If you will, turn back in your
Bibles to Revelation 2. Revelation 2. And you can follow
us in your pastor's commentary in your bulletin. Revelation 2. The title of our
message today is, The Church at Pergamos. Subtitle, The Battle
is the Lord's. What do we mean by that? I think
I told you last week, working with us through the book of Revelation,
the message to the church at Ephesus, the message to the church
at Smyrna, and now the message to the church at Pergamos is
actually a progression of God's purpose to reveal to them the
present rule of Christ among them with the objective of affirming
the salvation of God's people who are part of these local congregations,
giving them assurance of his presence. This is what is meant
by him who is seen as walking among the seven golden candlesticks. I think our elder gave that basic
word of assurance a moment ago when he said he will never leave
us nor forsake us. We love to quote that statement.
It is certainly true that God will not leave his people. But
the question is, will we leave him? And so it is very important
for you to understand not only the progression of his concern
for his churches, for which he gave each one of these three
churches thus far a unique revelation of his glory in terms of his
office and operation among them. We saw Christ standing in the
midst of the seven golden candlesticks, in fact walking with the seven
stars in his hand to the church at Ephesus. To the church at
Smyrna, he is seen as the one who has triumphed over death.
He possesses not only life, but resurrection life, which was
designed to comfort the church at Smyrna because they would
be facing persecution that would even require some of them to
die, as was the case with Polycarp in the first century, one of
the bishops of Smyrna. The church at Pergamos, as we
started with her last week, we stated that what was a warning
to the church at Smyrna has now become a reality at the church
here in Pergamos in terms of actual members of the church
being persecuted and even being martyred for the faith. And we
closed out last week enjoying and learning about one man whose
name was Antipas. who stood against the heresies
of his day, not being concerned with the consequences of telling
men and women the truth. What a remarkable spirit he was. And we also marked, did we not,
how that the Lord himself owned Antipas with these three possessive
pronouns. My word, my faith, my name, my
faithful martyr Antipas. And oh, that you and I might
be able to be owned by Christ in that day. Isn't that right?
That he'll be able to say to us, this is my servant. This
is my son. This is my child. This is my
elect. Because he was faithful enough
to stand for us, he's calling us to stand for him. And as we
are working through the church at Pergamos, we are realizing
that, OK, The persecution has now entered into the church at
such a level that they have now begun to persecute and put to
death the leaders. I want to call your attention
to this warfare on a larger, more biblical scope so that we
can begin to understand that this battle that's taking place
in Revelation chapter 2 is not a battle exclusive to that first
century. I would submit to you that the
same battle that the church was waging in the first century is
the battle that we are waging today. I would submit to you
that you and I are in a spiritual warfare. and intensely spiritual
warfare and I would also submit to you that we could easily identify
with the physical persecution and martyrdom of the first century
church here at Pergamos with our brothers and sisters who
are in parts of the world suffering and dying today for Christ. It
is very relevant what we are reading. What you and I are reading
is not archaic language that's so antiquated and so old as to
have no application to us at all. It is extremely relevant. But what I want to do now is
help you get a handle on the way our Lord will now begin to
move in terms of the genre and speech He will be conveying to
His church. Now remember, you and I are third-party,
if you will, listeners. Second-party listeners to a conversation
between two other people that means he's not speaking directly
to us but indirectly For he is speaking to the first century
church and its application is to us and therefore we must actually
stand back and observe with a broader periphery His discourse with
them and draw its application to ourselves Since the text says
let him that hath ears hear what the spirit is saying to the churches. It is to us. It certainly is. If you will pull up your first
point, let's get to our first point and understand what's going
on. I say the battle is the Lord's because it's important for you
to understand that whenever God calls a people to himself, believers,
children of God, when he saved them and calls them out of darkness
and brings them into his marvelous light, They are now on the Lord's
team. You've heard me say this before, but I don't know if you
necessarily get it. When God saves you and puts his mark on
you and brings you into his family, do you know what? His battles
become your battles and your battles become his. But ultimately,
when we understand the origin, design, scope and nature of the
battle, we are comforted in this reality. The battle is really
the Lord's. It's his battle that he is fighting. But we are also fighting. So
therefore, child of God, fight the good fight of faith. Lay hold onto eternal life with
which you have made a good profession thus far. Point number one in
our outline, the things that were written for before time
were written for our what? I am obviously quoting Romans
chapter 15 verse 4 where the Apostle Paul has spoken to the
church at Rome letting them know the unique blessing of the Scriptures,
the Scriptures and at that time the Scriptures were the Old Testament
from Genesis to Malachi, the Scriptures. You know that portion
of Scripture that people often think has no application to us
today? but somehow think that it too
is antiquated and irrelevant. It should not be sought after
for any practical wisdom, much less its spiritual benefit to
us. But the man or the woman who
professes to be a Christian in this day, especially in this
day, better understand that you will not fare well in this warfare
unless you learn things both old and new. Unless you understand things
both old and new, you will not fare well. You know how you hear
some folks saying, you know, God saved me, I had a New Testament
Bible. Remember that? That little bitty thin little
Bible? That's like an a la carte at a restaurant for those of
us who like to really eat. That little thin little Bible
just with a New Testament? What a farce to assert that you
can actually teach people the whole counsel of God from Matthew
to Revelation. Do you understand that a true
scribe is one who handles old things and new. Knowing that
the new is affirmed by the old and that the old anticipates
and hides the new, unless there is a constant referencing of
old and new, you really never do get the new. And as it were,
our master is going to demonstrate the necessity of those who are
gonna enjoy the book of Revelation. If you are going to enjoy the
book of Revelation, you need to know some old things. Now,
by the way, some old things are good. You know, in our present
generation of always making something new, I really don't care for
a whole lot of new stuff. I'm not into the new normal.
You understand what I'm saying? I'm not quite into the new this
and the new that. And as I was making my way to
church today, I recall making this observation about 10 years
ago. I don't particularly care for adult hyphen this. That'll
catch up with you in a second. Because the implication is, unless
you put adult on it, you might be traversing into territory
that will shame you. Or cause you some type of discomfort. Because, you know, we have adult
books. And we have adult dreams. And
I'm driving to church today, and I saw a building on which
it said, adult toys. I have no idea what that means
personally, but let me share something with you If you don't
understand that there is a false new That's fundamentally denying
the true old You're gonna be deceived by the present narrative
Because the present narrative is coming from somewhere else
other than God See when God speaks the old and the new is the same
He never changes God is an immutable and because he never changes
his truth never changes And we can really learn how Christ himself
is the great great scribe of the scriptures pulling things
old and pulling things new and Pouring out the treasures of
his riches to his people through the gospel and unless you're
willing to track with Christ this way He's gonna leave you
in the dust And he's not even giving you any warnings. He's
about to go into old paradigms and make those old paradigms
relevant to where we are today. And you're going to have to pick
up on the present connection with old paradigms because he's
speaking in code. Now, there are people who don't
like that either. Why don't you speak plainly to us? Well, he
has spoken plainly and you still don't listen. So then he has
chosen to set aside a people who really care about truth and
he has given them a disposition of heart To seek him And when
you seek god with all your heart, guess what? He does he lets you
in on his secret You see the secret of the lord the mysteries
of the lord The hidden things of the lord are with them that
fear him and he will reveal his covenant to them for the rest
These things are all done in parables that seeing they see
not, in hearing they hear not. It's so very important for you
to grasp this if you're gonna enjoy the book of Revelation,
because we're getting ready to talk about terms now that if you don't
know your Old Testament Bible, you're gonna be lost. So here,
what we must understand is that our Lord is calling us to three
principles under this first point. Those things that were written
from a long ago were written for our learning. I have to learn
why God wrote what he wrote in the Old Testament in order for
its application to be given to me in a beneficial way. Three
points I want to call your attention to. A knowledge of the Old Testament
is the framework with which God is now giving us the revelation
or the apocalypse. The book of the revelation comes
fundamentally from four historic Ethics. Four, I want you to mark
this now, the Egyptian account of delivering Israel out of Egyptian
bondage. That's a paradigm. Alright? The wilderness sojourn where
the children of Israel were in the wilderness for 40 years,
that's another paradigm. It's a grid of interpretation.
