Well, good morning. Glad to see
everybody here this morning, enjoying one another. Before
we begin, if you would open your Bibles with me to Matthew chapter
10. Lesson will be from Matthew chapter
10 this morning. Before we begin, let's bow together
in prayer. Our great God, our holy heavenly
father. Oh, how thankful we are. to be
able to come into your courts this morning with praise and
with thanksgiving, knowing that our prayer, our praise, our worship
will be accepted in and through and because of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Father, we have so much to be
thankful for, but it all pales in comparison to Christ our Savior,
the unspeakable gift of your Son. Father, I pray this morning
that We pray in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that you would
bless us as we meet together, enable us this morning to worship
you in spirit and in truth. Father, I pray you'd bless your
word in this hour, the next hour, cause it to go forth in the power
of your spirit, to bring glory to your name. Father, this morning,
let us see your glory. We pray with Moses of old, Lord,
we beseech thee, show us your glory. Father, cause your word
to reach the hearts of your people, to give life, to give faith,
to cause us to see the Lord Jesus Christ, to feed the hearts of
your people, comfort and courage your people through the preaching
of your word. Father, we pray this for our
class here. We pray for our children's classes. Father, bless for your great
namesake. We do thank you, Father, for your blessing to this congregation
for years and years and years. How abundantly you blessed us.
Father, we're humbled, we're in awe, in awe of your mercy
to sinful men and women such as we are. We pray you'd not
take your hand of mercy and leadership from us. Leave us not alone,
we pray, but continue to bless us with your presence and with
your word. Father, for those who are away from us traveling
this morning, we pray traveling mercies that you'd watch over
them and bring them back home safe. We pray for your people
who are hurting and need you especially. You know the need
of each one, each heart, each mind, each body, each soul. Father,
we pray you'd bless according to the riches of your mercy and
grace to your people. All these things we ask and we
give thanks in that name which is above every name, the name
of our Lord Jesus Christ. All right, this morning I've
titled our lesson, our free gift. Now I told you last week, I'm
looking at this Matthew chapter 10 as the Lord's preacher school.
And we're going to continue looking at that this morning. And our
Lord gives instruction to his, uh, his disciples, but to his
pastors and the church through the ages that the gospel, the
gospel of Christ is to be preached as a free gift. You know, the
gospel of God's free and sovereign grace. If it's preached right,
it has to be preached freely, doesn't it? Without charge, without
conditions to be met by the creature. So first I want us to see this,
that God's preachers preach the gospel freely. Matthew chapter
10 verse 7. And as you go, preach, saying
the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers,
raise the dead, cast out devils. Freely you have received, freely
give. Now, the job of the church, and
especially the pastor, is to preach. He says, as you go, you
preach. You preach the gospel. And by
preaching, I don't mean that you just get up and behind a
podium like this and talk. Or like you see so many people
on TV today, you know, they walk around the stage, they're pacing
back and forth. They got their little mobile mic, you know,
they're pacing back and forth. Almost all that kind of stuff.
is not true preaching. It's religious-sounding talk,
but it's not preaching. True preaching involves the proclamation
of a specific message. You notice the Lord didn't say,
go preach, period. He said, go preach, saying, here's
your message. You preach, the kingdom of heaven
is at hand. We are to preach Christ. We're
to preach Christ and Him crucified. We're not to wonder what topic
or message, it's always this. Christ. It's Christ and Him crucified. That meets the need of every
one of God's sheep. I don't care where they're at.
We're to preach the gospel. Matt Bayston made an interesting
observation to me a week or two ago. He said that the word doesn't
say unto me, woe if I preach not. It says, woe unto me if
I preach not the gospel. We're given a specific message
to preach. Woe is unto me if I don't preach
a specific message and you don't believe a specific message. It's
the message of Christ. And this message is an urgent
message. My personality, I feel like I
need to tone myself down a little bit. I'm going to be tense about
what I do. This message is urgent. It's
urgent. The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Today, today is the day of salvation. I call on you all the time in
every message, come to Christ. Come to Christ and come to him
right now, right now. Today is the day of salvation.
