In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of preaching the truth and feeding the congregation. He shares a personal story about a shepherd he met in Colorado who loved his sheep enough to preach the truth to them and take care of their physical needs. The speaker also highlights the significance of being a good witness for Christ by maintaining cleanliness and decency. He mentions that despite his straightforward preaching, the congregation grew to like him. The sermon concludes with a humorous anecdote about a small television set in the choir area that displays the scores of the Bears and Cowboys football games.

I was in the city of Decatur, Illinois, preaching a few days ago. I was to preach the last message. Dr. John R. Rice was to preach the first message, and I was out at the book table. He was just beginning to preach, and I slipped in. I heard somebody say, Hallelujah! And I did not think that sounded like the usual expression of our conferences. I looked over and I saw a group of people, about six or seven people, with long flowing hair, I mean men, long hair down to the, I guess they were men, they had beards. I do not know if the beards are becoming fashionable with ladies these days, but way down, I mean way long hair, and I am not being unkind or critical about it now, I just noticed them. And the more Dr. Rice would preach, the more they would, the more enthusiastic they would become. And I stood to speak and spoke for a while, and I guess there must have been a half a dozen, maybe downstairs, and several up in the balcony. All had their Bibles, all of them would say, Amen, Amen, Hallelujah, praise God! And so I am, I am not against that, by the way. In fact, I think some of you folks could use a bit of it. But I, and I preached and it was over. They came by and chatted with me the next morning. I could tell, though, they were a little bit leery of me. The next morning, morning service, a hundred and twenty-five of them showed up on buses. I found out they were having a Jesus Freak convention, they called it that, down in Decatur. And they had enjoyed the service on, the six or eight or ten, had enjoyed the service on Monday night and had brought a hundred and twenty-five back. Now, they looked like hippies, but they were, I think, converted people, most of them, and I think perhaps as good a percentage as we have here, converted people. But they were a little leery of me. And the pastor was a little bit afraid to recognize the visiting preachers. He had promised that he would, and he didn't. And so when I stood to speak, I said, I want all the preachers to stand up, full-time Christian workers. And I said, I especially want the person in charge of this visiting group. He stood and told his name, where he was from. And they were still a little leery of me. And I said, you folks, you may be frightening to some people, but I said, you're just some kids, just barely grown, some of you not grown yet. And I said, I love you and I'm glad you're here. I said, how long has it been since you had a meal, a good, hot meal? And they, they like that, one fellow said, had oatmeal for breakfast. And by the way, that beats your ham and bacon. But anyway, they, I said, okay, I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to buy all of you a hot lunch. Now you start feeding 125, Jesus freaks, haven't had a meal for a long time. You're in trouble. It cost me over $125 altogether, just for a little something. But I, I wanted to know if somebody loved him. And I, I said, now, I don't agree with all that you believe. And I said, I want you to know this, your mom and dad back home deserve your, your love, your attention, and your letters. I want you to go home, write mom and dad a letter. See, they travel all over the country, just travel together. Sleep in tents and travel one city to another. And I said, number, I said, next thing, I want you to remember this. Though you may be Christians, you're still human. And for a bunch of unmarried boys and girls to be traveling across the country together is not at best normal nor healthy. And I said, you're asking for trouble. And I said, you behave yourselves. And then I gave them all a free copy of my book on Jesus Had Short Hair. Don't know why I did that, but I did. And you see, you know, you don't love them. Let me ask you a question, buddy. How long has it been since you spent $125 for a bunch of them? I love them enough for I preached the truth to them and fed them. And if you don't do both, you don't love anybody. And if you feed them and don't preach the truth, you don't love them. And so I preached the truth to them, told them they ought to get their hair cut, and they ought to be clean and decent, and they ought to bathe, and they ought to wear clean clothes, and they ought to be good witnesses for Christ. And you know, those guys and gals, they got to liking me. Can you imagine that? No, you can't, can you? But they got to liking me. You kids just keep your heads still while you're in church. And they got to liking me. They came back that night, and the leader said, now get this, the leader said, Brother Hiles, where do you pastor? And I said, First Baptist Church, Hammond, Indiana. He said, I thought that's right. He said, could you tell me where you're going to be speaking in