It's language there that God will use in the person of Christ
to reveal his will to that first century church and thereby to
us. You have to understand the Egyptian
historical epic, the wilderness historical epic, and then the
troubles Israel experienced in Canaan, and then finally the
Babylonian dispersion. You remember how the children
of Israel were dispersed into Babylon in 587 BC? Those four
epics encompass the language and genre of the book of Revelation.
And if you are not, if you're not one who loves the word of
God, the book of Revelation will, you'll get lost in the book of
Revelation. In our theology, in our Greek class, we're teaching
Greek 101. We have warned our students that there's a fog that
you go into initially. Once we start stacking principles
of how to understand the Greek language, you enter into this
fog and it gets troubling and you wonder where are we going.
And this is like any educational discipline. When you're being
stacked upon with different rules, you might get the first one,
you might get the second one, but by the time that third and
fourth one gets stacked on you, you say, where am I at? And you
got to know how to ride it out until the fog clears. And when
it comes to biblical truth, you cannot understand the gospel
unless you're willing to ride it out in faith until the fog
clears. Until the fog clears. So there
are three things I want you to do in terms of Preparing to go
through these seven churches with me is first you're gonna
have to understand the old new paradigm Secondly, you're gonna
have to have a capacity and willingness to hold Intention both old things
and new that's a challenge because some of us can't do two things
at once, but you got to learn How to hold the old and new together.
Are you guys hearing what I'm saying? how to be able to think
about old things while being taught by new things because
they're interrelated and finally You and I have to comprehend
its urgent application to us and be ready to do what our master
has said to every one of those churches that had need for admonition,
and that is to do what? Repent. God's speaking to us
today. Point number two in our outline.
Let's get to work. You have an adversary, child of God, and
that adversary is whom? Listen to what he says in chapter
two, verse 10. Fear none of those things which
thou shalt suffer. This is Christ speaking to the
church at Smyrna. Notice what he says. Behold,
the devil shall cast some of you into prison that you may
be tried. You shall have tribulation, 10 days. Be thou faithful unto
death and I will give you a crown of life. I wanna lift out the
term the devil for a moment because that phraseology or that language
is completely pushed back today and rejected by most of our high
intellectually driven culture. Most of our intellectuals, those
who are learned as it were, who believe they possess a greater
level of knowledge and understanding of how the world works, epistemology
and anthropology and sociology and particularly psychology,
They scoff at the ideas of a realm of beings that are spiritual
in nature and malevolent in their disposition who have nothing
but a desire to see men and women destroyed. They don't even believe
in that dimension. They don't believe there's a
world of devils. They don't believe in demons. They don't believe
that there's an enemy against your soul who works tirelessly
to blind you and set you up for destruction. They do not believe
it. That's because they're dumb and blind. And they're too smart
to know that they don't know what they ought to know. But
our master, who is himself the epitome of wisdom, has just stated,
the devil shall throw some of you in the prison. Right? Did
he say that? So, how does the devil manifest himself in order
to take people physically and throw them into prison, and physically
persecute them, and physically destroy them, that is, kill them?
How does the devil work? Well, he works through emissaries.
Certainly he works through demons spiritual demons which oppress
people and possess people and manipulate people and deceive
people Christ has asserted that to you do believe that child
of God there is a spiritual dimension you believe that you you do believe
that Christ actually Directly went to war against Satan himself
when he vicariously took on our role as the last Adam in the
wilderness when Satan came with him with those three propositions
you do believe that was a real event do you not and For if you
do not believe that that's a real event, the whole of your salvation
is in danger. And our Lord was nothing but
a lunatic in the wilderness seeing seeing phantoms, if you will. If, in fact, all he did was hallucinate
about a real entity called the devil who tempted him on three
occasions, by the way, which three occasions are the things
with which you and I are tempted with every day. And I am so glad
he passed the test, aren't you? because in him passing the test,
I passed the test. I believe that there is a devil
because I believe that there is a God and I believe that God
is truth and I believe God's truth has told me there is a
devil. And I believe that the devil
is one of those entities, one of those instruments by which
men are thwarted and hindered from seeing the glory of God.
And I know that we have to fight against that entity and the whole
host of them with the warfare with which God has given you
and me. And you know what that is? Faith in God's Word. We have to believe God's Word
if we have any hope of dealing with this battle. I want you
to understand that there are two major vehicles by which the
devil works, which is given to us in the framework of the book
of Revelation. If you get these models, if you understand these
structures, you'll understand how the enemy works against the
church. First, he works against the church through politics.
Do you understand that? Every political system in the
world, every secular institution, every world, every governmental
institution, every entity that is an organization in the world
that is not founded upon or based upon biblical truth is governed
by the devil. Every institution that is not
rooted in biblical truth is ultimately governed by the devil. There are two major expressions
of our worldview for all of us that we operate under, politics
and religion. Politics and religion. Politics
and religion affects everything you believe and do. You may say
it doesn't, but it does. You actually have a politic and
you also have a religion. Even if you're an atheist, that's
religion. I can prove it to you. But my point is this, there are
two entities that basically encompass the whole of our existence. They
occupy the major portions of our thoughts and they impose
themselves upon everything that we do. Politics is the cause
for which, in many reasons, you and I are struggling economically
today, and religion is one of the massive causes for all of
the psychosis and neurosis and fears and anxieties and hatred
for God and unbelief that's dominating our world. Politics and religion.
And guess who runs both of them? The devil. It's very important
that you know that. When our master said, the devil
shall throw some of you into prison and you will be tried
ten days, who throws the people of God into prison but political
entities? political slash religious entities. It's governments that oppose
the truth of God's Word. Who opposes the believer when
he's in college seeking to stand up for a biblical worldview and
an epistemology that reflects the Word of God when their peers
and their teachers stand up to oppose them? It's the political
ideology of those religious institutions. that move forward to silence
you when you challenge their assumptions and presuppositions
of how things have been brought into existence. What's behind
those powers? The devil. The devil. You are in a warfare whether
you like it or not. You have to ask the question,
have you gone AWOL or have you put on your armor to fight this
battle? Or have they taken you captive?
