In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of living a purposeful life. He challenges the audience to consider what they want to live for and encourages them to serve the Lord and their generation. The preacher also emphasizes the significance of being actively involved in a local church and using one's talents and abilities to make a difference. He highlights the need for self-reflection and acknowledges that God knows our deeds, both the ones we hide and the ones we are unaware of. The sermon concludes with a reminder to prioritize listening to God and seeking His ways above worldly pursuits.

Thank you very, very much. That was quite beautiful. Would that you'd open up your Bible to the book of Revelation, chapter 3. Book of Revelation, chapter 3. Beginning in verse 14. To the angel of the church in Laodicea write, the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God says this, I know your deeds that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spit you out of my mouth. Because you say, I am rich and have become wealthy and have need of nothing, and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, I advise you to buy from me gold refined by the fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourselves, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed. And I salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. Those whom I love I reprove and discipline, therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him and he with me. He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with me on my throne, as I also overcame and sat down with my father on his throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, I come before you and pray your help for the sake of your own glory and the benefit of your people. In Jesus' name, Amen. To the angel of the church in Laodicea write, Whenever some preacher turns to this passage, the church begins to tremble. Because this text is usually preached in a very hard, very rebuking, sometimes even angry sort of way. And there is a need for that at times in the church to come down very, very hard and to preach a hard word from the Lord. But if we only look at this passage in that manner, we miss so many things. You see, whenever the Lord comes to a group of people to speak to them, He is always the Lord of love. One of the ways that you can discern the difference between when Satan is speaking to condemn and God is speaking to reprove is this. Whenever Satan rebukes or condemns you, he will always leave you without hope. Whenever God speaks a hard word to His people, even through the prophets in the Old Testament, we see this. Whenever God speaks even a hard word to His people, He never leaves them destitute of hope, but always leaves them with repent. The mercies of the Lord are new every morning. So when we look at this passage tonight, I don't want you to just think of rebuke, of something negative, of how wrong you are, of the foot coming down. I want you to look at this passage as instructive, as helpful, as a blessing, as something tremendously positive in our lives. Now, He says to the angel of the church in Laodicea, write, Who this angel is, there is no grammatical, contextual way to determine. You can say whatever you want to say as long as you want to say it, but grammatically and contextually, it is just impossible to identify who He is talking about. Some say He is referring to a literal angel. Others say He is referring to the pastor of the church. Others say He is referring to maybe even the spirit of the church. All sorts of different things, but the Bible is silent. And when the Bible is silent on a matter, we would do well to be silent also. Now, we can make our inferences, we can say what we believe it might be, but when the Bible doesn't go ahead and explain it, maybe it is not that important. And maybe we spend too much time trying to explain the things that aren't explained, and things that aren't that important, and we miss what is really important here. What is really important is Jesus Christ has sent a message to His church. That is what is important. And it is an authoritative message. Now, first of all, I want you to understand something. The greatest blessing that can be manifest in the church is God sending that church a message, no matter how hard it is, and God working in that church to discipline, reprove, and rebuke that church. That is a sign of tremendous blessing from the Lord. As a matter of fact, in the New Covenant, it promises, some of it in Malachi, that He would come as a refiner's fire, that He would come rebuking and cleansing His church. And one of the greatest acts of judgment, of divine judgment, upon a people who identify themselves with Christianity, is when God no longer comes to rebuke, or discipline, or correct. There are so many, and they are not churches, but there are so many, I don't even know what you would call them, people coming together throughout this country on Sunday morning, collecting themselves together in religious buildings that are no more churches than a man on the moon. They can commit all sorts of abominations, they can teach all sorts of heresy, but God never rebukes them, He never corrects them, He never censors them. And why is that? For the same reason, I do not discipline another man's children. They don't belong to me. So I want you to know something, church. I want you to know something, believer. If God so zealously guards you that you cannot get away with anything, that is a sign, a manifestation of His love and His blessing in your life. But if you are a person, or a group of people who have identified yourselves with Christianity, and yet you are able to live in the abominations of this world, you are able to trespass the commandments of God, without God ever coming to you, ever censoring you, ever rebuking you, ever convicting you of sin, then know this, you are reprobate and on the road to hell. So see, when we see God come to us with a message that may be very, very difficult, it is a sign that we are His people. It is a sign of blessing. It is a sign of encouragement. Now there is something very important here that I want you to understand. Preaching is an extremely dangerous thing for both parties, for the preacher and for the ones listening. Now why is that? If what I preach here tonight is not biblical, it's not from the Lord, then on the day of judgment, I will stand and receive greater condemnation. Not many of you be teachers. Why? Teachers undergo greater scrutiny, greater condemnation. False prophets will be cast into hell. So you see, it's a fearful thing for me to preach, because if what I say is not true, I come under the judgment of God. But then it's also a fearful thing for you to listen to preaching. Now if what I say tonight is not biblical, is not from the Lord, then it's not a fearful thing. You can totally discard it, walk out the door, and you're absolutely free from everything I say. But if what I say is biblical and from the Lord, then you are bound by it and will be held accountable for it. To whom much is given, much is required. Now I want you to understand something. This is very, very important. Very important. When I was a pastor in Peru, I would preach on a certain topic, six weeks, eight weeks, you know, three months. And then I would invite a visiting pastor or visiting preacher to come in and also preach on the same thing. And I'd stand there at the back door and hear countless members of my own church come up to that man and say, praise God for that message, we've never heard anything like this before. And I'm thinking to myself, I have preached this for ten weeks. Now, when your pastor gets up here, familiarity breeds contempt. When your pastor gets up here, he's not your pastor. He's hopefully God's man. And the fact that you hear him every week is a dangerous thing. Why? Because we have a tendency not to listen much. Because we hear it every week from the same voice. But know this, if he is preaching the text, if he is being biblical, much is going to be required of thee. Do you understand? It is a fearful thing to attend church when the word of God is being preached and God himself is in attendance. Now, let me say something about authority, which is extremely