In this sermon, the preacher discusses the state of the world and the lack of people seeking after God. He emphasizes that throughout history, there have always been small movements of believers, but in the present generation, there is a strong delusion that has caused people to believe lies instead of the truth. The preacher shares his personal testimony of being saved by God and highlights the importance of God's intervention in saving sinners. He concludes by expressing concern for the lack of desire for God in both Christians and non-Christians and emphasizes the need for a genuine thirst for God.

I suppose there is no way that a congregation or a Christian individual could possibly be more tested in his strengths and weaknesses exposed than for a congregation to set aside days like you have here, call them services hoping for revival. I have been somewhat alarmed by the pastors, Brother Davis, all over the land that say they'll never attempt another series of meetings. That's not good. I can remember when evangelic services were the glory of Baptist, many of you could, can. I hate to see what's happening. And I think we could fuss about it or something like that. But when the going's rough, the Lord shows us a lot of things that maybe we never would see if we didn't encounter some rough going. I've been preaching 39 years, and this is the roughest I've experienced. You just can't seem to strike a note that the Lord will bless. It's a test of your organization. It's a test of your prayer life. It's a test of your visitation program. It's a test of our spirituality. It's a test of our love for the Lord. It's a test of our love for lost souls. Multitudes of our church members are not batting very well when they are thus tested. I believe that every organization of the church that doesn't function in services like this ought to be done away with. I cannot conceive of a Sunday school teacher who could sleep at night if all the students in the class were not here every night, that didn't have both legs broken, or working something, or the WMU, or the training union, or the brotherhood, or any of the 10,001 organizations we've got now trying to pump up the old head cow. And I think we ought not to get discouraged, but we ought to rehaul the whole machinery. For if our machinery don't function, we'd better swap it off and get some that will. Amen? Though we're being greatly tested, I am. I dearly love this godly pastor and his wife. I wish I could have been a help to them. I hope he'll get some sense. He's the hardest working man I've seen lately doing what he ought not to do. Amen? What he ought not to do. Now it's been a test of me. What shall I preach? And I won't hold the judgment what the Lord's purpose was here, but for better or worse, we've been speaking this week on the text in 2 Corinthians chapter 13 and 5, and we're quoted afresh tonight, So, examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith. Prove your own self. Know ye not that Christ is in you, except ye be reprobate. If he's rejected, your course is not in you. Last night we spoke on my conviction, and I tried to enforce it by the word of God, that this generation has passed into a season of reprobation. Multitudes of doubters commit what we call the unpardonable sin every day, and that number is increasing day by day. And the reason, of all reasons why I believe that is true, is that men are not seeking after the Lord today, either those who profess to be Christians or those who don't profess to be Christians. The one thing that would break your heart if you followed the evangelists around was people who do not pant at the Lord. I do not pay a great deal of attention to the acts, good or bad, of men, but I do think it's very, very, very important what their desires are, what they're looking for, and what they're running at. The best man I ever saw could take the pieces many different directions, but thank God a Christian whose taste is of the Lord is bound to be a fellow that's running scared for more of Christ. I cannot understand the generation of so-called Christians who say, I'm all right. I believe it's far into Christianity, and if I'm speaking a little truth that we do live in a day of people who seem to be pretty well satisfied with themselves and their relation or lack of relation to the Lord, would that be true of people who at least tell you they're Christians? We need not wonder that those who make no such claim are full of excuses and alibis, but are not seeking the Lord. And that's a terrible state, if it's true, and I think maybe it is, because the one unanswerable reason why this generation is not characterized by heart and a holy and a persevering seeking after the Lord is that God has to create the thirst and then supply it. And men and women are not thirsty for God now, and that's the most terrible thing we can face, because the only one who can make men thirsty after holiness ain't making men thirsty after holiness now. It seems that God has left this generation of church members and otherwise to pursue everything else except him and go on to hell. Tonight I wish to speak on the subject, a thankful people