Sermon on the Mount Part XL - Beware of False Prophets

[0:00] Please turn to the book of Psalms, and this morning we'll be looking at Psalm 100. And in my Bible, right underneath Psalm 100, it says, All men exhorted to praise God. And Psalm 100 is a psalm for thanksgiving.

[0:35] Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before Him with joyful singing.

[0:49] Know that the Lord Himself is God. It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves.

[1:02] We are His people, and the sheep of His pasture. Enter His gates with thanksgiving, and His courts with praise.

[1:15] Give thanks to Him. Bless His name. For the Lord is good, His lovingkindness is everlasting, and His faithfulness to all generations.

[1:31] Thank you, Gary. And for, I guess, approximately the 40th time, let's turn to Matthew's Gospel, where we are nearing a wrap-up in Chapter 7.

[1:49] And I'm going to be a little saddened by parting company with the Sermon on the Mount. It's kind of like an old friend that you're walking away from, and we'll just have to look back on from time to time.

[2:06] But we've spent several weeks together in this Sermon on the Mount, and we've noted a number of things in connection with it. We have labored, I'm sure not to the extent that we would like, but we have labored to try and explain what appear to be differences and contradictions between the Sermon on the Mount and some other portions of Scripture.

[2:30] We are thoroughly committed to the idea, to the concept, that there are no contradictions in the Bible. But there are certainly a number of places where there appear to be.

[2:42] And in the Sermon on the Mount, we've already discovered a number of those places that appear on the surface to contradict other passages, particularly those later in the New Testament.

[2:54] We know that is not the case because there are two different programs afoot, and one is specifically designated for Israel, and another is specifically designated for the body of Christ, which is comprised of Jew and Gentile, both of whom come to faith in Christ, and they constitute the body of Christ.

[3:16] So I've already given you several reminders that will help us to maintain our focus, I think, regarding this. And I'm just briefly going to run through, well, I've jotted down 10 or 11, but just note these, if you will.

[3:31] I'll be as brief as I can with them. First of all, when Christ gave the Sermon on the Mount, it was given prior to the reality and the occurrence of his death, burial, and resurrection.

[3:47] That is very important. The Sermon on the Mount, as well as just about everything else Christ taught, was all before the cross. If you do not understand and appreciate that, then you will be in for a very bumpy ride as you work your way through the New Testament.

[4:05] Secondly, the Sermon on the Mount was given to an exclusively Jewish audience. The Bible makes a distinction between Jews and Gentiles.

[4:16] Very often they are referred to as the circumcised and the uncircumcised. Circumcised has to do with Israel. The uncircumcised has to do with everybody else.

[4:27] But that is frequently the way they are characterized. And when our Lord Jesus gave this Sermon on the Mount, we don't know how many people were there, but suffice it to say there were probably several hundred, maybe even a few thousand, because we recall instances when he is going to feed 5,000.

[4:46] And the text tells us that there were 5,000 men besides women and children. So we are talking about a great number of people. And as he began delivering the Sermon on the Mount, he started out with just talking to his apostles.

[5:01] And as he continued talking, the crowd kept building, and people kept coming up the hill, and they would go so far, couldn't go any further because of the crowd, and they would just sit down on the grass and listen as he taught.

[5:16] And the text tells us, as we end the Sermon on the Mount, that the people were absolutely amazed. They were just flabbergasted at the authority with which he taught. Third, the Sermon on the Mount was given to Jewish audiences functioning, operating, living under the Mosaic Law at the time.

[5:40] Please don't be mistaken in thinking that because this is the New Testament, that these people were living under New Testament rules and regulations, if you will, because they weren't.

[5:53] Judaism was still very much in force. The Mosaic Law was still very much that which governed the behavior and the conduct of the people. It was all under the Law of Moses.

[6:05] Christ recognized that. He put himself under that law. And he said he did not come to destroy the law. He came to fulfill it. Christ had the utmost of respect for the Law of Moses, but he had a great deal of disrespect for what the religious establishment had turned the Law of Moses into, because it was something that Moses did not intend at all, and that God did not intend through him.

[6:35] And then four, the Sermon on the Mount was given to reveal the real intent and purpose of the Law. The Sermon on the Mount was given to contrast the religious establishment's interpretation of the Law versus the original intent and meaning of the Law.

[6:55] And they had erred far from that. Six, the Sermon on the Mount key verse is chapter 5 and verse 20, where Christ said to the crowd, Unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven.

