Isaiah 5, verse 20 and 21. Isaiah 5, verse 20 and 21. Woe unto them that call evil good,
and good evil, that put darkness for light, and light for darkness,
that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter. Woe unto them
that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight."
Now, that is a very simple verse of Scripture to understand. Some people, what we would call
good, they call evil. What other things that we would
call evil, they call good. What we call light, they call
darkness, and what we call darkness, they'll call light. Because people
can look at the same thing, read the same Bible, and come up with
exactly opposite conclusions. Come up with an entirely different
gospel. Do you believe that? And that's
what I want to talk about tonight. Arminianism, hard doctrine. Arminianism, hard doctrine. I
remember preaching this up at Jim Byrd's a few years ago. I
asked Gary if he remembered me preaching, and he said, no. And
so I said, well, if I did, it's worth repeating anyway. But even
though the scriptures will not talk about our meaning, I'll
define it here in a minute, that God, who by His blessed grace
has taught us grace. Isaiah 54, 13 says, All thy children,
thy children, shall be taught of God. And our Lord Jesus said
that Himself. Everyone that hath heard and
been taught of the Father cometh unto Me. That's what He said. If God taught you anything, if
God revealed anything to you and taught you anything, and
if He taught you anything, He taught you this one thing. He
said, You're going to come to Me. Everyone that hath heard
and hath learned and been taught of the Father, they come to Me.
Because that's who God's only one that God will have any dealings
with in this world is His Son. And the only deal he'll have
with people is those through his Son. No other way he'll do
that. And those of us who have been
taught by God Himself to trust the Lord Jesus Christ for all
of our salvation, not part of it, all of it, we get accused
of many things when people find out what we actually believe.
When people start finding out what you really, truly believe,
And they find out that we believe in grace, salvation by grace
from Alpha to Omega, salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ, salvation
by the grace of God, with no works, no doings, nothing of
ours added to it. And what they'll say, they'll
make these statements, and I've heard them made many times. If
I believed what you do, I could sin all I want to and still go
to heaven, since you're all saved by grace. When they learn that
you believe in absolute predestination, and when I mean absolute predestination,
there's nothing on this earth, not a bug that flies, not a germ
in the air, not a leaf that falls from a tree, that God did not
predestinate that thing to fall and take the course it did. Absolute
predestination. If there's anything in this world
or universe, out from under the will of God, then that thing
has more power than God. I mean, He directs everything
to the minutest detail in this world. Now, that's what absolute
predestination is. And so when they learn we believe
in predestination, they say, well, if you, you know, it don't
make no difference what I do. It don't make no difference how
much I sin. I still get to go to heaven. And then they'll tell
us this. You said, you know, but since
we believe the salvation's all together with the Lord and by
the grace of God, they'll say, well, you believe a man couldn't
be saved even if he wanted to. Well, I do. I believe a man can
be saved when he wants to, but God's gotta give him the want
to. Yeah. I just, I ain't never found
anybody wanting to be saved until God saves them. And after He
saves them, they want to be saved. And they want to continually
be saved. And they say this, they said,
what you all believe, and this is the awfulest accusation they
could make against what we believe. Since you believe in salvations
of grace, total absolute predestination, believe that God saves whom He
will, then that way you all believe, you believe that babies go to
hell. Because they're not predestinated. They're not elect. And another
accusation they make against us, and I'll deal with that later.
Another accusation, they say, is it makes men to be robust.
Says, you're robust because you have no will. God just treats
you like you're a robot, treats you like you've got no power,
no will, nothing about you. He just saves you against your
will and saves you, you know. And you have no will whatsoever. And another accusation they make,
they say, well, if I believe what you believe, it'll kill
the church. It'll make it dead as it can be. There's no evangelism.
