Saturday night before I lay down to sleep, I pray that the Lord would be faithful unto you all in the following day in the preaching of His Word. And I trust Him to do so. I do not trust this instrument, but I do trust Him. Turn with me in your Bibles, please, to 1 Corinthians chapter 15. We'll read verses 29 through 34. We have read a very large portion already, the whole chapter, so we will limit our reading to 29 through 34. Here now the inerrant, infallible, and inspired word of God. Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why are they then baptized for the dead? And why stand we in jeopardy every hour? I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus, our Lord, I die daily. If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantage hath it me if the dead rise not? Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Be not deceived. Evil communications corrupt good manners. Awake to righteousness and sin not, for some have not the knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame. May God add his blessing to the reading, to the hearing of his most holy word. The quotation this morning is from the Reverend Thomas Boston. The wicked world is a dangerous society and has been ruining to many. How many have been ruined by their being educated and living amongst those of the world lying in wickedness, never having an opportunity of good company? where they might see or get good. How many have been ruined by their falling into ill company after hopeful beginnings? The stream of our nature runs the wrong way. So the world lying in wickedness rose with that stream, and so is successful in working sinners' ruin. Proverbs 13, 20, he that walketh with wise men shall be wise, but a companion of fools. shall be destroyed." All right, very well said. Let me give you a little bit of the lay of the land here before we move on so you understand where we're going. So we have this section in 29 through 34, and we have been preaching through that section now for a few weeks. And Lord willing, we're going to come to the end of that section either this week or next, but I'm not going to be done with it at that point. there are several uses that I've already built up in my notes that I will probably not have time to get to today. And so what I want to do is I want to come to the end of chapter 15 verse 34, put a pin there and then go back through 29 and 34, or 29 through 34 in one sermon or two and provide a number of practical applications of that section. And I want to do that in a sermon by itself or maybe two sermons by themselves in order not to You know, I want to maybe flow through the passage, get to the end of it, and then provide all of those applications or uses in one sitting so that we can digest them together, okay? So that's kind of the lay of the land over the next two or three weeks. Pray that the Lord will help us to get through these sections or this section quite expeditiously, not too hurriedly, however, because we want to ring the scriptures for what we can get out of them, what the Lord would have us. to receive. Okay, so if we want to review just a moment from last week, we are studying the passage, Evil Communications Corrupt Good Manners. We unpacked it in its language from the original and then we began to give two examples last week. A man whose name is Lot, not Job. But Lot, and I know that last week I got stuck on saying Job over and again when I was actually meaning to say Lot, and I apologize for that. It only reminds me of my weaknesses, and I pray that you're all intelligent enough to sort that out in your minds. Thank you for being upright in all of that, and thank you for those that actually brought that to my attention. I do appreciate it. But we looked at Lot's life, and as it's unfolded there in chapters 13 and 14, Genesis and then in chapter 19, 18 and 19. And we saw failure upon failure because Lot chose or was not properly concerned with the evil company he would be keeping when he moved his tent towards Sodom. I hope you remember that from last week. And then we only had time for one more example and that was Joseph. You remember what Joseph said when he was talking to his brothers? There are those who would say that Joseph was completely upright in everything he did. I remember I had one Sunday school teacher once in an adult Sunday school class a long, long time ago that said, out of all the types of Christ we have in the Old Testament, Joseph never breaks down and sins. Well, I don't think that's right. I don't think that's right at all. I think perhaps there could be a movement of the spirit of prophecy upon him whereby he hides his identity. He's not required to give them all of that identity up front. And he does things with them that are perhaps upright as the spirit of God would move him down the road of, you know, of that prophetical office of his as he brings his brothers to repentance. However, when Job says, when Job swears by the life of Pharaoh, we cannot go down that road with him. There is nothing that we can do except to stand up and say, that is wrong. And especially as we come to recognize that Pharaoh was worshipped as a god among the Egyptians. So we cannot go down that road with Joseph. And we must say that Joseph's association, remember who he married? He married the daughter, her name was Potipharah, and she was the daughter of the priest of Ulm. Remember that? let's remember who he had married and that he was perhaps a little too close to that religious form of Egypt. And so when he used that, what we call a minced