Bible Teaching

Calvary Temple Teaching Library

Unfruitful Works of Darkness Pt.2

Hallelujah! Amen. Scripture says that we're living in very perilous times. Amen? It's dangerous out there. In the last days, "because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold." We're in those days-calling good evil and evil good. Isn't it amazing? It's called political correctness, but it's actually the spirit of antichrist. That's what it is. See it for what it is. It's called secular humanism-it's the spirit of antichrist. That's what it really is. It's called technological advancement-it's the spirit of antichrist. That's what it is. We see now that it's becoming more blatant. People used to know that what they were doing was wrong. Now they stand and say, "This is right, you're wrong. You're deceived. You're deluded in this belief of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Bible is a hoax." Most of this country used to believe in the Bible even though they didn't practice it. Now it's mocked; it's despised, and we're a remnant that is called to stand up and oppose the greatest power on earth: the kingdom of darkness, the spirit of antichrist.

You and I have been called to enter into a time that, if it were not shortened, even the very elect would not stand. How perilous is this time and what are we doing to prepare ourselves for it and those that we love, this generation that's being raised up, our young people, the adolescents? You know how hard it was when you were an adolescent. What about now in this environment? They don't stand a chance without Jesus. Yet we wink at many of the things that everybody is doing because "everybody" is doing it. I want you to know that few there will be that find it. Amen? If everybody is doing it, then we need to do the opposite because we need to be among the few. We need to be unique. God is calling us into that, and, as we're talking about this kingdom of light versus the kingdom of darkness, it's not only light because of the glory of God and the truth that emanates, but it's light because it's a kingdom that loves the truth. It wants to know what will bring glory to God. It's not a kingdom that just wants to know the rules. "What do I have to do?" It's a kingdom that says, "How can I become like Him? I want to be transformed. I know that the condition I'm in is lacking and I can be more."

In this Ephesians passage, as we were talking this morning, we saw that we are to be followers of God as dear children. His sheep know His voice and another they will not follow. Followers of God, people that hear the voice of God, know that voice is distinct. It's separate from all of the other noises that we're hearing out there. Tragically, the most dangerous noises that we're hearing are within professed Christendom. Let me remind you that in the last days, "...many false prophets shall rise and deceive many." We have heard that there has to be true leadership to keep us from being tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine. We saw very clearly this morning in the fifth chapter of Ephesians where the Spirit of the Lord was speaking. He's saying that we've got to be aware of this one thing: "Let no man deceive you [verse 6] with vain words [empty words]." What are these empty words? Anything that doesn't agree with the Word of God is vanity. It's empty; it's powerless. In other words, when people begin to share with you their experience, their perception, their application... No! What does the Word of God say? "Thus saith the Lord."

We talked this morning about how in the flesh we'll try to justify our positions many times and we'll hear people talk about different aspects. "Well, this isn't really sin and that's not really sin and my conscience..." We do know that there is latitude in conscience, but rather than looking for how much you can express your perception and your liberty, why don't we define sin in this way: "All unrighteousness is sin" (1 John 5:17). Amen? Why don't we start there? Once we use that for a reference point, then we're not trying to see how much ungodliness we can get away with, but how much we can become like God, because everything that is not like Him is sin, or it's the seed of sin, or the fruit of sin, or the consequence of sin. Even things that are amoral that are not done by Him and for Him are missing the mark. We can become more. Not to become more, when we can, is to deny Him and to devalue Him. It is sin by not letting God be all that He can be in our lives. In this generation that we're living in, we are being smothered by our prosperity. As the prophet of old said, "I will destroy them through prosperity." We are a people that are in danger of that, because in our prosperity we have too many things we can do other than, so we need to guard ourselves and be careful, each one of us knowing our own lives and our own tendencies, and guard ourselves. Being able to speak into the lives of those that you know and love and ask them, "Is this going to bring life to you or death? Is this going to bring glory to God or is it just going to bring glory to you?" It's very important that we understand the danger of the hour that we're in. In this great affluence of this nation, in this nation of antichrist-because that's what America has become-founded on biblical principles and now denying and rejecting the very principles on which it was founded because of individual liberty.

