I know that for most of you,
thankfully, it's been many years since you have been in one of
those three ring circuses, folks call churches. But have you ever
imagined what would happen, or tried to imagine, what would
happen if the Lord Jesus Christ were to walk into the average
Baptist church in this country in this day in the middle of
a worship service, what they call worship services. I'd sure like to be there. I'd
sure like to be there. Turn with me to Luke 19. I'll
show you exactly what would happen. Luke 19, verse 45. He went into the temple and began
to cast out them that sold therein and them that bought, saying
unto them, it is written, my house is the house of prayer,
but you've made it a den of thieves, a dark cave where crooks live. And he taught daily in the temple,
but the chief priest and scribes and the chief of the people sought
to destroy him and could not find what they might do, for
the people were very attentive to hear him." We read the other
accounts, the people paid attention to him because for the first
time in their lives, they listened to a man preach. with the authority
of one who believed what he said. He talked to people as one that
had authority, conviction. He believed what he said. Benjamin
Franklin, one of our founding fathers, he was a deist. He had no interest in God, the
Bible, or Christianity. But every time he had a chance
to, he'd go hear George Whitefield preach. And somebody asked him
one time, said, why do you go listen to that man preach? You
don't believe anything he says. He said, no, but he does, and
I like to hear him. Our Lord taught the people with
authority as one who believed what he preached. If you read
the accounts given by Matthew and Mark of this same incident,
Mark tells us that after he had driven out those money changers
who sold doves, and dumped the money changers' money on the
floor, turning their tables upside down. He went so far as not to
even allow them to carry their vessels through the temple."
We would be shocked to see the things Matthew, Mark, and Luke
record, these things that our Savior did that evening when
he came to Jerusalem. But if there's one thing this
religious generation needs, it needs to be shocked. It needs
to be shocked. Our Lord Jesus did something
here that just folks were astounded. Can you imagine? Here they are
on the most high, holy day of the Jewish calendar. More people
in the temple than at any other time in the year. Packed house. Jews gathered there and apostolates
gathered there from all over the empire. Came from hundreds
of miles away for this one great feast. And the Son of God walks
in and he goes to work. But if you think this is surprising,
Turn to John chapter 2. John gives us a very vivid portrayal
of an exact same incident that took place three years earlier.
Now, this is not some gentle act that the Lord Jesus did.
There's no way to make this thing look like, well, he was really
behaving like a gentleman here. There's no gentle act. Our Lord
Jesus was furious. He was mad. He was angry. You could see fire in his eyes.
Let's see. Here's three years earlier, John
2, verse 13. And the Jews' Passover was at
hand. And Jesus went up to Jerusalem and found in the temple those
that sold oxen and sheep and doves and the changers of money
sitting. And when he had made a scourge
of small cords, he made a whip He drove them out of the temple,
and drove out the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers'
money, and overthrew the tables. He turned everything upside down.
I mean just flat turned everything upside down, and said to them
that sold doves, take these things hence, and make not my father's
house an house of merchandise. And his disciples remembered
that it was written, the zeal of thine house hath eaten me
up. The disciples said, I reckon that's what he's talking about.
He's full of zeal. His anger has something to do
with his zeal for God's house, God's people, and God's worship. When our Savior first began his
public ministry, the first time he went with his disciples to
keep the Passover, He saw in the house of God an unbearable
display of irreverence and utter contempt among people who claim
to be worshiping and serving God, a display of irreverence
and utter contempt for the house of God and the worship of God. And it drove him out. Now, three
years have passed. He comes to Jerusalem again.
Again, it's the time of the Passover. And what effect did the first
thing have? None at all. Things were exactly the same
as they were three years earlier. Well, what was the great offense
here? What were these people doing
that was so bad? Lots of folks look at this passage
and say, well, ought not to sell books or tapes or anything in
church house. This building is a building. It's not a holy place. This is just a building. That's
not what it's talking about. The business that was carried
on here in the forecourt of the temple was connected with sacrificial
offerings. It was connected with the atonement
money the Jews were required to pay every year. The Jews came
to Jerusalem at the time of Passover from many, many countries. You
remember in Acts chapter 2 that Brother Bob read back in the
office just a little bit ago, the people heard those folks speaking, every
man in his own language, from all these various countries.
