is God's only way to ransom the sinner and wash sins away. How worthy the Lamb through the ages will reign. He came as my Savior, He'll come as my King. The blood of Jesus flows from the cross, Pleading my part and hoping for the cost. Dear Son of God, how loving Thou art! Merciful Steve, you're coming to my heart. Amen. Thank you for your good singing. We can put our hymnals aside. And I don't have to dismiss the kids because, well, I do. One of you can leave. Do you want to go to the class with Mrs. Shore? Yeah, you're welcome to. Go ahead, Eppa. All right. 1 Thessalonians chapter 2 and verses 1 through 6. Paul in his day had a very powerful gospel, and we've just completed a study of the book of Acts. It's amazing. As you go through that book, you see a gospel that was just brilliant in its brightness, in its power, in its impact. I guess you could say almost disgusting today to see that the gospel, it seems, has lost its power. You could ask, you know, why aren't we having the same effects? Why aren't we seeing people respond? But I would question whether or not, in whatever, in the broadness of Christianity, whatever, wherever somebody is in that scheme, as far as saying evangelical, whether fundamental or not, whether some of these key points about Paul's gospel is missing. Like for instance, I could think growing up of times where even in a good church, okay, a church that loves God and is doctrinally right and is practically right, but has very little gospel outreach, strong admissions, right? So, as we'll look at this, there's ways that, just in the broadness of Christianity evangelicalism, if we took Paul's gospel and we took whatever we've got in our relationship with God in our gospel, and we compared it with Paul's, probably there's gonna be areas where we'd have to look at it and say, you know what? My gospel is not like Paul's gospel in that regard. But we need to get back to Paul's gospel. Again, his gospel was a powerful gospel. 1 Thessalonians 1.5, just the previous chapter to where we're at, it says, for our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Ghost and in much assurance, as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sake. Paul's gospel was, it was powerful, it was dynamic, it was spirit-empowered gospel that Paul shared. In chapter two, verse 13, which is our text, within our text, or just after the text. It says, for this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because when you received the word of God, which he heard of us, you received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe. Okay, a couple things. When they received it, they're listening, Paul's coming along, he's on his mission of sharing Christ to the world, and he comes and he begins to tell them about Jesus Christ crucified and risen again for their salvation, like we've already spoken about, atonement, that that is the atoning work of Christ, that is the payment for your sin, that your sin can be covered. with the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. As he did that, his gospel was so powerful that as people received it, they didn't receive it as Paul's opinion. They didn't think, well, that's just your worldview, Paul. That's just the way you think. You were brought up in it, and he wasn't. We know that, but that's what a lot of people say. That's the way you are. You've just grown up in it, so you believe it, et cetera. But as Paul gave it, there's something about what they said that they had to stop and go, you know what, this is God speaking to me. It's not somebody, yes, God uses people, but it is as if God himself is speaking to me in my heart saying, look, this is true, this is my word, okay? So he received that as the word of God. But notice at the end of the verse, it says, which effectually also worketh also in you that believe. effectually worketh also in you that believe." Okay, the gospel has power to set man free, but can I say it only sets those that will come to faith and believe it free. That's it. So somebody could say, ah, see, you believe that, but it doesn't work for me. It doesn't work for you because you don't believe it. Because you've not accepted what God said. As soon as you accept what God said, it works. I mean, if we have people in this community, as we evangelize, we share Christ with them, they take it as the word of God. They take it as the truth of God, salvation by faith in Jesus Christ alone, that he died on the cross, paid the price for his sin. Every single person in this community would experience then the power of the gospel to set them free from the punishment of their sin and from sin itself. It's powerful, but it only works in those that believe. So there's both and. We've got on the one hand, yes, We've got to give the gospel the correct way. As we seek to give the gospel, we have to examine the gospel gun and say, you know, I'm trying to shoot the gospel gun and see unbelievers get saved. And so I got to examine it and say, is my gospel right? Am I giving the most powerful gospel I can give? So you've got that aspect of the gospel. On the other hand, you've got the aspect of the gospel of mankind has to receive it. They have to believe it. So in either case, an ineffective gospel or a gospel that's not God's gospel the way God intended, that's gonna weaken the gospel. And then man's reception of it, that's gonna affect the gospel as well. Do you see it? So I mean, you're kinda dealing with two things. But as believers, what do we wanna do? We gotta make sure that