Five Symptoms of Self-Serving Religion

This coming Sunday morning as I already mentioned will be gathering here in our church facility at 930 for those who are able to come will maintain careful procedures and we will have some restrictions will not be will not be church as usual, but it will be the assembly of the saints will gather together to worship the Lord and to hear his word in person than on Sunday night at 6 o'clock will be back to life streaming from this location and again next Wednesday night, but perhaps some other changes are forthcoming and when they are we will certainly pass that along.

We are praying for all of our government officials in these times of difficulty in our government official of the week that beacon this Wednesday night is Gov. Roy Cooper, Gov. of North Carolina.

He has great responsibilities. A great weight upon his shoulders. Please uphold him in prayer are military person of the week is Senior Airman Justin Marley and the U.S. Air Force in Lincoln, California, and we pray for him.

The Lord will protect and guide him and bring him back to us safely at the appointed time. We have a number of phrases on our prayer sheet tonight with praise the Lord that Calvin Collins is much improved. As he's battling cancer were grateful the Scott do Lori was able to secure tickets to the Philippines to rejoin his family will be leaving tomorrow to travel across the country to California and then in a few days will be boarding the plane to join his wife and son in the Philippine.

We thank the Lord that Amy Hill is doing well from the foot surgery that she had recently in the Tyler Phillips is likewise doing well from cancer. In fact, I noted that the number names are cancer section. My prayer sheet seems to be the lowest number that I've seen in a while were grateful that many of these have improved significantly in some have even been taken off the list and we also praise the Lord that Isaias Lawson had successful surgery this last week on his spine out in South Dakota and that he is doing well now under members. I can tell you that my wife Marty is greatly improved from her cracked ribs is not 100% better, but she's a lot better.

I think the vacation last week did her a world of good and she's improving. Thank you for your prayers. We continue to pray for Sarah Cardwell recovery from her knee surgery and I learned recently just really a few moments ago that there is some concern and what what may be causing the concern cannot be known until additional tests are run.

MRIs are are done or whatever, but please remember Sarah in prayer. I think she's a little discouraged. She considers a possibility that she may have to have additional surgery certainly trust not to Guthrie's at home and still battling cancer. Pray for her art. Pope continues to pack battle.

His CO PD as does Lenny Braley. We don't mention him in that regard is often because his case is not as severe as arts, but he also battled COPD as well. Actually, Watkins continues to recover from her pulmonary issues were praying for Marianne Freeman who is waiting for certification as a speech pathologist and the covert situation is holding up that process. So please pray that everything will come together as is expected, Sarah Gilmore and Enoch's mother is experiencing some health issues which may be related to her medication chemically and Christine Boettcher if I'm pronouncing that right or by you had a one week old baby who passed away recently, acquaintances of Ken Sue Elliott of our church. Please pray for Kennedy and Christine Larry Morse's nephew Brandon Noris remains at UNC on 100% oxygen. He's is very weak though he's doing somewhat better was able to speak to his relatives this weekend. Please pray for Gary Percocet. He's a boulder and committed evangelist who preaches the gospel out in the open air on the streets and he was arrested doing that very thing in Greensboro last week. He was preaching to the protesters and he got arrested.

I'm not sure of all the details, but it does make sense to me that protesters are are protected to say freely to to have free speech for whatever they want to say but that he doesn't have protected free speech to say what he wants to say to them so anyway. Pray for him as he will not be going to court and in dealing with this situation. He's a dear brother. I met him I know him and I'm praying for him to pray for Lee Vestal who fell and broke his kneecap and so he has one more thing on top of so many other things. He fractured his kneecap and he will be in the stabilizer for several weeks and then after that is scheduled for knee replacement surgery and we are praying for. Why don't matter. It's the only senior care facility that I'm aware of in this area had a real outbreak of 19 but they have had with the many residents that tested positive in staff. It is a test test deposit positive in the report to us is that there has been 19 deaths, as far as I know, that's the only really hot spot of the Covidien elements County so pre-please pray for the staff and residents of White Oak Manor continue to uphold Trevor Johnson missionary Trevor Johnson is he's come back to the states to deal with some family issues and is also continuing to recover in his health situation which has been very serious. Paul Snyder in the states is doing better. In fact, I'm going to read a portion of his letter tonight in the moment and we continue to pray for missionaries. Tort law in South Africa who was awaiting word that a liver donor liver transplant donor is available to him. I pray every day that this may be the day we will hear news of his scourge surgery being scheduled to families have been touched by death. I patted Betty Duncan of our church buried their son John yesterday 57 years old, died very suddenly. Please pray for them and a friend of Annina Dick Whitehead died in New York.

