In this sermon, the speaker shares personal anecdotes to emphasize the importance of not remaining silent about one's faith. He recounts a plane journey where he noticed people wearing red suits with only their hands and faces visible, but he did not speak to them about his faith. He urges listeners to wake up and not let Satan silence them. The speaker also shares a story of being stuck in a ditch and being helped by a stranger, highlighting the importance of helping others. He concludes by urging listeners to ask God for forgiveness and to rid themselves of self-seeking attitudes.

Good day, this is Bill McLeod from Winnipeg, Canada, bringing a message from the Word of God. My text will be Philippians 3, verse 2, which says, Beware, beware of dogs. I want to read a scripture from Isaiah 56, from verse 10. His watchmen are blind. They are all ignorant. That is, they are untrained. They are all dumb dogs. They cannot bark. Now, these are supposed to be watchdogs, you see. They cannot bark. Sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber, yes. They are greedy dogs which can never have enough. They are shepherds that cannot understand. They all look to their own way. Everyone for his gain, from his quarter. Beware of dogs. And we might see, beware of having a dog-like nature. That is a problem, too. And so, these dogs, watchdogs, are supposed to warn of impending approaching danger. And in a sense, every believer should be a watchdog. This is made quite clear in the Old Testament. And so, as well as, of course, in the New. Every Christian, then, is supposed to be a watchdog for God. And to warn of danger. Warn the unruly. Comfort the discouraged. And so we are told. All right, let's look into this very carefully, then. He says they are blind. They can't see. What good is a dog that can't see? A watchdog that can't see? Well, he that lacks these things is blind and cannot see afar. He often has forgotten he was purged from his old sins. 2 Peter 5.9 Blind. Can't see. Forgotten he was purged from his old sins. And then, ignorant. What does it say there? They're all ignorant. That is, they're untrained. They don't know how to do it, even. Hebrews 5.11.12 You ought to be teached. You have need that one teach you again. Which be the first principles of the oracles of God. And become such as have need of milk. And not of solid food. For everyone who uses milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness. For he is a babe. But solid food belongs to those who have been trained. Those who have the experience. And those who know what to do. You see, the writer was really unhappy. Because these people have been Christians for a long while. And when considering the time they've been saved. They had to be trained all over again. They'd forgotten the things they once knew. And so, they were dogs, too. They were untrained and just ignorant. They couldn't, God couldn't use them. And then, it speaks of dumb dogs. Dogs that cannot bark. They're all dumb dogs. They're all dumb dogs. They can't bark. Barking is a dog's thing, isn't it? I would say it was, certainly. It's a dog's thing. I was in Alaska. And staying in a house. And right next to the house where I stayed. Holding meetings. There was a fellow. He had four cages for dogs. Set up on about four feet off the ground. And each cage had a dog in it. And they were big. Big malamutes or whatever. I'm not sure of the breed. But they were white, mostly. And I never once heard them bark. So, I said to the host of the house where I was staying. What's with those dogs? You know, I never heard them bark. And he said, listen. At one time, they barked day and night. But I appealed to the noise by-law. And he was told he had to stop this. So, he debarked them. None of them can bark. It must have been hard on the dog to have that happen. Because, like I said, barking is a dog's thing. So, they're being debarked. You know what's happened? The devil has debarked a lot of Christians so they can't talk for God. They don't bark. They have nothing to say. It doesn't matter what kind of company they're in. If something bad is said about the Bible or about Christians or about Christ. Not a word is said by Christians. They're all dumb dogs. They can't say a word. And that's not the way they're supposed to be. Okay. We need to be trained to bark at the right time and at the right things. We have a neighbor dog that barks at everything. He's barking all the time. He's not barking. He's not a watchdog. He just barks. And we don't want to be that kind. There's some Christians like that, too. They're always barking. But they don't really have anything to say that's worth listening to. I know when traveling, I've been in a lot of foreign countries. And I've occasionally had people in the middle of the night trying my door. When that happens, you know what I do? I bark like a big dog. And I practice that. I bark like a big dog. And I'll tell you, they're gone. You hear these people running away. They don't want to tangle with the big dogs. You know, so I've been barking that way like a dog. Psalm 119.128 says, I esteem, that is, I count all your precepts, that's every one of your teachings, to be right, and I hate every false way. If you're a watchdog, a real watchdog, as Ezekiel 3, Ezekiel 33, then you certainly will esteem all God's precepts concerning all things to be right, and you'll hate every false way. And when you see false ways or see them coming, you bark. You bark out loud. They're sleeping. They love to sleep, apparently. Sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber. And some people are like that. And they talk in their sleep. I've seen dogs barking in their sleep. And you'll see their bodies twitching, and they're