what we're doing as we seek to get the gospel is that we give the gospel as God intended it to be given. And so we could ask this morning, We're going to look at Paul's example, because he's the one in this passage saying, this is the way I gave the gospel. As we look at that, we could ask the question, well, is it biblical for us to look at the example of Paul's gospel and apply it to ourselves? Here we are 2,000 years later in New Testament times. Is his example that good? Is it that correct? Is it that accurate that we can make it a doctrine, in a sense, where we can say, if we're not giving this gospel the way Paul did, then we're wrong in our application of the gospel? And I believe we can come to that position. And we can come to it biblically, because Paul has said, in 1 Corinthians 4, 16, he said, wherefore I beseech you, I plead with you, be ye followers of me. Paul's an apostle, he's a preacher, he's a spirit and power preacher, but he's also an apostle. He's an author of scripture, so as he is given scripture, we know all scripture is given by inspiration of God, and it's profitable for doctrine, for proof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. So Paul has authority when he's writing scripture, and he's writing here, in this case, 1 Corinthians, when he says, I beseech you, be ye followers of me, he's got the authority of God behind him in what he's saying. 1 Corinthians 11, verse one, he says again, be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ. Again, he's commanding that, follow me. As I'm seeking to lead the early church for Christ, follow me. And then he commends in our passage, the chapter before our text, he commends these believers in Thessalonica that were receiving this letter, as he says, and ye became followers of us and of the Lord. So, Thessalonians, who are you following? You're following us, the apostles, and Jesus Christ. But notice, as they followed Paul and Jesus Christ, what happened? Because it says, it goes on to say, so that ye became in samples or examples to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia. Now, for from you sounded out the word of the Lord, what's at the gospel, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith to God where it is spread abroad. So Paul said, as you followed us, as you followed the Lord, what happened? You became givers of the gospel. So it's already taking place. So I think I can say dogmatically this morning, with the authority of scripture, that Paul's example is one that we are given for the purpose of examining our gospel and saying, are we giving the gospel as God intended? And to really consider how we witness to somebody and how we preach the gospel. And we are called to preach it. Well, in Corinthians 121, It says, for after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God. It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. There's a lot of people today that have this idea, and it's almost honorable. They almost pat themselves on the back as far as their relationships with unbelievers. And they say, I'm just living it in front of them. I'm not preaching it. And if they tell you about something that's affected that person's life where it seems like the truth is starting to click with them, they'll almost make it honorable saying, but I didn't preach to him, but I didn't preach. Wait a second. Is it honorable to say that when God has commanded us, go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature? So it's not preaching, yes, it's an offense. Preaching, by the way, just means to foretell. It is what I'm doing up here, but it's also what we do anytime we speak to somebody about the Lord. That's preaching, okay, in the sense of foretelling, telling it to them. So it's not a bad thing this morning to have opportunity to, in a sense, in that sense, preach the gospel to them. God's commanded us to do that. And so what we're examining is how we do that, how we verbally share Christ. All right. So with that introduction, let's pray and ask God to bless his word to our hearts this morning. Father, we're thankful again for the word of God. And Father, we praise you for the power of God. And Lord, our confidence this morning, it's not in ourselves. And Father, we wanna examine our gospel gun, as it were, and how we're shooting out the gospel and what we're using, and methodology. But Father, we confess this morning that the power is of you, that the power is the Spirit of God, that the power is God. And yet, Father, we can hinder that power working through us if we don't have a gospel like you intended. And so I'd ask, please help us to seriously examine our hearts this morning, examine our gospel. May this message be of help to us in our evangelism. And Lord, we need to evangelize today. There's thousands of people on their way to hell, and I pray, God, give us compassion. God, give us grace to not be so self-centered, that we care so much about ourselves and what we got going on in our own little worldview, that we miss the big picture of a world without Christ, on its way to a Christless eternity, and the fires of damnation. And so, I just pray, use this message as you receive it, and help me as I preach. It's in Christ's name I pray, amen. All right, so if we're gonna preach the gospel, as Paul preached the gospel, then we need to have a purposeful gospel, okay, a purposeful gospel. Verse one, now we're to 1 Thessalonians 2, beginning at verse one. Paul says, for yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you, that