Come on, amen. And what it is for us really all about, he gets us through storms and he does different things in life, man, so I just thank him for what he's done for us. Amen. And in the way of salvation. And I wanna look at Matthew 12, look at verse 22. Then was brought unto him one possessor of the devil, blind and dumb, and he healed him, so much that the blind and dumb both spake Jesus knew their thoughts and said unto them, every kingdom divided. brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand. And if Satan cast out Satan, he's divided against himself. How shall then his kingdom stand? And if I be of Israel above, cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out? Therefore, they shall be your judge. But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come unto you. Or else how can one enter into a strongman's house and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strongman, and then he will spoil his house? I'm gonna preach on that verse this morning. I don't wanna touch on the doctrinal or the, you know, we try to teach how to study our Bible here, and I don't wanna touch on the prophetic or the doctrinal meaning of the verses this morning. On Thursday, I'll touch on, in the next couple verses, it talks about the blasphemy of the Holy Ghost, what they call the unpardonable sin. We'll touch on that Thursday. But in these verses, I want you to know, we do know the strong man's sake. who is still loose in this day and age, and will be until Revelation 20, am I right? Revelation 22, and he laid hold on the dragon, an old serpent, which the devil had taken, bound him a thousand years. And in this parable, his goods that he's speaking of, Satan's goods, would be the people that he controls. Verse number 22, then he was brought unto them, one possessed with the devil. So, we've got that understanding. We know what the strong man is. We know what his goods are. And doctrinally and prophetically, I believe this is to the house of Israel, amen? And the spoiling of the house of Israel will take place in Revelation 11. It'll be cataclysmic. The Bible says in Revelation 11, 15, and the seventh angel sounded, and there were great voices in heaven saying, the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever. So prophetically, we see something going on in the future doctrinally for the nation of Israel in these verses. But if I'm giving you devotional thought that I've heard preached over and over on this verse, I don't see anything wrong with that. I just wanna compare this verse instead of to the strong man's house to a man's body. Again, doctrinally, I'm gonna look at Luke for one verse. And I'm not going to dig into the doctrine of what we're talking about in the book of Luke there, but it says in Luke 11, 24, when the unpeached spirit, it's the parallel verse, when the unpeached spirit has gone out of a man, he walked through dry places, seeking rest, found a gun, he said, if I return to my house once I came out, that's talking about a man getting a spirit, a demonic spirit out of him, and seven of them coming back, amen? And we'll talk about that at another time as well, amen. Many say that's a man trying to get right without salvation, trying to get things out of his life, and it's just coming back sevenfold on him, amen, and tearing him up. You need Christ. You want anything fixing your life? You ain't going to be able to turn over that leaf. You ain't going to be able to do something different, amen. You ain't just going to change something. You need Christ to come live inside of you, amen? Now I'm gonna give you a devotional message this morning relating to salvation on this single verse in Matthew, verse number 29. Or else how can one enter into a strong man's house and spoil his goods except he first bind the strong man and then he will spoil his house? You see, when a man is lost this morning, now I'm preaching on salvation, but this applies to all of us. You either got it or you didn't. If you didn't, you need it. If you got it, you need to understand it. You need to be able to teach it to your children, to your family, and you need to be able to win souls for Christ. So this relates to all of us this morning, amen? And when a man is lost, there's a stronghold in his life, and that stronghold is a stronghold of Satan, amen? Salvation is simple this morning. We always say salvation's easy, but salvation is simple, but it does not mean it's necessarily easy for every man as we relate to easy believism as some call it, amen? Just a simple prayer and nothing happening, amen? No conviction or nothing, but a man just said a prayer and said, all right, I'm going to heaven with no change at all. There's a battle for the soul of a man. And that battle can be won quick sometimes. It can be won early in life. It can be won simply, like it was for Tyler at the age of eight, I believe, on a bell of hay. But that is not always the case. Sometimes it's more difficult for a man, maybe one that's filled with pride, maybe one that's filled with the world. It can take longer for that man to get saved. That man may not get saved until