[7:19] Now there are some things there that are really very, very important. It was the scribes and Pharisees who constituted the authority behind the Law of Moses.

[7:32] It was their interpretations and the interpretations of the rabbis before them that put the people under obligation. And their interpretation of the Law of Moses many times strayed far from the meaning of the Law.

[7:49] They got involved in all kinds of petty minutiae, nitpicking, details, etc. And at the same time, they had become experts in figuring out ways around the Law when you didn't want to abide by it.

[8:04] Find a convenient way to get around it. We call these loopholes. So that it technically, technically, you are being obedient.

[8:16] But practically, you are not. And all they cared about was the technicality. Dotting the I, crossing the T. And this is something that Christ really railed against and with good cause.

[8:31] And be advised, please. When he said, accept your righteousness, that of the general population there, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you won't enter the kingdom of heaven.

[8:46] Now he's not talking about you won't go to heaven. That isn't even on the table here. He's talking about you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

[8:56] The kingdom of heaven is going to be an earthly kingdom. It's going to be here on this planet. Not to be confused with heaven where God dwells and where believers go when their spirit exits the body here and they go to be with the Lord in heaven.

[9:17] That's not the same as the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of heaven is earthly. That's what the Jew was focused on because he was promised a land, an earthly inheritance.

[9:28] And there, of course, are those today who completely negate those promises. And they believe that any promise that God gave to the ancient Jew about inheriting or possessing the land of Israel is a promise that the Jew long since has, what shall I say, lost because of his disobedience.

[9:54] God withdrew the promise of the land. And that's what some of these articles back here are talking about. This is the replacement theology. This is that which sides with the Palestinians. This is that which says Israel should give up more land and more land, whatever it takes to provide peace.

[10:11] Israel should be willing to cede whatever land they have in order to provide peace. And it's something that I'm not going to go further into, but the articles back there deal with this.

[10:22] And seven, the Sermon on the Mount is all about behavior that is required for entering that kingdom. And eight, the Sermon on the Mount is to be interpreted against the law, not grace.

[10:38] Don't read the grace of God, which is going to be a new dispensation. Paul the Apostle refers to this as him being appointed, delegated by God, to be the apostle of a new dispensation.

[10:58] It is the dispensation of the grace of God. God's grace has always existed from Genesis chapter 3.

[11:10] But under the apostleship of Paul, who is designated as the apostle to the Gentiles and one who is entrusted with the dispensation of grace or the doling out of grace or the administering of grace, it's going to be a new emphasis.

[11:27] What is the emphasis in the old covenant? It's the law, the law, the law. What's the emphasis in the new? It's grace, grace.

[11:38] The law condemns. The law says guilty, guilty, guilty. The law cannot justify you. The law cannot make you righteous. The law can only show you where you fail.

[11:51] The law can condemn you. The law can bring death because the wages of sin is death. This is why we are told that the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.

[12:09] And what enabled him to offer this grace and truth? It was he satisfied the demands of the law. And the law has nothing more to exact because the full penalty of the law has been met in the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.

[12:28] So what's left? This is why Paul said in Romans 6, for you are not under law. You in the body of Christ, you are not under law. You are under grace.

[12:40] That's a whole different ballgame. It would be wonderful if Christendom could just understand that distinction. It would make such a huge difference. We're not under law.

[12:51] We're under grace. This does not mean the Christian is lawless. We are under the law of liberty that has set us free in Christ.

[13:03] That's an entirely different thing. And that's Romans 8. It's just a glorious thing. And you know something? This is so simple. It's so easy to see.

[13:15] But I must tell you, I am embarrassed to admit that for the first 15 years of being a Christian, I never saw this distinction.

[13:28] Never heard it. I was saved in a little Baptist church out in Ellensburg, Washington. And three hours later, the minister who refused to marry us because I wasn't a believer married us.

[13:43] So I was married in a Baptist church and baptized in a Baptist church and ordained in a Baptist church and the deacon of a Baptist church. And I went to a Baptist school, Cedarville, down the road.

[13:55] I never heard this. Never knew this. Never understood this. And my sweet wife's husband, first husband, Dave Weinbrenner, started asking some very disturbing questions that we didn't have answers to in a Baptist church at the time.

[14:18] And we started searching these things out and we came to different conclusions. And this is where we are now, 45 years later. So I thank God for the journey.