The money changers were there for what appears to me to be
very good, reasonable purposes. It looks to me like it's very
reasonable. If they were not there, all these people coming
from different countries would have to go to a lot of trouble
to exchange their money to the currency in Jerusalem so that
they could make proper payment of atonement money, every man
a half shekel. And so the money changers set
up their tables, and they were sitting right there as you came
through the temple. It's so convenient. Come to God's house. You come
from this place. Oh, here, I'll take that. Here's
your half shekel. Where'd you come from? Oh, here's
your half shekel. I'll take that. And of course,
they had to make a little profit. Had to make a little profit.
Same thing could be said with regard to the other businessmen
who were there serving the Lord, serving His people. If the people
were to keep the Passover, remember what they were required to have.
They were required to bring sacrifices, animals, oxen, sheep, wines,
oil, salt, all those things which were involved in making sacrifice.
The poor who couldn't afford the oxen or the sheep were permitted
under God's law to bring a pair of pigeons or a pair of turtle
doves. And of course, all through that
area, there were plenty of dove and plenty of pigeons. But then
they'd have to go out and catch them. So it's very convenient. They come in. They bring the
money. I'll buy an ox and take that to the Lord. I'll buy your
sheep here. I'll take that to the Lord. Or they'll go over
here to the fellow who's selling for the poor folks, and I'll
buy some turtle does. I'll take two and take that to
the Lord. Very convenient. Very convenient. If it weren't
for these folks being there, they'd have to go out and trouble
themselves to worship God. If it weren't for these folks
being there, they'd have to make preparation before they came
to the house of God. If it weren't for these folks
being there, they would have to actually be involved. in worshipping
God. What could be wrong with what
these folks were doing? We read of nothing in any of the narratives
that these people did except that which appeared to be useful
and very reasonable to be done if your purpose were anything
except worshipping God. It'd be perfectly reasonable
if you were running a business. It'd be perfectly reasonable
if you had a restaurant. It'd be perfectly reasonable
if you were taking folks and bringing them into the country
for any other reason. Their crime was this. The priest and the
people sought to enrich themselves in the name of worshiping and
serving God. That's serious business. That's
serious business. They sought to enrich themselves
in the name of worshiping and serving God. Our Savior said,
you're a den of thieves. And I say with regard to any
man Any group of men, anywhere, under any name, who seek to enrich
themselves in the name of worshiping and serving God and His people,
they are a den of thieves. Their purpose is altogether masked
by that which they say. Their real purpose is their own
gain. We were talking about it before
services. I hadn't told anybody what I was going to preach on,
even my wife. And I was sitting there listening to Bob and Rex,
the first two fellows who came in tonight, talking about some
of these things, and I thought, I wonder how they know how much
my dander is up. Some time ago I was preaching
down at Buck Mountain. A preacher came to hear me and
we sat down at the services. He started talking to me. I've
been a pastor in this place for a long time. Typical. Arminian,
free will, works, shindig. And he said, oh, I'd give anything
to have a free pulpit. We talked a little bit and he
said it again. We talked a little bit and he said it again. And
I leaned over the table and I said, the only reason you don't is
your fault. It's your fault. If you had any backbone, you'd
have a free pulpit because nobody could control you. Nobody could
control you. That passage Rex read a little
while ago, that's true. Look at Peter. I read that and
I think, here's this man standing before fellows who had just put
the Son of God to death. And they asked him, how did you
do this? Peter could have said lots of things and told the truth. He could have said, why, we did
this by the name of the Lord Jehovah, the only true and living
God. And then he said, well, amen,
brother, we're one mind in this. But Peter knew where their point
of rebellion was. It involved the person and work
of God's darling son and the accomplishment of redemption
by him. And he stood up on his hind legs and he said, I've got
one thing to say to you. This man stands here in front
of you whole because Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified
and God raised from the dead, made him whole. Now do what you've
got to. That's where it is. And then
preachers excuse their cowardice and compromise because they're
afraid of some deacons. Their cowardice and compromise
because they're afraid somebody's going to pinch their wallets. Here's
something else that's wrong with what they did. They turned the
house of God into a den of thieves. And in doing so, they took that
which was to be the house of prayer and made it a house of
pleasure. That's the problem, those two
things. Oh, they read the law. They kept
the feast with great pomp. And they kept their impressive
ceremonies. Oh, I can imagine how impressive
the ceremonies. I can see the priestly garb.