Have you taken your gear off, laid it down, folded it together,
and walked right into the hands of the Taliban? Because you fail
to believe the gospel and understand that this warfare is a warfare
to the death? Am I making some sense now? See,
y'all wake up when we do politics. See, religious folks like to
say, don't talk to me about politics. But listen, if we're not talking
to you about Christ, the rest is politics. Because politics
drape all your movies, drape all of your commentaries, drapes
all of your sitcoms. Politics is everywhere. So is
religion. You'll never get away from it.
So the enemy comes through politics and religion. Let me give you
the biblical framework so you can understand this, and then
you'll understand better why we can be comforted by this truth.
When Christ said, or else I will come and fight against them. Revelation chapter 13 verses
1 through 4 will give us a picture, a description of the political
entity with which the church has always been engaged in warfare. We dealt with this when we did
our opening commentary on the book of Revelation, but I need
for you to see this again. Chapter 13 verse 1, And I stood
upon the sand of the sea. This is John in a vision. I told
you that the prophets often were by seashores when they received
revelation from God. You guys got that? John was by
the seashore Ezekiel was by the seashore and john is a neo-ezekiel
type of prophet and the seashore meaning that you are on the boundaries
of earth looking out into the masses of the water because the
seas represent the peoples and what comes up out of the seas
are visions of kingdoms and powers and entities fulfilling biblical
prophecy and the prophet has the blessed benefit of being
on a solid foundation while it is observing a topsy-turvy world
that's constantly going through the different motions and changes
and turmoils and conflicts. Am I making some sense now? The
prophet gets to see these things as the Lord gives him that revelation.
Daniel saw coming up out of the sea seven kingdoms, which are
full composite here in our text. Listen to it I stood upon the
sand of the sea. I saw a beast rise up out of
the sea having seven heads and Having ten horns and having upon
his ten his horns ten crowns and upon his heads the name of
what and I submit to you that if you can accept the fact that
a System of government that does not bow the knee to Jesus Christ
is nothing but a beast And in fact, the term beast here is
to be described and understood as a wild beast, a ravenous beast,
not a tame beast, a wild beast, a ravenous beast. And will you
mark this? This is going to help our continued development of
our text. The only thing that comes out of his mouth is blasphemy. His whole doctrine is against
God. The whole of the system is designed
to oppose biblical truth. Listen to what he goes on to
say. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and
his feet were like the feet of a bear, and his mouth was like
the mouth of a lion. And the dragon, who was the dragon?
The devil, gave him his authority and his throne and great authority. Power, authority, and a throne.
Who gives the political systems of this world their energy, their
wisdom, their design, their agendas, their plans? According to the
word of God, the devil. He's the power behind the image. The power behind the image is
the enemy. And his doctrine is one doctrine
in total, and that's blasphemy. You've proven that to be the
case. And so our Lord is describing to us here the political entities
of the world. Look with me now over at verse
11. Watch this now. Watch verse 11, because we've
just looked at one beast. And I beheld, what? Another beast. Now mark the language here, coming
up out of the what? Not out of the sea, out of the
earth. These are the subtle shifts in biblical prophecy when we're
dealing with prophetic images that you have to capture. The
first beast comes up out of the sea. The sea, metaphorically,
in the old Hebraic idiom, is the masses of the people. The
chaos of a fallen world system that has no foundation under
it. Does that help you? See, the seas are topsy-turvy,
as Isaiah chapter 57 verse 21 put it, but the wicked, are like
the troubled sea, tossed to and fro, which have no rest. That's the state of man so long
as he is not on the foundation, the solid foundation of biblical
truth. But now we are on the sands or
the shore or the earth and another beast rises up out of the earth.
Now this beast appears to be more stable than the other beast. Because the other beast, ladies
and gentlemen, goes through the cyclical process of coming and
going. See, governments come and governments
go. Powers come and powers go. Entities
come and entities go. But behind those coming and going
of different entities and kingdoms and powers is the same devil
with the same doctrine, rising up anew with new systems. Am
I making some sense? This is history. So as you and
I are observing history right now in our text, going all the
way back to, let's say, 1700, 1800 BC, when the Egyptian empire
dominated the world all the way up to our present time, what
John has described as the political systems of the world in verses
1 through 3. And now he's getting ready to
talk about another entity that the devil uses that's a little
bit more shifty, a little bit more subtle, and a little bit
more apparently stable. Because see, on a topsy-turvy
sea, even unsaved folks like to get off that for a little
while. I mean, they party on the weekend and act a fool. But
as soon as they get drunk and they start wobbling back and
forth like the mast on a ship, they're looking for solid ground.
That's why they end up in church on Sunday morning after partying
all night, Saturday night. I'm helping you. You don't even
know it. Why? Because the church is the
one entity throughout human history as the epics unfold that appears
to be the most stable. Operative word appears to be
the most stable. Are you with me so far? Listen
to the language. Here's what he says in verse 11. And I beheld
another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns. Ooh, do you see that? What do
horns represent in the scripture? Authority, power. He had two
horns like a what? Lamb. So what is this picture
of? This actually is a picture of
a more docile domestic beast, a ram, if you will, a lamb, if
you will, something that corresponds to that which is acceptable with
religious people because it's actually pointing to whom? The
Lamb of God. Who is the Lamb of God? But see,
the lamb is a depiction of that which is sacrificial in nature,
that which is giving in nature, that which stands in a mediatorial
role in nature. The ram or the lamb in the Old
Testament was always the symbol of the sacrifice between God
and the people. And no one ever fears a lamb. Are you hearing me? And so the
idea depicted here is that we have an institution Emerging
not up out of the sea but out of the land much more stable
in nature But it has authority to now it has authority and yet
it's a lamb. Oh We can trust that because
we know lambs don't intentionally hurt anyone But we got to be
a little careful because this lamb has some power ah But you
better listen carefully You continue to observe the words because
there's something a little bit more nemesis about this lamb
Are you guys listening to me? Watch this now. He says and I
beheld another beast coming up out of the earth and he had two
horns like a lamb But he spake like a dragon Do you see that? So now you're in trouble now
if you don't have the principles of discernment necessary to know
that there's a difference between what a person look likes and
what a person says. You don't have the discerning
capacity to be able to work through images versus substance, appearance
versus doctrine, tones of voices versus motives of the heart.
Are you hearing what I'm saying? Which we're talking about is
discernment. The word to discern is to divide and to see both
truths at one time. If you and I are given to just
seeing one thing, like a lot of people are. Lots of people
are given to only judging things based on their appearance. You
know what that means? If it appears to be a beautiful,
wonderful, amenable, kind entity, it must be. Such people are shallow
in their thinking. and they're limited in their
understanding. And they're not ready for the depths of Satan
as they speak. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? For the people of God, we are always given to discerning,
piercing through the appearance. going beyond the superficiality
of words, penetrating into not only the manner in which words
are spoken, but understanding the motive behind them. Not only
concerned with the motive of what a person says, but the implications
drawn out by what they say. We carefully ask the question,
what is the source of this teaching? What is the framework and method
by which it's being taught? Because the methodology in some
cases is just as bad as the objective. And now where is this doctrine
going? Where will it lead to? And those of us who are Christocentric
in our truth claim says, did it come from Christ? Does it
glorify Christ? Does it exalt Christ? Does it
bring men and women to Christ? Will it lead us to the glory
of God in Christ? Will it stable us on Beulah's
land of glory in Christ? If these things are not taking
place in the inquiry of what people are saying, ladies and
gentlemen, you can be hoodwinked and damned. Hoodwinked and damned. So be careful to understand that.
