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[0:00] This message was recorded at Vision Baptist Church in Alfred, Georgia. It is our prayer that you will be blessed by the preaching of God's Word. Amen. Jesus is the saving one. Amen. Take your Bibles if you would and open them with me to the book of Matthew chapter 5.

[0:14] Matthew chapter 5 and we're in verse 9. And we're going to talk about some persecuted peacemakers. Some persecuted peacemakers you went through with me last week.

[0:25] We took the Word of God and went through the Sermon on the Mount. We got all the way down to verse 9. We saw that the Lord's talking to these Pharisees and He says to them, Hey, you guys come all powerful and mighty, but God is looking for those that are poor in spirit.

[0:41] God is looking for those that are broken. God is looking for those that are humble. And that's who He works in. That's who He gives His happiness to. It's almost like a ladder you got here. You're watching all this happen.

[0:52] And now we get down to what we're going to do. We see what He did in us. Now one of the things we're going to do is we're going to be peacemakers. The Bible says in chapter 5 verse 9, Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.

[1:07] Father, I pray that you would help this truth to sink in. I pray you'd help us to be peacemakers. I pray you'd help us to share your Word. I pray you'd help us to be ready to face persecution that will come our way because we decide to love you and serve you.

[1:21] And I'll give you great honor and glory and praise for all that you do. In Jesus' precious name, amen. Well, if you're writing anything down, we could share. Here it is. We share in His great work.

[1:33] We could share in His great work because He has given us peace. We have peace. And so we can partake in giving that peace out. If you would look at verse 9, it says, Blessed are the peacemakers, children of God.

[1:48] And then it says, we have peace and we know how to get it. We've got peace in Jesus Christ. And we're to share that peace. Open your Bibles to 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 18 with me if you would.

[1:59] 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 18. And I want to go through one of the most powerful passages of Scripture in the world. I want to show you some fantastic truths.

[2:10] 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verses 18 and following. 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 18. And read with me if you would. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 5 verse 18.

[2:21] And all things are of God who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ and hath given to us a ministry of reconciliation, of making peace.

[2:31] To wit that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ.

[2:44] As though God did beseech you by us, we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God. For ye have made in to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in us.

[2:57] So here's what's going on in the Bible story. Adam, how about you and Santiago come here to help me? And sir, you too. All right. And we'll just pray the microphone works to get it out to the video.

[3:09] I know it's having a little bit of a problem. These guys are sweating it back there. More than I am. Hey, y'all come down here. Which one of y'all want to be God? Let me see. Which one of them do we make God in this story? Not you, Santiago.

[3:22] Okay, Sergei, stand right up here on the platform. Sergei, it's God. Come on over here, you two sinners. Okay. Here's what happens in the Bible. Here's the Bible story. Let's go all the way back to Adam and Eve, and let's consider what happened.

[3:36] What happened was, and this is something you need to understand about sin. Sin isn't a list of sins that you got. Sin is when you live your own way. Sin is when you live your own way.

[3:47] In other words, it could be a really good way. You could be extremely moral. You could pay all your bills. You could be the best neighbor possible. But if you don't know Jesus, you don't trust Jesus, you're living your own way, and you're going to go to hell.

[3:59] Or you could get into some wicked sin. Satan doesn't care which one of these lines you take as long as you don't get into God's way. And so Adam and Eve sinned against God. Adam, you just got to step out of the way. I'll get you back here in a minute.

[4:11] Sit down right there on the front row, and I'll get you back. So this sinner sinned against God, and he did his own thing, and he was separated from God by sin. Sin separated us from God.

[4:22] How many of you know that? Say amen. All right. Then what happens in 2 Corinthians 5, what happens is the God of heaven in his son, Jesus Christ, comes down to earth and dies on a cross so that this man can be saved.

[4:34] And he makes peace. It is not this man doing anything. It is God making peace. Look what it says. 2 Corinthians 5, first verse I gave you, what was it, 18? Let me make sure I got you the right verse.

