[0:00] This message was recorded at Vision Baptist Church in Alfreda, Georgia. This is the next message in our series in the book of 2 Corinthians, entitled, We Faint Not.
[0:14] Thank God we're not who we used to be. We've been redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ. Amen? Take your Bibles if you would, and open them to 2 Corinthians chapter 11. And I'm excited to get to share this chapter with you and the truths here.
[0:26] And I hope that when you go home today, you'll understand just a tad more what's going on. One of the most exciting things that goes on in the life of any dad is the fact that his children will one day grow up and get married.
[0:37] And there's a very beautiful day that you set aside for your daughter to get married. You spend a lot of money, and you have this very special day. And on the day our daughter Stephanie got married, my wife came in.
[0:52] And I'm usually up well before anybody else. I was just laying in a bed, and she said, you need to get up. We got a wedding to go to today. And I said, feels more like a funeral to me. And she was all excited about her daughter getting married.
[1:06] And I was all scared to death. Is this Yehu going to take care of my daughter? And is he going to love my daughter? And is he going to be good to my daughter? Well, in the story you have today, the Apostle Paul is talking to the church of Corinth as their pastor.
[1:20] And he's saying to them like he's their dad. And he's excited about the fact that he is one day going to get to present this church to the Lord. And he wants to present the church as a pure, chaste virgin.
[1:32] It's a big responsibility. And in his culture, it was even a bigger responsibility that your daughter would get married pure. She wouldn't have been with anybody else. She would have been saved and prepared for that special day when she would be given to her husband.
[1:46] That was a big deal to them. And so Paul uses a phrase in the Bible, if you would. If you would, look into verse 2. He said, I am jealous over you with a godly jealous. That's really like, I'm just so excited about you.
[1:59] This is, I love you. I protect you. I care about you. I don't want anybody hurting you. I don't want anybody messing with you. And he said, I have espoused you. I have gotten you betrothed.
[2:12] I have gotten you engaged to one husband. And I want to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. So if you write things down, write this one down. It's all or nothing.
[2:22] All or nothing. And here's the story. Paul is about to present the church to Christ. And he writes them and says, hey, I want you to know, this is very important.
[2:34] It's all or nothing. Now, I don't know how many of you are in favor of polygamy. How many of you, don't I ask it? Because some of you might just be dumb enough to say yes just to be dumb.
[2:44] But you know, I doubt very many men want to share their wife with another man. How many of you would say amen to that? You know, I doubt very many women want to share their husband with another man. Every now and then, every now and then something will come on TV and you'll hear about somebody's got, you know, a man has more than one wife.
[3:00] And I say, hey, baby, doesn't sound like a bad idea. I give me 10 wives and put nine of them to work and the two of us will stay home. And she said, you can't handle one wife. And then she says, if everything ever like that ever happened, she would just kill me.
[3:12] And that's basically the way it is with most people. Amen. We want exclusive rights and privileges to our spouse. Is that true or not? Say amen. It is. And you know it is.
[3:23] Well, here's what goes on in the story. Paul says, I want you to know that serving Jesus isn't something you take lightly. It's all or nothing.
[3:34] You're either all in or all out. As you stand before me here today, I ask you this question. Do you take him to be your lawfully wedded husband? Yeah, one of them.
[3:46] Yeah, for a while. Very few weddings ever go along that way. Would you agree to that or not? Can you imagine a wedding? Do you take him to be your lawfully wedded husband?
[3:56] Well, yeah, as long as he don't mind the other three. And that's just not how it works. And that's exactly what Paul's talking about here. He says, I've espoused you. I want you to know that in Christianity, Jesus is a jealous God.
[4:12] I want you to know that God is a jealous God. I want you to know that they expect full. He expects full, open, frank privileges just for him.
[4:23] By the way, can I just go ahead and tell you I'm that way too. I really love my wife. I do not expect my wife to be with anybody else. And there would be some very great anger if there ever was.
[4:36] Now, notice what he said when you got saved. Luke chapter 14, verse 25. And I won't read all these verses, but you want to write them down so you can check them out later. The Bible says there were great multitudes following Jesus.
[4:48] And in verse 26, he turned around to all these big crowds. He said, I'm not sure you guys really want to follow me because if you come to me, you got to hate your father and your mother and your wife and your children and your brethren and your sisters.
