Hey, hey, hey. Hello out there in internet land. It's me again. It's me, Brandon. And I'm the host of this YouTube channel, this podcast, this Pristine Grace website. I'm the guy who is now going to be hosting a lot more videos here.

Anyway, I just want to say thank you all for bearing with me with all the poor quality videos I produced in the past. But I think the game has changed and I think I've upped my game some, actually quite a bit. I've leveled up my skills and I've been doing a lot of practicing, a lot of practicing talking to the camera. and working on preparation and I think I've got a format now that I think is going to work going forward.

So needless to say I've been busy the last couple of weeks. First of all, you all know I've been playing with music lately and I've been making albums and I've got two albums out there. The first one is called From Pride to Praise, and the second one is called In the Little Things, and I've been working on the third album called Break the Cage. And I think I have most of the music done, and I'll slowly roll the videos out over the next month. There are about 17 songs on the album, and two of them have already been published to YouTube.

I also have a page on Pristine Grace website where all the music videos are located and as I add the videos to YouTube they will be located there as well. Finally, you can download all those albums off the pristinegrace.org website once they're all available. The first two albums are now available for download in mp3 format, so you can import them into your iTunes or your Apple Music or whatever music player that you use.

Second, I've been working on a way to make my videos really stand out, to really pop. I've added some better lighting, as you can see. I've got a far better camera setup now, and I'm working on my software setup, and I've made great advancements, and I have a better way now to display my notes so that I don't go into these videos completely blind, like I have in the past. the last few videos that I've made. I've just been rambling on and tried to splice things together.

So anyway, I hope you notice an improvement because it's not easy getting all this to work and making it look seamless. And with that being said, I also have been working on my entire line of videos for next year. Been working on the roadmap, if you will, for next year's podcasts and speaking subjects and whatnot. And I'm working on making another attempt at getting back into internet preaching. Yeah, I used to do that back in the day. I think I stopped it about five to six years ago before the pandemic hit.

And all the videos that I'm going to make for particular topics, they'll be on a special page on pristinegrace.org. These videos that I make will be topical and very much like a sermon where I discuss the things that I find important. And so for the last five years or so, if you've been following me, you'll notice that whenever I do preach, it would usually be for something, let's say a funeral or the occasional sermon at my local church. But it hasn't really been enough to satisfy my desire to get out there and speak.

I've felt the need to get out there and talk more about the things of God, about Scripture, and I don't think those limited opportunities are good enough for what I really want to say. So I think YouTube, Facebook, Sermon Audio, the Internet, my website, those are all the perfect outlets for me. I was involved with preaching at my church, but it appears that my messages weren't all that desirable there. So I was removed from the preaching list there, but I'm not going to get into that on this video.

And I just want to say, though, before anybody asks, I'm not bitter about it at all, but I'm very happy about it because I know that that's something the Lord had a hand in. Of course, He has a hand in everything. He's sovereign.

But I'm actually very happy about it as I think it frees me up emotionally to deliver my message in the best way that I know how and also in my native realm which is the internet. And I don't think maintaining my website, pristinegrace.org, is really compatible with any sort of teaching or leadership position in any church for that matter, not just the ones that I attend.

And the reason for this is, well, it's multifactorial. A lot of it is just because of me, and I feel like I'm restrained in some ways, and I don't want to feel that restraint. But I think the number one reason for this is politics. One word, politics. And you can't go anywhere in this world without avoiding politics. You know what they say. You know what they say. They say you may not care about politics, but politics cares about you, and it will find you out and force you to engage. And sadly, that's true even in our churches.

But anyway, please bear with me as I continue to improve on my video making skills. It's been a very steep learning curve. In fact, that's all I've been working on here these last two weeks, other than some of my music. The music has actually taken a back seat to this. I do have the songs done, but I haven't made the music videos. It requires a lot of work and requires more than just opening up your webcam software and recording a video and uploading it to YouTube. It requires preparation, it requires thought, it requires software coordination, etc. I'm very happy with the results so far.

But anyway, I do plan on hitting on a variety of meaningful topics here in the next year. Topics that I don't really see that often online. And I want to bring my own personal point of view into my videos. Not just preach what people want to hear me say. I want to put my own perspective on things.