[14:30] But this material is so important and so liberating. And it makes the scriptures not only come alive, but it makes them come together.

[14:41] And things fit. And they don't fit otherwise. And it's just wonderful. Well, don't want to stop there.

[14:54] Sermon on the Mount is to be interpreted against the law setting. Not grace. Because grace doesn't come until later. Here, for all practical purposes, now this is going to sound like a stretch and you're not going to think that I really mean this, but I really do mean it, but I know it's not going to sound right.

[15:14] But I'm going to say it anyway. From a practical standpoint, an interpretive, understanding standpoint, keep Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John under the Old Testament.

[15:31] I know it says New Testament. You can open the fly leaf of your Bible there and it says the New Testament. But bear in mind that Christ was born under the law of Moses.

[15:43] He was circumcised under the law of Moses. He kept the Sabbath under the law of Moses. All of those things are in keeping with the law. And that's exactly the way it should have been.

[15:56] He came not to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. And he fulfilled it. By not only living precisely in everything it required, but by paying the full penalty of the law as if he hadn't obeyed it.

[16:12] He died as one who was a lawbreaker. Although he wasn't. He was innocent and spotless. He died in the stead of those who were lawbreakers.

[16:25] That's us. So when you keep the Gospels in the Old Testament motif under that standard, it helps to explain a lot. And nine, some mistakenly see this as grace and not as law.

[16:43] And it is a big mistake because as you read the Sermon on the Mount, you know what you find on here? You find a lot of law keeping. A lot of law requiring. A lot of doing. Do this, do that.

[16:54] And we are delivered from that under grace. But this is not grace. This is law. And when we take up our next series of messages, after finishing the Sermon on the Mount, we are going to go into considerable detail showing you where and what we are now, under grace as opposed to under law.

[17:18] And for some of you, I'm sure it will be some ho-hum material. You've probably heard it before. But for others, it will be as liberating and as eye-opening as it was to me when I first heard it.

[17:31] And frankly, I'm getting real antsy to get into that. I think, Marie, maybe we ought to postpone our vacation and forget that. Well, that didn't go over very well.

[17:45] But I'll be chomping at the bit when we get back to get into it. Okay. Just kidding, dear. So, some mistakenly see this as grace here in Matthew, rather than a contrast between law and grace.

[18:06] It is not a contrast between law and grace. And this is what I meant to say. What we find here in the Sermon on the Mount is not a contrast between law and grace. And that's what a lot of people do.

[18:17] That's what a lot of Bible teachers do. And that's, I've heard a lot of them teach this. And they teach that, that the scribes and Pharisees were interpreting the laws of Moses in a law way.

[18:34] And Jesus was interpreting the law of Moses in a grace way. No, that is not the case. Not at all. Christ is not departing from the law of Moses.

[18:47] Jesus in the, but I say unto you. That's a big mistake. And some people think that, that Christ is leaving the law aspect and moving into the grace aspect, which is what the New Testament is supposed to be all about.

[19:03] And that's why the people were so, were so excited and seeing the contrast. No, no, no, no. That's not the case at all. He is not. Jesus is not teaching here the difference between law and grace.

[19:16] He is teaching the difference between the establishment interpretation of the law, as opposed to what the law was really teaching in its original intent.

[19:27] So it was truth versus error. But grace does not come into the picture here. That is not until later. The Sermon on the Mount is filled with contrasting interpretations between how they had been taught regarding the law of Moses and how they should have been taught.

[19:47] Christ constantly used the terminology, it has been said, or you have heard. But I say unto you, and what he is actually saying is, what you have heard was wrong.

[20:01] They had it all wrong. You have heard that you should hate your enemy, love your neighbor. But I say unto you, love your neighbor, love your enemy, do good to those who persecute you.

[20:14] Now, there's no question that has a tinge of grace, but it's still under the law. And the law was never completely devoid of grace. We know that Moses or that Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord, and that was long before the law was even given.

[20:29] And then, item 11, Christ assumed authority to himself, as opposed to that of the scribes and Pharisees. So, I want you to look at chapter 7 and verse 9, and there we find a contrast between stones and bread.

[20:46] And what is he saying here? What's the underlying thing here? If a father, if a son asks his father for bread, will he give him a stone? What's the implication here?

[20:59] What is Jesus actually implying? What he's implying is this. They've been giving you a bunch of stones. I've come to give you bread.