You won't try to reach out and see people saved. You don't want
to see people converted. It'll kill the church. What's
the worldly reason to go out here and try to evangelize people
if you believe that God's gonna elect people chosen unto salvation
in Christ? It'll just kill evangelism. It'll
kill the church. And oh boy, if I had a nickel
for every time I heard this one, we'd all go on vacation. They
say, boy, if you ain't got no altar, how in the world are you
going to get anybody saved? How are you going to get anybody
saved if you ain't got no altar? How are they going to get saved?
If they ain't got no altar to get on to and pray through, how
in the world are you going to get them saved? A fellow came
in one time, and you all remember years and years ago. God has
been so gracious and merciful to us. I don't want to sound
mean or hateful. But I remember, Floyd, years ago, after Brother
Henry came the first time, you remember we had that morning's
bench over at Fay Chapel, you know, it was made out of plywood. And Floyd built that thing. He
said, I built it, and I can carry it out of here. Sure enough,
he took that thing out and carried it out. And that was the last
time that a fellow come in to build and said, where'd you want
to go? Oh, it's gone. Well, God left
this place when it took over, and God went with it. Oh, thank God that He saves us
from our ignorance. Oh, thank God for that. And I'll
tell you what, and they say this, and I've had people say this
to me, and maybe they say it to you. I'd quit preaching if
I believed like you, but I'd close the church, because it
makes no difference anyway. God is going to save who He will,
and who He won't, won't be saved at all. So what's the use of
making any effort? Just close the church door, since God's
going to save you anyway. So those are some of the accusations
they make. Now, let me give you a little
history lesson, if I can. What is Arminianism? We call
it free-willism. What is Arminianism? Well, there
was a fellow named Jochebus Arminius. This is where this started at.
But there's three theological systems to get around that men
use to get around the absolute sovereignty of God and salvation,
to get around that salvation's holy of the grace of God with
no human merit of it at all. There's three, and let me give
them to you. First of all, there's Pelagianism.
This is awful. Pelagius was a British monk,
and he started teaching that man was not affected by the fall
whatsoever. that he did not die and Adam's
fall did not affect them whatsoever. All they received from Adam was
a bad example. And a man can be saved by doing
good himself. We did not die in the fall. The
fall had no effect on us whatsoever. We just received a bad example
from Adam that we could obey God just like Adam should have. And then there's semi-collegianism. And they didn't deny the fall. These type of people, they don't
deny the fall. But they deny the totality of
the fall. Now, I tell you, several preachers
I run around with, this is what they believe. They don't deny
the fall, but they deny the totality of it. They say we were just
injured. Everything fell, but you will.
That you lost all power, but the power of your free will.
One preacher said, well, I feel like just like what you're preaching
now, what it's just like what Brother Henry May and them preachers
is, because you deny that man loses the power to accept God
when he will. That God even took the power
of salvation out of his hands. Now, that's what I mean when
they didn't deny, they deny the totality of the fall. Everything
saved but man's, everything was lost but the power of his will.
Now, that's just an injury. If you've got any ability, if
you can walk on a crutch, then you're not completely crippled.
And that's what they're talking about. They believe that the
will of man and the will of God, they work together. And the will
of man was the dominant factor in salvation. And then John Wesley. I'll tell
you what, John Wesley. Now, here's where evangelism
comes from that we have today. He believed in the totality of
the fall, that, oh, we lost everything in the fall, dead in trespasses
and sins, no ability to come to God with another. But he believed
and taught that because of Christ's death and the atoning death of
Christ, that a universal and sufficient grace was given to
all men, all men everywhere, a universal and sufficient grace
to all men, and that if you cooperate With that grace, when it comes,
in the moment of your opportunity, you'll be saved. But God has
to give you a chance. And that Christ made salvation
sufficient for you if you'll cooperate with Him when you get
your chance. Now, that's Arminianism. That's
Arminianism. That's the long and the short
of it. And why do we call it hard doctrine? Well, look with
me over in John 6. Why do we call it hard doctrine?