Here we are as a people in the midst of all of this and, at the same time, then, Christendom is getting in bed with the world-the great whore. We've shared many times. This great whore is not going to be that everybody is on fire for God and keeping the Word of God and then, boom! One day they just deny it. It's going to be a continual deluding, an apathy, an intermingling of humanism and Christendom and we see it around us in every form. What we need to understand is that everything that is not by Him and for Him is not acceptable to Him. Amen? I don't care what label you put on it, whether you want to put Christianity on it, or philanthropy, or whatever you want to call it. It has to be by Him and it has to be for Him.

When Paul is writing to the church of Ephesus-a church growing up in the middle of this same spirit that you and I are in-he begins to talk about the need for sound doctrine, first of all. This whole epistle starts off where he establishes sound doctrine. Then, from the sound doctrine, he says, "On the foundation of sound, biblical doctrine, when you understand what redemption is about, how it works, what it's for, the renewing of the mind, the regeneration of the human heart to where we're no longer seeking our own, and wickedness, rebellion, and justification, but we're seeking to embrace Christlikeness through the blood of Jesus Christ to where we begin to have our eyes opened to where we can discern between good and evil." Once that happens, he says, the next part of this epistle begins to be one of unification. "Now that you've been sanctified and justified, you need to be unified because you cannot make it on your own." You've been justified, you've been sanctified, and now you need to be unified. You need to become one together as you're intertwined and that great message of Chapter 4 of being fitly joined together, the building of a church, the strong body of community. Why? Not only for the propagation of the gospel, but for the preservation of each individual.

I want to tell you something. The deeper you get intertwined, the safer you are. I'd try to get in the middle of this rope because the deeper you are in the intertwining and the unity and the oneness of the body of Christ, and the way you relate to the body of the Christ and the unity of the body of Christ primarily is in this local community. We are universally part of the church. We're brothers and sisters with those in Africa. We're brothers and sisters with those in China. We're brothers and sisters with people in the Assemblies of God and the Baptists and the Presbyterians-those that are truly part of the body of Christ-and we recognize all of them. We realize that we're one with them, but we are relating to one another, aren't we? This is where our growth is. This is where our protection is. This where our commitment is, as we are being placed and used for the glory of God. In the midst of all of that, Paul says that you need to understand very clearly the need to constantly "...be renewed in the spirit of your mind; and that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his [brother]: for we are members one of another" (Ephesians 4:23-25).

You remember that classic line, some of you, in the movie with Jack Nicholson. I can't even remember the name of it right now, but when he was on trial as a military officer and he was being cross-examined-a great classic scene where he uses that line: "You can't handle the truth!" Many of us are living like ostriches. Many of us don't want to face the truth of how vile it really is out there. Many of us can't handle the truth of how vile it is in here. [in the heart] It's vile out there, but I want to tell you something, it's viler in here. Right in here. I'm pointing at me. I'm not pointing at you because I'm a man that was conceived in iniquity. I'm a man under total depravity, without experiencing the regeneration, and a new man being created internally, one created to live in righteousness and true holiness, and one who used to seek lies and vanity. The biggest problem with man is that he lies to himself. Once you're illuminated and you become a new man and you love truth and you love light, not only can you handle what you are, but you want to know more of what you are. Reveal it to me, Father, that I can do something about it, that I can confess it and be forgiven, that I can be transformed, that I can put it on the altar and offer it to You. Let those that are around me speak truth to me, not the spirit of flattery, not a covering that is not of God, but that which brings light and the blood of Jesus and I can be made in the image of Christ. "[Put] away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor."

Can you handle the truth? How many of you really want to hear the truth about yourself? If you're a child of light, that's what you seek, that's your treasure, because you know the truth and the truth makes you free. Amen? Can you handle the truth? The problem is that many of us want to put our own convictions forth as truth. We want to promote our own agendas. We want to place our own consciences upon other people. I'm talking about the Truth, the Word of God. We want to get caught up, as I shared this morning, on many of the peripheral things. We're not going to emphasize at this time whether you should watch a movie at all, because there are people in the body of Christ that think if you have a television in your house, it's sin. They truly do. To go to any movie theatre, to watch Bambi, is sin. "You're lost, going to hell!"