Please pray for that family. We are continuing to pray for David Phillips was cancer on the brain and kidney for Ben Vestal whose cancer has reached a place where the treatments are beginning to do harm rather than good.

So he's going to be changing his treatments to something more mild. Pray that the Lord will minister graciously to him and then Leslie white two has brain tumors and is declining. She is a cousin of Sue Vestal not to Commit Missionary Communications and Other.

First of All, from Carl and Jamie Hinshaw to Our Dear Friends at Beacon.

Thank You so Much for Your Prayers and Support. After the Passing of Carl's Mom Mildred Hinshaw, Your Calls, Cards, Food in the Beautiful Plant from Beacon Were Such a Comfort to Us.

Even in These Times of Social Distancing Your Love Was Felt Very Close in Our Hearts. We Love You All and Praise God for Your Ministry to Us.

We Will Miss Mildred but Rejoice That She Is Now with the Lord and Free of Pain and Physical Limitations That She Endured for the Last Two Years of Her Life with Love in Christ, Carl Jamie Hinshaw, and Then This Card from Doris Loftus Dear Pastor Barkman Congregation at Beacon Baptist Church.

Many Thanks for All the Calls, Cards, Prayers and Food.

Also, the Heartfelt Container Container Garden Sent to Us during the Loss of Wayland. It Means so Much to Know, My Church, Loved, Cared and Supported Us in so Many Ways during Whalen's Sickness and Our Loss with Love Signed Doris Loftus. Marty and I Counted up Seven Deaths That Were Either Members of Our Church for Work Close Family Members of Members of Our Church Just since This Cove Cove Would Lock down Situation Began in March. It's Quite, Quite a Number, and We Are Looking to the Lord for the Health and Strength That Only He Can Give Enough As a Missionary Communications. I Said That I Would Read One Relating to Paul Snyder.

Natalie Relating to Him, but Written by Paul and Trish to Update Their Supporters and I'm Going to Just Pick out A Few Things, but Here They Write. We Have a Huge Praise. Trish and I Are Praising the Lord Because All the Funds for the Purchase of the Next 300 Solar Recorders Has Been Given by Now Able to Purchase All 300 Solar Speakers from Singapore.

Thank You for Praying for This Need. The Lord Gave the Funds within a Week of Sending out the Request.

This Is Proven to Be a Very Effective Way of Spreading the Gospel in a Number of Countries Is by Putting Our Recordings and the Device to Play the Recording in the Hands of People Who Otherwise Would Have No Way to Have Either This Material in Recorded Form or the Means to to Listen to It, but This Has Proved to Be Very Effective in a Number of Countries and Paul Continues to Write the Last Four Weeks Have Been Encouraging for My Health and for Trish and I I Was Able to Meet with Several Men for Fellowship and Encouragement That Doesn't Sound Remarkable to Us but for Him That's Remarkable. He Has Not Been Able to Do That.

It's He Says I Have Seen Some Improvement in My Overall Mental Condition. I'm Still Battling Depression and Fatigue, but There Has Been Improvement. I Have an Appointment with My Neurologist Next Week He Will Be Giving Me Results of My Latest Blood Work and Hopefully Scheduling My Therapy for Eyes, Facial Nerves and Muscles. Please Pray That the Veiled Will Be Lifted from the Current Virus and That We Can Begin Treatment.

This Particular Therapy Treatment Is a Fairly New Type Procedure, but a Lengthy One.

Pray That This Will Heal Help Heal the Brainstem, Nerves and Muscles.

Also Pray for Marianne Still Fighting Anger from Noises and Movements of Bother, but Again We Have Seen Improvements, but She Still Has a Ways to Go That from This Nighters Dear Missionary Couple, What Else I Have a Communication from Missionary Herbert Taylor Herb and Wanda Are an Unusual Couple Many of You Course You Are Members of Beacon Congregation Know Them Because They Have Been Here a Number of Times but They Have a Great Burden for Spanish-Speaking People in America Hispanics As They Are Generally Called.