In John chapter 6. Our Lord Jesus said here in John
6.60. So our Lord Jesus, when He preached
here in John 6 and John 3, they said, oh, how can these things
be? It's hard doctrine. Look what it said here in John
6.60. Many, therefore, of His disciples,
when they had heard this, they said, this is a hard saying. Who can hear it? Who can hear
it? When Jesus knew in Himself that
His disciples murmured, and He said, does this offend you? Do
you stumble over this? What and if you shall see the
Son of Man ascend up to where He was before? It's the Spirit
that quickens, The flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak
unto you, they are spirit and life. And there are some of you
that believe not, for Jesus knew from the beginning who they were
that believed not, and who should betray." And why are we calling,
they call what Christ said, hard doctrine. That's why they call
what Christ said, darkness. They say what Christ said, evil. What Christ said was no light
in it. That's why they crucified him.
But we say what Christ said is good. What Christ said is light. And an Armenian would look at
that and say, that's hard doctrine. Well, Armenianism is hard doctrine
to me. It's rough. That means we can't
hear it. We don't believe it. We walk out on it. We can't take
it. They can't take our doctrine. We can't take their doctrine.
Now, let me give you several reasons why we consider our meaning
is a bad, bad doctrine. I'm going to give you ten reasons,
and I won't be very long at it. Now, we believe that God Himself, before the
foundation of the world, saw all men fallen in Adam. All men
lost, all men fallen in Adam, all men dead in sin. And God,
in pure grace, in Christ chose some of Adam's fallen race unto
salvation and pure grace. But now this is what Arminianism
says. They say that God looked down
through the telescope of time and saw something good in some
that caused him to save them. He saw that, I see that you'll
believe and you'll repent And you will, you've got some morality,
you've got some intellect, you can be reasoned with, you've
got some sincerity. So God looked down through time
and saw who would believe, and who would repent, and who would
have some morality, who would have some sense, who would have
some sincerity. And so he looked down and ended
up taking credit for something that men was going to do anyway.
So you see, if this is so, He created men and women who knew
would not have these qualities required. I didn't have any of
these qualities. I certainly didn't have any faith exercise
before God gave it to me. I certainly didn't know what
repentance was until God brought me to it. And I had no morality. I've never known a moral man
in my life. Everybody talks about, they're
moral, they're good and moral people, good and moral people.
A man's not moral, he hates God apart from the grace of God.
And, oh, beloved, if I tell you here's the thing, here's the
thing. Arminianism destroys the free salvation set forth in the
gospel. We preach a free salvation. We
preach the gospel, and this salvation is free. God gives it freely. Christ paid for it, bought it
with His own precious blood. And the proclamation of the full
and the free and complete salvation in Christ to sinners. And if
it wasn't that, as you see, it destroys it, because what we'd
have to do, if our meanings are right, we'd have to go out here
and look for those who seem to have some morality, some intelligence,
who are smart, who, by reasoning, we can reason and then to believe
the gospel. What we'd have to do then, we'd have to start some
education systems. We'd have to start catechism
classes. We'd have to start some programs. We'd have to start
trying to teach people. And look for good people. Oh
my, how would you like to have to go out here and find somebody
good enough to be saved? Huh? Go out here and look for
good people. I remember my old son. He was
going to a Presbyterian church, and they had an adult, they had
an education class. They had an education system
set up for when you come into their church, they start teaching
you their doctrine. Start teaching you what it was.
And he was really going on and on about how good it was, and
how much he enjoyed it, and all this. And I said, son, I want
to tell you something. You don't get educated into the
kingdom of God. You get born into it. He just,
he's back in the cap, said, oh. And that's what our many neighbors
are teaching. You get taught into the kingdom of God. But true evangelism, listen to
me, true evangelism is based on The sovereignty of God. Who in the world, why would we
go out here and preach if God's not going to use the gospel to
save somebody? William Carey. William Carey. Do you know why
he started? He went over to China. Do you know why he went? Because
he wanted to take the gospel to people that never heard the
gospel. He wanted to take it places where nobody knew anything
about. David Brainerd. He learned the
Indian language and he went off and started preaching to the
American Indians and living just like the Indians did until he
caught pneumonia and died when he was 29 years old. Spurgeon,
my soul, a strong graced man, strong graced man. He sent preachers
out on us and said, you go here and preach and I'll see that
you get bread and I'll see that you get cheese, but go preach
the gospel. George Whitfield would stand,
and 20,000 people would be around him. His voice was so strong.
