Titus chapter 3. We're going to mainly look at verses
2 and verse 3 tonight. Let me read just a few verses. Titus chapter 3, verse 1. Put them in mind, remind
them to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates,
to be ready to every good work, to speak evil of no man, to be
no brawlers, but gentle, showing all meekness unto all men. But
we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived,
serving divers' lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful,
and hating one another. But after that the kindness and
love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works of
righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He
saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost,
which He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior,
that being justified by His grace we should be made heirs according
to the hope of eternal life." As I read these verses here,
4, 5, 6, and 7, I thought how anxious I am to get to studying
those verses. down there are just wonderful
thoughts that come to you as you even read those verses. But
first of all tonight, let's look at verses 2 and 3 to speak evil
of no man. And it's amazing as he begins here to remind us of
what to do and what not to do. And I think it's very telling
that the Bible constantly reminds us what we should do and what
we should not do. And it's telling because the
Lord knows what we are. He absolutely knows what we are
and He knows that over and over and over again we have to be
reminded what to do and what not to do. Isn't it amazing that
He has to remind us to obey magistrates, to obey the laws of the land
when we know that we should? And we know what would be the
consequences if we didn't have civil authority. We would live
in chaos. And knowing all that, He still
has to remind us. Paul reminded us in Romans 13.
He does it here. Peter reminds us. Then it's very
telling that He has to come here and remind us of something else,
to maintain good works, to be ready to every good work. You mean we have to be reminded
of that? He's created us into good works, and yet He has to
continue to remind us. And He reminds us of not what
to do, to speak evil of no man. Do we have to be reminded of
that? Do we have to be reminded not to let any evil communication
proceed out of our mouth? We do, don't we? It's amazing
how we read these epistles, and not so much this epistle, but
other epistles. And we begin with this doctrine. He tells us what to believe in
the first portion of these epistles. And then the last portion, He
tells us what to do, how to live our lives. And I tell you, both
of those are important, aren't they? It's essential that the
Lord tells us who to believe and what to believe and how to
believe. If He didn't, we'd be deceived, wouldn't we? We wouldn't
know what to believe. But isn't it just as important to tell
us how to act, what to do and what not to do? And I just think
it's very telling that sometimes when we read these things and
He reminds us of these things, it just reminds us how crooked
we still are. how absolutely crooked that we
still are. And sometimes I'm amazed that
God puts up with me, aren't you? How patient He is with me, how
patient He is with you, how long-suffering He is. It makes us realize how
we need an advocate with a Father, and that we have one, that He's
seated there. And how patient the Holy Spirit
is to abide with us, to be merciful to our unrighteousness, The very
fact that He's reminding us to do these things and not to do
these things tells us that yet we are so unlike Jesus Christ
our Savior. The Scripture tells us that we're
predestinated to be conformed to the image of Christ. But boy,
sometimes we almost despair that we're no more like Him than we
are. After 45 years or so of my life
of following Christ, sometimes I almost despair to think, Lord,
look at the difference between you and me. It's amazing, isn't
it? Did our Lord Jesus ever speak
evil of anybody? Do you ever find where one single
time He slandered any man or any woman? You never find that.
Did he misjudge anybody's actions or their motives? Never. Did
he ever have to put a guard over his mouth so he wouldn't speak
evil? He never did. Did he ever have to examine himself
to make sure that he was doing right and that he was reframing
for evil? He never did have to do that.
But you have to do it all the time, don't you? You have to
set a guard over your mouth and over your actions. You have to
prompt yourself to do that which is good, and you have to restrain
yourself from doing that which is evil. But He never did that. He never did that. He did no
sin, the Bible says. Ain't that wonderful? Aren't
we so unlike Him? He did no sin. Who among us can
say, I have no sin? Who among us can say, I never
sinned? As shameful as it is, we have to admit it, but he never
did. And he had no guile in his mouth. Never spake any guile. Even when he was reviled, the
Scripture says, he reviled not again. And when he suffered,
he threatened not. He threatened not. So it reminds
us, even in these passages like this, the difference still between
us and our Lord. And every one of us will acknowledge
that, won't we? We all acknowledge that. We may
measure up to our own criteria, but we don't measure up to Christ
as our example. And it leaves us praying, Lord,
make me like Yourself. Work in me to will and to do
of Your good pleasure. Give me the mind of Christ. Cause
me to walk like He walked in the world. Confirm me to His
example in faith and love and obedience and wisdom. Make me more like Jesus Christ,
my Lord. Well, we need these instructions,
don't we? We need these precepts. We need them. There are times
when we not only should not speak evil, But there are times when
we shouldn't even tell the truth on some people. Some people have
fallen. Some man, some woman have fallen.
