[0:00] It's good to be saved! What a beautiful day! Amen. Take your Bible this morning, go to 2 Corinthians chapter 11. 2 Corinthians chapter 11.
[0:19] We work in there, comm-wise and everything, back there? Good. By the last day, I get it figured out. Then I leave, and by the time I come back, we've got to start training all over again.
[0:32] Turn your mic on. 25 years in evangelism, and I still don't remember to turn my own mic on. Maybe that's because I don't have any problem hearing myself. Amen. And so I've got a hearing problem the VA has helped me with.
[0:46] My wife also has a hearing problem, which is hard to understand, because she didn't have when I met her. I don't know what happened there, but... 2 Corinthians chapter 11, look with me in verse number 3.
[1:01] And Paul writes this, he says, But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so your mind should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
[1:17] Paul is concerned with the people that are going to hear this epistle read, that they get confounded, confused, the word is corrupted, from something that God intended to be very simple.
[1:33] Amen. And so I want to preach today on the simplicity that is in Christ. Amen. Amen. Let's go to the Lord again and pray.
[1:44] And Father, we do ask that you'd feel pleased to meet with us today. We know that we're two or three are gathered together in your name. There you are in the midst. We know that.
[1:55] It's not that we feel it or we think it or we're taught it. We believe what the Bible says, and that's what the Bible says. So, Lord God, even though you're here, I pray that our spirit, our attitude, things like that, would make you feel welcome.
[2:11] We want to hear from you today. We're not just, you know, putting a check mark on a list. You know, we're not just going through the motions. Bible Christianity is very real, and only because you see fit to manifest yourself.
[2:26] And we pray that you would feel welcome in the corners of our heart today. There are needs in here, Lord God, that I don't even pretend to know how to meet. But you know every need in here, and you can meet every need.
[2:39] I pray that we would allow you to. Pray that the message would go forth clearly, and I'm going to need your help for that. But I pray that it would land on good ground this morning, trusting that folks that have made it here today have a desire, a curiosity to hear what this is all about.
[2:58] And they'll find that here, because it is not about religion. It is not about Baptists. It's about you. And we thank you, Jesus Christ, for making it simple enough for us to get in.
[3:12] And just please, again, pray you'd see fit to meet with us. Bear witness to that soul in here today that maybe has never got in on this simple plan. Pray that today would be their day of salvation.
[3:25] I love you, and I pray these things in Jesus' name. All right, now I've got a gospel track here. And so many of you have seen it before, I'm sure.
[3:36] It's been around a long time. If you can't see it from there, it's called God's Simple Plan of Salvation. How many of you have ever seen that before in a church? It's a very popular track.
[3:47] It was in a lot of track racks when I first got saved. And it was written by a guy named Ford Porter in 1933. So it's been around a long time, like I said.
[4:01] It has been translated into 129 languages. The gospel track that I wrote 30 years ago with my testimony has been translated into nine languages.
[4:12] I thought that was pretty good until I read about we got a long way to go. Amen. This track has been printed over 660 million times.
[4:29] The title is simply this, God's Simple Plan of Salvation. Amen. And it contains the gospel. Not a deep Bible study on, you know, spooky stuff.
[4:43] And it contains the gospel. Take your Bible, 1 Corinthians 15. The gospel. Most Americans have heard the term. And we're going to show you right what it is.
[4:54] In 1 Corinthians 15, in verse number 3, Paul writes this right here. But for I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received.
[5:10] How that Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures. And that he was buried. And that he rose again the third day, according to the scriptures.
[5:25] It's important today to say that what we believe is what the Bible says. It's not what we think. It's not going back to what Grandma said.
[5:37] We're Bible people. Amen. And it's important to us because obviously it's important to God. Because there you are. You see it twice in two verses.
[5:50] There's a lot of ideas. There's a lot of different opinions. There's a lot of churches. There's a lot of people. But what we're concerned with. How do you wade through all that? How do you know what's right?
[6:02] And many are very convincing. And now we're at a different level where people are taking advantage of the Internet. And there's a lot of heresy. And there's a lot of things that are flat out wrong.
[6:13] But the guys that are putting it forth sound very convincing. And so what is the litmus test, if you will? How do we know what's right and what's not?
[6:23] I'm like the pastor. Well, I'm not as smart as him. But I'd be the first to admit that I could be deceived. I mean, I spent 15 years in 1% of motorcycle gangs.
[6:35] I was deceived a little bit. Amen. How do we know what's what? We've got the Bible. That's why our emphasis is on the Bible. That's why the name of this church is Bible Baptist Church.
