I was reading the book of Ephesians and Colossians a little bit yesterday and some this evening. The Lord has spoke to my heart about just speaking to you a few things from this chapter. There's so much we, from this book, so much we'd love to preach out of this book tonight. And of course, time would fail us and my voice would fail us and your patience hearing my voice like this would fail you as well. So Colossians chapter one, let's pray and we'll just pick up in verse one. Okay, Father, we love you. Thank you tonight for the power of your word. I'm glad it still not only has the power to save a man, but change a man after he is saved. And Lord, make him holy, able to conform us to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the image of your son. And Lord, you said that if we say that we abide in you, that we should walk even as you walked. And Lord, we have the power to walk as you walked. And Lord, all the good things that are in us because of Jesus Christ. Lord, anything good in us whatsoever is because of you. We acknowledge that. We understand that. Help us to grow in your grace. Help us, Lord, to take the verses that are before us tonight. just by the way of expounding a little bit verse by verse that you'll speak to our hearts in these things. Correct us, God, where we need it. I'm sure all of us are in need of some kind of correction tonight, some kind of reproof, and even the rebuke that we may need. And Lord, because you're a merciful God, Lord, I know that you'll edify us through these things. Lord, turn us from ourselves, turn us unto you. Lord, we are a people that cannot depend upon ourselves, we have to depend upon our God. And Lord, we trust in you tonight. We thank you. We love you. Lord, I'm glad that my life is not in my hands. It's your hands. Matter of fact, scripture said our life is hid with Christ and God. What a safe place to be. And I pray now that you'll bless us with your presence, your power. Your person, Lord, bless us with the word of God tonight. Our hearts are hungry to hear it. We stand in need of something tonight that only you can give us. And Lord, I don't know what your people need. You know what they need. And I'm so glad that you've always been so faithful to take your word and speak to a man's heart in the only way that you can do it. And we're thankful for that. I'm glad I don't have to sit up here tonight and figure out everybody's life and what everybody needs. And so, Lord, just use me tonight. I pray in Jesus Christ's name we ask it. Amen. Amen. Boy, it's a comfortable place to be able to be as a preacher, to know it's not left up to me to know what you need. That's God's business. And I'd try to make a mess out of it, I promise you, if I tried to fix all of us. But he has a way to fix us, doesn't he? He can fix us, he can correct us, and when he's done, I'm glad he can make us a fixed people. We can say, my heart is fixed, oh God, my heart is fixed. I believe that you can look at that verse in Psalms in two ways, just come to my mind. When God fixes what's wrong with your heart, then your heart will be fixed, stable, steadfast. And David said, my heart is fixed, acknowledging he had a problem. And then he said, my heart is fixed on God. I mean, he could have been making two times of a commitment, a statement to God that he's moved, not moving and not going anywhere. But I know this, before I can become steadfast, I need to be fixed. My issues, my problems need to be fixed. And you say, preacher, I don't have an issue. Yeah, you're the issue. You got a bigger issue than anybody. I promise you, that's the issue. You're a liar and you don't even know what you need. All right, Colossians chapter one, I felt a breeze from another world. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ. It's getting hot, so we need a breeze. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God. What's a blessing to know that when God has called a man into a place that he knows it's the will of God that put him there. And you've heard the statement that you need to be sure you're not mama called and daddy called and preacher called and God called. Bible college called you better be sure that if you say that you're called you know God called you. God put you in the ministry. We know that Paul is an apostle by the will of God and Timotheus our brother to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colossae. Let me not pass over that too quick in your Bible reading sometime do more than just read meditate pay attention to the words and what you're reading. God's called us to be faithful. He's writing to the faithful. We should all fall into that category. Faithful. I tell you, if you want to know what'll make you faithful, if you'll just get full of faith, full of believing this book, the more you believe this book, the more faithful you'll become. It's one thing to say we believe something. I know this, a man literally will live by and respond to what he believes. So we find out what you believe by how you live. I'm not talking about head knowledge. There's a lot of things you can have head knowledge of, but when a man has a conviction about something, he'll do his best to live by it. So we need to be a people of conviction. That's a bad word in the day we're living in. The emerging church and All these