Believe on Christ and believe on him right now without delay. For the life of me, I don't understand
why anyone would want to delay coming to someone as glorious
and as wonderful as the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. The job
of God's preachers is to preach the gospel. We're not to go out
and perform the miracles and the physical healings we see
described in verse eight. Now we covered this last week,
but let me go over it again briefly. The Lord gave the apostles and
some in the early church, they did have the ability to perform
these miracles that the Lord describes here. The gifts of
miracles of healing and tongues and casting out demons and so
forth. The Lord gave these men these abilities for a specific
reason, not that people would be awed at the end, you know,
that they could perform these miracles, but when they perform
these miracles, people would know beyond a shadow of a doubt,
God's with that man. He has to be. Nobody could do
these things except God be with them. He must be speaking for
Christ. He must have a message from God
for me. Maybe I'll listen to him. That
was the purpose of these miracles. But today, the day of miracles
is over. You don't need miracles today
to tell if somebody's preaching the gospel or not. We know if
a man is preaching the gospel or not, if the message that he
preaches matches the whole word of God. It's not just he picks
a verse out, you know, and says, this is what that means, even
though it contradicts the rest of scripture. We know a man is
preaching the gospel if his message matches the whole word of God,
not just one verse, but all of it. You know, the scripture says
the Bereans were more noble than those in Thessalonica. Well,
why? Why were they? Well, it's because
they received the word with all readiness of mind. They received
the word in faith. They believed it. And they searched
the scriptures daily to see if these things be so. And when
they searched the scriptures and they saw that these things
they heard preached were so, according to the word of God,
that's when they believed it with all readiness of mind. So
the way you see if a man's preaching the gospel or not, Check him
out. Check him out. You check me out
on the whole word of God and see if my message matches the
word of God. And you know, that's a whole
lot better than miracles. You know, Peter said what we have
to do. Peter saw miracles. I mean, he performed them. He
saw wonders. The thing you think of the things
Peter saw and did. Peter walked on water. Peter
healed people. He saw the Lord through these
many miracles. He was there in the Mount of
Transfiguration. He saw the glory of Christ. And Peter wrote to
those of us who never have saw anything like that. He said,
you've got something better, a more sure word of prophecy. You've
got the word of God. This word, having this word open
to us, being able to read it and have it preached to us, expounded
to us. It's much better to see miracles.
Your miracles could be done by another spirit. Could be, couldn't
be. God's word can only come from
the Holy Spirit. And if someone needs miracles
in order to believe, I'll tell you what they're saying. It's
pretty serious. They're saying the word of God
is not enough. I need something else. I need
something I can see, touch, feel and hear in order to make me
believe the word. So the day of miracles is over,
but these miracles are pictures of what the Lord still does for
his people through the preaching of the gospel. God's people or
God's preachers are not to to try to perform miracles and do
things to make people in the flesh feel better, make their
bodies feel better. That would be nice, but that's
not our goal. That's not the commandment is
preach it, preach the gospel. God's preachers there. They have
a goal. It's spiritual healing. It's
the healing of the soul. It's the comfort of the hearts
of God's people. And that can only happen through
the preaching of the gospel. It's the preaching of the gospel
that gave you a new heart. It's the preaching of the gospel
that will feed it. It's the preaching of the gospel
that will comfort it. And the Lord calls the gospel that we're
to preach to the hearts of God's people. It's the preaching of
the kingdom of heaven. The gospel of the kingdom is
the gospel that declares God has a kingdom. He has a people
and Christ is the king of it. And if you would be saved, you
must bow to King Jesus. You must submit yourself to him,
submit yourself to his righteousness. The gospel of the kingdom declares
that the Lord Jesus Christ is the sovereign savior. He's the
king, and the king does as he will. He saves whom he will,
and he passes by whom he will, and he does not owe us a chance
to be saved. The king is sovereign. He shows
mercy on whom he will show mercy. Now, I know the flesh doesn't
like that, but my advice to you is don't complain about that.
Rejoice. Rejoice. Christ the King is going
to show mercy to somebody. I'm going to go begging for it,
aren't you? The gospel of the kingdom is
good news to sinners because the gospel of the kingdom, the
gospel of Christ the King is the only gospel that can save
a sinner. The gospel of Christ doesn't
declare a savior that tried to save somebody. If Christ tried
to save me, how do I know he did? The gospel of the kingdom
declares Christ the king came and he saved his people from
their sin. Nobody can undo his purpose. Nobody can undo his will. Nobody
can undo what he purchased for his people because he's the sovereign. The gospel of the kingdom doesn't
tell us a bunch of things that we must do in order to be righteous,
in order to keep our righteousness. The gospel of the kingdom declares
Christ the King has already accomplished righteousness for his people.
