradual legislation. Whereas communism seeks a violent and final confrontation to eliminate all dissension and to achieve its utopian goal of a stateless and classless society. It has been said that it's the same in all three ideologies, the desire to seize monolithic control of a society. Monolithic means one big block being controlled by the government. Mussolini termed this the totalitarian society, where they said everything in the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state, or deep state. There was an author, an ex-FBI agent, I brought this up before, his name was W. Cleon Skousen, who wrote a book, 1958. He wrote the book, and the book was called The Naked Communist. And later, he would add, about three years later, he would add to that book what he defines as communism's 45 goals. That was so impressive and so well-researched. I mean, he didn't make these things up. As an FBI, ex-FBI agent, he had heard the testimony given to Congress by scholars. He had the writings from current or former communists. So he knew exactly what their goals were. And so he wrote that, put it in his book as part of his book. And in 1963, Albert Herlong, a congressman, Democrat, believe it or not, from Florida, had those read. into the congressional record. So it's on record, congressional record, since 1963. And it's almost prophetic. I'm going to read just a few of them this morning. And bells should ring when you hear some of this stuff. Remember, 1961 is when Skousen put these in his book. That is 64 years ago. Okay? 64 years ago. Listen to what some of these are. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States. Guess which one? AOC's not a Republican. Bernie Sanders isn't a Republican. Dumb Dummy, Dumb Commie, whatever his name is, he's not a Republican. None of the socialists are Republicans. They're Democrats. That's the party they captured. I pick on Democrats because I know what they are. Another one, get control of the schools and the teachers associations and soften the curriculum. Infiltrate the press. I told you before, at one time, the New York Times was the quintessential newspaper. It isn't anymore. I think Mark Levin wrote a book showing the demise of the New York Times. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and pictures. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them censorship and a violation of free speech and press. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in the media. Do you realize there was a time in the situations, the comedies, I forget what they call them, in the different comedies, Dick Van Dyke, et cetera, where they never were in the same bed together. Two separate beds, his and hers. The Brady Bunch were the first time that you had two people in the same bed. Boy, we've come a long way, haven't we? Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. There's a statement that an American communist cell was told to eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward, and meaningless forms. So you go to a park now and you look at something. I've seen stuff in parks before. My first thought was, these are all the mistakes that were made in the high school welding class. They put them together, put them on a pedestal, and they call it art. Have you noticed that lately? Chicago, downtown Chicago, they have The Bean. It's a chrome-plated thing that's shaped like a bean. Well, it's cool. I mean, you can walk underneath it and see your reflection, and you can stand back and see your reflection. It's called The Bean. Exciting stuff. present homosexuality, degeneracy, and promiscuity as normal, natural, and healthy. This is 1961. 1961, a young man would have never dreamed of wearing an earring. This is prophetic, if anything, in that sense of the word. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with social religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a religious crutch. We've outgrown religion, right? Let's grow up. We don't need religion. It's just a crutch. And I've told you what to say. If somebody says to you religion is a crutch, you remind them that they are handicapped and disabled. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the grounds that it violates the principle of separation of church and state. I challenge you to ask some of these people out here if that term separation of church and state is in the Constitution and see what you come up with. I'll bet you nine out of 10 of them will say, well yeah, that's in the Constitution. That's how dumb our American society has gotten. Not their fault because somebody took over the school system and didn't teach them what they're supposed to teach them. and if you're not aware of it no separation of church and state is not in the Constitution it's a phrase that Jefferson used and writing to the Danbury Baptists promising them the government will stay out of your business that's the idea of separation of church and state the government will stay out of the church's business discredit The American Constitution by calling it inadequate and old-fashioned. You've heard people talk about the need to redo the Constitution. God forbid. Discredit the American founding fathers as selfish aristocrats and racists. Belittle American culture and discourage the teaching of American history. I mean, we just went through Columbus Day. And people think, oh, Columbus was just a bad guy. He came over here to steal from the Indians and all that stuff. And don't even understand the history of who Columbus is, what he was, what it was all about. Michael Knowles is the expert on Columbus, if you will. Look him up. Listen to some of his lectures on Columbus. Listen to some of his questions and answers at universities from people who think Columbus was a bad guy. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI. Well, the FBI has discredited themselves, speaking of James Comey, and the others. And fortunately, we have a president that will dismantle the FBI, has dismantled it, and replaced those losers with some good people. I think was it the FBI that caught these people up in Michigan, these ISIS people in Michigan that were gonna have a terrible Halloween terrorist act and it was the FBI that got them? The FBI is doing a lot better this year than it was last year, I guarantee you that. Infiltrate and gain control of big businesses and unions. The unions in Ohio and Toledo were always Democrat. I mean, we had the Teamsters Union at the corner of the trail and South Street, it would go past it twice a day. And at election time, they'd have all the signs out. It was so easy to vote in Toledo. You go there, you write down all the names that are on all the picket signs, and then you vote the opposite, and you'll be doing pretty good. And transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as mental health or social problems. 1961! And they're still talking that stuff. Eliminate the police and let's send social workers out there. Boy, that'll be fun. Anyway, our country's under attack. And it is worth fighting for. It's worth fighting for. The unborn are under attack. I've told you when people ask you are you you stand for women's reproductive rights absolutely I stand for women's reproductive rights except I'm standing for the woman in your womb that's what I'm going to stand for right there of course the issue of abortion begins with the when does life begin and we've come a long way since 1973 there's been a lot of research done and the fact the matter is at the point of fertilization when the 22 chromosomes from the mother and the 23 chromosomes from the father 23 and 23 are combined at the time of fertilization and there is a brand new person made right at that point that zygote that's what it's called the zygote has its own DNA a woman may say my body my right okay your body you're right but the baby isn't you it's got a separate DNA it's a separate person we know that scientifically we know that biologically and the Bible has always treated the unborn the same way as the boy and he calls them babes you don't find the word fetus in the Bible or what-have-you you find a babe babe is in the womb a babe is out of the womb it's a person no matter it's a zygote blastocyte embryonic fetal development it's a person with a definite beginning and it's at that point that person becomes a human being an abortion is killing a human being in the womb and therefore the one that's doing that is a murderer and the one paying for it is an accomplice or a co-conspirator And that's a logical conclusion. I met a guy in Missouri one time. And we preached at a small church in Missouri near Jefferson City, or as they call it, Jeff City. And we had a good time. It was a good church. And we had lunch there and evening service. And after that, we went to somebody's house. And there was a campfire. And we sat around the campfire and all that. And an older fellow came up to me during that time. And he said, Brother Jim, let me tell you what I did. I'm thinking don't tell me what you did I said I we had a talk show radio talk show here and I said I listened to it for about an hour and both those people were pro-choice he said so after about an hour he said I called him up and he said to him you know when I started listening I was pro-life but after listening to you too I'm pro-choice oh and they were so excited because they've converted somebody they thought so they said what was it that changed your mind he said well let me tell you he said I know this I know Christians and conservatives they don't kill their babies but you kill your babies and he said you know after a couple generations you've got one group that doesn't kill their babies and another group that does kill their babies you do the math there's a silver lining in this abortion thing the silver lining in this terribly terribly dark cloud is that the doctor is guilty of murder that's that should be a given he's guilty of murder he's you kill a human being you're guilty of murder you say well it's a human being but the mother's carrying it well she's gonna carry it after it's born to for a proper in the next couple of years carry it to the to the crib carry it to the table to eat carry it to the car seat you're gonna carry that and so it's okay to kill the baby anytime you have to carry it No, the doctor is guilty of murder. The mother is guilty of conspiracy to commit murder. Both of them should be prosecuted. But here's the silver lining. The baby goes to heaven. The baby goes to heaven. And there will be a lot of people in heaven. I believe when you get to heaven you're going to be about 30 years old. You're not going to be a little chubby baby with wings flying around. You're going to be probably 30 years old. And there will be people in heaven