In this sermon, the speaker reflects on a personal experience where they felt deceived and foolish. They emphasize the importance of not giving any room to the devil and not allowing negative influences into one's life. The speaker also shares a powerful testimony of a worship service where God's presence was felt strongly, and an angelic voice was heard. They encourage the congregation to be mindful of their actions and to seek forgiveness and reconciliation with others. The sermon concludes with a reminder to be kind, tender-hearted, and forgiving, as Christ has forgiven us.

Well, good morning. Morning. You ever get tired of sitting? Yeah. You know, I preached for some years in bush camps. You never got a chance to sit, you know, and you never knew where you were going to preach, and you never had a pulpit. It was really different. And I remember one case, just one big room, not as, well, maybe as big as this room, and over in the far corner is a heater, and then there's a wire strung from the ceiling, and guys' clothes hanging on the wire, you know. And then they had a shelf right across the sand. That's where they all slept. That's where I slept, too, on this shelf. They just moved over a little bit, let's me get in, you know. Anyway, I stood over here preaching, and guys were sitting there, had cigarettes, cigars sometimes. It's their turf. I couldn't tell them what to do. You know, I got to pull out a bottle of whiskey and take a shot halfway through the sermon, you know. They just ignored all that stuff. And so I'm preaching. It was really different. But it was a great time, the same time. I'd gone into a camp one time. Actually, this was the first time I ever preached in a bush camp. I'd worked in bush camps before, so I knew what the life was like. And I was a little bit nervous about going into this bunkhouse and inviting these guys to the meeting that night. I got in the bunkhouse. There was three radios going. There was two or three poker games going. Some guy drinking all the booze and all. I couldn't get anybody's attention. I felt like a fool. I was all in there. Nobody listened. Then a guy came up to me and said, Oh, I said, I have an announcement. Oh, see, Tom got all the radios off there. And everybody came and cried. What's the news, you know? Well, I was dressed like a bushwhacker, you see. And that's why I said I'm a preacher. And they roared with laughter. That was a big joke, you see. I finally persuaded them. And then they began to do a little cheering and catcalling and whatnot. A good natured league. Then one said, Well, we're all beer drinkers. And if you have some beer at the meeting over in the cookhouse, we'll sure come. What do you think? I said, yeah. It all comes with beer. I said, do you guys know what the Bible says about beer? Total silence, you know. What does it say? Well, it says that when the children of Israel came to a place called Beer, the Lord gave them water to drink. And I said, you know, it's a barrel of water in the kitchen you guys can help yourself. You know, I had to check that out after to see if I... It just came to my mind, you know. It's in Exodus. It actually says that, you know. The Lord just bailed me out, you know. So, they all came to the meeting that night. You know? So, that's how the world got me going. And we sure had some experience sometimes. I remember one time I had a full house and all the guys were there. And one of the guys was drunk. And he got up and started telling a story. Well, I knew I had to get rid of him or I'd lose all the guys, you know. So, I went down and took him by the elbow and let him out. Boy, you'll see, man. He said, you can't do that bubbles race in front of the gang. I said, well, you deserve it, man. You know? I said, you wouldn't do this in church, right? Well, I sure wouldn't. Well, he was drunk. You know, drunk enough to say almost anything. And I knew I had to get rid of him. And he was arguing with me. And all of a sudden, the guy started singing. Back in the meeting, you know. They were singing. I had little song sheets I'd given out to them. And they were singing away, you know. And it turned out that the cook of the camp, a male, was a born-again believer. And he knew I was in trouble, so he took the meeting over. But he was leaving the song. So, the Lord bailed me out there, too, you know. Another time, I got to a Jehovah's Witness camp. And I knew I was going to have trouble there. I found that there was eight guys who weren't Jehovah's Witnesses and they stayed in a little shack by themselves. And the rest were all J.W.'s, their wives and their kids and everything, you know. So, I talked to the powers that be and they said, well, no. There's no place for me. I said, what's wrong with the cook house? Well, they're watching the floor plan. Well, I said, you've got two cook houses. What about the second cook house? No, no, they're painting the floor there. Oh. I said, what about the bunk house? Ask the guys. And the guys said, okay, it's okay. So, the bunk house. Yeah, you can come and preach all you want, but you've got to give us a chance to ask questions afterwards. Good deal. That's right, I'll do that. What they didn't know was the night before I'd been in a manor camp and they had a beautiful quartet there, a male quartet, and I'd invited them to come to this J.W. camp the next night just in case I had a meeting and sing, see. And I told them, I said, now, if you guys come and I have a meeting, come about 8 o'clock and I'll listen for you coming up. We'll get together. If you don't come, it's okay. Anyway, I told the quartet, I said, listen, they don't believe in being saved, so sing that song, Be Saved Tonight, you know. And they don't believe in the reality of heaven, so sing How Beautiful Heaven Must Be, you know. And these guys, when they walked in, the whole, psychologically, had a tremendous impact on the meeting, you know. These guys looking, wondering, what's going on? These four big guys, you know, and how they sang without accompaniment, you know. And then I preached. And there was a guy in a bunk right here, I could have tapped him on the head, he was just on his hands and listening carefully, you know. Anyway, I preached. And I asked for questions, you know how many I got? I never got one. They were just sitting with their heads down, you know. Nobody knew what to say, so we made the gospel course as clear as we could, and I said, you know, Paul knew he was saved, he wrote to people and they were saved, and I know I'm saved, how come you guys don't, you know. And nobody said a word, you know. The next morning, just as I was leaving the camp, I stayed with the eight guys who were in J.W.'s, and the next morning, as I was walking past the mill, it broke down. So the other pilots had nothing to do, they were standing around in a group talking, so I went over and talked to them. One of them said to me, hey man, that was great last night. I said, really? What did you learn? He said, I found out for the first time you can know you're saved. And, I got saved last night, he said. Praise the Lord, you know. The next year when I came back to the same camp, they had a different strategy for me. So they said we're going to have a certain building, so I went to the building, and they had three chairs set up, and one for me, I was in the center, and there was a guy on each side firing questions at me, and the rest of the gang were standing all around me. I like that kind of situation. I like getting into a jam, you know, because by my God, I've run through a troop, by my God, I've leaped over a wall. I had a great time there that night. They start off by saying, now you believe that Jesus Christ is equal to God? Yes, I do. We don't believe that because it says that Jesus was subject to his Father in Heaven, and so he couldn't be subject to them if he was equal to God, you know. He couldn't be subject to them if he was equal to them. And, you know, I showed up that morning, the answer came down like lightning. I said, well, was Jesus Christ greater than Mary and Joseph? Oh, yes, of course, yeah. Well, as soon as I got there, I looked and he came down to me and was subject unto them. If he could be subject to his earthly parents, couldn't he be subject to his heavenly Father? And it went like that for an hour and a half. He said, oh, it was really neat. Yeah, well, of course it is. And finally, we're all standing around, and one guy says, well, if there's anything for sure, we can't know your Savior. Boy, that was just a, you know, springboard. And I just said, listen, guys, if I was to say I wasn't saved, it would be the biggest lie in this world because I told them how Jesus Christ is Savior years before. You know, if it