Thank you, sir. It's an honor to be here for a host of reasons. I did just leave yesterday from inner city Chicago. It was minus 12 when I left yesterday. So it actually seems like I've come to a warming trend and warming area here. I was in the Philippines a few weeks ago and had mentioned a service that it was minus five when I left for the Philippines. And two little Filipino girls came up to me after the service and said, you're teasing us. I said, what do you mean? She said they said it can't be minus five. They said zero is the absence of everything. How could you have less than zero? I couldn't answer them. I had to come back and get the science teacher in our high school to explain that to me. Anyway, it doesn't seem quite so bad here today. I'm from pastor in inner city Chicago. We get asked all the time, you know, what suburb we're from, because that's where folks used to having churches be. Tell them in Chicago, we believe folks only live in the suburbs because they're not tough enough to live in the city. And I have the privilege of pastoring in the city. It's been interesting, wonderful experience. I thank God for the school here. I have known of Brother Comfort and heard him many times over the years. Remember, and it goes back a long time ago now, but a Bible college chapel years ago when he spoke on the holiness of God and that message has been a blessing to me ever since. Good to see Brother Spencer, and he and I have shared in fellowship together, especially about the issue of Bible colleges and accreditation, and I thank God for the stand your school takes here, and wish I could take a couple hours and explain why, but I promise you I do. I've seen what accreditation does to Bible colleges, and I praise God for the leadership here, and Brother Spencer. And then saw Brother Bill Dillon. I had not seen him in years. He was a student of mine years ago. In fact, if any of you would like good stories about him as a Bible college student, see me after chapel, because I have some that are worth selling. I'm kidding when I say that. Um, I don't know how few years ago since I've been, I've been pastoring in Chicago for nine and a half years. I'd been here once before in 2001, got to preach in chapel and a young couple came to our service a few years back. They said, we just stopped in on the way driving somewhere, but he showed me his Bible and the margin of the passage that I had preached on. And where are you taking notes on it? And he said that this particular set of notes really helped me at a critical point. And I want to thank you for it. He didn't have more than five minutes to stay, but it was a blessing. And I remembered it. It reminds me again how important this Bible college business is and how important chapel is. If you would go with me to Philippians chapter one, please. Every. generation, there seems to rise up a new group of Bible colleges that we could thank God for and praise God for. But 20, 30, 40 years later. Most of those colleges are gone. So I'm thankful for Ambassador, because from everything I can see, you're standing for what you've always stood for, and I thank the Lord for that. That's an important thing and something you ought to be excited about and grateful about. We're in Philippians chapter one. We pick up in verse 12. But I would you should understand, brethren, that the things which happen into me have fallen out rather into the furtherance of the gospel. So my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace, all of the places and many of the brethren in the Lord waxing confident by my bonds are much more bold to speak the word without fear. Some indeed preach Christ even of envy and strife. That's the title for this morning, preaching Christ of envy and strife. Some indeed preach Christ, even of envy and strife, and some also goodwill. The one preached Christ of contention, not sincerely, supposing to add afflictions to my bonds, but the other of love, knowing that I am set for the defense of the gospel. What then notwithstanding, every way. Whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached, and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice. Dear Heavenly Father, I pray you bless us during this time. Help us to be some challenge and encouragement to these students. Bless them in this most important time in their life, setting a foundation for a lifetime of ministry. Bless the staff and the faculty and this institution. Watch over it, meet its needs. Continue to guide it and preserve it as you have, and we'll thank you for it in Jesus' name. Amen. Here's the situation for Paul. He's in prison. He isn't in prison because he's done anything wrong. He's in prison because he's been preaching the gospel in a world that is hostile to the preaching of the gospel. He's in prison, and while he's in prison, there's some folks who've been emboldened in their preaching because of his being in prison. But it's not all what you think. Some of the folks that have been emboldened in their preaching are emboldened. They're preaching Christ out of goodwill, and they're doing an even more effective job for the Lord than they ever did before. But some of them. have taken the opportunity to preach Christ for a wrong motive. The Bible doesn't say they were always preaching is from a wrong motive. Probably most of them when they were young