[6:47] The emphasis is on the word Bible. Amen. And the Bible, the verses that we read, they contain the gospel.
[6:57] Paul said, I deliver it unto you first of all. How many have heard the expression in your life, first things first? Amen. Right there. That's where it comes from.
[7:07] A preacher one time said the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. The gospel is the main thing. You can have a brain full of religious facts.
[7:19] Even they could be correct. But if you're not saved, if you've never believed on the gospel, if you've never trusted that Jesus Christ died for your sins. It said died for our sins.
[7:31] He didn't die for his own sins. He was sinless. We had a need that we could not meet. On our best day, on our average day, on our worst day, the Bible says all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
[7:45] Amen. And then it says the wages of sin is death. My years in the motorcycle clubs, I buried 41 of my own guys. And the last thing I said to every one of the funerals that I went to, which was most of them, I'll see you in hell, brother.
[8:01] That was doctrinally correct. Because if a person dies before they believe on the gospel, it's simple. Believes on the gospel, that's where they're going to go.
[8:15] Not because they were evil. Not because they were drug heads or drunks. Because they never trusted Christ. That's the gospel that Paul was concerned, that people in this church, young church, newly established church, the simplicity that's in Christ is what we have.
[8:36] If you got it, you're saved. But it is also the message that we have that we can take to a lost and dying world, loved one, co-worker. And if that gets corrupted in our mind, we start adding to it, subtracting to it, simplifying it, complicating it, corrupting, then the devil's will has been accomplished.
[8:58] My friend, it's simple to get your sins forgiven. The tract says, God's simple plan. And God intended it to be simple.
[9:09] It says in 1 Timothy chapter 2, in verse 3, For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who will have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
[9:26] People say, Well, if you only knew what I did. I understand that. That's a two-way street. I don't want to know everything you did. You don't want to know everything I did.
[9:37] But it's important to know that God knows every single detail of your life, everything you ever did, every place you ever went, every thought that ever crossed your mind. He knows every detail about you.
[9:48] And Romans 5 says, But God committed His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners. Christ died for us. Buddy, I'm going to tell you what. People aren't conscious of getting a good deal.
[9:59] Well, the best deal you're ever going to get is to get it on the simplicity of the Gospels in Christ. Amen. He wants everyone to go be saved.
[10:11] He's, he, and it's his will and desire that no human soul end up in a place that the Bible says he prepared for the devil and his angels. Amen. This is how serious he is about it.
[10:24] I mean, I can say it, I can, this is how serious God is about making it possible for anybody, everybody. I got it. Have you got it?
[10:35] Maybe you didn't get it. You need to get it. This is how much God wants you to get it. Get saved. That's what I'm talking about. It says, For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.
[10:46] Oh, yes. The environment, the planet, the animals, the trees. God loved the world. The world loves the world.
[10:58] But the pronoun, whosoever, lets you know, He's not talking about the planet. He's talking about people. That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
[11:13] I've preached in prisons. I've talked to spiritual men that didn't come to the reality that they needed to be saved until they got in so much trouble they couldn't get out. That was my case.
[11:24] And I talked to them, and I'd say, Would any of you give one of your children to keep them out of hell? And they're more honest than some Christians.
[11:36] Some Christians might piously, Oh, yes. I would do. You liar. Convicts are more honest. They'll just look at you and say, No way, man. But God did.
[11:48] God did. Why? Because He doesn't want you to end up in hell. He didn't want me to end up in hell. He wanted me to have a chance. He made the gospel simple. It isn't a bunch of hoops you've got to jump through.
[12:01] It's faith. It's faith in that what He did on the cross of Calvary was capable of forgiving your sin. The Bible says, Cleansing you from all sin.
[12:13] Amen. Believe me, if it wasn't simple, I'd have never gotten out. I've learned a little bit about it since I got out of jail, since I got in church. But maybe you're in here today and you've never trusted Christ.
[12:24] I had a guy ask me in Montana last year. He said, Rose, you preach on heaven. Yeah, man. I'm longing for it. I got friends there.
[12:36] I got family there. I got a Savior there that I'm looking forward to thanking in person. Amen.
[12:47] Guy said to me, he said, Brother, you guys, preachers, oh, he wasn't saved. He said, you guys are all talking about heaven all the time. What do you got to do to go to hell? And I said, nothing, man.
[12:58] You're doing fine. You just keep going the way you're going, living your life, putting your trust and your confidence and your belief and whatever it is that's important to you.
