If you've got your Bibles with you, would you stand with me for the reading in honor of the word of the Lord? And you'll turn if you open up to Matthew chapter 28, the very last chapter in the book of Matthew, and we're going to be in the last four verses. The title tonight, they assigned to me the battle for the world. And we're going to come out of what is commonly called the Great Commission. In verse 16 it says, Then the eleven disciples went away into Galilee to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them. When they saw him, they worshipped, but some doubted. And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. Amen. Father, tonight, Lord, as we just, or this day, I pray as I come before you. God, I am always in so much need, God, of your grace. I need to be filled with your spirit. God, let your word be dwelling richly in me. That God, that in the words that I speak, that you would take all these thoughts that are just so scrambled, and Lord, that you would funnel them down, and God, that your word would go out, that you would get glory, that your word would be proclaimed, that Christ would be exalted, that your perfect will would be done, nothing more and nothing less. And I pray these things in the name of Jesus. Amen. You may be seated. Well, this evening, or this afternoon, I guess, we're going to be looking at what we call the battle for the world. You know, if you just start thinking about the messages that we've already heard, we started off with the battle for the beginning. And you think about that, and just to wrap that up in just a tight little package is this, if you can't believe the first 11 chapters of the book of Genesis is real and it's literal, how can you believe anything else in the Bible? I mean, how is that even possible? Now, one thing I've differed with Paul Wilson on, and he just growls at me a little bit, I absolutely do not believe in a young earth. I believe in an old Earth. You know why? Because I don't let the science world dictate that there's an old and a young. The Earth is just as old as it can be. There are no such things as millions of years. The Earth is just old. I'm sorry, but it's just old, and it only happens to be about 6,000 or 7,000 years old. So don't even let the science world dictate that you've got to... No, we just believe in creation, and that's old, okay? Now, I just say that kind of half-heartedly, But you know, you think about the battle for the Word or the battle for truth that Caleb brought to us. My goodness, we live in a time when There's so much pragmatism that goes on in churches. It's like, I can tell you this, here in the last, I don't know, maybe the last two, three years, something like that, I've always held to the idea of the belief that this is foundational. I mean, everything that I believe, everything that I'm going to do has to come from the Word of God. It has to. And if I'm going to have a debate or I'm going to argue with you, then we have to make a deal right off the bat. Whatever we're going to say, it has to be biblical. Now we all know that we can do biblical and still be wrong, but at least let's make an earnest attempt to come from the Scriptures. And my conviction today is this, more so than ever in my life, whether it's in salvation or sanctification, I make no apologies for going to the Word of God. Absolutely none. I'm preaching on the streets. We go out and street preach. Listen, people say, that stuff doesn't work. Let me tell you something. The only thing that works is doing it the way that God has said to do it. And if He said, preach the gospel, that's what I'm going to do. He didn't tell me to build the church. Jesus said, I'll build the church. When it comes to sanctification in the church house, we don't need all this nonsense. We need to preach the Word of God. The primary way that we disciple people comes right from the pulpit. And then there's other ways we can do it. I'm not saying that's the only way, but I'm so sick of these little fancy phrases we come up with. We're just doing life on life. I don't even know what that means. Just preach the Word. Give people the Word of God. I'm not picking on you if you use that phrase, but, you know, it's just like we've got to come up with these new little phrases so we can, you know, be refreshed. Well, we move from that to the battle for fatherhood. that in our homes that we would be raising our children according to the scripture. Now I'm going to tell you something, that was probably the most convicting of all the messages. Oh Lord, our trip down here in the first night was absolute disaster and chaos. I called down and I said, I think Miss Evelyn probably has like some kind of cage or something, soundproof. They said, no, she don't have nothing like that. You know, I had to, I prayed with my boys the next day. I'm going to tell you, those guys getting there, they got excited. They got excited being in a hotel, and the problem is you put them rooms in that same, on them beds in that same room. I mean, I kept raising up, like, if you move one more time. Next day, I said, yesterday was a bad day, wasn't it, fellas? He said, yeah. And I said, because you don't mind, you don't obey. I said, but I got to apologize to you because I'm not minding, I'm not obeying God. Can y'all forgive me? Let's hold hands and let's pray. And we go from that to the battle for the church. Lord, help us if there's ever been a time. Went to Ireland a few years back. Me and my wife had prayed about going over there, that God would lead us over there to do church planting. And man, it's hard to find churches over there. It ain't hard to find churches in the Bible belt, is it? But it is hard to find a biblical church. And it's like we just keep caving to the pressures of this world, and that's what we're going to talk about tonight, is the battle for the world. Okay? So let's just get into the text and let's look at this. In verse 16 it says, Then the eleven disciples, they went away into Galilee to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them. Before Jesus had died, before he had been crucified, before he had rose, he had told them in several different passages, he says, after I rose, you know, after I rise from the dead, I got a place I want you guys to meet me at. And he would tell them, I'm going to rise from the dead. They weren't the brightest bunch, okay? I mean, they're always like, he just keeps saying this, what's he talking about? Well, here he is. These eleven disciples, they went away to Galilee. Now who's the eleven disciples? This is who God had chose. These are going to be the ones that we say that we're built upon the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, which is Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone. They're going to lay the foundation for what we're built upon today. That's who these men are. And what we're talking about is, you want to get right down to it, I've got a note down here, but here's the thing. We're talking about, we're getting ready for war. Church, do you realize that we are in a war? We're in a battle. We're not, this, I can tell right now this is going to be a long one, okay? Sorry Greg, but this is probably going to be more than 30 minutes. Now listen here. Here's the thing we are in a war but yet so many Christians They've got this concept of your best life now that we just come in for a community meeting We got an Elks Lodge meeting tonight or something like that and we're going to play P knuckle or whatever your you know Them little funny little fancy game. That is not what the church is. He is about to deploy them into warfare That's what the Great Commission is Now listen to this Not only that, but do you remember, let me just back up so I don't mess this one up, but in Matthew 16, and I don't know why my glasses ain't working, they're just readers, but they're not working, so I've got to kind of back up and do this, okay? This is when Jesus had asked them, he said, who do people say that I am? What are you guys hearing? What's the word on the street? They said, well, some of them, you know, they're saying you're Elijah, some say you're Jeremiah or one of the prophets, you know, but who do you say that I am? And Peter, you know, the guy that always speaks up, he got this one right. He says, who do you, who do you say that I am? And Peter answered and said, you're the Christ, the son of the living God. Jesus answered and said to him, he says, blessed are you, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my father who is in heaven. And I also say to you that you, or Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it." Now, you see, when we're going into warfare, now in the one aspect, when he talks about the gates of Hades or the gates of hell shall not prevail against it, when we're going out, I can tell you this, where God is sending his people, even hell itself ain't gonna keep us out, okay? But let me tell you something even bigger than that that he's probably saying. They crucified Christ! He went into the grave and three days later, He bursts forth, triumphing over sin, triumphing over death, gaining the authority to send us out. Even death is not going to stop this military move. Even death itself is not going to stop this. So this is these disciples we're looking at. Now look at verse 17. It says, when they saw Him, they worshipped Him. Now, you've got to picture this. I mean, they had seen Him on a number of occasions right here. Can you imagine that? Physically seeing the risen Christ. Oh, the worship. I mean, just to want to be near Him, to touch Him. But then that next thing says, but some doubted. You might want to circle that in your Bible. But some doubted. Do you remember the road to Emmaus? You had these two guys walking, man, they're just sad. They're just shaking their head, they're talking on the way. Some guy comes and starts walking with them, it's none other than Jesus, but he hides himself, they don't know who he is. He's listening, he says, man, what are you guys talking about? What are you, some kind of stranger? You don't know what's happened? This is the biggest news the world has ever heard, literally. Then what was the problem? They didn't understand what had happened. I mean, this Jesus was going to come back. He's going to restore the kingdom back. We're going to destroy our enemies. He's the Messiah. He's the Chosen One, right? But not only that, we've got more problems today. Some of them crazy women went to the tomb and they said somebody stole Him away. And the people, when John and Peter showed up to verify this, they believed the story that somebody had stole Him. They doubted too. And Jesus begins to walk with them. He begins to expound to them Himself in all the Scriptures. Beginning at Moses and the Law and the Prophets. What a seven-mile Bible study. Oh, they get to the end of that and He reveals who He is and they said, did not our hearts burn within us? And here they are. But some doubt it. Some doubt it. Isn't that our problem? How many times has God moved in a way in your life that you knew in the next day? I don't know if God can do this one. Oh, well, don't we battle there? Oh, the doubt. I mean, we've got Thomas, we've got all... I mean, just over and over and over we see these things. In verse 18, If you're taking notes, I didn't give them to you. The first one was the disciples. The second one was the doubt. The third one is what I call divine authority. Y'all like that alliteration? Yeah, I ain't got no PhD initials after my name. But I will tell you this, I have a new alphabet. It's going to revolutionize the dictionary. Y'all are going to like that when I come out with it, ain't they, Paul? They're going to like that one. But anyway, that's another story we won't talk about right now. In verse 18, we look at the divine authority. Jesus came and spoke to them saying, all authority has been given to me. And I want you to think about right before that, what did they do? But some doubted. But yet he's saying, all authority has been given to me. How much authority? All authority. Listen I want to read to you what he said about this over here in Daniel if I can find it real quick This was prophesied. It was foretold in Daniel. Listen to this and Daniel 7 13 and 14. You don't got Turner cuz I'm quick He said I was watching in the night visions and behold one like the Son of Man coming with the clouds of heaven He came to the ancient of days and they brought him near before him Then to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed." Daniel foretold this. We go over here to Mark chapter 17, and look what he says here. He says, Jesus spoke these words. lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son that your Son also may glorify you as you have given him authority over all flesh that he should give eternal life to as many as you have given him. Back up to John chapter 3. You remember the John famous 3.16? You know, most famous verse in all the world. You know that in context, when John 3, 16 was told to Nicodemus, Nicodemus' jaw hit the ground. You see, Nicodemus was thinking, yes, I believe verse 15 where it says, you know, he's coming to save the Jews, of course. But he says to whosoever, whosoever believeth, you surely don't mean these Romans. You surely don't mean these Greeks. You surely don't mean these barbarians. That's exactly what I mean. You see, because all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. In