men had been called to be preachers of the gospel and they started out preaching in obedience to the Lord. They start out preaching because they love the Lord. They start out preaching because they love the souls of men. But along the way, something had happened. They were still preaching because they were preachers. They're still preaching because that's what they knew. They're still preaching because that's what they thought of themselves as. But their motive in preaching had changed. Their motive had become envy. And their method, strife. And preaching out of envy. See, they looked, they said, hey, you know, Paul, he's been a big deal and he's been writing scriptures, some 13, say 13 books. Some of us think 14, but he's been writing scriptures and and he's been used of God and he's performed miracles. I mean, he was preaching at midnight. I know some long winded preachers, I may occasionally have been accused of being a long winded preacher, but can I say I've never been preaching at midnight before ever? He's preaching at midnight and a guy sitting in a window and, and, and a lot of folks have guessed he's sitting in a window to get some air, to stay awake because I don't care who you're listening to at midnight is tough. And the guy falls out of the window, falls asleep, falls out of the window and he dies. And Paul is not willing to have his service interrupted. She goes down and raises him from the dead. How would that be? How did they promote Paul in the next meeting after that? I mean, he's a big deal. He stood up to Peter publicly in front of people. And he's a big deal. But you see, there are a lot of preachers preaching Christ out of envy and what whatever their motive was originally, their motive now is to be a big deal. Then, like the fact that Paul got all that attention, that God used Paul for this or Paul did, they want to be seen of men. And now that Paul's in prison, say this is their opportunity to get some of the glory they thought Paul got. They didn't understand what the glory Paul got was like. In fact, the glory that Paul got was the kind of glory that puts you in prison for preaching the gospel. But they didn't see that. And I will tell you, I have watched this in the lives and hearts of preachers and preachers who once preached Christ out of good motives and a love for God and a love for souls. You can now tell every time they get in the pulpit. That they envy they want what somebody else has. Why did he get to preach at that conference? I'd be a better preacher for that conference. Why does he get to pastor that church? I'd be a better pastor for that church. Why are people paying attention to him? Why are they noticing him? Why? And they get envious and they think that they should have all that for themselves. They're preaching for the wrong meaning it, the preaching of the gospel becomes the way to promote themselves. And so they're always looking for some more attention and some more glory and some more influence. This isn't new. Would you go with me back to Numbers chapter 11? It came up in Moses time, not from Moses, but from some of the folks around Moses. Look at Numbers chapter 11. And verse 26. Holy spirits come down on Moses and the elders, and most of them are outside the camp preaching. But then in Numbers chapter 11, verse 26, it says, but there remain two of the men in the camp. The name of the one was Eldad, the name of the other, Medad, the dad brothers. And the spirit rested upon them and they were of them that were written, but went not out into the tabernacle and they prophesied in the camp. And there in a young man and told Moses and said, Eldad and Medad do prophesy in the camp. And Joshua, the son of Nun, the servant of Moses, one of his young men answered, said, my Lord, forbid them. Why did Joshua care? Joshua is a devoted follower of Moses. He said those two guys are preaching and they're not doing it the way we do. Why should they be preaching? Why should they be up in front of everybody? How does Moses get any glory out of their ministry? They're not in Moses following Moses exactly the same way that the other 68 elders are. Boy, you see that kind of thing all the time. Well, why? If they got him preaching, he didn't go to our Bible college. Why have they got him preaching? He's not in our group. Why is that what you see it all over the place? Why are you using that evangelist? Why are you going to that camp? Why do you support that Bible college? That's not ours. I wouldn't support a Bible college that belonged to anybody. It doesn't belong to God. I wouldn't want to send anybody there. But you see it all the time coming up. And here's a Moses answer. And we're not talking about a bad man, by the way. Joshua got off center. Joshua was a great man, and so this ought to caution us. Good men can make this mistake. And Moses said to him, envious, thou for my sake, would God that all the Lord's people were prophets and that the Lord would put his spirit upon them. Now, Moses wasn't concerned about what kind of glory Moses got out of this. Those men were really preaching. They were really prophesying. They were really serving God. They didn't have to serve Moses to serve God. You don't have to belong to a specific fellowship or have gone to a specific Bible college or have a specific evangelist in the preacher, promote a specific paper. And