[4:49] Verse 18. And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given us a ministry of reconciliation. All things are of God. Verse 19, if you would.

[4:59] To wit, that God was in Christ. So God in Christ came down, and God paid the debt of sin himself, and God did something to bring man back to him and to reconcile man back to God.

[5:13] And so we have peace with God through what Jesus did on the cross at Calvary. If you understand that, say amen. All right, but then he said to us in this book, he says, I want you to be peacemakers.

[5:25] There is no peace without Jesus. There is no peace outside of God. If you understand that, say amen. And so there's no peace outside of God. Come on, Adam. So Adam and Eric, you can come over here too.

[5:35] Adam and Eric are fighting, and they don't get along, because this guy's Moroccan, and this guy's redneck, and rednecks and Moroccans don't get along.

[5:47] Do you all get along? No? Okay. Do you all get along? Oh, he's a nicer guy than you. Not hard, though. And so what happens is, this Christian was commanded to be a peacemaker.

[6:00] This Christian was commanded to come over here and say, I want to make peace. I want to help you all get peace. But peacemaking that's really going to happen, is going to happen because he knows the peace giver.

[6:11] He knows the one who forgives sin. He knows the one that can bring these two together. So he can bring that message. He is commanded to be an ambassador. 2 Corinthians 5.18, one more time if you would. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 5.18, And all things are of God.

[6:25] God did the reconciling, and he did it by Jesus Christ. And look what he did. He gave us the ministry of reconciliation. And we can get these two guys together in peace only when they know him.

[6:37] So Santiago comes with the gospel. Santiago shares the gospel. These two men come to know Jesus. These two men can be saved. Are you with me? Can you say amen if you're with me? All right. Thank you all. Walk with me through this passage of scripture if you would.

[6:51] Walk with me through the passage. We are given this ministry. We're to go to people and say, Be reconciled. We're to go to people and say, Be reconciled. God's done all so that you can be saved.

[7:02] Calling us peacemakers was like saying, Here's a quality of your father's character in you. Who's the peacemaker? The peacemaker is our father. We sinned. We walked away.

[7:13] We did our own thing. And our father stepped forward and said, I will make peace. And he came in Jesus and died on the cross and paid our sin that we could be saved. He called us fishers of men earlier in the book.

[7:26] And now he calls us peacemakers. You and I have the gospel message that we can share. There's a story written by Don Richardson, who was a missionary over in Papua New Guinea and Nidia and Jaya in that area of the world.

[7:41] And there were these two tribes. And they hated each other. And they were fighting. And he and his family, 50 years ago, they went into that area of the country. They took a boat. And they went up the river. And they met with them.

[7:52] And he began trying to teach these natives the Bible and teach them about Jesus. And he was having a very frustrating time because they lived for war. They lived to eat each other.

[8:03] They lived to kill and actually eat each other. And when he told them the story of Jesus and the disciples and Judas, they loved Judas. Their favorite character in the story was Judas because Judas was a conniving, scheming guy who could get ahead in the world.

[8:18] And they loved him. And because one of their tricks was they would come over to a guy from the other tribe and say, We'd like to make peace with you. We want our families to get together. Come over and live with us.

[8:29] Come over and eat a meal with us. And they would bring him over time after time. And they would fatten him up. And they would keep giving him food and everything. And then one day when he was in their house, they'd just kill him and eat him. And so these were like wicked, dirty people.

[8:41] And the missionary couldn't figure out how in the world can I help them understand that Jesus is the answer. And Jesus is the hero of the story. And one day he saw a battle between the two tribes.

[8:52] They came down and they had this battle. And then they decided they were going to try to make peace. And they had this wonderful thing they did. They took a baby from this side of the river and this tribe. And they put it over on this side of the river.

[9:03] And a lady actually passed the baby between her legs. And they said, This baby will be the peace child. This baby will make peace because one of ours lives with you. One of ours lives with you.

[9:14] You raise him as yours. And if anybody would ever harm the peace child, they would be the most wicked, vile, and despicable person on the planet. Don Richardson saw that great act happen that day.