heaven and on earth. Now I want you to think about that for me and you. What does that mean for you and I? Isn't it something when you come under, you're on a job somewhere and you're doing a task and somebody that has some kind of credentials there comes and questions you, but the very one that told you to do it is the one that is the owner of it all. You're under that authority, so when somebody comes and says, you need to stop this, I don't think I'm going to. Kind of like the other night, I checked into the hotel. Old Nick there, he says, basically, he says, you can pretty much have what you want according to Miss Evelyn. So I said, bring the steaks on up, bring all. No, he. But here's the thing, when they spoke of her, they spoke with respect. I felt like, I felt like a special, special guest. I mean, they knew I was the guy that Miss Evelyn was taking care of, our family, you know, I'm saying it like that. And so, when he says, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth, and then what does he say? You're going to be deployed. That's the next point. Still staying with them D's, ain't I? I got bad news for you. They're going to run out in a little bit. But here's the deployment. He says, go therefore, and he says, and make disciples of all the nations. Go therefore. Do you realize that in Christianity, There's really just two things that Christians do that the church does. And I'm using the word church in the same way that Stuart's talking about that called out assembly. There's really only two things that we do. When he says go, he's talking about evangelize. Go preach, go proclaim the gospel to a lost and dying world that they may be saved. Go preach repentance and remission of sins that they may be saved. And when that happens, he says you make disciples of all nations. That's the only two things that Christians do. Now, can I tell you something? We ain't done a very good job, at least in America. How do I know? A poll was taken, I was watching Ray Comfort years ago, and about 1996, a poll was taken of one of the largest denominations in the United States of America. I have a feeling it was the SBC. Now, you know polls, they're pretty accurate, right? I think about three out of four polls are wrong, according to one poll. But the poll that was taken in this large denomination was this. 96% of that denomination that professed to be believers, followers of Christ, had never on one occasion shared the gospel with another person. Now I want to show you something. If there's only two things for us to do, And 96% of one of the largest denominations, almost 100% hasn't done the first part of this. We're not doing a good job of discipling. Because if we were, then we would see people being trained, being equipped to know how to go out. When Paul was about to die, when he was taking the mantle and he was placing it upon Timothy, he said, I'm giving you a charge. Preach the word. Then he says, do the work of an evangelist. Now people are going to argue, well, Timothy wasn't really a pastor. Let me tell you something. I'm a firm believer. If you're a pastor, you better not only be evangelizing, you better be leading the charge. This is probably that moment where people don't like me. Now, I've got good news for you. I mean, this scares people. Why do people not evangelize? Number one reason, you know what people in one little study showed that the thing that people are most afraid of in life in all of life is public speaking. And evangelism would kind of fall in that category. You've got to go up to somebody that probably doesn't want to hear from you and tell them something they probably don't want to hear. You know what ranks right behind that? Death. People would rather die than have to speak to somebody else. Now, I am not an introvert. I don't know if you've noticed. But I am not an introvert. But I can tell you this. Early on, me and Justin Wright, we were going down. We'd been watching Ray Comfort. We'd been watching this. And we said, man, we can do this. We got our tracks, we'd ordered our tracks, man, we had some million-dollar bills, and we was loaded down, and we went down to North Hill Shopping Center in 8th, Oklahoma, and we started on the movie, and we walked all the way around, or whatever it is, and we walked all the way back. You cannot believe, I mean, some vicious old women with walkers were like, whoo-hoo, she looks scary. Leave that one alone. I mean, that's what it feels like in your mind. She could be the sweetest looking lady, but you're like, better leave that one alone. We got back, we took a breath and we go, this is tougher than we thought. But we gave it another shot. We stepped over the line and got it going. Now I'm not going to say it didn't happen without weird things happening. I was, we would just take turns. It was my turn to lead and we got to where we was working real good together. But one time I was leading and I don't know, I brought up the old parachute thing out of nowhere. It didn't fit. And this whole conversation just faded out. Guys kind of gave me like real weird and we walked off and Justin goes, what was you doing? I said, I don't know. It just didn't, something happened. So we had those moments. But you know what? We were out trying to share the gospel with people. We were out trying to do that. Now listen to this. This deployment is this. We're to go out and evangelize. We're to go out and disciple people. Where are we going though? We're going to the world, right? He's sending us into the world. Now, let me just go over here to John chapter 17. I might have to use my glasses for this and I'm not sure. Now from John chapter 17 from verse 6 down through verse 19, 13 times the word world is in there. I've underlined it everywhere it's at. Now I'm not going to pick up from verse 6, I'm going to pick up in verse 14. He's sending us into the world. Now listen to what he says. I've given them your word. And the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Now, I want you to understand something. When we go into the world, here's what you're going to find, that not only when we go out, see, we are attacking, we're on the attack. Now, it's not the vicious-looking attack that we usually think of in war, things like that. No, our attack is done with a smile, it's done with love. It's done when they're flipping you off and cussing you out, and you're saying, man, God bless you. That's happened a lot of times. There's this part that goes like that. Now, here's the thing. See, what happens is, is this. We sit in churches and we talk about evangelism. My little guy, Tanner, since he's not in here, I'll talk about this. He's all the time running through the house. He's got an imagination. He's