wasn't sound, you know. Don't be afraid of Jehovah's Witnesses. They don't know their Bibles well. They have some proof texts they know well. You get them away from that? I was witnessing the door while I was going to Transformer. This guy, he came to the door, a great big guy, and he was a G.W. We had quite a bit of logic and discussion, you know. And so I said, you know what, it says in Isaiah, Jehovah said, I am the first man on the land, right? That's right. Could anybody else say that? Oh, no, he said, no, because he's dead. I said, how come Jesus said that in Revelation chapter 1? Long silence, you know. Well, he says, you know, the Bible gets flaky sometimes. Anyway, so much for that. Do you sometimes read something in the Bible and you don't understand? How do you handle it? I learned how to handle it as a young Christian by reading something in a Broadway movie set. He said, I read the Bible the way I eat fish. If I come across a bone, I don't quit eating fish, I just lay the bone on the side of the plate and go on eating fish. He said, I do the same if I come across something I don't understand, I don't quit reading the Bible, I just lay it aside. And so I did the same, you know, and something you don't understand, well, God knows what it means, so you ask God to help you understand it. And somewhere down the road, sooner or later, you get the answer. Turn to Ephesians chapter 3, verse 14. Now Paul is praying for something to happen to the Christians at Ephesus. Okay? For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with power by his Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. I got that far as a young Christian. I said, what now? What's he praying for? I mean, how come he's praying for these Christians at Ephesus that the Holy Spirit, or that Christ will give Christ a new heart? I've read through it about 16 times now. That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. Some translation, that Christ may abide in your hearts by faith. I just couldn't get it. What's he talking about? Aren't they all Christians? They all already have Christ living in their heart? Why is Paul praying this way? Doesn't make any sense, you know. So what was the problem in the first place? Well, they live inside of a plane, and that's not taken care of. And not long after, there's a Greek scholar called Kenneth Reese, W-U-E-S-T, and he did his own copy of the New Testament, and I happened to get a copy, and I'm reading it in Ephesians chapter 3, and here's what his verse said. That he would grant you, then verse 17, that Christ, here's what he had, that Christ may settle down and feel at home in your heart by faith. Christ doesn't always feel at home in our hearts, you know. If there's things in our hearts that shouldn't be there, Christ really doesn't feel at home. That doesn't mean he leaves, but he is disquieted, and he needs our joy, he needs our peace. We've hundreds of times heard people say, well, I just don't have any peace, you know, I don't have any joy. What's wrong, you know? The problem's never with God, it's always with us. Our heart is supposed to be his home. Okay? We are his temple. He lives there. I remember being in a hotel one time in Grandview, Minnesota, many years ago, I was preaching at bush camps up in the back mountain, and I stayed overnight in this hotel. I just happened to get a room over the beer parlor, and sat in there, you can imagine, the hollering and the shouting and the bombing, and I think a couple of fights went on, and all kinds of stuff. Do you think I felt at home? It was this strange hotel, I was sitting there, and the door opened, the guy walked in, looked under the bed, looked in the closet, and walked out again, didn't say anything, you know. It was that kind of a place, you know. I mean, I put a chair under the doorknob that night. But, I did something that wasn't too charitable, I prayed that God would burn this hornet's nest down, you know. I made sure, I said, now make sure nobody gets hurt, you know. And you know what? I burned about a week later, you know. I didn't feel I had to let the insurance company know that I didn't get into it, you know. Yeah. But I didn't feel at home, I'll tell you. Now being in a different place over the years, especially in that kind of ministry, where you just didn't feel at home, you know. And you couldn't do anything about it. And people, there are times when Christ doesn't feel at home, in my heart, in your heart, you know. But He doesn't feel at home, yes? I decided not to say it. That's exactly, on the way to Winnipeg, me and Frank and John were reading through the whole book of Ephesians, and when we were done, that's the exact portion that we re-read again. Frank re-read it and later testified on it. Now that you're preaching on it, I just have to tell you. Okay. When you have a heart that's full of envy, are you envious of what other people have? Wish you had a better wife, a better husband, a better home, a better job, a better car, better kids. Are you envious? The Bible makes it very clear. We're not to be envious of anybody, you know. You should be totally satisfied with your situation in life, whatever it is. You need more money? Well, that's fine. God knows you need it, you'll get it in due course of time. But we're not to be envious at the wicked, especially at the wicked, it says. You know, they do things, bad things, and earn money and get lots of money, and then they zoom ahead and you don't get anywhere and then you live an unrighteous life and you wonder how come this is, you know. But we're told very clearly in Psalm 37 that we're not to be envious at the workers of iniquity because they'll soon be cut down and they'll wither away, you know. Okay. Or a heart full of covetousness, which is much the same, Luke 12, 15, Christ said, Take heed. You know, Christ had been talking about the unpardonable sin in the context, and there was a guy in the crowd who wasn't listening and when he got a chance and Christ stopped him and he said, Master, speak to my brother. Will you divide the inheritance with me? And Christ said, Who made me a judge or a divider over you? And then he said, that's what he said to the guy, then he said to them, says to the crowd, Take heed and beware of covetousness because a man's life does not consist in the abundance of the things which he possesses. Our houses are so full of things, your feet stick out the windows. We still don't have any more time for God anymore. It's like that, isn't it? Covetousness. Remember in the Old Testament, there were eight things that the Israelites were told that were never to covet? Your neighbor's wife, husband, ex, ox, ox's ass, or servant, manservant, maidservant, or anything you have. You're not to covet anything your neighbor had. That's a hard one. Sometimes we don't even realize it's going on, but we're coveting certain things that other people have, and we're envious at them, and Christ is disquieted within us because we're supposed to be satisfied in Him. It's like God said to Abraham, Fear not, Abraham, I am your shield and your exceeding great reward. If you've got God, you've got everything. You've got everything. I say it again, if you've got God. So don't ever be covetous. He grieves Jesus Christ. Sometimes it's unbelief. You ever go to a meeting and just say to yourself, Ah, nothing's going to happen here. It's going to be dead, you know. And it is dead to you. It may be quite a lot to somebody else. I never could understand as a pastor, when people are following by shaking your hand at the Sunday morning service, and somebody says, You know, pastor, I didn't get it or anything. I actually fell asleep. God just wasn't here. Somebody else comes around and grabs your hand and you're weeping and say, Oh, pastor, God spoke to my heart this morning. He blessed me so greatly. I mean, in the same meeting, you know. How do you figure it out? Well, you have to figure it out somehow. Anyway, Hebrews 3.12 says, So be careful, brethren, you don't have an evil heart of unbelief. I had a friend in the States and he had to travel and he was flying all the time in his business. And so one morning he told me he had a fight with his wife and he didn't make it up and he took off and that was that. So he made up his mind, I'm not going to witness to anybody today. He was the kind of guy, he and most of his wife, they're always witnessing to people, but he made up his mind. No, he had a bad attitude. He was really upset and angry with his wife and he's flying, you know. I'm sure not going to witness to anybody, you know. Well, he opened his briefcase and the New Testament fell on the floor from his briefcase and the girl sitting next to him says, Oh, is that a Bible? And she