weeks and months to come? I said, why? And here's what he said. He said, do you know why we have people like us? He said, we are sick and tired of the hypocrisy in the organized church. And then he said, you don't agree with us on a lot of things, but he said, we think you are sincere. And I said, you think right. I was out in Southern California preaching. It's been several, a couple of years ago. I was preaching Founders Week for the Baola College. I don't know what that stands for, Baola. And I was eating in a restaurant next to the motel where I was staying, and I heard somebody say, Praise the Lord! I looked down, and there were a couple of fellas, or girls, and I'll be honest, I did not know which, because girls wear britches and boys wear long hair, and it's pretty tough to tell. Now, honestly, it is. You can usually tell by the length of the hair. If the hair is real long, it's a boy. But I heard a fella say, Praise the Lord! I looked down, and they had a Bible. And they had a Bible. Now, if you get mad at me because of this, I'll say it again. Buster, you fork out $125 and feed us. What you're trying to do, you're trying to salve over the truth. Now, I love everybody. I don't care how you're dressed or how you wear your hair. God knows I love you. And by the way, I don't ever change a message when I walk in the auditorium. I always preach what I plan to preach. Never change it to touch anybody, never change it to evade anybody either. And, but, I'm simply saying this, I love them. But Paul said, Am I to come near you because I'll tell you the truth? Anyhow, these fellas, I walked up, I said, Are you fellas Christians? And they said, Praise the Lord. And I said, Amen. They said, What are you doing out here? And I said, I'm preaching the Bible. I preached at about seven different churches that week, throughout the Southern California area. And they were at every service. And I won't forget the leader. He was a little bitty guy, had about 28 inch waist, and he must have had a 56 inch pair of trousers on. And he had a rope around it. He had a rope through the loops. And really, he looked like a tent. Honestly, he did. And, but they followed me. I preached in San Diego. They went to San Diego. In fact, I drove a bunch of them down with me, took Carla with me to San Diego. And all the boys had hair way down to here. I love them. Preach the truth to them. Everywhere I was, I preached the Bible, said it's a shame for man to have long hair. Preach the truth. Look, most of these Jesus freaks are not upset with us because we preach something that they don't agree with. They're upset with us because most of the churches in America, and you know it's true, and they know it's true, are a bunch of hypocrites. Now, they're right in this respect. There needs to be a revival of sincerity in the Lord's Word. In the text a little while ago, that you may be sincere till the day of Christ. That you may be sincere. The word sincere is a very interesting word. It comes from two words. One S-I-N-E, sine. One C-E-R-A, sera. The word sine or sine means without. And the word C-E-R-A means wax. The word sincere means without wax. That's what it means. Well, now you say, good night, what's that got to do with, what's wax got to do with sincerity? I'll tell you. The Roman builders would conceal the flaws in the marble by putting wax inside the marble. They would try to cover it over. Then when the building was built with that marble, it would sit in the sun and the sun would melt the wax in the marble. And after a while the marble would split. Why? Because the wax would melt. And the flaws in the building and construction would be revealed. And so when somebody talked about something sincere, they meant without wax. It's all building, it's all marble. It has no wax in it. And that's what the Lord, why the Lord chooses that word sincere without wax. Now there are four things the Bible teaches us about which were to be sincere. The first thing were to be sincere about our salvation. Philippians 110, that ye may be sincere till the day of Christ. The day of Christ is the rapture when Christ comes for his own. The day of the Lord is the revelation when Christ comes with his own. But it says here, we are to be sincere till the day of Christ. Why? We'll get our resurrected bodies in, our glorified bodies in. We're to be sincere about our salvation. Now brother, you can get by until the day of Christ with your confirmation as your hope for heaven. But brother, when the day of Christ comes, the sun's going to beat down on your wax and melt it and flaws will be, will be shown in your foundation without wax. Are you saved? Yes, I'm confirmed. You've got wax in that. Are you saved? Yes, to be baptized. There's wax in that. Are you saved? Yes, to live a good life. There's wax in that. The only true foundation for salvation is, is faith in the finished work of our Lord's death on the cross. Nothing, anything else but when the heat comes, that's why Jesus said upon this rock, I'll build my church. Now I'm a preacher. I've been preaching for 28 years next month. For 28 years I've been preaching. Brother Pierce, there is not a day I live without examining my salvation. You sit in the house, you go to heaven because you're a preacher. No, I go to heaven because I'm born again. And I examine