[13:08] You just go out to the end of your life with whatever that your confidence is in and you'll find out about hell. The sin, the unpardonable sin, there's one unpardonable sin.
[13:21] He said, is there an unpardonable sin? I said, yes, one, not trusting the simple gospel of Jesus Christ. God can't forgive you if you don't ask him to.
[13:35] It's not hard. Amen. It's simple. Maybe it's too simple for some people. Let me ask you this. Let me give you my little outline here. You might say, how simple is it?
[13:46] Well, I'll tell you. John chapter 14 and verse 6, Jesus said unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Not a way, not the best option, not a good choice.
[13:59] He says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Now, that's definitive. That should be easy enough. But for hardheads like me, he adds these verses.
[14:13] No man, you hear what I said? No man cometh unto the Father, but by me. Say, well, I believe this.
[14:24] You can believe whatever you want, but no man gets their sins forgiven unless they believe in what Jesus Christ did to forgive them. Now, no other systems of belief pretend to present to you a Savior that loved you enough to take your punishment.
[14:42] but my God did. That's when I put my faith in 32 years ago and buddy, I'll tell you what, he's getting better every day. I'm making a little progress, but Jesus Christ is making a lot.
[14:56] He's getting better. Listen, this thing about, well, what do I do to be saved? It's not multiple choice. Amen. There's just one choice. Personally, that's refreshing to me.
[15:07] Listen, I made so many bad choices in the first, not everyone, but I made so many bad choices in the first 37 years of my life that if somebody would have came to me in prison and said, okay, this is, how you get to heaven, A, B, or C, based on my track record in life, I would have got it wrong.
[15:29] This is like the multiple choice test where there's only one answer. You can't get it wrong. Glory to God. Unless you ignore it. Unless you let it go in one ear and out the other.
[15:39] The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 15 unless you believe in vain. Yeah, I heard it. Okay, no big deal. I'll put it on the back burner or I'll just, you know, categorize it with all this other systems of belief while I search for what I believe.
[15:51] You better get a hold of this thing while you're breathing, son, sir, a miss. You better get it while you can. He made it simple. He's given you a chance, chance after chance.
[16:05] And our prayer, our purpose is to bring a place where people can come and hear the truth. Not about what we believe, not about what we think, not about what God did for us, about what Jesus Christ is willing to do for whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord.
[16:25] I'm just happy to say that he made it simple. I had a try to witness to a guy one time and he says, yeah, okay, but what about, what about any, you know, everybody can come up with some, you know, what about the aliens?
[16:39] What about the people under? I said, you know what? There's an explanation for all your questions, but the issue at hand is this. What about you? Me and you are talking right now.
[16:49] I'm trying to tell you what Jesus Christ did for you. thinking about anybody else is a distraction. What are you? Pilate said to Jesus, he said to the crowd, he said, what shall I do then with Jesus who is called the Christ just before I condemned him to be crucified?
[17:07] Guess what? That's a good question. That's a question you should be asking. If you're in here and you're saved this morning, you did the right thing with Jesus. You believed on him on eternal life.
[17:19] No matter where you are, it could have been yesterday, could have been 50 years ago. Wherever you are, it's a babe in Christ or an old person in Christ. Hope I didn't offend anyone.
[17:30] Amen. But wherever you are, believing on him puts you in Christ. You need to worry about you. Are you in Christ? Are you saved? You can be.
[17:40] God wants you to be. He made it simple enough to be. Amen. The Bible says in Acts 4, verse 12, I mean, don't belabor yourself with questions that are not relevant at this point in your life and then it doesn't even mean they're bad questions.
[17:55] But the question for today is are you saved? It says in Acts 4, verse 12, neither is there salvation in any other. For there is none other name given under heaven among men whereby we must be saved.
[18:13] It's not confusing, but you've got to believe it. Amen. We're talking about God's simple plan. In Acts chapter 25, Paul and Silas have been arrested, beaten, incarcerated for presenting the gospel of Jesus Christ in an area in an age at a time where it's not popular.
[18:33] No, it wasn't Southern California, but it's close. Amen. Maybe that day is coming for us. I don't know. But they're locked up. Again, they've been beaten and what do they do?
[18:43] They're not taking their tin cup and banging it on the bars, singing the blues. Oh, nobody knows the trouble I've seen. The Bible tells us in Acts, in the book of Acts, chapter 16, I don't know what I said, but that's what I meant.
[18:57] Chapter 16, verse 29, no, verse 25, it said, it said, they were singing praise unto God. In verse 28, the prison gate swung open. Yeah.