I remember the first time I corrupted Janet and took her to see a movie. She'd never been to a movie in her whole life. She was raised up believing that it was sin to go to a movie. I corrupted her as we went to a drive-in theatre and I can't remember right now what it was that we saw. It was some Walt Disney thing like Bambi or one of those. She thought that lightning was going to strike the car at any moment. This is where she was raised. That was what she was taught. There are people that truly believe that and it's fine for them to believe that, if it's unto the Lord, the Scripture says. If they're doing it as unto the Lord, if they're doing not as works, if they're doing it not to prove their righteousness, if they're doing it not to appease God, because the appeasement of God is the blood of Jesus Christ. Amen? That approach can be good or it can be bad. Why am I doing what I'm doing?

We can get sidetracked and go from that extreme to any other extreme, and everybody is trying to justify their position. That is not what we need to emphasize. It's putting on the new man. It's partaking of righteousness and true holiness. It's living less for self and more for Jesus, contributing less to self and more to the community, the body of Christ. The issue is not: "What you are doing?" The issue is: "What are you not doing-that you should be for the glory of God?" We emphasize sins of commission and de-emphasize sins of omission. Sometimes sins of omission are greater than sins of commission because "...to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin" (James 4:17). You don't hear about sin anymore in churches. "It's my conscience, what I perceive, my liberty." "Sin is the transgression of the law." "All unrighteousness is sin." "To him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin."

Do you know what we need to have reemphasized in our lives? Sin is our enemy! Many of us haven't seen sin for what it is. Sin is the very consequence of Adam's rebellion. We have been conceived in iniquity. Sin, missing the mark, ought to be something that horrifies us! For ourselves or anybody in our presence to commit a sin should just cause us to rise up in hatred to that vile force that is the root of man's damnation, and left alone in any one of our lives, will ultimately cause death. How can we tolerate it? The power of sin, the putridness of sin, the vileness of sin has been lost. We have been desensitized to the vileness of sin and how it opposes the holy God Who has redeemed us by His own blood. He became sin with our sin that we might be made the righteousness of God. Why would we then purposely go out and defile these robes of righteousness with what we used to be, the old man, selfness. Don't start thinking about acts of commission, self-ness, independence, self-pity, self-righteousness, self-justification. Everything that is I-oriented is an abomination to God because it is no longer I that live, but Christ that lives in me.

If we're going to be this new man, if we're going to put on righteousness and true holiness, we're going to need to speak the truth to one another and be angry and sin not. Be angry at the sin in your life. Be angry at the sin in your friends' lives. Be angry at the sin in our midst. Be angry and sin not by being self-righteous, by being one that condemns others, by being one that is moving in anything other than empathy and sympathy and love and compassion and speaking only toward that to see them set free, not to justify yourself, not to vaunt yourself, not to expose others so that you can feel better about yourself, but just to see sin's power broken in our midst. Don't let the sun go down upon your wrath. Don't give place to the devil. When the sun goes down-what's the consequence of the sun going down-darkness. Don't give place to the devil. Anything that's in darkness is the devil's realm. He is the accuser of the brethren. He's the whisperer. He's the one that moves in darkness. Just speak the truth to one another in love. Darkness is the one that goes around and tells seven other people about your brother's sin so they'll pray for him instead of going and confronting him to his face. Darkness is justification of your lack of fervency for righteousness and holiness. We try to cloak ourselves in our individual, independent consciences. Yes, we have independent consciences. Yes, we all have different realms of liberty. But it's not about my liberty, it's about my pursuit of Christlikeness. It's not about what I'm free to do in the time that I'm not being led by the Spirit in a specific realm of ministry. It's about how fervently I'm pursuing death to self, Christlikeness, consumed with His glory.