And they've brought shame maybe on the Lord's name. They've embarrassed
themselves. They've embarrassed those who
love them. And they're brokenhearted. And you know what? You and I
should say nothing about it. Somebody will say, well, I think
you ought to tell the truth about things. But love covers a multitude
of sins, doesn't it? So even in that, we should not
even tell the truth about somebody who has fallen. And I had a dear
pastor friend of mine, and he and I were preaching at a conference
one place, and he wasn't feeling good. He was having trouble in
his mind, and he preached an excellent message. But right
in the middle of his message, he made one of the most terrible
statements I ever heard in my life. And he didn't even know
he made it. It was terrible, absolutely terrible.
And he came down out of the pulpit and we went on with the services.
And his wife said, Sweetheart, did you hear what you said? She
told him what he said. He said, I didn't say that. She
said, Yes, you said that. But you know something? Nobody
said a thing about it. Everybody just covered it up.
And you haven't heard a word about it since. Love covers a
multitude of sins. So there's a time not only not
to speak evil, but there's a time. Don't even tell the truth about
some dear soul who has fallen or made a mistake in something
like that. I don't want to mislead us here
in what this text means. It doesn't mean we're never to
expose evil, even evil people and evil deeds of people. It
doesn't mean we're never to expose lies. and those who preach and
teach lie. Paul was writing to Timothy and
here is what he said. He said, Timothy, Alexander the
coppersmith did me much evil. The Lord reward him according
to his works. And he says, Of whom be thou
aware also, for he has greatly withstood our words. Here was
a man Paul exposed, called him out by name. That is fine, isn't
it? Nothing wrong with that. Evil
needs some time to be exposed. The Lord Jesus exposed the Pharisees,
didn't He? And called some of them by their
names and called them vipers and serpents and told His disciples,
You beware of the leaven, of the doctrine of the Pharisees,
which is hypocrisy. So there's nothing wrong with
exposing evil people, even calling them sometime out by name and
exposing their lies. That's not what the Apostle Paul
is speaking here. But to speak evil of no man means
don't slander someone. Don't misrepresent someone. Don't
tell things on people just to injure their character. or cause
someone to lose confidence in them. Don't do that. And aren't
we bad for this? Don't speak evil of someone just
so we will look good. If we can set somebody else in
a bad light, it makes us look better, doesn't it? So don't
slander. Don't misrepresent anybody. And evil speaking is so common
even in the church. that the Bible constantly warns
us against it. There must be something to this
that needs to be stressed even in the church because everywhere
the Bible speaks against, don't do this, don't do this. Peter
warns us in 1 Peter 2, 1, listen to this, laying aside all malice
and guile and hypocrisy and envious and all evil speaking. Lay it aside, lay it aside. He that will love life and see
good days, let him reframe his tongue from speaking evil, and
his lips that they speak no guile." Refrain from it. The Apostle
Paul said this, "...let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor
and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice." Evil
speaking. And James said this, "...speak
evil, Speak not evil one of another. And I want us to turn over there
and read that. Turn over here to James chapter 4 with me. Because
he mentions something here. He looks at it in a different
manner than anybody else. Look here at what James says
about it in James chapter 4 and verse 11. James chapter 4 and verse 11.
This probably gets a little bit closer home to some of us in
James chapter 4 and verse 11. What James is writing here in
verse 11, look what he says, Speak not evil one of another
brethren. Brethren? Speak not evil one
of another brethren. He that speaketh evil of his
brother, and judgeth his brother, speaks evil of the law and judges
the law. But if thou judge the law, thou
art not a doer of the law, but a judge. There is one lawgiver
who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you that judgeth another?"
Now here is what James is speaking about. Paul deals with this too
in the fourteenth chapter of Romans. But here is what James
is dealing with. During what we call the transition
period in the early church, beginning during the book of Acts, the
church was coming out using an obedience to the ceremony of
Lord Moses. And they were having a difficult
time doing it, not being circumcised, abstaining from certain meats
and certain drink and not keeping company with certain people.
keeping feast days and new moons and all of that. They were having
a difficult time getting out of that. And we've looked at
that before and we see why they're having a difficult time doing
that. But some of the believers were beginning to realize we've
got liberty in Christ. This ceremonial law doesn't bind
us anymore. We don't have to be careful about
eating certain foods and not eating these certain foods. We
don't have to worry about trying to get up to Jerusalem for some
feast day. It's such a burden on us. Christ
has set us free. But some didn't have that knowledge. Even some who had believed in
Jesus Christ, they thought, we're still under this ceremonial law.