people moving away from Bible-believing churches and going more liberal and getting all their liberties and stuff, they don't like that word conviction. But you know what the problem is? They also have convictions. They have a conviction to have no convictions. That's what their conviction is. I've got a conviction, we don't need no convictions. Every man's got some kind of convictions. And you'll live by your convictions. We'll only know what you believe by how you live. That's how we know what a man believes, by how he responds and how he lives and what issues outside your life. So be faithful. The scripture is written to the faithful, the saints and the faithful brethren in Christ. Dracolosi, grace be unto you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We give thanks to God. And we give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you. I was trying to move on real quick, but boy, the Lord's kind of slowed me down for a second. We stand in need of calling each other's names out to God. If you're not praying for the brethren, you're missing out. You're missing out on a blessing. Take time and call men's names out to God. Put some things on your prayer list. Sometimes you'll be able to pray with a passion, and you'll be able to pray with a burden and with a heart, and then other times you're gonna feel like you're just having time to read off the list, but still just read off the list. Call their name out to God. Bring them before the throne of God. Bring them before the throne of grace. Call their name out to the Lord. I've told you before that if you're not, deliberately, distinctly praying for things, you're not even going to be able to acknowledge whether or not God answered or not. Have some people that you have some things that you pray about every day and be able to rejoice with people whenever God brings whatever it is to pass that you're all praying about. That's one of the ways we can show that we care about each other, praying for each other. And I just wonder if you think about the church, if you think about the church and you think about your brethren, if you only wait to pray for them when they're in real trouble. If you only wait to pray for them when things are really going real bad in their lives. Now they need prayer during that time, but oh God knows they need prayer every day. It means a lot, I don't take it lightly. People come and say, preach, I pray for you and your wife and your children every day. I say that's good, because you don't know how bad we need it. Ain't no tellin' what our life may be if it had not been for the saints of God prayin' for us. I believe that prayer moves the hand of the one who moves the world. I believe it moves the heart of the one who controls everything. And if I don't believe that God would step into our lives and do things because of prayer, then why even pray? Might as well talk to the wall about it. No, we serve a God who's able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think. He's able to do that. He's able. We've been able to see God do some things that seemed impossible. I'll be honest with you, I told a brother, I'm not gonna talk about the situation, I was praying about something the other day, and I prayed about it, and when I prayed about it, I thought, nah, I'm just praying because I know it can happen, but I don't think that's gonna happen. In my, I wouldn't have told you that, but in my mind and heart. You ever prayed about something, God doing the impossible, and you're praying, and in your mind you're going, yeah, but hmm. Been there. Got done praying about it, few hours later got a phone call, hey, and I'm like, what? I shouldn't have been real surprised, but I was surprised. You know what I knew? It wasn't because I was praying. I didn't have enough faith about the situation. But that's how we are sometimes. But I believe that God still can do impossible things. He can. And so let me encourage you tonight, church. Let me encourage you to pray. And he said, praying always for you. I wonder how many times we lie saying, brother, I prayed for you. Brother, I prayed for you. I've had people text me before, you know, about something. And so I stop right there, and it may be three or five seconds, Lord, I pray for him right now in that situation. You bless him, you help him, then I say, I've been praying for you. It's a whole lot better than the way you do it. You just get a text, oh, I'm praying for you, blessed God. You ain't even read the word. Tell the truth. We usually, I'm praying for you. When? How long? Can you even remember? So at least, praise God, I'll take a moment to pray for you before I tell you. At least I prayed for you. Amen. Just being honest. Since we heard of your faith, we've heard of it. If you have faith, it ought to be able to be seen. Faith is not something that's secret. Faith is something that'll be made public. Because a man's faith will make him do something. Is that not what our brother James told us in the word of God? Show me your faith without your works. I'll show you my faith by my works. He said to them, James was battling that way back there. He said, you say you believe there's one God? He said, the devils believe, and they have more belief than you do. At least they tremble over their belief in God. He said, the devils believe