Some of the things over the years that we've done-one of the things, the Finish the Race ministry and these different things-and I've shared with you. God didn't tell us to go start a ministry. We went and did something that we enjoy doing and whatever we're doing, we minister. It's not a ministry; it's a function in which we minister, if you understand what I'm saying. In all of these things that you're involved in, what God has given you, are you using it for His glory? Wherever you find yourself-gardening, strolling the mall-are you using it for a purpose to minister, or are you coveting the clothes that you can't afford, instead of ministering to the people that are working in the store. Our lives are about serving Jesus. Wherever I find myself, I need to tell somebody about the Lord! Wherever I find myself, God has put me there to share His goodness and His glory and His love. For me to live is-say it-Christ. It's very simple. It's not something that you have to hear these voices. "The Lord is speaking and I really feel God is leading me to Nordstrom." (And all of the ladies said, "Amen.") I happen to find myself in Nordstrom. (Now, that's where I like. If I'm going shopping, that's where I go. Why? Because I like the fact that when I buy something they don't hand it over the counter to me, they walk around the side. They are taught how to make you feel special. It's a class operation. I like that. I don't like getting stampeded at the blue light special. Some of you are thinking, "Pastor, are you too good for the blue light special?" How do you think I know about them? I've bought a lot of things at the blue light specials and surely don't think I'm too good for it, but if I have the choice...) Do you want to know what? I minister to the people at the blue light special and I minister to the people at Nordstrom. Amen? Wherever God puts me.

Are you ready to speak that truth? There are no apologies. I don't make any apologies for shopping at Nordstrom because God has given me the wherewithal to do that at this time in my life. I didn't ask for it. God gave it to me and in the midst of all of this, I don't have to sneak around to go to Nordstrom and pretend that I've been at K-Mart. We live our lives openly. So many of us are trying to justify. The fact of the matter is we are not part of a communistic, socialistic endeavor. The kingdom of God is diversity. He's going to make some of you richer than others and, because of that, if you're not one of them that God has chosen, don't question God and think you should have what somebody else in our midst has. Just thank God for what He's given you. Amen? "I should have that." You're judging God? "I'm going to get that no matter what it costs." I want to tell you something. If you get it other than God giving it to you, it costs too much. Amen? If God gave it to you, it didn't cost anything. It all comes back to that selfness and the questioning of God and jealousy and envy and pride. We need to see it for what it is and bring it to the light and deal with that tendency to be other than what God has called us to be and where He's placed us in His body and His kingdom and what gifts He's given us and not despise them but use them solely for His glory and absolutely for His glory. When I say absolutely, I mean to give it all, praise God, to take that one talent and use it for the glory of God, to take those five talents and use them for the glory of God, and recognize that He is the one that originated the one or the five. He doesn't expect five out of the person He gave one. He expects you to use it for His glory and to boast in Him.

We need to stop lying to ourselves and stop lying to one another, not giving place to the devil, and moving around in darkness and despising and judging and criticizing and coveting, but just speak the truth to one another in love. "Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying." Corrupt communication is anything that doesn't glorify God, that doesn't edify the body, that doesn't agree with what God's will is in your life or those that are around you. It's corrupt. It's vile. "Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, [loving] one another, as God for Christ's sake hath [loved] you."

We see the unity that He's calling us to-not uniformity-unity. We're different. We have different calls. We have different gifts, different functions. We can't say to one another, "I have no need of you." Now, what in our community is lacking because you're not doing your part to the best of your ability? It may seem small to you, but we have need of you. God has placed you. He has gifted you. One member can't say to the other, "You're not important, we have no need." Don't allow all of this judging of ourselves and wanting to be other than what God has called us to be. Don't let that be found in your midst. Put away the bitterness, and clamor, and wrath and be followers of God, as Paul goes into this fifth chapter. Walk in love. Love prefers others. Love does not vaunt itself. It doesn't behave itself unseemly. It doesn't demand its own way. It's not puffed up. It's patient, believes all things, and endures all things.