[21:12] That's what he's saying. They've been giving you phony fish. They've been giving you snakes for fish. I'm giving you fish. And do you think, for a moment, that the scribes and Pharisees are not seeing through this?

[21:30] Do you think they're not getting the implications? Oh, they are. They understand full well the category in which he is placing them. And it is not going to sit very well.

[21:42] Here is the beginning of a hostility that is going to arise against Jesus of Nazareth. And it will only intensify over the next three years until finally they have had enough.

[21:57] And they decide that this man from Nazareth has got to go. And they start plotting for his murder. This is the beginning of that buildup.

[22:07] And it is starting way back here. And the reason that Christ is doing this, of course, is because he, as the Son of God, as the way, the truth, and the life, is so committed to truth, he will not countenance error.

[22:25] And these people have been getting a steady diet of error. And Christ has come to put an end to it. And those who are in the positions of power and influence are not going to relinquish that easily.

[22:41] And that's where the standoff really begins. Christ assumed authority to himself as opposed to that of the scribes and Pharisees. There is a contrast between stones and bread.

[22:53] Christ is implying you've been getting stones. You've been asking for bread. But you've been getting stones. You've been asking for fish. This is something to eat.

[23:04] It is spiritual sustenance to take in that establishes the soul. And that's not what you've been getting. This is why these common people heard him gladly.

[23:17] They just marveled at his words. They not only made sense, but they were contradictory to what they had been taught. And in verses 13 and 14, there is a contrast between the narrow and the wide gate, and a contrast between the narrow and the wide ways.

[23:35] There is a contrast between the many and the few. There is a contrast between good fruit and bad fruit. There is a contrast between bad trees and good trees.

[23:46] And as you read all of the, but I say unto you, there is no other place that you can put the religious establishment other than in the negative aspects of all of that.

[23:57] And Christ is counteracting it with the truth that he is giving, and it stands out in bold relief. And the reaction of the crowd across all of this grassy plain where they are is just looking at each other in amazement.

[24:11] Did you hear what he said? This is amazing. You never heard this before. They were hungry. Of course they were hungry. When you have people crying for bread and you give them rocks, they're going to be hungry.

[24:25] And they were. They were open and receptive. Just a beautiful thing. So let's look at the text here if we may, and the few verses that we've got. I do want to allow some Q&A time today.

[24:37] We are in, I'll not elaborate anymore on verses 9 and 10 and 11. We've treated them as well as the, what is referred to as the golden rule.

[24:49] And we've even touched on verses 13 and 14. And today, look at verse 15. False prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves.

[25:05] Can you put that together? Any idea who these false teachers are? False prophets? And by the way, don't be misled by the word prophet, because prophet means two things in the Bible.

[25:22] The primary meaning of the word prophet is preacher. prophet means to tell forth, to expound, to simply preach.

[25:36] And when someone does that, he is prophesying. I am prophesying right now. And it has nothing to do with predicting the future. That's an entirely different meaning.

[25:48] Very often, when we hear the word prophet, we think of someone who speaks about a future event that is going to happen. That is one of the meanings.

[25:59] But it's a secondary meaning. The primary meaning is to simply preach. And these false prophets were simply false preachers. And what made them false was the information they were giving out.

[26:13] It wasn't accurate. It wasn't true. This, again, presupposes the existence of truth. Because if there is no such thing as moral truth, as many subscribe to today, if there is no such thing as absolute moral truth, then there is no way to identify evil.

[26:39] You're just left out on a limb. Then you have nothing remaining to you but the kind of relativism that we see today. Do you realize that there are people in positions of power and influence in this country?

[26:58] And I'm sure they are represented by both major political parties. People who are absolutely incapable of being embarrassed. people that you can't, you cannot shame them because they have no sense of shame.

[27:19] Why don't they? Why aren't they capable? If you, if somebody cannot be embarrassed, you don't have any leverage. You can't shame them and you can't embarrass them.

[27:30] And the reason you can't, now think this through, the reason you can't is because they have already adopted a personal set of what shall I say, of relativistic values.

[27:46] That means they themselves are the authority as to what is morally right and morally wrong. so no matter what they do that may violate a common standard or a norm or value in our culture, they just reject that and say, well, that's your values.

[28:10] That's your position. That's your conviction. I don't hold that. You see, I believe that all morality is relative.