These people are all solid men who believed in the free, sovereign
grace of God. And they wasn't out passing out
tracks, trying to talk somebody into something, and trying to
go down the Roman road. You see, they all went out and
preached that God has to elect people, and He'll quicken whom
He will, and give sight to see and a heart to believe whom He
will. You remember when Paul was in in Corinth, and everybody
was against him, and they was all going to beat him and throw
him in jail and all that. And he was getting ready to leave
the next day. And the Lord appeared to him,
the Lord Jesus appeared to him and said, Paul, don't you leave
this place. Why? I've got much people in
this city. Paul didn't know who they was. But God knew, and He said, you
know, you've got to stay here to preach the gospel to them.
And I'll tell you something else about Armenianism that makes
it so hard. It destroys the true concept of the free will of man.
How much do you know about how will a man's free is? His will
is. How much do you know about it? Everybody thinks that man's will
is the first thing to act, but it's the last thing to act. You
see, Arminianism destroys the true concept of the free will
of man. We believe, as taught of God, that man's will is free,
but yet it's bound by sin. And what do I mean by that? That
it has to act according to its nature. Has to act according
to its nature. Now, when a man steals, is that
what made him a thief? Or did he steal because he was
a thief? So you see, a man's got to act according to his nature.
And if he's got to follow his nature, he's going to act according
to his nature. You put a man in a cell and put him in a jail
cell. That's what you do. You put a man in a jail cell.
While he's in that cell, he can lay down, he can stand up, he
can walk around, he can do exercises, he can eat in that cell. He can
do anything he wants to inside that cell. But if he ever gets
outside that cell, somebody else got to unlock the door. Somebody
else got to open it up and break it down. And that's the way man's
will is. It's free, but it's bound by
his nature. And everybody in here, the last
thing to act in anything a human being does is his will. Now,
you listen to me. I hope I can make this... You
know, before you can make a... a right decision, you present
it with certain things. Your understanding, your emotions,
your affections, and then the last thing to act is you get
all this stuff put in your mind, and all this stuff reasoned out,
and then you'll say... You reason everything out, and
then you'll say, But the last thing to act is
the will. You have to reason, you have
to have some understanding, you have to have some things presented
to your mind, you have to have all these things presented to
your mind, and then you say, well, then I'll act. But the
will's the last thing to act. But to our men, it says, it's
the will's the first thing to act. If they can just make the
will to act, and just make the will to come forward, just make
an appeal to the will, then everybody can be saved. But man's fruit
to his nature is character. And it's necessary for a man
to do what he wills. And I tell you what, when a man's
will's free, it's most predictable when it's free. Let me show you
something in Mark. Look over here in Mark chapter 15. You
leave a man free, and you all know this. There's people that
you know, that you know what they're going to do because of
their nature. You know what they're going to do, and you know what
they're going to say. You know how they're going to act. You know what they're
going to tell you. Because you already know what they're going
to do, because you've observed them, and they've talked to you,
and you've nerved all these years. And you'll say, well, it doesn't
make a bit of sense that you're telling me what you're going
to do. I'll tell you what you're going to do. There's people that's lost. You
can mark down what they're going to do, because you know what
they're going to do. They've done it too many times.
Look here in Mark 15 and verse 12. They started crying out for him
to release Barabbas, like Oviah preached last Sunday evening
on the Christ of the Cross. And Pilate answered and said
again unto them, Why will ye that I shall do unto you whom
ye call the king of the Jews? And they cried out again, Crucify
him. Then Pilate said unto them, Why?