oath, it was indeed not upright. It was a sin in him from those evil associations that he'd made. And we want, we are the more forward to give him a break, right? He had no choice in going to Egypt. He was sold into slavery. Alright, so that was last week. Now we want to look at Jehoshaphat. We want to go on and a few more examples of evil associations. So turn with me in your Bibles please to 2 Chronicles chapter 19. The story is memorable enough that we need not recount the story so much, maybe just a few lines, but this is the rebuke of the king that comes from the seer, Jehu, the son of Hanani. And remember, there are a couple of Jehus in scripture, okay? So this is Jehu, the son of Hanani, a prophet in Jehoshaphat's time. And Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, returned to his house in peace to Jerusalem. What an understatement that first verse is, right? You remember what has happened? He's gone out to war with Ahab. He said to Ahab, my people are as thy people. Right? Let's go out to war together. Let's go up to Ramoth Gilead and let's get after those filthy Syrians together. Of course, Ahab is a Baal worshipper. And yet, Jehoshaphat joins himself. to Ahab in that battle. It's Jehoshaphat's idea. He's the one who sends to Ahab to join their forces together. The Lord, for his part, is seeking occasion against Ahab. Who will entice Ahab that he may go up and die at Ramoth Gilead? You remember all of that. And so Ahab then, having all of that prophecy from Micaiah, the son of Imlah, we have then Ahab saying to Jehoshaphat, I'll tell you what, this is a battle where I want the southern kingdom to be, you know, extolled and glorified, so I won't wear my kingly robes, you wear your kingly robes instead. And Jehoshaphat says, okay. And so he goes out into battle with his kingly robes on, And of course, the Syrians, they've got a saying among their soldiers. You remember this, right? Fight with no man save the King of Israel. That is Ahab. And so they see a guy dressed in royal apparel. They think it must be Ahab. And they pursue him and they corner him and they're about to slay him. And Jehoshaphat says, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, this is Jehoshaphat here, not Ahab. And so they leave him. And they can't find Ahab. Where's Ahab? I don't know. Can you find, did you see Ahab? No, I didn't see him. Did you see the king of Israel? No, I didn't. And so one guy just fires an arrow into the air without any direction at all except from God. And it hits Ahab between the chinks of the armor and he dies. So when the prophet here says, Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, returned to his house in peace to Jerusalem, let's understand, the great understatement that he has made there. It's a very modest statement. But he can afford a little bit of modesty in this case because of what he's about to report in verse two. And Jehu the son of Hanani the seer went out to meet him and said to King Jehoshaphat, shouldest thou help the ungodly and love them that hate the Lord, therefore is wrath upon thee from before the Lord. Nevertheless, there are good things found in thee, in that thou hast taken away the groves out of the land, and hast prepared thine heart to seek God. And Jehoshaphat dwelt at Jerusalem, and he went out again through the people from Beersheba to Mount Ephraim, and brought them back unto the Lord God of their fathers. So Jehoshaphat made those evil associations as well, did he not? What happens with regard to Jehoshaphat's son? Do you remember? You remember how we showed last week from the life of Lot, how that his sin had played out in his offspring, in his daughters, and then also in his family, in his wife? Well, what happens with Jehoshaphat's son, well, who is it? Ahaziah, that he marries the daughter of Ahab, Athaliah. Now let me ask you a question. Do you think that the son of Jehoshaphat would ever have made such an alliance with the Northern Kingdom and married Athaliah, the daughter of Ahab, had Jehoshaphat maintained a proper separation from those who hated the Lord? Well, there's an obvious answer there. It's really a rhetorical question. And yet these evil associations play out in the family of Jehoshaphat as well. And we all know the mess then that ensued under Athaliah, that she sought to kill all of the royal seed and that it was a nurse that took a little baby aside, Joash or Jehoash, took him aside and preserved him from her bloodthirsty deeds in order to put herself upon the throne of the southern kingdom of Judah. All began when Jehoshaphat said to Ahab, I am as thou art, and my people as thy people. Right? The next example that I want to give you is David. David, because of evil associations, also had his own difficulties, and we'll find this in 1 Samuel chapter 27 1st Samuel 27 verse 8 and David and his men went up and invaded the Geshurites and the Gesrites and the Amalekites for these nations were of old the inhabitants of the land as thou goest to shore even unto the land of Egypt. And David smote the land, and left neither man nor woman alive, and took away the sheep, and the oxen, and the asses, and the camels, and the apparel, and returned, and came to Achish. And Achish, by the way, he is the king of Gath. Achish said, Whither have ye gone, or whither have ye made a road to-day? And David said, Against the south of Judah, and against the south of the Jeremelites, and against the south of the Kenites. And David saved neither man nor woman alive to bring tidings to Gath, lest they should tell on us, saying, So