Be careful to understand that. These are two beasts that we're
dealing with. Going back to our PowerPoint, I want you to grasp
this now because you got to hold these tensions. How does the
devil work? He works in politics to persecute you, but he works
in false religion to seduce you. So in politics, he persecutes
you because the political beast knows nothing about love and
charity and kindness. His job is to take every dime
you got, make you broke as I don't know what, get you mad at him
so he can be justified to shoot you. That's a short order version
of the beast setting you up to kill you. Because all you're
doing is asking to give him a break, man. But on the religious end,
it's much more subtle. See, because on the religious
end, what we are dealing with is seduction. Seduction. What does religion do? It seduces
you. It comes off in a form of godliness. It actually denies biblical authority,
which is the power of God. It appears to be nice and kind
to you. That's the form of the Lamb. But when you really listen
carefully to their words, they speak just like the dragon. Now,
Pastor, how does the dragon speak? I'm glad you asked. You need
to be that inquisitive. How does this dragon speak? This
is how he speaks. He speaks of the world. Here's a dichotomy principle
that Christ lays down. They that are of the world love
the world and the world hears them. He that is of God hears
God's word. All that's in the world is the
lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life.
It is not of the Father. See, John just made a distinction,
did he not? He said there's a world, its
world system operates out of lust of the eye, lust of the
flesh, and the pride of life. It is not of the Father. Do you guys see that radical
distinction? So now you've got a battle to fight, because you
may very well be listening to the dragon whose underlying principles
of articulation are all rooted in these three, the lust of the
eye, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. That's what
the devil came after Jesus with in the wilderness. And he won
the test. Why? Because he operated out of a biblical narrative.
It is written. Right? And so what we're dealing
with is the question of whether or not my heart, my passions,
my drives, my aspirations, my goals, my plans are rooted in
the diabolical message and agenda of the devil, or are they really
rooted in biblical principles? Because if I am more or less
inclined to the diabolical schemes and the diabolical agenda of
the devil, then I am already seduced. Are you hearing me? So let's work this through a
little bit. Why do I say that seduction is the fundamentally
crucial method by which the devil particularly deceives religious
people? It's because that's the pattern
all through scripture. And that's the one that we're going to find
ourselves exercised in over the next 30, 40 minutes. Go with
me in your Bible to Revelation chapter 17. I want you to see
the fundamental imagery of this great harlot. This harlot really
is connected to the second beast. The second beast in Revelation
chapter 13 is the beast that's deceiving the masses through
signs and wonders. We'll get back to that in the
future. But here in Revelation chapter 17 verses 1 through 4,
I want you to see a marvelous, marvelous thing. Are you there?
And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials
or bowls and talked with me, saying unto me, Come here. I
will show unto you the judgment of the great what? Now the whore
is an old new paradigm. You can't understand the whore
unless you read the Old Testament. Because the Old Testament uses
the term whore more times than anywhere else in the Bible, warning
God's people about idolatry and spiritual fornication. Which
we'll get that when we go back to our text. And because the
whore is seductive. and because men and women are
drawn in by her more times than not. Listen to the language. I will show you the judgment
of the great whore who sits upon many waters. The waters are the
nations of the world with whom the kings of the earth have committed
what? So here we have an illicit relationship. We're going to
talk about that because this is what Christ is coming after in
the church at Pergamos. With whom the kings of the earth
have committed fornication now get the picture now the great
harlot. We are already surmising is the false church the prostitute
church The ungodly church the illicit church the whorish church
Who knows she can turn a man into a piece of bread? She uses
the power of her seduction to get him us proverbs 7 proverbs
9 proverbs 23 and 24 Do you understand that? By the way, Solomon knew
a little bit about it, didn't he? And he warns us, she will
take the man void of understanding and seduce him right to hell. But ladies and gentlemen, we're
not merely dealing with physical fornication. We will in a moment.
But we're dealing with the larger spiritual dimension of men and
women giving their souls over to the beast and giving their
souls over to the seductive, whorish spirit of this world,
which bondage manifests itself in so many ways. The plethora
of bondage with which men and women are in bondage to the great
horror would take up the rest of my time if I simply enumerated
them. So now remember, we're dealing
with a spiritual principle, right? But it manifests itself in a
myriad of different ways. It all is bondage rooted in a
seduction as a consequence of men and women not being grounded
in biblical truth. If you're not grounded in biblical
truth, the whore will get you. If you're not grounded in biblical
truth, the whore has gotten you. Listen to the language. She sleeps
with the kings of the earth. Do you understand how powerful
this woman is? She has the ability to affect
rulers, kings, princes. Presidents, dignitaries, rulers
at the highest level are sucked in by this harlot. You know she
has the common people. If she's powerful enough to get
senators and congressmen and presidents and dignitaries around
the world, the common people don't have a chance. Listen to
what it goes on to say. And the inhabitants of the earth
have been made to drink of the wine of her what? There we go
now, conflating two images that you need to get a handle on.
Wine and fornication, wine and fornication. Mark those because
those are the two principles with which the devil operates
today to keep most people in bondage. Did you get that? See,
this is what I meant by understanding how to hold the tension of old
and new things because the old things are not old. They're relevant. Truth never gets old. Truth is always relevant. It
doesn't wear. It has no expiration date. It's a commodity that holds good
at all times. It doesn't deflate. It doesn't
inflate. It maintains its value at all
times. True. Well, that's old. No, it's true. Did you get that? That's old. No, that's true.
Well, if it's true, then it's relevant because truth is relevant. You're going to see it here in
a moment. Stay with me. She commits fornications with
the highest of the people, but she commits fornication with
the common people through drink, which moves them into the liaison.
This is her methodology. These are her witchcrafts. These
are her sorceries. These are her methods of bringing
men and women into a sedated state. This is what you do when
people are in pain. You get them inebriated. You sedate them. And then you
actually allure them through incitement to self-gratification. That's our world system. Remarkable! Because what I'm describing is
church. When Christ is not at the heart
of it. And the gospel is not the foundation. And the Word of God is not the
narrative. When you and I are not coming to church to hear
the word of God, and I mean hear the word of God, and you and
I are not coming to church to be taught about Christ, and I
mean taught, didoskelon, about Christ, you and I are coming
to church to be entertained. That's why people get up after
10 minutes and walk right out. I say, this ain't doing nothing
for me. You know what I say? Sorry. Sorry, because we're preaching
Christ here. We're teaching the word of God
here. Listen, watch this. Watch this. We actually want
to go to heaven. See, that's the difference in
the market, ladies and gentlemen. The difference is whether or
not you're going to have your mind renewed by the power of
the Holy Ghost through the word of God so that your central focus
is the glory of God in Christ so that you can be anchored in
Christ when the storms come because your storm is coming. Your storm
is coming. And when your storm is comes,
if Christ is not your anchor, you're going to be blown away.