picks it up, you know. Well, yeah, it's a Bible, you know. Oh, do you read the Bible, you know? And he said, That rascal is a lord of the mind. He made me witness. And he led this girl to Christ, you know, see. But he had this evil heart of unbelief. Well, you go that way. But, you know, did you go pray before you came today? I'm not going to ask you to raise your hand or anything, but I ask this question quite often in churches. And I call it an embarrassing question because the response is usually, almost always, is very slow, very low. Very few people come to church service and pray in the first, you know, expecting a blessing and praying for God to bless them. You know, about two years ago, my friend rang a long-distance call from Phoenix, Arizona. And so I gave him his name and he said, I was in some of your meetings years ago and I was really blessed by them. And he said, I found out where you lived. He said, I just want to pray for you. So he started to pray. And people, it went on for ten minutes. And he went most of the time. A lot of the time I was just getting showered to death there. And he, it wasn't put on. It was just a mighty thing, you know. He's known me several times since. He always wants to pray, you know. He doesn't want to talk much, but he wants to pray for me. And that's beautiful, you know. At one time when I was in Crusades, I had 18 people who prayed for me every day. Some of these people fasted and prayed one day a month or maybe one day a week even, you know. And they were part of my team. So you have to never worry about them. They didn't know about them, but I knew about them. They were the ones I was under God, I was looking to. Anyway, a heart full of worry and unbelief, you should take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart and unbelief. You sit there in a meeting with unbelief in your heart, nothing's going to happen, you just hope it's not a long sermon, this kind of garbage, you know. And the Christ who lives within you will be grieved, you know. You lose your joy and peace, and sometimes it's hard to get it back, unless they come on God's terms. What about pride? I've often heard people, sometimes preachers say the biggest problem they have is simply pride. You know, you preach a great sermon and people tell you what a great sermon it was, and then you're on cloud nine for a while, and then maybe your wife will bring you down. Something may happen somewhere, and she will come down. Pride grows before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. You can be sure of that. God has angels who know how to put a cane between your legs and trip you up, you know. And so pride God hates because it's Satan's sin. His sin. He corrupted his wisdom, does anybody know the rest of that? In Ezekiel. He corrupted his wisdom by reason of his brightness. That is, he got looking at himself instead of looking to God. And he saw how much more beautiful than the average angel he was. And he was a goner. Pride. I don't know, when I look at myself and know my own heart, there really isn't any room for pride, you know. When I survey the wondrous cross on which the Prince of Glory died, my richest gain I count but loss, and poor contempt on all my pride. Forbid it, Lord, that I should most save in the death of Christ my God all the things that charm me most. I sacrifice them to his blood. If you've got a pride problem, take a trip to the cross. Ask God to speak to you about the cross. You know, one chapter in the Bible I read again and again and again is Isaiah 53. There's things in that chapter that you don't get at one reading. Maybe even after six readings. All we late sheep have gone astray, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. I think the Martha reading there in the KJ says, and the Lord has made the sin of us all to meet on him. Our sin, your sin, my sin. Pride goes before destruction. Do you have a judgmental spirit? Many people who try to justify having a judgment, well, you have to pass judgment. Well, there may be some kids in your own kitchen. Oh, yes. In 1 Corinthians chapter 4 it says, Judge nothing before the time until the Lord come. Who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the heart. And then, listen, then shall every man have praise of God. The weakest Christian, God will be able to praise in that coming day. Who are you that judges another man's servant whose own mastery stands or falls? Yes, you shall be held up for God is able to make him stand. It's not your business to be, you know, criticizing, judging some other guy's hired servant. That's what the Bibles say. I gave you in one of the other meetings the God's recipe for revival in James chapter 4, and after one came up, the next verse says, Speak not evil one of another, brethren. This has been called, this gentleman, this has been called the favorite indoor sport of these angelicals. It is. I was flying in Austria one time, and got talking to the guy next to me, and he's a born-again believer. He said, I was raised Orthodox Catholic, and then he said, some Pentecostal got ahold of me, and I could see it, you know. Oh, I said, it was nice. And where do you go to church? Oh, he said, I've gone back to the Orthodox Church. Oh, really? He said, why did you do that? He said, you know those Pentecostals? He said, this is not true of all Pentecostals, by any means, but it was the one he outlived me in. It could have been a Baptist church. He said, in the church I went to, they were always, constantly criticizing one another. I never ever heard that in a Greek Orthodox church, you know, and so I went back to the church, you know. You and I have no business. Now if somebody is sending a Christian mother or sister, you have a right to go with them and talk to them about it. Not from up here, down there, but on the same level, you know. You have a right to do that, and sometimes a duty to do that, but not to gossip about them to somebody else. That's not your business. So it says, judge what? Judge nothing. That's what it says. In 1 Corinthians chapter 4. Judgment of spirit. May be an odd fellow of us. You know, pornography is a great problem, even among evangelicals. I'm going to give you a couple of illustrations here. I had meetings in the New Orleans in Edmonton, and a pastor who was attending a meeting, not from that church, came for counseling one night, and he told me, he said, I'm hooked on pornography. I think I've got demons or something. He said, it's just totally overwhelming. He said, I'm going to have to leave the ministry because I just can't stop it. We checked him out. It wasn't a demon problem, but I reminded him the Bible says that no man say, when he's tempted, I'm tempted of God, for God can't be tempted with evil, nor does He tempt any man. But every man's tempted when he's drawn away of his own lust and enticed. I said, brother, it's you. And you've got to repent. I had a psalmist with me, and he started to pray. Oh, that's one of those cases where I think he forgot we were in the room. I mean, he was alone with God, and he was praying, his body was snapping back and forth. He was crying to God to tell Him, God, you're a wicked, rotten, hell-deserving sinner, He loves you. He told me, repent of you. And he prayed on, and we just prayed silently, and suddenly, you know what happened? He laughed. And you could hear the chains hit the floor, you know. He was free. I mean, he knew it. Oh, man, what a time of shelter we had afterwards. He said, I want to do my testimony tomorrow night. Well, I said, listen, you did your testimony, don't talk about the porno problem, you know, just say that you had a great problem that Jesus delivered you from. Okay. So the next night, we had a guy take him to one of the meetings, and so I went to the guy, and I said, now, I'd like you to take everything tonight, not just my sermon. He'd just been doing my sermon. And I take everything. He said, okay, sure, no problem. Talk yourself to that. I mean, he's sitting right there, and I'm talking to him. So this guy gave his testimony, but he said, you know, God led me to sing a song, and he wasn't the singer. Oh, happy day that fixed my choice, I'll be my Savior, and my God. And people listened. As he began to sing, God came on the scene. If you shut your eyes, you'll have shown that God had lowered an angel on a golden chord, and an angel was singing. The whole congregation was weeping. I was weeping. I mean, God was so clear. It was incredible. The pastor with me, Bill Alliance, the head pastor, he said, I'm 63 years old. I've been in ministry long enough. I've never seen anything like that in my life. Well, I said, I've heard it before in revival meetings. I said, it's God the Holy Ghost. I thought