that have gone from the womb to heaven. And I bet you they're gonna sit down with us and say, so tell us what that was like. Tell us your story. And say, well, I was born. And they'll look at you like, what is born? I was born in America. What's America? Never experienced this stuff. They're gonna be in heaven. These aborted babies are gonna be in heaven. But listen to me. the baby baby is going to go to heaven but never do the voting booth and when these liberals kill their babies they're not going to go to the voting booth I have eight children that go to the voting booth I have 18 grandchildren of the Lord Terry's are going to go to the voting booth who have been trained in the nurture and admonition of the Lord they know what's right so the silver lining you want to kill your babies okay go ahead knock yourself out nobody can convince you or anything like that you're gonna do it but understand this in two or three generations when you have a vast vast majority of people over here that are pro-life and you're trying to find people that are pro-choice blame yourself suffice it to say the unborn are worth fighting for children are worth fighting for Vermont recently passed legislation calling for a major expansion of state subsidized childcare from birth to five years old. It's called Let's Grow Kids, Act 76 is part of that. In a nutshell, it seeks to replace parenting with unionized daycare directed by an enlarged centralized state bureaucracy. Boy, that sounds good, doesn't it? And the argument is, don't I can't afford health I can't afford childcare there is no affordable childcare well there is it's called parenting we both have to work maybe maybe you don't we raised eight children on the road I was the one getting the check for preaching and all that stuff. Who knows how that was going to be? Sometimes it's here, sometimes it's down there. My wife was making culottes on the side and had a little business there. And the kids had their little business that they had. That's what we had. And we weren't making a ton of money in evangelism. I mean, I'm not like Ernest Anks that can heal people and have somebody give me a 747. I never had that. But you can afford childcare, it's called parenting. And I don't know if you realize this or not, but you know, Dom Kami is pushing universal childcare in New York City. We're gonna have universal childcare. Do you realize America tried universal childcare? Were you aware there was a time in America where we were practicing universal childcare in World War II? When Rosie the Riveter went to the factory, somebody had to take care of the kids. And so we had, during World War II, we had universal childcare. And when the war was over, the United States thought, no, we're not gonna continue this. Now France was doing the same thing, Canada was doing the same thing, the United Kingdom was doing the same thing. They decided to continue on with that. But the United States says, no, let's not continue on with that. And then there was the rise in the 1970s of women's rights and the feminist movement who said, we wanna have our own career and we wanna be able to work, but we have children. And so they said, let's push for universal childcare. And my best friend, Richard Nixon, who kept me out of the draft, Nixon vetoed that, said, we're not gonna do it. You know why Nixon vetoed it? He said, it damages the family. It hurts the family. But now we're seeing it again. Listen to this. The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care, a longitudinal investigation following a group of 1,364 children from birth onwards, came up with these findings. And it said it raised some concerns. By age four and a half, children who have spent more than 30 hours per week in childcare had, on average, worse outcomes in every area of social-emotional development, weaker social competence, more behavior problems, and greater conflict with adults at rates three times higher than their peers. Just 2% of the children who averaged less than 10 hours per week exhibited behavioral problems, compared to 18% of those who averaged 30 hours or more, and 20% of those who averaged 45 hours or more per week. The negative effects associated with extensive hours in child care rivaled the effects of poverty. Oh, it sounds like a great idea. Let's stick our kid in a daycare over here, and I can work, and my husband can work, and we'll make lots of money, and they'll take care of our kid. And it's hurting the children. It's hurting the children. I think of New York City. New York City having universal child care. My first thought is, who's watching my kid? And if they're paying the minimum wage, they're probably not the best person to watch your kid. And how are they handling the problems that come up? I mean, that's a disaster waiting to happen. Now in Arizona, you have the fundamental right of upbringing, education, health care of your children. US Supreme Court repeatedly recognized that. Parental rights don't end when school begins. Arizona law explicitly protects the rights of parents to direct their children's education, even within the public school system. However, if you're in California, The California bill allows courts to take away parents' rights if their child comes to the state for what is euphemistically and deceptively called gender-affirming health care. The bill makes California a destination