[19:08] The Lord heard them singing. The Lord was blessed. The Lord answered. The Lord showed up. The prison bars came open and no prisoners went anywhere. When that prison guard saw that the gates were open, he was ready to kill himself before Caesar did.
[19:24] That's how, that's how, that's how, what a great responsibility it was. Failure wasn't really an option. Zero tolerance, you know. And, and Paul yelled out, said, wait a minute, do thyself no harm.
[19:35] Nobody's escaped. You know what that guy knew? Something supernatural just happened because let me tell you from my own experience, if the gates open, prisoners are going to leave if they can. Amen.
[19:47] Some of them are very creative and escape in spite of everything. But buddy, the door opens up, I'm going to say, oh, I'm out of here. You know, let's do, let's do a couple months on America's Most Wanted. Does that show even till on?
[19:58] I don't know. I don't know. But nobody laughed. And that guy knew something was going on. And this guy had heard Paul and Silas singing. Singing. What are they singing? They're singing about Jesus Christ.
[20:09] They're singing some of the things like the themes of what we've been singing tonight that Jesus saves and there's power in the blood and those kind of things. And he knew something was going on and he sprung in.
[20:19] And what did he say? Why did he even say it? Sirs, what must I do to be saved? He's a heathen of the highest degree, a Roman soldier. Amen.
[20:30] In charge of tortured, beaten, maybe executed Christians. And when he heard about the love of God and the grace of God and their singing, he says, Sirs, what must I do?
[20:42] I mean, his real question is, is there any way I can get in on this? And they made it real difficult. They said, go get a haircut and get rid of them clothes and cover them tattoos up and take out them piercings and all this and, you know, wash your filthy mouth and then you, they didn't say any of that.
[21:01] You know what they said? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. How could he have made it any simpler?
[21:13] He couldn't. He didn't. Because it was intended to be simple. It was intended for anyone, for everyone to get in on.
[21:25] Paul was concerned that these early Christians, that their minds be corrupted, that would stifle their ability to witness. That's what the devil wants. But, praise the Lord, he made it simple.
[21:38] It's simple enough for me to get saved six o'clock in the morning in a jail cell. 32 years ago, next month, amen, I walked into a little church on the backside of Dayton, Ohio, two days out of jail, hair down the middle of my back, covered in tattoos and all that, and walked in and I had no clue what I was getting in on.
[22:01] But I was just as saved then as I am right now because I didn't get religion. I did not clean up my act. I put my faith and trust in Jesus Christ alone.
[22:15] That's how simple he made it. Are you saved today? I hope you are. I hope you are. If you're not, you can be. You can be. First question on this little outline is, how simple is it?
[22:27] It's simple enough for anybody to get in on. Amen. And maybe the next question, it would be, why is it so simple? And, well, I'll tell you why. Let's face it. The track record of the human race is pretty lame.
[22:43] Let's go back to the beginning. Genesis chapter 1, God created man. Chapter 2, created woman. Chapter 3, they run into the adversary with no peer pressure.
[22:57] One rule. Don't partake of the tree in the midst of the garden of knowledge of good and evil. One rule. And they blew it. Amen.
[23:07] They blew it. That's how we started. No wonder we blow it as often as we do. So then the next phase was human government. And that wasn't the answer. If you've noticed, it still isn't.
[23:20] Genesis chapter 6, verse 5, it says this, and God, this is just before he flooded the whole earth. Do you believe that? Absolutely. Absolutely. Why is that even hard to believe?
[23:31] You go to the Grand Canyon right now, and they'll try to tell you. There'll be a plaque that says how this happened 50 million years ago. And then you stand on the south rim of the Grand Canyon, and you look at the rock formations, and they're at an angle like this, just what you'd expect to see if it was covered with water and the waves rushed over.
[23:51] And you're going to see the rock formations down here that are much newer than rock formations because of the, I mean, the creation itself declares the reality of the Bible.
[24:02] And scientists, the Bible says, professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, make fools out of themselves, trying to explain things where I don't try to explain things. The Bible says it.
[24:13] I believe it. But just prior to the worldwide flood listed in Genesis chapter 6, you've got God saying this. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great near earth.
[24:26] He's seeing some of that today. And that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart were only evil continually. And I've heard preachers say that's the way it is now.
[24:37] Well, no, it's not that way now. Every imagination of the, of the, let me read it right, of the thoughts of his heart are not evil only continually. And it is a lot of places, but we got a room full of people right now that don't fall into that category.
[24:51] And it's getting there. I'll give you that. But thank God for the remnant. Thank God for people that are willing to stand up and say, I love Jesus Christ and you can not get in on this too.
