This sermon emphasizes the importance of being aware of false doctrine, likening it to leaven that subtly infiltrates and distorts the truth. It delves into the deceptive nature of false teachings from various religions like Roman Catholicism, Mormons, and Jehovah Witnesses, highlighting the need to stand firm on the inerrancy of Scripture and salvation through Christ alone. The speaker urges listeners to seek and uphold the truth of God's Word amidst the prevalence of misleading doctrines.

Beware of the leaven means basically what Jesus is going to talk about, beware of false doctrine. Many times I've said this and you've heard it, I'm sure, before that the devil doesn't come dressed in red wearing a pitchfork. Saying, hey, I'm here. He comes into our lives with leaven, whether it's sin in our lives, the Bible refers to leaven as sin, or false doctrine. He plants a little bit of leaven. And in order to fully exhaust this topic, I would need probably a few weeks or a few months. But I'm going to talk about a few different religions that I talked about a few years ago. And I think it's vitally important because we're confronted with this on a daily basis. And I didn't want to just keep arguing with God all week, and I know this is kind of going to rub some people the wrong way. But I think it's important to do when we're talking about this area of doctrine. So before I get into that, let me actually read the verse. Matthew 16, verse 5. Now when his disciples had come to the other side, they had forgotten to take bread. It's pretty common with them. Then Jesus said to them, take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. They reasoned among themselves, saying, is it because we have taken no bread? But Jesus, being aware of it, said to them, O you of little faith, why do you reason among yourselves because you have brought no bread? Do you not yet understand or remember the five loaves of the 5,000 and how many baskets you took up? Nor the seven loaves of the 4,000 and how many large baskets you took up? How is it you do not understand that I did not speak to you concerning bread? But to be aware, be aware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Then they understood that he did not tell them to be aware of leaven in the bread, but of the doctrine, the doctrine of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Now, before I get into the whole leaven part, I was quickly reminded of how quickly they forgot about God's provision. And I was convicted this week. Basically, they're saying, hey, we're out of bread. We didn't bring any bread. Is that what Jesus is talking about? And he said, wait a minute, were you not there when I fed the 4,000? Were you not there when I fed the 5,000? You had all this left over. But still, what are we going to do now with this bread? And how is he going to provide? And he said, how quickly do you forget? Why don't you remember what I did for you? And in our own personal lives, how often or how quickly do we forget about God's provision? We come to a new trial and we say, but not this one. This one I'm going under. This one, God, I don't think you can get me through. And he gets us through and we go to the next one. And we don't look back on his provision. Because if you remember back on what Christ brought you from, remember back how he held you during that time of misery and despair, held you as you went through that difficulty, how he saved you, how he sealed you, how he's been guiding you financially, relationally. Even though we might not like it some of the times, he's there. He provides. So to me, this was a good reminder that we often forget of God's provision and where he brought us through. And we think, oh, there's a new challenge. I don't think God can handle this one. And then he gets us through. So what remembering does is it actually puts your heart in a very receptive position. Now you're joyful. There's peace. Where anxiety used to be, now there's peace. Where there's confusion, now there's peace. Because you're trusting on the God who can bring you through. Now I could have stayed some time there, but I want to talk about this issue of leaven. Beware of the leaven. And most of you know what leaven is. The women do, right? If you cook. It's a little tiny thing you put in with some ingredients like dough. And a little piece of bread, what happens? Really what the leaven does, if I remember correctly, it's like an agent. It goes in, it forms gas molecules, and there's gas bubbles. And as it cooks, that's why it's all soft and fluffy. And that's why things that don't weigh much have a lot less calories than things that weigh a lot. Because that's a lot of air. So the little bit of leaven goes in there, and it affects the whole environment. You can't just go and pull the leaven out. It's done its work. And so Jesus is saying, beware of these religious leaders. Beware of their false doctrine. And not only does he say, beware, he says, take heed. And what this means, I actually looked it up online, and there's differences here on the Greek and stuff. But it's almost like, it reminded me of take heed. I'd say, hey David, or hey Mike, or hey Chris, hey listen up guys, listen, take heed. Julie, Bill, Mark, listen up, listen up, take heed. This is very important. So he's getting the disciples ready in their heart to now listen. Beware of these people who represent God. Beware of this false leaven that comes