it was not in vain. Okay, our entrance in unto you. Where was this church? Somebody help me out. The Thessalonians were in the city of Thessalonica. Paul, where's Paul from? Paul's from Jerusalem. How'd he get there? Missionary journey, right? And so he's saying, remember when we came there to share Christ, this is how it took place. He said it wasn't in vain as we got there. In vain means without purpose. So it wasn't that Paul got to Thessalonica and he's just kind of there to just kind of be there. Paul has a gospel purpose. As he came to that place, he's got a purpose of sharing Christ. Remember in our study of Acts, every time that Paul got to another city, the pattern was similar. It said, you read, and he entered into the synagogue, right? Typically, he entered into the synagogue. He began to speak to the Jews and say, you know what, that Messiah that you're looking for, he's come. His name's Jesus Christ, and he begins to take the Old Testament scriptures and show them how those scriptures are fulfilled in the life of Jesus Christ. Not everybody believes him some do praise god some of the jews do get saved but by and large every time he did that There's a rejection of christ. There's a rejection therefore of paul And so paul's despised he's persecuted because of it But every single time it's the same pattern He comes into a community. He goes into the synagogue every time again. I mean he's coming it's gospel So in modern day missions mindset, people have this idea, yeah, I'm going on a mission trip. Hey, that's great. What are you going to do? Well, we're going to build houses. Oh. Or we're going to help establish a clinic. Good. We're going to seek to teach good sanitation. Again, good. We're going to seek to care for orphans. Good. We're gonna seek to, there's all these things, we're gonna feed those that need food, we're gonna start a food pantry. And you can say good, but can I say this, that's not good if it leaves out the gospel. If the purpose of that is gospel, in other words, I'm going there to establish an orphanage so that I can have a Bible school so I can teach those kids the gospel so that they can be saved, good. Orphanage of itself, pointless as far as purpose. Because God hasn't called us to go into all the world to start orphanages. As good as it is, and as much as those kids need a home, what they need more than that is a heavenly father. They need Jesus Christ as their savior. And so there's this idea, missions is, it's become, instead of being gospel focused, it's become just a humanistic endeavor to try to better the lives of people in their social environment. And that's not what God's called us to do. It's vain. You know, this morning, in a sense of my life as a believer. God has put me in a location that no other believer's in. I've got certain neighbors that nobody else has. I share some with Kathy, right? All right? We share some neighbors, but I've got closer relationships. I've got different relationships. In a work setting, there's people I come in contact that somebody else that's working would not come into contact with. They'd come into contact with people I don't come into contact with. What could I say this morning, could you say about your sphere of influence? And wherever God's placed you, Would you have to say, would those people stand up and say, on the day of judgment, their entrance into me was in vain? There was no gospel purpose. See, everything in a believer's life ought to have a gospel purpose. I know, maybe in a work setting, somebody can't evangelize all the time, but they can pray for their coworkers, they can seek to give them encouragement, biblical encouragement. They could seek in off hours or during hours if they're allowed to have conversation, to share the gospel with them. The same with neighbors, you know, when they say, you know, their entrance into me, it's in vain. And at the judgment day, stand, and if they could, look across at us and say, before they're damned, before they're cast into hell, hey, your entrance into me was in vain. There was no purpose. You never gave me the gospel. You never gave me what I needed. You never warned me about hell. You never told me about God's love and Jesus Christ. See, the gospel, the Bible says in our weapons of warfare, it says, feet shod with the gospel peace. But I believe very few believers get up in the morning and put on their gospel, she is praying and saying, God, I pray today you give me opportunities to speak to somebody about you. And then as that person comes across her path, take the time and say, you know, can I invite you to church? Can I give you a gospel track? And do you go to church? You know, what do you believe about God? And start a conversation that has a gospel purpose of speaking to them about eternity. See, Paul's gospel, it did, you know, you look at Paul and you go, man, what a great man of God. He went to all these countries. He was the big voice of these that have turned the world upside down have come hither. He was the one proclaiming Christ around the world. But it wasn't, he wasn't on holiday. He wasn't just traveling. He wasn't just, I'm sure Thessalonica was an amazing city, but Paul, when he looked at the city, didn't see the city, he saw the souls. And so when it comes to the gospel, there has to be purpose. We're not gonna become good evangelists by accident. It's not gonna happen without effort. And so we gotta examine our gospel gun and say, well, is the bullet in there? Is it ready? Is it prepared