all this envy around that kind of thing gets people off course. It happened in the time of the apostles. Would you go with me to Mark, chapter nine? Matter of fact, you go through the New Testament carefully, you find out something similar to this happened three different times with the apostles. They were having a debate. They were not debating. The finer points of theology. They were debating which one of us is the greatest. Now, we're not debating like this. Well, I think he's the greatest. No, I think he's just I'm the greatest apostle. I mean, look at what I have done. Look at what I've accomplished. Why don't you guys understand that I'm the greatest apostle? Mark, Chapter nine and verse 38, and John answered him, saying, Master, we saw one casting out devils in my name and he followed with not us. They didn't say when following Lord Jesus, he wasn't following John and the guys. So we forbade him because he followed with not us. I mean, you shouldn't be preaching. You're not in our group. You didn't have the training that we apostles had. You haven't been traveling with us. You shouldn't be preaching. You shouldn't be carrying out the apostolic gifts because you're not one of us. Look at the Lord Jesus answer. But Jesus said, forbid him not for there is no man which will do a miracle in my name that can likely speak evil of me. For he that is not against us is on our part. For whosoever shall give you a cup of water to drink in my name because you belong to Christ. Verily, I say in you, he shall not lose his reward. This this discussion came right after. Go back to verse thirty three right after this. He came to Capernaum being in the house, he asked them, what was it that you disputed among yourselves, by the way? He knew that on the trip there they'd been arguing. But they held their peace, for by the way, they had disputed among themselves who should be the greatest. He sat down, called the twelve and sayeth unto them, if any man desired to be first, the same shall be last of all and the servant of all. They took a child and set him in the midst of them. And when he had taken him in his arms, he said unto them, whosoever shall receive one of such children of my name received with me, whosoever shall receive me and receive it, not me, but him that sent me. And it's right after that that John says, by the way, this guy over here, he's casting out devils and he doesn't follow us. He didn't get it at all. The men, and this is the single most important thing that I would tell a Bible college student, look into the future. I used to, when I was president of Bible college for a while, and I'd preach on chapel in this several times a year, and I'd talk about it in classes. And if you'd talk to any of my students from that era, they would tell you that's the number one thing they remember about me. They kept saying it over and over and over again. This isn't about you. If you think it's about you, you will miss the whole thing. This isn't about you. You say, yeah, but but I'm pastoring this church and folks are giving me a hard time. Boy, then it's a good thing it's not about you. It's about what God has called you to do. Some years back, I was in my first pastorate. And I had one staff member, youth pastor, he's an assistant pastor to me at Ravenswood today. But we're going through a hard time. The church was famous as a preacher killer church. It had been in existence for 21 years, and I was the eighth pastor. The church I pastor now is 123 years old. Every now and then everybody asks me if I started it, but I'm promising you I didn't. I'm the 17th pastor. uh, the church I'm at now, but I was the eighth pastor of that church. It was only 21 years old. It's kind of embarrassing to have your 21st anniversary and realize that if you wanted to invite former pastors in, they'd take up the front pew. We're going through a rough time. And I went to see the pastor under whom I was saved. Be honest. He pastored in a heretical denomination, but, but somehow he missed what they were supposed to believe. And he preached the gospel. And I was a bus kid that got saved there when I was 10. When I was 15, the denomination figured out what he was teaching and they fired him. And. He told me on the way out, I was heartbroken, he told me, look for an independent Baptist church. So I did. I was telling brother Beal, but the whole story about my becoming a Baptist is not necessarily a noble one. That was a Baptist church, had a bus ministry on our block. And I went out and flagged down the bus, went to church 15. And the next week on teen visitation, they sent three pretty teenage girls to my house to invite me back. And I became a Baptist in my living room that day without having the faintest idea what a Baptist was. Years later, I studied it out and said, man, I'm glad I got in a good church that way. But when I made the decision to be Baptist, it had nothing to do with the Bible, but it still worked out well. I went to see this pastor because I knew he'd been through a terrible time. I said, I'm going through a terrible time and they're attacking me and they're attacking my youth pastor and they're tearing him up. And I said, it's bad enough for me to go through it. But to watch him go through it, I said, I don't know if I can keep doing this. He said, you only have to answer one question. Whose