Man, it'd make the pope look like he's dressed in rags. They
were impressive. They were impressive. But they
made the Word of God of no effect, because this is what they did
with it. Now let's go on. They set it aside and ignored
it, preferring to the Word of God their traditions, their customs,
their history, the teachings of their fathers, generation
after generation, and they just laid the Word of God aside. Oh,
once in a while referring to it, but never paying any attention
to it. Now, is there a message here
for us today? The temple was destroyed 2,000 years ago. We
do not observe those holy days the Jews profaned. Our Lord fulfilled
all those things that were required in the law. And I have to acknowledge
I have seen a lot of strange things in churches. And I don't
even go to the... circuses. But I've seen a lot
of strange things in churches. I've seen a lot of strange things.
But in 35 years as preaching, I've never yet seen anybody selling
animals in a church house. I've seen a few bring them in
to give them away for a Sunday school prize, but I never saw
anybody selling any. I've never seen anyone conducting currency
exchange in a church house. Such things wouldn't surprise
me, I'll be honest, but I haven't seen them. So is there anything
here for us? Any message here for us? Indeed
there is. There are some very important
lessons. Let me give you four of them. Here's the first. The
purging of the temple by our master stands out to me as one
of the most glaring displays of his absolute Godhead and divinity
while he walked on this earth. I'm reminded when our Lord Jesus
was in Gethsemane and the soldiers came to arrest him, the master
gave orders on the day. He gave the orders, not the folks
who came with Caesar's name, not the folks who came with swords
and spears and staves, but the Son of God gave the orders and
the fellows who came to arrest him did what he said. They did
what he said. When the demons were about to
be cast out of that man possessed of a legion of demons, they begged
the Son of God to give them permission to go into a herd of swine. On
this occasion, our Lord Jesus comes into the temple, and the
fact that He did what He did. Now try to picture it. Here are
the chief priests. Here are the scribes and the
Pharisees and the Sadducees, these mighty, mighty powerful
religious people. Here they are, these fellows
who hadn't hesitated to say whatever they wanted to in the past. But
while the Son of God is in there with fire in His eyes and anger
in His voice, turning the tables upside down, driving out the
sheep and the cattle and driving out the money changers and those
that sold doves in the temple, they didn't say a word. They're dumbfounded. They're
awestruck. Here's another thing. The house
of God is his house. Christ is the head. The only
head of his church. He is the king. The only king
in his kingdom. And there is no voice of authority
in the church and kingdom of God. No voice of authority at
all except his voice. None other. None other. I can't stress this sufficiently.
Anytime a congregation decides that their voice of authority
is a creed they have drawn up or a creed somebody else has
drawn up, this is what you'll do. Now, what does the creed
say? And we will judge this book by
our book. There is no voice of authority
in the church and kingdom of God except his voice given to
us in his word. He alone is the head. He alone is the king. He alone calls the shots. He alone determines how his kingdom
is run. Here's the third thing. Sometimes
faithful men Men who seek the glory and honor of God simply
must get angry and must show themselves angry. It must be
done. I know that sounds so strange.
Oh, I like Brother Joe. He's such a loving fellow. He's
so nice. Everybody loves Brother Joe.
He never has a bad thing to say about anything. He's so good.
He's such a good preacher. He never causes any ripples.
He never disturbs anything. Oh, he's so nice. He smiles so
pretty when he preaches. I remember years ago, my friend,
Brother Harry Graham, and I had attended a meeting together,
and a brilliant intellectual fellow was trying to explain
the charismatic phenomenon, as they called it in those days.
And he was so careful not to offend, so loving. Now, our charismatic brethren,
our Arminian brethren, we don't want to speak evil of them. And Brother Harry looked over
at me and he said, they're soon going to love themselves right
out of truth. Truth demands that those who
love it adhere to it and never give approval. or the appearance
of approval to that which contradicts God's truth. You heard me. Neither give approval
nor the appearance of approval. Don't do it. And silence is the
appearance of approval. Now, here's the fourth thing,
and I want to camp here. The church of our God is a house of prayer. And when I
speak of God's church, I'm not talking about this building.