it every day, every day of my life. I say, okay, the Bible says you've got to know that you're a sinner to be saved. I know I'm a sinner. The Bible says you must know that sinners are lost without God. And I know that I'm lost without God. The Bible says sinners are condemned to spend eternity in hell. And I know that's true. The Bible says that Jesus Christ went to Calvary, took upon himself, my sin became my substitute, became my sacrifice. And the Bible says if I rely on that payment for my salvation, I'll be saved. And every day of my life I go through it. Where was I when I did it? And I relived that experience when I was an 11-year-old boy and knelt outside the back door of a church and got on my face before God and said, dear God, I'm a poor little barefoot boy, but if you will take me, I'll dead sure take you. I didn't trust my goodness and I didn't trust my membership in the church and I did not trust my baptism and I did not trust the Lord's supper. And by the way, anything less than that won't get you to heaven. Anything less than that has wax in it. I beg you in God's name this morning, get sincere salvation. The Bible says that you may be sincere till the day of Christ. Are you sincere this morning? If I asked you to walk up here on the platform, stand behind this pulpit and tell me when you were saved, could you? Brother Bordeway, could you stand up here and tell me about your salvation experience? Brother Sully, could you do that? Brother Fisk, could you do that? Brother Helton, could you do that? I went on and on. Could you do that? Could you? Could you? How about you and you folks over here and you over here, young people, and up here in the balcony and up here in the center and up here? If I had you stand this morning and called you by name and said, hey, walk down here. I want you to stand behind the pulpit. I want you to tell me where you were. You may not know the month or the day of the month or the day of the week or the hour of the day, but can you tell me where you were? Did you know you were a sinner? Did you know sinners are lost? Did you know Jesus paid the complete penalty for sinners? Did you know faith in Christ would save you? I don't mean faith plus your good works. I don't mean faith plus your baptism. I don't mean faith plus your church membership. I don't mean faith plus your confession to a priest. I don't mean faith plus the confirmation when you're a child. Did you put your faith in Christ and were you born again? Anything else less than that has wax in it. And when the heat of God's judgment comes and you stand before the great white throne judgment of God and the God of all the universe looks at you and your name is called and you look in the face of the God who made you, and you will, you will, you will. You'll have to look in his face some day and he'll say, here's your name here. And then the heat of the judgment of God will melt down upon you and all the wax shall be taken off and all the hypocrisy and all the fake religion and all the counterfeit Christianity, all of it shall be melted. And there you shall stand bare before God, naked before God. Do you have a sincere salvation? But you say with the house, I'm a deacon in this church. And you know, deacons in first Baptist church haven't a respected man. We have a hundred good men who are deacons here. But the house think of the embarrassment it'd be if I walked down the aisle in this church and told you I never had been saved and I've been serving on this deacon board. Brother, you think how much more embarrassing it'll be when all the nations you've ever lived and all the people you've ever lived stand before God and your name is called. And we'll look and say, oh, oh, looky there. He was a deacon in our church. That man was on our deacon board. In God's name be embarrassed today rather than embarrassed when there's no hope in eternity or the world to come. Oh, but you sit with the house. I'm on the staff. You understand? I'm on the staff. I, uh, I sometimes maybe sit on the platform or I type letters in the office for the house. You just think the embarrassment that would be, uh, that I would incur if I were to walk down the aisle and say, I'm not born again and I will not save. Oh, think of the embarrassment. Let me say this, brother Fisk, if you're not saved this morning, then get saved. I say for the house, if you're not saved, get saved. I say for the house, and if you're not saved, get saved. I say for the celly, if you're not saved, get saved. In God's dear name, the fire of judgment and the sun of God's searchlight will shine upon you and the wax will get melted. In the name of Christ. But you say for the house, you don't understand, I sing in the choir. Folks sit out in the audience and they look at me. Until the other day, they saw five choir members nodding in one sermon. Five in one sermon. And they said one poor fellow was going, fellas, don't let your head hit the floor. It makes noise when your head hits the floor. And one of the choir members said to me this morning, he said, don't forget, the Bears come on at 1230. Nobody's going to buy you off. Shall we stand for our closing prayer, please? The honest truth is, fellas in the choir, if you look carefully, there's a small television set right here. In case I step back like this this