in a reprobate state, a thankful people in a reprobate state. You'll not turn to it please, I've fudged on you, I have it marked. I want to read one verse of scripture in the old testament and then a passage in the new, in the 65th psalm and the fourth verse. There is a ringing, blessed hallelujah, praise the Lord, verse of scripture. It reads like this, Blessed is the man whom thou choosest and callseth to approach unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts. Oh my, in the setting of the old testament where God elected a small insignificant nation and made them his chosen people, elected them out from among all of the nations. And then to read about how every time a false prophet came to town they went whoring after him and departed the formal worship of Jehovah God. And how all of the calls to revival in the old testament days were nothing more or less than a calling of the people from going through the motions and giving lip service instead of heart worship to almighty God. In such a, in a setting like that where the apostle Paul will remind us that the whole outfit would have been as Sodom and Gomorrah except that God remembered his covenant. Oh, to have lived in old testament days and to read this verse and say glory, glory, glory, hallelujah. I have a lot of evidence and reason and hope to believe that this text includes me. This is the man whom God chooses and callseth to approach unto him that he might dwell in the courts of the land. It would have been bliss to be one of the people when God was dealing with an elite nation, blessed of whom individually died or in hell tonight for the holy gospel. But the scriptures say it was not mixed with what? Faith. Thus they died. It would have been blessed to have been one of the few who followed Caleb and Joshua and believed God instead of took counsel of their fears and their carcasses rotted in the wilderness and there in hell tonight. What a blessing it would have been. What a cause for praise it would have been. Oh, how they would sing hallelujah. Hallelujah, amen. They had some evidence in those awful days that they were one of those who in spite of the way the elect nation went to hell, they were those whom God had caused to approach unto him. And there is a thanksgiving message like that in the second chapter of Thessalonians. Second Thessalonians, in second Thessalonians chapter two, there is another man praising God, giving thanks and glory, hallelujah, amen. And in the message tonight, we'll see doing it in the awfulest context, in the most terrible, terrible context, perhaps in the entire Bible. And in this awful context, we'll read it in a little bit where men have been given a strong delusion, such a strong delusion by the judgment of almighty God that they can't believe the truth. They can only believe the lie and they've been done that way because they did not receive the L-O-V-E, love of the truth that they might receive. And God almighty, because they didn't love the truth, brought them to the place they couldn't believe it if they'd have had it. And they could only believe a lie and it did that in order that they might be dead. That's exactly what the scripture will read in a moment. In that awful context, we'll read verse 13. The apostle Paul says in this context, but I've painted a dark picture, he said, of the time of antichrist and the time leading up to it. But I am bound to give thanks, verse 13, but we are bound to give thanks always. We are bound, you couldn't keep us from it. Just bless God, it bubbles and it bubbles and it bubbles. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so. That's all you got to do. Just give a chance, anybody that is saved in the Old Testament time would praise the Lord. And anybody that's saved in this awful day we're living now, brother, he'll be full of bubbling praise. Thanking God that God saved. Thanking God. Thanking God. But we're bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord. I won't be in that crowd with any hope on me. Folks that the Lord loves. And we're bound to give thanks to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord. Why? Because God has chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the spirit and belief of the truth. Where unto? He didn't just fix it so he hoped you'd stumble on it. Where unto? He called you. Thank God. Called you to what? Passion. Called you to what? Belief of truth. Thank God he calls men. He called you. He chose you. He appointed the means, the way, the spirit, and the truth of God. And then he didn't just run off and hope that we'd stumble on it. But bless God, he called you out of that awful atmosphere by our gospel. Called you to what? To the obtaining of the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's something to thank God about. And anybody that's experienced it, brother, he'll never get over it. He'll never get over it. He'll never get over it. A thankful people in a reprobating age. I want tonight your indulgence as we go through the scripture briefly and get a description of the day that Paul is living in when he wrote these blessed words. I want us to get a new conception, or have our