to myself, I've got all this on tape, and this is going to be great. Man, pray it to other Christians, you know. So I went to see the guy, and you taped everything tonight, no? He said, I just taped your sermon. I said, what? Well, did you want more blood? I said, don't you remember for the service, you sat there, I stood here, and asked you to tape everything tonight? I don't remember that, I said. I said, you don't remember that? I thought, like, sir, are you a goon or something? I said, forget it. I walked away wondering to myself, oh, a stupid character, a man alive. How stupid could they forget? The Lord said, get on your knees. I mean, it's crucial. So I got on my knees and the Lord said, now stay there until you can praise me that it wasn't taped. I didn't want it taped. I was just meant for this crowd to know. So it took me about five minutes to get over it. And I was able to praise the Lord for it. And it's never been a problem since then. Judge Member Spirit O'Connell read one other case in the center boy, Saskatchewan. And a guy came up to me before a meeting and he said, my wife and I were in a missionary meeting recently and we went forward and dedicated our lives to full-time missionary service, but he laughed, we can't, we can't go into any kind of ministry. I said, why not? He said, well, we're hooked on porno. He told me, he said, I started off, I got my wife into it and now we're looking for dirty stuff all the time, he said, and we're doing some of this stuff and I said, do you want to be out of it? Well, as a matter of fact, we don't. He said, I enjoy it too much. And he started to walk away and I stopped him and I said, just a minute, before you go, are you a born-again believer? Well, he said, I've accepted Christ into my heart. I said, okay, then listen to this before you go. Every time you watch that rotten filth, you're forcing the Christ who lives within you to watch it with you. And you know what happened? I'm not exactly, he fell on his face on that carpet throwing this and wept and wept and wept. And he kept crying, God, I didn't realize. I didn't realize, God, can you forgive me? And he just wept his way back to God, you know. They went to Bible college after that and they're in ministry now, I don't know where, but this is how it was, you know. But that's what's happening. People don't think of that. You watch some salacious thing, you know, well, God, I'm not going to do it often, I might do it once or twice, but Christ says to watch it with you. And that's what we're up against, you know. That's why he's praying that Christ would settle down and feel at home. As new believers sometimes we do a lot of things we shouldn't do because we're not taught, you know. But sometimes after 15 years a Christian is still doing some of the things we have been taught, you know, that we shouldn't be doing. And then sometimes it's just an unforgiving spirit, Ephesians 4, 32 says, be kind, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake is forgiving you. Is there anybody you can't forgive? And people sometimes say, oh, if you knew what I've gone through, you know why I can't forgive. I feel like saying, oh, come on, drop that, what are you talking about? You think I haven't learned anything? I've been around a long while now, you see. No. I tell people, you can't tell me anything that would shock me, I've heard it all, you know. So people, you know, have this attitude, crazy, can't forgive. Why can't you forgive? Well, it was so rotten, you know. Okay, what did Christ pray on the cross? Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. He forgave the world for crucifying on the cross. Now, you see, when he asked us to forgive us, he does it on the basis, even as Christ has forgiven you. Sometimes I repeat myself, illustrations of everyone have to forgive me for that, Spurgeon did the same, I discovered. I had a case, you know, where a fellow phoned me one night, talked two o'clock in the morning, he just confessed to his wife, that he had committed adultery on one occasion, and she wouldn't forgive him, and she ordered him out of the house, and so I went over that middle of the night, and so she's mad as I had her, you know, and he's sitting there crying. And I finally got her attention, she wouldn't even listen to me, and finally I got her attention, and I reminded her about this parable Jesus told, and I said I'm just going to put it into Canadian dollars so you can understand. Here's a guy, he owes $50,000, and he's going to be thrown into a debtor's jail, he begs the creditor to have mercy on him, and the creditor does, and he says okay, let's forget about it, you don't owe me anything. And this guy goes out in the street, and he sees a guy who owes him $5, grabs him by the throat, shakes him to his teeth, so I asked him pay me what you owe, I'm going to throw you into a debtor's jail. Now wait a minute, he was forgiven $50,000, couldn't forgive $5,000, so I told him about this story, and I said now, the $50,000 represents your sins or my sins or your husband's sins against God, that's the sum total of our sins. Because James chapter 2 verse 10 says if you keep the whole law of God and offend God in one point, you're guilty of the whole business, you've broken every law that God has given you. Have you ever heard someone say that? If you keep the whole law of God and then offend God in one point only, you have broken every commandment that God has given you, the reason being the law of God is indivisible for humans, it's not 10 commandments, it's the commandment of God. That's what I said. So I said to her, so the $50,000 is your sins against God, the $5,000 thing, that's your husband's sin against you. And I said, what did Jesus say to that servant that wouldn't forgive the five? She didn't know. And I pointed right at her and I said, you wicked servant. And I stared her down, you know, and she found her head dropped. She looked at her husband and smiled. He came running over, fell on his knees and she ran her hands through his hair and it was all over. I saw him 10 years later walking with God, loving each other. She couldn't forgive you, you better forgive. You'll be in trouble. You'll be in trouble if you don't. It doesn't hurt the other people, your attitude, but it hurts the one who lives within you. He can't send him down and feel at home because of this unforgiving spirit we have. In the light of Calvary, and I can't forgive. Then sometimes it's just that we're lazy. I've met people who told me they were lazy. They just love to sleep all the time, eat and sleep like the dogs over there in Isaiah. They like to eat, they like to sleep, sleeping, lying down, loving the sun where it says they can't bark. They're barkless, but they should be doing their thing, which is barking, but they can't. And the Christians sing to talk about Jesus, and we often won't do that. Maybe we're just too lazy. Some people are like that, just plain lazy. The Bible talks about the slothful over there in Proverbs and other places a number of times. It doesn't speak in complimentary terms of a slothful person either. But there's other thoughts as well. 1 Corinthians 15, 58. Where we have in the Bible the word therefore or wherefore it takes you back in the context. He's coming to a conclusion from what he's been saying. So 1 Corinthians 15 is a great chapter on the resurrection of Christ and our resurrection when he returns. And then comes this word wherefore, my beloved brethren, be you steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, for as much as you know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. Charles Winston preached 60,000 times before he died. Winfield only preached 15,000 times because he died very young. He sometimes preached 6 times in a day. Both those guys did. Spurgeon sometimes preached 18 times in a week. I once preached 28 times in one week. I wouldn't do it again. Four times in a day. It was good but it was too much. Anyway, lazy, too lazy to think about God. Be steadfast, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Because you know that your labor is never in vain in the Lord. Years ago, Melford, Saskatchewan, I visited a guy in the hospital. He was a sinner. He was interested in being saved. And I gave him a Bible. Never saw him again. Years rolled by. I was down in the state somewhere and a guy came up and he said, do you remember giving a Bible to a guy in Melford, Saskatchewan many years ago? And I said, yeah, what about him? Well, he said, that guy got saved. He read the Bible, got saved. And he told me that if I ever made a use of it, it would happen. So, you don't see it now. You'll see it someday. You may not see it in this life at all, but you'll see it in