in. So the first part of bringing in this leaven, this destructive leaven, is in doctrine. The Bible talks about primarily two different areas. Leaven with false doctrine, which is here. And also Paul, I believe, talks about it in 1 Corinthians. Where leaven, he says, don't you know a little leaven leavens the whole loaf? Talking about a man who is dating his father's wife like a stepson. And Paul says, in the church you allow this into the church? You just look the other way? And Paul says, that little sin will become leaven, and it will affect the whole body. Anytime you ignore sin in a church, in a family, in an individual, it will affect as it grows. And I'm hoping to get to that point. But right now I want to stop for a minute and talk about leaven and doctrine. Do you know what the definition of doctrine is? Good, you don't have to. I'm going to tell you. It's what is received and believed. And I actually have a passion for doctrine, for truth. I know you might not know that, but I do. It's a joke, right? The reason is because truth changes us. It's actually, you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. Now, commentators are divided. Is the truth Jesus Christ? Well, of course. Will he set you free? Yes. But also knowing the truth, and in that word, if you look up that word knowing, again in the Greek, it has the nuances of application. If you apply the truth, it sets you free. Regardless, I have a passion for the truth because it's God's word. And anytime you begin to deviate from that, it's never a good direction. Never a good direction. So doctrine is what is received and what is believed. So Buddhists have a doctrine. Did you know that? We have good friends. We've known for 30 years, Hindus. They have a doctrine. They have doctrine. I've sent them a few of Ravi Zacharias' books on Jesus, among other gods. Very good apologetic type teacher. And every religion has doctrine. And that's where the differences are. And that's why everybody wants, can't we all just come together? But you can't do that. Because they are mutually exclusive. So it begs the question, who's right? Right? If we all have different beliefs, who is right? So this area of doctrine is vitally important. And leaven, so if you have doctrine is what we believe. And leaven is something that permeates something else in order to change it. So these teachers, these religious leaders were bringing in false doctrine to permeate and change. And Jesus said, beware of them. And I truly believe that the enemy plants leaven as well. Because if he can get us to start to slide on truth. And I've seen this, folks, more times than I can count. A person starts to slide in an area, before you know it, in a couple months, they hate God. They don't want to have anything to do with Christianity. Or they'll have their form of Christianity and label you judgmental, prideful, narrow-minded. When did it start? A little bit of leaven. And it began to change them. So here's what it's been a few years on, a few years since I spoke on. In this area of doctrine, people ask me, why don't I mention all religions? A lot of times I'll point out a few here and there. Number one, I don't have time to point out every single religion. Number two, there's great resources like Kingdom of the Cults by Walter Martin. Or Ron Rhodes, I believe, has a great book on it. So you can see different cults and different things there. Now, I also said this at the first sermon. I need to make a distinction here. A cult, it's okay to use that word. The definition of a cult is anything, any belief system that departs from historical, biblical Christianity. You can't call them Christians. Those people say, well, we're Christians, too. No, you're not, if you don't embrace biblical, historical Christianity. That's the definition of a cult. But when we use that word, we think of, what, Jim Jones and drinking Kool-Aid and hundreds of people dying. And that is true. But there's other forms of cults when you go away from historical Christianity. Now, here's where I have to take a breath and explain a little bit. Within Christianity, there is what is called denominations. That's not what I'm talking about here. A denomination, within Christianity, when Jesus taught, there are what they call essentials to the faith. If you deny one or some of these, you're on a very slippery slope. If you deny the inerrancy of Scripture, those people say, I can't really trust the Bible. It's written by men. You're going to be on a very dangerous path pretty soon. Because by what else are you going to gauge truth? Your own heart. You're going to put different books up against. The inerrancy of Scripture and the sufficiency of Christ. Faith in Christ alone, through grace. Paul says, through grace and faith, we believe in Christ and Him alone. He is the only way, the only truth, the only life. That's it. No works, no other person, no this. The inerrancy of Scripture and Christ alone. And of course you can throw in there the virgin birth. I mean, when you start throwing that out there and Jesus wasn't God, He was really a created being. These are essentials. Because here's what it boils down to. Either Jesus was who He said He was, lunatic, liar, or Lord. Or He wasn't. So Jesus said He was the Son of God. Jesus says He is God. There's the triune nature of God. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, the Trinity. So there's essentials to the Christian faith. You cannot deviate from those essentials. But within that framework, you've got Baptist, Pentecostal. Which Pentecostal believes in the gifts of the Holy Spirit, charismatic. The gifts of the Holy Spirit, charisma. It's from the New Testament and the first Corinthians. But then you have Baptist, who a lot of them don't. But they do believe in baptism. I hope we do. A believer's baptism. A believer has to get baptized. If you look at the history of the Baptist, a lot of it started hundreds of years ago when they were baptizing little babies. Little infants. You baptize a little six-month-old, they're good. They're safe. No, they're not. Don't count on that. So they would go and re-baptize them. And they would get in trouble many times. And then you have Methodists. The followers were Charles Wesley. And the Methodists, it's methodology. There's a process of discipleship. And then you have the Presbyterians, who their founder was John Calvin. And then you have the Lutherans, who their founder was Martin Luther. And so, basically, a lot of these denominations start as disagreeing on the non-essentials. And that's okay. That's why Westside Christian Fellowship is a non-denominational church. So we don't really link up with certain groups, which we do. I have friends in all those groups. But we're just non-denominational, meaning, what does the Bible say? We're not going to come over here and say, we're this or we're that, and get caught up into the denominations. And personally, I don't think there's a problem with denominations. I think there's a place for them. If somebody believes in the gifts of the Holy Spirit and somebody else doesn't, somebody loves a different type of worship, somebody loves hymnals and organs, it's going to be hard to worship together. It's going to be hard to do things together. So denominations, I think, arose out of the need for non-essentials. Another non-essential, church government. There's differences over there. Presbyterians have what's called a presbytery. And they govern the church by a plurality of elders. A whole bunch of elders rule the church. Or if you have Episcopal, there's like a one-person leadership, and they have elders to support. And then, should women be senior pastors? Pentecostal Charismatics would say yes, other groups would say no. So they divide over these, not necessarily in a bad way, but hey, we can't really do church like that, so we're going to do church this way. And that's where the denominations come from. So I want to clarify that, because a lot of times people are like, why are there so many denominations? Why can't you guys agree on anything? We do agree. Christ is sufficient. Salvation through Him alone. The inerrancy of Scripture. The virgin birth. The deity of Christ. These are all foundational principles that the church is built on. But then we get into the cult, where a little leaven comes in. Let me just sprinkle a little bit of that in there. And then it begins to change and permeate. Now here's the key. We are encouraged to be at peace with all men, even with those who have different beliefs. We can all agree on that. But the Bible also encourages us to boldly and confidently present a scriptural basis for truth and compare differences. See, I'm called to be a peacemaker, but not a religious negotiator. In other words, if I have a neighbor who's in a cult, and I just, hey, how's it going? Good? Water my lawn for the next three years. Don't want to disrupt this one. But what about if God opens that door? And we're allowed to, hey, have you ever thought about the differences? Have you ever thought about what God's Word says? And I know it's a hard balance to find, because on one side you can either be viewed as a Bible-thumping, narrow-minded, man, that guy's just angry for God, and that doesn't accomplish a lot. But the passive approach never wins anybody. Never. So we have to find the balance, pray to God, Lord, show me what to do here. And the first one I'm going to talk about is the inerrancy of Scripture. The inerrancy of Scripture. And the three groups that I talked about three years ago, and I want to do it again, Roman Catholicism, Mormons, and Jehovah Witnesses. Not to pick a fight, but just show you how a little leaven comes in, and it really affects the whole religious system there. So the inerrancy of Scripture, the Bible. The Bible, God's Word, sufficient. Roman Catholicism promotes submission to the teachings of the Pope, bishops, and sacred traditions that often supersede Scripture. Traditionally, followers are not encouraged to read the Bible, but to lean on papal interpretation. The title, vicar, V-I-C-A-R, Vicar of Christ, implies that the Pope has the same power and authority that Christ has over the church. So there's a lot of things that the Pope or the papacy, or what would they call those, councils, over the last hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years, that they would put in things that supersede the Bible. Have you ever heard of Mary worship? There's a bumper sticker that says, you can't find Jesus, look for his mother. That's blasphemy. That's not a good thing to have on your car. I just don't know what to say to that. But it's the inerrancy of Scripture. Actually, they guarded it so much that they didn't want the common person to read it. Have you ever heard the word John Wycliffe? John Hus? William Tyndale? You go home, you probably have