[28:22] And when you take that position, the reason they can't be embarrassed is because they haven't violated their values. Their values are still intact.

[28:34] They see nothing wrong with same-sex marriage. After all, everybody is entitled to happiness. That's their position. And if they want to engage in that, you can't embarrass them over that because they haven't violated their conscience.

[28:52] They haven't violated values, and they reject what we would call absolute standards across the board. They say there are none. The traditional position for this nation, and for that matter, for the most of the world, the traditional position is there is an overarching authority that is a blanket for morality for all people of all times in all places.

[29:21] it is wrong to commit murder. That's an absolute moral value. It is wrong to take another person's property.

[29:32] It doesn't belong to you. That is not a culturally conditioned thing. That is an absolute moral value. But if you take the position that I'm entitled to whatever I can get, to whatever I can take from whomever I can take it, and I don't have any qualms about it.

[29:50] And if I want to steal from you, and if I think you've got more than you need, and that's even beside the point, but if you have something I want or I need, I can justify that on the basis that I want it or I need it or I'm entitled to it more than you are, so I'll take it from you.

[30:05] And I'm not going to feel guilty about it because guilt is the emotional pain that is caused from violating a standard. And I haven't violated any standard. That's my standard. And I haven't violated.

[30:16] That's why I say you can't embarrass these people. It's impossible. That's one of the negatives that is killing our culture and our society.

[30:26] It is the embracing of moral relativism. It is nothing more than a flashback to the time of judges when it says there was no king in Israel and every man did that which was right in his own eyes.

[30:47] That's where we are. That's humanity today. That's our modern world. We are steeped in this thing called relativism. They tried to make that fly with the Nuremberg trials after World War II when several of these Nazis were indicted and were convicted of war crimes against humanity and some of them were sentenced to be executed and others got long prison terms.

[31:17] And their argument of course was we weren't violating any standard. We were just carrying out orders. And well, you know, that didn't fly with the Nuremberg court.

[31:28] But you know what? Today it might. Today it might. It just depends on how widely you're going to apply relativism.

[31:38] in this passage we have the guaranteed product of different kinds of teachers.

[31:51] And the illustration that is given is between the trees and the fruit that they produce. He's using that to illustrate the false prophets. False prophets never appear to be false prophets.

[32:04] They will never show up on the scene. and I want you all to come to my meeting tonight. I'm going to be preaching. And by the way, I'm a false prophet. I want you to come out and hear what I have to say. No, they always appear in sheep's clothing.

[32:19] They always have hidden agendas. They have certain things in mind that they want to accomplish and use you to do it.

[32:32] But you don't know what they are. they have an open agenda that will generally satisfy everybody. But they have a hidden agenda that only they and a few close intimates even know what it is.

[32:52] And when the time comes, they will utilize it. These are false prophets in sheep's clothing. Is there any animal that is more innocent and more harmless than sheep?

[33:12] Sheep are so skittish someone says that when they take their sheep out, they can't even go too close to a babbling brook because they get skittish just by the noise and the action caused by the water running over the rocks.

[33:25] They have to lead them beside still waters, not raging waters. So they appear to be very harmless and very much worthwhile and they are in reality, with their hidden agenda, they are the opposite of sheep.

[33:46] What's the biggest predator that sheep have? Probably wolves or something akin to that. And by the way, do you think this is lost on scribes and Pharisees that happen to be in the audience?

[34:04] I can see a couple of scribes and Pharisees sitting there on the grass along with the other people looking at each other and saying, is he talking about us? do you think he's talking about us?

[34:19] Yeah, he's talking about you. That's exactly what they are. They are false prophets and they are in positions of power, influence, and respect.

[34:30] They stand in the marketplace with their long robes and people hail them, hail rabbis so and so. A lot of perks go along with it, a lot of respect, a lot of adulation and all the rest, and they've been eating this up until this commoner from Nazareth comes along and blows the whistle on them, and things really start getting tight.

[34:52] Inwardly, they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes, nor figs from thistles, are they? And what this means is, what he is actually saying is, look, what you need to do is look at these false teachers, look and listen to what they are teaching, and then ask yourself, what has their teaching done for them?

[35:27] What are they producing what are they putting out? What is their lifestyle like? Are they practicing what they're preaching?

[35:41] Because a tree is judged by the kind of fruit it gives, and if a tree is really a bad tree, it's not going to give good fruit. So one of the first things you ought to do is examine the teaching that someone puts forth and ask yourself, does this teacher live what he is teaching?