his older age, and it may be much more difficult, if you will, although salvation is simple. Christ made it easy, but what we do is we let somebody we didn't even talk about form a stronghold in our lives, and it makes it much more difficult. Now neither here nor there, there is a strong man that does not want anybody to be saved. He does not want anyone to call upon the Lord. He does not want anyone to have a home in heaven. He desires all control of men, he desires all worship from men, and he wants to take every bit of that from God. He's the arch nemesis of God, and therefore he hates you. He wants you to burn in hell. He does not want you to believe Christ died on the cross of Calvary, rose from the grave. He does not want you to put your faith and trust in the gospel of Jesus Christ and be saved. Amen. And when a man is born again, the strong man loses the battle and is no longer in charge of that house or that body. So I'm gonna give you three truths out of that verse this morning, then we'll go to the house. Or else, how can one enter into a strong man's house and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man, and then he will spoil his house? Firstly, I noticed there is a searching this morning. Father, help us this morning, God. I pray you, just God, help us understand salvation, God, on a level, God, that we can be great soul winners. God, we can help our children, we can help our spouses, we can help our family. And dear God, if there could be somebody in here, a little in doubt, God, maybe lost and on their way to hell. God, I pray you speak to their heart through the spirit of God this morning. God, they've fallen to conviction. Lord, I pray God they put all their faith and trust in you, Father. We love you and praise you in Jesus' name, amen, and amen. Man, it feels good to have my voice feeling good. I like preaching, hallelujah. Number one, we notice there is a searching this morning. Look at the first of that verse. For else how can one enter into a strong man's house and spoil his goods? How can you do this? Well, the fact is that we must understand as it pertains to salvation of soul, whether it is for yourself, for your family, or for so many others, is the fact that a man is not without a master in life. There is nobody in this room or in this world that does not have a master. You are not independent. You are not in charge of everything in your life. You are bowing to a master daily, amen? Whether you know it or not this morning, every man has a master. The lost and dying world has a master. But I'll tell you what, they sure don't like to hear who their master really is. Now listen, we have extreme cases. I had to take statistic courses in my degree, business degree at Marshall. And when you take statistics, you take the brute sample, you take the extremities. I can't remember the names for the highs and the lows. You knock them off and you get your mean out of that temple without the extruders. Of course there are extreme cases in life of different things happening, but can I tell you that there's some real extreme cases of folks that they're complete fools and they hate God and they make it known to everybody. How many of y'all know celebrities that have, quote, said they sold their soul to the devil? I'll give you a story. I used to have GPT not to write my sermons, y'all, but to look up statistics and things like that, because you don't organize them where you can grab them and copy-paste all that stuff. So I've asked it yesterday. I said, give me some times that celebrities sold their souls to Satan. And I let it answer that, and of course it gave me the most liberal, leftist answer ever. There are rumors that men have done this, but no really documented cases, yada, yada, yada, yada. I said, quit playing me for a fool, man! I started yelling at the AI. I do it, it's fun, amen? It comes back and apologizes to you. You're one of the people I can apologize to. I said, quit playing me for a fool, Jack GPT. I listened when I was lost to rap songs and music that said they sold their soul to the devil. And I know of stories. Please give me some of those for my sermon tomorrow. Amen. And in short, I said, I am sorry. You are correct. Now I understand what you are asking. And it began to show me things. It showed me how Snoop Dogg, in a song on Murder Was the Case, in 1990-something said, I sold my soul to the devil, and the price was cheap, and it was gold when I stole it. And he's a heartless beast, amen. It talked about Jay-Z, and just recently saying, Lucifer, son of morning, I'm going to chase you out of earth. from a song titled Lucifer. It talked about, I know y'all worldly folk don't watch no Brother Where Art Thou. You know the black boy that was playing the guitar? That's a true story. They say he couldn't play the guitar with a lick, and I've been to the crossroads in Mississippi when we was preaching a meeting down there, and they took us to where the crossroads was, where this man, what's his name? Ah, what, no, no, no, no. I go, Robert Johnson, Robert Johnson, Bob Johnson, he went down to the, he says right here, I