You're going to be blown away. Well, listen to it. So he carried me away in the
spirit and to the wilderness. And I saw a woman sit upon a
scarlet colored beast full of the names of blasphemy, having
seven heads, seven horns, seven heads and 10 horns. Do you see
what just happened again? Do you see what happened? John
took us back to Revelation 13 one, then 13 11 and attached
a woman to it. So not only is the political
system identified here, the religious system is identified here, but
the woman is attached to it too because they work together. I'm
building a point here. I'm going to show you in a minute
what the point is. The common point of unity between the false
church, politics, this whore, this whore who are all operating
under the power of the devil. When you stand back far enough
to listen to politics and listen to our present cultural agenda,
cultural goals, cultural models of existence, and you listen
to the false church, they're all saying the same thing. If
you come into church and you are not radically confronted
with a whole new worldview, you're not in God's church. When you
come to church and you're not confronted with another worldview
than that which is outside of the church, then you're not in
God's church. When you come to church, and
church has accommodated the world so that everything that's out
there is in here, you're not in God's church. Stay with me
for a moment. Because see, when you come into
God's church, ostensibly, you are coming into another dimension.
A dimension whose principles are different, whose goals are
different, and therefore their expressions are different. Now
we're not crazy, and we're not bizarre, and we're not 5150.
We live in the world, but we're not of the world. And our doctrine
is not of the world. Our doctrine is not of the world.
And we're not here to cater to your flesh. We're here to get
you grounded and rooted in Christ so that you can live for his
glory. God made you in his image. He made you in his image. And
you know, deep down in your soul, the truth, you know it. Your job is to walk in it. And
when you come into the church, you come into a danger zone.
You know what that danger zone is? True, true, true. which is what we're seeking to
hide from seven days a week. The goal of man is to run from
truth, parry truth, move from truth, make sure truth doesn't
get you. When you come to church, truth is going to hit you square
in your forehead when you come to a true church. Because our
goal is to make sure you are confronted with reality. so that
you are not deceived in this hour of worship. Now, when you
leave here, you can deceive yourself all you want. But when you come
in here, what you need to know is I'm going to be confronted
with the reality of God. So the devil works through two
means politics and religion to deceive the message. Let's move
on. This is very important. Go back to our PowerPoint under
number two, because I want to I want to expose the enemy a
little bit before I move on to my third point. Now historically,
it's very important for you to understand also this paradigm
of politics and religion is something that is precedent. It's marked and it's clear. In
the days of our Lord Jesus Christ, when he came into the world,
if y'all love Christ, I'll tell you what, if you think you love
Christ, you have to ask the question, are you ready to be radical as
Christ was? Because see, Christ was not some
milquetoast individual who complied with all the rules of the land
and affirmed the cultural practices of the people. I'm sorry, he
was actually real radical. How radical was Christ? I can
tell you how radical he was. He was radical enough to tell
the truth to the political beast. Tell that fox, here I am. I'm not coming to give him a
hearing. Tell that Fox, Herod, I'm not coming to give it. Tell
the president I'm not coming to give him a hearing. Did you
hear what I just said? You can get all the other false
prophets. They'll come quickly. Get T.D. Jakes and Joel Osteen. Get them all. They'll go up to
the White House quickly. Tell that Fox, I am not coming
to the White House. Are you hearing me? Herod wanted
him to come up, come up and do a magic trick for me. You know
what Christ says? I'm about my father's business.
I have a business to do. I must work today, tomorrow,
and the third day be perfected. So that's what real Christian
folks are about. Because we understand what's going on in the high powers,
in the high places. We understand the deception,
do we not? I don't need a plaque from the president. I don't need
a plaque from the senator. I don't even need a plaque from
the local assemblyman. Don't give me a plaque. If you
give me a plaque, I'm probably on the wrong track. I'm probably
messing up. If you come in here and give
me a track, I'm probably messing up. I'm probably messing up. I have probably started to decline
in telling the truth of the gospel because as nature's politics
and true religion don't mix, but politics and false religion
lives together because they are two sides of the same deceptive
coin. Are you hearing me? Okay, stay
with me a little bit because we're in the book of Revelation.
You are privileged. And I say that with all earnestness. You will not go to churches and
get taught like this You just will not Because the book of
revelation calls you to certain conclusions that people don't
want to have to deal with They just don't want to have to deal
with it, but i'm i'm willing to deal with them Because I understand
the impact of the blessing of those who read and hear the sayings
of the prophecy of this book Remember the first blessing blessed
are they that hear and they that read the sayings of the prophecy
of this book. I want to hear them because I
want the blessing. Listen to the point. So then
there is a third point that I need you to know. Our master dealt
with this. Judaism was the major nemesis against Jesus. You guys
know that? Judaism. But it was the major
nemesis against Jesus because Judaism had collapsed into political
allegiance by which they worship Rome and therefore they had abandoned
the true and the living God. We actually call that apostasy.
First century apostasy largely was manifested by Judaism's commitment
to Rome, for which they said, we have no king but Caesar. You know what we call that? Revelation
chapter 17, verses 1 through 4, the great horror. How can
you, a church under the nomenclature of the bride of Christ, say that
you have no king but Caesar and not be a harlot? Am I making
some sense? The second manifestation of this
harlot church It's Catholicism. That's right, the emergence of
the Constantinian Kingdom in 3rd, 4th century AD. By the time we get to the 6th
century AD, Roman Catholicism, that's your oxymoronic terminology,
Roman Catholicism is taking over from Judaism. where now Roman
Catholicism is a hybrid of hierarchical political powers that have operated
over the last 200, 2,000 years to control the masses and make
people into Christians by the sword, not by the gospel. Are you hearing me? And when
once the church collapsed into the worship of politics as a
sword, it lost the gospel. Yes it did. Do your own research.
The sorceries and the tricks and the lies and the manipulations
of Christianity under Catholicism in first century all the way
up to about the Reformation is laughable because they kept the
people hoodwinked. under lies. The common people
were pagan. The common people were ignorant.
They were illiterate and unlearned. So the church could could wink
them with lies. Join me on the Friday study. You'll learn about
the seeds of this with Simon the Sorcerer we're dealing with
in Acts chapter 8, okay? You'll learn the difference between
the true church in the powers of Peter and John and the false
church in the pseudo powers of Simon Magnus, which was a foreshadow
of Catholicism in its integration like a whore with politics. Pastor, can you justify that?
Sure, right now. If you really examine it, Catholicism
has sat in the seat of government, every government around the world
since its inception. Virtually all of the leaders
in high powers are Catholic. I'm telling the truth. God open
your eyes. And after Catholicism, we moved
into what we call apostate Protestantism. What was the Protestant movement
in the 15th century? It was a return back to the Word
of God, because the Word of God had been taken out of the church
for some 1,000 years. Saints, can you imagine going
to church without a Bible? Yeah, you can, because people
do it every day right now, because we're in the apostasy again.