important. From where does authority come to preach? We hear people, they say, well, you know these TV evangelists, they've all received a special anointing from God, special anointing of the Holy Spirit. Well, the Bible says in 1 John that all believers have received the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Some men, more the fundamentalist, Baptist type of men will say, I have authority because of my calling. Well, just because someone's called doesn't mean they're right. Men who are called can be wrong. So from where does authority, true biblical authority come when someone is preaching? It comes from this, I have authority tonight to tell you about God and to tell you what to do and even command you to do certain things and stop doing other things only to the degree that I correctly interpret and clearly communicate the word of God. Other than that, I have no authority. So the only question here tonight is, is it true? When your pastor is preaching, the only question is, is it true? Is it biblical? Whenever the church, maybe the church leadership believes that it needs to go in a new direction or do something that no one's ever done before and people stand up and say, well, we've never done that before. It really doesn't matter a hill of beans. The only question is, is it biblical? That's all that matters. That solves every problem. I was preaching several years ago at University Town and I'd spoken at the university and I was preaching in a congregation outside of that university and some unbelievers came, rather secular fellows came just to kind of listen to me and fight with me a little bit after the meetings. And I was preaching on that Jesus Christ is the only way. When I came down, a young man was very angry with me and he said, I don't like the way you presented that. I don't like your spirit. I don't like your attitude. He went on all about all the things he didn't like about me. And I said, young man, listen to me. I'm going to teach you something very important. I will bow before you right now and ask for forgiveness. Without even judging myself, I will ask forgiveness that I have offended you. But young man, in the end, that really doesn't matter. Because even if I am all the things you say I am, I am arrogant, I am proud, I am quick-tempered, if I am all the things you say I am, still the question before you is this, what I said, is it true? Because if it's true, you cannot use my sin as an excuse not to obey it. You see that? Now when you leave here tonight or when you leave after hearing a sermon anywhere, sometimes when we preach directly about sin, I've heard people get up and walk out of the congregation and they'll say, well, I just don't agree with that guy or I just don't like what he said or who does he think he is? You see, they're missing the point. It doesn't matter whether you like him or not and it doesn't matter who he thinks he is or who he thinks he's not. The only question is, is it true? You see, in every sermon you have to be able to say one of two things. The man who just preached to us is a heretic, a false prophet, completely wrong, and I'm not going to listen to a word he says. Or what he said is right and it is biblical and I am bound to obey it. That's not the way people think. What people do is this. They make it a personality battle. I don't like the guy, therefore I'm not listening to him. So you can't do that. You can't do that. It's the same way with Jesus Christ and C.S. Lewis' trilemma, the logical argument he put forth. Jesus is either a liar or he's a lunatic or he's the Lord of glory, but you can't patronize him. In the same way, the preacher is either a heretic or sent from God and you can't patronize him. Now, to the angel of the church in Laodicea write, who is going to speak to this church? Well, in this text, it is Jesus Christ. Now, the important thing tonight is that I myself preach what Jesus said. If I preach Paul Washer tonight, you are not bound to obey. But if I correctly interpret this text, you are bound to obey because it is Christ himself that is speaking to you through his word. Now, one of the things my wife, she is from Spain. One of the things that she first noticed, she said, when she came to this country was this. She couldn't believe how thin-skinned that Americans were. She goes, you can't tell anybody they're wrong in the church. They will get so offended, they're gone. She goes, in the church in Peru, we knew that was the pastor's job. To rebuke, to correct, to teach. But here in America, if you just look at somebody the wrong way, they're gone. That's true. And it's probably true of some of you. If someone were to come and correct you, if someone were to come and tell you that possibly your teenager is lost, even though you believe they're saved, you'd get so offended, you'd go to the next church and not recognize you're leaving a church that loves you, because at least they'll tell you the truth. Are you willing to open yourself up to biblical rebuke? Because if you're not, there's no hope for you whatsoever. Are you willing for a man of God, with the Bible open, and not just the pastor, but godly men, and even open to the rebuke of godly women in its proper context? Are you open to rebuke? Are you open to correction? Are you open to someone walking up to you in love and humbly telling you something that's going to hurt you, but they do it because they love you and for your benefit? Because if not, there's no hope for you. You can't grow. One of the most important aspects of fellowship is correction and rebuke, and yet I see none of it today in America. No wonder we don't grow. How can we grow? Now, I want you to look at something here. The one who comes to rebuke this church, Laodicea, and the one who may come tonight to correct this church is Jesus Christ. And look how He's described. First of all, He's the Amen. The one who, when you open the Bible, corrects you, is the very one who is the fulfillment of every promise God ever gave. Can't you listen to someone like that? Why would you want to balk against someone like that? Why would you want to have a stiff neck against Him? In the love of God, in the faithfulness of God, in the sovereignty of God, He is the very answer, yes, to every promise God ever gave you. Can't you listen to someone like that when He comes to you and tells you, you're wrong? There are certain people, especially certain older men, that I don't know why, but they have taken me under their wing and they love me. They love me. They would die a thousand deaths for me. They have mentored me. They have been a blessing to me. They have rebuked me so many times. I take it because I know them. I'll never forget one time I preached. Oh, I was just full of rage. I preached one night, almost tore the church apart. And afterwards, one of those dear men came up to me. I was standing almost right here at the steps of the platform. He just shot out of his chair and came right up as soon as the service was over. And he said, Paul, you preached the truth tonight. And you preached it in the flesh. And you need to get down on your knees right now and ask God to forgive you. And then you need to stand up and ask this church to forgive you. He was right. And he saved my ministry, maybe. Most people don't have enough love to do that. Probably most of you would have walked out of here telling everybody how wicked I was, but none of you had enough love to come to me and tell me I was wrong. That's typical church. But some people really do love. And they love so much, they're willing to put their life on the line. And even rebuke the very ones they love. When someone comes to you in love, humbly, listen. And when someone comes to you not in love and not humbly, still listen. Because it might be true. Don't use their sin as an excuse for your own. Is it true? But here we know it is. Why? Because the one speaking to us is the Amen. And he's not only the Amen, it says he is the faithful and true witness. He's faithful. The one who comes to you in Scripture to correct you, he has always been faithful to you. Always. Has he ever failed you one time? Has he ever turned his back on you one time? Has he ever not come to help you one time? Has his blood ever failed one time? Well, then