So basically, this is really just my first video of the new format. And I hope it looks good to you. And also, I just want to say it's more than just a brief update. We're actually going to get into something today. I have actually prepared a little mini sermon, if you will. And after this video, I'll start hitting the video podcasts here hard. I'll be hitting them hard. And I think 2026 is going to be an amazing year for our website, Pristine Grace, and the work that the Lord's given me.

And it's been such a privilege to be able to talk to you and hear back from my listeners. I don't have a large audience, and that's fine with me. I'm not looking for notoriety or anything like that. I just want to continue to make videos to add to my archive of videos which I've made in the past. Most of them can be found on the Pristine Grace Sermons page over on Sermon Audio. And would you believe it, I actually have videos going back to 2006 on there, back when I was making them with an old Sony camcorder.

But anyway, let's go ahead and get into today's topic if you don't mind. I'd like to talk about something that I've been thinking about and even wrote a song about, believe it or not. Anyway, I'm sitting here talking to you. And I keep thinking about how many years I've been around church, been around church life, ministry life. As you know, I've been running pristinegrace.org or some form of it or some form of website since 1997. I've been doing this a long time now, nearly 30 years if you can believe that.

And I've had so many conversations with other believers and non-believers and all kinds of people, weird ones too. All of them, all walks of life out there on the internet. And I've been around long enough to see trends come and go. I've been around long enough to see people rise and people fall. Long enough to see movements get started with good intentions. That can include, you know, even theological movements. And then I've seen these movements slowly drift into something entirely else. So, yeah, I've been around the block, if you will. And I've crossed paths with a lot of ministries over the years, a lot of teachers, a lot of different teachers, a lot of men whose doctrine I don't agree with. Some of them I strongly disagree with.

And if I'm being honest with you, my flesh would love nothing more than to start naming names, to start calling people out. and start drawing lines in the sand and issuing warnings and all that and setting the record straight because I've dealt with a lot. I've dealt with all kinds of slander on the internet, libel if you will, people making a big deal about me when I'm just a little guy on the internet and I also don't like it when people speak wrong things and teach wrong things and teach things that go against the gospel. But I just want to say that the Lord has me on a leash. The Lord has me on a leash. And I don't say that lightly. I mean that very literally. Well, not literally, but... I don't know what the right word is for it, but yeah, the Lord, he does have me under his control. He's got me on a leash.

And this isn't just a clever phrase or a metaphor that I came up with. It's something I've come to recognize about how the Lord deals with me personally. Okay? How the Holy Spirit tugs on my heart. And there is something in me that wants to fight. That's just who I am. I want to fight. I want to fight so badly. I just want to prove them wrong. I just want to go out there and get the last word. And I want to feel justified. In my opinions, I want to feel validated. I don't want to be proven right in front of everyone. And the more confident that I am that I'm right, the stronger that urge becomes in me. But, like I said, the Lord's got me on a leash. And every time I get close to going down that road, there's that tug on that leash around my heart. And that tug, it's not loud. It's not dramatic. and it's not some thunderous warning from heaven, although sometimes it is my wife in the next room telling me I shouldn't be doing what I'm doing, but it's usually just a steady pull back. It's like a hand on my collar saying, hey, not this way, not now, not you.

And I've learned to recognize that tug as mercy, mercy, because if the Lord gave my flesh full freedom, I would absolutely misuse it. I would turn discernment into a weapon. I would turn the truth into a club. And I would end up doing far more harm than good. And I know this because I've done it. I have turned the truth into a club to bang people over the head with. I've turned my discernment into a weapon. And I've turned my good judgment into a weapon as well. So, yeah, I know what I am and I know what I'm capable of.

But anyway, let's get into the Scriptures. I thought about Acts chapter 15 as I was preparing this message, and the Scriptures there say in verse 39 through 40 that there was a contention that was so sharp between them, which is Paul and Barnabas, that they departed asunder from the other. And so Barnabas took Mark and sailed on to Cyprus, and Paul chose Silas and departed, being recommended by the brethren unto the grace of God.

Now pay attention to that. That passage matters to me because it reminds me that even godly men can disagree sharply. And there was no pretending it wasn't serious. Between Paul and Barnabas, there was no pretending at all. But there was also no scorched earth campaign afterwards. I don't read or I don't think they did. I don't think they felt the need to warn the churches about one another. I don't think Paul was going around, hey watch out for that Barnabas guy. Barnabas wasn't doing the same about Paul. They didn't write letters tearing each other down. You don't see that in the scriptures. But what you do see is they separated and they kept serving Christ.