servant are you? He said, if you're your own, you have the right to look at that and say, that's too much, that's too hard, it's too difficult, I don't want to do it. But he said, if you're God's servant, It's your responsibility to go through whatever God sends you. With your focus on him and your willingness to answer this question, he said, God allows you to have this time so you can come up with an answer to this question, whose servant are you? And if the answer is God's, it doesn't matter what you go through. And if the answer is yours, then make a decision whether you want to do this or not, he said, I can tell you, you probably don't want to do it. John didn't get it. It's not a boy, never about John. And it's not about you, it's not the people God has called you to minister to. And when you settle that, that this isn't about you, that will solve so many problems. Look at Luke chapter nine. Verse forty six. And this appears to be a different incident. I can explain why, but for time's sake, I'm going to move on. There arose a reasoning among them, which of them should be greatest. They're still arguing about it. Which one of us is the greatest apostle? And Jesus, perceiving the thought of their heart, took a child and set him by him and said unto them, who shall receive this child in my name, receive with me and who shall receive me, receive with him that sent me for he that is least among you all the same shall be great. It's not about you. But these folks were arguing over who the greatest preacher was, you read in First Corinthians, Chapter one, and the Christians were having arguments, who's the greatest preacher, Paul? Peter or Apollos, and there's a fourth group, but they're rebuked, too. So they must not have been sincere about it. They say we don't follow men like that. We follow Christ. I mean, we're better than you all. Because Christ is the only one that means anything to us. Trust me, when you look at me, you're seeing somebody that Christ is lucky to have because I'm so loyal. God doesn't have groups. Men form groups on occasion for the efficiency in accomplishing something, but a God doesn't have groups. The church I pastor 1934. It was an American Baptist convention church, and it was close to Chicago seminary, which was one of the first two Baptist seminaries to go modernist. And they had professors and students in the church that were modernists. And they got into a battle about this. And the pastor, wise pastor in that 1934, we have all the records. He spent a year getting the church ready in the military. They call that shaping the battlefield. But he spent a year getting the church ready, speaking on the virgin birth of Christ and the inspiration of scripture and all these things that make it sure that it was clear. And the liberals from the seminary were just upset and upset and upset. And after a year of preaching, get ready. He called for a business meeting. And they did three things. They voted not to have any women preachers in the church. That was the big deal in the convention in that day. They voted to leave the American Baptist Convention and they voted to expel anybody that didn't believe in the church's doctrinal statement from the membership. That a business meeting that lasted for hours and the handwritten notes we still have. And the seminary professors kept getting up, say, you'll never be anybody. Your church will never be respected. You'll be looked down upon. You'll never be anything as a church. And a bunch of blue collar factory workers. Stood up with their Bibles and told the seminary professors they were going to follow the book, they weren't trying to be anybody, they weren't trying to be special, they weren't trying to be noticed. There's several American Baptist Convention churches around us today. Every one of them is pastored by homosexual. And Ravenswood, still in the same building, preaches from the same Bible, the same gospel, and has the same doctrinal statement it had in 1891. They won an incredible victory just by being true to the scriptures and because it wasn't about who's going to look in and who's going to be impressed and who's going to think we're great. It's about being faithful to the Lord. Matthew, Chapter 20, verse 20. Then came to him the mother of Zebedee's children with their sons. Worshipping him and desiring a certain thing of him, he said into their what wilt thou? And that'd be pretty impressive to be talking Lord Jesus. He says, what do you want? Just wanted one little thing. She saith unto him, Grant that these my two sons may sit the one on thy right hand and the other on the left in thy kingdom. That's all I'm asking for is that you would exalt my two sons above absolutely everyone else. Just one little thing. See, this is a basic desire of the old sinful nature. It is not at all the desire of the spirit. When Barak looked for great things for himself, Jeremiah said, don't do it. But in this case, it was Mama. And of course, Mama wanted to guide the life of her two preacher sons. And and let me tell you, my years of the Bible college, I ran across a few mothers like that. I'm sure I'm the only one who's had that experience, but I ran across a few. And all I want is my sons to be the two most important people. Not just in the Lord's work now, but in the kingdom when it comes. And part of the answer is to drop