All right, it's a real joy, the Lord that he's given us to be back at Mount Pisgah. And I first of all want to say that I appreciate so much the message. I believe this is going to be a great week if we obey the Holy Spirit and the Word of God in this conference and this time. I have had a burden for the meeting ever since I found out that I was coming, and I've been praying that God would speak to us and God would help us, that we'd be able to minister something to you that would be that of real life, that would honor our Lord these days. If I know my heart, that's my desire, is to honor Him. I appreciate the privilege to get to preach with Brother Bob Doone. Brother Bob's a real friend of ours and I appreciate his ministry. Amen. And what God is doing through this man across America to bring a revival to our land. Now I really don't know what you're supposed to preach in Bible conferences, really. The only thing I know you're supposed to preach anytime, anywhere is the Bible. Whether it's a missionary conference, or whether it's a Bible conference, or whether it's a revival meeting, or if it's Sunday morning or Sunday night, there's nothing else to preach but the word of God, is there? When we depart from that, regardless of what we call it, we're going to get in trouble. I don't know what I was being expected of this week. Brother David, I noticed in the brochure that he had, he had me in the center, and it looked like, according to the picture, that I was supposed to be the sweet feller. I really don't know. He didn't tell me that, but I was just kind of looking at the lineup, and where I come out of the lineup, that's the way it looked like it was supposed to be. But I'm not sure that that's what the Lord wants. So we'll just try to be obedient and give what God wants. I want you to open your Bibles to John's Gospel chapter 7. It was a little bit hard to breathe when I first got up here. It was a real heaviness. And I believe that that has probably contributed to the message. I think probably God must have spoken to someone in this message. Maybe several. Now, while you're turning, let me give you a testimony, and this might help some of you. The reason why I want to give this testimony, some time ago we was in a Bible conference at our church. And God began to move and speak, and we had two good men of God preaching in the conference. And as he began to speak, he began to deal with my own heart. You know, a meeting should be for all of us. It should not be for just a select few that we think needs help from God. Folks, I'm gonna tell you, we all need help from God. And God began to speak to me about something that happened three to four months prior to that meeting. There's a situation between an individual, myself, and that individual at that time, at this particular time was not members of our church. She had been a member of our church and had gotten wrong and done some things that I felt was wrong and I handled it. Did you hear me? I literally handled it. I mean I handled it. And I was rad in handling it but I wasn't rad in the spirit that I handled it. And as a result of that God said, now this meeting and this church under your leadership will go no farther until you go and apologize to that person. And when you go to eat and crow like that, it'll make you think a little bit. And so I just did. I just went and apologized to that person and then I got up in the church and I said, I did this and I had to apologize. And as things continued, the meeting moved, and God blessed. But you never get by any meeting without dealing with yourself, if you're honest with God, and the Bible is brought and preached. Brother Bob and Brother Francis has just been with us in a minute, and God dealt with me in some areas that I had to deal with and I had to confess. And I'm glad I did. It's not easy on the flesh, but it's so good once you get it done. And I tell you, the blessings of God can flow. And I tell you, I don't want to snap people off anymore. I was in a meeting last night at our church, and I said something to one brother just a little quick. He said something, and it didn't hit me just right. Pretty quick temper. If you hit me just wrong, I'm just liable to snap at you. But the Holy Ghost, and he probably didn't even know it, but the Holy Spirit of God just slapped me like that and said, you wrong. And I got down to pray. And I got up, and before we ever left that room, I said, brother, I want to apologize. Well, you say, I wouldn't be like that. Well, you might not be saved. That might be the reason why you wouldn't be like that. See, if you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit of God, and you know the Lord, then you will deal with your sins. Or else God will deal with you. That's just the way it is. And that's the way God has it. And I don't know, I believe God's in this meeting. I wanna preach tonight, be not a Pharisee, but be a Christian. Be not a Pharisee, but be a Christian. And when we don't deal with our sins, we're Pharisees and not Christians. Now, in John's Gospel 7, verse 53, is where