got his fingers up like this and he's going pow, pow. I mean, he's going from one end of the house to the other and he's spinning and rolling and all this. I'm like, what are you doing? He goes, well, that's just my imagination. You know? That's what most of us as Christians are doing. We love reading about George Whitefield. We love reading about Hudson Taylor. We love reading about, you know, all of those guys like that that went and did the work. I mean, we love seeing all those things where Bible stories, where they went into the battle. I mean, they went and they invaded and they conquered. We love that. But man, let's just do this, the old finger gun. We'll talk about what we would do. Man, guys like to go buy a sword, you know, like, man, I got the armor on. That's not really the sword he's talking about. See, if you're Christianity, if it isn't real, you better start asking yourself what you have a hold of. If it's something that keeps you in these four walls that we call the church, this is not. People argue and bicker over how you're to worship, you know, how you're to do your church service. I have a feeling if Peter and Paul showed up, they'd probably walk in our church service and go, we don't know what y'all are doing. We never did nothing like this. That's probably the case of it, you know. It's like, that ain't bad, fellas, but we don't know really what you're doing. You see, the thing of it is, this has to be real. Now listen, this first part is we're attacking the world. The world's going to hate us. They're not going to sit there. I mean, I used to do this, like, man, if you go, they're going to be like, man, I'm so glad you came. If the middle finger says that, then I got what I was looking for, right? I don't think that's what it meant. Now, I had a guy tell me the other day with his fist clenched in my face telling me I better not ever tell his wife that she's not an angel again. A real angel. I was trying to be nice. I said, you might be a sweet lady, but you're not an angel. You're a person. And I was wanting to go into the gospel how that's even better. But he didn't like that. So that's what you're going to get. Now listen, he goes on and he says this. He says, I do not pray that you should take him out of the world. Man, we want to do that all the time. It's amazing how we want to be like a cult before we realize it. We'll go to a big old camp meeting in the mountains somewhere. And there's Christians everywhere. And we'll go. Somebody always goes, we ought to just all sell our stuff and move to this mountain. You said Jim Jones and everybody else, right? Yeah, that's not what he said. He said, no, I'm not praying that God takes you out of the world, but that he keeps you while you're in this world. Now listen to this. He says, they're not of the world just as I'm not of the world. Then he says, sanctify them by your truth. Your word is truth. Now I want you to understand something. The two aspects is on one, we're going out, but here's the problem. As we are invading, we are going out into enemy territory. We're going into the world. Do you know what the problem is? You see, the world's wanting to get into us. We've got this double battle going on. What is the world? 1 John 2 verse 15 describes it like this. For all that is in the world is the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. As we're trying to invade the world, guess what? We've got an enemy that ain't going to sit still. He's going to try to bombard you. He's going to try to get your attention off of what the main thing is. And he wants your attention on this over here. Oh, don't think I'm talking about just glitzy, glamoury things. It could be coming to a church and becoming a new pastor. And Satan could start putting in those thoughts. Man, look what you're doing here. Look at how you're... And before long, Paul's standing up. He's going, let me tell you about my church. This church has grown since I got here. And I don't think that'll ever happen. But you know what we don't ever want to do? We don't ever want to think it couldn't happen to us. You see what I'm saying? I mean, how does Satan attack us? I'm not there yet, but listen to this. I want you to think about this. Look over here just real quick. When we're talking about this deployment going into the world, look at the book of Luke. Okay, now Matthew and Luke, both in the fourth chapter, talk about when Jesus was tempted. in what we call the temptation. Now listen to this. Jesus being filled with the Holy Spirit returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness and being tempted for 40 days by the devil. And in those days he ate nothing and afterward while they When they had ended, he was hungry, and the devil said to him, If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread, the lust of the flesh. But Jesus answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. Then the devil took him up on a high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. We see the lust of the eyes. And the devil said to him, He said, All this authority I will give you in their glory, for this has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. Here was the devil tempting Jesus, take the shortcut, I'll give you the authority. But no, Jesus lived the perfect life. He died the sacrificial death, and he was given the true authority. He had taken it back. Man had sinned, man died, and that son of man rose from the dead, triumphing over the devil, sin, and hell. And he says, all authority has been given to me. He goes on and he says, if you'll worship me before me, all will be yours, and Jesus answered, Wait, he's, oh, I gotta back up. The devil said to him, he said, oh, he said, no, all this authority is given to me and if you'll worship me. And then Jesus answered him, he says, get behind me, Satan, for it's written you shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve. Then he brought him to Jerusalem and set him on a pinnacle of the temple. And he said to him, if you are the son of God, throw yourself down from here. For it is written, he shall give his angels charge over you to keep you, and in their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone. And Jesus answered and said to him, it's been said, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. Here's the pride of life. And now when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him for an opportune time. Jesus said, if they do these things to me, they're going to do these things to you. Same thing. We're tempted in the same way. And so on the one hand, we are going out and we are engaging in battle with the enemy. And at the same time, it's turning around and it's trying to get in us. And we have