morning and preach, and when we announce invitation number, if the first two digits is the score the Bears have and the last digit is the score that the Cowboys have. But you say for the house, I'm in the choir. Folks sit out there and look at me. And they know I'm in the choir. Well, if I left my seat in the choir and came down the aisle and told the folks I ever had been saved, they'd be so embarrassed. And you stand before Almighty God and all the nations of all the world are gathered for the great white throne judgment of God. Your name is called and you stand before God and God opens his book and the recording angel says your name and God says it's your name in the book. And you say, dear Lord, I was in the choir and I know I wasn't saved, but I thought it'd be embarrassing. But Lord, I sang in the choir and I carried a part too some of the time. And I was on key most of the time. But it's your name in the book. But Lord, I taught for a Sunday school class. I was a faithful teacher. We had the biggest Sunday school in the whole world. But it's your name in the book. But Lord, I had a big fall program. I gave out balloons one time with the church's name on them. And we had more people than in my class, anybody. But it's your name in the book. But Lord, you don't understand. I had a bus route and I fed the boys and girls that were hungry. And I gave them clothes. But it's your name in the book. But Lord, you don't understand. I was a good neighbor. I was a good wife, a good husband. I took care of my family. I paid my debts. And I was a respectable person. I never had liquor come through this mouth. I never had a cigarette hanging out of my lips. I never said a bad word in my life. But it's your name in this book. But Lord, you don't understand. Don't talk so loud, Lord. I mean, that's wrong. I was a clean person. I honestly, Scouts Honor, I never one time read a Playboy magazine. I mean, that's the truth. I never did. By the way, none of you folks ought to either. But I never did. I never read anything that was bad. And I never watched a dirty show on television. And I didn't go to the movies. And I didn't dance. And I didn't play. When you stand before God, when the wax is melted, all that stands before God is your faith in God. Without wax, salvation without wax, salvation without wax, salvation without wax. There's something else that God wants us to have without wax. And that is, He wants our preaching to be without wax. Philippians 1.16, it says, The one preached Christ of contention, not sincerely. It said, Some preached Christ of contention, not sincerely, not without wax. And let me say, I promise you this. I promise you this preaching in this pulpit will not be the best preaching in all the world. I promise you it may not be the most interesting preaching in all the world. I promise you it will not be the most intellectual preaching in all the world. But I'll promise you one thing, and those folks who have been in this church 14 years, I can say this, and God hears me when I say, I can say the 14 years I've walked behind this pulpit, and every sermon I've preached has been without wax. It's been sincere. Without wax, oh God, give us a generation of preachers who preach with all their hearts, preaching without wax. It was Bortolome, who was the court preacher for Louis XIV, who decided to stand before Louis XIV and expose some of his wicked sins. He stood one day and pointed his finger right in the face of Louis XIV and pronounced judgment of God upon him for his sins. Louis XIV became indignant and dared to say to the court preacher, fire him. And Bortolome stood and he said, your majesty, when I walk in the pulpit, I have no master but the king of kings. God give us a generation of preachers who don't preach to please the deacons, who don't preach to please the wealthy people, who don't preach to please anybody, but God's preaching without wax. Preaching without wax. The kid preacher in East Texas, pastor of the Grangehall Baptist Church of Marshall, Texas, 10 miles out in the country. My study was just over to the right of the pulpit. The Lord's Torment seated about 150 people and I became its pastor. We had 39 Sunday school, the first Sunday. I got on my knees before I walked from my office, first office I ever had. I walked in my office in the pulpit. I got on my knees at the door and I said, dear father, I pray that you would help me while I pray. Pastor of this church is a 21-year-old young man. I pray you would help me though I cannot give them the seasoning of years. I cannot give them the wealth of experience. There's one thing I can give them. I can give them a preacher who means what he preaches and believes it with all of his heart. I promise God I'd preach sincerely. And may I say, ladies and gentlemen, I say this morning when I say, you may not agree with all I preach, but I believe it in the crown of my head and the sole of my feet. I used to have a hair on my head. Now it's every skin on my scalp. But I believe it. I believe it. I believe it. I believe this Bible is true. Every word of it. I believe you've got to get born again. I believe it. I believe you're going to hell if you don't repent and get saved. I believe it. I believe Jesus died for sinners. I believe it. I believe Christian people don't live life. I