I ain't much on all that white stuff, so I told you that we may have to relocate further south. I don't like birds in the winter. Of course, I guess it's fun for the kids for a little while. The difference is that it's ice, not snow, which makes it worse, because the ice started melting today. It just made it mushy. Amen. 2 Corinthians chapter 12 tonight. Second Corinthians chapter 12. This is part of our monthly reading. We have two days left in January and both days will be in the book of Jude. Jude is a compact book that packs a punch. I do encourage y'all to read it. Second Corinthians chapter 12, verses 19 through 21. If you're able to stand, please stand. in reverence of their reading of God's Word. Verse 19 of 2 Corinthians 12 says again, Think ye that we excuse ourselves unto you? We speak before God and Christ, but we do all things, dearly beloved, for your edifying. For I fear, alas, when I come, I shall not find you such as I would, and that I shall be found unto you such as you would not. lest there be debates, envies, wrath, strifes, backbitings, whisperings, swellings, tumults. And lest, when I come again, my God will humble me among you, and that I shall bewail many which have sinned already, and have not repented of the uncleanness, and fornication, and lasciviousness which they have committed. Father, we ask you to bless the reading of your word tonight. Help us. help us search our hearts tonight. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. May we be seated. It is a heart issue. Your service, my service to the Lord, our desire to be pure in the eyes of God and the sight of God is a heart issue. We know the church is made up of people. Today people often have a wrong view of the church. Therefore there are on the membership role of churches, lost and saved people. But in the Lamb's Book of Life, there are only the saved. That is it. Everyone written in the Lamb's Book of Life is saved. The church in heaven is perfect. We know this. The church on earth is not perfect. And it's because we are still robed in this flesh. Every church is free to conduct their selves or their services as they see fit according to the authority of the scriptures. We're not bound to do things like the church down the road, and that is a blessing. We are to do things under the authority of the scriptures, and all that we do, we are to do under the authority of the scriptures. 1 Timothy 3, 14 and 15, Paul writes, these things write unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly. But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. So we see that according to these scriptures here, there are a certain way that we are to conduct ourselves in the house of God. When has this place never become the house of God? It's always the house of God. Amen? Whether it's Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, Monday, Tuesday, so on and so forth, it's always the house of God. And there is a way that we ought to conduct ourselves in here all the time, and especially during the services. We've learned the last few weeks that God is a God of order. He is not a God of confusion. The services should be in order. They should not be full of confusion. There are things that a church will do when that church loves the Lord Jesus Christ and is focused on and serving Him. There are also things that we'll see here tonight that a church would do when they are not in love with Jesus Christ and not focused on serving Him. And of course, again, this is a hard issue. Folks, it's real easy just to go through the motion. to stay busy in the ministry, but not stay busy for the Lord. When we get here, it is common to see a church begin to compromise, to compromise the scriptures, to make the church appealing to man instead of honoring to God. People are so geared today to have a success in the eyes of this world and the success in the eyes of this world for a church is numbers big buildings I want to say this, there's nothing wrong with numbers there's nothing wrong with big buildings but what is wrong is when we put that before God when we worship those things before God and when it causes us to compromise the scriptures just to get a big building or many people inside that big building people start gearing the sermons they start gearing the services whether it be the music or however you want to look at the services towards getting lost people and listen our lives should be consistent of glorifying God especially in the house of God the music that we play the songs we sing should always be about glorifying Jesus Christ. The messages preached should be straight from the Word of God, in context, without compromising, without backing up, preached in love. Look at verse 19. Let's get into the Scriptures tonight. Paul says again, "...think we that we excuse ourselves unto you, Are we to be apologizing for preaching truth? Are we to be apologizing that the Lord is using us? He said, we speak before God and Christ. What we're saying, God is our witness. Christ is our witness. Watch this, but we do all things dearly beloved for what? Euridifying. Amen? What does Paul desire? It is to edify the church, to build up the church. I know we looked at this a while back in 1 Corinthians 14, at those who were seeking what God had not given to His church. And yet Paul over and over and over again in 1 Corinthians 14 talked about edifying the church by preaching and teaching the Word of God. Paul doesn't edify the church by emotions or events, but the scriptural way, which is given the whole counsel of God. Listen folks, when Paul preached, he preached truth. He preached the Bible. When Christ preached, guess what Christ preached? Truth. Scriptures. The