[36:05] What has it done for him? Is there a distinction to be made? I can assure you none of this was lost on the scribes and Pharisees when they were there in that audience.

[36:21] you will know them verse 16 by their fruits, that is the produce. It's interesting that we even call that produce, don't we?

[36:33] Why do we call produce produce? Because it's what the ground produces. It's what the tree produces. It's what the soil produces. So we call it produce.

[36:44] Every supermarket has got a produce counter. and every teacher has produce also. We produce in accordance with what we teach.

[36:59] And if the teaching is one thing and the producing is another thing, you've got reason to suspect that you might have a wolf here in sheep's clothing.

[37:12] Does this Pharisee and scribe live what he is teaching? Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

[37:25] So then you will know them by their fruits. What do they produce? That's a good test. You hear every now and then and you see particularly on television some of the health wealth gospel and I'm not going to name names because I don't want to dignify them but there have been actual cases brought where they went to trial where individuals who were on TV on several stations and begging people for money and they call it seed faith and plant your seed by sending me money and we'll send you this wonderful prayer cloth which is a piece of paper where you're supposed to stand on with your feet with a whole bunch of rigmarole and you would be surprised how many really vulnerable sometimes desperate people are out there in the audience and they may be dealing with a severe situation maybe even a terminal kind of illness and they think I guess I don't have anything to lose I've tried everything else and they send off money to these people and they preach one thing and you go check out where these people live and the fact that they're driving a

[38:41] Rolls Royce and all the rest of it it's health and wealth all right it's for their wealth and people are just snookered into this but they never come across this by the way I just I just want to profit from your money send me your money no they sound so pious and they've got a list stack there that high a prayer request that people have sent in and they say we go into our prayer chamber and we pray over every one of these requests by name and on and on and on and one of my favorite quotes of P.T.

[39:14] Barnum the master circus master the P.T. Barnum of the Barnum and Bailey circus used to say there's a sucker born every minute and my saying is there's a religious sucker born every 30 seconds and people are just waiting to be taken advantage of and there are those who do that and you look at these people and check out their lifestyle and the homes they live in the cars they drive and all the rest and the whole thing is just a sham it's all hypocrisy they are wolves in sheep's clothing and there's plenty of them out there and the poor public many times doesn't have the understanding or the savvy to make a distinction and what Christ is doing here simply this he's blowing the whistle on the wolves and they don't like it and they're going to come after him for it and that's precisely how this thing is going to play out from the sermon on the mount on okay we've got a few minutes for q a and i'll be glad to entertain any that you may have and if you've got questions that you don't want to ask publicly feel free to write them out drop them in the offering box and i'll do my best to to answer them okay Terry in the back and then uh uh did i see another hand yes over here uh uh

[40:33] Terry i'm trying to figure out how to identify a wolf is a catholic priest considered in that category i would say probably some catholic priests are and some are not um and the same thing is true of preachers same thing is true of rabbis i think that there are i think that there are some catholic priests who probably really do know the lord in fact i i i know one that someone here in the congregation told me about and she went she she went to this priest who had been a catholic priest for many years and with her bible and sat down with him and they had quite a lengthy discussion and the conclusion she said the conclusion that he came to is i believe everything you're saying and i think you were right but i've come too far it's been too long i can't do anything about it i can't change now it just seems that the extremes are pretty easy to figure out but then people who hold deep seated beliefs may well be absolutely incorrect in their biblical interpretation and not teaching grace you know for by grace are you saved through faith but they actually believe what they're saying and they quote scripture and they have good intentions yeah so are those false prophets and are those the walls well all i can say is the lord reads the heart he's the only one who who really knows we some i know i've heard christians say well i'm i'm not i'm not judging i'm just a fruit inspector but we have to be careful about that too because we don't always you know we don't always judge correctly because we don't know everything that's involved in the situation i uh anyone anyone who teaches something that is not true is a false teacher particularly especially in that area and i categorize myself as that i've told you that i have taught things that i later discovered were not true i believed them at the time remember the calvinist issue and the time we spent in that the time that i was teaching and fortifying and insisting that that was the truth and it wasn't i was a false teacher in that area and frankly it pains me to admit that but it has to be true because if you're not teaching truth you're teaching error and i was teaching error and not only that but it troubles me because i know in my humanity and in my not knowing everything i'm still very capable of teaching error i will never do it intentionally but i know i've done it unintentionally and how many times have i told you that every preacher should be really scared of two things one is that people will not believe what he says and the other is that people will believe what he says those are two legitimate fears and i face them all the time and the only way that you can the best way that you can deliver yourself from not teaching error is to study the truth as much as you can and then you just have to leave it with the lord you see you see an imperfect vessel which is what i am i am a very flawed vessel an imperfect vessel cannot teach perfect truth it's impossible