[4:59] Yea, in your own life or you can't be my disciple. And by the way, when we first got married, often we'd be sitting in our house. And Betty said, well, when are we going to go to my house? And I said, we are sitting in your house.
[5:11] But it's amazing how newlyweds still think their house is mama's house. And they forget that that's their house. And I had to say to her, you know, this is ours. She'd say something. Well, I want to visit my family. I said, you're with your family.
[5:24] Say amen. How many of y'all ever had that problem? Am I the only ones ever had a wife do that? Has anybody ever had that? If you have, say amen. Nope. All of y'all got perfect wives. You're lying to me right here in church.
[5:35] This message is not going any further. I can already tell. You see, you see, he said, if you're going to follow me, you got to hate your daddy and your mom. By the way, I really wanted my wife to say, bye-bye, mommy.
[5:46] Bye-bye, daddy. I'm going to live with Austin. I really thought that's the way it ought to have been. And I really wouldn't have married her. She said, if you marry me, you got to take my mom and my daddy, my wife. We're all moving in. Everybody comes when I come.
[5:57] I'd have been like, okay, looking for another wife. Say amen. Number 27. Verse 27. He said, whosoever does not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.
[6:08] Verse 33. He said, you got to forsake all or you cannot be my disciple. In Matthew chapter 10, verse 37, you got to love Jesus supremely. He said, he that loveth his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.
[6:21] If you love your son or your daughter more than me, you're not worthy of me. You got to take up your cross and follow me or you're not worthy of me. In 2 Chronicles chapter 16 and verse 9, his eyes go throughout all the earth seeking who has a heart perfect towards him.
[6:36] And that word perfect there doesn't mean, it doesn't mean there's no sin and there's no failure. It means you've given your whole heart. David, King David had a perfect heart towards God.
[6:47] Yet you and I both know about his sin. But here's what God said. His heart was always perfect toward me. Even when he was doing wrong, he only loved one God. He never loved another God. He never had two gods.
[6:57] His love was all for one God. So I want you to understand this morning, Paul is jealous. Paul said, church, I preach to you and I teach you because I want you to be in love with Jesus.
[7:10] And I don't want you to let lies and falsehoods destroy the relationship. I don't want sin to creep in. I don't want sin to ruin your relationship. I don't want you to not have this relationship.
[7:22] So first I want you to look at this morning, it's all or nothing. And I'd just like to ask you a question. How many of you really love Jesus? You see, America lets us have this philosophy of, well, I love him on Sunday mornings, but I really don't love him all during the week.
[7:36] I love him when I need him, but I don't love him all the time. I love him, but it's a partial love. Yeah, I love him, but I love a lot of other things too. Well, here's the blunt truth in the Bible.
[7:47] Paul said, I'm jealous over you. I've got a godly jealousy over you. I want you to love Jesus and Jesus alone. I want you to serve Jesus and serve Jesus alone. It's Jesus.
[7:58] It's all Jesus and nobody else. And that ought to be the way it is. And this morning I should be in a room full of people that say, I love Jesus more than I love my wife. I love Jesus more than I love my mama and my daddy.
[8:11] I love Jesus more than I love my money. I love Jesus more than I love my job. I love Jesus more than I love my bank account. I love Jesus more than I love my retirement program. I love Jesus more than I love myself.