When I speak of God's house, I'm not talking about a physical
structure. The church and temple of God, the house of God is the
assembly of his saints met together in the name of Christ to worship
him, met together for prayer. You are the temple of God and
the Spirit of God dwells in you when you come together in the
name of Christ. Where two or three have gathered
together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. Now,
there is no room. There is no room. If you take
your notes, write it down, there's no room. There is no room in
the house of God for anything but prayer. Hmm, well brother Don had shut
down most places they need to be shut down There is no room
in the house of God for anything but prayer worship Now, let's
see what the scriptures are teaching us Turn with me if you will to Nehemiah
chapter 4 There's no room in God's house
for anything but worship, and worship according to this book.
It doesn't matter what your daddy did, your granddaddy did, or
your great-great-great-granddaddies did a thousand years ago. It
doesn't matter. What does God say in His Word?
As it was in the days of Nehemiah, so it is today. The strength
of those who are supposed to bear the burden has decayed. And there's a lot of garbage,
a lot of rubbish in the house of God. And if we would worship
our God, if we would serve him, we must clear the rubbish out
of his house. Bring it, that rubbish that's
been brought in by the philosophies and traditions and customs and
sentiments and opinions of men. Get a shovel and a dump truck,
fill up the dump truck and haul it off. That's what needs to
be done with most of what goes on in the name of worshiping
God in our day. Look here at Nehemiah 4. Nehemiah
has come back to build the house of God. And Judah said in verse
10, the strength of the bearers of burden, those fellows who
are supposed to be doing the work, they don't have any strength. Their strength is decayed. And there is much rubbish. I imagine there was. It's been
70 years since that place was destroyed. Just dust, ash heap,
just rubbish, just trash. There's much rubbish so that
we're not able to build the wall. I say to you, as Peter said to
those who stood before him on the day of Pentecost, save yourselves
from this untoward generation. I took the time last night to
look up that word untoward. Save yourselves from this warped,
winding, crooked, perverse generation. And he was talking about the
religious world accepted and approved by everybody. There's
so much rubbish in the churches of this day that a true gospel
message simply can't be preached in most places of worship without
utter warfare breaking out among those who profess to be worshiping
God, those who profess to be serving Him. Oh, everybody has
a form of godliness. I know that. I know that. And
they'll fight you for it. They have a form of godliness
they maintain. They have a form of religious
exercise to which they are devoted. But while they maintain and devote
themselves to their form of godliness, all the while they deny the power
of true godliness. That is, they deny the gospel
of Christ. That's the power of godliness.
It's the power of God unto salvation. The religious generation in which
we find ourselves today is well described by the Apostle Paul.
Ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the
truth. Religious books roll off the
bookshelves by the thousands every day. Roll off the printed
press. Folks have Bible studies, have
talk sessions, rap sessions. They get together and talk about
the Bible and study and study and study. Ask questions and
ask questions and ask questions. Answer one, they'll have ten
more. Just full of questions. Pay no attention to the answers.
We've got more questions. Constantly trying to learn something
about God and never able to get hold of it. Never able to arrive
at truth. There's so much rubbish in religion
today, that the first thing a preacher has to do, if he goes into one
of these churches, is get a shovel and clean house. That's the first thing you've
got to do. Sometimes I get calls from folks wondering if I'd be
interested in going here or there. Not on your life. I wouldn't
go through it for anything. No, sir. No, sir. Not me. Not
me. Until the rubbish is cleared
out, nothing else can be done. We can't build the walls of Zion
on a pile of garbage. We can't build a wall of hope
and security on religious rubbish. The foundation cannot be laid
until the trash has been removed, recognized, dealt with, and hauled
off. And cleaning up a pile of garbage?
is never easy or pleasant, but it must be done. Faithful men
in every generation have found it their responsibility and have
found the work painful and costly. Moses had to deal with the sons
of Korah. Elijah had to deal with Jezebel
and Ahab, the prophets of Baal. Isaiah had to deal with those
being in his day who kept the worship of idols around. Hezekiah
had to confront the nation of Israel. These people had kept
the brazen serpent. Now imagine this. All those years
since the days of Moses, back yonder in the wilderness, when
God commanded to make that serpent of brass and lift it up so that
everybody who looked at that serpent of brass, a picture of
Christ our Redeemer, would look on him and live, be taken care
of, just like that. And they kept the serpent. Oh,
I can picture it. They fixed him a nice cubicle,
polished that thing up, kept it shining. Oh, now, this is
just to remember. We want to honor this thing.