[9:25] He went to them and he said, You know who the peace child is? The peace child is Jesus. He came down from another place. He was born on this planet. He was born to a woman here. And Judas betrayed him.

[9:35] And all of a sudden all the tribes said, We don't like Judas. We hate him. He betrayed the peace child. But it was Jesus who paid the debt. It was Jesus who made peace for us. And you and I can make peace because we know Jesus.

[9:48] We know the peacemaker. We know the one who came to die on a cross and pay our sin debt. And you and I are to be peacemakers. And we can live at peace. We can live peacefully because we know the peace of God.

[10:02] So we're to be peacemakers. I could stop right here and just tell you I could spend a day with you. This verse is about soul winning. This verse is about world evangelism. This verse is about taking God's peace to the planet.

[10:14] It's not about building a church. It's not about getting people to come here. But there's only one way to have peace. You can't have peace in your heart until you have peace with God.

[10:25] And so people won't ever have that until they know Jesus. You and I know Jesus. You and I know that our sins have been paid for. You and I know when we lay our heads down at night. We know if we die tonight we're going to go to heaven.

[10:36] We know that no matter how bad things get on this planet. We know our salvation is secure in Jesus Christ. We have the peace of God. How about that? Amen? We have peace with God.

[10:47] We know that God's wrath, God's anger, whatever you want to call it. God's anger against sin has been taken care of. Jesus took care of that on the cross of Calvary.

[10:57] Amen? And so we have the peace of God. The biggest, nastiest storms that come along. We used to be in Idyquipa, Peru, and there would be these earthquakes. And they'd get up, I mean, seven on the Richter scale, more than that on the Richter scale.

[11:10] And you'd be in the house and you'd hear it coming, sound like a train coming straight at you. You're like, what in the world, sound like a train's coming at the house. And all of a sudden the whole house would start shaking. And everybody would get terrified.

[11:20] And I'd be like, hey, I'm all right. Don't worry about it. I know exactly where I'm going to go. Big storms come even now. I like to go out and watch them. I'm like, can you believe how powerful my God is? Can you believe what's going on? But I have a peace that passes all understanding because of what Jesus did on Calvary's tree.

[11:36] Amen? And now what's going to happen? You and I are to be peacemakers. You and I are to be peacemakers. We don't just know this truth. We share this truth. We don't just have this truth.

[11:47] We share this truth with other people. So we're at work. And we're talking to a person. And we realize, man, this guy is going through the mess. And this guy needs help. But he doesn't need psychological help. He doesn't need financial help.

[11:58] He needs really to know that God loves him. That Jesus died on the cross for him. That he can go to heaven when he dies. That's the most important truth to ever know anywhere. Can you say amen if that's right? We're going to be peacemakers.

[12:09] So we're going to be sharing the truth. We're going to be telling people. We're going to be going at it. We're going to aggressively share our faith. We're going to be peacemakers. We're seeing people fight.

[12:19] We're going to step in and say, hey, look, let me help you have peace. But the peace we're going to share with him is Jesus. We're going to step out and say, man, Jesus died on a cross to pay your sin debt. Jesus died so you could go to heaven when you died.

[12:32] Jesus died so that you could be saved. And you need to trust Jesus Christ as your Savior. We are peacemakers. That ought to be our job. We are fishers of men. We're going to go win people to Christ.

[12:43] We are peacemakers. We're telling people this is how you can have peace. It's through Jesus Christ. And that leads to the next thing that's in your Bible. If you'll go with me to Matthew chapter 5 and verse 10, look what happens.

[12:57] As we live for Jesus, as we share his holiness, as we share his message, there will be persecution. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake.

[13:10] For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad.

[13:21] For great is your reward in heaven. For so persecuted they the prophets which were before you. We have seen in these beatitudes who we are. We are the poor in spirit.

[13:32] We're broken. We're humbled. We come to God and we trust him. We've seen what it makes us do. It gives us a pure life. It helps us to be peacemakers. And now it brings us to what they do to us.