[8:22] I love Jesus. Now you say, that's really a harsh statement. you do not think that's a harsh statement as long as i'm talking about your wife if i were to tell you this morning i love betty more than i love my mom and my daddy i love betty more than i love my children i love betty more than i love my job i love betty more than i love other things you'd just say well that's a good husband that's the way you ought to be and you're right and so if you have anything less than that for jesus paul would be saying guys i am working in your lives to help you fall in love with jesus and jesus alone that's the first thing god it's all or nothing the number two thing is this he's concerned true spiritual leaders are concerned that god's people not be deceived and that they know the truth and what happened go to verse three what happened i fear less by any means as a serpent beguiled eve through this subtlety so your mind should be corrupted from the simplicity that there is in christ and here's what happened you see here's a dad preparing his daughter to get married and he's working on i mean he's saving money and they're got they're they're buying the dress and they're and they're getting the money ready for the meals they got to prepare and they're buying all this stuff that goes into having a wedding i mean you know and it's a it's it's a little bit of an expensive affair to have your daughter get married and we did it modestly but it was still thousands of dollars and some people spend mega bucks on it and here's what here's what paul's saying guys i want to present you as a chaste pure virgin to jesus i want you to be saved and clean and right and there's some yahoos coming in that want to mess all this up and i'm upset about it i don't like it one bit some yahu shows up to visit your daughter it's a guy not her husband not to her husband to be and he comes over to the house and you see him at night trying his best a sweet talker and he's bringing her flower and he's flowers and he's bringing her chocolates and and he's trying his best to win her heart before she gets married if you're a good dad you're going to walk out throw the gun and say look here bud get off my property this girl is engaged when you say amen if you don't have to do that he just picked the phone up call her call her boyfriend and say he's over here you might want to come by the house bring a gun i'll back you up because engaged they made a decision and here's what was happening these judaizers were coming down there and they were trying to get their minds off the word of god trying to get their minds off the simplicity that was in christ and man paul's heart's breaking he loves him he told him one time he said you might have a lot of instructors in christ but you only got one dad and that's me you only got one guy that's that's teaching you that really loves you that cares about you and he said in verse four he said they come down there and they're bringing another jesus and another spirit and another gospel and you guys are putting up with them you are bearing with them give me a break well he just wants to be my friend those are famous last words of real dumb people say amen he just wants to be my friend he's there to mess you up paul said i'm jealous i want to present you to jesus like you ought to be paul says in verse six haven't i been very open in front of you you know these guys come down you don't know these people they come down here and they say they went to bible college and they say they know all this bible stuff and they say they're friends of peter and james and john and they say all this stuff and he says in verse six he said i might not be able to speak as well as they do you know they're they got them fancy highfalutin seminary words and and and and they they they they really are sharp and i may not be that sharp i'm rude and not in speech it's kind of like i'm a country boy you just got a tennessee hillbilly preacher there's no Harvard graduate here in the pulpit and he says he said
[12:26] but he says but i'm not i'm not slacking knowledge because i know god i know jesus and he said i've been very open with you and i've shown you don't you people realize what's going on around you don't you realize in verse 13 that they are false apostles they try to act like one of the apostles but they are deceitful workers that means they're lying to you they're fake they're fraudulent most of you probably not ever had to deal with fake money but when you live overseas you learn fake money you get it in the offering plate when you're a missionary pastor you get it when you change money they look at you and they say white boy won't know the difference and they slip you uh 50 worth of bad money and and i've seen it happening here in america now you had somebody at the fast food place you had no a 20 bill in the center looking up the light and i think my goodness we're back in peru everybody's checking out the money to make sure it's false paul said man why don't y'all check out the preachers and see if they're right they're false workers and by the way he says in verse 13 they transformed themselves into the apostles of christ he said they come down here bragging about hey i'm the man of god i got letters from jerusalem i'm an apostle and they act like they're somebody and you guys are listening to them you guys are listening to them these guys these guys are hurting you these guys are hurting you and you guys are listening to them can i just tell you he says to his church people you need to understand you can't go by appearances you can't measure ministries by how many people attend and you can't measure ministries by what it looks like he says because in verse 14 satan himself is transformed into an angel of light so why does it surprise you that his ministers would be transformed into ministers of righteousness have you ever noticed how much they want to make it look so holy and so pure there's a big cult out of utah and man they got the sweetest families and everything is so beautiful and so perfect but they have another jesus they have another gospel they have another spirit they have a whole nother thing and and we'd look at them and go wow man i wish we had families like they