believe it. I believe every word in this book and in Gopi's perspective, church. So men who come may not agree with what we say, but they'll know we agree with what we say. Preaching sincere without wax, without wax, without wax. Years ago, after I preached my first sermon and failed, I went to my, all of you folks have heard this who've been here long. I went to my room and knelt on my knees and looked up to God and I said, dear God, I couldn't preach. I just lasted a few minutes and you didn't get much when you got me, but I'll make a promise to you. I'll promise you that if you will help me to be a preacher, I'll never walk to my, I'll never finish a sermon without going alone and remembering the failure that I made tonight. I said, oh God, if you will make a preacher out of me, if you will just let me preach, I'll always give you the credit for it. As soon as I get through, there's not a service here at First Baptist, be it Sunday morning, Sunday night, or Wednesday night, or whether it'll be tomorrow night in Minneapolis, Minnesota, or last Monday, wherever I was, in Hollywood, Florida, Monday and Tuesday. Never a sermon I preach, but when I don't go back to my motel room and get on my face before God and say, dear God, I remember what I was when you got me. I know who butters the bread. I know who gives the power. I know who's made me whatever kind of preacher I am. And I remember that night when I stumbled and stammered and stuttered and failed and turned back in shame and disgrace. I'll never forget it. Oh my God in heaven, give us a generation of men of God who are sincerely in love with Christ and preach the Word of God without wax. But there's another, there's another sincerity that God wants and that sincerity and our love, our love. 2 Corinthians 8, it says, prove the sincerity of your love. I liked the song this morning. And I think I can say it honestly. I think I can say I love him more than I've ever loved him. I think I can say I praise him more than I've ever praised him. And the older I get, you know, I get worried sometimes. I used to be, I've always been loud, but I'm getting, and I used to criticize folks who, you know, shout. I don't shout in public. I don't want anybody shouting right now. Let me do the shouting here. That's what I get paid for. But, but, but I find myself in private especially praising the Lord more and more. And when Paul said to the church at Corinth, prove the sincerity of your love, he said, prove our love that was out without wax. And if the Lord this morning were to strip me of all of my hypocrisy and all of the sham and all the put on, and he were to put my love in the searchlight of God's judgment, I'd like for the Lord to see that I love him. Oh, he ought to be loved. Spurgeon said, dear Lord, dear Jesus, help me to love you so much that when I look up and say, I love you, Jesus, you look down and say, I know it, Charles. In the Civil War days, Preston Brooks was a senator. Preston Brooks and Charles Sumner became in, in, in, in, became angry to each other on the Senate, in the Senate chamber. And they actually had a fight. And Preston Brooks almost killed Charles Sumner. 1851, the pre-Civil War days. And during the Civil War, somebody came to Charles Sumner and said, said, Mr. Sumner, what did you think about when you thought you were dying on the Senate chamber? And Mr. Sumner looked up and he said, I thought, when I thought I was dying, when Preston Brooks, I thought he had murdered me, he said, the thing that went through my mind was the fact that I had lived and now I was dying. And nobody had ever looked at me and said, I love you, Charles. Nobody had ever said, I love you, Charles. Let me ask you a question this morning. Have you told Jesus you love him this morning? Huh? Have you told him you love him? The other day, as you know, I, I counsel a lot of people. Day and night, day and night, I counsel with people. And the other day, oh, so many problems. One person came by, had financial difficulties, and I said, Brother Fisk, I can't let you have it, I can't let you have it. And one fellow came by and said he hated a guy he works for. And I said, Brother Sully, you ought to have love in your heart. And, and so one fellow came by and said, I'm going to kill the choir, I'm going to kill the choir. And I said, Brother Bordway, you shouldn't feel that way. But anyway, I, I counseled all day. And one other lady came by. She made an appointment. Thirty minutes. And I, she walked in. And I, toward, toward the last part of the day, my arms, I don't want anything on them. I wear short-sleeved shirts usually to, to the office. And, and I take my coat off. Do you ever get so tired that when you go to bed at night, you don't want a cover on you? I don't care if it's ten below zero, you want to just kick it off. Do you ever feel that way? And about late at night after I've counseled all day, I just don't want anything touching my arms, you know. And so I, I trudged to the door and opened the door and had another come in. And then a lady came in. I said, have a seat on the sofa there. She sat down, and I sat across from her. And I said, what's your problem? She said, don't have any. I said, what are you doing here? She said, I just came by to tell you something. And I said, what is it? And she said, I