went down to the crossroads, I fell down on my knees, and he asked whoever to have mercy and help me, amen, and he walked out of there, they said all of a sudden he could play anything he wanted to on the guitar, and he became a famous blues jazz musician. I believe this stuff. I don't care if y'all do or not. Meredith Manson said we are the beautiful people, we are the children of the devil. Rolling Stones, Keith Richards said, pleased to meet you. Hope you guessed my name. But what's puzzling you is the nature of my game and the sympathy for the devil. There's all kinds of, we going all day long. I've been trying to tell my kids that these Hollywood elites and these political elites, have done something spiritual, they've done something mystical, and there is something demonic behind all of it, amen? And they have a master, amen? And by the way, any of you parents letting your children listen to secular garbage, I ain't gonna rail on you this morning, but you're messing up, just believe me. You're fouling up, amen? There may be one or two that come out liking bluegrass or something, ain't gonna hurt them, but I'm saying about 90% of people that come out loving secular music is gonna love some garbage. It's going to put drugs and alcohol and fornication and immorality in their mind and put a demon on them. I believe it. I'm going to give you all a soapbox. I'm sick of stupid preachers acting like secular music's alright. It's these goofball redneck fools that don't listen to nothing but bluegrass. They think wet bluegrass never hurt me young and it's okay to listen to secular music. They don't understand that only about 3% of the population listens to bluegrass. I made that stat up, and I'll look you one up later and give it to you tonight. Most children are drawn to that hip-hop junk and all that rock and roll junk and that Billie Eilish junk and all that demonic stuff that's got the devil all over it. And I know people personally in my family that's been changed by music, and their life has been completely manipulated by secular music. Don't you ever miss your preacher that says it's all right. Amen. Amen. Good preaching. I want y'all, when we get this asphalt driveway up here, I'm gonna ask y'all to drive through and let me see what's on your radio. Before we start church, see if you're in the right place to even be here. You been putting demon music in your ears on the way here? Amen. Good preaching. It's saving my message, I'm sorry. I'm not trying to be mean, I'm trying to help you. There's demons on it. If I show you lyrics of a bunch of them saying, I sold my soul to Satan, and then you're gonna listen to them, you're putting that demon in your home, you're putting that stuff in your mind. So we know there's people that know who the master is, but what about your little grandma maybe? Sweet little lady, never lived a wretched life, never lived in deep sin, but she never really believed she had to trust Christ. Strong man on her. with two kids hanging out with whose parents are some other religion, they don't believe Christ died for their sins. Does a strong man own them? Sure. Sure. What about that friend at work that you, you're around, they died of sex, you kind of just made it okay to be their friend, but you know the law, you know, they go home and pray, you know, they go, they go do all them things, they don't trust Christ. Does a strong man own them? Are they demonically possessed? Sure. Like a Bible, sure. John 8 and 44, ye are of your father the devil, and the lust of your father ye will do. 1 John 3 and 8, he that committed sin is of the devil. Ephesians 2 and 2, where in times past ye walked according to the course of the world, according to the prince of the power of the air. The spirit that now worketh, that's the spirit of the prince of power of the air, that's Satan, that now worketh in the children of disobedience, those who don't trust Christ. Colossians 1 and 12, giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers and inheritors of the saints in light, who hath delivered us from the power of darkness. They're in the power of darkness. In whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not. Sounds like Satan's got a pretty strong controlling hand in people that ain't saved. Every single person that's not saved is possessed, and if you don't like that word, they're owned by the devil, and they got a master, and there's a strong man controlling their house. He's their master. Maybe I can get somebody to agree on biblical separation. I'm going to print your message on it. Why do you think you ought to separate from the lost and dying world? Because they're the devil. You put your children in the presence of Satan by ignoring the devil. You put yourself in the presence of Satan by ignoring the Bible. You bring Satan and his children into your home by ignoring the Bible this morning. And the fact of the matter is there's a searching out of a man to see who his master really is. It's either one or the other, Jesus or Satan. You're sitting here and you don't know Christ? You are filled with Satan this morning and he's your