down to verse twenty four. And when the 10 heard it, they were moved with indignation against the two brethren. That's because they wanted to be in those seats. I said, James and John aren't the greatest. I'm the greatest. We can debate over who's number two, but we all know who the greatest apostle is. Verse twenty five. Jesus called them unto him and said, you know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, that they that are great exercise authority upon them, but it shall not be so among you, but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister. Whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant. Even as the son of man came not to be ministered into, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many. When preachers get as a motivation envy, they want to be the president of the Bible college. They want to be the one that speaks at graduation. They want to be the one that speaks in a Bible conference. They want to pastor the biggest church without building it. They want to get called the pastor of the biggest church. They want to be the one that gets the honorary doctorate. They want to. I mean, they're looking for every little edge they can get to lift up themselves and say, look how big I am and look how important I am. They have a wrong motive. They're not the first. It's not new. In fact, would you turn to 3 John? Little interesting comment about a fellow named Diatrophes. I've told folks, Diatrophes is amazing. He lived to be a very old man. I know that because I pastored him. 3 John, verse 9 and 10. I wrote into the church, but the atrophies who loveth to have the preeminence among them receiveth us not. Wherefore, if I come, I will remember his deeds, which he doeth, prating against us with malicious words, not content therewith, neither doth he himself receive the brethren, and forbideth them that would, and casteth them out of the church. See, diatrophies wanted to be the big deal in the church. Can I tell you there are little independent Baptist churches all over America that have a diatrophies? He wants to be the big guy there. He wants to be the one that makes the decisions. And let me tell you this many times, doctor fees wants to call somebody who's just out of Bible college to be the pastor. Because he figures the guy is young and he won't know what he's doing and he because of his age, he'll be intimidated by doctor fees. And if they get him in and a young man in and he's going soul winning and he's witnessing to people and he's touching people's lives and they start coming into church and all of a sudden there's enough people that he brought into the church that he could outvote diatrophies, diatrophies will start running those people off and start complaining about the pastor. Because all diatrophies cares about is having a church that he can be in charge of. Both my first I have Ravenswood's in the third church, a pastor, both my first and third church, I've pastored diatrophies. What I didn't know in the first church is diatrophies has to go if God's going to bless what I did know in my third church was a diatrophies has to go if God's going to bless. And he ended up being the one that left. But I'm telling you, there's a boatload of diatrophies is out there. And you young men will probably face one and probably face one in the first church you pastor. Because he all he wants to know about this is how does it glorify him? How does it build him up? He wants a church that he can run. He wants a preeminent envy is what motivates his ministry. And in the beginning, he'll tell you he's the greatest preacher. You're the greatest preacher he's ever heard. Nobody was ever as dynamic as you. Nobody was ever as great as you. He is so grateful. that have you as his pastor and he will tell you that clear up till you don't do something he said for you to do. And then you'll go from being the greatest pastor ever to being inexcusably unable to pastor. For a while, when I was in another college, it was my job to help graduates to find a place, I remember a guy called me one day and he said, you help us find a pastor. I said, I'll try. He said, we've had 10 pastors and they were all bad. And I and it was every time it was a mess and it was the pastor's fault. I said, you don't suppose your church has a problem about praying and finding the will of God for a pastor. But maybe some of the problem is your fault. He hung up on me and I never heard from him again. Years later, I would hear about that church and was able to figure out who the doctor fees was in that church. The guy I talked to on the phone. He continued to be a nightmare for preachers. I know two, three years ago. as a group of folks, probably about 15 of them that were related. They came in and filled up a pew and a half at Ravenswood. It was their first service there. And they had just left a church out in the suburbs. And I knew the pastor well, and I knew what had happened. And that fellow had been used to running that church before the pastor got there. And he was really, really angry that the pastor wanted to pastor. And he came in and they all sit down at Ravenswood. And he said, we'd like to talk to you about Ravenswood and find out some things. And I said, don't bother. I said, I don't want you here. And they represented money and workers and musical talent and something. But I