[25:04] And amen. And when that's gone and you know, what, what's going to come next? It's going to make the flood look like a, I don't even know what to say. Amen.
[25:15] But God had to make salvation simple because after the flood and then people still didn't live for God, he gave them the law. He gave them rules. Okay, they must need some rules. And he gave them the law. And Moses went up there and you all saw the movie.
[25:28] When I got out of jail, when I got out of jail, the first thing I could think about was this movie that I saw as a kid, The Ten Commandments. And I will just say, Charleston Heston made it great, Moses.
[25:39] Anybody agree with me? I thought that was great. So here I am in jail and I'm thinking, well, when I get out, you know, and begin this Christian journey, I'm going to go buy the, and it was a videocassette.
[25:50] And it was a two tape set, 30, like $35. Now they put it on a thumb drive. Amen. But I get this thing and I watch it. Amen. I thought he did a great job.
[26:02] Moses goes up on the, goes up on the mount and comes down with the Ten Commandments, the law. Okay, listen. You guys aren't doing so good, you know, just going every which way.
[26:13] So let me make it real simple. Don't do this. Don't do this. Don't do this. Do this. Do this. Do this. And you'll be okay. I like it simple. But they blew that.
[26:23] They couldn't do that. Everything that God came up with, man failed. He said, well, I think he said, and I try to speak respectfully, I think he said, you know, if I'm going to spend eternity up here in heaven with anybody but these angels, I've got to come up with something they can't mess up.
[26:45] And so the Bible says that for by grace I am saved through faith and not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. I'm going to make salvation a free gift.
[26:56] And you get in by faith and you get in by believing. You don't get in by works. You don't get in by turning over a new leaf. Amen. You get in by believing what Jesus Christ, let's face it, everybody believes something.
[27:11] I got news for you. What I'm talking about has been in writing in the English language for over 400 years. I hope no one in here dies and goes to hell because you've embraced some ideology that you saw on a Discovery Channel special or a YouTube video because everybody believes something.
[27:31] I'm getting my beliefs out of God's book. My book says, Be entering in at the straight gate for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads unto destruction and many there be that go in thereat. Even with salvation offers a free gift, the Bible teaches us that most people are not going to get it.
[27:47] The next verse says, But straight is the gate and narrow is the way that leadeth unto life and few there be that find it. I marvel on occasion that David Spurgeon is in the few that are going to make it into heaven.
[28:04] I feel that blows me away. I don't deserve it. I never saw it coming. Amen? If you're saved in here today, you made it into the most, I appreciate the Marine Corps, if you're saved in here today, you made it into the most elite few in the history of mankind.
[28:26] And if you're not saved today, today you can be, you need to be, God wants you to be, we want you to be, we'll help you in any way we can.
[28:38] God made it simple enough. If God can save me, He can save anybody. Amen? So the verse said this, our text, 2 Corinthians 11, 3 says, But I fear that by any means, as the serpent beguiled, yeah, as the serpent beguiled, leave to its subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
[29:08] If you have a Bible, go back to Genesis chapter 3. Now the serpent shows up, right here, Genesis 3 and verse 1, and it says this, Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God hath made, and he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, You shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
[29:42] Anybody have a wonderment about who that represents? Revelation tells us that old serpent is the devil. It is the devil himself. This is the temptation of Eve in the garden by the devil.
[29:54] We clear on that? Oh, but I thought it was a talking snake. Yeah, no contradiction there. That snake's still talking too. Amen. So what I want you to point out is this is the first question mark in the Bible.
[30:08] And it questions, it's the devil asking it, and he's questioning what God said. And the battle to question what God said and to cause people to doubt what God said that started right there in the third book of your Bible is raging today still.
[30:25] And he's very successful in causing people to question what God said. In verse 4, there in Genesis 3, and the serpent said, Son of the woman, you shall not truly die.
[30:37] And there's the first lie in the Bible. And there's the devil asking it or saying it, and he's calling God a liar. Oh, I never looked at it that way.
[30:47] Kind of subtle. You shall not, God says you're going to die, and the serpent says, oh, you won't die. It's kind of subtle. He's subtle. More subtle than any beast in the field. But he called the Lord a liar.
[31:00] And in John chapter 8, verse 44, Jesus Christ returned the favor. Like this. He is talking to a religious crowd. He said, You are of your father the devil, and the lust of your father ye will do.
[31:15] He was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth because there is no truth in him. How much? No truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he's speaking of his own, and here's what Jesus Christ said real clear, real clear, not subtle at all, for he is a liar.