I begin reading. John's Gospel 7, verse 53. The Bible said that every man went unto his own house. Jesus went down into the Mount of Olives, or went unto the Mount of Olives, And early in the morning, he came again unto the temple, and all the people came unto him, and he sat down, and he taught them. And the scribes and the Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery, and when they had set her in the midst, they say unto him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery in the very act. Now they didn't recognize Jesus here as master, as you and I would think in terms of master, but they were recognizing him as some rabbi or some teacher, not as Lord. And they said, Master. Now Moses in the law commanded us that such should be stoned, but what sayest thine? This they said, tempering him that they might have to accuse him. or tempting him that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down and with his finger wrote on the ground as though he heard them not. So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself and said unto them, he that's without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. And again, he stooped down and rolled on the ground. And they which heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning at the elderness, even of the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had lifted up himself and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, woman, where are thy accusers? Had no man condemned thee? She said, no man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, neither do I condemn thee. Go and sin no more. May we bow our heads for prayer just before we share the message. Our Heavenly Father, I want to thank you tonight for our Lord. I want to thank you tonight that we know him, that our sins are under his blood. And our Father, I want to thank you tonight for the challenging message that's already been given by our brother. And I pray in these days that all of us that are here and all that come, will receive something from thee that we need. Whatever, God, that our needs are, I pray that you would open our hearts. And God, that you would speak to us in these days, and then I pray that we would have obedient hearts to obey and do what thus saith the word of God. Help us, our Father, to be searched. And may we obey you, and may we walk in your truth, and in your righteousness, and in your paths, that your name may be glorified. Our Father, if we fail in these days to glorify your name, and to bring honor and bring praise to your name, then surely, God, we fail. I pray that your name will be honored in this hour because we ask all of these things in Jesus name and for his sake we pray amen I want to speak from out of the text and out of the verses that we just read don't be not a Pharisee but be a Christian I've been doing some study on various things in the gospels concerning the Pharisees and concerning the law and the practice of different folk in the scriptures, in the New Testament scriptures. And I found that these Pharisees that we think a lot about and actually in our own minds, many times we despise the word Pharisee, fit fairly well in our fundamental circles. They fit fairly well in our fundamental churches. I'm afraid that we, very possibly, may have more Pharisees than we do Christians. Did you ever think about it? I mean, we are formed and have the terms, but they don't know anything about the gospel, the living gospel of Christ. They just don't know anything about it. And I'm afraid that in the midst of our circles where the gospel has been plentiful, that we've overlooked the fact that God still wants us to obey his word. It is a sad thing, beloved, that we so destroy the effectiveness of our lives even as believers by being disobedient to what God has to say in his word. Now, I want us to notice some things that have to do with these Pharisees. The Pharisees were a very religious folks. They're religious folk. They were people that had, they trusted in the religion. They put their entire full trust in their religion. They knew nothing about a reality of a person which they knew nothing about God. And I'm afraid that our churches are filled up with such things, such people, such situations. I don't know whether it disturbs you or not, but it disturbs me to think that the greatest, probably, evangelistic field that's in our land today is in the doors of our own churches, that we can get people to see that they need to know a living Savior. If it ever dawns on people that they don't know a living Savior, they'll cry out for mercy. Let me tell you this experience that we had during our conference week before last brother Bob finished up on Sunday morning and On that Sunday morning, there's a lady. That's a fine. She is a fine lady they've been members of our church for several months now the kingdom an independent church and She's been a member of our church for several months and she's been a faithful laborer in our school. She's the secretary of our school, the secretary of our church. She's one of the finest ladies