And what a stark contrast that it is from today. You don't see that today. If you see disagreements between ministries or between men online or even offline, you see them often separating angrily and attacking each other. But you don't see that in scripture there. And that tells me something important that separation is necessary sometimes. But, and that's a big but here, public destruction is not necessary. And this example that we see here, it stays with me, especially in this age of social media where disagreements are often treated like a blood sport.

Because one of the biggest temptations in Christian spaces, especially online, is to make the enemy visible. It's to point him out. It's to expose. and to rally people around opposition instead of around Christ. How many times have you seen that? Tell me, be honest with you. How often do you see that annoying? I see it all the time. Not as much as I used to because I'm not online as much as I used to, but when I was in the different forums and on Facebook and in the different groups there, it was always opposition, opposition. It wasn't positive gospel preaching, it was oppositional preaching.

And a lot of times that opposition gets dressed up as courage or discernment, when really, in my opinion, it's just the flesh wearing church clothes. James chapter 1 says, and this is verse 19 and 20, wherefore my beloved brethren let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath, for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. That verse by James, that doesn't just apply to believers, it applies to me. It applies to how I speak, how I write, how I respond, and how quickly I reach the microphone or the keyboard or a post on my social media.

I know my own heart well enough to know that when I'm angry or frustrated or doctrinally stirred up, I'm not operating in pure, holy clarity. I'm operating in the flesh. And I know one thing about my flesh, and it craves attention, it craves the spotlight. And I'd say this is true for a lot of people, if not most. But Proverbs says in 17 verse 27, it says, He that hath knowledge spareth his words. Spareth is words and a man of understanding is of an excellent spirit. That word Spareth implies intentional restraint. It means holding back. It means knowing when not to speak, even when you could. That's a hard, hard, hard thing to learn. Oh, I'm over 50 years old now. I'm coming up on 51 here soon. And I don't think I've learned that lesson very well. I'm still learning it. Restraint. Let me repeat that again. He that hath knowledge spareth his words. He that has knowledge spares his words. That means the more you know, maybe the more you spare your words. I don't know, but I have a hard time sparing my words and I have a hard time dealing with that restraint that I should have.

And when we start naming names, the spotlight shifts and it always does. Suddenly Christ isn't front and center anymore. Controversy is front and center. Arguments are in the limelight. Personalities become the important thing. And Christ, Christ gets buried under what I call the noise. And if you listen to my songs, you'll notice that I mention this noise quite a bit. Okay, there's a lot of noise out there and you gotta learn how to avoid it.

But anyway, Paul, he warned about this in 1 Corinthians when he said in chapter 3 verse 4, For while one saith, I am of Paul, I am of Paul, and another, I am of Apollos, are ye not carnal? Ministers, preachers, pastors, elders, leaders, deacons, online personalities, people with dozens and dozens of followers on Facebook, YouTube channels, YouTube leaders, they're nothing. Okay? They are nothing. Zero. We are nothing. Okay, I don't, listen to that. I'm gonna repeat that again. For while one saith I am of Paul and another I'm of Paul's, are you not carnal? We're all carnal, okay, and we're nothing, but God, he is everything.

And I want this place, this site, this ministry, Pristine Grace, pristinegrace.org, this YouTube channel, this sermon audio channel, wherever you're watching, I want this ministry to be light, not noise. All right. And that's going to be my theme from here on out, other than, of course, Christ. But yeah, we're not going to be noise. We're going to be naming names. We're not going to be pointing the spotlight at anyone. The spotlight belongs on Christ.

And Jesus said in Matthew 5 verse 14, ye are the light of the world. The city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. That's a verse you don't hear every day. I don't hear that often. It's sad. I don't hear that spoken from the pulpit all that often. And it needs to be said. We are the light of the world. All right. We as believers, we're the light of the world. And guess what he said in two verses down in verse 16. He says, let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your father, which is in heaven. Listen to that. Jesus doesn't say to glorify yourself. He doesn't say to glorify your discernment, or your ability to judge, or call out the guy on the other YouTube channel that you don't like. He says to glorify your Father. He doesn't call us to point to all the problems with the church down the street, or that bad teacher. He says, glorify your Father. He says, actually, let your light shine before men.