What evil hath he done? And they cried out the more exceedingly,
Crucify him. Now listen. And so Pilate, willing
to content the people. The last thing he'd done, he
tried everything in the world to present Christ in his flawlessness,
but the people kept off, and willing to content the people. The people's will was to crucify
Christ. Do you want to crucify Him? Well,
I'm going to let you do it. That's what he ended up saying.
Willing to content the people, released unto them Barabbas,
and delivered Jesus, whom he scourged and crucified. Now,
you let a man's will be free, and you can predict what he's
going to do. You can predict it. And let me tell you something
else, the fourth reason why Arminianism is so hard doctrine. It always
ends up in fatalism. Now, what do I mean by that?
Unless all things are in the sovereignty of God and in His
providence and in His government, to say, what I mean, you know,
they'll say, God's done all He can. Things are out of His control.
Well, that ends up in fatalism. In fatalism. That's what it means
that you just end up in absolute fatalism. God's done all He can
do. If things are out of his control, unless things are all
in the sovereignty of God, it ends up, you know, just fatalism. There's no wisdom to it, no righteousness
to it, no goodness to it, no prophetess to it. Everything's
out of his control. Well, then what in the world's
going to happen to me? What's going to happen to you? You end up
in fatalism. And, oh, my, there's a lot of
folks who believe that. Here's another reason why Arminianism's
a hard doctrine. It really, truly, Arminianism
gives a religious license to sin. Do you believe that? I believe Arminianism gives religious,
gives them a religious license to sin. You see, men practice
what they preach. Men practice what they preach.
If they hear preaching that you can be lost again if you sin,
that you lose your salvation if you sin, your backslide if
you sin, you know, if you start preaching that, folks will start
practicing. If you start preaching that you've got to quit certain
things in order to be saved, then if you don't do those things
and you fall back into those things, you naturally get lost
again. So they just go back out into the world and go back into
sin, and then they'll say, one of these days I'll go back and
the Lord will take me back. Now, let me tell you something. Oh David, and Daryl read that
tonight. David said, It is against thee,
thee only, that I have sinned, and done this evil in thy sight,
that thou might be justified when thou speakest. He said,
I'll take the consequences of my sin, and I was warned and
done it. That's my sin. And he says, but oh God, if I'm
ever, if you don't turn me, I won't be turned. If you don't work,
I won't be worked. And oh, if you don't do it, it
won't be done. You can turn grace off, but you
can't turn it back on. You can walk away in sin. And
men do that. They'll say, well, I've sinned,
so I'm just going to go back to the Word. David sinned, but
he could not make God to do anything for him. That's what I'm saying,
is that he got in and he says, Lord, you've got to work for
me. You've got to teach me. You've got to make me whiter
than snow." And oh my! And I fear because
of the sovereignty of God. Oh, I don't want to sin against
God. Though I love Christ, would we want to hurt Him so who loved
us? Our faith works by love. But
you'll always say, well, you know, the Lord will take you
back. I know you've sinned and I know you've done this and all
that. And the Lord, He'll take you back. That's just, it's an
awful religious, it's a religious license to sin. And I know in Arminianism, in
rank Arminianism, when I call it rank Arminianism, I'm telling
you it's all of the flesh, and men, it's unbelievable what they'll
do to make an excuse for their sin. And let me tell you another reason
why it's hard doctrine. It's an I-I-I doctrine. Some of you got family members
that's in Armenianism, in free will works religion. It's an
I-I-I doctrine. I did. I did. I went to church. I've been going so long. I went
to the front. I went to the altar. I accepted
Jesus. I got saved. I got so-and-so
saved. But ours is a Christ, Christ,
Christ, Christ message. Christ's sovereign will, Christ's
sovereign mercy. Christ's salvation is of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation is by the grace of
God. God is sovereign mercy in Christ's name. We want to talk
about Christ, they want to talk about what they do. You see,
their religion is a subjective religion. That means that they
are so interested in an experience, they're always concerned with
self, our free will, our doings. And they'll tell you how long
they've been to church and haven't missed a service, how long, how
many times they've been to a Sunday school and haven't missed. Tell
you how many people they've got saved. Tell you how many people
they got into church, how many people they brought. But ours,
is an objective salvation. What I mean is that our salvation
is outside ourselves. We don't look to ourselves for
anything. Our salvation is outside of ourselves. It's subjective.