that I ever met. She's one of the most respectable ladies that I ever met. But I denoted through the Holy Spirit that there was a mold of something missing in that lady's life. I didn't know what it was. I thought maybe that she just needed to break into some new truths or that she just needed to grow up some in the Lord. It was not a spirit of rebellion or nothing like this, but there was just the lack of fellowship. And guess what happened last Sunday morning after the service where the Bible brought the message on the new birth. And she started out the door and she said, Brother Bearden, I've got to talk to you. And I said, well, you can talk to me. When do you want to talk to me? She said, and she was pale. I mean, she looked like death had moved into her house, and it had. And she said, I don't know, but I've got to talk to you. And I said, well, I'm available anytime you get ready. And she just kept hanging around her and her husband. and everybody else frankly left. Brother Bob and I carried her to the study and she sat down and she said, I don't really know whether I know God or not. And friends, she got born again. I'm afraid in our fundamental churches that we got people that know the fundamentals and they know the terms of what we call But they don't know our Lord and our Savior, Lord Jesus. And they are nothing more than Pharisees. My friend, they can tell you how to dot the I's, how to cross the T's. They come Sunday morning. They come Sunday evening. They come Wednesday evening and they carry on and they operate offices in our church where there is no reality of God in their lives. And as a result of this, they're lost. And as a result of this, they're going to perish unless life is ministered to them people. And here we have the Pharisees. They had it all figured out. They had their form. They had their religion. They had their works. They had their do's and they had their don'ts. My friend, you can have your do's and you can have your don'ts. You can have your religion and you can have your form. You can have all of this. But if you have never personally met Jesus Christ, you're lost. Well, how'd I know when I personally met Jesus Christ? I mean, there's only one person today that can let you know that, and that's the person of the Holy Spirit. That woman been down the Roman road? She'd been down the Roman road in the scriptures. My friend, you can go down all the roads you want to, but if you don't meet God, you're lost. I'm deviating from where I thought I was going, but I'm going to follow God. He's running this thing anyway. If he's not, we will have to go home. And this may be a good place to start right here. We need to find out where we ought to go. These Pharisees evidently, they felt like, they thought that everything was alright. They felt like everything was all right. They thought everything was all right. And they was going about doing what they thought was good. But they did not know God. Beloved, I want you to note some things in the beginning of the message tonight. I want to get that off my heart and now I'm going to bring that that I feel God wants us to bring. But I want you to notice the Bible said, and every man went to his own house. But then, the Bible tells us in the next verse, and Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Here our Lord didn't have the foxes out of holes, the birds found this, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head. Here our Lord goes to the Mount of Olives, and in this particular situation, If you look from a spiritual standpoint, you can see our Lord in two situations. First of all, you can see Him in the fact of His humility. He had no place to lay His head. But you can see Him and His exalted power in the fact that He went unto the Mount of Olives. Folks, you know what we need to see? We need to see God. I'm going to say this, we need to see God in his solid power. You know what that means? My friend, we need to see God that he is in control. A lot of people think that they're ordering God around. They pull God's string, and puppet God does what they say. But I want to establish the point tonight that I don't order cut around and no one that's present here orders cut around, but our God, if we know the true God, is sovereign. Somebody said to me, if you believe that, well, now there's a lot of folks hung up on the wrong idea about the sovereignty of God. My friend, if God is sovereign and men are dropping in the pit, the only way to stop them from dropping in the pit is to fall prostrate at the feet of the sovereign God and say, Lord, have mercy. And if God don't have mercy, there is no mercy. And if God don't grant grace, there is no grace. And if God, my beloved friend, don't save your loved ones and your neighbors and your friends, there'll be no saving. God's on the throne. And my friend, when we dethrone God and bring God down to our level, we have purported the scriptures. That's why the people that have their gimmicks, they've dethroned God. A man that has gimmicks has dethroned God in his life. My friends, I'd be ashamed