to be on guard. Let me tell you something. There's no furloughs. There's no time to take a break. Even when you have those times of rest, you have to be on guard. So we have this deployment. Now, I want to talk a little bit about our enemy, the devil. In Luke chapter 4, we see he's the tempter. In 1 Peter 5, 6-9, he is the one who tries to devour. He compares him to a roaring lion going about seeking whom he may devour. You know, when I was growing up, some of you older folks will remember this. Omaha's Wild Kingdom, remember that? Most of the time, it was a dud show. It was about a bird or something. But every now and then, the lions. I mean, that's what he was waiting on. And they always had them antelopes, and it was always this young, inexperienced, got away from the herd, they got trampled down and killed. I mean, it was cool, but then it kind of made you cry a little bit, I'll just have to admit. Or it was that the old and the one that was crippled, you know, and that lion would seek him out and devour him. You see, folks, can I tell you a little bit about just the church? You know one of the greatest gifts God has given you in the church is the church? You're not a Lone Ranger person. The church is that called out assembly. They are called out to congregate, to fellowship, to encourage, to lift up, to hold accountable all of these things. And you see, because we have an enemy. Now he's a defeated foe. And hold that thought. Remember, he's a defeated foe. But I'll just give you this little sample. Do we live like he's a defeated foe? Go back to this enemy of ours, the devil. He blinds the minds of the unbelieving according to 2 Corinthians chapter 4. Paul says, if our gospel is hidden in its veils, he said, the God, the little g God of this world has blinded the eyes of the unbelieving. How has he blinded their eyes? It's not that they physically can't see, but what it is, they're looking at the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life. My goodness, we got a show called American Idol. How many of those people go, I grew up singing gospel songs, praising Jesus, but now I'd like to be your idol. Worship me. And don't act like you didn't vote. In Matthew 16, when he talked to Peter, he said, Get thee behind me, Satan. You know what Satan is? You know what that word means? That's your adversary. When Peter was saying, Not me, Lord. This is right on the heels of saying, You are the Christ. Now he says, No way, Lord. Not me. I'm not running. I'm not turning away. I'm willing to fight. I'm even willing to die for you, Peter. You're gonna deny me three times for the rooster crows. Come on. Now, them other guys didn't speak up. They was all like, yeah, we're with Peter. You know, Peter at least spoke up. That's good and it's bad. I'm like Peter. I'm that guy that speaks up, gets embarrassed, but sometimes it works out. Not as much as I would like. So we got this adversary. We've been deployed. We're going out into the world, but how do we fight? If you got your Bibles, turn over to Ephesians. Chapter 6, beginning in verse 10, he says, Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. Now, I want you to listen to that closely. Be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. Never once has he told any Christian to be strong in yourself. Rest and rely on your own abilities, your own intellect, your own might. No, no, no. He says, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. And those wiles is that trickery, like Wile E. Coyote. I mean, he had all the cunning tricks. He was going to try to entrap, you know. You know, Caleb talked to us last night, and I do believe, I do agree that, you know, it's just like when they teach people, you know, how to detect counterfeit bills. They don't teach you to show you a counterfeit bill. They show you the genuine article. They show you the real money, and they have you study it to the point that you know it so well that you know the counterfeit. Now, I am going to say this. It is good to know what the counterfeit folks are saying, so when they say it, you're kind of going, I know that ain't right, but what are they talking about? So I do kind of want to know that stuff. But now listen to this. When he's talking about these schemes of the devil, we think of it like this a lot of times, man, if I go over here, they're going to attack me. Sometimes they attack you, sometimes they persecute you, but sometimes they flatter you. Sometimes they come to you with compromise. Sometimes they tell you how good you are. Well, they're just lovely people. People go to the church. You know, the reasons people go to the church kills me sometimes. How come you go to that church? Well, they are just so friendly. I've yet to go into a place that wasn't at least a little bit friendly, and that's including the Colts. That's not why you go there. Now, if they're unfriendly, you might want to check out one out. Maybe you want to just check out. But here's the thing. See, Satan's going to come and he's going to offer all kinds of things. You know, it's just going to be a little compromise. In Oklahoma, we just had to vote down the marijuana thing, which shocked me, it got voted down. But you see, when that all came in, it's just like, Lord only knew that we had so many sick folks in Oklahoma. I mean, this was a medical thing and I think about 90% of Oklahoma was about to die. But see, here's what happens. Here's the cunningness. Here's the wiles. This is all we want. It's just medical. Oh, you know what? Now that we think about it, everybody's doing it. We didn't know 90% of us had a medical problem. We can do it for recreation. Let's just do that. Yeah, I mean, guess what? Them kids are going to be sneaking out back, 10-year-old. I've been smoking weed since I was 10. You know, we steal them and smoke them. Same story with cigarettes, but now it's You see, you don't just look here, you look down the road. You want to see where this has the potential to go. But he talks about these schemes of the devil and he says, look, we don't wrestle against flesh and blood. Even though Satan is working through education, working through entertainment, he's working through the media, he's working through all of these outlets. I mean, think about it. Every hospital that was made in America in the beginning was what? It was Christians. Colleges. Christians. Would you say they're Christian now? Even the ones that claim to be Christian? Lord. No. You see, he says, we're not in a physical fight. And a lot of guys, you know, we're packing heat, we want to shoot somebody. That's really not the war that we're in. Now, there is a time you may have to shoot somebody, but it's not usually over a disagreement on Scripture, okay? But