master. You can't help it. You can't change yourself. You can't do nothing about it. And when you look at it, man, I was thinking, Emily's the one that come to mind. I don't know that she ever lived a rough testimony. Ever since I've known her, been singing in church. And ever since she been here, singing in church, being faithful to church. But sure enough, an attempt made five years ago, she fell into conviction, realized she was lost, and got born again. Amen. Amen. She was as much the devil's child before she got saved. All that time sitting in a church pew, follower of Satan. As friends of mine that I grew up with, that I know have tortured men, have sold dope, have done time in prison, has probably killed men that fell on an altar and got saved and got born again. If they truly got born again, guess what? Both of them was equal in the scheme of everything. Both of them were Satan's, controlled by Satan, amen? They were Satan's children until they got born again. But thank God, most of them fell into a condition and got saved by the Spirit of God. Who's your master? Who's your master? Search yourself. Then there's the stride. It says, Royal Falcon One entered the strongman's house and stole his goods. Here he is. Except he first bind the strongman. Is that by force? Binding someone? Is that a fight? Is that a fight? I want you to notice the strongman must be bound. And number one, there's only one that can do it. There's only one that can do it except He. Now I know it's Matthew and it's a parable. That's why He ain't capitalized, amen? And like I told you, it's an emotional message. But He would be the Savior, amen? He would be the Holy Ghost. We just said the Holy Ghost's a person, am I right? The only way a man will be saved is if God, through the Holy Ghost, begins to deal with and convict the heart of a sinner. You hear me? Hear me, young people? You can't just throw some flippant prayer in the air at some big hot, hot pressured youth meeting, amen, and nothing ever changed. And you go back and listen, you know if God lives in you. I believe that. Amen. If you're sitting there not knowing that God's living in you, you've probably got a problem He probably ain't living in you. That's why it's confusing because you've never had Him living in you. So you don't know what it's like to have Him living in you. So you sit there and think, well, mom and dad told me I was saved. They said I was eternally saved. And I know I said that prayer. And that preacher said, all I had to do was say that prayer. And now I'm confused. I don't feel nothing different. I don't know that God's living in me. But they said that and they're sitting there in confusion. They may know that they have eternal life. There's nothing secret after God. They're all gone out of the way. They are together to come out proper. There is nothing to do with good, no, not one. Ephesians 4, 17, this I say, therefore, and testify unto the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart. Who being past filling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness to work all unclean with greed. But he hath not so learned Christ. Do you remember my 1790 Old Testament? It says the heart is deceitful above all things desperately wicked. Listen to me this morning. You did not decide that you was going to get right with God and then go find God. Now that ain't capitalism. I believe God will deal with me and he put a conscience in you. But you did not find religion as the world says. Do you understand that? You did not decide it would be a good thing to try this thing out, and it just so happened that you're doing better in life now. Listen, that one's always gonna wheel away. The sun's gonna come up and scorch that one, honey. I'm telling you, it ain't gonna happen. God has to do something in your life to bind the strong man, or otherwise you will be living in sin the rest of your life, and you'll die burning in hell forever. The God of all glory came looking for you and convicted your heart of your sin and who your master really was. He did that one day in a moment. It's a transaction, amen. And in faith and complete surrender to God under your own will, you chose Christ as your new master and you were born again. And guess what? Satan don't like to give up without a fight. You know how many folks I've dealt with that I've watched the battle? Don't find you a 20-year heroin addict and try to tell them about Christ. Don't watch them desire Christ, but watch the fight ensue inside of them. There's such a stronghold and a demonic battle that takes place for the salvation of the soul. Try to win an older man that's worked his whole life for an education and to obtain wealth and riches and to obtain status. And now he's got vast wealth, and you'll see the battle of the ages for his soul. Let him go through something bad like a divorce or whatever it is in his life that sparks something in him that he needs something. But then watch him battle for the world and goods. Amen. You can literally watch the battle between Satan and God in a man. The demonic stronghold on a man for wealth and Why do