people were amazed. They said, what mighty power does this man have when speaking of Christ? Let me tell you why. The messages that Christ preached had meat to it. There was a point to it. He wasn't just beating the air. And because there was meat and because there was a point to the message he preached, there was also an effect from that. The effect is that it knocked people down. Amen. It opened up the hearts of the people. It showed people who they really were. Over and over again, Paul stressed, as he's inspired by God, as he's writing the inspired Word of God, Paul stressed the preaching of the Word of God. Because this right here, folks, is what edifies the church. This right here. If you go through a hard time, a song might help you a little bit. Thank God for songs, biblical songs, by the way. But let me tell you what's really going to help you. Scriptures. Scriptures. Why? That's from God. The scriptures are from God. Every word is God-written, inspired of God, given to you and I. It's unchanging. It's sure. It's steadfast. and God cannot lie. Turn to 2 Timothy chapter 4 please. 2 Timothy chapter 4. Look at verses 1 through 4. These are familiar scriptures to us. 2 Timothy chapter 4 verse 1. I charge thee therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing in his kingdom. Look at verse 2. Preach the word. Amen. That is simple, ain't it? Preach the word. Be instant in season, out of season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort. with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. And they shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned unto fables." My, my, are we there today? We are there today. I was thinking as I was typing these notes out about the churches. You can go back to 2 Corinthians. I was thinking about the churches that's within just a 10 mile radius. a ten-mile radius. That means ten miles as a crow flies and makes a circle. There are a lot of churches. We are surrounded by churches everywhere. But I've got to think, Lord, how many of them are still preaching truth? How many of them have not compromised the Scriptures? How many of them have not made the church about man, but yet the church is still about God, honoring and glorifying God. And the sad truth of the matter is that it's not a whole lot. And I'm not on some high horse saying that. Amen. That's the truth. Sad truth. It's heartbreaking. So we see what Paul was telling Timothy in 2 Timothy. We see it all around us. This means that there are lies being taught. A half-truth is a what? That's a lie. Verse 19, he writes, but we do all things. Do you see that word all there? We do all things. Every thought, every word, every deed is to edify the church. And then he puts this in here, Dearly Beloved. This is spoken of Christians as united with God or with each other in the bonds of holy love. Holy love will be a biblical love. Brethren of those who come together we hold each other up we love on one another first John all through first John the Bible tells us that we know we passed on death on a life because we love who the brethren a Man does not love the brethren the love of God. It's not in him Hebrews 10 in Hebrews chapter 10 verse verse 24 the Bible just says and let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is the exhorting one another and so much the more as ye see the day approaching Paul loved the Lord and therefore he also loved the Lord's church he loved the brethren He wanted to be with them. He also wanted the church to be pure. We've learned in 1 John 3, verse 3, And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure. This purifying process is not always pleasant. This meant that Paul would have to stand against sin. It means the same thing for you and I. In standing against sin, he would have to stand against people. And in standing against people, he'd have to stand against the people that he loves. That can get tough. Also, when Paul says, I offer the church to be pure, he has to stand against heretics and their heresies. He has to be bold in the Scriptures. He has to know the Scriptures. He has to stand against the heretics and their heresies. And he did this. Look at Galatians 1. Look at verse 6. Verse 6 of Galatians 1. I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you unto the grace of Christ unto another gospel. Which is not another, but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ." Apostle says in verse 8, matter of fact, underline that word some in verse 7. If you write in your Bible, I want to encourage you to do that. Which is not another, but there be some that trouble you. These are continually troubling you and will pervert the gospel of Christ. This is their goal. This is continually. They preach it. They teach it. They go door to door sharing it. What are they sharing? They're sharing a heresy. But though we are an angel from heaven, now why would he say we are an angel from heaven? Do you think that there's people that was with Paul at one time who's now gotten away from Paul and are teaching heresies? Apparently so. And we also understand that the Bible tells us that the devil can transform himself into what? An angel of light. But though we are an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. as we said before so say I now again if any man preach any other gospel to you than that he have received let him be accursed this word accursed is anathema it's someone excluded from the favor of God and devoted to destruction Paul saying let that person be excluded from the grace unmerited favor of God. Let him be appointed to destruction. Folks, do you think Paul hated heresies in the heretics? Paul understood something. Look at