They Develop That Burden While Herb Was Pastoring a Church in Virginia Trying to Remember the Name of the Town and Escapes Me at the Moment, Though I Did Visit Them There. On One Occasion, but There They Began to Reach out to Hispanic People in Their Area. Develop a Real Burden for Them and past the Age of 50. Herb and His Wife, Wanda Learned the Spanish Language so That They Could Minister to These People and Then Felt the Leading of the Lord to Leave Their Their Pastoral Ministry and to Go into Full-Time Hispanic Evangelistic Ministry and Primarily in Facilitating the Starting of Hispanic Ministries in Other Churches.

They Were Helpful in the One That We Have Have Established Here Are ESL Ministry As Well As Assisting in Planting Hispanic Churches across America and They Have Been Very Effective in This so That I Read a Little Bit of Their Letter How They Are Continuing to Minister during These Difficult Days of Covert to Say These Are Unusual Times Is Certainly an Understatement. Little Did We Know What 2020 Would Hold on March 1 We Visited Several Hispanic Churches in the Atlanta Area That Hearts That Morning, Our Hearts Melted to See a Church Family Worshiping in a Crowded House. That Evening We Visited Another Hispanic Ministry Where We Sought to Encourage the Pastor and His Wife in the Midst of Trying Time on March 9-11, We Participated in the Annual Conference of Mission Gospel Ministries International Herb Challenge the Minute Missionaries with the Church Planting Presentation and Then Life Dramatically Changed.

For All of Us on March 12 We Flew to Cleveland Ohio to Participate in Council Meetings at Baptist Church Planters. That's the Mission Board That They Are Serving with. But We Had to Return Home Via a Rental Car on March 19 at the Time Everything Was Closing down. As You Know, Because of Covert, 19 We Were Scheduled to Attend the Wedding of One of Our Baptist Church Plantar Missionary Kids on March 21 in Florida, but Instead We Joined Them Via Lifestream This Photo Bottom Right Has Become a Regular Seen in Our Own As We Have Connected with Our Ministry Partners. It's Herb in Front of a Front of the Computer Screen. That's the Way A Lot Of Us of Connected As We Have the Content Have Connected with Our Ministry Partners Prayed with Our Baptist Church Plantar Missionaries Given Premarital Counseling Shared Scriptural Challenges for Deacons Meetings and Prayer Meetings Encouraged Fellow Ministry Workers and the List Goes on. Ministry Continues, Just Differently, We Have To Admit In Spite Of These Unusual Times We Have Enjoyed Having Less Travel Instead Just Being Home for a Change. Praise the Lord for Good Health.

During This Time for Continued Ministry Support for Being Able to Virtually See so Many Friends Missionaries and Supporters from around the Country. Please Pray for Wisdom to Know When We Should Schedule Future Ministry Trips for Several Ministry Workers Who Are Facing Real Discouragement Preparations for Our MCH All Meeting in September, 25, in Greenville, South Carolina. Every Year They Conducted a One Day Seminar for the People Involved in Hispanic Ministries Church Planting Ministries and Other Ministries from All across the United States, and This Is Something of a Planning Conference for Leaders All across the Country in This Movement and Then Please Pray for Our Baptist Church Planting Missionaries to Go Well and and Quintana Serving in Seminole, Florida, Where Several of Our Church Members Are Struggling Financially. Do to the Pandemic Will Ensure That Prayer Request Could Be Repeated a Number of Times in Other Places As Well. Just a Couple of Words from a Prayer Letter from Tom and Connie Chapman in Chile They'd Asked Us to Pray for a Friend Named Roberto Who Was Very Very Sick with Covert, 19 the Lord's Answer Prayer. I Just Read This Much We Want to Thank You Again for Praying so Faithfully for Roberto. Your Prayers Were Not Wasted.

This Dear Brother Was near Death. The Lord Heard His Children's Prayers and Healed Him on Some Other Things but I Will Stop at That Point Will In Spite Of All of This, We Should Have Hearts of Thanksgiving to God. The Bible Tells Us in Everything Give Thanks, for This Is the Will of God in Christ Jesus concerning You. And so We Give God Thanks for Covert, 19 We Don't Know Exactly What He's Doing, but We Give Him Thanks and We Pray That He Will Use It to Bring Our Nation to a Place of Humility, Surrender, and Genuine Seeking for God. We Pray in the Midst of These Riots and Rebellions That Are Going on across Our Land That Are so Disturbing That Again God Will Use This to Show America How Much It Needs Christ That Human Solutions Are Not Sufficient to Solve Our Problems That We Need God in His Wisdom and His Power, and We Pray That the Lord Will Do That and We Thank Him for Whatever It Is That He's Doing through These Things. My Heart Is Filled with Thankfulness to Him Who Bore My Pain Who Plumbed the Depths of My Disgrace and Gave Me Life Again, Who Crushed My Curse of Sinfulness and Close Me in His Light and Wrote His Law of Righteousness with Power upon My Heart. My Heart Is Filled with Thankfulness to Him Who Walks beside Who Floods My Weaknesses with Strength and Causes Fears to Fly Whose Every Promise Is Enough for Every Step I Take, Sustaining Me with Arms of Love and Crowning the with Grace.