Another thing I want to think about and consider is this. I don't want to be wrong about people. I don't trust myself enough to publicly condemn someone I've never spoken to, at least. Someone whose heart I don't know. Someone whose private prayers I've never heard. Romans 14 says in verse 4, who art thou that judges another man's servant? To his own master he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be holden up for God is able to make him stand. And that verse right there, that verse humbles me, humbles me every time I read it. And Jesus himself said in Matthew 7 verses 1 and 2, Judge not that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged. And with what measure ye meet, it shall be measured to you again. That doesn't erase discernment, but it does demand caution. demands a lot of caution.

And I've seen what happens when ministries become known primarily for who they oppose or what they oppose. And they sure do attract the attention. They're very popular. But it's an audience that's fueled by outrage. It's not fueled by a hunger for Christ. And outrage always needs a new target.

Paul warned Timothy when he said in 1 Timothy 1 verse 4, neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies which minister questions rather than godly edifying which is in faith so do. Endless controversy, which is the theme of today's world. It doesn't build the church. It drains it.

There are just simply too many false teachers out there. And if I made it my life's work to expose them all, I'd never preach the gospel again. I'd never teach the scriptures again. I'd just be reacting. All right? And I don't want a reaction website. I don't want a reaction YouTube channel. Okay, and Paul said in first Corinthians 2 verse 2 for I determined not to know anything among you Save Jesus Christ and him crucified

Okay, that wasn't ignorance on Paul's part that was his focus and that's my focus too That's that's what I want. Well, that's what I want my focus to be. I hope it is

And I also think about the weaker believer we have out there. We never talk about the weaker believer, do we? We all talk like everybody is a strong believer, but that's not true. Not everybody is a strong believer. There are varying degrees of strength when it comes to belief. But there are weaker believers out there and we need to guard them and protect them. And you don't guard and protect necessarily by calling out your enemies.

Romans 14 verse 15 says, But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou do not charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ died. In Galatians 5, 22 through 23, which is one of my favorite passages in the Bible, it says, but the fruit of the Spirit is joy, peace, longsuffering, here's a key word, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance, against such there is no law. Yeah, you don't hear that preached every day either, do you?

But what's right there in the scripture is Galatians 5. Temperance. Temperance. You know what that is? You know what temperance means? It means self-control. And self-control is active restraint. Okay. And let's be honest. I don't have any self-control. The only control I have is the Lord who's got His hand on me. He's got a leash on me. He's controlling me. And He's actively restraining me.

Now I'm not going to sit here and say that truth doesn't matter or that doctrine doesn't matter. That's not true at all. I love truth. Truth matters. I love good doctrine. I love sound doctrine. Doctrine matters. But guess what? Charity, love, that matters too. And Paul said in 1 Corinthians 13 too, and though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, And though I have all faith so that I could even remove mountains, but I have not charity, I'm nothing. Nothing.

So if you've ever wondered why I don't name names on my website, this is why. It's not because I fear men. It's I fear the Lord. And it's not a weakness. It's not a weakness on my part, although a lot of people say it is. Because they say I don't know enough to call out all the false teachers. No, no, no, no. No, it's submission. It's submission to the Lord. I'm on a leash, and I want to stay there. I want to stay on that leash.

Because if Christ is lifted up, He'll do the exposing. He'll do the separating. And He'll guard His sheep better than I ever could. Jesus said in John 10, verses 27 through 28, My sheep hear my voice, and I know them. And they follow me, and I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

So my aim is is simple. Let this little place on the internet stay full of grace. Let my heart be ground in Christ. And let Christ stay in the center. Let the light of the gospel, the light of Christ, shine quietly and steady within me. And let me stay on the leash, right where the Lord has me. And honestly, I'm thankful for it. I'm thankful for it. And that's really all I got to say about that.

So I just want to say thank you for listening to me. I hope it was useful to you and I want to wish all of you a Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. And I hope to be seeing you soon. Maybe at the start of the year I'll have another video for you. and hopefully I'll have that third album out here soon. So anyway, thanks for listening. Once again, grace and peace. Goodbye.