As those around us are growing, we are patient, we are loving, we are longsuffering with them, but we speak the truth. We say you can't remain that way. "I'm not going to stand here and watch sin kill you." In the Young Adult meeting just yesterday, it reminded me of the one of the old Puritan meetings. A few of the young men got up and confessed their sins. It would have been nice if they'd done it on their own but, actually, they were approached by Pastor Jeff and they were told very frankly, "Look, you have a decision to make. If you want to continue to live that way, get out of here. You are no longer welcome. But if you want to change, then you share with this body what you are and what you've been doing and the deception that you've been bringing and the leaven that you've been and the hypocrite that you've been and ask them to help you finish this course." That's what some of these young people did. They stood up and they said, "This is what I've been and I've been living a lie." And love says, "Yeah, I thought so. That guy has always been a jerk and a loser." NO! Every one of us is touched with the feelings of their infirmities. We all know that we're the same person and have those same tendencies but, by the grace of God, we could be there, but by that grace, we made right choices. They made wrong choices. It doesn't make us better. It makes God good. Amen? So what do we do? I can have compassion for them and I can tell them that as long as you want to follow God, I'm going to be here for you, but I want to tell you something. You are not going to come in here and be leaven and destroy us. Anytime that you do something wrong, I'm going to speak to it and it's going to be exposed. If you refuse to repent of it and change, we're going to expose it to everybody, because you're not going to come in here and destroy us.

That's the life that manifests itself in love, preferring others. It's not an easy thing to go and have to approach people in these areas. Do you want to know why we're uncomfortable? Most of us are uncomfortable because we know our own vileness. Who am I to speak this to them when I have this in my own life that I'm dealing with? Because it's the truth and the truth is not gauged by my righteousness or by my experience, but by the Word of God. "Let God be true, but every man a liar" (Romans 3:4). There is only one standard and we're all responsible to live it. As we become more jealous for God's glory in our midst and more violent toward the sin in our midst, then we're going to become a safer people from Satan who goes about seeking whom he may destroy, those that are on the periphery that are getting picked off because their life is in darkness. When you see somebody drawing back, becoming less a part, they're on the way to dying. What are we doing to help them? "Well, they don't want help. I've said you need to be here more and you need to be a part and they just blow me off." Well, why don't you go tie them up and bring them? Why are you taking no for an answer so readily when they're dying and going to a devil's hell, when sin has come into our midst and is destroying our children and the people that we say we love? We just say, "Well, I tried to help them and they didn't want help, so I'm just tired of it." It's never too late until they're dead. Amen? I hate that sin that has them in bondage. If I tolerate in them, it'll take me over. If I make an exception for them, I will be destroyed by my judgment because what I judge right for them, I'll ultimately judge right for myself.

The Scripture goes on and speaks toward us having this love and says, you need to understand something. "But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you." We talked about the fact that we can't it slide even once. "Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words: ["Well, that's just conscience, that's amoral, those are liberties that they have."] for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. Be not ye therefore partakers with them. For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light." That's what you used to be. Do you hate what you used to be? Then why would we tolerate it back in our lives or in our midst? We know the reproach that it brings upon the blood of Jesus. He speaks to some specific things, fornication, pornea, and in the day that we're living, we need to guard ourselves against this.

I think I saw on part of the news, or in the newspaper, while I was on vacation, something that had to do with new pornographic vending machines or something like that at the Olympics. They have these things that you can go in... It's a vending machine and you can get pornography to put on or in your computer or whatever if you can't get the Internet. Well, the fact of the matter is, most of the commercials on TV are pornography. What do we do about this? Everything is going that way. You can do what my wife does. I come home and my magazines are all ripped up. I'm serious. I'll come home and I'll get my magazine and I'll open it and this page is gone and this section is ripped out and anything that has some woman in it that's in any way suspicious, she's delivered them. Are you protecting your husbands, your sons? Men are more given to the sexual. Girls are like, "He's so cute." Rip their heads off. There's no place. We can't give place. We are in a world that is being inundated with pornography, with fornication. There's no place for it. It's death. Even in the ways that some have been approached at different times and in the different fashions and different aspects that we contend with in our own midst, you have to be very careful. So when your husbands speak to you, when your parents speak to you, some of you ladies, in the way that you're dressing, listen to what they're saying because we're not going to have it in own midst. Amen. We need to guard ourselves. We have to use wisdom in these things. There are guys out there who will lust after some woman in a potato sack with a bag over her head.