It was a religious relic they worshipped. Hezekiah said they
burned incense to it, calling it worshipping God. And he ground
it to powder, said it's a worthless piece of brass, threw it in water
and said, now drink your God. You can't do that. You can't
if you worship God. You can't if you serve God. Paul
had to deal with the Judaizers. Luther had to deal with those
fellows coming around selling indulgences. Calvin had to deal
with the same Romanists. Jonathan Edwards in this country,
he pastored a church for 20 years. Church he's grandfathered pastored.
And it got along fine until finally Edwards was convinced something
bad wrong. We've got church members who
never profess faith in Christ. and started to insist that the
church members had to at least profess to be believers. And
you know what they did with him? Threw him out the front door.
Threw him out the front door. George Whitefield, in his day,
couldn't find a place in the Church of England that ordained
him to preach. He preached in open fields everywhere. Same
thing true in Spurgeon's day, same thing true in our day. And
I've preached in a good many churches in the last 35 years. And in those years, I think I
know exactly where the problem is. I think I know what the rubbish
is. And I assure you, wherever I
find it, I deal with it. Wherever I find it, I deal with
it. Let me point out three things. Number one, in religious circles today, I'm
talking about churches of every brand and category. I'm talking
about the most radical fundamentalist and the most radical liberal.
I'm talking about churches of every brand and category. I'm
talking about Calvinistic churches and Armenian churches. In the
religious world today, righteousness has been made a work that men
perform. That's the problem. What does
that mean? The holy, pure, immaculate, unchanging
law of God has been whittled down to a set of rules and regulations
that men can obey, by which they make themselves righteous before
God, so that mere outward religious exercise and outward religious
conformity to certain religious rules is declared to be righteousness. Turn to Matthew 23. Matthew 23. Woe unto you, verse 25, scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you make clean the outside of
the cup and the platter. Oh, you clean up real good. You
clean up good. Take a fellow who's been a drunk
and you get him sober. You take a fellow who's been
a dope head and you get him clean. You take a fellow who's been
an adulterer and you get him to quit. You take the fellow
who's abused his children and you get him to quit. Oh, you
clean him up. And you stand him up and he looks
pretty. But within, they're full of extortion and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse
first that which is within the cup. Christianity ain't something
outside. It's Christ in you. We don't begin with the outside
and work our way in. We begin with the inside and
God works his way out. Just exactly the opposite of
the world. Clean up that which is within
the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean
also. Verse 27, Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like, what a picture,
your religion, and all the folks banded with you, as like a grave,
white in sepulchers. You go out on Memorial Day, Put
flowers around your daddy's grave and you paint the grave up pretty
and you make it look so nice and you honor your daddy and
forget that inside ain't nothing but dead men's bones. Your religion
is just a whited sepulcher. A tomb of death. And there'd
be no change on the inside. Look in Matthew chapter 5. Matthew
chapter 5. Verse 20. Our Lord Jesus says, I say unto
you that except your righteousness shall exceed. Wait a minute now. Exceed the
righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees? These fellows
paid tithes on the chickens they raised. If you had ten chickens,
you gave the church one. They prayed three times a week. or three times a day, fasted
twice a week. They dressed religious. Man,
you could look at one walking down the street and say, there's
a Pharisee. Boy, he loves the Lord. He loves the law. Anybody
going to ever listen to him pray, you know he's going. You can
look at him and tell he's a Christian. Oh, can you now? Can you now? I had a preacher's wife tell
me one time, so I can look at somebody and tell them they're not the same. I
said, would you tell me what they look like? Can you? Oh, now I can tell you who's
religious. I can look at a fellow and tell you whether or not he's
religious. I can hear him open his mouth in one sentence and
tell you whether or not he's religious. Oh, they talk so good. But our
Lord says, except your righteousness exceed all that. You've got to
have something they don't have. You've got to have something
they don't have. Better righteousness. Better righteousness than that
righteousness that men attain by obedience to the law or by
pretended obedience to the law. Except your righteousness exceed
the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no