some books right there, say Tyndale Publishing House. Two of those three were burned at the stake, or killed, because they dared to translate the Bible into the modern, the tongue of, what they would say back then was, giving the common man God's word. And that was a crime, I guess. And listen, hear my heart, it's not to poke fun. I had just my, oh, I don't want to talk about this. But the need is great. The need is great. Because my hope is it will help a lot of people. And that's why a lot of times I want to keep the services in Latin, and do a lot of things that just are not scripturally sound. I'm going to get to that in a minute. The Mormons refer to the Bible, but look primarily to the Book of Mormon, despite the fact that no geographical locations mentioned have ever been found. I talked about this last week. We know where Jerusalem is, but we don't know where Bountiful is. Nor any other location mentioned in the entire book. There's nothing. The challenge with believing both the Bible and the Book of Mormon, is that Jesus Christ and Joseph Smith cannot both be right. They go like this, all the time. Who's right? Both? No. When you make Joseph Smith right, you just discard a lot of what Jesus said. You can't have it both ways. But here's what they do. Mormon doctrine teaches that the inspired words of their living prophets become scripture. Thus, superseding the Bible. So if you see a Mormon reading, usually, are they reading this? No, they'll have it down here somewhere. They're reading the Book of Mormon. That supersedes this. Not good. They believe that Jesus and the devil are spirit brothers. Father God and Mother, whatever she would be, decided to have spirit children. This is sad. It's so off base. And I often wonder, how many people are in hell because of pride? That's what this boils down to. Anybody should be able to say, you know what, I don't like what he's saying, but I better investigate it. Yeah, look up the Book of Mormon. Look up the covenants. Look at their writings. They actually say that God was once like us, and that we will be like God. Blasphemy. Blasphemy. And that you will rule planets and have spirit children. Why? How does that happen? We don't believe this. It's a good book. It has good things. But the Book of Mormon supersedes. That's considered a cult. If you don't want to stick around your house very long, just say that. Let's look at the Bible. Look at the Book of Mormon. I'll show you that you are a cult. Oh no, let me go get my elders and my bishops. No, no, you. Your soul's on the line, sir. Your soul. You. Nobody's going to stand next to you on the judgment seat of God. Your soul's on the line. We've got to get this stuff right. Jehovah Witness. Through the New World Translation, they claim that their version of the Bible is scholarly and more accurate than this Bible. However, the translators were not biblical scholars or theologians. The New World Translation came into being in 1961. 1950, they had the New Testament done. 1961, the whole Bible was done. You know what the whole purpose, the whole purpose of the New World Translation, the purpose of that Bible, is to remove the deity of Christ. Their founder did not like the deity of Christ. That darn theology, I've got to get rid of that one. So, for example, John 1, when the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. But before that, in the beginning was the Word. And the Word was a God. That changes things. The Word was a God, not the God. And if you look at other references about the deity of Christ, they remove them. But they said, well, our book's scholarly. We pull from the Dead Sea Scrolls and different things. Here's the embarrassing thing. This is all, they've had court cases on this and everything. That they actually, when they were asked, who was your translators? Because you can look in New King James, you can see who translated the Bible. They said they're too humble and they want to remain anonymous. Oh, okay. Well, you just removed the deity of Christ. You might want to... So, when the names finally came out, they were humbled, I'm sure, because four of the five only had a high school education. One guy, they have, you can find the court case, actually went on the witness stand, said, yes, I'm a Hebrew scholar. I translated this. They said, could you just change the fourth verse in Genesis? Just the fourth verse from English to Hebrew for us right now. Nothing. They can't even read or speak Hebrew. And so, how are you going to... Because Bible translation is this. I take the Greek New Testament. I take the Greek and I go back and I look at all the manuscripts. I look at the Greek and I translate this word. Telios means this word. Perfected. And we translate painstakingly verse by verse by word. And we translate. That's why it's called the dynamic equivalence. And word for word, formal equivalence. And translating the Bible formal is word for word. Dynamic is thought for thought. So, you want a more word for word translation. You want to avoid, if you use the New Living Translation or the Message Bible, those aren't study Bibles. Those are more commentaries. So, you get a word by word. And you look exactly what the Greek. And if you want to get to the Old Testament, oh boy, here we go, Hebrew. You've got to break down the Hebrew. And you explain, here's exactly what the word of God is saying. So, these guys who remove the deity of Christ can't