We have to be circumcised. We have to keep this law of Moses.
And those who did not understand the liberty they had in Christ
was speaking evil of those who were enjoying that liberty. That's
what James is writing about here. And we have a wonderful example
of this in Acts chapter 10 and 11. Remember when the Lord told
Peter to go down and preach to Cornelius, the Gentile nation,
the Gentile people? Tell them words whereby they
must be saved. Peter went down to them and entered
into the house and preached the gospel to the Gentiles. The Lord
saved them. And Peter spent a few days with
them and ate with them. What he ate, we don't know. But
when he came back up to Jerusalem, those Jews in Jerusalem met him,
and boy, they contended with him, the Bible says. They argued
with him. I can see them gritting their teeth, what have you done?
What have you done? You know better than this. You
know that we're not allowed by the law to go into those foreigners'
house and you did that and you ate with them? What did you eat?
They disputed with Peter. But Peter began to tell them
what God had told him to do. He said, The Lord told me to
go preach to them. I obeyed the Lord. And they were
ready to speak evil of Peter. And that's what James is talking
about, speaking evil of your brethren. And they were wrong,
but they thought they were right. But they didn't understand the
law, did they? This is what Albert Barnes said about this passage
here. I think he can say it much better
than I do. He said, Many harsh judgments, which one class of
religionists pronounce on others, are in fact judgments on the
laws of Christ. And he said this, We set up our
own standards or our own interpretations and then we judge others for
not complying with them. Don't we do it? We set up our own standards and
our own interpretations and then we judge others for not complying
with them when in fact they may be acting only as the law of
Christ properly understood would allow them to act. Those who
claim a right to judge the conduct of others should be certain that
they understand the nature of true religion, true religion
themselves. It may be presumed, unless there
is evidence to the contrary, that others are as conscientious
as we are. And it may commonly be supposed
that they who differ from us have some reason for what they
do, and may be desirous of glorifying their Lord and Master, and that
they may possibly be right." We've seen this. We've seen the Armenian
system, and we see the Calvinistic system. And if you get outside
of what the Armenians perceive as their system, boy, you've
had it with them. But it's not just them. You go
to the Calvinistic system, and you get outside of what they
perceive as their system, and they'll speak evil of you. Oh,
now wait, they say. Wait, you're outside of this
system. That don't agree with our system.
Well, you can't put the Word of God in a system, can you?
No man's system is big enough to put the Word of God in it.
So we can't say, well, I've got my system here and I can judge
everything you do according to my system. You can't. We can't,
can we? We can't. We have to be so careful
judging people and speaking evil of people just because they don't
agree with us in every jot and in every tittle. I remember when
the Lord first saved me. I don't know why I'm even telling
this. I know it's going to sound awful. But when the Lord first
saved me, boy, we used to guzzle the wine. Man, when I was growing
up, people all around us made wine and we had a boon farm and
we guzzled the stuff. Most of us stayed sick half the
time. And moonshine and boon farm and homemade wine. And when
the Lord saved me, I came out of all that. I just quit drinking. I didn't sip a beer or wine or
anything. But I had a neighbor who drunk
beer. He's a professed Christian. He drank beer. And you know what
I told him? I said, man, you can't be saved and drink a beer
or drink any wine. That was my judgment. I set that
criteria up. And I just didn't tell him that.
I demanded that of him. And you know what he told me?
Same thing Larry, a man, told you. Buddy, you need to go read
your Bible. And I went and read my Bible.
And I went back and said, I'm wrong. I'm wrong. That's what James is saying.
He said, you guys have set up your interpretation of the law
and you're judging people according to your interpretation. And he
said, you're speaking evil of them. They did that with the
Lord's disciples when they were going through the cornfield and
they were hungry and they started pulling those little ears of
corn off and eating them on the Sabbath day. And those Pharisees
said, why do they do that which is not lawful to do on the Sabbath
day? They're sinning. Stop your disciples from sinning.