case enter into the kingdom of God. Now listen to me. Listen
to me. Righteousness is not something
you do. It is not something you do. You cannot make yourself righteous. Well, Brother Don, I understand
that we make ourselves more righteous. Say that again now. Oh, I understand
you can't make yourself righteous, but surely a man can make himself
more righteous. If you can't make yourself righteous, how
are you going to make yourself more righteous? Righteousness is not something
you do. No, sir. Righteousness is something God
did for us in his son. The Lord Jesus Christ, God's
darling Son, is the Lord our righteousness. And the only righteousness
we have is that righteousness which is made of God unto us,
our righteousness in Christ who is our righteousness. There is
none else. He made us righteous by His atoning
work, by His obedience unto God unto death, and He makes us righteous
by putting something in us that no religion can, by putting Himself
in us. Christ in you, the hope of glory. Christianity is not a creed,
it's a person. Christianity is not something
outward. but altogether inward. Christianity,
godliness, is not something that men see, but something God puts
in the heart, and the Lord looketh on the heart. That's all. All right? That's the first problem. The bondwoman and her son must
be cast out. Must be cast out. Works religion
has got to be cast out. All of it. Now listen to me. Listen to me. All of it is rubbish
that prevents the building of a wall of hope and confidence
and security before God Almighty. You cannot build the walls of
Zion on the rubbish of works. It can't be done. Here's the
second thing. Worship, or what men call worship,
has degenerated into nothing but religious entertainment.
Ceremonies performed under the disguise of worship. Most churches
are nothing else but religious social clubs, entertainment centers.
I sat recently with a pastor who Finally gave up preaching
and got into some other business, good that he did. He said he
just couldn't take it anymore. He said, we used to spend six
months preparing for the worship service. He said, well, our worship
team choreographed everything for six months before we got
there. You need to do that to entertain folks. If God the Holy
Spirit didn't exist, if there were no such thing, most churches
it wouldn't change a thing. They could go on just like they
always have. Their program wouldn't have a
glitch if there were no such person as God the Holy Spirit. You see, you don't need the Spirit
of God to make a decision for Jesus. But you must have Him
to be born again. You don't need the Spirit of
God to reform your life. Any good counselor can help you
with that, but you must have the Spirit of God to be regenerate.
You don't need the Holy Spirit to make a profession of faith
in Christ, but you've got to have Him to have faith in Christ.
You don't need the Holy Spirit to learn a creed and learn to
fight for it, but you must have Him to learn the gospel. You
don't need the Spirit of God to stand up and testify and brag
on Jesus. But you've got to have him to
bow down and worship. You don't need God the Holy Spirit
to be devoted and zealous in the performance of religious
activity and service to God. But you've got to have the Holy
Spirit to sit at the master's feet and hear his word. You don't
need the Spirit of God to be immersed in water. Anybody can
do that. But you've got to have him to
be baptized into Christ. You don't need the Spirit of
God to observe the Lord's table. You can go through this service
with us every Sunday night for the rest of your lives. You don't
need the Spirit of God for that. Oh, but you've got to have Him
to remember Christ and commune with God our Savior. You've got
to have Him. You don't need the Spirit of
God to recite a prayer. But you must have Him to pray. I don't think I'll ever forget
something Brother Bobby Esther said to me shortly after God
saved him. It's been some years ago. I don't think he mind me
telling you. He said, when I attended that other thing, I think it's
the way you referred to it. I never had any trouble getting up and
reading scripture or praying. But oh, I have a tough time doing
this since God saved me. You don't need the spirit of
God to exercise religion. You've got to have him to worship.
You don't need the Spirit of God to stand up in a pulpit and
give out a lesson and call it a sermon. But oh, you've got to have Him to deliver
a message from the heart of God to the hearts of His people.
You don't need the Spirit of God to pay your tithe. Any accountant
can tell you what 10% is. But you've got to have Him to
give two mites. to God Almighty. You've got to
have Him. You don't need the Spirit of
God to love religion. I know lots of folks who love
religion. But you've got to have the Spirit of God to love one
another. You don't need the Spirit of God to meet together. But
you've got to have Him to be a habitation of God through the
Spirit. To be a house of prayer, of worship. You've got to have Him. to worship
God. There's no room in this place.