did David, and so will be his manner all the while he dwelleth in the country of the Philistines. And Achish believed David, saying, He hath made his people Israel utterly to abhor him. Therefore he shall be my servant forever. Now that may have been a little difficult for some of you to understand. Let's explain it. David has been chased out of Israel by Saul. This is before the land is divided into the northern and southern kingdoms. That didn't happen until after Solomon in the days of Rehoboam. So the nation is all one at this point. David has had to flee from Saul and so he's fled to Gath in the land of the Philistines to King Achish. We might question the wisdom of David fleeing to Gath, seeing that it was Goliath of Gath that David began his career with as his warrior. But he did. Here he is in Gath. And so David still has a mandate upon him from the Lord, and he is the enemy of God's enemies. And yet here he is in Gath, God's enemies. So what does he do? He goes out far south. Now remember that Gath is in the south, along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. If you're looking at a map, so the Mediterranean Sea has a coastline that is on its east edge, pretty much north and south. I mean, it's got variations, but pretty much north and south. And then toward the south of that, where it begins to curve toward the west, toward that south part, that's where Gath is, along that edge there, okay? Now, David's already in the south, he's fled Israel, he's in Gath with King Achish, and so what does he do? He travels east from there, out toward the east, in the southern part of Israel's territory, where there are still the enemies of God there, and he attacks them. And notice that he not only attacks them, but he leaves nobody to tell the tale. He kills them all. women, children. He takes all of the spoil to himself and he takes all of the apparel so that there's no record left of who it was that he conquered. They've got all that stuff. A wanderer can't just travel by and say, oh, look at that. These are the garments of those folks that are the enemies of God. I wonder who conquered them. It's all gone. David has covered all of his tracks. And so he comes back to Gath after that military excursion, and Achish asks him, so, where have you been today on your exploits? And David says to him, notice, he says, well, against the south of Judah, against the Jeremialites and against the Kenites. Now, they were both allies of Israel. And Achish believes him and he says, oh, David's gonna be my soldier forever now because he's attacked his own people and their allies. Did David tell the truth though? No, he did not. He lied to Achish. Now again, we maybe want to extend a little bit greater forgiveness to David and understand his circumstances because he was unlawfully driven out of Israel by Saul. Yet, even when unlawfully driven out and finding himself in the midst of Achish and Gath, notice what those evil associations did for him. They did not work in the way of uprightness for him. Rather, they worked against that. So we see some of David's weakest moments where he just tells a bold-faced lie to Achish. All right. Maybe two more. Two examples from the New Testament. Turn with me to Matthew chapter 26. Again, a very familiar passage to us. We'll begin our reading in verse 69. Now Peter sat without in the palace, and a damsel came unto him, saying, Thou also wast with Jesus of Galilee. But he denied before them all, saying, I know not what thou sayest. And when he was gone out into the porch, another maid saw him and said unto them that were there, this fellow was also with Jesus of Nazareth. And he denied again with an oath, I do not know the man. And after a while came unto him, they that stood by and said to Peter, surely thou also art one of them for thy speech bereath thee. Then he began to curse and to swear. saying, I know not the man, and immediately the cock crew. And Peter remembered the word of Jesus, which said unto him, before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. And he went out and wept bitterly. You say, well, Pastor Todd, this is a different thing, isn't it? No, no, no, it's not at all. Listen to what the apostle said in 1 Corinthians 15, 33. He said, evil associations, you know, as it's translated in communications, corrupt good manners, good morals. He doesn't say that they're voluntary or involuntary. He doesn't say you chose them or didn't choose them. He doesn't say any of those things. He's simply stating the principle. And the principle here was that when Peter was in the company of those who would associate him to Jesus on the night he was arrested and heading toward the cross, Peter did not want to be associated. with Jesus Christ in their presence and so he denied him. Evil communications corrupt good manners, good morals, good ethics. He didn't have the conscience to stand in the face of the accusations that were brought. You are an associate of Jesus Christ and I hope you see that in choosing to associate with them he distanced himself from Christ. Let's not fail to notice that as well. And as he denied Christ in his speech, notice how ironic it is that they said to him, your speech betrays you. And that's when he began to curse and to swear with his mouth. Even with an oath, he said, I do not know him. And then finally, one more. Turn with me to Galatians chapter two. Verse 11. But when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. For before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles, But when they were come, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision. And the other Jews dissembled likewise with him, insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation." What is dissimulation? Pretense. Hypocrisy. Before James sent a deputation from Jerusalem to the churches of Galatia to see what was going on there. Peter, the rest of the Jews, and Barnabas, under the instruction of the Apostle Paul, they were eating unclean food with Gentiles. They didn't have difficulty with it. Rise, Peter, kill and eat. We've already seen that. Peter had no difficulty. Oh, but hold on now. We need to have separate tables. the Jews from Jerusalem have come. So we can't eat with Gentiles now. And notice that the rest of the Jews were carried away by Peter. I mean, Peter, who is he? He's an apostle. He's gonna have clout and respect. And so not only were the Jews carried away, but also even Barnabas was carried away with that dissimulation. He should have distanced himself. from that evil association, but instead he fell right in with it. That drew a stinging rebuke, a public rebuke from the Apostle Paul, did it not? As you read on in the chapter. Okay, well those are the scripture examples. We had Lot last week, we had Joseph last week, and now we have these few this week, Jehoshaphat, David, Peter, and Barnabas. We could find many, many other examples. I want to show you Old Testament examples, New Testament examples, people that are held highly in esteem, people that are somewhat weak-willed, all of it. Because the principle is true for us all. Every one of us will be affected one way or another. It is an absolute principle. Evil communications corrupt good manners. So I want to talk with you about that. I want to explore the direct commands of scripture for a little bit, and then for the rest of our time together, maybe talk about those associations and how they work. So get your Bible drill hats on, and we'll start with Psalm 106. Psalm 106, verse 35. We're going to move quickly through these passages for the sake of time, but each of them have the same message. Psalm 106 verse, well, let's see, verse 32, talking about the people of Israel, they angered him also at the waters of strife so that it went ill with Moses for their sakes, because they provoked his spirit so that he spake unadvisedly with his lips. They did not destroy the nations concerning whom the Lord commanded them, but were mingled among the heathen and learned their works. They served their idols, which were a snare unto them." Speaking of the people of Israel. 119-63, I am companion of all them that fear thee and of them that keep thy precepts. There's the other side of that coin, right? Those are the kinds of associations that we ought to desire. Proverbs chapter 1 and verse 10, my son if sinners entice thee Consent thou not if they say come with us. Let us lay wait for blood. Let us work privily for the innocent without cause Let us swallow them up alive as the grave and hold as those that go down to the pit We shall find all precious substance. We shall fill our houses with spoil cast in thy lot among us Let us all have one first my son walk not thou in the way with them Refrain thy foot from their path for their feet run to evil and make haste to shed blood and so on Then we go to Proverbs 9, verse 6. Forsake the foolish and live, and go in the way of understanding. In Proverbs 13, 20. He that walketh with wise men shall be wise, but a companion of fools shall be destroyed. Proverbs 22, 24. By humility, oops, 24, make no friendship with an angry man and with a furious man, thou shalt not go. Proverbs 29, 34. Sorry, 24. Whoso partner with a thief, hateth his own soul. He heareth cursing and bereath it Not. The word bere, that is a, that's an old English word, which means the same thing to betray. But here in this context, it means to rebuke that cursing, right? To say you ought not to be speaking that way. In other words, in the new Testament, we have the same kind of, of application in first Corinthians, not just 15, but also seven. Verse 39, talking about marriage here. Notice the wife is bound by the law as long as her husband liveth. But if her husband be dead, she is at liberty to be married to whom she will only in the Lord. Only in the Lord, Paul says. And then 2 Corinthians 6, verse 14. Be you not unequally yoked together with unbelievers? For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness, and what communion hath light with darkness, and what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye, all of you together, are the temple of the living God. As God hath said, I will dwell in them and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore, come out from among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord. and touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you, and will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. Right, 7-1 belongs to that prior discourse there in chapter six. And then one more in, well, let's see, where are we here? 2 Thessalonians chapter 3. it is not second Thessalonians wait a minute maybe it is yes yes but ye brethren be not weary in well doing verse 13 and then in verse 14 and if any man obey not our word by this epistle note that man and have no company with him that he may be ashamed Yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother." All right, so those few passages of scripture are teaching a scripture principle that is replete throughout the whole, and that is that we must keep close watch over our associations. Now, here's the first point that we want