[31:35] And he said, the father of it. That tells me that he's got descendants. He's got great, great grandchildren. Some of them are in churches today. Amen. Liars. Let me tell you something.
[31:47] God's book is pure. God's book is true. The devil questioned it. I don't question it. When my life doesn't line up with the book, it ain't the book. I change. It's my life.
[31:58] That's been working for 30 plus years. Devil said to Eve in verse 5 there in Genesis 3, For God doth know the day he eat thereof. Then your eyes shall be opened.
[32:08] This is the temptation. Your eyes shall be opened. You shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. A preacher said it last night. Maybe that line wouldn't have worked on Adam.
[32:21] Maybe he tried it. We don't know. It doesn't record it. But boy, it worked on Eve. And I'd say this to say, I'd say that to say this. The devil knew exactly what buttons to push with Eve to cause her to question what God said and to doubt what God said.
[32:42] And it worked. And I'm telling you today, today, he knows exactly what buttons to push to get the response and reaction he wants out of you.
[32:56] He knows what to put in front of you that'll cause you to question the Bible. You could be sitting there going, I don't believe all that. Okay. I get it. My responsibility is to give you the truth. My prayer, my desire, is that you accept it as the truth.
[33:10] But the devil doesn't want you to. Duh. Amen. He knows what, he knows what buttons to push to cause you to question God or to say, well, I'll have to look into this.
[33:23] He'll make sure you never look into it. He knows, he knows what, what to do, even for Christians. He knows what to put in front of your face so you'll quit listening to him. You'll quit talking to him.
[33:34] You know, there's a lot of Christians that are saved, that are cold on God. That makes it that much more important that we stay close to the Lord, tenderhearted, trying to accomplish God's will that we be the light in a very dark world.
[33:48] Have you noticed that the world's getting spiritually darker all the time? Amen. The devil complicates, corrupts, and he's good at what he does.
[34:00] Sometimes he does it like this. Sometimes he does it by, he corrupts God's simple plan by adding stuff. Yeah, like good works. Yeah. There's people that believe you're saved by grace, but you've got to work to keep it.
[34:13] Amen. Good works are good. The Bible says in Ephesians 2 and verse 10, you're created on two good works. But somehow people missed verse 9 that says, when it talks about being saved in verse 8, it says, not of works that any man should boast.
[34:27] That's not true. That's religion. That's not, that's not Bible. Amen. There's people that may be saved or maybe not, but they're not going to ever do anything for God.
[34:39] They're not even going to embrace the glorious gospel because it's too complicated. It's not complicated. Like the guy I mentioned last night or this morning sometime I mentioned about the prisoner and said, I don't think I can live it.
[34:49] I couldn't live it either. If it wasn't a free gift, if it wasn't for the grace of God, I couldn't do it. You couldn't do it either. But it's not. It's simple. Amen. And sometimes he complicates it by oversimplifying or corrupts it by oversimplifying it.
[35:07] Like the one, two, three, repeat after me movement. Amen. It's just a prayer. Pray a little prayer. You ever pray to God to forgive you? Pray this. Jesus Christ, please accept my desire to be forgiven.
[35:21] Be my Lord. Let me tell you something. That book says in Romans chapter 10 and verse number nine, it says, If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, that's you, admitting something you and God both already know.
[35:35] You're a sinner. Hope that didn't offend anybody. You're a sinner. Say, Well, you don't know me. I got a Bible that says all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
[35:46] Amen. That's what the preacher was trying to get across earlier. What we are, those of us that are saved, what we are is forgiven. Amen. We ain't know better than anybody else. That's for sure.
[35:56] But we know somebody that is. Somebody that cared for us. Somebody that loved us. And we so appreciate that, that we feel a burden. We feel direction to tell others.
[36:07] And that's what this is all about. Telling others. A beggar's giving some other beggars some bread. Amen. But sometimes people, It says, If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from death.
[36:24] The prayer ain't what saves you. Huh? Well, that's just getting honest with God. Believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from death. Thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness.
[36:37] And then with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. It's with the heart. I had a prisoner ask me one time, Well, what does that mean? Believe in your heart. Well, as best I could, I answered it like this.
[36:48] It's a comprehension that you have to get a hold of that Jesus Christ went to the cross for you. Not the world. Not a human race.
[37:00] That thing says, when it says, Confess with thy mouth and believe in thine heart, it's personal. If everybody in the history of the human race was on their way to heaven except you, whoever you are, Jesus Christ would have came down and took that beating and allowed them to nail him to that cross, he would have done it for you.