to be fired? So preach a purposeful gospel. And then also we find about Paul's gospel, he preached a powerful gospel. He preached a powerful gospel. And I just mean in the sense that it was unstoppable. There was nothing anybody could do to stop the gospel coming out of the Apostle Paul's mount. Do whatever you wanna do to him physically, and it's not gonna stop. It's not gonna cease. It's part of Paul's life. We're gonna see that later on under passion. But preach a powerful gospel. This is a day of persecution. If you look at chapter two, verse 14 and 15, Paul acknowledges that to the church in Thessalonica. He says, for ye brethren became followers of the churches of God, which in Judea are in Christ Jesus. For ye also have suffered like things of your own countrymen, even as they have of the Jews, who both killed the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and have persecuted us. And they please not God, and are contrary to all men. Okay, wait a second. Paul, what kind of opposition are you facing, life-threatening? Yeah. This is, I mean, just a generation from Jesus Christ. Christ was crucified. He's the leader of the church. He's crucified. What's happening to his followers? Paul well knows what's happening to his followers. They're being put into prison and put to death because Paul has been a part of that, and now Paul's on the other side of that. But you'll notice, as Paul faces this, nothing stops him. If you look at Acts, and again, in our day, we could say, believers could say this. I could say, why don't you witness? Hey, it's not easy to witness. Oh, really? What happens? People shut the door on my face, yeah? What else? People laugh at me. Really, you know, people, maybe they see me coming, they're like, oh, he's, you know, the Jesus freak. Yeah, he's always talking about Jesus, you know? And you're talking to that person, and you say, really, you're not, why again aren't you giving the gospel? Because of that persecution. You know, and then someday, they're gonna stand with the Apostle Paul before the Lord Jesus Christ, And they're gonna say, and Jesus is gonna say, you know, why didn't you give the gospel? And they'll say, you know, people didn't want it. They hated me, they mocked me, they made fun of me. They shut the door in my face. And Paul's gonna take his shirt off. He's gonna turn it to face away from you. And you can look at his back, and his back is covered with whippings. He's whipped, the Bible says, 195 times. His back was just lacerated. I mean, his back would bear similarities to the back of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was stoned. And yet nothing, you look at these men, it's like nothing stopped them. And then you consider, you know, do I have a powerful gospel? Because they did. They had a gospel that never ceased. They had a gospel that would not stop. Remember the story of in Macedonia, Paul gets the Macedonian vision and it's the person in the vision crying out and saying, you know, crying out for somebody to come help them. And they determine, you know, we're going to Macedonia. They go there, Lydia gets saved down by the water, she accepts Jesus Christ as her Lord. But as people begin to respond to the gospel, there's an uproar in the city, Paul and Silas are taken, they're put in prison. It says, the multitude rose up together against them. The magistrates rent off their clothes, commanded to beat them. And when they laid many stripes upon them, they cast them into prison, charging the jailer to keep them safely. Who having received such a charge, thrust them into the inner prison and made their feet fast in the stocks. And right there in scripture, you expect us to read in the next verse, and they quit. And they said to one another, this is ridiculous. Here we're serving Christ, we're trying to do God's will on earth. God has commanded us to go into all the world and preach the gospel, but it's not worth it. This is not something that we desire to do. Tell him if you gotta go, it's fine. You might need to go. And you expect to see that. But you know what it says in the next verse? It says, and at midnight, Paul and Silas prayed, and they sang praises unto God, and the prisoners heard them. You know, again, how does our gospel compare to that? I get discouraged. You know, it's something that happens where somebody who's not very receptive to the gospel, it's easy to get stung by that and to think, you know what, I'm never gonna give the gospel again. You know, a lot of believers have done that. They had a bad experience sharing Christ, and they said, you know, never again. But you know, that's not the gospel God's given us to give. He wants us to give a powerful gospel. You know, a lot of times as I've done evangelism, I've said this to people that are with me, we'll get a really tough opportunity, somebody curses out, or somebody will tear the flyer, somebody will be rude, and I'll say to them, you know, What I found is a lot of times after a very difficult opportunity, the next opportunity is a very good opportunity. Because Satan, I don't know how much Satan knows, whether he's aware of the opportunity that's coming, but I think he is. Because what I found is, again, that hindrance occurs just before a really great opportunity to share Christ. But if we quit at the tough opportunity, then we never get to see the blessing of it. God's called us to give a powerful gospel. So preach a purposeful gospel, preach a powerful gospel, and then preach a pure gospel. Verse three says, for