here's the thing, he says, we don't wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities and against powers and against the rulers of darkness in this age and spiritual host of wickedness in the heavenly places. Now, I'm not going to break all that down, but just let me say it like this. What that is basically saying is that in every aspect of life, every higher or lowest degraded type level of living, we're affected by Satan and his dominion and all of those demonic angels that work under him. That's about as far as I'll go with that. But just what you need to understand is there's not an area that you're going to venture into, including the church, where Satan is not working. See, this is a battle for the world, right? Now listen to this. We're going to fight like this. He says, Therefore take the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. We've got to first start with putting the armor on. We've got to get geared up. We've got to be ready for battle. And when we've done that, take your stand. It's like when it's talking about in those days when wrestlers, you ever seen them wrestlers get out there? Man, like in the MMA, UFC? You may not like it, but I think it's kind of cool. You know, big John McCartney used to go, he'd say, you ready? Let's get it on. I mean, him got, no, you're sitting there ready for the fight. Listen, there's so much wimpiness. There's so much effemacy. You know what word I'm trying to say? Amongst men in the church today. There's been times I've even doubted, I don't really think I'm pastoral type material, because I look like a bulldog, I'm loud, I'm blood, I'm all these things, and I see these soft-spoken pastors and I'm like, well that seems to be what they're supposed to be like. That was a good time for y'all to say something like, no man, you're good. Maybe you're questioning it too. Missed that one. Now listen to this. He says this, he says, stand there for having girded your waist with the truth. That right there is the part where they cinched it up and they was going to go into battle and it's like, it's what's holding all the armor together. It has to be cinched up by the truth. And then he says this, he says, He says, having owned the breastplate of righteousness, that your heart is right. And I don't mean in a positional standing, but I'm talking about in a practical, that you are hungering and thirsting for righteousness, that you're equipped like that. And having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace, that you are ready to go at a moment's notice, that you know what the gospel is, you're ready to go and preach it. I'm going to skip verse 16. Verse 17 says, take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. My goodness, folks, if you've got a Bible, read it. Don't just read it to get your three chapters in in a day so you can get it done in a year. Forget about that year junk. I don't care if you focus on one verse. When God's opening something up to you, stop. Look at it. Study it. Put questions out. Find out what He's talking about. I'd rather you learn that one verse than read 50 chapters. Know what the Word of God is saying. It's the foundation of everything that's on. The reason people don't want to go evangelize is because they're afraid and because they don't know. And they're afraid if they get asked, they ain't going to have an answer. It's amazing to me how the most important thing that there is on planet earth to be a Christian, to be a follower of Christ, how we treat it so flippantly. Would you go to a doctor? Would you go to a heart surgeon that treated his profession the way most Christians treat being a Christian? Yeah, I got a degree. I ain't really ever done nothing. But I am a heart doctor because I chose to be one. And I say I'm one. Get down here, buddy. I don't think so. No. Now listen to this. He says, praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end and with all perseverance and supplication for all saints. Folks, I'm going to tell you something. If prayer, and I mean much prayer, is not preceding everything that you're doing, continually being done while you're doing. If it is not what follows when whatever might have happened, whatever battle has been won, or whatever, at the end of that there should be praise and there should be prayer. Go read Acts chapter 4. They had been threatened and all this and they came back and reported what had happened. We healed a lame man. They threatened us. They told us to do this again. They came back and they praised. They gave God praise. They prayed together and they said, Lord, you hear their threats. Give us boldness that we may go do exactly what they just told us we can't do. And they went out and they preached the gospel with all boldness, with all prayer. But I'm going to back up. I'm going to read verse 16 now. Above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. How are we going to win this battle? I mean, you're going to go out. I'm going to tell you something. When I was in Ireland, our host, I don't know what they did, they just kind of took off. Irish people are odd. Time doesn't matter in Ireland. We're just in this house like, I don't know what we're doing. I don't know where they're at. We're just kind of trapped. And I don't remember exactly how it came about, but I said, I'm going to go for a walk. I should have took breadcrumbs. I thought I could get lost, for real. But I paid close attention to what I was doing. I stayed on one little path. And I walked down, I went across this bridge on this big river, and I'm praying the whole time. Because I feel like God is leading us over there. And I'm just walking by people. And I've seen all these people that don't want to hear the gospel at all. They don't want me to come over there. And all of a sudden, I just felt so overwhelmed. And I said, God, this is too big for me. It's too big. I had nobody. I didn't make it a year in college, Evelyn. I finished 18th in my high school class. 