It's concerned with God's grace and mercy in Christ. We've been
taught since we've been taught the grace of God that we are
never, ever to look to ourselves for anything. We always... Our salvation was accomplished
for us 2,000 years ago on the cross of Calvary. So why would
I want to go to me when everything was done for me there on that
cross when Christ bore my sin on the cross? All right. And I'll tell you another reason
why I'm eating this hard doctrine. Because men make themselves to
differ. Men make themselves to differ.
Look with me over in 1 Corinthians 4, 7. Men make themselves to
differ. You know, they'll say, they'll
say, you know why I got saved that night? It's my repentance
was stronger than another person. You know, when there's four of
you on the altar, how come you got saved and the other three didn't?
Well, my repentance was better. My faith was deeper. My faith
was stronger. I was more honest. I was more
sincere. than those who didn't. He explained to me. That's what
they, you know, what made the difference when these four come
up. I asked a fellow that one time. He said that. He said,
well, my repentance was stronger. My faith was stronger. And theirs
wasn't. If they'd repented like I had,
believed like I had, they'd all got saved too. What was that fellow's name?
Is that who it was? She's sharp. But he bragged about, you know,
how strong his faith, his repentance was. That he made the salvation,
the only thing that made him different than anybody else,
was his own repentance, his own faith, and his sincerity. And
if they had the same thing that he did, they would have got saved
too. But look what it said here in 1 Corinthians 4, 7. For whom
maketh thee to differ from another? Huh? What have you got that you didn't
receive? You got faith? Did you receive it? You got repentance? Did you receive it? You got grace? Was it given to you? Do you have
any gnarly scriptures? Who taught it to you? Now, if
you did receive it, why would you glory as if you didn't receive
it, but you done it yourself? And that's why I look with me
over here at 1 Corinthians 1.30. I'll tell you, the grace of God
makes a man lose his right to brag and to boast. One of the
men on the way out this morning said, you know, and talking about
why God allowed sin to remain in us is that no flesh should
go in His presence. That's one reason. But look what
he said here in verse 30 in 1 Corinthians. But of Him, of God, are you in
Christ Jesus. How do you get in Christ? God
puts you in Christ. And then God made Christ unto
us wisdom. The wisdom of God. God made Christ
unto us righteousness. We don't have one. Sanctification,
holiness, and redemption. And why did he do that? That
according as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory
in the Lord. You going to brag on anybody?
Brag on Christ. You going to joy in anybody?
Joy in Christ. You going to joy in anything
at all? Joy in what Christ did. or he's begging. Is that right? You're bragging or you're begging.
Which are you, a braggart or a beggar? And then they talked
about babies. Let's talk about the doctrine
of infants for a minute. Here's why Armenianism is a really,
really hard doctrine. They say, you know, that what
we believe, that infants go to hell because, you know, they
Now, y'all preach babies into hell because if they're not one
of God's elect, they just go. But I don't know if anybody ever
believes that. But let me tell you something.
Now, this is really awful right here, and I know this is so.
They teach, Arminianism teach that children are born innocent. And then when they reach the
age of accountability, twelve years old, whatever they say,
most of them say twelve years old. And they use that time when
Christ was 12, and they said, what have you done to us? And
he's gone for three days. And then they was talking to
the doctors and the lawyers. They say they're born innocent.