And the Lord said, they're not sinning. You're speaking evil
of them. They're not sinning. He said,
did you ever read where the priests work all day on the Sabbath day,
preparing sacrifices and things, and they're blameless? My disciples
aren't sinning. You're sinning for falsely accusing
them. You've got your own interpretation
of the law. The law was not made for us to amend it. The law was
made to obey. And people want to mend it and
edit it and get their own interpretation so they can judge other people
by it. That's an evil thing to do. We've
just got to be careful, brothers and sisters, in judging people
and speaking evil of people. We have to be careful of that.
And that's what the Apostle James is telling us here. Not only do we need to be careful
not to speak evil of others, But something else we need to
be careful to remember, and this will help us too, we shouldn't
hear every evil word that's spoken about us. Don't hear every evil word that's
spoken about you. And I'm telling you, you're probably
going to hear somebody say something bad about you. But you know something? You've thought evil about somebody
else, haven't you? Look over here at another place
with me. Look in Ecclesiastes chapter 7. Way back over in the
New Testament. Ecclesiastes chapter 7. It's
on page 752 in the Pew Bible. Look all the way back to Ecclesiastes
chapter 7 in verse 20 and verse 22. This is something that you're
good to remember. I don't want to speak evil. I
don't want to speak evil of people. I've been trying my best and
I've been praying, Lord help me not to speak evil of people.
But you know what I found that I need just as much? Not to think
evil. Not to think evil about people.
And there's times that I've not spoke evil, but I'm sure thanking
them. And you know something? And in
the sight of God, that's bad. Look at what he says in chapter
7 of Ecclesiastes, and look in verse 20. Well, there is not
a just man upon earth. in and of himself the way we're
born. There's not a just man upon this earth that doeth good,
doeth perfectly good, doeth continually good and never sins. You won't
find him. You just won't find him. Only
been one man like that. That's Adam before his fall and
Christ Jesus 2,000 years ago, the Son of God in our humanity.
Look in verse 21. Also, take no heed unto all words
that are spoken. Don't listen to every word that's
said about you. Why? Lest you hear your servant
curse you. Hmm. Hear somebody curse you.
Hmm. Man. I hear a lady one time say
something about me and man, it burnt me up. It burnt me up and
I went off and pouted. I pouted and when I got over
the pout I'd get mad and I'd go from getting mad back to pouting.
But look here what he says in verse 22. For oft times also
your own heart knows that you yourself likewise have cursed
others. You may have did it in your mouth
and they may not have heard you did it but you did it. You did
it. Look in chapter 10 in verse 20. Here he tells us what he is talking
about. Look in chapter 10 and verse 20. Just over to your right.
Curse not the king, no, not in your thought. And curse not the
rich in your bedchamber. Boy, that is pretty private,
ain't it? In your thoughts and in your bedchamber. For a bird
of the air shall carry the voice, and that which hath wings shall
tell the matter. by thoughts. Well, this tells
us something about this speaking evil. It's not just the speaking
of evil, but it's the evil thought. The Lord tells us not to think
evil. Why? Because God is conscious of our
thoughts. Our secret thoughts becomes a
voice that God hears. Nobody can hear our thoughts,
but God can. God can. The Bible tells us what
the Day of Judgment is all about. It's called this, In the day
in which God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. The secrets of men. The secret
thoughts, the secret motives of man are exposed to God. The Pharisees came to John the
Baptist and he said this. He said, Who has warned you to
flee from the wrath of God? He said, Say not within yourselves,
in your own heart. Don't think within your own heart.
We have Abraham to our Father. We don't need your baptism. because
we have no sin to repent of. We don't need righteousness that
you're talking about. We're not concerned about imputed
righteousness because we've got righteousness of our own, thank
you. We're Abraham's seed. We don't need the Son of God.
We don't need sins forgiven because we have no such thing. And John
said, Don't even begin to think that in your heart. Why? Because God sees it. God hears what's being said in
the heart. That's what we ought to be concerned
about, isn't it? You know what? If we would guard our hearts
better, a lot of stuff wouldn't come out
of our mouth. if we guard our hearts. And if we realize that
our very thoughts are exposed unto our Lord, we'd guard our
thoughts much more, wouldn't we? The same God who hears the
cries, the heart cries of the humble, He hears also that wicked
voice of the self-righteousness who says, I don't need salvation. I don't want salvation. I don't
need forgiveness of my sins. He sees the heart. He knows the
heart. God who hears the groanings of
a humble heart hears the sinful thoughts of that self-righteous
heart that is trusting to itself for its salvation. He looks upon
the heart. And this goes a long way. I want
you to turn back over to our text. This goes a long way in
explaining verse 3 in our text. Look quickly back over in our
text, Titus chapter 3 and verse 3 because there is one of two
things in here. If we don't realize that he is
speaking of the heart, then we won't know how to understand
this. Let's read verse 3 again. Paul included himself. Look at
this. For we, me and you Titus, We were also sometimes foolish. Now, I can understand why the
Apostle Paul said that he was a foolish man. The word means
to be ignorant, to be ignorant, to have no understanding. And
Saul of Tarsus was ignorant of some things, wasn't he? He was
ignorant of the holy nature of God. He wouldn't have been bragging
how he could make himself accepted to God if he wasn't ignorant
of God's holy character and just nature. Who is among anybody
that can come up before God and say, I'm clean in your sight?