chasing something maybe in their sleep. And for some Christians, the only time they talk is when they're sleeping. And so they love to sleep. They love to lie down. That's what got David in problems. When he should have been on the battlefield with Joab and the rest, and a time of year when kings went forth to battle, he was lying on his bed. And he rose off of his bed, and it must have been in the day he'd been lying down because he walks up from the roof, he can see this woman washing. This would never have happened otherwise, but it did happen, because he was sleeping down lying when he should have been on the battlefield for God. And so that's a warning to us also. Then it says there are greedy dogs which can never have enough. They always want more. We went on holidays once and took our dog with us, and it was a big dog, and I would never make that mistake again. But anyway, we drove a long ways from Winnipeg into Kamloops, British Columbia or Kelowna. It should be not Kamloops. Anyway, we got there, and they had a dog. And a strange thing happened, you know. We just had the one dog dish, and so we put the food in the dish, and then we tied my dog to a tree and their dog to a tree on the other side of the path and put this dish down and let the two dogs go at the same time. My dog, being bigger and faster, got there first. You know what he did? He picked up the dish and walked away, but the other dog couldn't get anything. And somebody said, you know what? He's been watching humans too long. Let him laugh about that. But loving to slumber, greedy dogs that can never have enough. And some people like that. One fellow said, I'm not greedy. I just want all the land that joins mine. He was a farmer, you know. He wasn't greedy. He just wanted all the land that joined his. And some people, they're not satisfied no matter how much they have. Listen, the Bible says clearly, having food and clothing, let us be there with content, having food and clothing. Food and clothing, that doesn't even talk about a house. But having food and clothing, be thankful because there are millions of people in the world that don't even have food and clothing, you know. I've been in India and seen people in places, they live on the sidewalk. They say the invention of plastic was a godsend because in the rainy season, most people can somehow get a piece of plastic and lie under the plastic. They'll get wet on one side. They won't get wet all over. And, you know, we were in the Philippines one time in a town of about 120,000. I don't recall the name of the place now, but there was no such thing as garbage disposal. And so the people got their heads together and they named one street Garbage Street. And everybody in the place came and dumped their garbage in that street. And we saw that. I got some movies of that. It was for three blocks, it was garbage probably five, six feet high and so wide that there was no sidewalk or street left. Houses on both sides, rats running through, pigs rooting around in them. And then I saw ladies climbing into this garbage looking for some banana peels or orange peels they could take home for the kids to have something to eat. And then here in Canada and the States, if the garbage truck is two hours late, we're screaming to high heaven. People, we've got to straighten up. We've got to understand. A poor man in North America is a wealthy man in many parts of the world. It would be considered that because they have so, so little. I talked to men in Madras, Italy. They're working full time for a, I don't know what you'd call them. But anyway, they were making clothes of different kind. So I asked them what they were earning. And they were earning the equivalent of $2 a week. Not $2 an hour, $2 a week. This means for a lot of those people we discovered it was a bowl of rice once a day. A bowl of rice once a day. And people here in North America, we're going to have to pay for this because God has given us so much. And we give so little. Most Christians don't even tithe. About 15 or 20% of Christian people tithe. And the rest are robbing God, robbing God. And then they're wondering. We're wondering why things. We don't have the ministry and power of the Holy Spirit in our churches because of the way we live. We're a bunch of greedy dogs. That's what we are. And so they cannot understand. They don't know what's going on. And the average Christian doesn't have a clue as to what's going on around him. If you're lacking wisdom, you should ask in faith. Nothing wavering. God will give you what you ask for. James 1, 5-8. If in a man lack wisdom, let him ask of God that gives to all men liberally. And he doesn't upbraid us for asking too much, you know. But let him ask in faith. Nothing wavering. For he that wavers like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed, let not that man think that he should receive anything of the Lord. Can and understand 2 Timothy 2, 15. Study to show yourself approved unto God. Rightly handling the word of truth. Get into the Bible and get to know it. Oh how I love your law. Psalm 119, 97. It's my meditation all the day. Psalm 119, 162. I rejoice at your word. As one that finds great spoil. If you can't understand, it's because you don't know your Bible well. The Bible knows the past, the present, and the future. You need to get into that and study it. Finney and Moody, they used to rise at four in the morning and study the Bible and pray until eight o'clock every morning. No wonder they were used to my way of God. They prepared. They were never saying they couldn't understand. They knew what was going on. They knew what God's work was, what his plan was, and they moved in that direction. And so we must do the same. Then it says they all looked to their own way. And many of us are like that. The Bible says that we're not to look to our own way. 1 Corinthians 10, 24. Let no man seek his own, but every man another's welfare. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. You've got some problems, maybe you should look for somebody with some problems and try and help them out of theirs and then find deliverance from your own problems. But Paul said all seek your own, not the things which are Jesus Christ. And he was talking about Christians. As the context clearly shows, here's what he said. I have no man like mine who will naturally care for your estate. For all seek your own, not the things which are Jesus Christ. And so every man looking to his own things. Philippians 2, 4. Don't do that. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. It says the Lord turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his friends in Job 42, 10. You know, we're so engrossed in our own problems and so on, we have no time to think of others. And sometimes Christians live a whole lifetime just looking on their own things. Someone said the prevailing philosophy today is what's in it for me? What's in it for me? One time I slid off a road, it was a very poor road, it had been raining, and I slid into the ditch and there I sat. And cars went rolling by, nobody stopped. And then I saw coming with a big sign on the front, something about Jesus as mine. I said, oh, he's a Christian. I flanked him, he never even slowed down. And then a man in a big truck came along. And he stopped and said, hey, chum, can I help you? I said, I don't know, it's kind of a messy thing down here. But, well, I said, we'll try. So he got a chain out and hooked on, and he got mud on his hands and on his clothes. And I said, oh, man, you shouldn't have started here. You know, I can survive here. And no, no, he said, I'll get you out of there. And he got me out, and so I offered him a $10 bill. No, he said, I don't have any money. He said, someday I'll be in the ditch and you'll pull me out. And so he had the right attitude, but the Christian was a different story. And oftentimes people, non-Christians, are better than we are. Jonah was sleeping in the bottom of the ship. And the captain of the ship came and woke him up and said, wake up and sleep. What do you mean by sleep? What are you doing down here? Arise, call upon your God. You ought to be praying. Everybody in the ship was praying, and there weren't even believers. And the believer was doing nothing. He was sleeping. And like I said, lying down, loving to slumber, sleeping. Okay. They all looked to their own way. I had a friend who at one time was property rich and money poor, and he knew some wealthy people. He went to them, Christians even, trying to get some financial help, just to get out of the current problem. Down the road things would have been better, but he was property rich and money poor. You know what he told me? He said, I couldn't get a nickel out of one of them. In every case, the question was, what's in it for me? What am I going to get out of this? And finally he found a man, I don't think the guy was even a Christian, and this fellow offered to bail him out and did so. And so as Christians, you know, everyone looks to their own way, everyone for his gain from his quarter. Listen, our text is beware of dogs. And I say, beware of having a dog like nature. Isaiah 123 says, everyone loves gifts and follows after or seeks rewards. Everyone. And Micah 311, he speaks about the heads of the nations who were doing their work for reward and the priests who were doing their intercessions for hire and the prophets who were divining for money. And so all three were in it for self. Malachi 110 speaks about people God was upset because he couldn't find anybody that would kindle a fire on the altar or open the doors of the temple unless they were paid. And that was then, back then. Well, Luke 12, 15, we're to take heed, a man's life doesn't consist in the abundance of the things which he possesses. Jesus taught us that very clearly. Your life doesn't, you know, we have so many labor-saving devices, they've got our windows now, yet we don't seem to have any more time for God. We're trying to use our spare time to get involved in pleasure. When Paul warned us that in the last days perilous times would come, perilous means hard, difficult, dangerous times. Then he says, men will be lovers of their own selves. Maybe this is a long list of names of sins people will be involved in. And then he says, lovers of pleasure is more than lovers of God. And so that's a problem. That's the way our civilization is in our country and in many countries today. Take heed and beware of covetousness. Remember, I read an article in a Christian paper, it was a charismatic paper, and this lady said, I am a child of the king, and the king owns the universe, he's very wealthy, and he wants me, his child, to be wealthy too. And then she said, I absolutely refuse to be poor. If I'm poor, that's because of my unbelief. I will never, ever seek to be poor or allow myself to be poor. Made a big point, you know. So I wrote her a letter, I got her address, and I wrote her a letter, and I said, have you never read that verse in James chapter 2, verse 5, that says, hearken my beloved brethren, has not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith and heirs of the king, which he has promised them that love him? And I mailed the letter, and about two weeks later I got a letter back, and she thanked me for the verse. She said, I will never, ever make the statement again. She said, I didn't know that was in the Bible. You know, in the book, in the Old Testament, Proverbs, and other places, we're told