My Heart Is Filled with Thankfulness to Him Who Reigns above Whose Wisdom Is My Perfect Peace Whose Every Thought Is Love for Every Day I Have on Earth Is Given by the King, so I Will Give My Life by All to Love and Follow Him Wonderful Him. I Now Open My Bible to the Book of Galatians and I Am Going to Open up a Text in Chapter 6, Which Is toward the End of the Book Is Really in the Part That We Would Probably Call the Conclusion of Paul's Six Chapter Epistle to the Galatian Churches. What I Want Us to See in This Passage Is the Danger of What We Might Call Self Serving Religion.

When I Use That Word Religion. I'm Not Excluding Christianity. Some People like to Think of Christianity As Being Not a Religion. Everything Else Is Not Christianity, Not Bible Christianity Is a Religion, but Bible Christianity Is Not a Religion Lime Including Bible Christianity, and That Term Religion Because the Bible Itself Uses That Term to Describe Christianity in the Book of James Is Not a Real Common Term, but It Is a Biblical Term and We Read Some Things about Pure Religion and Undefiled before God and the Father Is This to Minister to the Widows and the Father Listed in Their Affliction, and to Keep Ourselves Unspotted from the World. That's Pure Religion. That's Christian Religion. And That's Always a Danger in Any Any Religious Expression. Any Religious Profession That We Can Turn That Religious Commitment into a Self-Serving Religion Rather Than a God Serving Religion and for That We Must Always Be on Guard and so with That Introduction, I'm Now Going to Read in Galatians Chapter 6 Verses 11 to the End of the Chapter. This Is the Conclusion of the Book and Here's What Paul Says See with What Large Letters I Have Written to You with My Own Hand As Many As Desire to Make a Good Showing in the Flesh. These Would Compel You to Be Circumcised, Only That They May Not Suffer Persecution for the Cross of Christ for Not Even Those Who Are Circumcised Keep the Law, but They Desire to Have You Circumcised, That They May Boast in Your Flesh, but God Forbid That I Should Boast, except in the Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ, by Whom the World Has Been Crucified to Me and I to the World. For in Christ Jesus Neither Circumcision nor Un-Circumcision Avails Anything but a New Creation and As Many As Walk According to This Rule, Peace and Mercy Be upon Them and upon the Israel of God. From Now on Let No One Trouble Me, for I Bear My Body the Marks of the Lord Jesus Brethren the Grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ Be with Your Spirit Man. The Conclusion of Paul's Epistle to the Galatians. Sometimes This Concluding Section of Paul's Epistles. This One of the Other Ones Is Called the Subscription and Most of Paul's Epistles. This Section Is Closing.

Section Contains Warm Personal Greeting and Often Even Names of People Sometimes Rather Lengthy List of People That Are Singled out by the Apostle Paul for Commendation at the Conclusion of an Epistle to a Particular Church but Here in This Galatian Epistle Paul Instead Returns to the Main Doctrinal Theme of This Book.

He Has Been Dealing with the Problem of Judaizers and Wrong Views of the Gospel That Takes up the Bulk of the Book.

It Takes up Virtually All of the First Four Chapters of the Book and Then in Chapters 5 and Six for the Main Part Team Brings Application Out Of the Doctrinal Part That He Has Already Given but Now He Goes Back to Doctrinal Considerations Back to Theological Considerations As Were Going to See in Verses 11, 12 and 13 Tonight Is a Do That White Light.

For Example, Does He Omit the Customary Personal Greetings. Well, He Doesn't Tell Us Why so We Can Only Speculate, but It Is Obvious That There Was a There Was a Breach of Fellowship between These Churches and Paul. The Error That Had Crept into the Churches Had Caused Great Disagreement and I Think Evidently Even Some in These Churches to Turn Their Affections Away from the Apostle Paul and to Turn Them toward False Teachers. Paul Sends This Epistle to Correct Them to Show Them Their Error to Lay the Errors That They Were Dealing with, down Alongside Sound Doctrine down Alongside a Proper Understanding of the Gospel so That They Might See the Error That They Were Involved with and Hopefully by Doing This He Would Recover Them to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The Purity of the Gospel and in so Doing, Would Recover Their Affections toward Him.