You bow to it. And by bowing to it, this is
what I mean. But to submit yourself to the righteousness of Christ
is to quit everything that you're doing to try to make yourself
righteous. Quit doing everything that you're trying to do to make
God happy with you. and submit to the righteousness
of Christ. The obedience of Christ, the
work of Christ is all you need to make God happy. And if you
try to do something to add to it, God won't accept it. So submit,
submit to the King. The gospel of the kingdom is
the gospel that fits the need of all kinds of sinners from
all different walks of life. The gospel of the kingdom says
you don't have to be good enough to be saved. You got to be bad
enough. You got to be sinful enough.
And if you're sinful enough, you come to Christ because he's
already accomplished the salvation of his people. You trust him.
That's good news for sinners. The gospel of the kingdom declares
a kingdom that is an absolute eternal peace. There is peace
with God in the blood of the kingdom. The blood of Christ
the King that He shed to put away the sin of His people. Christ's
blood took away the sin that made God angry. There's peace. There's peace. And His blood
applied to your heart will give you a heart that's at peace with
God. That peace is a two-way street, isn't it? But it comes
one way. Through the blood of the King.
Now you come and rest. Rest in Christ the King. His
Kingdom will never be a threat. It's always at peace. Nobody
can threaten it. Because Christ is King. Nobody
can threaten His rule. Now that's the message that God's
given us to preach. He said, preach, preach. Now,
I know the day of miracles is over, but we're still in the
business of spiritual healing. And that's what these diseases
and things, these miracles, that's what they all picture. The gospel
of the kingdom is all that it takes to cure every sin sickness. It's the universal medicine. a universal balm, it cures every
sin sickness. The apostles could heal physical
sickness, but the gospel heals sin sickness and all sin sickness. That sin sickness that covers
us from the sole of the foot to the top of the head, the gospel
heals all of our spiritual wounds and bruises and putrefying sores
that haven't been bound up, that haven't been mollified with ointment
because there's no other cure for it. but the gospel of Christ
will. The apostles could cure lepers.
It's hard for me to imagine somebody more helpless and more miserable
than a leper. I mean, a leper, that horrible
disease just eating your body from the inside out, your body
parts, extremities falling off and just rotting away. I can't
imagine the constant fever, And on top of that, you're an outcast
from society. And the apostles had the ability
to cure that. And we saw several instances
of the Lord cured it, didn't he? Well, what is that all about? Well, in scripture, leprosy is
always a picture of sin. You know, we think of leprosy
as a disease of the skin because that's what you see, you know,
the skin rotting and falling off and stuff. But leprosy really
is a disease of the blood. It's in the blood. And leprosy
rots and kills a person from the inside out. The Jews called
leprosy the living death. There's a dead man walking. He
got leprosy. But isn't that us by nature?
We're dead men walking, aren't we? We're alive physically. But
don't ever mistake that for spiritual life. We're dead spiritually.
I mean, it's not just we're dying spiritually. We're already dead
spiritually. In sin, you know, false religion
always deals with the outward of sin. Stop doing that. Start
doing this. Quit doing that. Start doing
this. Because what they're seeing is the outside. But sin is not
what you see on the outside. The problem of sin is on the
inside. It's in the heart. It's in the blood. It's in the
nature. And it's killing us from the inside out. And the only
thing that will cure that spiritual leprosy, sin, is the gospel of
Christ. The gospel of Christ instantly
makes God's people whole. Then the apostles could raise
the dead. And what a miracle that was.