to admit I had a God that gimmick had more power than a God that had. We're depending on gods that don't have any eyes, and gods that don't have any ears, and a God that can't see. My friend, if you see the God that I'm talking about tonight, he'll put you on your face and he'll put you in his book to find out his will, what he has to say in this book, and he'll put you on your face seeking his will for your life. You're right, Preacher. Oh, beloved, tonight that we would see that our God, and another thing that I believe God showed me in this, My friend, where there is the exulting of Christ in our life, even as believers, there is always the humility that goes with that of exulting Him. Yes, sir, brother. Amen. Somebody said, well, I want to be big boy. But friend, you're just well to get down off your big boy stage if you want God to be involved in your life. Now, if you want to be the big man or you want to be the big person in your life, you're just as well to mark it down. God will not bring glory to your life. Lord, I love it tonight that we'd see there's another thing practically about this particular message that we need to see tonight. And that is, the Bible said, and early in the morning, he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him, and he sat down and taught them. I tell you what I'm going to do, God. I'm going to do my job today. I'm going to eat three good meals today. God, I'm gonna do the things that I've got to do and I got so many things to do that I don't hardly dream I'll get them all done today. And if there's anything else left, God, I'm gonna give it to you. You're right, brother, that's the way we operate. I'm gonna tell you that's one of the greatest sins of a preacher's life and the greatest sins of members' lives of our churches. Who is more important than the God of heaven? Who is more important than the God that runs this earth? If we believe he runs this thing, then let's go to him in the morning, and let's wait before him in the morning, and let's put him first. Let us go before him early, and let us wait before God. Amen, brother. That's right. I want to tell you something. I've tried every kind of way to meet with God. My ministry, I've got up at four o'clock in the morning and said, now that's the way to do it. And I'd sit there at four o'clock in the morning, sat there and half, almost go to sleep trying to read my Bible. I'd try to pray and lay my head down on the floor and if I didn't want to care about it, I'd go to sleep reading the Bible. But you know what? There's not anything wrong with a There's nothing wrong with anyone else If someone come to visit you to say he's meeting with God right now. He can't be disturbed God spoke to me in our last meeting brother Bob was with us God give me the plan for my life is right now. I don't know how much more he's gonna call for From 9 o'clock in the morning to 12 o'clock in the morning, unless somebody dies, I got an appointment with God. Telephone rings, I'll call them back, or they can call back. Somebody wants to come by and talk about the weather, I'll talk about the weather some other time. But between 9 and 12 o'clock in the mornings, that time is God's time! He's on the throne, He's sovereign, He's running the universe, and He's gonna have to run the church, and that pastor, if anything's gonna be accomplished there, God's gonna have to run the world! They said that embarrassed me. You mean you don't have time for people. You mean you're so important. No, I'm so unimportant that I've got to give my time to God. We talk about the tithe and most of us think if we give 10% of our income, that we've done God a justice. But did you ever think about that if you tithe your time to God to meet God, you are in two hours and forty minutes out of every day. God bless you brother. Amen. Now I'm going to tell you something folk. We can talk about how fundamental we are. We can chew our fingernails and suck our thumbs. We can do all of these things, but if we want to really meet the God of heaven, we're gonna have to come back to the God of the Bible. Gonna have to come back to the God of the Bible. My friend, he came to the temple early in the morning. That's when he came. I thought I got so busy. I got so busy at this and so busy at that, I said, well, you know, I'm praying and I'm studying, but it's hard for me to have, you know, an organized situation. My friend, I got so many things to do, so many things to get done, that I don't know hardly what's gonna have priority, and if I don't spend three hours at least a day with God, I don't know how I can do what I've got to do. He came early in the morning. And of course, when you start serving God, and you start obeying God, you're going to have the Pharisees to put up with you. Now I want us to notice three things in the message tonight, and I hope I get this watch right, and I'll try to operate by the watch. The first thing I want us to notice is the frailty of man. You know, we're so, we have so wicked hearts, folks. Yes, sir, brother. My old heart is so desperately wicked, I