old conception repressed if we can, on how wonderful it is to be snatched out of a day like Paul's day, or a day like our day, and called unto the obtaining of the glory of Jesus Christ. I'll tell you what fact I wish, and that it could burn in our souls again, that it is sure enough something to be a child of God in this awful day. What a blessed, blessed Christmas. Oh, praise the Lord for the slightest that may be in any of us that he's called us out of the black atmosphere of the day in which Paul wrote in the days just like it only was. We've been called unto the obtaining, blessed God, of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Does the New Testament teach that there was to be a falling away from the true faith of the gospel? Yes. Verse three here in this chapter says, let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed the sin, the son of perdition. In first Timothy at chapter four, now the Spirit speaketh expressly that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and teachings of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their conscience seared with a hot iron. They were all church members, remember now, every one of these people that made a profession of faith. I'm going to give you a description of Paul's day religiously wise. Amen. All right. And then we turn to second Timothy and we read from the same man, the apostle Paul, this know also that in the last days perilous time shall come for men. What kind of men? Men where the names on church rolls, ladies and gentlemen, that's what he's talking about. Not the drunkard and the bootlegger, but professing Christians, men shall be lovers of their own self, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, reads like the description of the membership of a Southern Baptist church to me. It is true. Without natural affection, truth breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, hitty, high-minded, lovers of pleasures, more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. From such turn away. Brother, you'd better, if you don't want to go to the same hell they're going to. From such turn away. From such turn away. From such turn away. Read what the apostle Peter said. This isn't just the testimony of Paul. The apostle Peter will tell us in his epistle in the second chapter of the second book. We'll find it here in a minute. In the second chapter, but there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you who privately shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them and bring upon themselves swift destruction. They'll bring them into our organized churches. That's what he's talking about, isn't it? And many shall follow their pernicious ways. Many shall follow their pernicious ways by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. Or let the apostle John tell us in the second chapter, first John, little children, it is the last time. And as you've heard that antichrist shall come even now, or there are many antichrists whereby we know that it is the last time. They went out from us. Why? Why? Why? Why? Why is it typical? I'm a southern Baptist, so I talk about my kinfolks. What's the explanation of the fact that the church has to have a thousand members now to have 500 and send to school, and 200 of them will be below the age of church membership? That's par for the course, brother. Remember that if you depart from a church that preaches the gospel, you've departed from Christ. Now listen to me. Remember that a church member who absent himself from the preaching of gospel is going to split hell wide open. He's quit Christ. He's apostatized. He never knew him to start with. He just thought he did. What happened to him? They went out from us, but they were not of us. They never were God's people. For if they had been of us, they would not have turned our churches into places to go and flick out like we worship God on Sunday morning, then go to the beach and 10,000 other things the rest of the Lord's day. No, God's people don't do that way. But this is talking about a falling away, a falling away. Now, may I ask you this question and answer it the best I can? I don't know what your theology here is, and if I cross you, just forgive me. You apologize, and I'll forgive you. But yeah, when did this falling away take place? It took place while these officials were being written. It's been going on now for nearly 2,000 years. This departure from the gospel is nearly 2,000 years old, and brother, it's speaking worse every day. When did this falling away take place? Well, read again 2nd Timothy 3 and 1 and 5. This know in the last days perilous times from 17 away. Paul already said to Tim, you turn away from that out there. You go along with that that's going on there. It's beginning there. I'll read again the last verses that I read to you. They went out commerce and so forth. There are many antichrists going to come, and antichrist is coming. Now there are many antichrists whereby we know that is the last time. The falling away from the true faith of the gospel was even underway before these officials were written. But brother Barnard, what about the New Testament teaching