can't you listen to someone like that? And part of his faithfulness is this. He comes to you to correct you. Let me tell you something. If you are someone's friend and you know they're in sin, and you don't go to them to correct them, it's not because you love them so much. It's because you love yourself and you desire your own self-preservation and you don't want anyone to think bad of you. You're not being faithful to your friend. In the same way, I'm not being faithful to the congregation if I do not preach the truth. You know why most people don't discipline their little children? It's not because they love them. Don't buy into that lie. It's because they love themselves and they want their children to like them. They feed off their own children like parasites. The one who comes to you is faithful. But not only is he faithful, he's a true witness. Now, anyone else comes to you, including myself, with a witness against you, listen, but just don't accept right off the top. If God shows you that what they're saying is true, then accept it. If God doesn't show you, if it's not clear to you, then go gather some other brothers and sisters who will be honest and sit down all of you together and say, is this so about me? Is this true? Do I need to change? Apply Matthew 18 there. Because not every time someone witnesses something about you, not every time are they true and faithful. We can just simply be mistaken. Someone can come to you to rebuke you, and they might do it in love, they might do it humbly, but at the same time they might do it and they're fallible. And they're wrong. But when Jesus comes to you, He is the faithful and true witness. Everything He says about you is true. He knows you're rising up. He knows you're lying down. He knows you're coming in, you're going out. He knows the deepest recess of your heart. Everything He knows is truth. He is omniscient. He knows everything completely, perfectly, exhaustively, and without effort. So when He comes to you, what He says is true. Now let me ask you something though. Are you like so many people, that you are so busy with the things of this world, that you are not hardly ever before Him in the Word and prayer? You are so busy you never hear His voice. You're never before the open Word meditating upon it. You're never before Him silent and listening and reading and meditating and saying, Lord, show me my heart. Is there any wicked way in me? Examine me, O Lord. Even the pagan philosopher said that one of the highest virtues is to know thyself. We know nothing. We're a busy, noisy people. And our Christianity is just as busy and noisy as anything you can find in the world. A poet, songwriter has written a beautiful, beautiful narration of Jesus Christ coming in from the wilderness and desiring to go into the temple. He says, Weak from the journey and the long passing days, hungry to worship and join in the praise and shock met with anger that burned on His face when He entered the wasteland of that barren place. And it talks about Christ entering into the temple with all the noise and the clanging and the music and the buying and the selling and the screaming and the hollering. And he talks about making a whip and chasing the people out of the temple. And then it says, The noise and confusion gave way to His Word at last sacred silence so God could be heard. There's so much noise in the church. Can God be heard? So much activity, so much just useless, vain activity. How much time do you spend quiet before the Lord, asking Him to examine you, asking Him to examine you, to show you your ways? David even asked God, Show me how transient I am. Teach me to number my days. Is there any wicked way in me? He was a man acutely aware that there was a judgment coming. Silence in order to hear. Is anybody listening? Does anyone have ears to hear? So much noise. Do you know what the church, well, you know what Christianity is in America today? Hardly anything more than a six flags over Jesus. And the bigger the church gets, the bigger the carnival. Programs, activities, everything from ski trips to coffee shops. Why? Well, it's what you got to do when you got to keep the program going. And when men out of a desire to be famous within Christianity build big churches upon the bones of unconverted church members, you need a bulldozer to knock the whole thing down. And it's coming. Probably the only thing that will save the church in America is persecution or national catastrophe or revival. He says, the amen, the faithful, the true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. I love what the Puritans used to say and Thomas Watson, speaking of Jesus Christ and His authority and power, he would say, this is no inferior governor of some small village who has come to speak with you. This is no inferior prince. This is the beginning of creation. This word here doesn't mean that He is the first created being, as many cults would say. No, it means He is the head of creation. He is the origin and source of creation. The very one who holds your entire existence, every breath in the palm of His hand comes to speak with you in the Word of God. It was said by Jesus that certain people would rise up against the people of His age and judge them. The Queen of Sheba, a pagan, would rise up and judge the people of Israel because one greater than Solomon was among them. When I think of the countless pastors and Christians that I know in third world countries that I have served with, pastors who have planted 15, 20 churches and yet they have to go to their church and ask permission to take the one Bible that they all have out of the church in order to carry it to another village and use it to preach. And yet we have a Bible for every day. And it's not used. To listen to God! To hear Him! To stop! Just to stop! The only reason you were given ears is to hear Him. The only reason you were given eyes is to see Him. The only reason you were given a heart is to love Him. But we don't have time. You will fill up your SUV with every one of your kids and you will take them to every soccer match, football game, basketball game. You will run them here and there, teach them all sorts of things and they never learn the ways of God. How many hours a day do they spend acquiring knowledge that has no eternal value whatsoever? And in the busyness of your home, they'll never hear a word from God. The beginning of the creation of God says this, I know your deeds. I don't know your deeds. You don't know mine. And we take consolation in that, don't we? You wouldn't want a man to know your deeds or your thoughts. I was preaching one time speaking at a university and this reporter came up to me. He was so angry because I was speaking on sin. And he said, I do not believe that men are as sinful as you say they are. And I said, first of all, young man, it was not I who said it. I just read the passage. God said it. And I said, furthermore, man, take a test with me right now. If I could take out your heart right now and put every thought you have ever thought in your life, every deed you've ever committed, and I could put it on a DVD or a video or a film strip and I could show it here this evening in this auditorium to this entire university, is it not true you would run out of this building and you'd never show your face here on campus again? He could only bow his head and say, it's true. One of the things that we need to know, yes, our Lord is a merciful and gracious God. But know this, He knows your deeds. He knows them. He knows them. Some of them you know too and you hide. But others, you're so busy and your head is so filled up with noise that you don't even know when you're sinning against Him. My people perish for a lack of knowledge. Where there is no vision, the people run unrestrained. If I ever hear that... I've heard that passage preached wrong so many times by megachurch pastors. It's unbelievable. Where there is no vision, the people... We need a vision. We need to build a big church. We need to have a great ministry. That is not what that passage means at all. And those men either do not know the Bible or they are twisting Scripture. You interpret the passage in its context. It's speaking of where there is no revelation of God's law, the people run