to make sure we understand. We have certain associations over which we have little or no control at all, right? You don't get to choose your family. You are in the families that you are in by God's providence. You didn't choose that. You didn't, before time began, choose who you were gonna have as your brother and your sister and your mother and your father. Those are involuntary associations. You are in that association by force of being born into that family, right? We've looked at this in the spouse of 1 Corinthians 7. where Paul is addressing a real pastoral concern. What does the apostle say there? Well, there's a pastoral concern. Someone's come to faith in Christ after being married to someone in the Corinthian church. And that meant that former husband or wife would be perhaps going down and doing things at the temple that were, oh my goodness, right? They're still worshiping as idol worshipers. What am I supposed to do, Paul? In that circumstance, shall I be separated from the unbeliever? Paul says, no, if they're content to live with you, stay with them. That's an involuntary association. That marriage bond is something that ought to be kept at that point. Okay? So there are such a thing as, such things as involuntary associations. It may also be true of a child. that is converted by speaking to a friend or something like that, and he goes back home to an unbelieving household. He doesn't get to choose new parents because he's become a believer in that sense. We cannot sever such ties with our immediate family members in such cases, so that's an involuntary association. Secondly, we have co-workers if we work perhaps outside the home. I tell you of a truth, my dear brothers and sisters, let me just Let me just give you a piece of advice here, that if you've never had to work outside the home, you don't recognize what a blessing that is, because there are some horrid places to work, where all day long, you're going to hear foul language. All day long, you're gonna hear unholy conversation. All day long, you're going to be, you're going to have people enticing you to follow them in doing evil. If you haven't had to work outside the home, and you've avoided those influences, frankly, I don't know why people are rushing to do it. I can't understand it. So give thanks if you've never had to endure that kind of environment. If you've never had those kinds of evil associations. Okay, but more or less, right, we have some involuntary and some voluntary with regard to where we work outside the home. If you work in a place that is very lucrative but is horrible morally, you may choose to find another job that pays less because you care more about not maintaining evil associations. So there are some voluntary and some involuntary influences with regard to, you know, if we work outside the home at a particular place of business, a job site, a factory, or whatever that is. The folks we do business with then also in our activities of commerce, right, where we go shopping, for instance. where we go shopping, what stores we choose to patronize, whether we do that online, whether we go meet people and talk to them face to face, and so on. How we conduct all of that, that also involves some voluntary associations, and perhaps some involuntary associations, right? There may be only one place reasonable for you to get a particular good or service that you need, and so you must make an association that you perhaps would not otherwise make at such a time. So the folks we do business with. We might be able to choose with whom we do business and direct some of those associations toward those who have a like profession of faith and conduct themselves accordingly. Okay, so the rule for Christians then, what Paul is teaching us here is to beware of the principle. He's not telling us that in every particular and in every association we should avoid evil. He knows that that cannot be done. Remember what he said back in 1 Corinthians chapter 5. I wrote with you not to keep company with fornicators, yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, and then he goes on with a list of other sins, for then ye must needs go out of the world. What I was talking about when I told you that was if someone's in the church, he claims to be a brother, and he is habitually committing these sins, that you don't eat with him, that you don't eat the Lord's Supper with him, that you put him out of the church. Paul recognizes that we cannot go out of the world. He's not simply overturning that ten chapters later. We can't go out of the world. Some of our associations must be with those who are evil, unbelievers who don't have a profession of faith in Christ and who will, if they can, get over on you and your commerce or whatever. You must go into that eyes wide open. And by the way, may I say this, that it is better to overpay for something with someone that's upright than to get the best deal with someone that's not. That's my opinion. That's my understanding of it. If you're doing business with someone, remember that you ought to be the kind of person who understands who you're doing business with and you want to love your neighbor as yourself. Right? You want them also to make a profit. You want them also to be able to be in business later so you can patronize them again when you need to. If they have something that you need, you want to be able to go back to them. You don't want to be the one that puts them out of business. I can tell you being in the contracting business, in the construction business for a number of years