that this falling away was to take place in the last days? That's right. But the last days in the New Testament means the day between the first and the second coming of Jesus Christ. We've been in the last days ever since Jesus went back to the globe. We'll be in the last days till he comes back. Now hold on. The scriptures speak of the times past. Hebrews chapter 1, God who in times past hath now in these what, last days, spoken to us in his son. Now the teaching of the way is that this awful falling away from the true faith of the gospel even started in the days of the apostles. And it's been going on until this day. And it's getting worse and worse and worse. And it's gonna get worse until antichrist appears. When I was a boy, I was given to God to be a preacher before I was born. I didn't know until about the last I was saved. But I was an infidel when I was saved. Had been claimed to be one for four years. And I was an infidel because I had to have some sort of peace. And I knew if I got saved, I'd have to mind God. And that meant I'd have to preach. This generation tell me they got saved, but they never have been obedient to the Lord. I don't understand no such sacrifice. I'll tell you what's fact. I don't believe a man saved if he's still booking God and spitting man-bear juice in God's face and telling him I ain't going to mind. And the issue between me and God was, I knew if I ever surrendered to God, I'd have to do his will. If that ain't salvation, you tell me what it is. And I knew his will for me was to be a preacher. And I wasn't going to be one of these little hitchhiking preachers like I've been for 39 years. Not on your life. But when I was a kid, I didn't know nothing about it. He's going to have to be a preacher or go to hell. You're going to have to do whatever God calls you to do, go to hell, too. I don't know what he calls you. And I used to preach when I was a kid on the farm. And a chicken would die, a cat would die, a dog would die, something. We'd always have a big funeral. And if the chicken or cat or whatever it was, my daddy and mother owned it, I preached the funeral, brother. None of the other kids got to preach funerals. And I was a winding preacher in them days. And I remember that our favorite cat died. And we had the biggest funeral that was ever held on old man Jim Barnard's farm, I'll tell you that. We put on all the rousements. And I preached the funeral, and we took that cat out and buried it. And I was so fond of the cat that when we buried it, I left the teal end of his teal sticking up. I wanted to go out and check on the cat every once in a while. And I did. And you wouldn't believe this, folks, but more of the days passed. Every day I'd go out and just pull that teal just a little bit, see if the cat was still there. And I know you won't believe it, but the smell was a little worse the longer the time went. Now the cat wasn't a big deal. Ten days after we put him in the ground, except the teal end of his teal, but he smelled a lot worse. And this was in a bit more profound than it was when this falling away first occurred. But it smelled so much worse. It smelled so much worse. This appearance of antichrist ain't gonna happen just like that without warnings. I'm gonna make an announcement. I know you'll appreciate it. It's warm weather. No, it ain't. It's cold. It's fall. At one o'clock today, summer skedaddled, and fall took charge. That's right. Well, it looks to me like it had been hot up to one second before one o'clock, and then it got cold, but it didn't. And antichrist didn't have that in person, but he stood there. How has the world been existing in a state of falling away from and apart from the true faith of the gospel of Jesus Christ? Nearly 2,000 years. No, this world's tearing itself to pieces tonight. It's been dead to God for a long time. And a dead carcass smells worse the longer it's dead. That's why this world is staked in filth tonight. So far as the generality of professing Christian and to the world over is concerned, been in a state of apostasy from the apostolic faith, and has been since New Testament days. I start here with this terrible truth. The basic principles of the gospel are not believed by professing Christianity today. They have not been believed and taught all these years. There have been individuals who believe the gospel. There have been local congregations and groupings of congregations who believe the gospel. But for nearly 2,000 years, what we call Christianity has really been anti. Ladies and gentlemen, 2,000 years organized Christianity has been preparing itself to welcome with open arms the anti-Christ when you take the dive. That's what God's doing. Ladies and gentlemen, if you are saved out of this awful anti-Christian spirit that's now erupting and threatening to wipe out churches off the face of the earth, you join the psalmist who says, blood is the man whom God chooses and causes to approve. You dare! Of course, we're bound to give thanks, beloved brethren of the Lord, because God has in the beginning chosen you unto salvation through the sanctification of the spirit and the belief of truth, and has called