unrestrained like wild dogs. That's what it means. He knows. You need to become discerning. You need to be more than just acknowledging that, yes, He knows. But you need to know. And how do you know more about yourself? By sitting quietly before Him. By asking Him. By being concerned for these things. By getting into the Word and allowing the Word to cut you to pieces. You say, oh, the Bible is my friend. Well, it's not mine. It's what Martin Luther said. He said, the Bible is not my friend. The Bible is my enemy. The Bible comes against me every way I want to turn and cuts me off. The Bible is your friend. You probably haven't been reading it very much. Because the Bible is like a hammer. It's like a fire. It's like a sword. Sometimes I just want to pour myself out on the floor before it. I know your deeds. That you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spit you out of my mouth. Now before we go into anything else, let's just look at, I will spit you, literally, vomit you out of my mouth. My dear friend, does the preaching, the typical preaching in the typical Baptist church today have anything to do with language like this? What would, I mean, a pastor stands before the people and says, God's going to vomit you out of his mouth. Now anyone who preaches on this all the time is mean spirited, hateful, yes, I'll agree with that. But to never preach on these things? I'll never forget, I was preaching a conference several years ago. And I preached one night on the holiness of God. Just the holiness of God. That was it. I came down out of the pulpit. Some pastors were in the back. They came up to me. They said, Brother Paul, we need to talk to you. I said, okay. They said, we've got a problem with your message. And I said, well, what is it? And they said, you preached on the holiness of God tonight, and not once did you mention the love of God. And I said, well, gentlemen, I have a problem with all three of you. Because last night, I preached on the love of God, and not once did I mention the holiness of God, and not one of you had a problem with it. So we can preach on the love of God all day long, and no one's got a problem with it. You preach on the holiness of God five minutes without explaining that that's not really what it means, you're going to get in trouble. You see. You need to be very, very careful. This God is not Santa Claus. He's not a tame lion. He's really God. He makes alive, and He kills. He lifts up, and He judges. He restores, and He destroys. He's an awesome God. He really is. So when He talks and uses this language, here's what I want you to do. I had a fellow call me one time. This was on prayer. I was at a conference, and we began to pray for revival, and I began to weep. Now, all of us in this big conference, we were all sovereign grace guys. Believe in the sovereignty of God, which I do. Now, he calls me up, he's furious. He said, I thought you believed in the sovereignty of God. I said, well, I do. He said, then why are you weeping and crying out and begging God for revival? I knew where he was going. If God's sovereign, you can't make Him do anything, which I agree with. But I looked at him and I said, Sir, let me tell you something. Very, very important. The difference between me and you is I'm a theologian, and you're a philosopher. Well, he got really mad there. I said, Sir, listen to me. The Bible says that God is sovereign, and there's not a maverick molecule in the universe. The Bible also says you have not because you ask not. Now, Sir, a theologian says, God says this and I believe it. God says this and I believe it. I can't put it together, but that's really not my job. In the same way, the Bible says God is one. He is just one. And three persons are called God in the Bible. You know where all the heresy about the Trinity came from in the first five centuries of the church? Either from those who sought to deny the Trinity or those who sought to explain it. Now, the Bible says that I am before the Lord, I have the righteousness of Christ, that I have been redeemed. It talks of all those beautiful verses and chapters about my position before Him, and I need to take that seriously and I need to stand in it. And also, when the Lord says to a church, I'm going to vomit you out of my mouth, I need to listen to it. I can't put those two things together, but He says both of them and I believe it. Do you see that? We always go from one side to the other and we don't seem to be able to maintain a balance, do we? There is a balance. I have nothing to fear from God. And I have everything to fear from God. And when you get off into a tangent on either side... Let me tell you something an old preacher told me. I've learned a lot from old preachers. As a matter of fact, I learned this from an older preacher who learned it from an even older preacher. And it was this. He said, Son, falsehood is a very broad path. You can walk a thousand miles that way and be in falsehood. You can walk a thousand miles that way and be in falsehood. But being in the truth is like walking on the edge of a razor blade. It's very narrow. That's true. You hear a preacher that's always preaching things like God is going to vomit you out of His mouth and that's all He's ever preaching on? He's probably a very bitter, angry, spirited man. You listen to a preacher who never warns the church about judgment or discipline? Be very careful. He may be a wolf in sheep's clothing. Now, he says, I know your deeds. You are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were cold or hot, but because you are lukewarm. Now, most of you have probably only heard one interpretation of this passage and I want you to know that there are actually two viable grammatical possibilities here. I'm going to give you first the customary, traditional interpretation of this passage, which may be true. I'm also going to give you the other. First of all, you have heard it, haven't you? I'd rather you be totally against me or totally for me, but because you're halfway, you have no zeal, you have no passion, you have no heart about this thing, I just as soon spew you out of my mouth. And that is a warning to us about what? It is a warning to us about the lack of zeal, a lack of passion, that you can get so passionate about so many things and not be passionate about Jesus Christ and the work of God. We have the horrifyingly magnificent ability to turn absolutely everything into an idol, to get caught up in every tomfoolery, every vanity on the face of the earth and neglect the glory of God. What's your God? Well, I'll tell you. What do you think about most? There's your answer. What do you think about most? To most people, Jesus is like a little accessory they add on to the end of their life. And I hear preachers promoting that. Here's the way it goes nowadays. Modern day preaching. Look, yuppie couple that I want in my church because obviously you've got money. Listen, you've got everything. You've got it all. You've got a great job. You've got a great house. You've got great kids. You've got a great wife. Man, you've just got it all. You just lack one thing. You need Jesus. Let me make this little preaching this guy just did a little bit more biblical. Everything you have is dumb if you don't have Jesus Christ. Everything you have is going to burn. And Jesus Christ is not some little accessory you add on to what already is a sort of full life to complete it. He's not a part of your life. He is your life or you're going to hell. I'm not into marketing Jesus. He's not something that tops off the rest of the good things you've already gained without Him. It's like the Chinese Christian. When he went back to China, he said, I am just utterly amazed at how much American Christians can do without God. How much they can accomplish without God. My dear friend, these things should not be so. Zeal. Now, I don't want to leave you there because if I were to interview every one of you, you would all say along with myself that you lack zeal and you lack love and you lack passion. Now where are we going to get that? Pull you up by your bootstraps? Kind of get motivated, go to some conference, acquire the fire and get souped up for about two weeks and then go right back down to where you started? I mean, how do