eternity. What you've done, tracts you've passed off that people got saved to and you never heard about, or a word you gave. Like, I was at home one time and, well, the guy, he and his wife didn't get along at all. I saw that. They were Christians, but they didn't get along. That's sometimes true of Christians too. And so I determined to get to talk to this guy somehow, so we ate meals together, but he disappeared as soon as the last crumb was in his mouth. And so this day, I just said to him, um, how was your day? And he said, I don't know. said, I don't know. He said, I don't know. He said, I don't know. He said, I don't know. He said, I don't know. And so he said, I don't don't eat our One lady, though she was honest and she didn't mean to steal, but she was in a store and she was trying purses on her arm and walked out of the store with a brand new purse on her arm. She was halfway home before she realized she'd stolen his purse. So she said, if I go back, they'll call me shoplifter and I might wind up in jail. So she never went back. But in our meetings God spoke to her and so she went back. She told us she was going to go back the following day and so we prayed for her and she gave her testimony that night. She was just running over. She told the manager, she asked the manager of the store, she told him what had happened and he said to the lady, you've just made my day. He said, I've been here for 30 years. We've never had any shoplifter come back. And you're not even a shoplifter, but you came back. And he said, man, it's just made my day, you know. And she said, you're so happy. Yeah, but sometimes Christians do shoplift. When they come for counseling, they want you to pat them on the head. They want you to be kicked in the rear, you know. It's stealing no matter how you look at it. It's stealing, you know. You jumped off the shelf, you know, you put your hand up, you know. People try to justify it with cruel things, you know, stupid things. It's just, you wonder sometimes. Anyway, let him this soul steal more and more. But rather than labor work in the sense of things which is good, that he may have to give to him that needs. Do you ever think of it that way? It doesn't say that you may have to shop away in the bank, you know. That you may have to give to him that needs. We need to think that too, you know, because as Christians we don't normally think that way. You've got several hundred dollars in your pocket, maybe. Maybe there's somebody you're going to meet you need to give some of that money to, you know. God may lay a missionary on your heart and you should send him a check, maybe, you know. We should be open then. Okay, tithe, that's fine. We should tithe and give often. But there should be times also when we go beyond that. And maybe sometimes even until it hurts a little. But you cannot get God. Remember that verse to Ephesians. Whatsoever good thing any man does, the same shall he receive of the law. Do you believe it? You'll get it. You'll get it. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and run over, shall then give into your bosom. For it is the same measure that you'll meet with God, and shall be measured to you again. Maybe it's what the Bible is saying. I'm not preaching a prosperity doctrine. Don't misunderstand me. Because Paul said he went to this prison. Oh, we both hungered and thirsted and naked and bustling and had no certain dwelling place. So he was not a millionaire. Some of these guys are telling you people, you know. Anyway, the Son of Man has not where his head. All that I haven't stolen, steal no more. Maybe I'm a hard heart. And we often hear people say, you know, I hardened my heart years ago and it's still hard today. The Bible says in the book of Job, who has hardened himself against God and has prospered? Nobody has. In the Gospels, there are, I think, four places where it talks about people having hardened hearts. In three cases it were believers. And sometimes we just harden our heart. The preacher gets up, announces text, and right away we freeze. No, no, we don't want them to monkey around that text, you know, because it bugs them. So they just harden their heart, shut off their ears, and maybe sit with a smile on their face. Yeah. George Bell, a good friend of mine, he, great soul man, man. He moved to Toronto from Brandon, Manitoba, and met 400 people of Christ the first years in Toronto. He learned the Italian language, because he was having such a ministry among Italian people, he just learned the Italian language, you know. And he told a story one time, a fellow in his congregation was falling asleep all the time. And he tried everything, and talked with the guy, and the guy says, Pastor, I don't know what it is, I meant to get up to speak, I'm gone. So he heard a story, so he talked to this guy's wife, and he said, now, he said, get some Limburger cheese, you know, and the next time he falls asleep, stick it under his nose, you know. So she did. And he called and said, Mabel, take your feet off the pillow. I mean, just one of those things, you know. Anyway, the guy never slept again. All right. Sometimes Christians lie. You know, in Ephesians chapter 4, where for putting away lying, speak every man truth, he's talking to Christians. You know, lying is this thing that almost everybody gets into sometimes, you know. It's easier to tell a lie in some situations than to tell the truth. Down in St. John, Michigan, they gave me an old heap, and I was living 10 miles out of the city, and one trip in and out, and I had to put another quart of oil in it, you know. And smoke poured out from behind all the time, and they didn't have any insurance on the heap, you know. Anyway, St. John, Michigan. And my wife was flying in with one of my daughters one night, and so at the last minute, fortunately, the preacher said, take my new car for your wife. Now that old heap you have, take my new car. Okay, so I took his new car, drove about three blocks from the church, and ran a red light, and slammed into another car with this brand new heap, you know. Woo! Hey, Lord, where you up to? Woo! So I sit there, and the policeman comes, and he said, now what's the story? I said, the story is I ran a red light. I didn't see, it was up here, up and down here, I didn't see it, and I'm terribly sorry. He looked at me and he says, well, he said, you know, I've been a cop for 25 years. I think that's the first time I've ever heard the truth. Well, he said, you know, the court is sitting this afternoon, and I can take you down there and get it all settled, send you down to the court. They only charged me $25. It wasn't a bad deal, you know. And the preacher's car had insurance on it, so it wasn't a bad deal. But if I had done that with another heap, no insurance, you know, I'd still be paying probably, you know. But the Lord had a reason, all that, because in going to the court session, I had a chance to witness to the cop, and he was wide open. He didn't accept Christ, but he was wide open. And a lot of these people are so open down the road, they get saved, you know. A lot of them do. So, keep that. But speak truth always, no matter how costly it is. Tell them the truth. I got picked up one time by a Monty. I was driving a 72 Ford Club Wagon, and he said I was speeding. I was watching him pretty carefully. I didn't think I was speeding. I didn't argue. And so we talked a while, and then I had a chance to witness to him. He said, you know, I'm an alcoholic. He said, if I don't get a victory over this alcohol, I won't be a cop very long, you know. They know I'm fighting for it. He said, and I sure need a lot of help. So I told him about Jesus, how Jesus could take care of this problem for him, you know. And he didn't accept the Lord at the moment, but he was listening carefully, and I'm sure down the road he did. And then it dawned on me, this was the reason why the Lord had him, you know, pull me in. God wanted me to talk to this guy. So I really wasn't speeding, but God made him see it differently. I mean, God works with machines too, you know. He's got a lot of ways of working. It should never make you uneasy. It should only make you uneasy if you're living in sin. Then you're up against the mastermind of the universe. And remember in one of the sessions, I think I said, if you're trapped with the speed of light, which works out to some millions of miles an hour, it'll take you 120,000 years to cross the Milky Way constellation, of which we're a small part, you know. And that's the mind you're up against. So, you better not try arguing with God. He's got the last word, always. Full of anger, anger arrests an abusement of fools, it says in Ecclesiastes, you know. Anger arrests an abusement of