They have no sin. Then they reach the age of accountability,
then that is, then that's when they fall. Then you know what
you have? Every time a child turns 12 years
old, the first 15,000 12-year-old children in the state of Tennessee,
Fifteen thousand is going to fall when they hit twelve years
old. It's going to fall. When the Scriptures teach us,
by one man sin entered the world, and death by sin, and death passed
upon all men, and that all have sinned. And that means all of
us. Now, I'm telling you, that logically
does not lead to the salvation of children. And I'm going to
tell you why. If they don't, you know, you've
got to repent and you've got to believe and you've got to
be able to exercise your free will. Since they're not born
innocent, we know they're not born innocent, then they don't
have the ability to choose, they don't have the ability to exercise
their free will, they don't have the ability to repent and the
ability to believe. So it's absolutely necessary,
if you follow true Arminian doctrine, that an infant has no chance,
no opportunity, no way in the world they could be saved, according
to an army. But according to what we believe,
by the grace of God, that we know that children are not born
innocent. And Jonathan, just as John Walsley
mentioned to me this yesterday, he said, since he found that
they pray to get pregnant, Then he said, after they got pregnant,
it's been six weeks, he said, I've been praying. You just don't
know how much I've been praying lately. He said, I pray for a
good, healthy baby. I pray for its salvation. I pray that God would do something
for it. And you know, they pray to have
children. But an Armenian, there's no reason to pray for your baby
because he ain't going to be born in sin. But you know, Hannah,
she went off and she, cause God never gave her a child. She went
off and started saying, Lord, if you'll give me a child and
open my womb, I'll turn around and give the child back to you.
And then when she had the baby, she prayed and prayed to have
a baby. And that's what we do. We start
praying for our children before they're born. Because we know
they're going to be shaken in iniquity and conceived in sin.
And God would be, no, give us a healthy baby. Give us a baby
and help us to be good parents and bring them up in the nurture
and admonition of the Lord, to bring them up to hear the gospel,
to love them and cherish them, and do for them what's right
according to the grace of God. And oh my, you'll love them with
all your heart, but you know if God don't do something for
them, they'll grow up and there'll be no hope for them. So we start
praying before they ever come out of the womb. And I tell you what, and we keep on praying for them.
I pray for little old Bentley, and I pray for Ronnie. Started
praying for Josh and Dylan before they was ever born. And God in His sovereign mercy,
I pray that He'll do something for them. That's why Mary says
we won't rally ever Saturday. Every Saturday we can get her
because she comes to service with us. We want her in church
on Sunday morning. We want her here on Sunday morning.
We want her here to hear the gospel. And one of these days
she'll sit there by her grandmother and she'll beg God to open her
heart. And we'll try to keep busy every
Saturday so we can get him here to hear the gospel. What else are they going to be
saying? Don't ever think an infant's
born innocent. They're not. And that's why there's
no reason to pay for them. And, oh, I tell you, I've got
to hurry. And I tell you, the eighth and ninth thing is this.
It leads to the false interpretation of Scriptures. Always leads to
false interpretation. When they say God so loved the
world that He gave His only begotten Son, They said, that means everybody
in the whole human race. But it couldn't possibly be that.
Because over here it says, all the whole world lies in wickedness.
How can the whole world lie in wickedness and then die for the
whole world in Christ? And then they'll use John 6,
37. All that the Father... No, He'll say, here that cometh
to me all in no wise casting out. Leave the rest of it off.
Here that cometh to me all in no wise casting out. And then
here's another thing they do. They split the scriptures up.
There's a gospel for the Jews, there's a gospel for the Church
of God, and there's a gospel for the Gentiles. Ah, boy. God cast a vote for you, Satan
cast a vote for you. You've got to decide to vote.