The Messenger of the Gospel to Them. But at the Time That He Righteousness That Was Not the Case in Many of Them Were Disaffected toward Him and Therefore It Is Likely Again This Is Only Speculation That He Doesn't Have the Customary Warm and Friendly Greetings Because They Really Weren't Appropriate, They Really Wouldn't Have Been Welcome at This Time Some More Work Needed to Be Done but Be That As It May, Returning to Dr. and Reminds Us That Doctrine Is What Is Most Important and the Gospel Which Is the Heart of All Doctrine Is More Important Than Anything Else and That's What Paul Is Dealing with Here. If You Get the Gospel Right You May Have Some Other Things Wrong but They're Not Going to Be Tremendously Serious. We Want Everything to Be Right. We Don't Want to to Harbor Error in Any Area but If You Get the Gospel Right Other Things Are Not Going to Be Seriously Destructive, but If You Get Everything Else Right and the Gospel Wrong That Destroys That Destroys Everything That Will Destroy the Church That Destroys the Witness of the Community That Destroys Any Opportunity to Help the Souls of Men That Destroys Christianity That Turns Biblical Christianity and into a False Religion.

If You Don't Get the Gospel We Need to Be Sure That We Proclaim an Accurate Gospel Message Not Recognize When I Say These Things That I Place Myself in a Minority, Seemingly of Churches and Christians in America Because so Many Do Just the Opposite. Rather Than Exalting Doctrine. They Diminish Doctrine. They Downplay Doctrine. They Depreciate Doctrine, but I Assure You That the Bible Does Not. This Section the Closes the Galatian Epistle Is a Reminder That We Can Only Do Good to Others As We Get the Gospel Right Let Us Remember That Not What We See in This Section Will First of All We Have That Verse.

The Talks about Paul Writing with His Own Hand You're Familiar with That Verse 11. See What See with What Large Letters I've Written to You with My Own Hand Not Going to Take the Time That I Could Take You to Some Other Epistles Two or Three Others That Make a Similar Reference and Show Us That It Was Paul's Custom When He Got to the End of an Epistle to Write the Last Part Sometimes Just a Verse or Two with His Own Hand. The Rest of It Would've Been Dictated to What We Would Call a Secretary and Amanuensis As They Were Known in That Day and That Would Be in the Handwriting of Whoever Was Serving As the Secretary Taking Paul's Dictation. But When He Got to the End of the Epistle. He Would Take the Quail Out Of the Hand of the Secretary and He Would Write A Few Lines in His Own Hand. Why Did He Do That.

It Was to Safeguard against Counterfeits Because Even at This Early Time There Were People Who Were Sending out Epistles That They Claimed Were Written by Paul, but They Were Counterfeits That Were Not Written by Paul at All and so to Authenticate the Ones That He Wrote Even Though He Dictated That We Say Wrote Them Because Indeed He Was the Author of Them in Order to Authenticate the Ones He Wrote He Would Write out in His Own Handwriting. A Few Verses in His Handwriting Would Be Recognized by the Churches That He Sent These Epistles to That Is Plain That Is Evident He Makes Reference to the Fact That He's Writing These Last Few Lines with Large Letters, Larger Apparently Than What the Amanuensis You That Seems to Indicate That He Had Poor Eyesight That That's What Is Speculated and There Are Also Some References to That Elsewhere, but Here's the Point That I Want to Make It All of This from This Point. Verse 11 to the End of the Book Is All Paul's Handwriting.

He Doesn't Just Write a Closing Benediction in His Own Handwriting, but He Writes These Words That Have To Do with the Dangers of Self-Serving Religion in His Own Handwriting, Which I Think Serves to Underscore the Importance of the Verses That We Are Looking at Now That's the Point I Want to Make. He Wrote This in His Own Hand. Now What Is It That He Wrote That Is of Such Importance to Us. Well, It Is the Danger of Self-Serving Religion That Is of Turning Our Christian Profession and Practice into Something That Is That Is More Self-Serving Than It Is Christ Serving We Have To Watch out for That and How Do We Watch out for One of the Symptoms and That's What I'm Going to Show You Their Five Symptoms of Self-Serving Religion. In Verses 12 and 13 That's over Going to Take up in the Remainder of Our Bible Study Tonight.