have let me explain to you they are putting on a a face let me explain to you that religion always puts on a face it always looks pretty it always shows light boy you'll go overseas some of you and you'll visit overseas and you'll see some idolatrous stuff and you'll say that's the most beautiful statue i've ever seen look how beautiful it is of course it is the devil knows how to make it look good and the apostle paul stands back he said wait a minute i gave you i it's my job to turn you over to jesus as his bride pure and these yehus have come down and they're trying to mess you up now you listen to me as i tell you this when you turn on the television you have to be very careful every preacher you listen to and by the way you ought to be very careful with me you ought not even listen to me without taking out your bible and said i'm gonna read it i'm gonna say that's one of the reasons we go verse by verse and chapter by chapter so you can see if it's in the bible or not so if you can see if it makes sense we read the whole chapter today we read the whole chapter twice we read it once and i talked my way through it again i want you to know you got to check them out you got to hold the measuring stick up you you don't say well boy they sure look sharp that guy's really sharp he's in fit i believe he works out every day i think he has a halo when he preaches and look at all the people getting healed and look at all the stuff and he's got the shiniest pearliest white teeth you've ever seen in your life he must be of god and paul would look at you and say whoa i led you to christ i taught you about jesus i'm jealous over you and you're letting these people mess with your mind mess with your heart i don't understand it i don't understand it now go with me to verse five you see spiritual leadership carries a heavy price
[16:27] a great price and paul you could hear the hurt in the verse listen what he says i don't think i'm even a wit a little bit inch a little bit silly millimeter behind the chiefest apostles i'm not trying to tell you i'm some big shot preacher i'm not trying to tell you my name is peter or james or john i'm not trying to tell you i went to the fanciest college but i really don't think i'm that dumb i really don't think i'm that far behind and maybe i don't speak with the fanciest words but you haven't had anybody else that loved you been here been honest with you let you see their life let you know them you haven't had anybody else that loved you when you didn't love back you don't even respect your spiritual father paul's going to tell him in this chapter i have suffered physically financially emotionally and even spiritually for you i love you i never have taken advantage of you he's going to tell him verse 19 he said you suffer fools gladly you let the idiots come in here and you put up with them and look what they do to you they take you into bondage look at verse 20 they put you in bondage they come in and they tell you don't eat pork get circumcised obey the rules and you're like okay so i didn't tell you that it's amazing how many people want the kind of preaching you want to come where they beat you up you don't really feel like you've been preached to unless they yell at you and scream at you and stomp you and kick you and then you get to walk out of the room going man he about killed me today i think i'll go back next week to get another beating you're like an abused wife you got the abused wife syndrome i got a beating last week now i need one next week he said they they put you in bondage put rules on you they devour you look at the verse they devour you and those preachers came in and they were after their money can i just tell you turn the tv on that prosperity gospel preacher preaches one prosperity he is he is nobody else's but he is he's the one driving the bentley not you while you get prosperity he gets richer every day amen and he's back there saying y'all believe y'all give give to me you'll be rich what he really means is you're an idiot get to me i'll be rich paul said y'all suffer fools gladly don't you you let the idiots come in and y'all really eat them up don't you well you know y'all really like those psychological preachers pop psychology preachers that's your favorite he doesn't have to have one ounce of bible just as long as he's a pretty talker you go to church he hadn't what's the last time you open it go to their church they don't even have a bible with them preacher don't even need one they take of you they take paul said in the chapter he said they take but i wasn't a burden they take but i give they take they're needy clingy taking over you they exalt themselves isn't it amazing how many preachers today man if you just listen to them you know they're the smartest cookie the sharpest knife hey let's just be honest with you they never have had body odor in their lives their teeth are perfect they float through the air they never have a bad hair day i mean whoa whoa paul said they exalt themselves fact is they're not like real people you know i mean you look at me you say i could never be like that he ain't real he's above us paul said they exalt themselves and then they even slapped him on the face which was kind of a rabbinical thing they could do that it might not mean a literal physical slap but your teacher in jewish days could easily walk up to you and you're saying something wrong