in tremble. And so these people run around, I have faith, I believe there's a God, I believe the Bible. And James said, well, how come it isn't making you do anything? If you have faith, he says, show me, let me see your faith without your works. Can I say you can't see it? The only thing that will put faith on display is works. Works does not produce faith. Faith produces works. You can do a whole bunch of pharisaical things and do some work and have no faith involved. But when faith is involved, faith is gonna do something. One of the greatest texts you'll ever find in the Bible, and I love preaching from that text in the book of the Gospels, is when that man on his bed, and he was born, he was carried by four different people. And they tried to get him to Jesus in the house to get him healed. And they couldn't get him in the house, because there was so many people. And somebody in the crowd said, I got an idea. They said, what's that? They said, let's carry him up on the roof. Some Christians today say, oh, it ain't worth all that. But all four of them got on board. And they started, I don't know if they had to go get ropes and run and get ropes. I don't know what they did, but they carried him up on the roof. They didn't have to have ropes to get him up on the roof, probably. But they began to tear the roof up. I'm gonna tell you something, you gotta have a whole lot of faith you're gonna tear somebody's roof up to get in. They tore it up, made a commotion up there. People are hearing it. I believe it stopped everything. Everybody's attention is looking. And outside of that hole, they begin to tear it up on the roof. All of a sudden, the man began to be let down by the four corners of the bed. That'd been quite a sight. You either have to have real belief or you're crazy. And the Bible said this, the Bible said, Jesus took note of it, church. The Bible said, Jesus said, the Bible said, Jesus seeing their faith, he saw it. I don't believe, probably the hole was just big enough to get the man down. They probably didn't get a clear look of the people up there, because all they saw was the bottom side of the bed coming down and the man. When it's all said and done, their eyes are probably watching the bed as it come down, and they probably didn't even watch them four people. But you know what you saw coming down out of that ceiling? You saw faith. Faith made them do something. Faith will get you up off your pew of do nothing. If a man really has belief and he has faith in God, faith will produce works, and that's what James told him. You show me your faith without your works, I will show you my faith by my works. Faith, faith which worketh by love. You know what would make faith? Hey, if you fall in love with the Lord, you can't help but do something for him. You know what happens when you love somebody? You're good to them. Hey, when you love somebody, that love is displayed by an action. If you love your wife, you love your husband, your actions will show it. You love each other, there'll be actions that will show it. This is what the Bible teaches, faith worketh by love. If there is no, hey, faith can't work unless love, and so if you love the Lord, you'll work for him. I don't work to get saved, I work because I am saved. And the more you love him, the more you want to serve him. Serving is action, serving, and serving with a singleness of heart. So the Bible deals with this thing of being faithful. It deals with the fact of giving thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you. And then verse four, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus. So if you have faith, it's gonna produce works. And when you're doing things for the Lord, people gonna take notice of it. We don't do it to be seen. We don't do it for vainglory. You just do it because you love the Lord. That's what Paul said. I love that verse over there where he said, as being unknown and yet well known. You know what he means being unknown? You're not out there trying to make, you're not doing what you're doing to make a name for yourself. You're not doing it because anybody's watching. You're not doing it just, oh, people are watching. Let me do right. Paul said it's unknown, you're not trying to make it, you're not putting your name on the marquee, you're not advertising, hey, hey, everybody look at me what I'm fixing to do for Jesus. He says being unknown but then being well known. In other words, the Lord, I believe the Lord exalts those that exalt Him. God honors faith and faith honors God, both ways. And so Paul is dealing with the fact of your love The love which you have to, I love this statement, all the saints. In other words, your love don't pick and choose which saints you love and which ones you don't love. All the saints. And I've heard people say, well, preacher, I love them, I just don't like them. You know what the truth of the matter is? Could be that God looks at you the same way. He loves you, but the way you live, he just don't like you. The truth is we're supposed to love one another. And we're supposed to have love toward all the saints. And I wanna look at verse five for a second, for the hope, look at this, for the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, thank God we have a hope in heaven, it cannot change, it's laid up there for