[37:26] That's what understanding, believing in your heart is. This thing's personal. He said, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. I couldn't get any more personal than that.
[37:38] That's what Jesus Christ did for you. Amen? You get a hold of that and you can get your sins forgiven. He did that. He did that to keep you out of hell. Amen? If you ever get a hold of that, what the Bible says about hell, we wouldn't have to stand up here and give a sales pitch invitation and we're not going to, but places do.
[37:56] I'm not going to come in, oh, don't you want to see grandma again? Oh, don't you want to? Let me tell you something. You die in your sin, you're going to fry like a slab of bacon in a lake of fire forever.
[38:07] That's what the Bible says. And Jesus Christ went to the cross to make a way for you not to have to do that. It's so simple that the Bible says that you believe in your heart, you can have your sins forgiven, and you'll never have to worry about that.
[38:21] And not only that, the glorious gospel will be committed unto you that you can take to your loved ones and your friends and give them the answer that you found in Christ. When you get a hold of the fact that you're on your way to hell without Christ and Christ doesn't want you to and Christ made a way for you to have Him simply by faith, we wouldn't have to ask you to be saved.
[38:44] We couldn't keep you from being saved. I got saved in a jail cell at 6 o'clock in the morning when a Bible a chaplain gave me laid it on the floor next to my rack and said, Lord, I'm in more trouble than I thought.
[38:58] And that book says Jesus Christ went to the cross to make a way for my sins to be forgiven. And if that could apply to me, I want in on it.
[39:13] And I didn't have some religious, oh, please save me. I didn't have any religion. Every other word out of my mouth had to do with God, but it wasn't good. You follow me? But I was honest, and I got it.
[39:27] And He saved me. And I know He did because the Bible says He will. It wasn't a feeling. Amen. Nobody told me I had to do anything.
[39:39] But when I got out of jail, I went to church. And I sat under the preaching and teaching. And I made friends with other Christians. And I began to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord. But I'm going to tell you what, in 32 years, I have never remotely got over the fact that Jesus Christ cared about me enough to give His life.
[40:03] For me, I'm glad. If you're saved in here, I'm glad you got in on it. My way of thinking, all that was for me. And if you're saved in here, you ought to feel the same way.
[40:14] It won't get old that way. And if you're in here and you're not saved, the truth remains. He did it for you. He says, come. You need to come. You need to get saved. You need to put your faith and trust in Christ today.
[40:26] Because you don't have a guarantee you'll ever get another chance. Amen. Our text says, as the serpent beguiled Eve with his subtlety. He didn't appear to Eve the way he really is.
[40:39] No horns, no tail, no pitchfork. He's a monster. And if he would have appeared to her the way he really is, she would not have been talking to him.
[40:49] She'd have been terrified of him. And the same thing goes for today. And the devil's not appearing to people as he really is today. Even though he's the God of this world. It says in verse 4, in no marvel for Satan, of chapter 11, no marvel for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.
[41:09] Amen. He knows if he appeared to people like he really is, people would be running from him, not to him. He's the God of this world, the Bible says. He blinds minds, the Bible says.
[41:20] And the purpose of that is to keep lost people lost. Now when we say lost, we're talking about people that aren't saved. I'm talking about the importance of being saved. So we're talking about being lost, we're talking about people that are not saved.
[41:32] Yet. God wants them to be. God did everything possible to make it, everything necessary to make it possible for them to be, but they're not yet. And I want to say here, if you're in here this morning and you're not saved, I'm from Ohio, I don't know everybody here, so I'm not picking on anybody, I don't get briefed.
[41:52] If you're in here this morning and you've never trusted Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sin, plus nothing, minus nothing, then lost would describe you. And you are exactly the person that needs what I'm trying to put forth to you today, needs to understand that Jesus Christ died so that you can be saved.
[42:15] Not go to heaven, not have a wonderful life. Those are byproducts of living the Christian life. The Bible said he died for our sins because our sins were taking us to hell.
[42:25] If you're in here today, you're in sin, your sins are going to take you to hell. The Bible refers to it as lost. If our gospel beheaded, it's hidden to them that are lost. You say, I'm not lost, I know exactly where I am, I'm in the corner of folk and folk, poke and fenton, whatever.
[42:40] You know what I'm talking about? You may very well know where you are physically. I know where I'm going to spend eternity. I hope you do. If you don't, that's what I'm talking about.
[42:53] Our prayer is that today you'd let one of us open a Bible. If necessary, you may know very well. You may already have enough information to say, Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner. If hell's real, I'm going there.