just about think I'm about to get straightened out. And the devil gets up in me big as a mule. You're right, brother. And I have to go off somewhere and squall and ball again. And say, oh God, forgive me here! I never saw him. I never saw in my whole life a bunch of satisfied people as there is in our independent churches that's trying to be Bible-believing. You're right, brother. My Lord, we're so satisfied, we're so self-centered, and we're so settled down that God needs to send a storm and tear us all to pieces. We need a storm of the power of God. We need to try to meet Him every day. I want to tell you what, I believe you can get in a form just reading your Bible every day and praying. Do you know that? But you'll never get in a form meeting God every day. If you go there every day, and you meet God every day, Well, I'll tell you, it's good to know, glory to God, that we can talk to him that's running it all every day. You say, well, preacher, I wish I had an audience with the president. Well, praise God, I've got an audience with God every day. I don't want Mr. Carter's all right, and he can run his office the best he can, and I'll pray for him and trust that he'll do something right. But I'll tell you what, folks, I can go to God, and I know that what God does, can the God of all the earth. Won't he do that? Sure he will. that our frail heart, these Pharisees, you know we try to figure out, we're not careful even in our fundamental realms, down deep in our heart, we got man fooled apart, almost, at least we think we have, till we done started trying to fool God. We won't come clean! But we'll confess well to time, we'll confess well to come Sunday morning, Sunday evening, Wednesday evening, have a visitation program, but we won't fairly deal with a sentence that's keeping the pirate cod from working and being operative in our liberal life. Amen? We're not careful. And the scourge of the pharisees brought them to him with the will and ticket of adultery. And when they set him up in the maze, they declared to him, Master, come and help, right over there. This is the case for you. But the woman was taken from the tribe. I'll command the rest! Let me search within you! Follow me! It must pass through all of us! Let's search! get them saved, there'd be enough life generated around there, and they'd get in, and they'd get saved, and there'd be enough life generated around there, and then God's glory would be showered upon throughout the community, and sinners would see Jesus lifted up. You're right, brother. Amen. I watched five minutes fast. I want to preach five minutes more, at least. And I may take five. Amen. I'm not just holding you, beholding you. I've got something to say. And I don't have something to say because I'm here. I've got something to say because I met the man that is the God-man, my friend. And he said that I ought to say these things. The Lord again uses His Word. Luke verse 9. The Bible said, and they which heard it being convicted by their own conscience. You know why? He put that law to them. That Word of God had convicted them by their own conscience. What did they do? They left that place. They sure did, they got out of there. But they were scribes and pharisees, and when you put the word of God on them, the living word of God, and you put the law of God on them, and it sets them up, they get out of there. We've been just petting them around, and patting them around, trying to pump them up. They pump down, we pump them up. And they pump out, and we pump them in. It's just a pump here and a pump there. Lord God, if we'd let the Holy Ghost get a hold of them, let the power of God get a hold of them, and God saturate them with His power, and convict them with His Word, and birth them into His family, they wouldn't be so hard to keep. Amen. Glory be to God. cause of conviction. They went out one by one, beginning as the elders, even on the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the women, or the woman, standing in His midst. I tell you, if you preach, you'd just about be left alone now. I mean, all you gotta do is just preach Him! Or you say you can't get nobody saved if you preach that. Yeah, you can. You get them genuinely saved. The law was preached and it pricked their conscience. And as a result, the scribes and the Pharisees and the religionists left. And look, we got it all figured out. We're going to have Bible conference and I'm going to go if the word of God don't get too hot. But if it does, after all, nowadays all you got to do is just be a good Sunday morning Christian. Anyway, you know, I'll be there. My religion will get me there Wednesday night. I got enough, you know, that I got to go Wednesday night because after all, if I don't, I'm not going to be faithful and I might lose my reward. You don't have one. You probably lost. You're right. And then, well, you know, some of us has got this good religion that Sunday morning, I got some folks that you'd almost have to stand at the door and beat them out on Sunday morning. They'd beat the hell out of them. And then they'd