us, it's already reserved in heaven for us, that hope, out of everything, Jesus Christ is our hope, is he not? Then it says, whereof ye heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel which is come unto you as it is in all the world, and I love this, and bringeth forth fruit as it doth also in you since the day you heard of it and knew the grace of God in truth." It is impossible for the gospel to show up in a man's life and not bring forth fruit. He said, it's in all the world. He said, everywhere the same way that it happened with you. You wonder, boy, I wonder what God would do if they ever hear the gospel, the same thing he's doing here. Whenever he's allowed for the Word of God to have free course, if the Word of God is allowed to have free course in our church, and the only way it can have free course in our church is if you individually and me individually allow him to have free course in our hearts, then he can have free course in the church. And if we allow the Word of God to have free course among us, he'll be glorified. You know what he said? It works fruit. It works fruit. I was preaching on Sunday morning about how you hear the word of God, the way you should hear. Brother Blake read me a statement today out of a book this morning that he talked about the young men, this preacher was talking about the young men listen attentively. And here's what he said, they listened attentively with an eternal ear. Isn't that how we should be hearing tonight? Not for a temporary, not just for the moment, not just for the service, but we're listening with an eternal ear. and attentively giving our attention to the word of God. Because the word of God wants to work fruit in you. We know the fruits of righteousness, love, joy, peace. Love, joy, peace. Long-suffering. Well, if you're saying the spirit of God in you, he's gonna work some long-suffering in you. You'll have to be long-suffering one toward another. If you think, now let me say this, all you married people in here, I'm just being honest with you, and you family, siblings in here, If you think that you just some as a church we see each other on Wednesdays and Sundays and sometimes I get to see some of you on Saturday night get to see some of you on Tuesday night prayer meeting and things like that but some of you only see you once on Sunday don't see you on Sunday night and so the little bit you see each other you already struggle to have long suffering with people you only around once or twice a week much less someone you live with 24 hours a day. And it's a shame if you, brother or sister, if you would have more longsuffering with somebody that you only see every now and then and then the one you married to or the kids that's in your home you don't have no longsuffering with. Suffer long. Charity. Charity suffers long and is kind while it's doing it. Kindness. We preach on that thing kindness goes a long way. Charity suffer long and is kind. Charity. Endureth all things, hopeth all things, believeth all things. That's what charity would do, beareth all things. And charity is a bond of, if we get over there, charity is a bond of perfectness. If we get in chapter three, we'll see that. Look here in verse six, it brings forth fruit as it does in all the world. It'll bring forth fruit as it doth also in you since the day you heard of it. So in other words, the day you heard the gospel and you believe the gospel, God started working in you at that day. Don't hinder his work, let him keep working. and you knew the grace of God, you knew it in truth. Then he says, as you also learned of Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is for you a faithful minister of Christ, who also declared unto us your love in the spirit. Well, isn't that a blessing when somebody else can talk about how God's working in your life? God ought to be working so much in your life that somebody, if you were mentioned, they could declare your love in the spirit. You should be so faithful, you should be so in love with the Lord, there should be enough fruit in your life of God continually working that those around you, if somebody asks about you, they ought to be able to testify of your love in the Spirit. They should be able to. And so he said, look, these people, they declared, he declared, Epaphras declared, who also declared on us your love in the Spirit. For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, Do not cease to pray for you. You know why Paul prayed for him? Because Paul knows how easy it is to get sidetracked. There's enough glitter and glamour in this world, enough things to become covetous over. There's enough, but if we get in chapter three, you know what he knows? There's enough flesh left in all of us to sidetrack us and wreck us. I'm gonna read a couple of those verses here in just a second. He's prayin' for them. God's workin' in the Spirit. Fruits of righteousness are workin' in their life. Holy Ghost is workin', but while the Spirit of God is there being spiritual, and they're lettin' the Word of God do its work, and they're being Spirit-filled, and they're lovin' the Spirit, and their faithfulness, they have flesh and a carnal mind that's not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. There's gonna be that warfare going on in their life. That's why Paul's praying for