you think it's so important to get your children around the things of God? As much as you can in a country like this. You got a little guy up in here? I'm telling you. There's a strong man out there. And the longer you allow that strong man to fortify the house, you're messing up. When you put importance on the secular things of life, and other things over God in your children's life, you could very well be damning them to hell. And you ain't gonna like it when they're 19 years old and they're serving Satan to the fullest, amen? But you better be real careful about how you put secular things in your children's life. The strong man is trying to invest in their youth to keep them distracted and keep them ignorant of his ways. We know statistics. I talked about a minute ago, and there's outliers, statistics, but statistics don't lie very often. 80% of current Christians in the U.S. say they became Christian before the age of 18, as far as statistics. 67% of Evangelical Christians made their personal commitment to Christ between the ages of 4 and 14. Before the age of 14 was approximately 35% to 60%, 14% to 18%, 28% to 35%, 18% to 29%, approximately 15% to 25%, going down, down, down. After 30%, 10% to 23%. For a man over 40 to accept Christ as Savior, it's like a single digits, 5% chance. You know why? There's a battle for the soul. And the longer the strong man who owns you when you're lost gets to fortify that house, the more difficult it is. When I was young, thank God I got saved in 24. Amen. But when I was young, and I don't blame my mom and dad, and I don't blame Pastor Randy, they just didn't know about it. I never went to the UK. I never went to a youth rally. I never went to a special revival. I'm all love, Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, completely faithful all the time. But there was no youth at that church, and I was involved in other things, and I had absolutely no desire. You know, everybody in my family was saved at special services. I'm not saying you have to, and I'm not saying people don't get saved at regular church services, but that's just how I work at my family. Every one of my children say to me, either a youth rally or a youth camp or something like that, where God really got them a part from the world, and a strong man, and everything in this world is trying to tell them what God can do with their heart. At the same time that I was just going three times a week to baseball time, I was upset. Why do you think young people, teenagers, get obsessed with everything? Do you think that's just their desires? I believe it's the strong man trying to fortify his home. Amen. When you get a little older, you're more balanced. You're not going to fall in love with basketball. You're not going to fall in love with all these different things to where it obsesses you and takes over your life. But watch teenagers. It happens all the time. You don't think the devil of hell is behind that? Right. Getting them obsessed with the things of the world and fortifying his home. I loved baseball for 10 years. I loved basketball 10 years. I loved wrestling. I loved being an athlete. It was what I absolutely loved. But you know what? A strong man can build a fortress. I loved my college experience. They say sin is fun for a while. And I went up there and lived in sin and made 3.7 GPA and lived like a wretch. And I loved it the whole time I was doing it. There'd be times of fear and different things like that. But you know what strong man's doing? 45 taps. I did all that and it was a battle in my life. Thank God. Thank God I got to the deepest, darkest pit in my life and destroyed everything that got me in a place where I was no more. And the Holy Ghost of God kept buying that strong man. At the same time, seeking unconvicted men. The strong man's trying his best to fortify his dwelling place in the heart of man. Some of y'all may have been under conviction for, I know some of you have been under conviction for years before you got saved. Some of y'all may be sitting here right now, been under conviction for years, but you just ain't doing it. You're obeying the strong man. Some of y'all might be under conviction right now, but you're sitting here obeying the strong man. And if Christ comes tomorrow, regardless of who you die or land on, you'll be lost and in hell for all eternity. Because you evaded a strong man who wants nothing more than to destroy your life. There's a search. There's a strife. But then there can also be a spoil. It says, where else he come? One enter into the strong man's house and spoil his goods, except he first bide and There's the fact that the day that a man stops resisting the Spirit of God in their life and accepts Jesus as their Savior, the battle is won and the strong man is defeated. But it's so difficult sometimes for some men. It's very difficult when Satan has his claws deep into someone in their life. Problem is most men, when they get a taste of the world, they want to give up the taste of the world. Fishes 4 and 18 said, having the understanding of darkness and being alienated from the light of God through