Some of you don't come to church with your Bibles, and you're
betrayed. You're exposed. You're not serious about Jesus.
I could be lying to you. You would never know it. Because
you don't open your Bible. I remember I made a church mad
when I said that. Back in my young days when I used to preach
with a little fire, I used to go in people's churches and say
stuff that only young men would say. Only young men would say
this. Because they never invited me
back. I went into the church and I said, turn into your Bibles
to thus and thus place. And I looked around and I saw,
you know, maybe 50% of the people doing it. I said, now, if you
don't have a Bible here, you are in sin because I am a visiting
preacher and you have no idea whether or not I could hoodwink
you through eloquence. and subtle philosophical jargon
because you don't have the word of God to at least look and see
is what he's saying corresponding to the book. I never went back
to that church again. I feel bad too. That's how God
works. And then we move into the era
in which we are living now. That's why I have evangelicals.
Do you see that? May God open your eyes because
the evangelical church is already poised for a whole leavening
of apostasy. with the same methodologies by
which the enemy worked in the first century, throughout the
subsequent centuries, up through the Reformation, and right now
the evangelical church is also throwing the Bible away. Are
you hearing me? So now, when you watch television
and you observe those burgeoning churches, those burgeoning churches,
with thousands and thousands of people, and you go, the Spirit
of the Lord is moving, Before you finish that sentence, ask
the question, what spirit? Because those people walk in
there without any serious commitment to biblical examination whatsoever. Because they're not interested
in being taught true, they're interested in being entertained.
Let's go back now to our text, point number three. Go with me
back to Revelation chapter two. Our Lord now is going to deal
with a real problem that's existing in the church at Pergamos. Because
why? Because persecution is not the only method by which the
enemy comes after us. He comes after us through seduction.
And I would assert to you as I begin to work through the last
lines of our discourse that you and I are more or less susceptible
to and exposed to being deceived through seduction here in the
West and not persecution. Our trials are the seductive
Propositions of everyday life here in America point number
three then the strategy of Balaam the strategy of Balaam exposes
false Christians The strategy of Balaam exposes false Christians
I may just work with this a little bit and then go to our other
points and we'll come back here later the reason why I say that
is because when we move to the church in Thyatira and We're
going to have to actually deal with this doctrine again because
it's starting to become pervasive in the churches, okay? But he
introduces to us, Jesus introduces to us the strategy of Balaam. The terminology of Balaam is
given to us right here. Watch this. In chapter 2 verse
14, here's what he says, I have a few things against you because
you have there them that hold the doctrine of what? Now I'm
so thankful for those of you who have suffered for my namesake
What a blessing to have a church of people committed to biblical
truth even to the point of dying for Christ But every church on
earth has a mixture of saved and lost Do you hear me? I Have a few things against you
because you have their them you have in your church them We're
gonna separate the dim from the us and find out whether we are
the us or the dim in a minute Okay because you have their them
that hold the doctrine of Balaam. Now the doctrine of Balaam is
one thing and it has a consequent to it and the consequent is the
next clause. Who taught Balak to cast a stumbling
block before the children of Israel. Do you see that? You
don't necessarily even need to know the doctrine right now of
Balaam. All you need to know is that
the doctrine of Balaam is a stumbling block. that the doctrine of Balaam
causes people to fall into traps. Our word stumbling block there
is where we get our term scandal, scandalon, scandalia. It's a trap that was designed
to get people to actually be snared into a trap. And this is why our master said,
woe unto you that causes even one of these little ones to stumble. It'd be better that you put a
millstone around your neck and cast yourself into the depths
of the sea than to be a means of stumbling for my elect. So
whatever the doctrine is, the end result is causing people
to stumble away from Christ. Are you following? So what we
are dealing with is a strategy. Now, are we not now bound to
old and new things? Because we have now the name
Balaam. And Balaam is not a New Testament doctrine. It's an Old
Testament doctrine, isn't it? It's rooted in Numbers 25 through
31. And in Numbers 25 through Numbers
31, Israel is about to cross over into the promised land and
the enemy is now working Diabolically to stop them from successfully
passing over by wanting to heap a curse on them through this
false prophet this hireling called Balaam Balaam tried as hard as
he could to curse the people of God and it did not work Because
God had a purpose for his own people and when he couldn't go
through the front door of cursing He went through the back door
of seduction See, if the enemy cannot get you by a frontal attack
on some area of your strength, he'll get you by a backdoor attack
in the area of your weakness. And so what he did was went and
instructed Balak, the king of Midian, to set up traps. These are djinns. strategically
all around Israel so that as the people went about their business
they fell into a trap. I'm using the analogy of catching
animals now. You guys got that? Set up these traps. And I want
you to get the picture because I'm going to cut it short. He
said set these traps up and I guarantee you Israel will step into those
traps on their own. You won't have to even try to
seduce them in the sense of manipulate them or cause them to fear or
cause them to be distracted. They will walk into those traps
with their eyes open. Set the traps up, cover them
up with a little facade and they'll walk right into those traps.
Pastor, what are those traps? Those traps are fornication and
idolatry. These are the djinns everywhere.
Just imagine an open field, a territory, with djinns every 10 feet. And here you are trying to navigate
your way to where you're going, but you step into it. Boom! It
gets you. And you're stuck right there,
like a bear trap, or a trap for a possum, or some other vermin. and then pop, pop, pop all over
the place. Until you look around, guess
what? Thousands of people are trapped in these djinns. What
is the djinn? Fornication and idolatry. Is the enemy using those same
djinns today? Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop everywhere. People are trapped by the djinn
of fornication and idolatry. And they go hand in hand. They
go hand in hand because you see the gin is the stumbling block
of your fallen nature wanting to fulfill the cravings of your
own lust. Trapped. Trapped. Do you see it? He couldn't come
through the front door, but he went through the back door. And
I tell you, ladies and gentlemen, this is as contemporary as you
get. I see presently the doctrine of Balaam wreaking his havoc
in all of the church today. Right now. even among us Listen
to what our master says I have a few things against you because
you have there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam who taught
Balak to cast a stumbling block before the children of Israel
to eat things sacrificed to idols you got that and To commit fornication
this here's a strategy watch this. We all like to eat Then
we learn a lot about the idolatry of eating on Thursday ladies
That was a probing but necessary message wasn't it? It was a probing
but necessary message. We all like to eat but Idolatry
is right around the corner The first idol sin was around eating. And then that led to fornication. How does it happen? Well, see,
in the first century, where Christ is speaking to his church, it
was very much like Israel in the wilderness. A lot of the
food that was prepared for the cultural people were prepared
in idol temples, pagan gods. See, every religion has its feast.