them. He did not cease to pray for them and to desire, what? That they might be filled with the knowledge of his will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding. You've heard me preach on that before about the knowledge of his will. I'll just say this in passing, because most of you have heard me preach it quite a few times, teach it. So many people say, I wish I knew the will of God for my life, get to reading it. This is full of the will of God for your life. You should do a study. I've done it. I've preached on it, did a study. You ought to write some categories in your life. You know, I've written down in a notebook, as a husband, what's the will of God as a husband? I began, I wrote down every verse I can find how God told me to be as a husband. I wrote down the will of God as a father. And I studied everything the Bible taught me how to be a good dad. And I wrote it down. I wrote down just as a believer what God expects me to be an example of the believer, and I wrote it down. I wrote down as a pastor, and I looked at every verse the Bible explained to me and told me how to be a good pastor, be a good shepherd. And I did those categories, and I studied it. Let me tell you something, friend. You're gonna fill up page after page after page after page. I just don't know if I'm supposed to take a job in another state. Hey, get busy finding out what you do know. I just don't know what I'm supposed, no, you know a whole lot of what you're supposed to be doing, you just ain't doing it. God wants you full of the knowledge of his will. How can he expect us to be full of something that so many times people think of the will of God as this mysterious, unknown thing out there that we've gotta feel some kind of tug from the Lord. Oh, I felt it. I just, ooh, I just feel like that's the will of God. Right? Isn't that how you are? So why'd you do that? Well, I just felt the Lord nudging me. Is that how you figure out the will of God? I just felt in my heart. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. 1,000 times uh-oh. You felt in your heart led you, huh? You better find out some Bible about that. You read that, you go, oh my, if you go reading the verses, fool trusteth in his own heart. Better not let your heart guide you, you better let the spirit of God guide you. And you know how he's gonna guide you? According to the principles of this book. It will line up with the Bible. Now, it may not spell it out verse by verse. I love how God gives verses to preachers, just opens the door for them to preach on. You say, what do you mean? We're gonna come back here, look in Timothy. Let me show you this verse. Look in. Let me get over there, look at Timothy. Look in chapter 1 1st Timothy chapter 1 you know this verse 10 we talked about the law as good if a man use it lawfully you know the law verse 9 is not made for righteous man but for the lawless and disobedient for ungodly and for sinners for unholy and profane murders their fathers and murders and mothers for manslayers. for whoremongers, for them to defile themselves with mankind, for men-stealers, for liars. Boy, he's laying down a list, isn't he? For perjured persons, and stop. He's fixing to throw a statement out there, covers a whole bunch of other junk he didn't have time to write. And if there be, say it with me, any other thing. any other thing which is contrary to sound doctrine. Hey, there's some things going on in people's life that I can't give you a verse except when we line up the whole Bible and throw it in the middle of it, it's contrary to this book. Doesn't mess with the book. Therefore, any other thing which is contrary to sound doctrine, and I believe that's the verse, there's so many things destroying the church today, so many new things that are springing up, so many things that are taking people's hearts. You say, well, the Bible, no, the Bible says if it is contrary to sound doctrine, it's not right. Amen, if it's contrary. Go back, that's a little message within a message. Go back to Colossians. Look at this. I'm going to show you a couple of verses in chapter 3 and we're going to be done. Look at verse. Let me encourage you. I don't want to embarrass you. Church, I've asked you to do that study over the years, and I'm not going to ask you to raise your hand. Some of you did and some of you didn't, but let me tell you this. Go do that study. Go do it. I know this. When I was getting married, I wanted to know when I was getting married, I thought, God, I'm fixing to be stepping in uncharted waters in my life, and I want to be a good husband. Lord, what does your word say? And I studied. Now, when I was preaching years ago, I was preaching at a tent meeting, and the tent meeting was on the will of God, the will of God. And I preached that message on, here's the will of God. And I listed about 150 things that was the will of God for a Christian's life in that message. I just read off the things in the verses, what God expects out of them. And I did that study again as a husband. And when I began to have children, when you begin to have kids, say, oh Lord, help me. What does the Bible say about being a dad? Not just a dad, but a good dad. I didn't want, hey, I didn't want to be mediocre, mediocrity, you know, content to just be mediocre. I've been competitive all my life