fools. If you do lose your temper, ask the person or person's forgiveness. Down in Chile, I was speaking at a Bible camp on a lake in the mountains. In the Andes mountains. It was a beautiful place. About 50 or 60 people, and we had a session one day, and we were just sitting in chairs in a big circle in this big room, and a fellow got up and he said, Hey people, he said, do you realize something? They didn't know what he was getting at. He said, one year ago, we were at the same camp, and every one of us that were at the camp a year ago are here today. There isn't one missing. And he got a look around, yeah! That was really strange, you know. They were all there. And he said, if you remember, last year, at that session, I lost my temper, and I said some very evil, hard things. And God brought us together today so I could make it right, you know. And he made it right with the group. And I thought to myself, God could even do stuff like that, you know. Get all these people together? Well, look, Christ said, go into the village over in D.C. and find the coals there, you know, that have been tied, and you just pick it up, and if they ask any questions, you just say, the Lord has a need of them, and I'll answer them, and they find exactly as Christ said. He told them again, another occasion, when you go into this village, you'll meet a man bearing a pitcher of water. Follow him, and go into the house where he lives, and that's where we're going to have the Passover feast. I mean, God orders all this stuff, you know. He knows how to do it. I had to meet a man in Portage O'Prairie one time, near Chicago. I lived there one time. I lived in Winnipeg at the time this happened, though. But I had to meet this guy, and all I had was his first name, you know. I don't have a great memory, you know, except for the Bible, maybe. But anyway, I said, Lord, I have to meet this guy, so you're going to have to put us together. So I drive an hour and a half to get to Portage O'Prairie. I'm going down the main drive, and then I saw this post office sign, and I just had a few, I didn't even buy some stamps, so I turn around like this, and the guy walked by in front of the car, you know. The guy I'm looking for, so. Yeah, he can do all those things, and we trust him. He can't do anything that we don't trust him, you know. You've got to believe him to see his power and his wisdom. Okay, anger. That's Ecclesiastes 7 and 9. Rest in the bosom of fools. Heart full of carnality, Paul said to Christians, who ask this among you, all these envies and strife and divisions, are you not carnal and lawless men? And sometimes we're doing things in a carnal, that is, in a fleshly way, the way the world would do it, thinking as the world thinks and acting the way they act. And as Christians, we're not supposed to be that kind of person. To be spiritually minded is what? Life and peace, it says in Romans 8. To be spiritually minded. So, we should be attempting always to do things in a spiritual way. James spoke about envying and strife and divisions and all that. He said, this wisdom doesn't come from God. Historically, it's sensual, it's carnal, and it's demonic. It comes from demons. And sometimes we listen to demons, you know. And repeating things the demons are putting into our minds and hearts. And it grieves us that the Christ who lives within. Heart full of idolatry. I read a while ago about an outstanding businessman in Toronto, Canada. He's one of the wealthiest men in Canada. And every morning, he spends 15 or 20 minutes on his knees before a wooden idol. He's an idol worshiper. Even in Canada, you know. And people are doing that. We saw it from India. You'd see temples shaped like a pyramid on the outside of the temple with the carved figures. And sometimes with the carved figures of homosexuals engaged in homosexual acts on the outside of the temples. This kind of thing, you know. But idolatry in Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3, it says the covetous man is an idolater. And covetousness is idolatry. Don't ever let money get a hold of your heart. That's not where it's at. I had a preacher friend, and anytime he was asked to candidate in a church, the first thing he would say to him was this, I don't want to talk about money at any time until we've discovered, you've discovered, and I've discovered it's the will of me to come or not to come. I don't want any money to enter into the problem at all. And he said, you know, sometimes I accepted a call from a church who was getting considerably less than I was getting in the church I was in. That didn't mean anything to him. But I know a fellow in Alberta, and he was called to a certain church in another city in Saskatchewan, and he let me know at the very ultimate level, I'm earning $42,000 a year where I am, and I can't accept anything less than $42,000 a year if I come here. Now this was about, oh, 15 years ago. They couldn't afford that, but they wanted him to come because he had a good reputation and all of that. So they did call him. Then they struggled for several years trying to meet the payments, the bills. They had a hard time. By contrast, in India, I met a young guy about 25, and he was called to be a pastor, so he was so excited, he said, it's six months down the road before I'm to become a pastor in this little group. So, you know, he asked a question like you might ask a pastor here in Canada, where do you live? Have you got a house? Oh, no, he said, no. No, we never talked about that, he said, and if they don't have a place, he said, I can sleep under a platform. I've done that before, he said, you know. Oh, really? I know you wouldn't have a car, so I said, well, do you have a donkey or a bike or something? No, he said, I'll just walk. I said, and what will they pay you? Oh, he laughed. He said, they're very poor, and they won't pay me probably anything. So then I said, and what kind of a library do you have? And he held it up, a little tattered Bible, four by six inches falling apart, that was his library, you know. And he could hardly wait to go. And then later this other guy, the 42,000 thing, how does that figure this out, you know? So my wife and I, we bought him some books, and we got him a bike, and he thought the money would come, you know. He couldn't believe it. But you know, there are people like that. They'll serve God no matter what. And he would see God would provide for him, you know. He didn't have a state of sound or a place to play the vanity game. He always paused, you know. So. Okay, idolatry. A covetous man is an idolater. And sometimes you just have an unclean heart, but keep thinking evil, you know. 2 Corinthians 7 says this. Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, and remember, there are 7,487 promises in the Bible. Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the fleshly spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. If you've got an unclean heart, you'd better get it cleaned up, you know. Draw near to God, and he'll draw near to you. What's the next verse say? Cleanse your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you devil minded. Be afflicted in morn and weep, that your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up. Unclean heart. You know, it says, and this is something North America needs to remember. In the days of Noah, all flesh had corrupted its way. I mean, they were morally corrupt. Everybody was corrupt. It was that bad. Except for Noah and his family. And then, they were violent. There was violence in society everywhere. We've got the same problem today. Violence in society, moral corruptness everywhere. And if God doesn't do something with this generation of North America, you're going to have to apologize to Noah's generation. It goes together. Corrupt minds, no love, violence. One of the universities in the Eastern United States, they were recently given a gift of $80 million to put some of their top brains to try and find out what is causing violence in America. I mean, how stupid can they get? Don't they know what's causing it? I mean, you see violence on TV everywhere. Women with pistols, people shooting and stabbing. And they say, oh no, that doesn't affect anybody. Then why do people spend billions of dollars every year advertising their products if advertising doesn't affect anybody? You know. And then people, they're drunkards, and they don't like that word. So they say, well, they're alcoholics and they have a disease. If it's a disease, how come the government licenses places where they can catch it? Right? Does that make any sense to you? It doesn't make any sense to me. But that's how it is. Uncleanness. Witchcraft. I've been amazed. You know, the first time I ever preached or lectured