What Are They the Number One Image Instead of Reality. He Says in Verse 12 As Many As Desire to Make a Good Showing in the Flesh As Many As Desire to Make a Good Showing in the Flesh, Goes on to Say, These Would Compel You to Be Circumcised Is Talking about the Judaizers That Is Talked about Earlier in the Book. I Don't Have Time to Go Back to the Beginning of the Book and Show That to You but That's What Is Talking about Is Already Talked about These People before so He Doesn't Have To Describe Them in Detail. Now Those Who Have Followed Him up until This Point in the Epistle Know Exactly Was He Talking about What Is He Saying They Desire to Make a Good Showing in the Flesh in the Things That Relate to the Physical Body and Particularly to the Adamic Nature. They Want to Look Good in the Realm of That Which Is Visible, That Which Is External, That Which Is Considered to Be Successful by Worldly Standards. They Desire to Make a Good Showing in the Flesh.

A Good Showing to Others Talking about Their Practice of Christianity. In This Particular Setting Is Talking about Those We Call Judaizers. I Do Need to Explain to You That Term Refers Excuse Me to People of Jewish Background Were Born into the into a Jewish Family of the Jewish Religion into the Nation of Israel, Who Had Professed Faith in Jesus Christ. So They Are What We Might Call Converted Jews Christian Jews Messianic Jews, but They Were Propounding False Doctrine and One of the Things That They Were Doing This Again Goes Back to an Earlier Section, Galatians, They Were Following the Apostle Paul Wherever He Went Wherever He Evangelized It Established Churches and They Would Try to Get of These Churches and Teach That Faith in Jesus Christ Is a Good Beginning. But It's Not Enough and Now You Need to Go on and Be Circumcised, Which of Course Was the Right That Brought Males, Jewish Males into the Old Covenant through Circumcision. That Was the Sign of the Old Covenant That Was the Sign That One Was Jewish, so Why Were These People Who Claimed to Be Christians. Followers of Jesus Christ. Why Did They Continue Not Only to Take Pride in Their Circumcision but to Emphasize the Necessity of Circumcision to Others. What's the Reason for That. Paul Tells Us Here They Desire to Make a Good Showing in the Flesh There Trying to Impress People. According to Worldly Standards There Trying to Impress Jewish People Who Have Not Embraced Christ to Make Them Impressed with the Fact That These Though They Have Professed Faith in Christ Have Not Really Abandoned the Jewish Religion. In Fact, They Are Zealous for Circumcision As We Are.

That's Important to Them Because to the People They Were Trying to Impress Circumcision Was a Major Sign of Jewishness and to Make Converts Out Of Gentiles by Having Them Circumcised Was Highly Applauded among Jewish People. Never Jesus Said That the Pharisees Would Encompass the Earth to Make One Proselyte That's Important It Was for Them If They Could Go Somewhere to Convince Some Gentile That He Ought to Be Circumcised. In Other Words, Bring Him into the Jewish Religion to the Right of Circumcision Would Go to the Ends of the Earth to Do That. It Was That Important to Them. Now, Here Are Professing Christians of a Jewish Background Who Are Doing Exactly the Same Thing. Why in Order to Impress Their Friends and Relatives That Had Not yet Embraced Christ. They're Doing It to Make a Show of the Flesh, the Point Being That They Are More Interested in Impressing Others Than in Standing for Truth Now Today We Don't Have Many Examples of People Going around Trying to Talk Others into Circumcision but the Same Symptom Is Found in Christianity Today, Namely a Desire to Impress Others with Visible External Thing and so Anything to Report Large Numbers of Decisions for Christ. Whether There's Any Substance to Them or Not, Whether These People Show Evidence of Truly Being Converted or Not. If We Can Get Them to Make a Decision and Then We Can Report That We Have so Many Decisions We Had We Seen so Many People Saved That Is Highly Impressive to Certain Segments of the Christian Community without Any Regard for the Damage That You May Be Doing to the Souls of These People That You Are Pressing to Make Decisions without Any Understanding of What They're Doing and without Any Work of the Holy Spirit in Their Heart That Is Not What Is Most Important. What Is Most Important Is That It Makes Us Look Good. We Are Making up a Visible Showing a Good Showing in the Flesh. What Is That That's a Sign of What We Talking about Self Serving Religion. That's One of the Signs. One of the Symptoms of It. This Desire for Image Instead of Reality Presenting the Right Image Looking Good in the Right Way to Certain People That We Want to Impress and of Course, There Can Be All Kinds of Things That Fall under This Category That I Really Don't Have Time Victim and Have Difficulty Completing the List of Five Tonight so I Don't Have Time to Get into All All Kinds of Other Applications Will Just Have To Watch for This Tendency Were Trying to Impress the Wrong Ones Who Are We Supposed to Be Impressing Jesus Christ First and Foremost and Maybe We Could Even Say Jesus Christ Alone but so Many Times Were More Interested in Impressing Certain People Certain Kinds of People Certain Groups of People Than We Are Impressing Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. That Is a Symptom of Self-Serving Religion Image Instead of Reality Not I Said a Moment Ago with Paul Is Getting into Here Is into the Motives of These People Know This Is a Very Tricky Area Is Not Only Talking about What These People Are Doing That Is Wrong from an Objective Standpoint This Is What They're Doing. This Is What the Bible Says to Do Know That What They're Doing Is Wrong Because It Is Contrary to What the Bible Says but He's Getting beneath the Surface and Dealing with the Motives for Why They're Doing What They're Doing Is Telling Us Here There.