and I'll say in a competitive spirit, but I'm gonna tell you as a, as a Christian, I said, Lord, I don't want to just be a okay dad. Help me be a good dad. Help me be a good husband. Amen, haven't we been, haven't we been a good, I mean, you can, anybody can get up and just be a good preacher, say, boy, that was a great message. How about being a good, the difference between being a preacher and a pastor? Being a good pastor. And so, just being a good saint, being a good son of God, we can walk blameless and harmless as a son of God. Examine your life, examine it in the light. Are you walking in the will of God? Said, preacher, I know I married the will of God for my life, then live in the will of God while you're married. Look what the Bible says. Verse 10, that you might walk worthy. The only way you're gonna walk worthy is when your life matches the book, what God's commanded. Walk worthy of the Lord and all pleasing. what are you pleasing him in your spirit? Are you pleasing him in your attitude? Are you pleasing him in your demeanor? Are you pleasing him? Then he says, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God. Strengthened with all might according to his glorious power and to all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness, giving thanks unto the Father who has made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light. Verse 13, who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son. Look in chapter three real quick. Let me give you a couple verses in chapter three. We know he tells us if we, verse one, are risen with Christ, we should be seeking those things which are above. For Christ sitteth on the right hand of God, set your affections on things above, not on things of the earth. Why? For you're dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall you appear. then shall you also appear with him in glory. And because you're saved, and because your life is hid with Christ in God, and you're a new creature, and you're born again, and everything in chapter one without rehashing it, God's working in your life, faithfulness, he's working in your life, the love of the Spirit, he's working in your life, fruits of righteousness. When those things are happening, you know the only way that's happening? He said, look, that's why Paul said, I don't cease to pray for you when I heard about how you're living for the Lord, because you got to mortify. Put to death. Kill it. Kill what? Your members which are upon the earth. Got your affection singular, not affections, your affection. Because the Bible tells us we have crucified our affections and lust. Affections plural. Supposed to have one affection, supposed to be set on things above. Heart set on Christ and things above. Here, mortify what? Your members which are upon the earth. Fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence and covetousness, which is idolatry, look at this, for which things sake the wrath of God cometh on the children in disobedience. Those are big things. God saves you immediately. You know what he does? He works on some of those big outward things going on in your life. Begins to change those desires. Give you natural affection for inordinate affection. Begins to take away this unlawful, irregular desire for lustful things and an overexcess of abundance for craving of a passion of lustful things in your life. The Holy Ghost, when he moves in, begins to deal with that stuff and he changes you and all of a sudden you realize, man, I don't want to do all that stuff like I've been doing. Remember that when you got saved? Remember how that happened? Let me tell you, the Spirit of God doesn't stop there. He doesn't stop there. He's gonna continue that, bearing that fruit since the day you heard it. Should be continuing to work in you. So look what he says. These are the things that the world are doing. The wrath of God comes on the children of disobedience. Look at verse seven. In which ye also walked some time when you lived in them. Paul said that's your past, church. That's what you used to be, that's your back then, Brother Nick called it. That's what you used to do sometime. Look at verse eight. But now you also, Paul said God saved you, deal with the big stuff, he wants to do more than that. God is interested, look at me church. I'm not gonna worry you, I'm gonna let you out early here in just a sec. God is interested in getting down to the details of your life to please him. Somehow we think just the big moments please God. No, he's interested in the day by day decisions that line up with this book. So you know what he said he also wants you to do? He wants you to put off all these also anger. Anger, not only anger but wrath. Let me explain something to you. Some people think anger and wrath are the same thing. Oh no. A man, a woman or a man can be angry and display no wrath. You know what wrath is? That violent anger becoming violent, displayed outwardly violent. But you know what some people can do out of anger? They can take anger and produce a hatefulness in your life without throwing stuff, breaking stuff, screaming, hollering. Anger will cause them to hold a grudge and imprison you for day after day after day after day. They can cut you off and don't say anything if they're an angry man or an angry woman. Anger produces that