That's an astounding miracle. But you know, we've got a greater
miracle today that we see when those apostles and the Lord,
when they would raise people from the dead, every last one
of them died again, they all had to die again. The gospel
gives spiritual hope. eternal life that can never be
lost. If you believe Christ, this is
what the Lord said, you shall never die. You'll never die the
second death because Christ already died for you and he gives eternal
life. And the apostles could cast out
demons. I don't know much about demon
possession, but you know, this is a miracle we do still need
today. The evil spirit that needs to be cast out, the demon that
needs to be cast out is the flesh we're born with. The evil nature
of the flesh where our flesh is wicked and sinful and uncontrollable. Every one of us is born the nature
of a devil. That's this flesh. It's the nature
that says, I'll not have this man reign over me. I want to
be God. I want to be the one to make
the rules. And the only thing that will cast that flesh down
is the gospel of Christ. The only time that the power
of that flesh will be cast down is when we hear the gospel of
the king. The gospel of Christ the king. It's the gospel of
Christ that gives a new nature. The spirit. Scripture calls it
the spirit. The old man, the new man, the
flesh, and the spirit. And the spirit, the new man,
He rules and reigns in the heart. He reigns over the flesh. Now
that does not mean when God saves you, you have a new man that
you're going to sin less than used to. It doesn't mean that
at all. Matter of fact, you'll think
you're sinning more than you ever did. Because now you've got a
new man that sees what sin really is. Now you've got a new man
that sees how awful the flesh really is. So here's how the
new man rules. Before God saves you, You had
an old man and he ruled, didn't he? He ruled. Here's how he ruled. You could not believe the gospel.
You heard it. You couldn't believe it. You
heard it. You couldn't love it. You heard
it. You couldn't understand it. You heard it. You might even
think that makes sense, but you couldn't believe it. Then one day you thought, I believe
it. Well, maybe it's a passing fancy.
I won't believe it tomorrow. Tomorrow you believe it too.
And the next day you believe it too. And the next day you
believe it too. And you can't not believe it. What happened?
God gave you a new man and he rules. Now the flesh is just
the same as it ever was. The flesh cannot believe. But
the flesh can't stop you from believing now because the new
man rules. That's how the new man rules. By making it so we
trust Christ and we can't trust anything else. If the Spirit
didn't rule, we would trust something else, wouldn't we? rules in the
hearts of God's people. And the only way that can happen
is through the preaching of Christ the King. And God tells us here,
preach this message freely, freely. Don't put any conditions on it.
Don't tell people, now you got to meet this condition or for
God's sake, you got to do this, this and this, and then God will
save you. If we're putting those conditions on people, we're not
preaching the gospel freely. Salvation is free. Now you come to Christ and receive
it freely. God saved us freely, didn't he? Then we should preach
the gospel freely to others with no conditions being added to
it by us. And God's preachers also preach
the gospel freely in this way. They're not going to charge you
for it. Verse nine, provide neither is known. You go out preaching,
you provide neither gold nor silver nor brass in your purses
nor script for your journey. Neither two coats, neither shoes,
nor yet staves, for the workman is worthy of his meat. Now look
at Acts chapter three. Oh, if this is a good example
of preaching the gospel freely. Without, not charging somebody,
not making them, you know, do something for us before we preach
the gospel to them. Give to them freely what God's
given us freely. Acts chapter three, verse two. Let me get the right chapter
here. And a certain man, laying from his mother's womb, was carried,
whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple, which is called
Beautiful, to ask alms of them that entered in the temple. Who's
seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple asking alms?
And Peter, fastening his eyes upon him with John, said, look
on us. He's probably begging. He's just
like, you know, and John said, look up here, look at me now.
And he gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something of them.
Then Peter said, silver and gold have I none, but such as I have,
I give thee. I'm giving this to you freely
in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk. And
he took him by the right hand and lifted him up. And immediately
his feet and ankle bones received strength. And he leaping stood
and walked and entered with them into the temple, walking and
leaping and praising God. Peter freely gave that man what
the Lord had given him, didn't he? He didn't say, now, you know,
if I do this, you got to start giving me a cut of what you can
earn. No, he gave to him freely, didn't he? He didn't say, you
got any family that can, you know, can kind of help me out?
No, he gave to him freely. And that's the way we're to preach
the gospel. And just kind of as an aside, in case you don't
already know this, the next time you see a TV preacher on TV begging
for money and saying, now, You know, I can perform these healings,
and you send me this, and you know, send me this money, I'll
send you something back, and you know, I prayed over you,
touch it, and I'll heal you. But I need some money from you
first. You turn the channel. That man's a false prophet. I'm
telling you, God didn't send him. Because God's commanded
us to preach the gospel freely. Next time you see a TV preacher
on television begging for money, or you see him somewhere else
begging for money, saying, God's given me this work. I got a great
work, but I can't do God's work unless you give me money. You
just run away from him. Run away from him, turn the channel.