We have a feast. And the pagan religions had a
feast too. And where those temples, remember we learned that in Pergamos
there were temples everywhere, massive temples everywhere to
all kinds of gods, from Zeus to Asclepius and others. Even
the Roman emperors had their own temple. And in those temples,
guess what? There were lots of foods and meats that were offered
to idols. And after they gave the idol their food, then the
common people could eat the meats. Are you hearing me? Now watch
this. And so the fulfillment of the lust of their flesh, that
is their food desires, drew them into the temple. So it became
very easy from a desire to fulfill your physical belly to pay a
little homage to the idol. Whoo, because you're so close
in proximity now. Oh, but there's more going on
if you want to go into the depths of Satan here, because we got
some rooms now. After you give your little idol
worship, there's a door over there that if you want to go
through that door, you can go to the next level of revelation. Do you understand that's a synecdoche,
that's a terminology for sexual fornication under the rubric
that if you enter into these liaisons, God will reveal himself
to you. That's amazing, isn't it? You
want to get a revelation, commit fornication. Isn't that amazing? Go with me
in your Bible to Numbers chapter 24. I want you to see one verse,
a few verses in that context. And then I'm definitely going
to make the application. I know you think you're just about done,
but you're not. Now, I understand. I understand. I really do. I thank God for being able to
actually just tell the truth. I understand because, listen,
people don't want to be told that you're in trouble. People
don't want to be told that God sees it all. People don't want
to be told that you're not right with God, even in the house of
God. They don't want to be told this. See, we don't want the lights
cut on. We love darkness rather than light. I'm telling the truth.
Am I telling the truth? And especially when the Word
of God comes close to home, and it's coming close to home right
now, I can tell. Watch it. In Numbers chapter 25, verse
1 through 3. Are you there? And Israel abode
in Shittim. And the people began to commit
what? With whom? Now that's a very contractive
statement that required the insertion of the process by which it was
done, of which I have already told you. Balaam talked to Balak
and said, listen, all you need to do is set up strategically
your whorish women around the children of Israel in a kind
of very non-threatening sort of relationship by which they
could interact with each other. on social levels, on business
levels, and make sure that you put your idol shrines everywhere
because they are religious people too. Israel's a religious people.
Make sure you put your idol shrines to Baal Peor everywhere so that
they can be constantly confronted with in their mind the image
of Baal Peor. It corresponds to the television.
It corresponds to the internet. It corresponds to your iPod and
all of the mechanism by which you are constantly confronted
with the image of Bell PR. So you got that horror house
on every page of your internet, your iPhone. Coming home now,
isn't it? The God of the opening. The false God of the opening.
Peor means to open wide. To open wide. It speaks to the
wide road that Jesus said many will go therein. Narrow is the
way that leads to life. Broad is the road that leads
to destruction. But it also speaks in a negative sexual connotation
of the woman opening her legs wide. Don't get shocked. You see that
image every day. Am I telling it true? You are
observing bail P or everywhere you go and it's luring you in
without words and eventually people get in and Snap the trap
has gotten you If I would use the metaphor some
of y'all coming into church like this and some of y'all walking
out just like that It's the true It's the true you have to go
anywhere to be trapped by bail P or The enemy has made it easy. I wish I had time to go through
Revelation chapter 13. His mouth is wide. He pours out a flood. His goal is to get the elect.
But the earth opens its mouth and swallows up the flood. Who
are the earth? The unsaved. The unregenerate
will take his propositions. That's one of my points here
in a moment. The strategy of Balaam to expose false prophets.
Why do we say expose false prophets? Because listen, here's what he
did. He caused the children of Israel
to compromise their exclusive relationship with God, did he
not? And they called the people unto the sacrifices. Mark this,
they called the people unto the sacrifices of their God, and
the people did what? And bowed down to their gods. Verse 3, the continued incremental
involvement to the point of marrying them. And Israel married himself
unto Baal-peor. Do you see the word join? That's
just too plain of a word. It's the word that describes
the welding together of a man and a woman in holy matrimony. Do you guys get that? They made
an affinity with the false gods of the Midianites and the Moabites,
the god Belpior, when they were married to Jehovah. Ladies and
gentlemen, it's not this spiritual adultery. What else is this? This is syncretism, where you
merge the worldly religion with Christianity, which is what goes
on in all of your liberal churches. Are you hearing me? This is what
goes on in your liberal churches. This is why in your churches,
you can have this person's face up, and that person's face up,
and the other person's face up, and the other person's face up,
and the other person's face up. And you say, wait a minute. What
on earth does Gandhi have to do with Jesus? And then you have
your You have your pathion of different gods made in the likeness
of human beings running the scale all the way up to Jesus. And
by the way, Jesus is just one of them. And this is in your
so-called evangelical churches. Are you hearing me? And people
sit there comfortably and call themselves Christians in the
church that should be exclusively devoted to one man. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
These are the idolatries that you and I are confronted with
every day. That's absorbing the church and
destroying its capacity to witness for Christ. All right, pull up
our PowerPoint point number three so I can hurry up and move on.
Listen to what it said. The strategy of Bellum. What
are they? They are the trends of what? In the what? Trends of sin. I'll give you your own opportunity
to work that through. But I've said it before. You
and I are a product of our culture. Yes, we are. And our culture
operates out of trends. And when a church has compromised
biblical truth, you know it because the trends of the culture are
in the church. Our world is a world filled with
fornication and adultery and every immorality you can imagine
that corresponds to sexual gratification. Is that true? It is an idolatry. the highest order it dominates
the world and it dominates the church when we do the statistics
it's a dreadful dreadful thing that you need to understand that
when a man or woman does not understand that when you come
to Christ you make a break with the trends of this culture that
you have been you have failed to comprehend the the radical
nature of change when it comes to being a Christian. Because
you and I are dealing with a whole society of professing Christians
who say they are believers, but actually worship Belpior. Am
I boring you right now? Listen to me. Right now, present
among the average professing Christian who is ignorant of
the exclusive claims of Christ is the notion that you can live
in open morality and still be a child of God. Can I tell you what's going on?
We're not getting it. We are not getting the majesty,
the glory, the exclusive rights of one husband to one wife. We're not getting it. Because
it's not being preached. We are not going deep enough
with Christ to understand what the Word of God says. But do
you know what the Master said here in Revelation chapter 2?
I hate that doctrine. See, the book of Revelation gives
you a different Jesus than the one we get today. Because, see,
the Jesus we're dealing with today don't hate nothing. He
loves everything. This is what I was saying earlier
about, we love to hear the Lord saying, I will never leave you
nor forsake you, right? Wait, see, he's immutable. He
doesn't change. But you and I will move away
from him imperceptibly, gradually, little by little. Are you hearing
me? If he doesn't keep us. And the
only way he keeps us is through truth. And where you don't like
truth, you will not be kept. Father, sanctify them in thy
truth. Thy word is true. Where the church
abandons the word of God, there is no sanctification. Where there's
no sanctification, there's no renewing of the mind. Where there's
no renewing of the mind, there's no knowledge of God. Where there's
no knowledge of God, there's no love for Christ. Where there's
no love for Christ, there's no obedience to Christ. It works just like that. You
can play fast and loose by a few Bible verses, but those that
love him pursue him. As was Antipas, his faithful
martyr, who said no to the culture. I'll take your hamburger, but
I'm not worshiping your God. Did you get that? See, all things
are lawful to me, but not everything is expedient. I'll take your
falafel burgers, but I'm not worshiping your God. See, I eat
your barbecue, and I don't have a problem with ham, but I'm not
worshiping your God. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
Mm-hmm. See, there's a line that's drawn
when God's people are committed to truth. Let me share with you
one more truth before you get away, because I see a few people
walking away now. Go with me in your Bible to Ecclesiastes
7. Go with me in your Bible to Ecclesiastes 7 before I'm closing
out on the doxology all by myself. I want to show you a truth that's
going to scare you to death, but you need to hear it. You
need to hear this. This is Ecclesiastes 7. And I
may stop right here and come back. No, I think I'll just at
least finish by articulating my points. I want to make sure
you get this. I want to share a warning with you. This is very
important. As we're dealing with the strategy
of Balaam exposing false Christians, what I mean by that is, as we
saw in Numbers chapter 24, that Balaam was able to successfully
get the children of Israel to join to Baal Peor in a syncretism
of false religion, because the trends of the culture overcame
them, there was an infiltration into their camp false Christians
who became leaders in the church. This is what we're dealing with
in Revelation chapter 2. In Revelation chapter 2, we're dealing with
those who hold the doctrine of Balaam, right? Holding the doctrine
of Balaam. Holding the doctrine of the Nicolaitans.