And yet that's exactly what he thought. He thought God could
find no fault in him. He didn't know the nature of
God, did he? He was ignorant of that. I'll tell you something
else he was ignorant of. He was ignorant of his own nature.
He was ignorant of the nature of the law. Wayne taught us just
a few weeks ago about in Romans 7, Paul said, I was alive without
the law once. I didn't even have knowledge
of sin. I didn't know what sin was. I
didn't know what I was until God sent the law to my heart
and showed me. how holy it was and what it demanded. And I saw myself to be such an
ungodly sinner. I saw the lust. I saw the envy. I saw the murder. I saw the adultery
in my heart. He didn't understand it. And
I'll tell you something else he didn't understand. He was ignorant of
the nature of Jesus Christ as a Savior. He knew nothing about
the Savior bringing in a righteousness to give Him and to justify him. He knew nothing of that. He knew
nothing of that. So he said, I was foolish. I
can understand why he would say that. We see that in him. I can
understand why he said this. Disobedient. We were disobedient. Paul was among those who said,
let us break their bands asunder and cast their courts from us.
We will not have this man to rule over us. Paul was disobedient
to the law of Moses. He was disobedient to God. And
he was a disobedient to the Lord's Apostle. He was a disobedient
man. He said here that he was deceived.
I can see why he was deceived, can't you? He was deceived. You know something? Sin had deceived
him. Sin had filled his heart and he didn't even know it. Satan
had deceived him. Put this veil over his eyes so
he couldn't see. And his own heart had deceived
him. Self-deceived. We can see that about this man.
We can understand when He said here, we were living in malice. That word means extreme enmity
of heart. You know what He said about Christ
before the Lord saved Him? He said, I thought within myself
that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus
or another. He hated Christ, didn't He? Hated God. He says
here that we were hateful and hating one another, hating others. And I can see that in Paul. He
tried to stomp out the name of Christ, he hated Him so much.
He hated the Lord's people so much that he sold them into strange
cities and brought them back to Jerusalem. And when they had
to go to court, he went up and said, I heard that man calling
on the name of Jesus Christ. And he called Him God. He's a
blasphemer and deserves to die. He hated the Lord's people. So
I can understand that, but boy, look here what he says about
this. We were serving divers' lust and pleasure. Now, how in the world are we
to understand that about a strict Pharisee serving divers' lust
and pleasure? When we think of lust and pleasure,
we think of open sin, don't we? When we think of a man serving
his lust, we think, well, this man's left his wife and he's
going to lust after another woman. And we think, here's an alcoholic
that has given himself over to the pleasure of the bottle. When
we think of lust, that's what we think about, when we think
of pleasure. But you know something? The Apostle Paul, before the
Lord saved him, he didn't fit in these open and profane sins,
did he? You'd have never caught that man drunk. He didn't get
drunk. You'd have never caught him openly
lusting after a woman or committing adultery. He wasn't married.
He was a very strict religious person. He lived a separated
life. What then was these lusts and
desires, these pleasures? He wrote in Ephesians chapter
2 and he said we were fulfilling the desires of the flesh. And
what else did he say? Anybody remember what else he
said? The mind. That is where God sees, isn't
it? What were these lusts? Well, let me tell you what this
lust was. And this lust is just as bad as any open and profane
sin in the eyes of God, lusting after the praise and the esteem
of men rather than the honor of God alone. That's what Paul
was lusting after. The Lord Jesus told the Pharisees,
He said, You are they which justify yourself before men, but God
knows your hearts. That which is highly esteemed
before men is abomination in the eyes of God. And Paul was
living his life to please men. That's exactly what he was doing. You tell a man, you tell a man,
You'll be circumcised and you do this and you do that and you
do this over here. You just follow me and do what
I tell you to do and you'll be accepted with God. You'll have
a righteousness with God. You can muster up your own righteousness. You can save yourself. You tell
a man that and you convince him of that and you know something?