even speak the language. And it's all there. It's all documented. And when you say, let's see what the Bible says. The Arch Tower book says. No, I don't want to see what that says. What is that? That's a little bit of leaven coming in. I'm bringing a little bit of leaven. If I can remove the deity of Christ, then I can bring in other things like, you shouldn't serve in the military. You shouldn't celebrate birthdays. You know they believe that, right? I would like that, but my kids wouldn't. Where does all this come from? They believe that Jesus and Michael, the archangel, are one and the same. See, I don't say this at all to poke fun. I just say, hey, wake up. Truth is not universal. Truth is truth exclusive and narrow. Narrow is the way that leads to eternal life. You can't have this truth and that truth. They all oppose each other. Either Jesus Christ is right, and all these other religions are wrong, or what's the other end of that? See, the truth is all religions can be wrong. Let's be honest. But they cannot all be right. All religions can be wrong, but they cannot all be right. So who's right? You say, oh, we're right. We're so prideful. No, we're broken sinners that need God, and God has given us the inerrancy of Scripture, and he has provided salvation through faith and grace alone through Christ. That's it. So you'll see to leaven, to leaven something, to put a little bit of leaven, and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. These were religious teachers of Jesus's day. They were scribes. They were priests. They conducted the modes in the tabernacle. They went through the sacrifice. Jesus said, beware, because they're bringing in false teaching, false doctrine, basically saying statements about God that are not true. So if I have these groups saying things about God that are not true, do I remain silent? Or say, hey, you might want to consider this. And just think about this. Then the next point. Historical Christianity, about the Bible. Historical Christianity is built on the written Word of God alone. That's what the Protestant Reformation was about, to return to the Word of God. Have you ever heard of the Protestant Reformation? Do you know why you're called a Protestant? Most of you? Protestant comes from the word protest. Protest. So you have people like Martin Luther in Germany, Urich Zwingli in Switzerland, John Calvin in Geneva, John Knox in Scotland. And they start saying, hey, we're not going in a good direction. The church is going in a very bad direction. So Martin Luther comes out, October 31st, Halloween, 1517 and nails the 95 Thesis on the church doors of Wittenberg, Germany, and says, listen, we have a problem with all these areas. You are departing from the truth. Protest, Protestant. That's why Protestant and Catholics, it's like this. Now, let me back up for a minute. The first 200, 200, 300 years, the church was called the Catholic Church. It means the universal church. That's what the word Catholic means. Universal church. Everybody that was a true believer was part of the Catholic Church. And then a word got thrown in there, Rome. And that's when power meant religion. You could buy the papacy. And anytime you can buy spiritual authority, you're on a collision course to disaster. So religion started to get corrupt and bought the papacy. And then they would bring in, councils would meet and say, hey, let's worship Mary. She's a co-redeemer. Purgatory. Christ's death on the cross wasn't enough. You're gonna need to go suffer a few years. And then if you wanna get your relatives out of purgatory soon, can you put some money in here, in the coffin? And they have that old saying, when a coin rings, assault from purgatory springs. You know what I mean? That's what they were fighting. So the word Protestant, don't look down upon that. And I'm not like raising some crusade banner. I'm saying, I mean, there's believers who are in the Roman Catholic Church. I'm sure of that. But they're caught in the system because of that word pride. And it can't break. But if you look at what they believe and teach, the Bible is our infallible rule of faith being sufficient to give us the sure knowledge of the gospel. All scripture, not some. 2 Timothy, all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness. We cannot add or subtract to it. But what Roman Catholicism would say is the papacy is higher than this. And they'll tell you what you're gonna believe. We don't want you reading the Bible. Because if you read the Bible, you'll see that Christ is my high priest. Why am I going to a priest? Why are we preaching purgatory? Why at funerals are we doing Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee, blessed are thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of the womb of Jesus, 13 times. And I went to one funeral where they threw the incest over the casket and said because of his baptism as a little baby, Lord, we pray that you take his soul into heaven now. That's blasphemy. That's so far from truth that I don't know what to say. If this guy never repented of his sin, you're gonna have some guy sprinkle something and say because you were sprinkled as a baby? It's dead. It's dead religion. It's dead religion. What happens is when you just have religion, the power of God leaves. There's no power of God to see changed lives. When was the last time you ever heard a powerful Mormon bishop preach? Or a Jehovah's Witness, or