the ignorance that is in them because of their blackness of the heart. And y'all know that Percy Ray is where we go and pray. He is 45 minutes from Tupelo and an hour from Mississippi. Ambrose was born in Tupelo and did most of his work in Mississippi. And Percy Ray, Earl Farley, the pastor who helped Percy Ray, told us this in person. He said, Percy Ray, said God told him one night to go pray with Elvis. Elvis had just gotten sick. This was a month or two before he died. And he had gotten sick, and he was in the hospital. Percy Ray said, God, ain't no way I'm going to get in there. Ain't no way we're going to get through it. He's got security. He's got all this stuff in Memphis. Ain't no way it's going to happen. They said Percy Ray drove up there, and they said it was 2 in the morning. And perchance, the security guards had walked to get a cup of coffee. He said, Percy Ray walked right in the room where Elvis presses down the bed. He walked up to him and began to give him the gospel. I know many of y'all probably say, well, he's saying the gospel. He must have been saved. Believe what you want. He said he walked up and began to pray with him and give him the gospel. And the story goes that Elvis began screaming, grabbing his bed sheets, and began shaking and screaming, too much to give up! Too much to give up! And Will had found, and all those things were working. Percy Ray walked out of that night. He was dead in a month or two. If that be the truth, he never got saved. I thought he was burning in hell. That's right. That man will receive Christ. And when a man does receive Christ, there's victory over the things of the world. And that desire is taken care of. Yeah, I know there's times you'll want the things of the world, and your flesh will get the best of you. But you know, 1 John 5, verse 4 says, For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world. This is the victory that overcometh the world, even on faith. Who is he that overcometh the world, that he that believeth in Jesus? and get saved, and serve God the rest of their life. Barry Spears is in his fifties, been saved off of heroin 30 years now. We've seen the bank robber do 15 years and get saved in prison, now he's preaching the gospel, boy and man. Down the Facebook page, I love it. We've seen the murderer and abuser get saved, and write a part of the Bible, Apostle Paul, right? Beat up Christians, lock them up, kill them. We've seen a murderer get saved and come preach the gospel standing right here, Robert Gibson, two years ago. When the strong man's been defeated, God can use a man to do anything. Amen. Come help me, Sissy. This whole message here was just one of those easy ones for me to write. Didn't take a lot of studying. All them years growing up, man, in a Christian family, going to church, a false professor, confusion in my mind. It's the same, man. I can look back. I can look back and see a strong man controlling my life. I'm feeling decisions I may or may not make. The whole time I'm saying what I'm saying, I think I am, I'm sure I am, I know I got right doctrine, I know that's what I was taught. But always, something controlling me. Couldn't stand it. Couldn't keep my mind off the wicked stuff, couldn't do right. I knew something was wrong and it had it down in me. I knew somebody, something was in control of me. All them years of sin and all that stuff, man, I mean, there was times when that man said to me, God, why you say something wrong, man, something wrong. Thank God, thank God. I'm such a bad place in my life. I'm so humble. I'm so messed up that I knew I couldn't be nothing. I knew I needed somebody and that's when I invited Christ here. I said, you can have this thing. I don't want this thing to burn anymore. I don't want any of this. I didn't really say this, but I said, find that strong man. Kick him out. God, I don't want to do what he says no more. I don't want to serve Satan anymore. God, save me. And they saved me. The power came to my life. Amen. I said, would you say that I'm going down like it's nothing? I had it. I had it. I didn't want any of that stuff anymore, Delvin. It made me sick. It repulsed me. Because my master made me like this. Somebody else was taking control of my life. I know a lot of preachers are going to say, well, you haven't nailed it some time in your life. You probably lost it. It's been such a powerful conversion of my life. I've always known somebody else was running the shop in my life. There was 24, but they didn't know me. Who's your master? Who's your master? Maybe there's somebody in your life that's one of those small crabs. Maybe that's the same. You want the master of all masters? I want to know this. Why would you suffer? Why would you suffer? Who cares what he might do to you, man? Who cares? You don't have to ask for an answer. You can go on your own aspirations. Just make him trust you. Make him fight for you and pray for you in your life. Make him be strong, be the man that he's supposed to be. It's the best day of your life. Now, when you listen to the word slay, slay, you know it. You know it. I'm in love with you.