verse 10. For do I now persuade men or God, or do I seek to please men? For if I yet please men, I should not be the servant of Christ. Paul hated heresies. He loves the church. Therefore, he didn't want to see anyone in the church destroyed by the heresies. Heresies are poison. A church that loves the Lord will not allow false teachers in to stand up and teach and preach because they understand the consequences. Think about it this way. how many of y'all would allow I know that some of them do this and it's real popular on TV and people being swept away saying man those dudes got a lot of faith no they have a lot of stupidity those snake handlers it's not faith take them in By saying that, let me suggest, how many of y'all would let someone come into your home with boxes of deadly snakes and turn them loose everywhere? I don't care if they got snakes on the snakes. I don't want a car running around my house. Amen. Now why not? What's that snake going to do when it bites somebody? It's going to put poison in you. I know there are certain snakes that bite and you're dead within two steps. I understand that. But let's take the snakes that's around here. Got cottonmouths, the moccasins, copperheads. Got a few ground rattlers here and there. They pausing us though. When these snakes bite you, most of the time you're not going to fall out dead. But if you don't get some help, what's going to happen? Where's that pausing going to go? It's going to run through your body. It's going to run through your body. It's going to kill the body. Now picture that in the church. When a heretic comes in, we'll just come in, a snake just come in. A heretic is someone preaching and teaching, as Paul said, a different gospel, which is not a gospel. They come in and they're giving you something that's not biblical. Perhaps it could be a teaching of saved by works, a teaching that you've got to keep the law to be saved, or to stay saved. There are many different teachings out there. It could be a teaching that Christ is not God. It could be a teaching that Christ did not die on the cross. Listen folks, they can give you all kinds of historical facts. They can give you scientific data. But do you know what that is? That's poison. Let me take it a step further. If you was to watch this stuff on the History Channel, the Gospel according to Judas, who would want to read that? That's a Christian, by the way. Think about it for a second. Yeah, people watch that stuff on TV. Where does it go? See, this here is your eye. This is the eye gate. into your mind and your heart. If it comes in here, would you just let in? Poison. Poison. I could go on and on tonight on that, but I'm going to start nipping in the bud right here. Folks, poison will kill the body. I've heard stories of women whose husbands would be exceptionally cruel to them. These women would over time put poison in their husband's food. A little bit each day, each meal, poison. Which you ladies are all happy about. Well, guess what happened over time to their husbands? They died. Amen? They'd die. I'm not for sure what my wife's putting in my food, but I like it. Amen? I'd have to say she's putting a love potion in it, because I love her more and more every day. If that's poison, that's good poison. But poison will kill you. Poison will kill a church. Now, I want you to think about it for a second. I mentioned a while ago, in a 10 mile radius, Now, I'm not taking where we're at here. I'm not taking us and putting us on a pedestal. We are who we are by the grace of God. If we ever get away from the Scriptures, please hear me. God does give us space and time to repent. We understand that. But if we get away from the Scriptures, stay away from the Scriptures. We'll be no different in this world. We'll be a worldly church. A church who loves the Lord will continually be purified itself from sin, and we'll be on the lookout for heresies. A church who loves the Lord will be edified one another in love and with the Word of God. A church who loves the Lord will be evangelizing, will be out telling others about Jesus Christ, whether they're in your home, at work, in your community, amongst your family, you will be telling others about Jesus Christ and what great things He's done for you. A church that allows heresies to come in and compromises the Word of God and makes a church about man and not about the Lord, mark this down, this church will have cliques and divisions. It's a heart issue. Look at verse 20 of 2 Corinthians 12. Now remember in verse 19 Paul says that they do all things for their edifying. Right? Verse 20 says for I fear lest when I come I shall not find you such as I would and that I shall be found unto you such as you would not Lest there be, look at this, debates, envies, wraths, strifes, backbites, whisperings, swellings, tumults. Paul says ours to come to the church at Corinth and to see them doing right and for them to be constantly in a state of purifying themselves. If they aren't, For instance, if they're not doing church discipline, and if they're not holding each other accountable, he'll have to do it. He won't enjoy it, they won't enjoy it, but it will be for their good. We see the results here in the latter part of verse 20. of a church where the Word of God is compromised, and where there is no accountability, and actually where there is no leadership in the Word, and where people, if there was leadership, that people would not submit under the leadership of the elders, of the pastor. Folks, when everyone does that which is right in their own eyes, there is mass confusion. Picture in town. if they took away all the red lights in town. I said, okay, you do what's right in your own eyes. You know what's going to happen? Just stay there for a little while. You'll see fights. This is what you'll see. You'll see debates. You'll see envyings. You'll see wrath, strifes, backbiting, whisperings, swellings, tumults. You'll see these things. Now, if you take a church Think of church as compromising the Word of God. Let's allow this poison to come in. And you'll see the same thing. Look in 1 Timothy chapter 6, please. 