that there were Some general contractors that it seemed they took pleasure in driving some subcontractors to their knees. I tell you that is a horrible way to do business. We want to love our neighbors as ourselves and that goes along with how we do business and the person that we're doing business with. We don't want to be like that buyer that Solomon mentions in the Proverbs. It is not. It is not, saith the buyer. Oh, oh, oh, I don't know how I could buy that, that, that silly thing. And then he buys it. And then he goes immediately to his friend. Hey, see what I got here. Pretty nice, huh? Right? We don't want to be like that buyer. Okay? All right. So we want to love our neighbor as ourselves. And sometimes you may want to direct your commerce toward an evil association if you're having a good conversation with that evil association. In other words, If we were to absolutize this concept, evil associations corrupt good morals, what would we be saying if we absolutize it in the wrong way? We would say we'd never even speak to someone about Christ, because that's an evil association, right? We don't want to associate with them. That's not what Paul is teaching here. Our Lord Jesus Christ was able to associate with people that were the unsavories of the world, and he was indeed rebuked by the Pharisees for doing so. Now let us remember that our Lord Jesus Christ had the Spirit without measure and so he was able to go into situations perhaps that we are not able to and remain uncorrupted. We must know ourselves in these ways in order rightly to apply and to make use of this commandment, this prohibition on the part of the Apostle. Okay, so when it is required of us that we are in situations where we must associate with the unrighteous. The Bible helps us with that. It doesn't leave us simply as orphans. Turn with me to Matthew chapter five. Verse 13. Ye are the salt of the earth, but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out and to be trodden underfoot of men. Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father, which is in heaven. Brothers and sisters, you can't always be in the company of the upright. but you can always have your light on. Turn with me to Philippians chapter 2 verse 14 do all things without murmurings and disputings, that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation among whom ye shine as lights in the world. Okay, so he's talking to the church at Philippi, that's over in the peninsula that we call Greece today, right? And what's going on there in Philippi, is that it's a very loose society, very immoral society. Paul says, you dwell in the midst of a perverse nation. That's an involuntary association. You can't just get up, especially in those days, you couldn't just get up and leave everything and go to a holy city somewhere. You might have had trouble finding a holy city in those days. So Paul says, it's not that you need to get up and leave, it's that you need to shine as lights. And so the first thing that I want you to understand from 1 Corinthians 15 33 is that we're not always going to be able to avoid evil communications. We're not always going to be able to avoid evil associations. Some of the associations that we have in this world are involuntary. We get that. We understand it. We can't go out of the world. But what are we going to do when we are in those necessary kinds of associations? We must continue to be Savory. Why does the apostle, or sorry, why does Jesus use salt and light in those connections there? Let's remember, salt makes things savory. Savory to whom? Savory to God. We want to be salty in that sense, that we are savory to God. The Lord smells that sweet savor. All of the sacrifices, I don't know if you remember this or not from your Old Testament reading, But all of the sacrifices had salt on them. They were never to offer a sacrifice without salt. That was to teach a church under age that as that salt gave a sweet savor to them, they were to be savory to God because that sacrifice and what it pointed to, our Lord Jesus Christ, is only savory to God, right? That's the only thing in this world that is savory to God when he looks down upon this world. And it is only for the sake of Christ and his saver, that the Lord saves the world at all. So that's why salt is used there, that in the midst of an evil association, and if we might carry that metaphor out a little bit farther without running the risk of, you know, breaking it off eventually, but if we might run it out a little bit farther, we have that saver in the midst of what? In the midst of corruption, right? And Paul uses that a little bit later in 2 Corinthians chapter 2, does he not? Where he says our preaching is savory, but to those who are perishing it smells like death and corruption. Right? So think of it on, you know, in those terms, in that kind of duality. There is that which is savory, that which smells like You know, pick your favorite thing. Grilled vegetables or grilled steak or whatever it is. And then there's that which smells like you left the steak out in the sun for three days. What's that going to smell like? Well, in Texas, we're not left to wonder about that, right? Especially in the summer when we see those animals along the side of the road and the stench is so bad that we can smell them driving by them at 60 miles an hour. We're not left to wonder about that. Okay, but that's the kind of world that we live in And we are to be savory in the midst of that world. Yes, the world that we live in is an unsavory world, a corrupted world. And we