18th. Now that's impressive if I had 500. I had 28. Paul's a teacher. He's a science teacher, but he's also a grammar Nazi. One of our best friends, Justin Wright, another elder in Sovereign Grace, they have repeatedly tried to tell me that you cannot use double negatives. So I just did it again. I do it all the time. I'm going for a triple next time. You see, what they don't know is I don't even know what it is. Now let me show you something. We're trying to take the gospel to the world. I ain't the brainiest fellow, right? I hear this voice saying, you're too small for this. Somebody could do it, but not you. Above all, taking the shield of faith. Above all, taking the shield of faith. You can believe Genesis 1-11 right. You can believe the Word of God is without error, and you can believe it's all sufficient. You can believe in biblical fatherhood. You can have right things about a church. Stuart read to us about Ephesians. He'd go read Ephesians in the first three chapters. He said, I want to show you how God has blessed and loved you, church. He said, I want you to live like this, four through six. And thirty years later, you can go to Revelations chapter two. Thirty years later, after he wrote that, and he says, you've left your first love. Oh, you've got the doctrine right, but you've left your first love. Why do Christians not evangelize? Remember that thing, he's all authority? You remember that we have a defeated foe? Do you really believe that? Do you really believe the one that has told you to go has all authority? Do you really believe that he said, I'm going to build my church Do you really believe that this foe that wars against us, he's the little G-God of this world, he's not the ruler. He's a deceiver. He has the world under his spell. But he ain't got the authority no more. But we live like he has authority and we're serving a commander that he's trying real hard. 1 John chapter 5, verse 4. For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. Here's the battle. Whatever is born of God overcomes the world, and this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith. Do you know what every battle comes down to? Do you believe God? Do you remember when Moses, they said, let's go spy the land out? See, God had told him, I'm going to take you to a land, I've prepared it for you. It's a land flowing with milk and honey. I don't know if that was, you know, just symbolized they had a bunch or it was coming out so thick, there's honey just flowing on the ground. Cows are just walking around, milk just following them. Whatever it was, it was a land of abundance. And these spies go over there, and they come back, and there's two big old strong dudes, and they've got a cluster of grapes so big, they've got a pole on each of their shoulders going, this is some heavy grapes. And they come back, and they gave such a wonderful report of everything that, they said, it's just like we were told. But, we can't take it. There's people over there that are so big, we look like grasshoppers in their sight. But Caleb, Caleb goes, no! We can take them! And all the camp, they believed the ten spies that had the bad evil report. We heard Stuart today talking about it. They weren't able to enter in because of unbelief. Years later, Joshua, listen to this. I'll just read a little bit of chapter 1. In Joshua chapter 1, he says this, Moses, my servant is dead. He says, now therefore arise, go over this Jordan, you and all the people, to the land that I am giving to them. Do they believe that? You know, God's going to tell them, He says, I've already given it to you. You just got to go take it. Every place that the sole of your foot will tread upon, I have given to you, as I said to Moses. From the wilderness of Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites to the great sea toward the going down of the sun shall be your territory. No man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, I will be with you. I will not leave you nor forsake you. Be strong and of good courage. Joshua, do you believe him? Do you believe him? Man, I know he was with Moses, but he's telling me he'll be with me that way. Man, I'm nobody. They go across the river. Right before they go, you know what it said? There's this one part he's telling them to prepare. And I preached a sermon out of this years ago. And he says, you need to prepare. He said, because you've not passed this way before. The Christian life is about a whole bunch of, I've never passed this way before. Paul Priest called me and talked to me about this church, and you know what he told me? Maybe not in these words, but you know what he told me? I'm feeling a little overwhelmed. I don't know if I can do this. You know who I got to be? I got to be those fellows on the side, and I said, let me hold your arms up, brother, you can too. It's a good situation. I don't remember how the conversation went exactly, but it was along those lines. I personally think it's a good fit. You see, when Joshua and them got over the river and God says, here's Jericho, it's sitting up on a hill, it's got a wall around it, and it's got a wall around it, it's a double-walled city, impenetrable. And God has a battle plan. I got this great plan for you, Joshua, here's what it is. I want you to take the ark, I want you to take the priest, I want you to put him this far apart, and I want you to go around that city all the way around and come back to camp. Okay. Do that six times. And then on the seventh day, I want you to make seven trips around it. That'll wear you out. And on that last one, I want you to blow on them trumpets. Can you imagine the people in the city? I'm not sure what these guys are doing. I mean, they're scared. They've already heard. And let me tell you something, God had already delivered that city to them. And when they blew on them trumpets, those walls fell down flat and they took it. And you know what God said? Don't take any of the spoil. They go out to fight little A.I. right after that. We don't need but a couple thousand folks to go out and whoop them. I think it was 36 or 37 of them got killed. Joshua was just like, Lord, now I want to show you something. He forgot to do something on this one. He didn't pray. He didn't seek the Lord because this was so easy. And guess what happened? God says, Joshua, get up. There's sin in the camp. Somebody here does not believe me. And they find Achan, they take him, they destroy him, his whole family, everything he had. Here's David. He's just going down to give some cheese and stuff for his brothers in the war. Got this big man in Philistines, he's coming over, challenges, send somebody to fight with me. If they beat me, we'll serve you. If I win, you'll become our servants. Everybody's shaking, their armors just clinging together. Saul was head and shoulders above everybody. He ain't out there on the front line. Here come little David. Little ruddy-cheeked David. You know what that means? It means he wasn't a tough-looking kid. He was a little kid at the family reunion and all the little ants were pinching his cheeks and stuff. He wasn't a tough-looking fella. He says, I'm going to fight this uncircumcised Philistine. You know what he's saying? He says, he ain't got no covenant. That uncircumcised filth. I'll fight him. David, you're just a youth. You're Satan, right? You're just a youth, and he was a man born from his youth. Saul, there was a bear and a lion that came out against the sheep, and I killed both