our exhortation was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile. Because of maybe the persecution of the day, Paul and Silas could have had this little chat in prison. They could have said, have you noticed, Paul says to Silas, how people don't really like what we're saying. And Silas goes, yeah, you know, I've noticed that every time we mention the cross, it's like all of a sudden the hackles go up on the back of people's necks. And so Paul goes, yeah, you know, I think you're right. Let's not mention the cross. And Paul says, but you know what? When we mentioned sin, have you noticed when we start talking about sin that people don't really wanna hear it? And actually Silas, this whole preaching thing is standing up and proclaiming, people don't really like that either. So let's not do that anymore. Let's just change our methodology. Paul didn't do that. He didn't look for a back door to the gospel and say, you know what, I can't get at you straight forward coming through an open door, so I'm gonna try to go around and snag you from behind. I'm gonna try to just make the gospel, I'm gonna kind of trick you into accepting Christ and I'm gonna overcome these obstacles to the gospel through my own methodology. Paul never did that. How do I know? Verse three, for our exhortation, what we proclaimed, was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile. It wasn't a trick. You might think this, well, Pastor Ben, who would ever give the gospel in that kind of deceitful way? You know, there's tons of people that are trying that. They're looking for this backdoor to the gospel. This idea that we can't come straight at them. We can't be honest about what we're about. As soon as people see us as believers, we got this Bible out, they're gonna run. So let's put the Bible behind our back and let's kind of hide it. There's a whole movement, it's called Christianity, but it's not, that's based on this idea of people don't want this anymore, so we're gonna try to give them something else, or we're gonna sugarcoat the gospel, make it go down real easy, and we're gonna get them to swallow it without really knowing that they're taking Christ and what they're getting. It's a false gospel. Joel Osteen's a very famous, I guess, preacher in the United States, I think. He's probably famous over here as well. But he was interviewed by a man named Conan O'Brien and Osteen was being pressed by him to declare his message, you know, what his message is about. He said. First of all, in my services, I don't cover all those issues that we talk about here. Later, he responded to another question by stating, and I don't understand all those issues. And so, you know, I try to stick to the issues that I do understand. I know this, I'm for everybody. I'm not for pushing people down. He goes on, this author goes on to say, viewers of CNN saw a display of confusion, evasion, and equivocation coming from one presented as a Christian pastor. Then this author again says, Christianity is based on the truth that sinners need a savior, not merely a coach or a therapist. Joel Osteen's appearance on CNN Thursday revealed little that is new. It was Osteen as always, evasive and confused, but constantly smiling. This is now his calculated and well-practiced approach. He offered no word of the gospel, no reference to Jesus Christ, but he was introduced as one of the most recognizable faces of Christianity in America today. That's not it. That's not it, we've missed it. If this church ever became about, hey, it's about getting people in, and this kind of generic idea of trying to worship God, it's not the gospel. It's not what God intended. Anytime we substitute methodology for truth, we've missed it. Let me ask it this way. Is not the power of the Spirit of God sufficient today to bring somebody to salvation? He is. It's not the Word of God sufficient of itself to bring people to salvation. It is. Is there any other way somebody would truly get saved other than by this book and by the power of the Holy Spirit? No. even if somebody came back from the dead. Remember the question the rich man, or the suggestion of the rich man to Abraham saying, please, you know, my brothers aren't saved, there's five of them, send them back so that they can, I'm sorry, send Lazarus back from the dead to warn them, say, don't come to this place. And what did Abraham say? He said, they've got the word of God and the prophets. If they're not gonna believe that, they're not gonna believe even if somebody rose from the dead. And you might ask, well, what is it then? Why are these churches packed out with people that profess faith in Jesus Christ? A lot of it's not legitimate. It's not. There's no way that God would put his approval on something that is deceitful and tricky and try to get the gospel in the back door. And so Paul's gospel wasn't like that. And then preach a God-pleasing gospel. Preach a pure gospel, so it's exactly as God intended. Don't try to sugarcoat it or try to get it swallowed any other way. And then preach a God-pleasing gospel. Verse four, it says, but as we were allowed of God to be put in trust with the gospel, even so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God which trieth our hearts. You know, what has God done for me as a believer? I've gotten saved and accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord. It's like the Lord Jesus has reached down and he's handed me the gospel. He's handed me a sacred trust and he said, this is my message that merges with