are to be savory in the midst of that world. And then he goes on to talk about darkness. The world that we live in is dark. And by darkness there, he means ignorance and the corruption and unrighteousness that comes with darkness. That comes with that ignorance. And he says we are to shine as lights in that world and not only that but we are to shine as an advertisement of the uprightness of God that men may see your good works and glorify your father which is in heaven. That's what we do when we don't have a choice about the associations. Salt and light. Those are the scripture terms that are used there. In Ephesians the apostle will say don't participate in the unfruitful works of darkness but rather reprove them, shine light on them, air them out a little bit. Right? Shine the light on them. Everything that is exposed to light is brought forth and manifested. Let the light that you have shine before men, such that you are berating their cursing, as we read earlier in the Proverbs. So it's clear. The Bible's not a Pollyanna book. It's not a book that is unrealistic. It's not telling us, okay, well, you should break off all associations, except those, except that which is upright. Well, no, the Bible's not requiring that of you. Otherwise, you'd need to go out of the world. But where we have no choice, no advantage, no opportunity of anything different, we shine as lights. We add savor. like salt does. So the Lord has lit us and put us in the midst of darkness. He has salted us and put us in the midst of that world in order that we might raise it up around us. That there might be a zone of light around us and a zone of savoriness around us where we are affecting the world around us in those involuntary associations. But I'm gonna tell you that unless you're taking care of the voluntary associations, you will probably not be successful in the involuntary associations. And this is the point that Paul is making in 1 Corinthians 15, 33. If we are choosing to spend time with those who are evil and corrupted, If we are choosing for our disposable time to spend that with unsavory people, dark, people that are steeped in darkness, we will not be able when it comes time to those involuntary associations to be salt and light. We've already lost. We've already been conquered. We've already been bested. And that is what Paul's talking about. Where you have a choice, where you have an option, where you are able to direct your associations, direct them remembering that evil associations corrupt good morals. Remember that principle. Now we have seen haven't we, in our study, and I wanted to make sure and show you this, the difference between voluntary and involuntary associations. In Lot, we saw a voluntary association with the men of Sodom. In Joseph, we saw an involuntary association with Egypt. In David, we saw a somewhat voluntary association with Achish. He could have stayed in the cave of Adullam. Okay, he's already been with Achish in chapter 21. He leaves there, that's when he scrabbled on the ground, right? But he left, you know, he acted like a madman, in other words. And Achish said, I've got enough of Madman, get this guy out of my presence. And so he left and went to the cave of Adullam. He could have stayed in the cave of Adullam. Now it may have been particularly inhospitable there, so that he needed to go somewhere else. And so there's a voluntary element and an involuntary element in David there. And we saw what it did for him. Then we looked at Jehoshaphat. That was voluntary, right? Then we looked at, oh, let's see, who else did we look at? One more Old Testament saint, right? Who was that? Let's see. No, I guess that was it. He was the last Old Testament guy. And then we looked at Peter. Well, Peter didn't have to stay at the fire, standing around with those unbelievers. He chose that, that association. And then Barnabas. We looked at Barnabas. And Barnabas did not have to go with them in that association, although, They were churchmen with him, and so he may have felt an obligation, but notice in feeling that obligation, he was ill-affected by it. Okay, so what have we seen? We've seen that there's involuntary and voluntary associations. And I want to separate those in our thinking, because when we are called upon to maintain an involuntary association, we must stand strong as salt and light. But if we're going to stand strong as salt and light, then we're going to have to make decisions that are better than that. with regard to our voluntary associations. Now the grief of failure in this area is that when we make those involuntary associations and we, sorry, when we make those voluntary associations, and we brought this out in Lott, did we not, that often we don't know how far we've fallen. We're ignorant of how far we've fallen. We've been jaded and accustomed, and can I say it this way, we have been acclimated We've been acclimated to evil. And so we don't even know that we're doing evil. That's a difficulty. That's a big problem. And yet it happens all the time. It happened with righteous lot. And let's remember that we maintained throughout last week's sermon, that it was righteous lot that we were talking about. He was a righteous man. He was saved by the righteousness of Jesus Christ. He was righteous in that sense. He was a man of faith and yet he had become so very ill-affected by the evil associations that he made that he didn't know he was doing wrong. This is the grief of violating this principle that the Apostle speaks about here. Evil associations corrupt good morals. It's