They're Doing This in Order to Have a Good Image in Order to Impress Other People. Their Motive Is to Be Approved of by Men Rather Than to Be Approved by God. So Is Not Just Dealing with with What They're Doing Wrong in This Case Pressuring People to Be Circumcised When That's Contrary to the Gospel.

The Gospel Is Not Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and Be Circumcised, and Thou Shalt Be Saved. Nor Is the Christian Life Believe the Lord Jesus Christ and Follow Him and Be Circumcised and You Will Be a Good Christian. The Bible Teaches. Neither of Those Things.

So Why Would Professing Christians Be Doing This.

He Tells Us Here. There Is an Ulterior Motive. There's an Inward Moment Motive, There's an Underlying Motive There Trying to Make a Good Show to Others. Now Here's What I Want Us to See Judging the Motives of Others Is Very Tricky. It's Very Dangerous for Us to Do That or on Safe Ground Were Dealing with Objective Truth. Objective Realities. Here Is What Somebody Teaches Its Contrary to What the Bible Says It's Wrong Because It's Contrary to What the Bible Says, Regardless of Why They're Doing It. We Don't Know Why They're Doing It All We Know Is That It's Contrary to the Bible.

Here's What the Bible Says We Ought to Do.

Here's How We Ought to Act As Christians. Here's How Some People Are Acting Contrary to What the Bible Says What They Are Doing, Therefore, Is Wrong. We Probably Have No Way of Knowing Why They're Doing It but We Don't Need to. All We Need to Know Is That What They Are Doing Is Contrary to What the Bible Teaches. It Is Very Difficult for Us to Correctly Judge the Motives of Other. This May Be What Jesus Is Talking about in the Sermon on the Mount When He Says, Judge Not, That You Be Not Judged. The Bible Is Not Telling His Never to Judge.

In Fact Elsewhere. The Bible Says Just the Opposite. Jesus Himself Said Judge Righteous Judgments. You Are to Judge Righteously, You Are to Judge Biblically. You Are to Judge According to Truth. We Have To Make Judgment. This Is Right. This Is Wrong Because This Is This Is True to the Word of God. This Is Contrary to the Word of God. These Are Judgments That Not Only We May Make, but We Must Make Judge Righteous Judgment of What We Cannot Do Is Say the Reason Why This Person Teaches This Error Is Because of This the Reason Why the This Person Is Doing This Wrong Thing Is Because of That, and Judge Their Motive for What They're Doing. We Cannot Safely Do That I Get Paul's Doing That.

Propose an Apostle Paul Is Given Direct Revelation from the Lord.

Paul Is Passing on What the Lord Jesus Christ Has Shown Him Not Only about the Error of What These People Are Doing, but the Error in Their Motives. What Is It That Is Motivating Them to Go against Truth Even Truth That Has Been Shown to Them by the Apostle Paul and Others Why Are They Willing to Disregard Truth and Continue down the Path of Air. Why Is That so Important to Them. What Is Motivating Them to Do That and Pulses, Here It Is. Here It Is There Designed to Make a Good Showing in the Flesh Is Desiring to Impress the Wrong People. So Even Though We Cannot Accurately Judge the Motives of Other People Because We Can't See Their Hearts. God Doesn't Reveal Those Things to Us like He Did.