He's talking to us about the dangers in our midst and he says, "Let it not be once named among you. Neither filthiness..." This word "filthiness" is talking about impurity. It's not just sexual, pornographic-type stuff but impure behavior, other than holy, other than for God. Do you want to know what is filthy? Filthy lucre, the pursuit of money, that's filthy and it shouldn't be named here. There should not be in any person in here an ambition to be rich unless God is the source of it, because it's filthy lucre. It's damnable. It's a power that will destroy you. What we are to do is work as unto the Lord and to work hard and to let God bless us and to eat the fruit of our labors. If your labor as unto the Lord happens to make you rich, then praise God and rejoice in it and give God the glory. There are to be those that are rich among us, 1 Timothy says, but those that desire to be rich are going to destroy themselves. We would be horrified by the pornography. You would be horrified if your kids were saying "Man, I want to partake of all of this pornography!" But when your kids say, "I want to be rich. I want an education so I can go out and get rich and have big houses and drive Mercedes," that's filthiness. "Wanting to be rich is filthy?" It is damnable. It is deadly. We're not to want to be rich. We're to want to glorify God. "I want to be rich so that I can glorify God." Yeah, we know what your motive is and you're not fooling anybody but yourself. "Shouldn't we teach our kids to get ahead? We want them to be prosperous." No, we want them to be Christlike.

What is your treasure? God doesn't say that the sole purpose of man is to be rich. The duty of man is to what? "Fear God, and keep his commandments" (Ecclesiastes 12:14). What have you promoted among your kids? What have you wanted for them? What is it they're seeking? That's filthiness. Filthy lucre is gain by our own hands for our own purposes. You want to know what filthiness is. Filthiness is this conniving spirit that he addresses later when he talks about foolish talking or jesting. We think jesting is kind of like making jokes. That's not what jesting is all about. Do you want to know what jesting is all about? Jesting is about making suggestive statements, whether it's gossip, whether it's manipulation, to put ourselves forth. "You guys always go do that and you never include us." "Oh, did you want to come?" "No, I was just kidding. I didn't really mean anything by what I said." That's foolish jesting. A statement made as bait that's either critical, that's soliciting, that's self-promoting, whether the statements are made in self-pity or self-exaltation and then when called on, "I was just kidding, I really didn't mean that." That's jesting. That's the foolishness, that's the vanity. It's very close to the James spirit of being double-tongued to where you will speak partial truths-one thing to this person and another thing to that person and when you're called on it, you can't ever get caught because you've got a certain amount of truth, and you're just dancing around saying, "I meant this and I meant that." "Let it not be once named among you." Amen? Let your yea be yea and your nay be nay. Just speak the truth and say what you mean because it's all of this darkness and twisting of words and twisting innuendoes and withdrawn statements and "I didn't really mean..." Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Amen? If it came out of your mouth, you meant it. Put a watch over it. "I wasn't really saying that so you'd think bad about them." "Let it not be once named among you."

These things that we take as acceptable, are not acceptable. That is no more acceptable in our midst than adultery and pornography. Why? Because it comes against this very admonition of chapter four of unity, of communication, of edification. It's damnable! It will destroy us if it's not brought to the light. This foolish talking, this jesting, are comments made in darkness, comments that can't be brought straight up at face value. We can get it into doctrinal things and we would call it heresy. In personal things, it's called foolish talking and jesting. It's putting forth your own will upon other people. It's diminishing the value of others for the exaltation of yourself. It's making manipulation and moves for your own gain. When we try to bring it to the light, then all of the dancing starts and the justification and, "I really didn't mean." Bring it to the light. "Let it not be once named among you...but rather giving of thanks."