you get this zeal? How do you get this passion? How do you find this love? There's only one way to know Him. Theology. I know that's going to shock you. Theology. I hear people say, I don't want none of that theology stuff. Well, the word theology comes from the word theos, which means God, and logos, which means word or discourse. Theology is a discourse about God. So you're saying, I want Jesus, but I don't want to hear nothing about God. I don't want none of that doctrine stuff from the Hebrew word leka, meaning teaching. I want the benefits of Christ, but I don't want to hear any of His teachings. My dear friend, you cannot divorce the mind from Christianity. When you do, you're gone. So what do you do? You know I love my wife so much more after 12 years than I did when I met her. It's unbelievable. Why? Two reasons. I know more about my wife than I did 12 years ago, and I've experienced more with my wife than I had 12 years ago. You lack love for God? Then go into Scripture, cry out to Him, Show me Your glory. Show me Your beauty. Show me Your attributes. Show me Who You are. And the more you see of His beauty, the more you see of His glory, the more you see of His goodness and the magnificence of His works and His justice and His holiness and His sovereignty, the more you'll love Him if you're born again. You see, because many, if not most, today in American churches are not born again. Sunday morning in America is the greatest hour of idolatry in the entire week because most people are worshiping a God they made with their own mind, a figment of their own imagination. It's nothing more than a projection of what they are. And if you were to stand up... Sometimes people say, come to our church and preach on the attributes of God. And I'll say, you really don't want me to do that. It'll split your church. They'll say, what do you mean? We're Christians. I mean, what do you mean it'll split? I said, when I begin to preach on the sovereignty of God and the justice of God and the holiness of God, there are going to be many people in your church that are going to stand up angry, walk out stomping, saying, I could never love a God like that. My God's not like that. Because their God's not like that. Their God's not the biblical God. It's true. It's true. So there's zeal. And where does it come from? From knowing Him. Knowing Him. But now there's another interpretation of this passage. It's also a possibility. It's very ancient, very old. In the patristics in the first five centuries, it was common. And it goes something like this. You're neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were cold or hot, but because you are lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spit you out of my mouth. It goes something like this. You're useless to me. If you were cold, I could use you to refresh the saints, to encourage believers. If you were cold, you would be useful in some way. If you were hot, prophetic, if you were burning, I could use you to bring sanctification into the life of people. Your zeal could burn into the lives of others. Others could light their candle in your fire. But you're not cold. I can't use you for that. You're not hot. I can't use you for that. I can't use you for anything. As a matter of fact, you're just lukewarm, and lukewarm water breeds disease, and I don't want you evangelizing. I don't want you doing anything, because the only thing you're going to do is spread the disease that you're filled with. I can't use you for anything. Do you know that when you look in Romans 3, verses 10 through 19, where it talks about the characteristics of the reprobate, the characteristics of depraved men that are unregenerate and not Christians, one of them is they're useless. All together become useless to God. I just described a great part of church membership roles. It is a common knowledge truth. You're taught it in seminary. Pick up any book that's there. Well, first of all, I graduated from the University of Texas with a business degree, and one thing you learn in managing people is that in your corporation, 20% of the people are going to do what? 80% of the work. And 80% of the people are going to do 20% of the work. It is just a fact. No matter how you mix it up, it always comes out that way. You know what the problem is? That's not the problem. The problem is this. It's the same statistic in the church. 20% of the people do 80% of everything that has to be done in the church, because the rest are useless. And being useless according to the Bible is one of the characteristics of a lost man. Now, let me ask you a question. How useful are you to God? How useful? Would you be able to sit down and describe your ministry? Write it out on a piece of paper. Are you an instrument? God's instrument. Are you useful to Him? Is He using you? Is He? I don't mean are you just going to church on Sunday. That in itself is just hypocrisy out of this world. Don't forsake the assembling of yourselves together. That's not all it says. It doesn't say go to church, listen to a sermon. It doesn't say go to church and sit down and worship singing four hymns. You go to church, you gather together as a community in order to really and practically minister to one another according to your gifts. That's what He's talking about. We are so gone. It's unbelievable. We are so far off. We couldn't find a biblical church with a road map because we have one right here. He's not saying, you know, I hear this all the time. Don't forsake the assembling of yourself together. Be there on Sunday morning. That's not what it means at all. Even though you should be there on Sunday morning. What it means is, you collectively come together as a body to minister to one another. Each according to his gifts. Now what are your gifts and how are you doing that? I'm not going to let you go on this one. I'm going to push you. I'm not going to let you go. How are you faithful in congregating and gathering together with other believers in order to minister to them? What are you doing? When was the last time you knew the Lord used you as an instrument? Come on now. Think about it. If I were to hand out a sheet of paper to everybody, let's say that you're all my corporation. You all work for me. You're my employees. And I hand out a sheet of paper and I say, on the front part of that paper, I want you to give me a job description of what you do here in my company. The second half of that sheet, the first half of the back of the sheet, I want you to write out everything that you've done for me this year. And then the last part, I want you to write out what your plans are in the upcoming year to better serve our corporation. And I hand that all out and wait a couple of hours and I come back and I pick up your piece of paper and it's blank. And I say, well, on the part here, this whole front page where you're supposed to explain what you did last year, it's blank. Yes, I know it's blank, sir, but bless God, every time the doors of this corporation were open, I was here. Well, on the part about what you're going to be doing in the upcoming year, it's blank. I know, but I'll promise you this, boss, every time the doors of this factory are open, I'm going to be here. I'm going to say, bless God, you're fired. But now look, I don't want you to stand, now listen, I don't want you to stand before God one day because this is really going to happen. I gave you talents, he said. I gave you gifts and I gave them to you to primarily minister in your local body that you associated with and you did nothing. Nothing! Depart from me, you worker of iniquity! You say, are you saying that I'll go to hell because I didn't have works? No, I'm going to say that you're going to hell because you never were a believer and one of the evidences that you never were a true believer is that there never was any fruit in your life. Folks, Jesus and the church that you're involved in, it's not some little thing you do on Sunday. It's everything. Everything! And you know how God's going to make it everything? Because I know Americans aren't going to turn. Apart from a revival, we're not going to repent. So this is how God's going to make it everything to you. The same way He made it everything to the Peruvian believers. He brought the