No room in this place. There's no room in this place
for anything except prayer. That which involves the worship
of God. And I make you a promise. I make
you a promise. As long as I have any influence
as your pastor in this congregation. And when I don't have any, I
won't be your pastor. As long as I have any influence
as your pastor in this congregation, there will never be anything
done here except the preaching of the gospel, calling on God
in prayer, giving praise to our God, observing these ordinances
of divine worship prescribed by God. Oh, but Brother Don,
y'all are so out of step with the times. I intend to stay out
of step. It's my determined purpose. Oh,
but nobody going to pay attention to that. God's people will. Folks who hear the Master's voice
will. And frankly, I have no concern about the rest. I'm not
interested. I'm not interested in the opinions
of others. I'm not interested in what anybody
outside these walls thinks about what goes on in here. I'm not
interested in whether the folks in town approve or disapprove.
It doesn't matter one bit to me, not in the least. I hope
it doesn't to you. That's the second problem. Churches
have said goodbye to God to make room for their religion. Here's
the third. The church of this perverse,
crooked, warped generation has substituted the message of the
gospel, the message of Jesus Christ and him crucified for
a message of doom. Church today says stand up and
be counted. The word of God demands that
you bow down and worship. Church today says the Lord wants
to save you. The gospel of God declares, God
saves whom he will. The church today says, open your
heart and the Lord will come in. The gospel of God declares,
unless God knocks down your heart and puts himself in you, you
will never know him. The church today calls on sinners
to do their part. Oh, you ask the average religious
fellow, whether he's sitting in the pew like you are, whether
he's standing in the pulpit like I am, why he hopes to go to heaven
when he dies, he'll talk a little bit about God, and he'll talk
a little bit about grace, and he'll talk a little bit about
Jesus, and he'll talk a little bit about the Spirit of God,
and then he'll tell you why he hopes to go to heaven when he
dies. Ah, I did. I said. I felt. I experienced. Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah. It makes
a difference. And it's told you exactly who
his God and his Savior is. We pray for redemption and grace
in Jesus Christ the Lord alone. No other. Our Lord Jesus Christ
did not come here to reform the religious world. He came here
to work out righteousness for his people, and he did it. He
didn't come here to set a good example for you to pattern your
life after. I get so sick and tired, folks, excuse their works,
you know, excuse their religious show, religious nonsense. They go to a restaurant and they
want everybody to look at them because they're going to pray
now, going to pray now. Look at me, I love Jesus so much. Oh, I want you to understand
I love Jesus. I want you to see Jesus in me.
When our Lord walked on this earth, Larry, nobody saw Jesus
in Jesus. They sure ain't going to see
Him in you. I don't care what you do. I'll tell you what they'll
see in you. Religion. That's all. Oh, He's so good. He's so godly. He must really love the Lord.
He must really be devoted to Jesus. And I want to tell you
something else. When you get it, you got what
you were looking for because you didn't have any concern at
all in honoring Jesus. You want the approval of men
and you can't seek both. It can't be done. You cannot
seek the approval of your neighbor and the approval of God. You
cannot seek the applause of men and the approval of God. You
cannot seek to serve your own interest and serve the interest
of God's glory. It cannot be done. You'll serve
one or the other. You can't serve both. The Lord
Jesus Christ is not a sweet Jesus who wants to save. No, no, he's
not. Matter of fact, let me tell you
something. He doesn't want to do anything. Not God Almighty. God wants. He what? He wants. The Lord wants to save you. Isn't
that sweet? But you've got to do your part. So God's will doesn't matter.
God's power is insignificant. Christ's blood is meaningless.
His intercession is vanity. The work of God and the Holy
Spirit is no work at all, it's just a little influence to tug
at your heart. And the only thing that really matters is you. Oh, that makes it a little more
serious, doesn't it? Indeed it does. We do not preach
sweet Jesus who wants to save, but rather we proclaim Jesus
Christ, the Son of God, who by virtue of His blood and righteousness
is able to save to the uttermost all them that come to God by
Him. Now come home to Him. Come home
to Him. Come on. Brother Don, you just
told me I can't. I sure did. I sure did. I reckon
that means if you come, He did it. I reckon that means if you believe
in David, it's because he gave you faith. I reckon that means
if you turn to God to serve the living God from your dead idols,
it's because God turned you. Now, come unto Him. And He promises, Him that cometh
to me, I will in no wise cast out. Amen. Lindsay, let's sing
I Love Thy Kingdom, Lord. I believe it's number 188.