[44:34] there was only one who ever lived that taught perfect truth all the time and he was crucified for doing it so i'm always looking for error and the last thing in the world i want to do is lead somebody astray by what i teach because i take that very very seriously and let me tell you something else this is a big reason why we have a q a because you have every right no you don't have a right you have a responsibility if you hear me teach something that you know is not true and you don't call me on it shame on you you owe it to me you owe it to me to say marv that's not true what about thus and so and thus and so and it wouldn't be the first time that i would stand corrected because that's what flawed people need to do beth you had a comment or question i've always gotten um confused about let's see this is going back to matthew 6 verse 14 and 15 okay where it says if you forgive people their trespasses your heavenly father will also forgive you but if you do not forgive others their trespasses neither will your father forgive you your trespasses now wait a minute wait a minute i'm sorry let me turn my hearing aid up a little bit okay would you repeat that and where are you what passage yeah i'm on matthew chapter 6 oh chapter 6 okay going clear back okay verse 14 and 15 okay and it's talking about forgiveness and that if you know um you don't forgive other people that your heavenly father will not forgive you and i think back on remember several years ago when those little amish girls were raped and murdered and i and it was so horrible it was a horrible thing that happened and i remember those amish people went to that family and forgave them and i remember hearing on the news that they said we had to because if we didn't forgive then our our that god wouldn't forgive us yeah and um you know that's part of the lord's prayer and all that and i just wondered if you could just talk about that just for a short second because that's always confused me well that's understandable and i have a great deal of respect for amish people in some areas let me tell you i respect them for their cooking i respect them for their dogged determination to live the lifestyle that they live which as far as i'm concerned would be a great handicap i mean i just uh i chafe when we're without electricity for 24 hours because of a storm or something i can't imagine living that way but they do so i admire them for uh hanging in there with their faith in in that regard but at the same time i i cannot respect their um their their justification for it or because i am convinced and and by the way this comes in really with what we're talking about uh this is a requirement under the mosaic law and the forgiveness was a conditional thing this law forgiving men their transgressions was given exclusively to the nation of israel wasn't given to any of the surrounding this was this was none of this none of the law of moses none of the law of moses was ever given to the canaanites or the egyptians or um any other country it was given exclusively to israel not only was it not given to the other nations the other nations didn't even know about it didn't care about it it was exclusively jewish so this was one of the requirements under the law of moses and and i have told you that

[48:34] our forgiveness is a blanket forgiveness that we enjoy when we come to faith in christ and no you don't even have to confess all your sins in order to be forgiven for all your sins i can't even think of all my sins i mean i grew up from babyhood sinning right and left you know and it was too stupid to even know what sin was but i know i violated uh... standards and in every way shape and form growing up and as a teenager and everything else and when i came to faith in christ do you think i sat down and confessed every sin like i said i couldn't even think of them all but jesus christ cleanses from all sin when you put your faith and trust in him and it isn't a conditional thing other than the fact that you admit that you confess your sin and that's another whole subject that i'd like to develop but we don't have time now you know what is what is gone underground today and the reason that there is such little publication of the gospel and the reason that we have been hearing less and less people coming to faith in christ is because sin is no longer with us it has gone underground and the reason that so many people see no need for jesus christ today is because they have no concept of sin and if you don't have an understanding of sin you do not need a savior christ is completely superfluous and that's where we are today and when we forgive we forgive because we have been forgiven and yet you've got volition if someone wrongs you even a husband or wife if if a mate wrongs you and asked for your forgiveness you don't have to forgive them no you don't you don't have to forgiveness is a gift you do not have to give it if you don't want to but you need to understand if you are unforgiving you are saying in effect that you have a higher standard than what god does which is a pretty awesome thing to say be kind one to another tender hearted forgiving one another even as god for christ's sake has forgiven you i think the most contradictory thing that you can come up with is a christian who is unforgiving it's somebody then who has no appreciation or idea of how much god has forgiven him for how can you possibly how can you possibly refuse to forgive someone when you have been forgiven for so much yet you can you can or you can even come off with a phony forgiveness you can say oh yeah i forgive you and in your heart you're saying boy i'm going to find some way to get even that's not forgiveness or how about this one i forgive you but i'll i'll never be able to forget it that's not forgiveness either real forgiveness means i know you do not have the ability to forget it but if you could would you that's real forgiveness does that any help thank you uh one more and then we'll have to dismiss well two more and then we'll dismiss all right ron here's the mic uh years ago when you made the error of uh in calvinism uh you studied and you found