said, trust me, you wouldn't be happy here because I said you would never run this church. They never came back. They went to another church out in the suburbs. And not long ago, I was counseling that pastor in his time of discouragement that came from dealing with those people. Diatrophies is all over the place. Well, these folks, when you have the wrong motive, which is envy, you'll end up with the wrong method. You know, it's the wrong method is. Strife, you'll look to cause trouble, you'll look to be critical and say, well, you know, that guy that was preaching over there, that conference, they shouldn't have had him, they should have had me because, you know, that guy and they'll pick something incredibly minor or picky, and he believes that anybody believes that doesn't believe the Bible. And then they'll just look to cause strife everywhere. They won't be able to preach without attacking somebody by name and personalizing it. And there's some guys you never hear them preach, but what they attack people and you'll find out very, very rarely do they care whether the attack is true or not. Here's one of the things you young men and young ladies have to learn if you're going to be in the ministry, come to grips with the fact you're going to be lied about. It's going to happen. I don't know anybody with his spotless, a clean record, his brother comfort, but he's had horrible things said about him. I know that for a fact. You couldn't believe everything that's been said about me. If I tried, I couldn't be that bad if I devoted myself to it. And if you're going to write. Prepare to have every page lied about in terms of what you said. And trust me, I found that out the hard way. First time somebody misrepresented something I wrote, I virtually wrote a book to answer them. But before long, I found out there was not enough days in my lifetime to write enough books to answer all of that. You just have to smile and go on in recent years. I always used to get to criticisms in letter form and that was frustrating. But in recent years with the invention of email. When virtually all the criticisms come by email, there's this wonderful thing I discovered. It's the delete button. And so if you attack me in the first paragraph, I don't know what you said in the fourth paragraph. I may have missed out on some amazing things that would have been helpful. But delete. I wish that had been invented so much sooner. Would you look with me, Proverbs chapter 26 and verse four and five, this this is bothered some folks because it appears to be a contradiction, but it's not. What do you do when people lie about you almost all the time? Ignore it. Every once in a while, a circumstance will dictate an answer. Part of Chapter 26, verse four and five, answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be likened to him. I have a rule, I don't answer Internet theologians. What I mean by Internet theologians, people whose whole ministry is being on the Internet, criticizing people. I don't answer them. A pastor, a missionary has got some credibility that might generate a reason to answer, but I just ignore Internet theologians completely. And I discovered something wonderful that I didn't know was going to happen when I made that decision. It drives them stark raving crazy. It's the best revenge. They want to be noticed so bad, and when you don't notice them, they go crazy. Now I do it for the joy of it. There's a fella sends critical emails about me to me every day, 365 days a year. I don't think, and it drives him crazy because it's always in the first paragraph that I won't answer. I don't know if he has figured out. I don't even know how he closes a letter because I've never read the closing. I don't know how he closes a letter because I've never read the closing. Verse five, answer a fool according to his folly, but just said, don't answer. Isn't that a contradiction? The message is clear. Sometimes you shouldn't answer. And sometimes you should. May God give you the wisdom to know which is which. For me, it's the answer is, I promise, less than five percent. I'm not saying that's what it should be with you. Verse five, answer a fool according to his folly, lest to be wise in his own conceit. And a fella got attacked in a couple of years back, fella had me to preach for him and and somebody wrote him a letter and attacked him and said, I don't know if we can fellowship with you anymore. They said, Brother Stringer, you had Brother Stringer in and he said this and his book on Baptist heritage. And he said this and those things are wrong. And I did answer, I said, by the way, I noticed this when you were quoting me, you didn't give page numbers. And you know why you didn't give page numbers. I never said those things. They're not in the book. I said, if they were in a book, you'd have given a page number so that everybody could have seen it. I did answer that one. People are going to lie about you, learn to live with it. A lot of times the ladies have trouble because they have gentler spirits than their husbands and seeing their husband lied about. Just really gets to them, but it's going to happen, and while it may happen to your husband more often, you want to know who else it's going to happen to. You. This is what happens because there are plenty of people in the ministry whose motive is envy. And when