on this problem was in Minneapolis. And about 400 people stayed behind from their first meeting to listen to this lecture. At the end, they gave an invitation. I was just shocked. About 40 people came forward, all of them born-again believers, involved in some form of witchcraft. All the way from one or two things to 30 things, perhaps. And over the years, we've often had to counsel people into witchcraft. And quite often, I would say that mostly it was done sort of innocently in that they didn't even know what they were doing was witchcraft, you know. Then, in Cincinnati, Canada, which is a lot smaller than the Twin Cities in Minneapolis, I lectured on it there, and about 30 people came forward involved in witchcraft, you know. So it's a problem. And so it says in Ephesians 4, don't give any place to the devil. If you give him an inch, he'll take a foot, you know. And you can't just shake it off. You get involved in witchcraft, you can't just shake it off. I don't see a place in the Bible where anybody could do it on their own. They needed outside help. I mean, seen that and done that many times over the years. Don't get into that. And things like the Ouija board. I don't know how many people we've dealt with. A friend of mine, a preacher, was in the home, and they had a Ouija board sitting on the coffee table. And the coffee table was made of glass, sitting on a thing that had rubber. There's no suction cups on it, just sitting on rubber. And they had this Ouija board sitting there, and he knew what that was. So he said, they were using it, and he said, can I ask it a question? Sure, go ahead, you know. So he said, you know, it had little heart shapes in it with three legs on it. It moves around ladders and spells out words. So he said, Ouija, tell me, who is Jesus Christ? He said, the devil, that thing, threw up in the air and turned over and swam to the floor and broke into a thousand pieces. And the people of the house said, what in the world? He hadn't touched it, you know. Then he explained to them what it really was, you know. And so, it's not just a harmless game. Do you want a definition of witchcraft? Listen carefully. Any attempt to get information or help or entertainment by an appeal to hidden sources of spiritual power, other than the God of the Bible, that's witchcraft. Any attempt to get information, help or entertainment from any source other than the God of the Bible, that's witchcraft. They can do all kinds of things. A Christian teacher in Campus Case in Ontario, they had a new principal in the school and he invited all the teachers in the fall to come to his place for a party and they all went and he was doing witchcraft. And he had a big candle on the table and he lit this candle and walked, kneeled around the table with her hands on the table and she didn't want to do that because of peer pressure, you know. So she had her hands on the table. And he lit this thing and I said, watch the candle. And he watched the candle and the flame was about this high and it blew up like this and it was about this high. Now he said, watch it again and it turned down like this and just like a blowtorch was blowing out here, you know. And she said, well it's time I got out of here. So she got out of there, you know. But she said, you know what, all the way home walking there was something walking inside of me. She said, you could just sort of see the outline of it. And that night in bed she had a hard time. There was something in her room, you know. And so, anyway, it says, don't give any place, any room, to the devil. Don't do that. It grieves Christ, of course, greatly. We mentioned before something about gossip, bitter endings, strife, and all of that. James 3, 14 to 18, you might want that reference there. Let him restore us to humor. We talked about that. Not self-willed, it says in Titus 1, 7. I guess this is really, I don't guess, I know, this is the basis of all our problems in the area of sin, you know, that we're self-willed. We want to do what we want to do whether God wants it or not, you know. And sometimes we say, well God, I'll do it this once and I'll never do it again. Why do we do this once, you know? That's not right either, you know. So, it grieves God's Spirit. That list he gives over there in Ephesians, you know, Ephesians 4. Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed unto the day of redemption. Then in 1st Thessalonians 5, it says, quench not the Spirit. The word quench has the idea of throwing water on a fire. And if we quench the Spirit, when he leaves us to do something, we'll put water on the fire. And that quenches, it puts the Spirit down. It grieves him. Um, I think one thing that most of us have sometime entertained is just fear. The fear of man brings a snare. We're told that in many examples in the Bible, including Abraham. He arrived on two different occasions. Then his son Isaac arrived too far on his dad's bad example. And for the same reason. Because telling the truth was too unpleasant. They were among unconverted people and they might have been killed. They figured then they forgot that God was a God of the universe, not just a tribal deity. Sometimes we forget that too, you know. God is everywhere. If you're among people and somebody blasphemes God or Christ, do you ever say anything? Do you? Most of us don't. I mean, it hurts us. We don't like to hear that and we walk away. Listen, that's an open door for a witness, you know. I found that out years ago. Just say something. Say something, you know. I was walking with a brother-in-law of mine who at that time was not a Christian. He and his wife and I, we were walking down the street. I guess it was the Olympic. And a couple of guys passed us and they were blaspheming God. And my unsaved brother-in-law turned, went back, stopped these guys and balled them up for cursing. He wasn't even a Christian. He had some moral standards. There was an opportunity, you know. I'm going past a drugstore and there's probably 15 or 20 kids standing in a big circle there having a great time. And one of these kids, he started shooting up this big mouth, you know, about Christ. And they were laughing, giggling and so I broke through the group and walked up to him and I said, you were talking about my best friend Jesus Christ and I don't like the way you're talking about him. And you know, he never said a word. He just stared at me with his mouth open. He couldn't talk, you know. And I waited. Nobody in the group said a word. So I turned and walked out of the group when I went down the street. We don't ever forget that, you know, see. But we have opportunities like that. And even if it's a rough crowd, you say something, you know what you'll find? Mostly they'll quiet. I've never had a bad reaction in a case like that. You'd expect it in some cases and you don't really see that because God is with you in that. I sometimes tell people, you know, I remember a long time, this guy, I didn't know he was the bull of the woods back in the Shantyman days and he had a terrible reputation. I found out a little later on. He was blackmailing all the time. We'd have to meet in the woods, you know, in the bush. And so, he got cursing and he said, you know, it's life in the bush, he said, it's terrible, he said, trucks break down and he gets to be 40 below at night and nothing works anymore and he blasphemes some more and I said, I'm surprised it isn't even worse. He said, why did you say that? Well, I said, I hear you guys all the time asking God to damn this truck and damn this and damn that and damn something else and you don't know what answers pop up. Oh, well, he said, well, now, wait a minute, he said, we don't mean it. I said, why don't you tell God that so he'll understand. We don't mean it. After I found out who he was, I met him and he was really taking a bull by the horns. I didn't realize he had this awful reputation of being this big blasphemer, you know, but he just backed off, you know. People never get challenged, you know, and they need to be challenged and we can do it. Do it in a nice way, you know. Just let them know you're there and Christ is alive. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear because fear has torment, 1 John 4, you know. He that fears is not made perfect in love and God's love is the only love that is perfect. Remember faith works by love? Remember that? Galatians 5, verse 8, I think. Perfect love casts out fear. Perfect love casts out One time within a week, one week period, two different gals, not the same, in the same meeting, I think, they came for counseling and they were both filled with fear after listening to some rock music, you know, and they said, we can't get this stuff out of our mind, you know. I know today they're using a lot of Christian rock. Do you know where the word, the term rock and roll came from? That describes sex on the streets in Harlem in New York. That's where it started. And so they're talking about Christian rock? That bugs me, you know, that's not right, I don't think, you know. I wonder sometimes what we're thinking about in some of these areas in our churches, you know. Doesn't it say be still and know that I am God? Doesn't it say the Lord is in His holy temple and all the earth keeps silent before Him? But you get into some meetings in New York and you're proposing yours, you know. Someone said, Spurgeon said, nonsense is not improved by being bellowed. Do you believe that? Am I tromping on some toes today? Nonsense is not improved by being bellowed. No, that's, that's true. We need to have time to where it's quiet and you can think. People walking around carrying the radio with them, listening to music all day long, you know. That is not healthy, I don't think. It's not good, you know. God can't even talk to them because they don't have any time for Him. Okay, we're talking about feeling the double-mindedness last of all, James 4, 8. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts and double-mind you. So, double-mindedness is due to impurity of heart. James 1, 8 talks about that. A double-minded man is unstable in all ways. And the tribe of Reuben, God said, Reuben, unstable as water, thou shalt not excel. And sometimes we belong to the tribe of Reuben and we're very unstable, like water is moved by wind very easily and we're like that sometimes as Christians. We don't have to stay in a position. It depends on the people we're with at the time. We stand here if they're Christians, we stand somewhere else if they're backsliding, we stand somewhere else again if they're sinners. You think that pleases God? No, be steadfast, remember, unmovable. That's what He said for you and for me. And remember, Christ lives in your heart. And Paul was praying we might settle down and feel at home, really at home in our hearts. Husbands, love your wives and be not bitter against them. Sometimes there's a lot of bitterness even in Christian homes. And sometimes we need to, you know, Gordon Bailey so mightily used as God. I asked him one time, I said, don't you ever have any trouble getting sermons? Because he wasn't a student. But when I did, I gave him the New Testament on tapes. And since he was a carol inspector at the time, he was traveling all the time from here to there. And finally got to the place where he really knew the New Testament. He said, I don't have any trouble getting sermons. But he said, I have trouble in another area. So what is it? And I said, he said, well, have an argument with my wife, and I said, have any And he trouble sermons. And he said, well, I have with my wife, and I trouble life would be crippled. You can guarantee it. You're absolutely right. They don't go by facts, they go by feelings more and by influences and stuff and ideas and they like to talk and the men like to sit and think, right? At least they tell me that's how it is. You have to know they're giving honor to the ones on whom you can best them. I was in a home one time with a client in Manitoba and he was 85 and she was 65 and they were in love like a couple of teenagers. I knew some of the young. He'd walk by and pinch her and she'd look at him and glare at him and then she'd smile and then she'd go and pinch him, you know. Every time they wanted to best each other they had to touch each other with their arm or something and then they'd roar with laughter, you know. This was going on all day long. I was in the home, you know. Now one day he got up to do something. I didn't know he was putting storm windows on for the winter anymore. At his age, on a ladder? So I'm helping him with the dishes in the kitchen and all of a sudden the ladder goes back past the window and he's hanging on for dear life. And we were tearing outside and I caught him and there he's hanging on a ladder, you know. He looks at his wife and he starts to laugh. She starts to laugh, you know. And we were all going to laugh for all of us. And finally some neighbor's came and got him down over there, you know. And I was in Klamath after an anniversary service not long after she passed away. And I said, Brother Gil, I said, how was it with you? And he said, I miss my girl. I miss her terribly. I'm sure you did. Well he said, I'm sure when he got them it must have been a shoving time, you know. I don't think they have reruns, but if they have, I'd like to see some of these. It was such a great thing to see though. At that age. And she had physical deformity and yet he loved her with all his heart. We don't see a lot of it today. Double mindless purifying of hearts, okay. Did you know the Bible teaches clearly both in the Old Testament and the New Testament that Jesus Christ has circumcised our heart? Now the Bible speaks about circumcision in the flesh for the Israelites, the Jewish people. I was talking to a Jew one time and he said, do you understand that the Old Testament speaks about circumcision of the heart? And I looked at him and said, yes I know that. He knew that. He didn't know what it meant, you know. In Romans chapter 2 we're told that he is not a Jew who is one outwardly. Neither is that circumcision that which is outward in the heart. But he's a Jew who is one inwardly and circumcision is that of the heart. In the spirit and not in the letter, whose praise is not a amendment of God. And so there is such a thing as circumcision of the heart. And if you turn to Colossians chapter 2, there's a verse there we maybe should look at as we close. Colossians chapter 2, verse 11. In whom, he's talking about Christ. In whom also you are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, it's not a human thing, and putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. If there's anything in your life that needs to go, ask Christ to do it. To circumcise that, take it out of your life, he'll do that for you. That Christ may settle down and feel at home in your hearts by faith. And so if there's a problem there in your life, maybe something I talked about, something I haven't even mentioned, people take care of it. Try and say, you know the Bible says walk in love. Walk in love. Let all your things be done with love. Walk in love. Live in love. And have a loving attitude to everybody that you meet. I had a man in one of my churches and he, I guess he was probably the most faithful witness next to Bill Rempel, or maybe he was saying he was Bill Rempel, but it didn't look like I ever met, you know. He just loved to witness. But you know what he told me? He said, for many years I wanted to be a Christian and I didn't know how. And he had some close relatives who lived near his place who never once heard the gospel of him. So he never found out how to be a Christian. He's in his fifties. He says, I heard people talking about God and religion. Got as close as I could and listened to everything I heard, you know, hoping to get some light on it. He didn't read the Bible. He didn't know about that. But this went on and on, you know. Then one day a young Christian who was a druggist whose wife was a doctor, they were going as a team to Africa as missionaries and didn't know. And he said to this man, Elmer, Jesus Christ means everything in the world to me. What does he mean to you? And he said, boy, I was getting mad. That young whippersnapper talking to me that way. Man, he was mad, you know. But within 24 hours he was saved, you know. And he had such a sweet way. If you introduced him to somebody, within three seconds he'd be talking to them about Jesus, you know. He had such a sweet way. Nobody could get mad at him, you know. And sometimes he told me, he said, Pastor, I've been duck hunting and I've wounded a couple of ducks and I can't get them in the boat. Could you come and help me? Well, I knew what he meant. He'd been talking to some sinners and he got them so far he couldn't get them all the way. He wanted me to come and help him get them in the boat, you know. Oh, he was a great person. Look at the Lord now. Actually, when he was 80 years of age, he contracted incurable cancer. He asked somebody to pray for him and he was healed. And he lived for some years after that. Now he's in heaven. Now he's in heaven. And someday he will be there. Take heed how you build on Christ the foundation. Remember we were told that? Take heed how you build thereupon. For other foundations can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Build with gold and silver and precious stones, not with wood and stone, we were told. Remember? So, let's pray.