said, you've got a thirty-minute appointment. If you haven't got any problem, what in the world are you coming to see the preacher for? And she said, I've been here time and time again. And she said, I thank God this church has saved my children, and this church is all and all to us, and it's made the difference in my family, and my children are all good Christians, and they're going to grow up, they're going to be fine Christian people. And I've been to this office again and again and again and sat in this chair, and you helped, and there's been courage and strength and encouragement and help. And she said, I just wanted to look you in the eyeball and say, we love you, and we're for you, and praise the Lord, and there's nothing wrong, hallelujah. And she got up and walked out. And don't you think the Lord wants somebody to do that every once in a while? Dear Lord, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme. And the Lord takes care of us. Lord, I want this. Okay, Lord, how about this? And I think God would like to do that. But don't you think every once in a while the Lord wants us to walk in and say, dear Lord, I just set a little time aside to tell you I love you. I honestly do. I love you. I sincerely love you. It's without wax. It's honest. It's true. It's without wax. I love you. Oh, I pray for God always. I want there to be a place in this town, in this town of drunkenness, in this town of taverns, in this town of paganism, in this town of heathen religion, in this town of a dirty, filthy adult bookstore they're trying to start, in this town of trains, in this town of sin, in this area of filth and sin and smut and dirt and paganism. I want there to be one place in town where the pastor and the deacons and the staff and the Sunday school workers and the membership are sincere. We believe it with all of our souls that Christ is the answer. Sincere in our love. Without wax. Without wax in salvation. Without wax in preaching. Without wax in love. But there's another without wax. And that's without wax in service. In service. It says in Joshua 24, 14, fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in truth. What does it mean, fear the Lord without wax? For the fisk was on the front set still. For the fisk. If this morning the dear Lord were to shine a light on your heart and put a screen up here and the real reason why you taught your Sunday school class was revealed, wouldn't it be a wonderful thing if the Lord could say, with no wax there? No wax? Brother Sully, working with those rescue mission men down here at the mission, and if the Lord could look in your heart, the bound of your heart down in there somewhere behind all the rest of that stuff that's in front of it. And by the way, they said, where's Brother Sully? I said, he's round in front. And they said, I know that, but where's Brother Sully? And so, look, get him in a hurry. Would you please, don't linger this life and halfway through the sermon. But if the Lord could strip back all the selfishness and just shine his light upon it, wouldn't it be wonderful if the Lord could say, without wax? Wouldn't it be a good thing for the Lord to wave when you sang so beautifully a while ago, and that was a beautiful special. Wouldn't it be wonderful if the dear Lord looked down and said, that sure sounds pretty to the ears, but Brother Ray, he means it all the way through. No wax in that. I get the glory there. Wouldn't that be wonderful? Oh, to walk in the pulpit, and I've said it so often, to walk in the pulpit, and my labor for Christ to be gold, silver, and precious stone. The Bible says in the judgment seat of Christ that all of our work, every solo, every sermon, every class we teach, every bus route we have, everything we do, will pass through the fires of testing, and only that which was done for its glory and the praise and honor of Christ will last. I was talking the other day, a few years ago, I used to be president of a college out in Denver, Colorado. I used to spend about a week a month out there, and I met a shepherd out there, and believe it or not, they have a few shepherds out in the Colorado area. I talked to the shepherd one day. He told me something that I'd read and heard before, but it's true. He said that if a dog ever decides he wants to kill sheep and destroy the flock, a dog, when he decides to kill sheep, will do it at night, in the dark. And he'll come back and try to talk other dogs into going with him the next night. And if he can find other dogs to go the next night, he'll come back and he'll do some things to put the blame on the other dog. He'll get the blood and try to put it on the other dog, or rub the blood off himself on the other dog. And he said, and it's a strange thing, he said that the more the dog kills the sheep in the dark of the night, the friendlier he is in the light of the day. He'll lick your hand and wag his tail. Why? Because he's a hypocrite. He's not sincere. The other day I got a letter from down in southern Indiana. It said, one of your preacher boys preached down here. All he preached was Hiles. Well, you can't beat that. He said, all he preached was Hiles. He said, the First Baptist Church of heaven, he said, the Lord and Brother Hiles have done it together. And the fellow wrote me and he said, I guess you better know that some of your folks are worshiping you and not the Lord. Now, I don't want anybody to worship me. I want you to love me. I don't want you to worship me. I want Him to be so much higher than I am, and you know that's true. I want Him to be so much higher than I am, there's no comparison. I want you to be singing, oh, how I love Jesus, Jesus, oh how sweet the name, Jesus, every day the same. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, sweetest name I know, sweetest note in Sarah's song, sweetest name on mortal tongue, sweetest carol ever sung, Jesus, blessed Jesus. I want you to love me. I want you to worship Him. But I want there to be a sincerity. I got a letter not long ago from Wheaton, Illinois. The fellow said, I came to your church one Sunday, last Sunday night. He said, I think he said 126 times. Said, you said I 126 times. It's a long letter, many pages, 126 times. You said I. He said, you exalted yourself, said I. I wrote back and said, I counted the I's in your letter. There are 128 of them. Now, I got a letter last week. A fellow wrote me from Michigan, said he came down to visit the services and said he wasn't edified at all, said we laughed in church. That edifies me. The Bible says a merry heart does good like a medicine and tastes a lot better than Epsom salt. But you know what I do when I get a letter like that? First, first, sometimes I'll write a nasty letter back and then tear it up. I get it off my chest but don't get beat up over it. But I always do this. I don't care how nasty the letter, I don't care how unkind, I always get on my knees over the letter and I say, dear Lord, if it's true, let me know. I want to be sincere. I want to be sincere. Let me ask you a question this morning. Should you come to your class, maybe go to the spot where you taught this morning alone and get on your knees and say, dear Lord, may my teaching of this class be without wax? Let me ask you a question, choir members. Should you come here some night or some day and sit down in the choir and get on your knees beside where you sing and say, Lord, let my singing be without wax? For the boardway, should you come alone to kneel here at this place where you lead the choir sometime and say, Lord, let my conducting be without wax? For the fist, should you go to your class sometime and say, oh God, let it be without wax. Let it be sincere without wax. You don't know this, but it's true. I walk in this auditorium every week of my life. Every week of my life, I walk in this auditorium and I go through a ritual. I walk in this door, not over here, and I practice walking through this pulpit. I want to do it right. I want to do it so it will please God. One fellow said the other day, he said, I got saved because I like the way you walk in. I said, praise the Lord. Fourteen years of practice and I finally got one saved. And then I walk and I sit here every week of the world and I look out the building while it's empty and I say, dear God, back in that section right back there Sunday morning, there are going to be some little ladies whose hair has turned silver and their husbands have been gone and they're lonesome and they need encouragement Sunday and they have to get the window unstuck by themselves and they have to fill out their own income tax and they have to unstick the pickle jar alone and they're lonely and they have arthritis and they don't feel well. I say, God, help me to be what they need Sunday and I point over here to an empty section and I say, dear God, there's some young people over there, if they don't get right Sunday, they're going to go to the devil, some of them, some of them being tempted by that tempter like they've never been tempted before. Oh God, help me to give them what they need. And then I point all over the building and then I walk around the building and I pray for every section and I pray for every few and the people that will sit there and then I get on my knees behind this pulpit and I pray, oh God, help me to preach Sunday the truth of God. Help me to be honest and sincere under the power of God. Settle on me while I preach. Listen to me. I'd like to be a great preacher. I wish I could speak with the tongues of men and of angels. I wish I could speak like R.G. Lee. Every time I hear him preach, I want to quit the ministry or kill him, one or the other. And he gets to talking about all those metaphors and figures of speech. But I can't. I wish I could be like maybe preachers that have oratorical ability. I can't. But blessed be God, there's one thing nobody can surpass me on. If I'll get my heart right, I can be as sincere as anybody. Oh, to be without wax before God. To let God look at my heart this morning and say, oh, Jack loves me without wax. To let God look at my service this morning and say, he's serving me without wax. To let God hear my preaching this morning and say, he's preaching without wax. But the most important thing, to let God look down in my heart this morning and say, he's got it. He's born again. His salvation is without wax. Should you this morning say, dear God, forgive me for my hypocrisy. Strip away that sham. Strip away that hypocrisy. Strip away that acting. Strip away that porn. And come before your God without wax. Sincere and honest before him with your service, your love, and your soul.