We are living in a society when everybody has more than anybody could ever want and feels like they got ripped because somebody else has more. How thankful are you for what you have and how much do you express it? How thankful are you for your wife? How thankful are you for your parents? "I am, but I just don't speak it." Well, you sure speak all the criticisms. You still speak all of the self-pity. You still talk about how somebody else has more than you. How about being bold to be thankful for what God has given you and just go around and talk about how blessed you are, praise God, to have family, to have parents that are admonishing you in things of God, to have a wife that's faithfully pursuing God and willing to fulfill her order and her place. Men, you need to be thankful for your wives. Amen? I don't get out that much, but when I'm allowed to go out... There are some nasty women out there. Dear God, I just want to smack every one of them that I see. I'm glad I'm saved. I'd be locked up. I saw one poor guy in the airport. He's walking down the airport thing holding this wedding dress up in the air, she's on the cell phone saying, "Get over there!" I don't know if they were going to be married or coming back from their honeymoon, but it wasn't good. I wanted to yell, "RUN!" I was going to let him get in my carry-on. I'll help you. Dear God, what's worse than a big mouth woman, self-willed? We're thankful for you ladies. We know that it's not an easy thing to fulfill the call of God on your lives to be in a position of subordination. We know it's not a simple thing and God has given you grace and, in that grace, pray for us that we would be good overseers and that we would love you and lay our lives down for you.

I thank God-I want to do everything I can to see that my wife is washed in the water of the Word. I want to love her as I've been loved by the Lord. I want to be patient and kind and gentle because that's not an easy role. Do you want to know why I want to be that way? It's because I know what I am and how difficult it is to live with me. These are things that we need to understand. When I say difficult, I'm not a tyrant, but my face is set like a flint. Thank God that He has given me helpmeets that have had the same fervency and vision and never once balked at one thing that it would cost to finish this course.

Are you being that for your husbands? Ladies, I just want to encourage you. They need your prayer. They need your support. They need you to encourage them. They need to be your hero. They need to be the man that protects you and they need you to tell them that and how much you love them and how good a job they're doing. They don't need you to be going to the women's meeting, "Pray for my husband, he's an idiot." Of course we're idiots. You just don't need to advertise it. We're men. That's our role. Giving of thanks. Are you thankful for your husband? Are you thankful for your parents? Then speak it. Show us through your actions. We just need to give thanks. Are you thankful for the body of Christ? Are you thankful for brothers and sisters that are going to speak the truth to you? When somebody comes up and opens up your life and speaks directly into your heart and brings you correction and admonition, can you truly say thank you for loving me or do you say it grudgingly? The Lord chastens those that He loves. Amen? We ought to be thankful for it when somebody loves us enough to speak the truth.

"For ye were sometimes darkness, [verse 8] but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light." Do you run to it? Are you more comfortable in the light than you are in darkness? Is there anything in your life that you don't want revealed? Is there anything that you're withholding from your spouse, from your overseer, that you need to bring to the light, but you're afraid that you will be rejected. You're afraid that somebody will criticize you. I'm not talking about standing up in the meeting and saying, "I'm Charles Manson." How comfortable are you in the light? Is there anything that you're wanting to hide? Is there any area that you're not comfortable having addressed? Then we don't love the light. We don't love the truth. We don't believe that we're loved of God or of the brethren. Satan still has power over you. It's good to be free. Amen? Love is not touchy. When you believe you're loved, you're just sitting there saying, "Praise God. The reason they're speaking it is that they're not out to get me. They're for me. Iniquity is abounding. The love of many is waxing cold. Few are going to find this thing. Somebody cares for me. Thank God!" That's what He's calling us to in this passage.

Father, we thank You for Your Word tonight. In a world of darkness, in a time of cover up, everybody wants to cover up because of the iniquity, the wickedness, the vileness, knowing these things are not acceptable to God, knowing that these things are not holy, knowing that these things are not righteous, so we try to minimize the Ten Commandments. We try to minimize the Word of God. We try to minimize spiritual authority. Those people that are light, those people that are children of light, run to the light. They run to the truth. They embrace it to be free. When things are addressed in our lives, when things are addressed in our families' lives, we just say, "Praise God, we want to be free. We don't want any power over our household." "I don't know who they think they are." It's not criticism. It's not demeaning. It's not an attack. It's love. The devil is lying to you. Your flesh is lying to you. Your pride is lying to you. Somebody is trying to love you, praise God. Open rebuke is better, the Scripture says, than a perceived love and friendship that allows you to die in darkness. We ask You to make it real, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen. Let's stand before the Lord. It's a little bit late so before we go, just turn to somebody next to you and say, "He was talking to you." Amen. Praise God.

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