communists in down there in Peru and they killed 23,000 people and they wiped out so many churches and killed so many of my brothers and sisters in Christ and we were terrified. We had our building bombed. We had machine gun fire going everywhere in the service. We were threatened with our own lives. We hid out in the back of grain trucks so that they would not get us. And church meant something when those people came together. Church wasn't some little thing you do in order to be a proper southern person. Church was your life. You did everything to get there. You didn't want to go home because there was nowhere to go. Why? Because you stood eight hours a day just to get a bag of rice. Well, it's going to happen here. It's going to happen. Mark it down. God so loves His church, He will shred her to pieces to make her beautiful because what she thinks is beautiful, her gold and her garments and her eye salve, He hates. He hates it. It goes on. He says this, Because you say I am rich and I have become wealthy and have need of nothing and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. Do you honestly think they said they were rich? In their own hearts, I believe. They were going to church. They would have never walked in there because when you go to church, you've got to put on your church face and your church talk and everything else. No one probably walked in there, unless they were charismatic, none of them walked in there saying, I'm rich! But they thought it in their heart. You see, remember what He said? I know your deeds. I know your thoughts. And this is what He says. Now look at this. Never forget this. What is beautiful to the world and what is beautiful to carnal people who profess Christianity is filth and rot to Jesus Christ. The temple scene there in Matthew is going to happen here in America. Pastors and the elders and the leaders of the church are going to be walking there with Jesus. Jesus, look at this building. I tell you that there's coming a time when not one stone of this building is going to be set upon another stone. Because I told you a long time ago they worship not in this mountain, those who worship Me, or in that mountain, but the true worshippers of God worship Him in spirit and in truth. And I'll not tolerate this anymore. Look what He says. He says, because you say I am rich and have become wealthy and have need of nothing. Now how does that happen? It happens to all of us. You know, I was telling the pastor the other day, it wasn't hard to serve Jesus Christ in Peru. It wasn't hard to serve Jesus Christ living in a tent. It wasn't hard to serve Jesus Christ when persecution was breaking out on the church. It was hard to serve Jesus Christ when I got off the plane in Miami. I heard two Russian guys years ago. Now these guys, when they were teenagers, watched the KGB come in their church building, put their pastor against a wall, pull out his tongue and cut his tongue out for preaching the Gospel. And yet those two men stood in our church and said, the hardest thing we have ever had to do was be Christians in America. And someone said, how can you say that? And this was the answer of one of them, because there's no Jacuzzis in Russia. Life is not easy there. There's no prosperity. There's nothing. All you have is Jesus. Folks, poverty and persecution never harmed the church of Jesus Christ. Affluence and ease. Affluence and ease of life. Now that isn't to say, and it might be. I heard a preacher say a while back, when Jesus told the rich young ruler sell everything he had and give it to the poor and follow him, the preacher said, now he doesn't mean that that's what you're supposed to do. No, that preacher's wrong. Jesus could tell you to do that. He really could. Don't you realize that? He could lead you. It doesn't mean every true believer has to sell everything they have and give it to the poor. But don't think he couldn't come and knock on the door of your house and tell you to do that. What you have to understand is this. Prosperity and ease of life makes living the Gospel of Jesus Christ very difficult. Isn't it amazing that usually since there's no persecution really that much or physical persecution in the church in America, isn't it amazing that you see signs of greatest spirituality, especially in smaller congregations, when someone dearly loved in that congregation comes down with an incurable disease like cancer? Isn't it amazing how spiritual the church becomes? Because no one can save them. No one can help them. No one can buy their health with gold. No one can cover their malady with garments. No one has any salve to make the cancer go away. And the church starts praying and crying out to God and ministering to one another. You see? Have you not witnessed that? In times of most severe crisis when you think your entire life is going to fall apart, I was dealing with a group of believers in Texas a few years ago and the church was really going through some trial and this one young man was going through a terrifying trial. It was horrifying what he was going through. And he looked up at me one day with tears in his eyes and he says, I have never been so afraid. I have never been so frightened. I have never been so disturbed. My life is tore apart. And he said, but you want to know what my greatest fear is? That it's going to end. Because all of this has made me cling to Jesus Christ like I never thought possible. But this church, what were they famous for? They were famous for their wealth in the world. Laodicea was famous for its wealth. They were famous for their clothing industry, their garment industry. And they were famous for the salve and certain medicinal fountains that they had for healing. They were famous for those three things. And so Jesus Christ points out those three things and says they're worthless. They're worthless. I advise you, he says, to get rid of the whole thing. Don't talk about your riches. Buy from me gold tried in the fire. Now what does he mean? He's saying this, all your wealth and your prosperity and everything you have, it is going to burn up in the fire. It's going to be worthless. Much of your deeds, much of your thoughts, much of your activity and your endeavors, it is all going to burn up on that great day. So I advise you to get rid of it now. And he says, buy from me that which has already passed through the fire, tried by fire. What he's saying is, come to me and begin to do the things eternal that will pass through that flame and not be burned. Don't waste your life gathering gold that will burn. Buy from me. Come to me. Serve me. Live for me. And every treasure that is gained by you in my name will pass through that fire and remain. So a very wealthy man knew he was going to die, so he took absolutely everything he had and he sold it. He invested the whole thing in gold and then bought this huge chest and put all the gold in it and tied it up, strapped himself to it, and he died. He goes to the gates of heaven, as they say. An angel standing there and said, well, this is kind of unusual. You actually did get this far with it. What's going on? And the fellow says, sir, if I'm going to pass through the gates, I've got to take this with me. He said, well, you can't do that. He said, you don't understand. My whole life is in this thing. Everything I worked for, everything I sweated for, everything I sacrificed for, it's in this trunk. And the angel goes, whoa, that's pretty impressive. Well, maybe I ought to let you in with it if it means that much to you. I mean, you gave your life for it. You did everything you possibly could just to get what's in this box. Sure, come on in. I'm just curious, before you come in, can I take a look at it? And the guy goes, well, sure. Walks over there and puts the key in it, opens it up. The angel looks in thinking, man, I'm going to see something amazing. Looks in and goes, you spent your entire life working for pavement? And the guy goes, what? He goes, we pave streets with this stuff up here. You spent your entire life working for pieces of asphalt? Don't you realize that there is coming a day when you may weep, bitterly weep, because you've invested your life in that which does not remain. Now, he goes on and he says, and white garments so that you may clothe yourselves. Now, this is a big deal right here. It appears that there was some self-righteousness in this group. I want you to know you're not going to get to heaven with one shred of self-righteousness on your back. You talk about difficult for a camel to go through an eye of a needle. You're not getting to heaven with one shred of self-righteousness. If you think that you and Jesus got your own thing going, well, you've got another thing coming. He's not your co-pilot. You and Him do not have your own thing going. You aren't working together for this. You aren't trusting in Jesus and trying to do something else. No, if you're going to heaven, you're going to heaven for only one reason. Two thousand years ago, the Son of God shed His blood for your soul. And if you understand that rightly, if someone were to come up to you and suggest that you were going to heaven because you were a rather fine person, you would vomit. It would make you so sick. Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to the cross I cling. He says, I advise you, throw away this foolish, demonic, stupid notion that you are somehow respectable and upright and a good gain for God. You know what the old preachers used to talk about? You know we talk about repentance from sin? Do you know the old preachers also talked about repenting from good works? They did. Not from doing them, but from trusting in them. To repent of trusting in any goodness in yourself and throwing yourself upon Christ and Christ alone. And then he goes, I salve. I salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. Here's the thing. I honestly believe most people don't want to see. I knew a lady that was considered a very fine, upstanding woman in a certain First Baptist church many, many years ago who whenever I preached there, she would not allow her little boy to go because she was afraid that he would hear me preach and become a missionary. She did not want him to see. She did not want him to hear. Do you want to see? Do you want to hear? You say, oh yes, I do. Be careful. Be very careful. He has all the authority and right in heaven and on earth when he opens your eyes to tell you, sell everything you have and give it to the poor. He has the right to pick you up and tell you to go to Bible college or to be trained by your own pastor and then go to the Middle East and die a martyr, you and all your children. He has a right to do absolutely anything with you. Are you sure you really want your eyes open and your ears open to hear and see? Because it will not be comfortable. It will be terrifying, but He is good. Sometimes it's just better not to see. Sometimes it's better just not to hear. I honestly believe, I've seen this in my own life, I've seen it in so many people's lives that it seems to be a tendency in Christianity. You know, when you first become a Christian, I mean, whatever God wants you to do, you just want to be used of God. And you know what's amazing? You hear Him. I mean, you don't hear His voice. Maybe some people do. He actually does lead you. You know He's leading you to go witness to somebody. You know He's leading you to talk to somebody. You know He's leading you to stop doing a certain thing or to start doing a certain thing. And then what happens? Pretty soon the cost just gets greater and greater and greater. And what happens? You start getting, oh, I don't think that was God. That was just my emotion. And you almost like the doctrine that God doesn't speak anymore except through the Word. He never leads anybody except through the Bible. Because then you can shut off when He's saying, go across the street and witness to your neighbor. You can shut it off when He says, go to your pastor and just lay your life out there and say, pastor, pray for me. I want to know what my gifts are and I want to serve this church. You see. Do you want to hear Him? Do you want your children to hear Him? Your child. He's very, very smart. Brilliant young man. Got a great future ahead of him. He's 18 years old. He comes to talk to mom and dad one night and says, mom and dad, I'm not going to college. There's a tribe in Columbia and they've been seen, but no one has ever, ever even made contact with them. And even the other tribes are terrified of them. They're headhunters. They're violent. They've killed everyone they've come in contact with. God doesn't want me to go to Bible college. Mom, I need to buy a ticket. I need to put on a backpack. And I just need to walk into the jungle. Will you be happy then? That your boy heard from God? We're always happy when our boy becomes the pastor of First Baptist Church of so and so. But when our boy is asked to become a martyr, you think, well, that's unrealistic. No, it happened to a man named Bruce Olson. He almost died several times. He almost starved to death. He was so suffering from starvation in the jungle at one time that he passed out and had a dream that a butterfly was touching him on his lips. And when he woke up, three feet of a huge tapeworm was crawling out of his body through his mouth because there was no longer anything to feed on. Would you want your boy to hear the Word of the Lord when the Word of the Lord asks him to do something like that? This is basic Christianity 101. He says, those whom I love I reprove and discipline. Therefore, be zealous and repent. My dear friend, you need to understand something. It's amazing that preachers recognize this, that sometimes you're preaching and God begins to really move and He begins to deal with people about their sin. Isn't it amazing that it is always the most godly, most devoted people in the church that come forward weeping about their sin? And it is always the most carnal, wicked, lukewarm church members that sit back there as though not one thing was said to them. Because in fact, not one thing was said to them. The ones that God loves, He reproves, He disciplines, and He reproves. When was the last time the Lord came to you and dealt with you about a specific sin in your life? When was the last time you wept over your sin? That will tell you a lot. We're almost at the point where I know God loves me because He never deals with me. I know God loves me because He leaves me alone. No. I know God loves me because He so zealously guards me that I know if I turn one inch to the left or the right, He's coming after me. The sign of God's discipline is not a sign of being unconverted. It is a sign of conversion. If He lets a church go and doesn't discipline or correct that church, He does not love that church because it's not a church. It doesn't belong to Him. But He says this, those whom I love I reprove and discipline. Therefore, be zealous and repent. Why should you be zealous and repent? Because He loves you. And His rebuking, His correcting is a sign of His love. He's not sitting there and going, look, I'm going to crush every one of you, so repent. No, He's saying, I love you, that is why I corrected you. Now, listen, look at my love, behold it, and be zealous to repent. It's a labor of love. And then He goes on. I know that time is getting away from us. He says in verse 20, Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him and he with Me. Just to let you know, this verse has absolutely nothing to do with evangelism. And I had a preacher say, yeah, I know, but it works. A friend of mine preaching a while back, he was so mad it was unbelievable. I call him Rowdy Randy from Texas. And he was preaching and he said, I'm so sick and tired of these preachers that say there's the door of your heart but the handle's only on the inside and only you can open the door and God can't violate your free will and if you don't open that door, He can't come in even though He wants to. And my friend looked up and says, that door belongs to Jesus Christ and if He wants to, He'll kick it in with His foot. This has nothing to do with evangelism. He's not talking about a lost person's heart. He's talking about the door of the church. And you don't have a right to pull Scripture out of context and make up some silly little contract between a sinner and God. Yeah, you know how it is, don't you? He's knocking at the door of your heart and only you can open the door. Will you open the door? Well, how do I do that? Well, pray