1 Timothy chapter 6 and verse 3. 1 Timothy 6, 3, If any man teach otherwise, I consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness. In other words, if he's not teaching Christ, Christ's doctrine, if he's not teaching godliness, this is what he is. He is proud, knowing nothing, But doting about questions and strife of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain of godliness from such do what? Withdraw thyself. Take a note of what comes with heresies. destruction, death. This is a pattern which is clearly seen. Inquire about a church which splits on a regular basis, a church that has multiple troubles within, And often you'll find people who are compromising the scriptures, teaching false doctrines, and have made the church about man and not about the Lord. There'll be a spirit of competition among the teachers, among those who are singing, among the deacons. And when there's a spirit of competition, this is an unhealthy spirit here, that one tries to outdo the other to the point where they begin to run each other down. Then there's debates, there's envy, there's wrath, there's strife, there's backbites, there's whisperings, there's swellings and tumults. This is a hard issue. picture this for a second I'm not sure if y'all ever been to a church where church split the Lord's brought my life and I've been through some of them that was not fun whatsoever but imagine coming to church and sitting down on a pier and looking over at someone and saying I hate them Or sit over here amongst these folk and talk about all the folk on the other side. Walk past someone and you bump your shoulder on them real stern and you dare them to say something to you in the church. Can you imagine coming to church when you know someone's mad at you and you're mad at them and neither one of you want to get it right because both of you are too prideful? It's not a fun place to be, is it? And then you start praying they'll die. You pray for calamity in their life. When their son or their daughter is hurt or has cancer or a grandchild's killed in a car accident, you're happy. No love there. Terrible place to be. Told y'all before that I've been in business meetings before that was very unbiblical. And it was manifested or magnified where the women actually stood up and was about to fist fight. What happened? People compromised. Church discipline had not been enacted when it should have been. Look at verse 21. And last, when I come again, my God will humble me among you. And then I shall be well many which have sinned already and have not repented of the uncleanness and fornication and lasciviousness which they have committed. Folks, sin must be dealt with. And those who are spiritual must deal with it. And those who are spiritual will deal with sin in love and in humility and with meekness, stern but loving. The spiritual will deal with heretics with a strong arm. sit them down and shut them up. And if they refuse to hear, you mark them. If they continue to cause division among the church, you mark them, the Bible says, and have no part with them. The goal of a heretic is to lead away the brethren And someone who is spiritual, who loves the brethren will go to those brethren in love and with compassion and bring them back. This word bewail in verse 21 is to grieve for him. Folks, Paul's grieving for those who have not repented. Paul understands what happens to people when they don't repent. Folks, I'm talking about saved people here. I'm talking about the church. When the church refuses to repent, look at 1 Corinthians 11. Verse 31, we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord. Why? That we should not be condemned with the world. Not repenting hurts the person that doesn't repent. It also hurts the church that person is a part of when that church refuses to deal. with that person biblically. An Old Testament example would be with the sin of Achan in Joshua chapter 7. Most of you know the story where a guy said, don't take of the accursed thing. Achan took of it and hid it in his tent. And after that, Israel was defeated in a small battle. People died, which was no small thing. The people wept, the people mourned. They said, what's going on here? And God said, because there's sin in the midst of my people. And in my words, God said, you better deal with it. And Joshua did. Of course, we say he dealt with it kind of harshly. No, he dealt with it the way God said deal with it. And God does give us guidelines to do church discipline. And we ought to do those things according to the Scripture. And our goal in church discipline is to restore a brother or sister. That's the goal. But if they will not be restored, then we ought to turn them over to the devil, the Bible says. Put them outside of the church. And it's not that we're putting them out, but by their actions, they're putting themselves out. Put them out there so that the devil will buffet them. Buffet them. And perhaps that will be used to bring them to repentance. Sin not repented of hurts everyone. How about in our homes? Lord, help us. Again, those who are spiritual are to deal with the person or the people. A pastor who loves the Lord also loves the church where the Lord has placed him. And he will have a desire that the church is pure. And listen, folks, a pastor who loves the Lord and loves the church will want to root sin out of the church and keep it out. And he'll do this according to the Word of God. That's why it's so very important that the pastor preaches the Word. That the teachers who are teaching will teach the Word. The Word is our cleansing agent. Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse himself? By taking heed thereto according to thy Word. It's very important to give the Word. And again, I say this all the time, but I want to say how thankful I am for the teachers. Amen. Bring in the Word. Bring in the Word. This is stressful. When you deal with problems, when you deal with sin in people's lives, it's very stressful. It can be painful. but it's profitable for all. One of the reasons that many churches don't do this, when I say this I'm speaking of holding people accountable and knowing church discipline, is because they are scared people will leave the church. Sometimes the one in sin is a family member, and if that family member is exposed, and they'll expose more family members, Well, you know how it is. Let's go back to Adam and Eve. God said, did you eat this tree? Adam said, the woman that gave it to me made me eat. Eve, what did you do? The snake deceived me. It's always somebody else's fault. Sin must be dealt with. It grieves me, folks, and I say this honestly, we desperately need preachers and teachers that will stand up and teach the Word of God. That will not turn a blind eye to sin and to compromise. That teachers and preachers that do know the Word of God, so that they do know a heretic when he or she is given their heresies. and that will strengthen the people, edify the people by the word of God in a church that has the power of God in and on that church. Folks, every day we have a choice to make. Every day. It's a hard issue. If we love Jesus, we will be constantly purifying ourselves. We'll also want the church to appear also because we understand how it affects all of us. This means that we'll deal with our sins, ours and our loved ones. If it's one of my kids that's in sin, I shouldn't overlook it because it's one of my kids. This church shouldn't overlook it because it's one of my kids. Do you agree? Amen. Let me ask you this. Let's just say, for instance, that Taylor got an open on sin. Oldest girl. Would it grieve this church? I think it would. Would it grieve this church for us to have to go to her? and bewail her or over her and beseech her, beg her to get right, to do right, to repent? Would it grieve this church to have to have her stand up here before this church and her buck against the scripture, refuse to repent, and thus have to enact church discipline on her. I promise you it would grieve me and her mother. I believe it would grieve this church too. But the Bible says to put the sin out from among you. So I guess what we'd have to do, obey the Bible. and not compromise because it's one of my kids. About Dillon or Dakota. Be grieving. Grieve the whole church. They go on and on about all the kids that come here. What if my mom was to lose her mind and leave my dad for another man. Would it grieve us that that happened? I promise you it would. It should. But let me tell you something quickly. When you read 1 Corinthians, guess what you'll find? People in open known sin enjoying it and people in the church egging and on. That's why you have 1 Corinthians written. And we know that's not a church that you want to pattern yourself after. They've gotten a lot of things right by the time he writes the 2 Corinthians. Yet, there's still some things that need to be dealt with. The action of sin is a result, write this down, take a note. The action of sin is a result of sin in the mind and in the heart. The action is the manifestation of sin, not the beginning of it. It doesn't start it in the heart and the mind. The action is the manifestation of it. We ought to take every thought captive. Examine our lives according to the scriptures Now folks our heart is deceptive Deceitful above above all things and definitely wicked who can know it. This is what we got to do Where have we slacked up? Where have we compromised? As a church as people as children of God. And then confess this and deal with it. We've seen in 1 Corinthians and also you can go to Hebrews 12, the Lord deals with us when we don't repent. He knows our hearts. Confess means to agree. Repent means to turn. This is a heart issue. As we learned last week, Lord, show me my sins and the sins I am capable of. Lord, keep me from them. It is a heart issue. How's your heart? How's your heart? I want to encourage you all to do kingdom work. He is worthy. Let's pray. Father, we come to you again tonight in the name of Jesus Christ. Lord, we are a needy people. Help us, O God, not to blind ourselves to the truth of the scriptures. We need grace, God, that we would deal with sin in our lives. We would continually be purifying ourselves. Lord, to my knowledge, there's no one here in this church presently that we need to deal with that's in open, unrepentant sin. We thank you for that, Lord. But Lord, when it is revealed that there is one or two or however many We ask you for wisdom, discernment, O God, that we may know how to deal with them according to thy word and that we would do it according to thy word, whoever it may be, Lord. That we may bring you honor and glory. Lord, I pray this church would never, never, O God, be about honoring and glorifying man. but would always be about honoring and glorifying You. We love You. Thank You, O God, for meeting with us and working here unto Your honor and Your glory. In Christ's name we pray, Amen.