daily cruelty. Anger produces that I ain't have nothing to do with you. You can hold your tongue, you can hold all your wrath, that wrath you may feel that you're not doing, but anger causes a lot of destruction. Angry is not just a man that screams and hollers and cusses and everything else. He's the one that just, his anger will make him be cruel. to his children, to his wife, the wife be cruel to her husband, to her children, to other people, that's a result of anger. What happens with God, if he'll fix your anger problem, all that mess will start going away. And if he's working in you, hey, I'm glad you're not on dope anymore. I'm glad you don't cuss like a sailor anymore. I'm glad you don't go to all the dirty places you used to go. I'm glad you're not living like an ungodly, godless heathen anymore. That ain't where God stops, friend. The proof of the Spirit of God living in a man, he takes him a whole lot further than that. When a man's gonna please God, he'll wanna walk in the will of God, and he'll have to die to himself every day. Die to this old flesh. You wanna know why Paul said, I'm praying for you? Because there's enough in you to mess you up. Paul said, man, I heard of their love in the Spirit. I want them to stay that way. He said, let's deal with this anger issue. We can't go any further with that anger issue. And some of you take your anger to a new level and it's full of wrath. Boy, it's bad. Pastor Randall used to play around and he would always say, he said, before I'd walk in sometime, me and Miss Randall would be arguing, he said, I'd come in, he said, I'd open the door when I come home and I'd throw my hat in and peek through the door and watch it if it got chewed up. He said, if she tore that up, I ain't going in. Some of y'all say, I don't believe in UFOs. No, you identify them. They're like saucers and plates. No, they're not unidentified. They're flying saucers, just not unidentified. That's wrath. Wrath. So he said, let's deal with the anger issue. Well, some of you, let me tell you something. You better go to the Spirit of God, get on your knees and say, God, this anger, it'll destroy, it'll wreck a home. It'll wreck a church. We got some of those silent, angry people. Silent, but angry. And then anger goes to another level to wrath. Then malice, that wanting to hurt you. You hurt me, I'm gonna hurt you. I don't like the way you make me feel and I'm gonna make you feel worse. I wanna rip a marriage apart, I'd rip a family apart, rip a church apart. Malice, he said, let's get rid of this malice. Let's go on, let's put off all this stuff also. And he said, let's get rid of this malice, this blasphemy, filthy communication, saying horrible, hurtful things out of your mouth. Verse nine, get rid of the lying. Lying builds mistrust. When you broke down and lost trust, it's hard to gain it back. Takes a little bit of time, and it's frustrating. Try to get it back. Lie not one to another. Why? Seeing, seeing, seeing, ye have put off the old man with his deeds. Look at me, sir, look at me, ma'am. Thought you was a new creature. It's all God saved me, I'm a new creature. Well, let's see it. We're a new creature? Man, let's put on, hey, new creature, let's stop that line. Let's put off that, you have put off, the old man, the old man was already crucified on Calvary. The body of the sins of my flesh died 2,000 years ago, Jesus nailed it to his cross. It's dead. I have to get up every day and reckon it to be so. I am crucified with Christ. I'm dead. I'm alive in Christ and this old body of sins of this flesh was put to His cross. Reckon the fact that you have been crucified. You're dead. Put off the old man with his deeds. You know what you have to do every day? Put on the new man, which is renewed in the knowledge after the image of Him that created him. And then look at verse 12, get down there. Put on therefore. Now, what else do we put on therefore as the elect? You're the elect of God, you're holy, you're beloved. What am I supposed to put on? Bows and mercies. You want to know why we're not naturally merciful people? Man naturally is cruel. When he gets angry, his cruelty will come out. You know what also says bows and mercies put on what? Kindness. Most people are not naturally kind. If you are, thank God for you. If you are, it's because you were raised. Mom and dad instilled some kindness in you. You leave a man to himself, he's not kind. You have to put that stuff on. Put on kindness, humbleness of mind. Pride destroys a lot of people. You know what you gotta put on? You gotta make yourself be humble. You have to humble yourself. Why? Because we're so, so, Charity, you know what? Charity doesn't get puffed up. Pride doesn't vaunt itself. What do you have to put on meekness? Long-suffering, again, forbearing one another, forgiving one another. If any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. Verse 14, and we're done. And above all these things, above everything that you put on, put on what? Say it with me. Why should we put on charity? The next statement, read it with me, which is the bond of perfectness. Boy, charity will keep you together when the flesh is trying to rip you apart. Charity is what'll keep this church together. You hear me? Charity, it is the bond of perfectness. Every head bowed, every eye closed.