your motive is envy, your method is strife. You're trying to stir up as much trouble as you can. And I have sweet, sweet, wonderful, harmless ladies married to preachers and assistant preachers and in Christian school teachers and so forth, and they get lied about. They can't imagine where that comes from because they've never consciously hurt a soul in their lifetime. It doesn't have anything to do with the truth. Be prepared as part of the program. Let me say a couple of things here real quick. Don't be part of the problem. I mean, not only Joshua, would you go to Galatians chapter two of me, even Peter made this mistake. And Peter is a pretty great man. I mean, do you know anybody else that's preached and had. Three thousand people saved in one day. Or had five thousand men saved in one day. Who's walked on water? And granted, he didn't walk on water very long, but you don't know anybody else that walked on water at all. But they're in Antioch, and man, that the Christians are having a great time, all these Gentiles have got saved and the law is gone and and the Gentiles and the Jews are eating together, and man, I imagine that was a blessing for the Jews. I imagine growing up, spending your entire life smelling bacon, but not eating any. And now all of a sudden they're sitting at the same table and eating back forth their men is great. But then some folks come to Antioch from James. And all of a sudden, Peter, I don't eat with Gentiles. And that created such a stir that Barnabas quit eating with them. Verse 11, when Peter was come to Antioch, I was stood him to the face because he was to be blamed. For before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles. When they were come, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision. And the other Jews dissembled likewise with him in so much that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation. When I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto Peter before them all, if thou being a Jew livest after the manner of the Gentiles and not as do the Jews, why compel us out the Gentiles to live to the Jews? Now, watch this. If Peter and Barnabas could make this mistake. If Joshua could make this mistake, you and I could make this mistake. One more thing. Go back to Philippians chapter one with me. One more lesson from this, I hope you all get. In my ministry, there were three times. All during the first 20 years, I've been in full time ministry for 41 years now. Tell everybody I started when I was three. I've been a full time ministry for 41 years. In the first three years, the first 20 years, rather, there were three times I was so discouraged I wanted to quit. I mean, I really did. Here's the number one discouragement. There were others, but here's number one. All the fighting and fussing and feuding among preachers. Being attacked for things you've never done or even thought about doing. Having things you said twisted and turned. I mean, why should we have to go through this? I mean, there were moments I really wanted to quit. One time for six months, I prayed every night that God would let me out of the call to the ministry. Every night I went to bed praying that I got up in the morning, went on with the ministry. Somebody said, why didn't you just quit? I said, I was discouraged, not stupid. I've seen what happened when people just quit. I wanted him to let me out. But every morning I would get up knowing this was still my responsibility. One time I'd made up my mind, I was done, I really was done. So this time I'm done. I'm preaching a meeting, Sunday through Friday, and I said Friday night for the meeting started Friday night. I'm done. I walk out of the pulpit Friday night. Never again. I threw myself into it. So I'm going to do the very best I can in the last meeting I'm ever going to preach. But I am done. Got through the week, got through Friday night. Packing up some things and I'm done, I'm finished. Two young ladies came in the door, teenagers. They apologized for missing the meeting. You'd have to know them. They lived about an hour away. They tried to come to the service. They got hopelessly lost. I wouldn't have left the two of them alone in a car personally, but. They missed the whole meeting. They came in and said, look, we just got to turn around and leave. But said God put it on on our hearts tonight to come tell you how much you're preaching means to us. We've got to go home in order to be home in time for curfew. And they they were in that quick and out and they were gone. And I said, did you really. Right at this moment. Send somebody to tell me that. I said, maybe I'll hang on another week. And for a while, I hung on for a week at a time. Let me tell you something, I've got past that part, I have more fun than anybody I know. I pastor the greatest church in the greatest location, we're surrounded by paganism. Everywhere you look, there's somebody to witness to. I used to pastor in Indianapolis, every door I had been to, 20 other churches had been there. Now, no problem, I can walk outdoors any time of any day. I pastor some of the sweetest, most gracious people you could ever be around. Pastor an interracial church, the most interracial church I've ever seen. Well, we're so interracial we got sued for racism. Young young lady in our school wouldn't get good grades and the family sued us. It