my life on Calvary. This is the truth that the world needs. And look at the world, they're in need. Look around and see all these countries that need to hear about Jesus Christ. And I'm giving you the sacred trust. You know, at that point, who do I want to please? I want to please God. I look at that and say, what a privilege to represent Jesus Christ to the world. What a privilege. But we gotta remember that that's who we're seeking to please. We're not seeking to please men. And so he said, even so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God, which trieth our hearts. Again, going back to the impure gospel, who are they trying to please? Read the websites. Ask yourself, are they seeking to exalt Jesus Christ? Or is their message to the world this? We want you to come. We want you to feel comfortable. We want you to fit in. We want you to know that you're accepted here. Hey, it's all about you. We've got all these things for you. We've got all these classes for you. We've got all this, this, this, this. And how much does it say about Jesus Christ? How much is it this, you know, in our ministry, we seek to exalt the Lord Jesus Christ. And what we wanna do is help you to know how you can properly worship God and know God. And so Paul says, he goes on to say verse five, for neither at any time used we flattering words. And so Paul didn't come to them with flattery saying, you know, anything to try to kind of butter them up to make them receive the message. He didn't flatter them. as he knows. And by the way, going back to Joel Osteen, he does flatter. Listen to what he says. Hey, you're a great person. You're a You know, we love you, and it's all about just building this person up. It's called self-esteem, right? And it's all about good feelings, good feelings, good feelings, but it's really flattery when it comes down to it. Paul said, that's not us. For neither at any time used to be flattering words as ye know, nor a cloak of covetousness God has witnessed. Paul wasn't trying to reach in their pocket and get their wallet. He didn't hold out the visa sign as he sought to give the gospel. And then it says, nor of men sought we glory. So he's not trying to move forward in the eyes of men and say, hey, you know, get this reputation as the great preacher, the apostle Paul, neither of you nor yet of others when they might have been burdensome as apostles of Christ. Okay, again, the question is, as we give the gospel, are people gonna embrace it? Are they gonna go, hey, that's great, you know, I'm so glad you love the Lord Jesus Christ? No. So if my focus as a man is that as I give the gospel, I want the praise of men, I want people to appreciate the fact, even of our church, I want them to appreciate the fact that we're just, you know, whatever, we've missed it. Yeah, do we want to have a good testimony in the community? We do, but I want people to know that this church is a church that's all about Jesus Christ and glorifying God and pleasing God, and that this message, this exclusive message of the gospel is preached here without fear, without worry, because we're not seeking to please man, we're seeking to please God. The Bible says in the last days, one of the signs of the last days, and it's certainly taking place, is that there's gonna be people that just wanna, they wanna go to church and they wanna feel good. They wanna go and they wanna have a pat on the back and say, hey, you know, just, you're great and everything about you is great, but can I say this? There's so many times where we open up this book, it's light and there's darkness in our heart, and when the light shines into that darkness, there's gonna be a confrontation that takes place. It's a battle between heaven and hell. And at those times, it's not comfortable in the sense of feeling good, but it's profitable in the sense of eternity and what we really need. And so, again, but the world doesn't want that. 2 Timothy 4.3 says, for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lust shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. Okay, after their own lust, they're gonna see teachers that'll come along, give them a good ear scratching, you know, like a dog. We had a dog for five years after we got married. Dogs love to have their ears scratched. They just love it. You know, people do too. And if church was about, if church ever becomes about, hey, it's a social club, we want to get together, we want this positive message, and we want to just be, you know, just leave out those things that are heavy things. We've missed it. Because what church ought to be about and what the gospel is about, it's about glorifying Jesus Christ and bringing our lives into union with him. It's not about glorifying our lives and bringing Christ into union with us. So there's going to be difficulties at times because of that, but we ought to be pleasing God. Now, having said that, you might think, well, that's great. You know, we want people to come in and we just want them to feel miserable. And the answer is no, we don't. But we don't want to change the truth. It's kind of like this. You know, does a does a medical doctor, as he deals with somebody that has cancer, does he desire them to have the fear or the anxiety of their cancer? No. but he wants them to have victory over their cancer. But he can't say, he can't say this, you know, because I love that person, I care about them, I'm not gonna tell them that they've got cancer. Because I don't, they're having so much fun in life. I