That man's a false prophet. He's not sent by God. Can you
imagine the disciples going out to preach when the Lord, after
he sent them out to preach and walking into a town and telling
them now, Lord, glory sent me to preach the gospel to you.
But before I can, you all got to give me some money. You got
to help me out here and you know, in this ministry. You guys got
to give me some money because the Lord's not able to provide
for us. That's ludicrous. The Lord said, you go out and
you preach and you do it freely. The apostles didn't go out begging
for money and God's preachers don't do it today either because
the Lord will provide. God's servants, I know they need
stuff in this life, but God's servant is not a greedy man.
He's not a covetous man. He doesn't have to have the best
and finest of everything to be happy. He doesn't have to have
that. God's servant is not looking for a way to enrich himself at
the expense of the people to whom he preaches. He's an under
shepherd. He's not looking to fleece the
sheep. He's looking to feed the sheep. That's our job. Don't
fleece the sheep. Feed the sheep. Take care of
them. The aim of God's servant is to
take care of the sheep, no matter what it costs him, no matter
what it costs him. See, God's servants are not hirelings,
not taking care of the sheep because the sheep are giving
them something. And God's servants are not hirelings in this way.
Their message is not for sale. They're not trying to find out
what you want to hear and then preaching it. They come to you
saying, thus saith the Lord. This is what God's word says.
They're preaching freely. Their message is not for sale.
Their business is to freely preach the gospel of Christ as the Lord
has freely given it to them. Brethren, we wouldn't understand
a single word of this book if God didn't freely give us an
understanding. If he didn't freely give us a heart to believe it,
then we're to preach it to people freely. All right? That does not mean that God's
pastors are to take a vow of poverty either. You know, when
you find God's preacher, you're going to find him somewhere between
poverty and wealthy. He's going to be somewhere in
the middle. He's going to live like an ordinary, common, working
man, because that's what he is. He's a working man. He works
in the Word. God's pastors are to give themselves
to the ministry. They're to give their time to
prayer, to study of God's Word, to seeking out God's message
for his people in that hour. They're to give their time to
preaching. And if a man's handling the ministry, if he's giving
himself to the ministry properly, he's not going to have time for
a secular job. He's not going to have time. But he's not going
to be out on the street corner begging for money either. So
how is God going to provide for him? He's not asking people for
money. He's not begging people for money. So how is God going
to provide for him? Through the church. Look at 1
Corinthians chapter 9. I'll show you that. See, those
who preach the gospel, they live by the gospel. Both spiritually
and physically, they live by the gospel. 1 Corinthians 9, beginning in verse 7. Who goeth to warfare any time
in his own charges? Who planteth the vineyard, and
eateth not of the fruit thereof? Or who feedeth the flock, and
eateth not of the milk of the flock? Say I these things as
a man, or sayeth not the law the same also? For it is written
in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox
that treadeth out the corn? Doth God take care for oxen?
Or sayeth he it altogether for our sakes? Did he just say that
for the sake of the oxen, or did he say it for our sakes?
No, for our sakes. No doubt this is written, that
he that plows should plow in hope, and he that thresheth in
hope should be partaker of his hope. If we have sown unto you
spiritual things, Is it a great thing if we should reap of your
carnal things? Here's what Peter or what the
apostle Paul is saying, that those who benefit spiritually
from the preaching of the gospel, God gives them a heart to give
of their carnal things to support the ministry. And I'm not reading
this to you. I hope you know this to be self-serving
or try to get anything from you because this congregation, I
thank God for you. You don't need to be corrected
in these areas. Not at all. Um, we need to be
taught. You need to be encouraged to
continue, but, but not, not corrected, but we need to be taught these
things. This is how the Lord provides for his preachers. And if you'll look back in our
text, the Lord saying the same thing there in verse 10, at the
end of verse 10, he says, no, don't provide all these things.
Don't gather up all these extra things for yourself. You don't
need to do that because the workman is worthy of his means. He's
worthy to receive this here. How is he going to receive it?
God's going to provide it for him. And verse 11 tells us how
he does. And into whatsoever city or town you shall enter,
inquire who in it is worthy, and thereby do you go thins. Now the word inquire there means
to search out. You go and you search out someone
who's worthy. Who's that? I mean, who's worthy? Who's worthy of the gospel? Who's
worthy of Christ? Who's worthy of God's grace?