state for transgender procedures for minors, dubbed Trans Refuge Legislation by Senator Scott Weiner, SB 107, empowers California courts to take temporary emergency jurisdiction of children if they come to California for trans drugs, surgery, or mental health care. Since the legislation passed, adults can bring children and teens to California for experimental and damaging transgender medical interventions without the knowledge or consent of their parents. When is that earthquake going to happen? Arkansas passed the Save Adolescents from Experimentation Act in 2021. Alabama and Arizona passed similar legislation. Attorney General Ken Paxson in Texas released an opinion concluding that performing certain sex change procedures on children and prescribing puberty blockers to them is child abuse under Texas law. And were you aware that there is something called detransitioning? The sixth annual Detransition Awareness Day was held Wednesday, March 12, 2025. And so people give testimonies of the mistake that they made. On a recent episode of Dr. Phil, I know I'm sure you all watch him, Christian author Matt Walsh, who is a very good guy, was asked by a professor why he cares about the transgender rhetoric. He said, I care about the truth. I care about children and these insane ideas about gender being foist on our kids. I care about the women who are having their opportunities stolen from them. And he believes, like we believe, children are worth fighting for. But how about our faith? Is our faith worth fighting for? Jude verse 3. Beloved, when I gave all diligence of the common self... When I gave all the diligence of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered to the saints. We have a command from the Lord to earnestly contend for the faith. We need to do that. You know, all the talk with Charlie Kirk and all that, and he did a great job. I think he did a great job, more political than spiritual. He had his mistakes, we've talked about those before, and he had his issues, but being willing to go to the college campuses and confront these young people was a great thing. And I got to thinking about that and I thought, you know, we were doing the same thing. We were going to college campuses occasionally, street preaching in Memphis, Tennessee and various places, standing on corners and street preaching and dealing with crowds and dealing with people at parades and stuff like that. We just didn't have the organization, the connections, the deep pockets from a guy like Bill Montgomery who was associated with the other organization. during the Obama years, Tea Party. He was associated with the Tea Party. He had his connections and all that. And we didn't form a business out of it or anything like that, probably should have. We didn't have a 5.25 million house to sell when it was all over. But in that sense, in our small little way, we were contending for the faith. We needed to contend for the faith. And we take the positions that we do. This is why we take them. But why are we traditional? What does traditional mean? Traditional means long term. Our faith has existed 2,000 years. The Mormons haven't. The Mormons have existed since 1830, when Joseph Smith supposedly dug up some golden plates on a hill in Palmyra, New York. 1830. Wow, he's a religion that isn't even 200 years old. The Jehovah Witnesses, 1870, when Charles Taze Russell started his nonsense. Or any of these other cults. Bible Christianity has been around for 2,000 years. I didn't say Baptists. I mean, there are those who believe that the Baptist church started with John the Baptist, and that's ridiculous. But you know what we have that's 2,000 years old? The doctrines. The doctrines that we believe and that we teach were believed and taught since then. And you look at the early church fathers, everyone, every doctrine we believe, they have it. And you look at the different groups, and these different groups primarily believe everything we believe. I got a book in my office called An Army of Heretics. All these different groups that the Catholic Church has labeled as heretics, you research them and you find out what they believe, and they believe exactly what we believe for the most part. Traditional, we're 2,000 years old in what we believe. And we've got a Bible that works that way. It's been said, and I've mentioned it before, somebody said if you take all the Bible quotations by the early church fathers, no, not the manuscripts, what they wrote, their quotations. If you take all the quotations from the early church fathers and put them all together, you would have a New Testament minus 11 verses. And they taught and believed what we believe. We are conservative. What does that mean? That means whatever is not of faith is sin. And faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Meaning we function based on what the scripture says. The scripture is the final authority on all matters of faith and practice for us. we develop standards and convictions for various aspects aspects of our lives based out of Scripture call it whatever you want to call it and we oppose that which is contrary to our faith the psalmist said in 119 128 therefore I esteem all thy precepts concerning all things to be right and I hate every false way there are some things you should hate hatred is healthy when you're hating the right stuff our faith is worth fighting