mean, I don't wanna, the last thing I wanna do is wreck their life. But in a loving, gracious way, he can sit down with them and say, you know, so and so, and maybe he's their family practitioner, he's had them, you know, since they were a child, he's been a doctor for a long time. He says, you know what? I got some tough truth for you, but it's truth you can beat, but you have cancer. He can say it in a loving way. He doesn't have to blurt out the moment the person comes in, you've got cancer, you know, heartless, break it to him that way. There was a man, and let me give you the verses for this. This is in verses seven and eight. Paul said, But we were gentle among you, even as a nurse cherished her children, like a mother caring for her kids. So being affectionately desirous of you, we cared so much for you, we were willing to have imparted unto you not the gospel of God only, but also our own souls because you were dear unto us. Paul's already said, I didn't hide the truth. I came, I mean, gospel guns blazing, Jesus Christ is in. You know, your sin is worthy of hell, but you can be saved. But I love you, and I'm praying for you, and I wanna see you trust Christ as your Savior. When you do, I want you to go on for Christ, and by God's grace, I'm so burdened about that, I'm willing to give up my soul so that I could minister to you. That's Paul. And you think about Jesus. Did Jesus obscure the truth? No, he didn't, but he gave it in a very loving way. I spoke with a lesbian this past week. I could give you her name. And I spoke with her about 20 minutes. And I actually showed her Romans chapter 1 and what the Bible says about homosexuality. But you know, I was able to do that in a loving, gracious way. I know some Christians, their idea about homosexuality, the way they would express it is very offensive, even to me as a believer, because they aren't kind, they aren't gracious in the way that they speak about it. You know, God's not called us to be mean-mouthed about sin. You know, remember the story of the woman taking an adultery? He that's without sin cast the first stone and all those men go out of the room. That's reality. We're just sinners dealing with sinners. We're not somebody that's better than anybody else. We're somebody that knows the answer to the problem of sin and death and hell. But in a loving way, we can be very straightforward and say, you know what? That's sin, but Jesus Christ, because it's sin, he forgives sins. For instance, the woman taking an adultery is one example, but remember the woman at the well? She's a very immoral woman. She's lived with five husbands and now she's living with somebody and she's not married to him. But you know, Jesus didn't avoid her. Jesus sat down beside her and began to speak to her. But remember what he said, he said, woman, thou hast had five husbands, and he whom thou hast is not thy husband. Did Jesus then go shame on you? He didn't need to, did he? She knew what a wicked sinner she was, but he didn't hide the truth. He didn't say, well, it's okay, that's the way everybody is, and try to make her feel good about her sin. but he pointed out her sin to her. She said, sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. She got saved and a lot of her city got saved because he lovingly gave her the truth that she needed. You know, again, God's not called us to be mean mouth. We're called upon by God to be very loving. But love, people use love as a reason for not telling the truth, and we can't do that. So we preach a God-pleasing gospel, preach a personal gospel, and then preach a passionate gospel. It says, verse nine, and we'll end with this point this morning. There's a few more points that we could share. But preach a passionate gospel. It says in verse nine, for ye remember, brethren, our labor and travail, for laboring night and day, because we would not be chargeable unto any of you, We preached unto you the gospel of God. You know, Paul... Paul, how often do you give Christ, or share the gospel? And Paul goes, you know what, it's my passion. Laboring night and day, and any time of the day, you gotta meet, hey, you call me, we'll speak about this, we'll sit down, we'll talk about this, and he's just sharing Christ, sharing Christ, sharing Christ, why? Because Paul didn't look at it, well, I'm a Christian, so it's my obligation, I've gotta share Christ, and so here's my burden, let me take my cross, and I got this heavy weight on my back, it's the gospel, not at all. Paul's passion is that, He understood what the gospel was. He had a deep love for the gospel, and he had a deep love for people. You know, Leonard Ravenhill would say it like this. You know, you see that person, like I've mentioned, or somebody that's tattooed, somebody that's got plugs in their ears, somebody that, you know, whatever. I mean, it's just, they're licensed. And it's obvious that they're in the world, right? When you see that person, is there a burden in your heart? And this, and let me put on the other hand, a businessman or businesswoman, or somebody that looks put together, but you know they're lost. Do you have a burden to share Christ? Leonard Ravenhill said it this way, what if that was your son? What if that was your daughter? You know, away from Christ. How burdened would you be? How passionate would you be? I wrote a poem back when I was, I don't know, I think Katie and I were married at the time, but it's very short, but just what have you done? There's souls to be won. Did you go out of your way