of them. This uncircumcised Philistine will be just like them." David gathers up five stones. That giant comes out, sees who he's fighting, and he's just like, what is this? You're going to throw rocks at me? But David said, you come to me. The sword and the shield and things. But I come to you in the name of the Lord. The battle is the Lord's. And He ran to the battle and slew the giant. Do you believe? Do you believe Jesus? I'm not asking do you believe in Jesus. Do you believe Jesus? When He says go, do you believe Him? When He says make disciples, do you believe Him? And those disciples are like teaching and training people how to evangelize. Do you believe him as a father? Are you going to do what the Bible says and train your children up? Are you going to tell people, man, my little guy Tanner, my wife went to parent-teacher meeting the other night and they said, Paul, you're going to love this. He's pretty adamant about he debates the million-year theory. I'll tell you something else he does. He takes his Bible to school every day and he has a little Bible study on recess. However you want to look at it, he believes. Gideon. Gideon. Lord, you've got the wrong guy. I'm the least of the least of the least. I'm the least of my family. We're the smallest tribe. I mean, you've got the wrong guy. He says, go in this, that I might. I am with you. Starts off with 32,000. But he's fighting an army that you can't even number. There's so many of them. Everybody is scared, go home, 22,000, leave. He's left with 10,000. Okay. Hey, everybody drinks. I don't even know how this works. Everybody drinks like a dog. You get on one side and play drinks normal. I don't remember who was who, but he wound up with 300 men. And what God gave him for weapons, pitchers, and torches. I would say what a wonderful battle plan, but when God's the author of it, what a battle plan. And then people killed themselves basically in panic. See, that's a really good story, Ed, because it was way back there. It ain't right here today. Let me tell you about Misty Wright. Y'all know her, do you? Her husband's an elder at Sovereign Grace. She's one of the sweetest ladies you'll ever meet. For years, she quietly would go to the school, use her husband's classroom once a week, and teach junior high girls a Bible study. She'd bring them food and teach them a Bible study. See, we're not talking about fighting giants and trying to knock down Jericho and fighting an army you can't. No, she just simply did this. But you know what most of us do? Oh, I could never do that. Well, if all we've got is Christians who can never do that, we ain't going to do nothing. It's time to start living by faith. He says, how do we overcome the world? Here's the victory that overcomes the world, our faith. Your faith is a gift from God. He gave it to you to overcome the world. He says we don't have a spirit of fear anymore, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. I'll leave you with this one story. Y'all have probably heard of Kenneth Cates, right? Nope, you've never heard of Kenneth Cates. Because Kenneth Cates was nobody. Kenneth Cates, his mom left him, left the family when he was about six years old. She just couldn't stand it. They were poor, they were struggling, and she just abandoned the family. The father was raising the kids, but the aunt had to kind of raise them and all this stuff. And he was a very introverted, shy, backwards, goofy-looking fellow. He got in high school, got up around that age, and he wanted beer money, so he'd go cut the heads off the old parking meters. Passed out drunk in his car, popped his trunk, found out, here's the parking meter bandit. They was fixing to put him in prison. His grandma comes and says, would you give me one chance with him, one more chance? The judge says, I'll let you take him home, this is it. Put him on probation. And God, he got to a revival. Grandma invited him and he went to a revival and God saved him. And when God saved him, he began to read his Bible all that he could. He would go out and spend all night in the woods praying. And he started praying and he felt a call. He could hear people down in South America, somewhere down in Brazil, I think. And he said, I could hear the cries of the people, like, come help us. He had no idea where he was. And here's what happened. He says, Lord, I'm going to try to raise support to God, but the day I get off probation, I'm going to South America. That day rolled around and he got off his probation. The next day, he had saved up enough money. He went down there to South America and his support that he had was $25 a month from his home church. This is back in the 60s. He can't speak the language. When he first landed on the first plane, he was a thousand miles from where he thought he was supposed to be. Had to come up with money to get down to where he was going. Couldn't speak, couldn't do anything. But you know what? He believed God. Forty years later, when he died, there had been 25 churches planted all up and down the Amazon River. He was known as the man of God. When he died, they had a parade. They paraded his body all through the town with a train of thousands of people following it. His son-in-law, who married his daughter, he continued the work. There's over 40 churches planted down there now. Who's Kenneth Cates? He was just a dorky guy. He's just that guy in school, probably nobody talked to, real quiet, weird, you know. We all know that fella. But he believed God. You want to know how this battle for the world works? It's people who look into the Word of God and they believe what it says, not just intellectually, but they put feet to it. That's how this works. This is a small little church and you're in a pretty good-sized city. Well, surely God couldn't use somebody like this. God used 11 guys, 12 guys that weren't the most spectacular guys in Jerusalem in that day. But guess what? They believed God. My question to you is this. Do you really believe that we serve a king who has all authority? Do you really believe that the foe that we fight is a defeated foe? Dangerous as he is, he's still defeated. And do you believe that God has sent you to take back what is His? Father, this day, Lord, I want to come before you and I want to thank you, God, for your goodness. I pray, Lord, that as you look down on us today, let these words be a reality in my life. Let it be a reality in their life. I pray, God, for your grace and your blessings to be upon this church. I thank you for Paul and Charlo for them just having us down. Thank you for all the hospitality from Miss Evelyn. Blessing us the way she has and just everybody just I just I just want to praise you God in the praise in Jesus name. Amen