a priest? Never because the power, the boldness comes from the spirit of God operating in the life of a believer to preach the truth of God's word. They don't know if they have the truth or not. They're just going through the motions so there's no power there to change a life. And this breaks my heart because people are on the road to hell and they think they're on the road to heaven because of leaven. Now, here's where it gets even more disheartening. The inerrancy of Scripture and redemption through Christ alone. Roman Catholicism teaches that Mary was free of sin. You know, let me show you how we're so worried about being politically correct that it's hard to really help people. I submitted an article for our local paper on everything I'm talking about. They said, oh, we're not touching that with a ten foot pool. We're not publishing that. We've got too many Catholic and Mormon and Jehovah Witness readers in the religion section. Okay, so let's avoid the truth. So we keep, it's just a side note there. Just a side note. Roman Catholicism teaches that Mary was free of sin. Did you know that? Mary was free of sin. Well, why do they teach that? Because she is a co-redeemer and assists in redemption. Back to the bumper sticker. Can't find Jesus, look for his mother. Instead of teaching believers to rest in Christ by faith alone, Catholics often promote Mary worship and works to merit grace. See, that's why I get fired up. People could rest in Christ alone. If the cross wasn't enough, if the cross wasn't enough, what in the world are we doing? The cross plus something else equals salvation? Christ plus me doing good works equals salvation? Christ plus what equals salvation? Nothing, nothing. Scripture's crystal clear on that. So the leaven comes in, they remove the deity of Christ. Catholics remain dependent upon the church even after death. You ask a true priest or the pope if you could, you won't be able to, is there any salvation outside the Roman Catholic Church? No, no. There's no salvation outside of Christ. Anytime you have to belong to a society, an organization, or a church like that, be careful. All those sins are forgiven. All those sins are forgiven periodically in confession. The punishment still remains. That's what purgatory is. Could you imagine, we talk about having anxiety. Okay, I'm forgiven, but when I die, for the next ten years, I'm going to be beaten, whipped. I'm going to have to get my sins purified. I'm going to leave my wife a million dollar policy so she can donate it and hopefully get me out of there sooner. Folks, that's what this is. That's why my heart breaks. It really breaks. It's not joking or poking fun. Wake up. But it's called spiritual darkness. The enemy blinds us. How? A little bit of leaven. We say Jesus, we say God, we say salvation, so it must all be the same. No! Hindus say Jesus was a good teacher. They believe in God, the inner being here. And they also believe in salvation to some degree. Or reincarnation. Everybody uses the same term, so you have to be careful how you define it. Mormons believe that God was once as we are, and now is an exalted man. And that men can become gods like God. The prophet Joseph Smith refers to this as the great secret in times and seasons, chapter 5, 613, August 1844. Just look at the writings. Because now you ask them, oh no, we don't believe that. Well, your founder did. Your founder said that you will be like God, and God was once like us. But he got to his position by obeying a bunch of rules, like the Mormons do. I mean, I don't know to laugh or cry, honestly. It's sad. How can deception be this deep and dark? They also assert that God's marriage partner is our mother in heaven. We are their spirit children. Good works are necessary for salvation. If it had not been for Joseph Smith and the restoration of truth, there would be no salvation. There is no salvation outside the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Mormon doctrine, page 670. To me, that's pretty serious. That's pretty serious. But you're off the hook. So I told the first service, just get copies of the CD of the message, and when they come to your door, then you don't have to explain anything. Let me be the one who lives with the P.O. Box and the alias and things. But it's because people hearing this, and I'll just say up front, it's because we love you to share the truth. It would be much easier for me to come and give a nice, uplifting, warm sermon that even Catholics like and Mormons like. It would be much easier. But you're living in deception. And what I would do, if I were you, I'd say, Lord, if this is true, show me. That's a prayer He will answer. If a sincere heart asks God, Lord, am I trapped? Show me. He will answer. He's waiting. But because of pride, I've been a Baptist 400 years. I've been a Roman Catholic since third generation. I was baptized as a baby. You're telling me shit? You're telling me? Pride. Let's be honest. That's all it is. Let's be honest. That's all it is. Anytime somebody's challenged and they don't like it, it's a big five-letter word written right here. Leave me alone. That's a whole bunch of words. But pride. Pride. But think about it. If you told a Mormon, if you told them, and they're sitting there going, wow, could this be? No, my mom and dad, they were fooled. My granddad was fooled. There's no way. No way! They don't want to hear the truth. I told you guys, some of you