not your behavior that falls It's the foundation for your behavior that falls. It's your morality that changes. And when your morality changes, you can't know you're doing wrong anymore until someone like J.U. comes and says, is it right for you to love those that the Lord hates? Is it right for you to give your help and support to someone who only hates God and curses him? And as difficult as that would have been for the king to hear, we thank the Lord that the Lord granted repentance according to the passage that we read. And we see that repentance played out in Jehoshaphat's further reformation. This must be our way to avoid evil associations. Do you think Jehoshaphat thought he was doing wrong? Notice also, if you remember the history of it, that Jehoshaphat actually did attempt to raise up the conversation a bit. Do you remember that? Ahab brought all of his prophets out, all prophets of Baal, every one of them. And they all said, go up to Ramoth Gilead and prosper. And Jehoshaphat looks around and he turns to Ahab and he says, do you have any prophets of Jehovah here? Do you remember that? And then Ahab says, I have one. His name is Micaiah, the son of Imlot. hate him, because he never tells me what I want to hear. It's always something evil that I don't want. And Jehoshaphat says, well, let's hear from him too. Remember that? Remember that story? Even in the midst of that, however, Jehoshaphat showed himself evil affected, even with that best of intention. And that was a voluntary association that he had made. So let's remember all of that as we try to come to grips with this principle. The grief of failure in this area is that we don't know how far we've fallen. It takes that arresting confrontation and rebuke on the part of the prophet. It takes that arresting and confrontational rebuke on the part of the angels with Lot. And yet Lot is very slow in his response as we saw. So we become acclimated to certain unlawful practices, and in this, in being acclimatized to it, we lose our own sense of what is upright, and we begin to grade on the curve. We develop a mindset of, well, at least. You know what I mean by that? Well, at least I haven't. Well, at least these folks I'm hanging out with don't fill in the blanks. And what have we done? As soon as we begin to speak that language, we've already changed the standard. we've already changed our ethic. Because I'm here to tell you, brothers and sisters, that God's standard doesn't change. It doesn't change. If evil communications change your manners, your ethic, God's ethic doesn't change. And that is the one that we're required to answer to. Not the ethics of the group. We saw the ethics of the group in Proverbs chapter one, right? Come join in your lot with us. We'll all have one purse. We'll take from the poor and needy. If we have to, oh, we'll break a few eggs in order to get rich, right? We'll change the standard, but God's standard doesn't change. We're often ignorant how far we've gone from righteousness, and like Asaph, are awakened suddenly out of our beast-like estate. Asaph in Psalm 73, right? What does Asaph say? I was like a beast before thee. I got my eyes off of the Lord and started looking at the world. And I looked at the rich and I said, there's no pangs in their death. Surely I have cleansed my hands in vain." Those are Asaph's words, not Pastor Todd's words. And then he said, till I went to the sanctuary of God, and I heard their latter end. And then in his lament he says, I was like a beast. What did he do? He made an evil association. He began to look on the wicked rich with favor, instead of maintaining that upright standard of God. So, I guess we're about to close here. This is point number one. In this verse 33, we've seen the negative side of associations. And there's one more thing to remember that for the Christian, as we said a moment ago, the standard never changes. Associations and their influences come and go. And they change throughout our lives. A new job, a new living situation, a marriage, new opportunities for doing business in the places we shop, new stores open, and so on. All these things provide an opportunity for some kind of intentionality, support for like-minded people, upright folks in our commerce, in our relationships, and so on. We might also say a word about that these things change and they move. As we saw last week with Lot, we saw the evil associations that he made with the men of Sodom Because the place was well watered, then we ask the question, what does that place look like today? Nothing grows there. It's a salt pit. So salty that nobody drowns in the Red Sea. Everybody pops up like a cork. The water is so heavy. Nobody or nothing lives there. There's not a fish in the Dead Sea. little salt brine shrimp, the only creature in the world that can survive the salinity of that water. Inedible to men. And they feed on little algae that can bear the salt. That's it. It's not well watered anymore. And so all the things we hope to gain by making unlawful or unholy associations will go away. We will not profit from them. And we will lose our ethic. All right, so next week then, as we bring this sermon to a close, I want to drop the other shoe because that's what Paul does. Not only does he say evil associations corrupt good morals, then he goes on to say, listen to this, awake to righteousness and sin not. for some have not the knowledge of God. And so he gives us some direction for our voluntary associations. And that's what we'll look at next week. Let's stand and call upon the Lord in prayer.