for and the Word of God is worth fighting for you listen to some of these fellows on YouTube Frank Turek who was the mentor of Charlie Kirk as far as apologetics are concerned Other Christians, inevitably they're not using the right Bible. And they're the great standing for the faith, great defenders of the faith. They don't even have the right Bible. We do. I mean, it's not complicated. I've told you before, this thing is not complicated. I'm a preacher. There's so many Bibles out there. How do you figure out which one is right? It's not complicated, right? Everybody believes, every Christian believes that the Bible's the inspired Word of God. Not a problem. Here's the problem. We believe it's been preserved. We believe the Bible teaches preservation of the Scripture. And how ludicrous is it that God would go through the effort of inspiring something only to lose it within 200 years? If you don't inspire, if you don't preserve it, what's the point of inspiring it? So we have the inspired and the preserved Word of God, and so all we have to do is figure out where it's been preserved. Well, we have over 5,856 extant Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, either in whole or in part, okay? 5,800 plus. And what do we have with that? We have 99% of them all agree with one particular side. And a few oddballs over here. Where do you think the King James Bible comes from? I'll tell you where the oddballs come from, right over here. Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, what have you. That's where the ESV and the NIV and the NRSB and the NCAA and MLB and LGBTQ, that's where they come from. King James Bible comes from a line of manuscripts with 99% agreement. How hard is that to figure out where God preserved his word? And it's worth fighting for. I don't know what Bible the guy had that was burned at the stake in England. He might not even have had a Bible. But I remember Jules Stern, I believe his name was, or Jules Smith, would travel around the country. He's dead now, but he traveled around the country. He had all these displays of all these different Bibles. And we were at a church in Michigan in West Lake, West Branch, something like that. And he had his display set out there. So I'm looking at this different stuff, and I pick up these two rusty rings. And he just happened to be standing by them, and he said, you know what those are? I said, no. Looked like handcuffs of some sort. He said, those are ankle bracelets. They would put those on a man while they're tying him up at the stake so he couldn't get away. And they would put the, they called them faggots, they would put the pile of wood around the base of the stake and they would light that on fire. But they had to take his feet and they put the ankle bracelets around his feet so he couldn't get away. And I'm thinking that guy died for the faith. That guy died, in England by the way. England, there was a time in England where they persecuted Christians terribly. And I thought, I wonder what Bible that guy had. I know he didn't have any of the new ones. I wonder if he had a Bible. He certainly had a love for Jesus Christ. And he certainly had faith in what he knew was true. And was willing to be burnt at the stake. There are things worth fighting for. Our country's worth fighting for. The unborn are worth fighting for. Children are worth fighting for. Our faith is worth fighting for. The word of God is worth fighting for. And Jesus Christ believed that you and I were worth fighting for. Because if you talk about veterans, and I'm just about done, you talk about veterans and Veterans Day. The greatest, the veteran of veterans was Jesus Christ. Because he left heaven and came to this earth, putting himself in harm's way. And he paid the supreme price. All pay some, some pay all. He paid all at Calvary. He rose victoriously from death, and he continues his mission even today. And listen to me, if you're a veteran in here this morning, you should be able to recognize and honor that Jesus Christ is probably the veteran of veterans, who heroically and courageously, at great risk, came to this world to do what had to be done because he loved you and he loved me, because you and I were worth fighting for, and I'm glad he did. Listen, if you sit in here this morning and you don't know Christ as your Savior, let me plead with you this morning. Somebody thought you were worth fighting for. Somebody thought you were worth dying for. And you may think nobody loves you or cares about you. I can tell you one person that thought you were worth dying for. I sure hope you're trusting Christ as your Savior. I don't see any visitors in here. Well, I do, I have a couple visitors here. Well, I hope you can, made your decision for Christ. Hope you've trusted Christ as your Savior. Father, we thank you for your word this morning. We thank you, Lord, for being our veteran. Thank you for seeing us as somebody worth fighting for. Help us, Lord, to carry out your mission and to continue your work on this planet. Help us to fight the good fight. Help us to do what we need to do. And Lord, we thank you again for all that you have done for us. The altar is open this morning. Christian, you can do whatever God would lead you to do. If you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, we're going to give the invitation. People will be standing. They'll be