were here a few years ago. I went to a Mormon bishop's house and sat on his couch for an hour as he tried to convert me and two other guys, and I listened for exactly an hour. I said, okay, well, here's the interesting thing. Either Joseph Smith is right or Jesus Christ is right. And I just went on, like what I'm saying to you. He got so mad, he got up and he threw down his book of Mormon. He said, so you're telling me this is from the devil? I said, yeah, it is. And we were gone within five minutes. And I said, listen, sir, why are you so upset? If you've got the truth, the truth invites scrutiny. You should be able to sit down and have a cordial conversation. The reason I can sit here, legs crossed, and proclaim the truth is because it is. You're living a lie. Anytime that demonic element gets challenged, love doesn't come out, anger does. That's why they get angry. My wife would tell you, a Jehovah Witness out front I was really nice to, got him some little snack, lemonade lunches out of the refrigerator and they're like, blah, blah, blah. And they all just got in their car and left. If what I'm saying is true, why can't you? And I'd ask them, I said, let's sit down and talk about the truth. No, we can't, we gotta go up the street. If you've got the truth, let's sit down and talk about, let's just compare it. See, the truth, you don't have to defend the truth anymore, you have to defend a lion. C.H. Spurgeon said that. Just let it go. You don't defend a lion, you just let it go. You don't have to worry about defending the truth. Like, oh gosh, he got me there. Just let it defend itself. The problem is, most people don't know this. You're not in the Word, so the Word's not in you. You can come and say, listen, your Bible says that Jesus was a God. He's a created being. This Bible says he is the Lord Jesus Christ. And your knee will bow and your tongue will confess. So you better do it now. Don't say it like that. But that's the truth. Don't ever say it like that. You guys would be surprised. I'm nice in the front yard. Hey, have you considered this? Well, I know. But have you thought about this? Well, you let them talk for a while, and then they go back and get their bishops, and then they get real agitated. Because the truth, you can't do, what do you do with the truth? Let's go eat. That's what they do. Because the truth is just right there. And I looked him in the eye, and I said, you are on a broad road to destruction. Jesus is the only way, the only truth, the only life. He's not a created being. Your good works are not going to save you. I think he actually said he'd like to come back and talk to me by himself. We haven't seen him. It's been a year. But just show him the truth. If you could read a good book on apologetics, you could just, hey, have you ever thought about, and that's how you say it. You don't do what I'm doing. You say, well, have you ever thought about this? Have you considered, well, the Bible doesn't say that. And most times I say, well, yeah, it does. No, it doesn't. Let me show you. And then they're just speechless because they've been brainwashed through Watchtower, Track Society, or through the Book of Mormon, or through their teachers, brainwashed. They don't really read this. Their resources tell them what this says. So when you can read, you're saved through Christ and faith alone. It's not of your works, lest any man boast. What do you do with that right there? What do you do with it? You can't. So that's why truth is so important. What about Jehovah Witness? Believe that salvation comes through works and not faith alone. Jesus Christ was a perfect man that created being like us. According to John 1 in their Bible, Christ is a God but not the God. They do not believe everything that Jesus claimed about himself. If you walk through, hey, Jesus said he is the only way, the only truth. He says he is the Son of God. Well, no, that's not really what he meant. See, a little leaven. See, as soon as they took out he's a God, he's created. Okay, well, now you're just gonna leaven the whole bunch and then doctrine just gets weird. It just gets out there. They set out to systematically remove the deity for Christ. So just so you know, let me be clear what Christianity teaches. No one other than Jesus plays a role in redemption. Historical Christianity believes that Jesus is the only way, the only life, the only truth. No one comes to the Father except through him. He is not a God. He is God. We are totally forgiven when we repent and confess Christ as Lord. No punishment remains. Cross-reference Romans 3. God the Father was never like us and we will never be like him in that perfected state of being a God. This dangerous view exalts man and minimizes God. If a person claims that a messenger of light appeared to them as the new truth, point them to Galatians. But even if we are an angel from heaven should preach to you any other gospel, let them be accursed. Do you want to really upset some of these groups? Just read that one and say you are preaching another gospel. If I've ever seen another gospel, that's another one because you're adding to salvation. Christ is the only head of the church. We do not need an additional mediator or priest. We can stand before God because our sin debt was paid in full. No intercessor, no mediator, no penance, or no work can add to Christ's finished work on the cross. That's historical biblical Christianity.