How are you going to vote? Oh my. There he is knocking at
your heart's door. They'll use Revelations 3 when
it's talking about the church. And I'll tell you what. And here's
how they did it. And Gary Spiker can tell you
this. This is really, this is so. Larry Simpson used to tell
me this. He said they'd get on a bus and
they'd go into a big city and they'd just, out of these big
churches, they'd just roll out of that bus and they'd start
walking down the street and they would have six or eight people
saved every block. Take a whole busload of people
to go talk people into salvation. Get them booked up. But here's
what they'll say, this is what they'll tell you when you're
going to win a soul, when you're in a service. Now, don't let them know when
you're ready to give an invitation. Don't say, in conclusion, because
they know that you're getting ready to try to get them to come
to the front. Don't let them know when you
get ready for the invitation. Slip up on them. Catch them off
guard. Oh, if we can just get them to
the front, if we can just get them to raise a hand. They make
soul, wind, and everything. We make the glory of God everything.
And I'll tell you last of all, it's hard because of the concept
that God presents to men. Here's the concept that He presents
to men. God can't do anything but wait before your free and
sovereign will, and until you let Him in, He cannot possibly
come in. Your will is more powerful than
God's will, and He can't save you unless you let Him. God is at your mercy. He won't
impose Himself on you. A famous fellow on TV says this,
God would never impose himself on you no more than a man should
impose himself on a woman because it'd be like rape. And I'll tell you what they do
at funerals. They'll say at funerals, they'll say, oh, this is such
a tragedy. They'll say, this is not God's will. Anything ever
happen, it's not God's will. You got God's hands tied. God has no hands but your hands,
no feet but your feet, no money but your money. And Don Fortner
sat under this man for a while, and I'll tell you, out in Springfield,
Missouri, Noel Smith, he was a Baptist theology professor,
and you can look it up online and you can read the whole thing
that he said. But he said, hell is a ghastly monument to the
failure of God to save everybody. Well, what in the world can we
do about this business? What can we do about it? I'll
tell you what I'm going to do about it. I'm going to live by
faith. I'm going to live by faith. I'm going to live by Christ who
lives in me. I'm going to keep on preaching
the gospel, not defensively, because we're not wrong. They're
the ones that's wrong. I'm not going to preach it apologetically. I'm not going to apologize for
God. I'm not going to apologize for grace. I'm not going to apologize
for God's power, God's right to do what He will with His own.
If He wants to say, love Esau, I mean, love Jacob and hate Esau,
that's God's business. And that's why we're going to
present him the way he is. We're going to present man. I'm
not going to apologize for man and what I think about man and
how desperately, desperately lost he is. We're not going to
apologize for those things. And I tell you, preach it with
joy and preach it with authority. Oh, this gospel causes such joy. Impress men to come to Christ,
because you ain't got nobody else that can save you. Nobody
else put away sin. Nobody else has got the power
to save you. Nobody else can break your heart. Nobody else
can give you a new mind. Nobody else can give you a new
heart. Nobody else can give you the
will to come. Nobody else can make you acceptable
to God. Nobody else will God give you
grace to and through except Jesus Christ. And that's why we tell
men, come to Christ. Come to Him. I'll tell you, I've
had lots of opportunities over the years in talking to people.
to apologize. But I ain't going to apologize
for God. I ain't going to apologize for what I believe. And I'm ashamed
of what I once believed. And we've got to be patient and
understanding with people as much as we can. But do not ever,
ever, ever compromise with anybody over the gospel. Because if you're
doing it, you're compromising with the blood and righteousness
of Christ Himself. We're not going to do it, are
we? God help us. We're not going to do it. I'm not going to be
mean to nobody. I'm just not going to do that,
but at the same time, I'm not going to apologize. For God being
God and man being utterly hopelessly lost, and I certainly ain't going
to apologize for Christ and what He accomplished at His cross
and for whom He did it for. I don't have any problem facing
a man telling me where I work out or whether it's in a grocery
store, I have no problem saying that Christ whom He died for,
He's going to save. I have no problem with that.
Do you? I don't have any problem with it.