Paul, We Can Learn a Great Deal from a Section like This Where All Enabled by the Revelation That Is Been Given to Him by Christ Can See into Some of the Motives of the Human Heart.

This Insight Is Very Helpful Because It Is an Inspired Insight into the Motives of Those Who Are Corrupting the Truth of the Bible in the First Application or the First Examination of This Enlightenment That We Are Given Is to Examine Our Own Heart in Our Own Motives. Even Now, We Can't Always When We See Similar Things to What Paul Is Talking about Going on the Christianity Today, We Can't Alwaysfor Certain That What Motivated the Galatians to Do What They Did Is the Same Thing That Is Motivating Someone Else to Follow a Similar Error but At Least We Know It's a Good Possibility Because It's in the Bible There a Similar Action Is Revealed to Us As to Its Ulterior Motive, and so We Know That's a Real Possibility. We Can't Rule It out and We Can Warn People Be Careful That You Don't Value the Approval of Man More Than the Approval of God. That's a Real Danger.

Be Careful That You're Not More Interested in Your Image before Others, Then You Are in Pleasing the Lord Jesus Christ. We Can Do That Because the Bible Allows Us to Do That, Giving Us an Insight into Ulterior and Sinful Motives. More Than Anything Else We Need to Examine Our Own Heart, Lord God, Show Me.

Do I Have This Problem Do I Have This Tendency Do I Have a Similar Motivation to Be Willing to Compromise Truth to Set Aside Truth in Order to Gain the Approval of Man, It's a Real Problem.

It's a Real Danger. It's a Real Sinful Motivation That Causes Some People to Turn Biblical and True Christianity into Self Serving Christianity. It Makes I Change It Just Enough to Make Me Look Good.

That's Number One.

Set up and That's All We Have Time for Tonight Will Have To Take up the Others. Another Day We Shall Not Closing Prayer.

Father, We Want to Give You Thanks That Calvin Collins Is Doing so Well in His Battle with Cancer. We Pray That You Will Continue to Strengthen Him. We Rejoice in the Lord That You Have Answered Prayer in Regard to Scott the Lori, Whom We Have Been Praying for for Many Weeks That He Would Be Able to Be Reunited with His Family and Now the Arrangements Have Been Made yet Father He's Not There yet, so Please Direct Him and Protect Him As He Travels across the Country and As He Spends A Few Days with Relatives on the on the West Coast.

That Is a Board That Plane to Go to the Philippines.

Give Him Success. We Praise You Oh Lord, That Amy Hill Is Doing Well from Her Surgery in the Tyler Phillips Is Responding Well to His Cancer Treatments. We Thank You That Isaias Lawson Had Surgery That Went Well Last Week We Pray Lord for Our Government Officials Who Have Great Responsibility. Father We Pray That You Will Give Them Wisdom from above That You Give Them a Desire to Seek Such Wisdom Not to Presume That They Have the Wisdom Which They Need Prayer Lord for Our Own Governor Roy Cooper to Mike Minister to Him As the Governor of Our State. Pray for Justin Marley That You Will Protect and Guide Him.

Pray for Sarah Cardwell That You Will Help Her with Her Recovery.

Pray for Drew Guthrie for Our Pope and for Shirley Watkins. We Pray for Marianne Freeman. She May Be Able to Complete Her Speech Language Pathology, Circuit Certification for Sarah Gilmore and for Kennedy and Christine in the Loss of Their Baby and for Brandon Norris. Pray for Gary Ferguson's Who's Been Arrested for Preaching the Gospel, Lord, We Don't Expect Not to Face Persecution. Father, We Are Mindful of the Protections Which Our Constitution Affords Us, We Pray. Therefore, Lord, That He Will Be Allowed to Continue, and Others As Well.

We Pray for Lee Vestal. We Pray for the People at White Oak Manor. We Pray for Missionaries Trevor Johnson and Paul Snyder and Their Families and for Stewart Walk in His Need of a Liver Transplant. We Pray for the Family of John Duncan and Dick Whitehead and for David Phillips Is Battling Cancer in the Brain and Kidneys and Bend Vestal As He Continues His Cancer Treatment in Different Form and for Leslie White Now Lord, Keep Us Lord Will Keep Us Cleaving to Thyself and Still Be Leaving till the Time of Our Receiving Promise. Joyce with the Man