[43:05] The Bible says I don't have to go there. The Bible says I can believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, I've heard that before. I don't doubt that's true. Nobody's ever come up with a better idea. Amen?
[43:17] Today, I want to make you my Savior. Lord, I've got issues, I've got problems, I've got sin in my life. This ain't a magic show. Some things, everything doesn't just fall off.
[43:30] I came into the Christian life with 30 years of baggage. But little by little, little by little, began to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord, and the Lord gave victory.
[43:42] The verse that precedes your pulpit verse up here, in Acts 15, 1 Corinthians 15, verse 57 says, But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through the Lord Jesus Christ.
[43:54] There's victory that's available to you because of what Jesus Christ did. Our prayer is that you get it while you can. Let's all stand. We're talking about the simple plan of salvation.
[44:09] Amen? I say, you guys sure make it sound important. That's because the Bible says in Revelation chapter 20 and verse 15, Whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast in the lake of fire.
[44:25] There's two options. Up or down. No middle ground. Up or down.
[44:37] The Bible says for a Christian to be absent in the body is to be present with the Lord. The same Bible says Whosoever is not found written in the book of life was cast in the lake of fire. It's not hard.
[44:47] It's not complicated. It's not deep. Which way you go after you take your last breath hinges on what you do with Jesus Christ in this life.
[45:01] It's bowed and eyes closed. Many of you in here have heard this gospel because I've presented it more clearly than I did. And you ought to be eternally eternally grateful that Christ made a way for you to be saved.
[45:16] You ought to be grateful enough that you take the Great Commission to heart and live in such a way that your life testifies that Jesus Christ did something in you.
[45:28] Christians have a responsibility to live in such a way as to glorify their Savior. Amen? And my prayer is that you do. My prayer is that you kick it up a notch and understand that you have an obligation and it should be a desire to bring others to Christ to invite them to church to hand out a track.
[45:47] Amen? I pray that you would. If you haven't been I pray that you'd start because this is the most serious issue there is. If you're in here today and you're not saved oh my I remember wasn't that long ago I was we say our terms are lost and undone headed for the wrong place in eternity and honest enough within my own spirit to acknowledge that man if what that book says is true this is going to get worse before it gets better.
[46:20] Matter of fact it's never going to get better. That Bible says eternity is for those that reject Jesus Christ is a lake of fire. If you're in here today and you never trusted Christ you can you can in your heart pray acknowledging that Jesus Christ died for you believing he'll save you.
[46:44] if we could open a Bible take five minutes show you the verses so you can read it yourself we'd be happy to do that. If you're in here today and you've never been born again the term is born again you've never been saved you've never been forgiven you don't have the assurance that I'm talking about that God wants you to have and you'd like me to pray for you head bowed and eyes closed I'm not going to front anybody out wouldn't do that but you'd like by raising your hands say brothers Pershing pray for me I'm not saved pray for me anybody like that?
[47:20] be honest now you know if you are or not I don't know what holds a person back but I do understand you know the apprehension that comes along with being in a place like this but be honest with yourself be honest with God amen that's one is there any other?
[47:39] anybody I say just be honest say you know if I died today I would not go to the right place according to that book and I'll just pray for you any others like that? let me tell you something before I do pray you can do something about it I'll pray that God makes it easy for you to understand that you can settle the most important issue there is today it's not complicated it's not religious but you gotta believe you gotta have faith Lord Lord want you to there's been one maybe there's another after we get done praying I'll stand over here to the side if I can help in any way there's Christians all over this room that would be willing to take a minute pray with you Father I love you today and I thank you for grace thank you for great liberty thank you most of all for the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ thank you for the preacher that brought it to me over 30 years ago thank you for letting me get in on it thank you
[48:40] God that I never got over it a lot of fads and fashions have come through my 69 years but something happened in a jail cell 32 years ago that I've never gotten over and I don't ever want to get over it and I might so I stay around other people that have never gotten over it that's working Lord God there's Christians in here today I pray they were reminded today that there's a bigger issue than the cares of this life and they've been given the keys of the kingdom to pass on to somebody else thank you God for visitors that have been invited and have come and even for a hand that a person acknowledged they weren't saved and there's probably more and I pray that you make it easy for them to understand that this is of paramount importance and that it is easy to fix so simple God I pray you'd help make the decision today I thank you God for Jesus Christ please have your way in the rest of the service as the preacher comes amen and amen I'll be
[49:41] I'll be I'll be I'll be I'll be