[52:35] that you were wrong you corrected it what about false teachers today that are teaching many different subjects and then do not study to find out the error of their ways well uh i just hate to be in their shoes because um you know james um what i'm getting at is this you just said that you thought that there were some priests that knew the lord you know personally i don't think that any priest knows the lord because they are continually doing pagan and unbiblical practices i know i know and i read the articles that you did on uh catholicism they are back there that ron did and and and i i think that they are very good but um i we do not we do not have the ability to look into someone's heart and and i would as a priest or as a preacher i would really really be uh boy i don't know i i've often said i've often said probably the most dangerous thing you can do is to look upon truth that you recognize to be true you are convinced it is true and you walk away from it or you refuse to divulge it that is really serious business uh this is where it it pays to be ignorant so if you just don't know if you don't know then you're not responsible to do something about what you don't know but if you do know and you refuse to correct it um not knowing would not be an excuse they should be studying to find out that's true that's true and this is why james i was going to say james offers that that uh statement that he does i think it's in chapter three and he says brethren let's not be many teachers knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation i think there is a different a higher element of accountability that is given to those who are in a teaching capacity where they exercise influence over other people and i would include in that um public school teachers preachers everybody anybody anybody who has opportunity to influence the thinking and the decisions that other people will be making uh stands in a in a position of real accountability and it ought to be taken a lot more seriously than it is by by so many um lynette had a comment or question and then we'll dismiss this is right along those same lines of what he was just saying i know of a pastor in the area that a young kid came to them probably in their late teens or early 20s and said she said i'm really struggling with not knowing if i'm gay or not and i don't know what to do and this pastor of a big church said well you just really need to follow what you feel is right for you and whatever you think is okay you know that's the way the lord has made you and you shouldn't fight it and i when i heard that i thought i cannot believe the influence that this guy is going to have over this whole congregation like any pastor would and here this struggling kid is coming to them for advice and for help and to say please help me to stay away from this and he's saying it's okay it's all right don't worry about it and

[56:36] that just there's your false teacher and that's someone who's blatantly ignoring what's in scripture and i don't know if if they struggle with it themselves and they're afraid that if they'll ever be found out they didn't want to tell somebody it was wrong i don't know but i i can't believe somebody would say that well that's that is that is really tragic it is it is really tragic and yet it is so common with what's going on in our culture today and the moral relativism and you hear all kinds of arguments about this and there there are even states that that have laws on the books now that if a psychologist or psychiatrist tries to tries to help someone escape the gay lifestyle or the gay activities they can actually be prosecuted under the law they call it reparative therapy and all they are allowed to do is to affirm this person in their choice of lifestyle not correct it and not do anything to to try to restore them this is a really big subject and i don't know if you know it or not but you should how could you miss it do you understand this is taking our nation down do you understand that that and the same-sex marriage it is taking our nation down in fact in much of the western world it's taking the western world down it is it is getting to the place now where those who oppose the idea of homosexuality lifestyle activity etc going to be the group to be ostracized and maybe even in some respects persecuted because we will be seen or already are being seen as unloving unkind judgmental you don't want you want to stand in the way of people's true love and so on and and it's just beginning you know it's been going on for quite a while but it's getting to the place of where it's it's going to be intensified more and more and we'll see more and more evidence of it so read all of those articles back there if you will and i'm sorry i've gone way over on our time but let's stand and we'll be dismissed now the god of peace who brought up from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant even jesus our lord equip you in every good thing to do his will working in us that which is pleasing in his sight through jesus christ to whom be the glory forever and ever amen to experience but let's show yourけど it's no that's something to do to dokie because it's hollow and all that's like because it's all that's

[59:50] Maßnahmen are to which even cause that's so just Whew out for