and ask Him to come into your heart. Okay, I'll do that. Then the sinner prays and asks Him into the heart. And then you go, well, did He enter in? And the guy goes, I'm not really sure. And then you say, well, of course He did because He promised He would. So are you going to believe or call Jesus a liar? Look at that. That's superstition. It has nothing to do with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Most of these evangelists, they ought to put them on a boat, ship them off to some island, and we ought to stand on the dock and sing the doxology as they're pulling off. Because more people are going to hell because of that type of preaching than all the brothels in America. People are saved, not by opening up the door of their heart because the Bible says they can't do it. The Bible said God opened up Lydia's heart. People are saved because of a supernatural work of God that produces repentance and true faith. Not because they've made some silly little contract of decisionism with God. But what does this mean? First, I want you to look at the word behold. Behold. I think it's extremely important. Now, just look up here. Behold! Has no meaning, does it? No meaning at all. Now, keep looking up here. Don't turn around. Just keep looking up here. Behold! Look at me now. Now it has meaning. And that's the whole point of this verse. And if you can see this, it will really help the way your church is directed and how your church walks. Alright. Most churches hear the voice of God. God leads them to do something. Jesus leads His church to do something. But here's what they do. They believe that the leadership of Jesus Christ is static. Static means unchanging. God leads a group of people to do something. So they think that for the next 10,000 years, that's the direction they're supposed to be walking in. No. The leadership of Jesus Christ with His people is not static. It's dynamic. It's not that you hear a word from God and then follow it the rest of your life. No, you're constantly seeking God, constantly following God, constantly following every direction He may turn. Churches get in ruts because they obey something they heard from God and then close their ears off as though God's never going to speak to the church again. The church is looking in an entirely different direction. They're not looking at Christ. If they were looking at Christ, He wouldn't say, behold, or look over here. They're looking in the wrong place. And unless you are in the Word of God as a church, unless you are seeking to hear Him in silence, you'll never be able to follow Him. You'll constantly be wasting so much energy running like a bunch of rats in every direction. It is to constantly hear Him, to constantly go before Him, to constantly be open to Him. Lord, what do you want from this church? When was the last time this entire church got together, declared a day of fasting, came in here, and just sought God's faith with regard to, Lord, what should we be doing? Lord, what do you want from us? Where should we go? And church, He will not allow this church, if He truly loves this church, He will not allow you to sit there and never seek to hear His voice and depend on one or two other men to hear everything and do everything. He won't allow it if He loves you. You see, church? I mean, He's saying, behold, here I am. You're looking in the wrong direction. You may not be looking in the wrong direction today, but isn't it worth saying, man, we need to have a time of prayer. We need to seek the Lord. We need to ask Him to show us where we need to be going and what we need to be doing with every aspect. I'll go up and I'll talk to, at times I'll say, I'll ask a music minister, I'll say, okay, have you gone through the Old Testament and the New Testament to determine how God wants worship to be done? Well, this is the way we always do it. Okay? Now, I'm not saying that because I didn't see anything wrong tonight. I loved the worship. But what I'm saying is, do you see, you don't just take for granted anything. How should this church be led? Okay, get into the Word of God and determine how it should be led. How should we take care of our children? How should we take care of our youth? How should we disciple? How should we do everything? It all goes back to, let's go into the Bible and see. Let's call on the name of the Lord. Let's seek Him and let Him show us. But no, because you say, I know, because you don't need that anymore, you're pretty much, I mean, compared to everybody else, you're doing okay. Paul said, you compare yourselves by yourselves and that is not wise. And then he says, here's what I love, it's so amazing. I know it's late and you're all so worried that I'm tired, but don't worry about me, I'm young and full of stamina. He says this, I will come to Him and will dine with Him and He with me. What does that mean? These people had really messed up, big time. But look at this. He doesn't say, you've really messed up, now repent, and after I cool off for a while, I'll fellowship with you again. That's not what he says. He says, you repent and I'll come to dinner immediately. Isn't the Lord wonderful? He's not like this thing of, yeah, I've forgiven you, but I can't forget. I've forgiven you, but you just need to let me have my space for a while. Women. He's not like that. And men, if your wife says that, obey her. Because if not, you're going to stretch forth your hand and draw back a bloody nub. But Jesus isn't like that. You repent. That's why I love where it says He gives wisdom. Everyone loves that passage in James 1 where it says He gives wisdom. You know what I love most about that passage? Not that He gives wisdom, that He gives it without reproach. And what does that mean? It means this, you came to God for wisdom one day, He gave it to you, you went out and did just the opposite. You go back to Him when you need more wisdom, and He doesn't look at you and say, I'm not going to give you wisdom. I mean, after all, I gave it to you before, you didn't do anything with it. No, it says He gives it without reproach. He just gives it to you again if you've repented. Church, what the Lord, and here again, here's that mystery. There is so much the Lord could do with you. Remember what He looked at Jerusalem? You say, no, He's sovereign. Yes, I taught on that, remember? But He looked at Jerusalem and said, how long you would not. There are people all around this area that are lost. Other people who are looking for churches that are just even close to being biblical. There's a world out there. I mean, the doors have opened to do missions in the world in a way that 15 years ago, there's not a mission expert on the face of the earth could have ever dreamed that the doors would open up to do missions like they have. I mean, the only place you can't preach the Bible really right now is the United States of America. We used to say, what's the difference between Russia and the United States? You can teach the Bible in high school in Russia. There's so much to do. In Peru, we say this, Tu vives porque el aire es gratis. It means the only reason you're alive is because air is free. You don't do anything with your life. What do you want to live for? Some of you, older people. Let me ask you a question. Do you really want to die on the golf course? Do you really want to die collecting seashells? Or do you want to serve the Lord and serve your generation to the end of your day? Now, one final thing. You do that in the context of your local church. If God's called you to be a part of a certain fellowship, it's basically get in, get out, get out of the way, do something. It's in the context of your local church, the context of the body of believers. Church is important, folks. Church is important. It doesn't matter if that church is made up of a thousand people or that church is made up of five people. There has to be community. And if you're a part of this church or a part of your other church or church at home or wherever you're a church, you need to realize that God can do so much through a church that will listen to hear, behold, behold. Let's pray. Father, I come before You and I pray that You would use these words to help Your people and get glory for Yourself. In Jesus' name, Pastor.