You're going to please him right well. You're going to please
him well. And that's what Paul was telling
people. He wrote in Galatians 1, He said, Do I persuade men
or God? Do I seek to please men or God? For if I yet pleased men, He
did used to please men, then I should cease to be the servant
of Christ. What was this lust? It was lust
an act of the esteem of men. It was wanting the praise of
men. Walter Gruber told me when we
were down there visiting him one time, we was going around
over the Yucatan, and he said, I want you to notice the difference
in Catholicism down here as what you see in the United States.
He said it varies from country to country, and he'd seen this.
Down there, they literally worship idols. They've got their little
carved people and carved animals, and they literally worship them.
They feed them. They take fruit out and stuff
and put them in their little boxes for them, things like that.
They worship them. They don't do that here. And
he says, here's what you'll notice about Catholicism. It adapts
itself to the country that it's in to please the flesh, to draw
in more converts. That's highly esteemed in the
eyes of men, but that's abomination in the eyes of God. And that's
what Paul was doing, craving, craving the praise and the applause
of man. God has to wean His preachers
from that or they'll do the same thing. They'll do the very same
thing. What's this pleasure? Pleasure,
sinful pleasure. Serving divers lust and pleasures. Paul never took any pleasure
in getting drunk. But He took pleasure and exalted
Himself in His own righteousness and personal holiness. He did
that. He took great pleasure in that.
That Pharisee who stood and prayed, Lord, I thank You that I'm not
like other men are. God, I thank You that I'm not
like other men are. Oh, man. Oh, and his heart was
just bubbling over with pride. I'm not like other men. Oh, I'm
just not like other men." And man, he rejoiced in himself.
He stood there and he smiled and he rejoiced and his heart
was leaping for joy. I'm not like other men. I'm better. Oh, I'm better. I'm so much better. He took pleasure in that. Pleasure. I tell you, brothers and sisters,
that's probably worse and more dangerous in the eyes of God
than a man sitting on a barstool taking pleasure in a glass of
beer or a bottle of rum or whiskey. It's more dangerous, is it not?
That's the way He served His pleasure. He desired the chief
seats in the synagogue. Why? Because people could see
Him sitting up there. All the holy people sat up front. I don't know why. That may be
why all you people go for the back seats. That's what they did so people
would see them. When they came in to give their tithes, they
had somebody blow a trumpet before them so people could see them
say, oh man, look at them, look at them, look at them. And then
when people looked at them, oh, their hearts were just rejoiced.
What are they thinking about me? They're thinking, boy, if
anybody makes it to heaven, old Bruce Will, That's what they're
thinking. You'd like for people to think
that way about you. You'd like to be seen. Would you want to
go out there and stand on the street corners and pray so somebody
could see you and say, man, if there's ever a praying man, that's
one of them. That'd make you sick, wouldn't
it? If you're a Christian and you tried something like that,
God would whip the dickens out of you. Because you're just seeking
pleasure in that. So there are open and profane
sins that people take pleasure in. There are lusts that is evident. But I'm telling you this, there
is a pleasure of the heart that's just as sinful. And lust of the
heart that's just as sinful. And it's a religious lust. It's
religious pleasure. And it's sinful as it can be.
I've noticed the Pope and I noticed this about the Pope. You watch
him next time somebody walks up to him and he's sitting there
in his chair and he's got his little ring on his hand and somebody
walks up and kneels and kisses his ring. Look at his face. Notice his face. He is beaming
while men are bowing. Pleasure. Pleasure. And if he don't repent, God's
going to damn him. God's going to damn you. Sinful
pleasures. That's why Paul said, we ourselves
were foolish, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures. Sinful heart religious pleasures. Open and profane sins, Charles
Spurgeon said, has slain its thousands, but self-righteousness
its ten thousands. O God, save us from the sins
of the flesh and save us from sins of the mind. Save us from
black sins and save us from white sins. Save us from black angels
and save us from Satan when he transforms himself into an angel
of light. Save us from sins that are apparent
and save us from sins that we don't even recognize. Search
me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts,
and see if there is a wicked way in me, and lead me in the
way everlasting. And oh, how we bless God that
He is pleased to lead us and is so merciful to us.