No one. I mean, how are you gonna find
somebody that's worthy? Well, the word worthy, I looked
this up. This is very interesting. It
means having weight, and specifically it means having the weight of
another thing of value. Having the weight of another
thing of value. A worthy person is someone who's
not worthy in themselves. something else of value. God's
given them faith in Christ. God's given them life. God's
given them an interest in the gospel. They're worthy in Christ. They're worthy because they have
the weight of something else of value. Christ already dwells
in them. Well, how did that happen? Whenever we preach to people
who are worthy, you know why they're worthy? God's been there
first and he's prepared there are to be good ground. Look back
at Matthew chapter nine, verse 35. And Jesus went about all
the cities and villages teaching in their synagogues and preaching
the gospel of the kingdom. The Lord himself went to all
these cities and villages and what did he do? He preached the
very same message after he went to all these cities and villages
preaching the gospel of the kingdom. Then he told his disciples, you
go out and preach the very same message. He sent them out to
the places he'd already been. He'd already been to all the
cities and villages and they went and preached to people.
Some of them heard the Lord preach. Some of them, maybe they talked
to someone who heard the Lord preach and the Lord prepared
their heart and made their heart good ground. He made them worthy. And then he sent the disciples
out to preach to them. And a worthy person, when they
hear the gospel, they're going to believe it. They're going
to rejoice in it. They're going to be thrilled
by it. And that worthy person, God's given them a heart. They
will support the ministry. Verse 12. And when you come into
a house, salute it. And if the house be worthy, let
your peace come upon it. If the house is worthy, there's
going to be peace. If somebody is there that believes
Christ, There's going to be peace between you and them. There's
going to be agreement on Christ between you and them, and they're
going to take care of one another. The preacher is going to take
care of them in preaching the spiritual things, and that worthy
person is going to take care of the preacher and giving them
his carnal things, just exactly like Paul described in 1 Corinthians.
But now here's a sobering note, I guess, to end on. Everybody we preach to is not
going to believe the gospel. They're not going to love it. And they're
not going to love us who preach it. They're not going to love
those who believe it. But you know, we're to preach
the gospel to them freely too. Because verse 13 says, if the
house be worthy, let your peace come upon it. But if not, if
it, if it be not worthy, you're mistaken, you find that it's
not worthy. Let your peace return to you. And whosoever should
not receive you nor hear your words, when you depart out of
that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet. Now the
Lord is not telling us to do this in a mean spirit. Now you know that. He doesn't
teach us to do anything in a mean-spirited way. He's simply telling us when
somebody refuses the gospel, you preach to them, and not just
once, but many times, and you preach the gospel, they just
refuse to hear it. They will not hear you. They will not believe
it. They hate it. Then leave them
alone. Leave them alone about it. And
you don't have to be mean about it, but leave them alone. The
Lord says, leave them alone. Don't think you're more loving
than the Lord. And, you know, just make peace with them by
compromising the gospel and think you're more loving than the Lord.
The Lord said, leave them alone. Leave them alone. That's very
serious. I mean, can you think of something
more serious in this life than that? God leaving you alone.
I mean, that is the last thing I want. I don't want God to leave
me alone. I don't want God to leave you alone. But if someone
will not have our King, if somebody will not bow to our King, if
somebody will not worship our God, then we cannot walk in fellowship
with them. We cannot. And we're to leave
them alone. And I want to show you how serious
this matter is. We're refusing to hear the gospel, refusing
to believe it. Verse 15. Verily I say unto you,
it should be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah
in the day of judgment than for that city. Everybody, especially
religious folk, like to look down their nose at Sodom and
Gomorrah, all the wickedness that was there. And because God
destroyed that city in such a striking way, you know, we think, well,
that's the worst sinners ever was. You know what the Lord said,
isn't it? I mean, it was a wicked, wicked
place. God should have destroyed it.
He was right in doing it. But God says everything that
went on in that place, is not nearly as wicked as somebody
hearing the gospel and refusing to believe it. Can you think
of that? That's a solemn warning that
I pray that we'll heed. And I pray God will give us a
heart to continue to preach the gospel freely. Because the only
thing that's gonna deliver somebody from that kind of judgment is
hearing the gospel of Christ and believing it. And I hope
the Lord will bless that too.