[20:30] just swap you upside the head say listen to me boy and he said they slap you and you put up with it i've been nice to you they slap you you come back for more they slap you around and you like it maybe an example of doing it without words was the day jesus said to peter get thee behind me satan that was kind of like a slap but paul says look at what they do they put you in bondage they devour you they take advantage of you they they exalt themselves and they slap you and they and you keep coming back for more paul says uh i've suffered great tribulation i don't have time would you read the last part of the chapter you see the guys from jerusalem came down and here's what they said we graduated from the right school and we came with the endorsements we got the we got uh we got the colgate a good good family uh award going for us today and we have dr phil has endorsed me and and and uh and uh what's her name oprah's endorsed me the president has endorsed me and 50 last pre the 50 last presidents have all endorsed me and if you say they're less than 50 don't you worry i know more and they all will endure i'm i am a great i'm a great guy and paul looks at me and says let me tell you what i come with they claim all their credentials and i'll claim this i've gone hungry for you i have traveled and been in danger for you and to preach the gospel i have been beaten time and time again i have suffered for you you see that's what a real mom does isn't it you know think about the times a mother and all that she invests in her child and all the sleepless nights and all the pain she goes from paul looked and said yeah yeah y'all like them don't you they got real pretty credentials don't they well i'll tell you what i've done the fact is when i started my ministry that had let me down in a refuge bag probably full of poo poo down over the wall and i escaped in it i escaped through that basket on the road to get on down the road yeah i don't measure up to them but i really don't think i'm behind the real apostles maybe i don't measure up with these fancy ones and i'd like to ask you how do you respond to the spiritual care that's been taken for your soul if you're sitting in this room this morning god's been working in your life he has placed your parents and your pastors and your friends and people that have tried to care about you and love you and get you the gospel do you recognize all that god's doing and has done in your life to get the gospel to you do you acknowledge that many have prayed and worked to bring you to faith and maturity in christ do you run off after every teacher and every doctrine that comes along instead of being faithful to continue in your place learning and growing do you check everything out in the word of god to make sure it's true then know that this is the final authority for all spiritual matters do you hunger to be presented to god holy and pure as his servant and as his bride the apostle paul loves the corinthians he's very much in love with them like a daddy he cannot wait to present them because there's no fear about how the bridegroom will treat the church he knows jesus died for the church and jesus bought the church and the church belongs to jesus and all he's doing is getting us ready to get there the wedding day we're standing at the back of the church and my daughter stephanie reaches over and pulls my she's got my arm and she pulls me down and tears are streaming down her face and she kisses me and says thank you daddy and i walked her down i was crying all the way down we got up to the front and i preached a little thing i love that girl with all my heart i was so excited she got to get married i called her up later and i said baby because the guy he's bigger than me i said baby how can you love such a big fat galoot like him and she
[24:32] said dad i had a lot of practice with you and then i said how's he treating you and she said far better than you ever did i want to punch her for that one now she's got eight kids to remind her i was lots better to her amen just a joke watch this listen he loves you the apostle paul says i want to present you to the father i want to make sure you're saved i'm not interested in getting an offering out of you i'm not interested in you doing anything for me i want you to know that you're saved and know you're going to go to heaven when you die i want you to be ready to meet jesus i want you to be living a holy and pure life and i'm not trying to build a big congregation and i'm not trying to get a big crowd i just really care about you and yes i do get upset when people come along and try to teach you things they ought not teach you but it's because i love you and i'm jealous over you and i just want you to know they're fakes they're fakes they're lying they're fakes they don't open the bible they don't teach you the bible and yet you fall for them paul's like what in the world what in the world i love you and i care about you and this morning can i tell you as a pastor though i don't measure up to paul and though i don't measure up to him but i do love you and i think about you every day and i pray for you every day i want to know that you're saved i want to know you're going to go to heaven when you die i'm concerned for your marriage and i hurt when i know things aren't going well i hurt for you when you're having financial issues i care about you and that's exactly what's going on here you ought to come to church knowing this hey i'm here to grow in christ and to be all that he has in mind for me to be and i want to be faithful to search the scriptures and know the truth and not get off off target not get out of line paul said man i love you like a daddy loves his daughter and i care that when you stand before jesus you be saved you be right you be clean you be holy and man i don't want you by messing up your bible doctrine father in heaven i love you and i thank you for the chance to serve you and i pray that you'd work today and i pray your name would be glorified i thank you for your wonderful people and i pray god today that if there's somebody here that doesn't know you as their personal savior that they would confess their sin and put their faith in jesus for what he did on the cross of calvary for them and i pray dear god for christians in this room that they're born again and they know that they would uh go to heaven but lord they've been listening to things they shouldn't as far as wrong bible doctrine and they've been unfaithful to be in the word and god today you're dealing with their hearts to draw them closer to you that they would be concerned about their spiritual life and their spiritual growth there are some in the room lord that maybe have been taking flippantly their relationship with you and i just pray you bring that home to them and i'll give you praise you have been listening to austin gardner pastor of vision baptist church for contact information location service times or more audio and video recordings log on to www.visionbaptist.com host families are long respirřfilim warmer