The doctrine of Balaam, Old Testament. The doctrine of the Nicolaitans,
New Testament. You got that? But they have the
same teaching. All Christ was doing was saying
the old is here in the new. The name is changed. The doctrine
is the same. What is the doctrine? You can
have Christ and you can have this salacious, immoral world
too. Y'all know that's true. Here
we go. Watch this. I want to share a
proposition with you in point number three. And then I'm just
going to articulate points four and five and close. In point
number three, we have underlined the trends of sin in the church. We recognize that there's an
infiltration of false Christians who, once they get into leadership
positions, they promote, we can live like hell and we're trusting
in the grace of God. You don't have to change. You
have to repent. You have to abandon your sins.
You're fine. I'm here to tell you, you're
not fine. You are not fine. Now watch this. Watch this now.
And it's evident by the embrace and allegiance of our cultural
gods, right? This is the false church. Our
fourth point. needs to be taken heartily by
everyone here. Are you ready? The false church
will get you if you are not God's elect. The false church will
get you if you're not God's elect. I want to make sure this gets
driven home because this is the ache in the heart of those of
us who are true believers. The ache in our heart is we know
people, we swear they're Christians. Well, we hope they're Christian.
We want them to be Christian. But nothing evidences that they're
Christian so long as they are sleeping with the whore. We want them to be Christian
because we love them. But they don't love Christ. Oh,
they say they do. But you and I have learned if
a man say read the whole of first John, he straightens all that
out. Say doesn't mean a thing. Here's my proposition to you.
The whore of false religion is so powerful, so pervasive, so
smooth with her words, so buttery with her words, so flattering
with her seductions, so powerful with her salacious propositions. Read Proverbs 7, read Proverbs
9, read Proverbs 23. She is so powerful that if you
are void of Christ, you cannot resist her. Are you hearing me? This is why so many people you
know are just, they just fall over. They fawn after false religion. Deceived. Listen to it. Ecclesiastes
chapter 7. Are you there? This is Solomon
talking. He learned some lessons, didn't
he? You better listen to him. I applied my heart to know and
to search and to seek out wisdom and the reason of things and
to know what? Wickedness of folly. even of
the foolishness and madness. Here's what he concluded. Are
you ready? Here it is. And I find more bitter than death. How can something be more bitter
than death except the second death? You guys got that? How can something be more bitter
than death other than the second death? Eternal damnation. Listen
to what Solomon said. Now, Mark, here's your words.
Here's my here's my argument. My argument is if you're not
God's elect, you will be taken in by the horror. She will get
you. She's fierce. She's relentless. She never stops. She never stops. She never stops. She never stops. Her job is to
fill hell with souls. Listen to it. I find more bitter
than death the woman whose heart is what? Snares and gnats. Snares and gnats. So I'm talking
to a couple people, because people will call and ask advice. Because
I've been able to, I guess, develop a reputation over the last 10
years or so. of being a no-nonsense preacher.
I'm very thankful for that. That's the grace of God. Very
thankful for that. And so people call me from a distance. You'll
get that. Because, you know, even when
the enemy, even when people who are not committed to truth are involved in all of these
different systems, they will call a faithful man when they
actually want the truth. They may not do what we tell
them to do, but they'll call you. This is why you young men,
stay faithful. Because they'll call you. They'll
ask. I appreciate what you do, man.
I know you tell the truth. You're bold. Remember how some
of those Pharisees came to Jesus? Jesus, we know you, man. You
tell the truth. You ain't scared of nobody, man.
We know you. But wouldn't commit to him. So I received a call and a conversation
between from a couple of people who are really concerned about
the strategy of their church. Because you see churches today
are using snares and nets to catch people like fish and hunt
them like animals. They're using techniques and
methods. They're using schemes and plans,
all kinds of props and images. And what they do is they get
the nucleus of the church to buy in to these methods. Now
this is what we're going to do. Okay. First of all, we're going
to stop all of this, this, this religious music. We're going
to stop that because the people that are coming, they don't know
this stuff and we want to make them feel good. That's a snare. And the other thing we're going
to do is we're going to actually, uh, we're going to actually kind
of tone down on all the Bible verses because the other people,
they're not used to the Bible. So you'll hear me quote one verse,
maybe two, and I'm gonna tell some nice stories and then lead
them to Jesus. That's a trap. It's a trap. And what I actually
want you to do is I want you to warm in and when we get them
to make a decision for Jesus, a decision for Jesus, a trap.
I want you to come up first so that you can lead them up like
the black goat that led the sheep to the slaughter, lead them up.
A trap. And I can go on and on and on
and on. And these souls are struggling on the inside. Pastor, I don't
know if this is right. What do you mean you don't know if this is right?
The only reason you don't know it's right, because you're not
rooted in God's Word. The only reason you don't know it's right
is because you are not committed to biblical truth. If you knew
who God was and if you knew how he worked, you would know that
God doesn't set traps. He don't lay down gins. He doesn't
use manipulation. He uses one means by which he
gets souls into heaven. And that's the preaching of his
word, the preaching of his gospel, the proclamation of truth, the
teaching of the word of God. We have one net and that net
is Christ. And I guarantee you, if Christ
gets you, you'll be God. If not, there's another net out
there. Hear it. I find more bitter than death
the woman whose heart are snares and nets. Her hands are as bands. You know what that means? When she gets you in her clutches,
you're not letting go. She's not letting go. Only the man that pleases God
will escape her. You got it? Only the man that
pleases God will escape her. That's what I'm saying. If you're
waffling with the gospel, if you don't see the glory of God
in Christ, if you're not committed to biblical truth, you don't
please God. It's impossible to please our
God apart from faith in Christ alone, apart from works, according
to the word of God, the scriptures. That's the only way you please
God. Are you hearing me? That's the
only thing that's going to keep you from being taken by that
whore. If she takes you, you have no faith in Christ. No faith. We're going to wrap it up right
here. We're going to have the offering at this time, and then
I want to close with a word before we go.