today? You know, what if Christ had not gone out of his way? What if he in heaven had chosen to stay? There would be hell to pay at the sinner's cost, but Christ paid the debt on Calvary's cross. What have you done? There's souls to be won. Will you warn them of eternal doom? Will you go out of your way today? You know, what effort, what, you know, could we honestly say we've got any passion like Paul had? I mean, this man is passionate for the gospel. I read a bit, of interviews of the people that were on the beach in Tunisia when the gunmen attacked. When that took place, he's shooting people. It's an amazing story. Actually, Muslim people actually formed a human chain because this guy was not shooting Muslims. He's shooting Westerners. And they realized that, and so they actually blocked him from following some people. And some of the Muslims actually followed this guy. I was glad to hear that. But as you're reading this story, I mean, these people are fleeing for their life, and this guy's just shooting people. And it's a hard story to read. And they're giving personal accounts. This is where I was, this is what's taking place. And they're following this story in the timeline as it's happening, as this guy goes into the hotel. This man and his wife are separated at the last minute. He got, I don't know if he got shot. I mean, some of these people got shot, they didn't die. But as they barricaded the door of the room he's in, there's five of them in there, he realized his wife wasn't in there. and heard her screaming in the hall saying she'd been shot, crying out to him to help her, but he can't get out of the room because if they open the door, he's risking the lives of all the people in the room. And he talked about, you know, I'll never get over that. And he got out to her. Her leg had just been basically destroyed. She might lose her leg. But she lived. But he talked about the heartbreak of that. Another woman talked about how they were hiding and they heard a woman screaming and crying, help me, help me, I'm dying, I'm dying, right? And she said, for the rest of my life, I'll never forget. And I'll always wish that I'd gone out there to help that lady. She lived, the lady lived. But you know, I don't want to stand someday at the throne of God and have regrets and say, you know what? I wasn't passionate about it. You think about it, I have got the gospel. I have got something that'll change somebody's life forever. I'm accountable to God for it, but you know I'm also accountable to them. I don't want anybody at that judgment seat to point the finger at my face and say, you know, you didn't really care that much about me. Never spoke to me about Jesus Christ. Never tried to share in a concrete way the gospel with me. I don't wanna be there. I don't wanna stand there. I wanna stand someday before God and say, by God's grace, I had a passion for the gospel like Paul did. A passion for Christ. And so, that's just some of the things that we can look at. There's more things that we can see from Paul's gospel. But I believe, again, within evangelical Christianity, from fundamentalism to what we determine that states new evangelicalism across all of evangelical Christianity, if you really picked up Paul's gospel and examine our gospel in light of it, you'd find, you know what? There's reasons, practically speaking, outside of the fact that yes, God saves, He gives the increase. And yes, men reject. But aside from that, there's so much more we can do today if we have the gospel that Paul had. But we've got to put it on. And so may God just encourage us today to have a gospel that's God-pleasing, not men-pleasing, a gospel that's pure. a gospel that's passionate, a gospel that is focused, it's something, it's a priority. It's what we're about. We're about the gospel. And may the Lord use his word in our hearts today. Let's pray. Father, I pray that the Spirit of God would do that good work in our hearts today. Lord, I know you're working. I know you're working. Father, I praise you in the last week, we've seen the hand of God moving in our ministry. And Lord, that's awesome. And yeah, we don't have a huge crowd here today, but I know the Spirit of God has spoken to hearts. I know he has. Father, because you've been speaking to my heart. And I just pray today, Lord, that we'd be honest. If our gospel isn't what it ought to be, then I pray the Spirit of God give us grace to change. And Father, to have a gospel that's God-pleasing, that's pure in all these things that we've talked about. Father, if somebody's here today, they've not yet received Christ, or somebody listens to this message online, and they've not yet received the gospel, I pray that today would be the day of their salvation, that they'd bow their head and humbly invite the Lord Jesus Christ to come into their heart and save them, that they'd have the blood of God, the God's Son applied to their account, that they'd have that atonement, that they'd have that covering for their sin, that they know the joy of what we have, Lord. Yes, it's not fun to to say to them today, you know, you're a sinner. It's not fun to say your sin is damnable in eternity in hell. But Father, we can't hide the truth. And certainly our desire is not that they be burdened, but that they be set free from the burden of their sin, from the punishment of their sin. So Lord, again, we look to you. We praise you for your grace. Thank you for your help this morning. It's in Christ's name we pray, amen. And 251, hear the cross.