come and slow me deep. And they don't have as much life of their life as I do. They don't have as much life as that pill pit. The only time you move them is when you make a man between their toes. That's right, brother. Amen, brother. Tell them the truth. They are tied down to the last dollar. I've got some that are so kind in their tithing that if they make enough every week to where their tithe comes out to $19.90, They're such good pharisees and such good members that they wouldn't give God $20 to save their neck in a match. You're right, brother. You're right. You're right, brother. Amen. We hung up on Offred. I mean, I hung up on Offred. Because I done smelt that out and that's what's wrong with my church. A lot of folks, you know, you think we're doing pretty good. Had a $700 offering, you know, just offerings in the revival, but you know what? About 50% of my people, or 25, was giving all the offerings. And them other skunks that's laying out there, they're smelling and stinking, and they're looking pretty, but you punch one of them a little bit, and my friend, you got an order going out of the way. You're preaching, brother. Go on. I can just tell some of you really like this. You tithe after you give the union their dues. Oh, Lord. Oh, you know, after all. God help us. Let's get down serious. Amen. Not careful, we'll let the devil get this. And he'd like for us to life this burden off. We have to breathe there once in a while. Thought we might let you breathe just a little. But you look at this. In verse 11. Verse 10 and verse 11. You don't have it on the force of the word, but you have the faith of the woman. When this book is preached and proclaimed as power, it will produce faith. The Bible said when Jesus lifted up himself and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those that accuse thee? Hath no man condemned thee? Oh, you say, it's easy to get saved. You know, this woman got saved just like everybody else gets saved. You just have to find it in scriptures. It's all there. And she said, move, man, Lord! And I don't know whether you like to do this or not, but I just put me a good ring around Lord. And I said, I tell you, preacher, I have Jesus as my Savior, but He's not going to be my Lord. No, you're not going to heaven off of that kind of a cheap gospel that's being perverted and peddled all over America. Right. Why don't you want to go to heaven? Well, anybody with one eye and has sin would respond to that. But don't you want to forsake your sins? Don't you want to turn from your sins? Aren't you tired of running your own life? Don't you want the God of the universe, the silent one, to run your life? No! I want that. You know what? The law of God run the scribes and the Pharisees off. And that's what people accuse you. He said He's trying to put us on the law. He preached the commandments. He'll run them scribes and Pharisees off. but it shut this woman up under law and she realized that she was an adulterer and she has everything else the law of God said and she realized she was a sinner and she come to Jesus as Lord. You say, well I suppose she went on sinning. No, she got out of the sinning business. My friend, when there is faith preached and faith produced and that's a gift of God. It produces the Lordship of Christ. Right. Amen. There's no word in the Scriptures. You go throughout the Scriptures. John 9, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what he told Paul. Lord Jesus Christ. That shall be seen. Romans 10, 9 and 10, If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord, Jesus Christ. Jesus is Lord. You can't get saved unless you're willing to get rid of your sins. You can't get saved unless you're willing to repent of your sins. Now we think of people as vile sins as this. But if you broke one of the laws of God, you're guilty of them all. And the Bible said, and I'm closing, and Jesus said to her, neither do I condemn thee. Go and sin no more. There he demands her that there must be repentance. See, there is three things that's essential to salvation before that you go through a lot of things that people offer you. Number one, you've got to recognize the lordship of Jesus Christ. He is on the throne. And you have not only sinned against this country and your neighbor, but you have sinned against God. And if you don't ever see that, you won't never see no need to get saved. the Lordship of Jesus Christ. You must recognize that. You must recognize that salvation is a gift of God and that it requires repentance. And unless God grants you faith and repentance, which if I understand the scriptures right, the Simonese twins, you know what Simonese twins are? They're birthed together. When this book is preached in the living power, it will birth in the heart of a sinner a desire to let Jesus be Lord and it will birth in the heart of a sinner repentance and faith and nobody gets saved apart from that. I don't care how many Roman roads you go down, I don't care how many gimmicks you have or how many times you have baptized. If you've never met Jesus Christ, you're lost.