that he that reproaches the poor reproaches his maker. So the poor are poor because God has made them poor. That's really what it's saying. Now there's other factors involved, and we haven't time to go into that, but that's what it says. He that reproaches the poor reproaches his maker. The rich and the poor meet together, it says. The Lord is the maker of them all. So God makes the rich, and God makes the poor. That's what it's saying. All right, the rich and poor meet together. The Lord is the maker of them all. He that oppresses the poor reproaches his maker. Whoso mocks the poor reproaches his maker. Proverbs 14.31 and 17.5. Oh, people, listen, we've got to get it straight. Beware of dogs. Beware of having a dog-like nature. Beware of being a debarked dog that never has anything to say, not a word. You know, when people, let me give you an example. I was walking past a drunkster one time, and there's, oh, maybe 15 young people standing in a circle, and one of these young guys was shooting off his mouth and blaspheming God, and it was horrible. And I walked through the group, pushed my way through, and walked up to him and said, You are talking about my best friend, Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior, and I don't like the way you talk about him, sir. And he stared at me like I'd just hopped in from Mars or someplace and never said a word. And I turned around and walked away, pushed my way through the group again, and they stared at me like I didn't exist. They never heard this before, you know, but listen, people. When somebody curses God, stand up for God, you know. Stand up for God. God will bless you as you do. We're so silent, it's criminal. I remember one man. He was one of the most faithful witnesses for God I ever knew, but he told me for years he'd been searching for God. He had unsaved relatives that lived near where he was. He had a brother who was a Christian, and none of these Christians ever talked to him about Christ. He was in his 50s. If he heard people talking about religion or the Bible or anything, he'd get as close as he could, hoping to pick up something to tell him how to be saved. And this went on and on and on. Then one day he happened to meet a young man who was a druggist who was going to Africa as a missionary, and this young man said to him, Jesus Christ means everything to me. What does he mean to you? And he got angry. He said, that young whippersnapper talking away to me twice his age, you know. He said he had no right to say that, and he walked away from him, but he couldn't get away from him. And in 24 hours he saw the face of God and got saved, you know. Wonderful, but why had he waited so long? A lot of dumb dogs in his relatives. They had nothing to say, nothing to say. It's criminal, dear people. I was flying in a plane one time, and I did a lot of flying at one point, and I suppose I've flown four or five hundred times. Anyway, I got a seat on this plane, and as I came down the aisle, I noticed there was about five couples sitting there with big red suits on, and they had a hood. The only thing sticking out was their hands and their face. It even covered their feet, this red suit. I don't know what's going on here. I happened to get a seat next to one of these guys. He was a big tall guy, about six foot three or something. There he sat, and I sat beside him. We got talking, and I found out where he was going, so I realized I'd be off the plane in about an hour, and he was still going on, so I had to talk fast. I said to him, Sir, would you mind if I told you how I became a Christian? Now, that's not my usual approach, but that was my approach that day, and he didn't look at me. He just looked straight ahead, and he said, Well, I guess so. So I told him how I found Christ, and then the plane landed, and I gave him a gospel tract, which he took and put in his briefcase till he wouldn't look at me, and I get up to go, and I was standing in the aisle. I had the aisle seat, and he had the center seat, and his wife was next to him by the window, and I put out my hand to shake his hand. He took hold of my hand, and he wouldn't let go. Then I noticed he looked at me. The tears were streaming down his face, and here's what he said. You will never know. You will never know what you did for me today. You will never know what you did for me today, and I had to get my hand loose because I was holding up people in the aisle who tried to get by or were getting off the plane the same as I was, and so finally I got loose. I went about five or six seats down the aisle, and I stopped and turned to wave to him, and he leaped to his feet, and he hollered, You will never know what you did for me today, but I could have sat there like a dumb dog as people often do, said nothing, gave no tract, said nothing. People listen. Wake up. Wake up. If Satan's going to shut your mouth, you've got to do something about this, and some of this, as we finish now, will be through here just in a moment or two. Listen. You need to get on your face before God, perhaps, and ask God to forgive you that you're just a dumb dog, a self-seeking dog, a sleeping dog. Let us not sleep as others do. The Bible says, Let us watch and be sober, for they that sleep sleep in the night, neither be drunk nor drunk in the night, but let us who have the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet of hopeless salvation. So we're not to be sleeping. We're not to be sleeping. Oh, people, ask God to forgive you and to fill your heart that you get rid of the self-seeking. Oh, people, listen. What a need we have. Please, get before God. Ask God to search your heart, show you your sin, and do something about it. In Christ's name. Thank you. God bless you all. Amen.