you by our gospel to the obtaining of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, I believe that if the Apostle Paul were to come back and preach today in our organized churches, the majority of every church we've got would reject this message and refuse to hear it. Every visitation of God's own respect, if you test him today, has been a blessed intervention of God to call people back to the true faith of the gospel. We thank God for everyone of you. But it's been assumed with the spirit of his mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming, even him whose coming is energized by the working of Satan, with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish. Why? Because they receive not the love of the truth that they might deceive. What does God do about it? Nothing. Oh no, because men and women receive not the love of the truth. Do you wonder, Brother Barnes tells you, I know I'm right, that if you quit a church that's true to the gospel, and we've still got some of them, you quit Christ. You quit Christ. I've just got to speak, I suppose, to the inner circle of this church since I've been here. I've been doing my dead level best to say something that gets you alarmed about the unsaved condition of your church members. You quit Christ. You can't tell me, if you don't preach the gospel, I know it does, and if he does, all these church members with the names on the road, they're in danger of hell fire. That's right, folks. You tell me you love so, but quit frowning at me, so go after them, put your arm around them and warn them. They're on their road to hell. How do you know, Brother Barnes? They don't love the truth. The only way a felon gets saved is he's got to come where he loves the truth. Amen? Because they receive not the love of the truth, love of the truth, that they might be saved. They go to hell, and because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. For this cause, the next verse, God shall send them strong delusions. How strong shall it be? And this is something that's going on when Paul was preaching, and it's going on today. Only words. Shall send them such strong delusions, that they'll believe the lie. And the reason they'll be turned over with such a strong delusion, that they'll believe the lie, is in order that they all may be damned, who all shall be damned. Who believe not the truth, and who had pleasure in unrighteousness. Amen? A Christian's got no business being in a church, that doesn't believe lock, stock, and barrel, teach, preach, and live the truth of the gospel of Christ. Amen? And a felon that wants to get saved, that he better not mess around with a church that has departed from the gospel faith. And where it's not taught, and it's not preached. Well, I'll tell you ladies and gentlemen, to do so is to bring God's strong delusion on men and women, and fix them so they'll believe a lie, and they'll believe a lie, so that believing the lie, they'll be damned, and the ones who'll be damned are the folks who believe not the truth, and had pleasure in unrighteousness. That was the situation in Paul's day, and for nearly 2,000 years, by and large, except for a few of God's people, here and everywhere, that's the God's truth about it. Little movements in every generation, little handful here, little handful brother Davis here, he's never had but a few. Thank God he's had them. Oh, how blessed to have been one of them, one of Christ's little flock. He's such a nice person. Ladies and gentlemen, I face you tonight, I face you tonight, with the wonder of being a child of God. In an atmosphere where men have been given up to such strong delusions, they believe the lie. They believe the lie that they're going to be damned, as God turned this generation over to such strong delusions, that it believes lies instead of truth, that everybody shall be damned who do not do two things. First, love the truth. Brother, that strikes awful close to home, and who have pleasure in unrighteousness. In such an atmosphere, glory, hallelujah, we're bound to give thanks. Couldn't keep us from giving thanks. If in the day we live in now, when everything under God's shining sun except truth is being proclaimed, and believed by the multitude, when the most foolish things out of hell get the biggest following now, in this generation where the truth is despised, witness the empty houses of the Lord on Sunday night. In this generation where people take pleasure in unrighteousness, witness the carnival spirit of this infidel generation in that awful atmosphere. Thank you, Lord, that you chose me and put in my path the work of the Spirit and the word of truth. Election is not salvation, it's untrue salvation. God picks out of such atmospheres that he didn't do it, the whole outfit would go to hell. But he picks out his trophies of his wonderful grace and monuments of his love, and blocks out the hill of the striving, convicting, ruling, converting power of the Holy Spirit as he takes the truth. And he calls us men, and the Holy Spirit makes it real to men and women. He calls us to the attainment of the glory of Jesus Christ. That's God's people in this awful hour. Thanking