is because she was black. Now, we had another girl in the same grade that had been there the exact same year she had been, who was black, and she was a straight A student. But another boy had been there for a year that was black, and he was a straight A student. But we got sued for racism, had five public hearings in the lawsuit. And each time they had to turn in a written thing. And one hearing they put in this thing said everybody that knows Brother Stringer knows he has trouble with people of color. And my black folks went around on Sunday morning. To the white people. Said, don't you go to the next hearing? This belongs to us. The only segregated activity we've ever had. And they took up every seat in the courtroom and stood around the walls until the bailiff said, the fire marshal won't let us have any more people in. And then about 30 more were out in the hallway having a prayer meeting. And I do not believe that white people would have got away with having a prayer meeting in a Chicago courthouse. You know how much fun that was? I was white, my wife was white, the attorney was white. Everybody else was black. And the fellow soonest came in, he looked around, he's trying to figure out what's going on. He says, you're not really black people. Do you know what the joke has been at our church ever since? I mean, it's been about a year and a half. People come and say, Pastor, what color do you think I am? I say, you're sort of a pinkish green. That's. I mean, I have discovered something. This business is fun of serving the Lord and God blesses and he'll take the most difficult circumstances and use them to bless you. Would you look with me in verse 18? Here's the last thing I want to say on this subject. Don't let them take your joy. If you're in the Lord's work, you're having the greatest privilege and the greatest experience that anybody could ever have. Look at verse 18. What then? Notwithstanding. Yeah, yeah. Some guys are preaching Christ sincerely, but some of them are preaching out of contention. They're trying to add to the bad time that Paul's going through because they're envious of Paul. He said, what then? Notwithstanding, every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached. See, we're not talking about cultists and heretics here. They're still preaching the gospel, even though they have the wrong motive. But in every way Christ is preached and I therein do rejoice. Yay. And we'll rejoice. He said no matter what their motives are, they're out there preaching Christ. And along the way, some of these folks are getting saved. He said, I'm just going to be happy that some folks got saved. So I'm not going to dwell on this. I'm not going to be beaten by this. I'm not going to let this ruin me. I'm not going to let this take. I am going to rejoice. that folks are finding Christ as their Savior. One of the biggest critics I ever had said vicious and untrue things about me. One of my deacons, he led to the Lord 30 years ago. We were first talking and he'd been faithful in church. I was talking to him about being a deacon and he joined the church before I got there. I'd never heard of salvation testimony. He started telling me about how when he got saved, when this guy came to his home, knocked on his door, and he let him in, and he gave him the gospel and led him to Christ. Thinking, really? Boy, I've never seen him do anything like that. I've seen him do a bunch of other things. But one of my deacons was led to Christ by one of my biggest enemies. I said, praise God. Thank God that whatever else he's done on some days that day, he gave somebody the gospel and that person found Christ. And today he's a blessing to me and a blessing to our church. And don't let them have your joy. If you have to answer them, answer them, if you can avoid answering them, don't don't answer, but whatever you don't let them have your joy. Because there is in this. So many levels of blessing. When I started pastor in this church, I realized a lot of our new converts were from denominational churches and they were used to the doxology or something similar. And some of them said they missed having something like that, that you did at the beginning of every service. And so I don't want to do that. I picked a song. It's well with my soul. And I will sing that at the beginning of every service. And that functions like that for those folks, we'd started doing that. And one of my late Wednesday nights, people pick songs and somebody picked verse one of is well with my soul. And one of the ladies stood up and said, I'm so tired of that song. I've heard it so much since I don't know why we sing that so much. And she sat down. One of my deacons raised his hand to be called on for the next song, he took verse two. And asked for the next song, another deacon raised his hand, took verse three. Nexon was a teenage girl. She took verse four. I don't say, man, I'm glad that lady stood up. I mean, that ended up being a blessing for our church, she got mad and left, and that ended up being a blessing for our church. She's haunting another pastor now, and I'm not having any troubles at all with her. Don't let them take your joy. This is the greatest business in the world. Don't let them take your joy. Nothing is as glorious as being used of God to win people to Christ and see Christians grow. God bless y'all.