the Lord, praising the Lord, that in a generation of people that gone wild over everything except God, because you heard it, you knew it was God talking to you. He's coming by here and you said that's God, that's God's truth. I didn't just preach about it, that's God's truth. The man is calling me, calling me out of himself and the remnant of this generation that's a thankful people in a reprobate state. Blessed is the man whom God chooses and calls us to approach his song. Mr. Spurgeon said after he got saved, he went preaching one day and the preacher was wandering saying nothing about like me, I guess he said he couldn't follow him and so he just sat there having lost track. He's just trying to trace, to trace his salvation. Paul said thanks be unto God for his untraceable gift and I tell you right now it'll make the joy I'm bringing your soul. You start out to trace it. Oh, Brother Spurgeon said you know I sought the Lord, he did. As a young man he sought him for years and years. He went to preaching place after preaching place, he's reared in a godly home and all of that. Had to go to a little old free Methodist chapel on a snow bitten day and hear a lame one just quote a verse of scripture. Look and live. Mr. Spurgeon said well bless God I look and I live. He said oh it's so wonderful not trying to trace it. He said I found out I sought the Lord. I learned about it and then I found out the reason I sought him was he first sought me. And he said I felt love in the heart of the Lord and said I love him but I found out we love him because he first loved us. And he said every direction I went in I found out that the reason I saved was God saved. He did it. Years ago a big rich contract in the state of Mississippi claimed to get converted under my little ministry and after some years he began to pour many thousands of dollars in my ministry and we had a big five-fold tent and everything goes with it. We had meetings for many years and he footed the bill and I got to be with him a lot. One day we were riding down the highway going somewhere and we got in a fuss. We got in a fuss. He said Ross I love the Lord more than you do. I said can't be. I know I love him more than you do. We're ready when they're two. His wife used to phone all the hotels in Memphis or Nashville or Knoxville or St. Louis. Finally she'd find him he'd go and rent the whole floor of a hotel, fill up a bathtub and all the room full of whiskey and invite everybody in the city that loved whiskey and partying to come. He footed the bill. He'd get so drunk he didn't know where he was and she'd finally trace him down go get him bring him home sober him up. That's kind of life he lived. One day he claimed God saved him. He said fellas mean as I was I know I love the Lord more than you do. I said no Fred. I never got drunk in my life. I never pulled on those parties but reared in a Christian home trained in the Sunday school training union of Baptist churches educated in a great Baptist college. President of the infidel's club in that Baptist college my senior year and in spite of that God saved me. You can't tell me honey. You can't tell me anybody God saves. He'll never get over it. He'll never get over it. Well I can't believe the Lord saved me because I was such a fine fella yesterday every Friday night. In that great Baptist school I'd speak to 300 young Baptist students that joined my infidel's club and if you couldn't get a guest speaker I'd speak and shake my fist and I'd curse God and I'd dare if they didn't like what I said to come down and do something about it. Boy we had more fun cursing God and making fun of God than a barrel of mussels and God saved me. God saved me. I didn't accept Christ. God saved me. I didn't just make a profession. God saved me. I didn't join the church. God saved me. Blessed is the man that God calls us to approach under him. To him be the blessing. For saving the sinner. Do you understand that? While our heads are bowed brother Carter will you just lead us. We don't need the music in the first verse. This will be our closing prayer. This will be the invitation. Pass me not oh gentle savior. Hear my humble cry. While on others thou art calling thank God. Even in this awful day in which we live the God of all grace still calls sinners. While on others thou art calling do not pass me by. Why would you sing that first verse? That's a closing prayer. That's the invitation. You can sing it. You can pray it right where you are. You can pray it right where you are. Oh every head bow. Tomorrow night God willing we continue the messages on this awful scene. I covet pray crying to God on the part of God's people that the word may yet be honored and the Holy Spirit will discover me and flip men's hearts open. Tomorrow night I speak on the folly of knocking at a door that God has shut to and will not open. And Saturday night when God calls the sinner the last time. Those of you who are Christians wait upon the Lord and ask him to honor his word yet. I'll be honest with you. I don't like for the devil to whip us. I just don't. If I could lick him I would. But the Lord can lick him and let's call on him. Amen.