[13:43] Because he wanted them to know right off the bat, if you decide to follow Jesus, if you decide to live for him, if you decide to let him live in and through you, they're going to be upset and they're going to persecute you.

[13:55] So don't be shocked. If you live a light-filled life, if you live a light-filled life, darkness will not like you.

[14:05] Blessed are they. Happy are you when you get persecuted. Persecuted. That word persecuted has the idea of pursuing us, chasing us away in an aggressive manner. It's cruelty and injury.

[14:18] Those that are living out the beatitudes can expect to be hated, accused, talked about by those that do not agree with them, and what the God of heaven says. That's probably like the weirdest thing.

[14:29] Can you have these, every one of these beatitudes are like weird. It's like if you're poor, you should be happy. If you're broken, you should be happy. And if they're yelling at you and cursing you and saying bad things about you and even beating you and killing you, you should be happy.

[14:43] Anybody listening has got to be going, I don't get this. This is like the opposite. But this is what Jesus said. This is inspired word of God. Blessed are the persecuted.

[14:54] But they're persecuted for righteousness' sake. You can expect that if you serve Jesus, there's going to be resistance. The Bible says in 2 Timothy 3 and verse 12, Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.

[15:11] Light is not welcome in darkness. In our house, we keep the house dark at night. I mean, we don't have nightlight on, maybe a phone charging over there, a little bit of light here and there.

[15:25] And the other night, I just needed a drink of water. And I was fumbling around trying to find it, so finally I just opened the refrigerator to reach in and get me a bottle of water. And it blinded me.

[15:36] I mean, I remember standing there going, whoa, what? Because when you're in absolute darkness, light almost hurts. Is that true or not? And that's what I was. I mean, I stood there for a minute. I was just holding my eyes, waiting.

[15:47] I was kind of opening my eyes a little by little so I could use that light. And I reached in and got that bottle. I shut that door as quick as I could. Guess what happens when you live like Jesus wants you to live? He says in the next verses, we'll look at in the next couple of weeks, we're light.

[15:57] We're the light of this world. Light's not comfortable or darkness isn't comfortable when light gets around. Hey, sin's not comfortable when salt gets around. Salt gets in the wounds of this world.

[16:09] And so we are persecuted. We are persecuted because we bring honor and glory to Jesus. That's what we're going to do. We're going to live out who we are in Christ.

[16:22] You realize, I hope you understand. I hope you understand as you go through these Beatitudes, we started out being very poor. And we worked our way all the way up until we got to where we were peacemakers.

[16:34] By the way, peacemakers aren't exactly light. Peacemakers aren't exactly light. Over the years of being in the ministry, over 40 years I've been in the ministry, I've done lots of divorce counseling.

[16:45] And it's always been amazing to me how many times people I helped got mad at me. I remember this one couple. His name was Jerry. I don't remember her name. His name was Jerry.

[16:56] They've been divorced two or three times, both of them separately, and they were married together. And they were having this major fight, and they called me, and they wanted a pastor to come over. And I went over, and I spent hours with them several different times, and I helped them get their life right with God, helped them get their marriage back together.

[17:09] And when it was all said and done, they were both mad at me. She said, you know too much about me. You know who I've been. I don't want to come back to your church. I don't like you. He didn't like me. She didn't like me. And I was like, I made peace, and they don't like me.

[17:20] But that's what happens when you make peace. And anybody in this room has ever done much of that, you'll find that to be true. You're making peace. You're the guy that's going to go over to somebody and say, hey, I want to tell you about Jesus. If you ever go knock on doors, we're out knocking on doors.

[17:34] Not me. Some of the guys here in the church are out knocking on doors. I get an email, and it says, your church stuck something on my door. I'm an atheist. I don't appreciate it being stuck on my door.

[17:45] And you said you'd be here to help me, so I want you to come back and put an apology on everybody's door here where you stuck one of those things, because we said no soliciting. And so you try to make peace, people don't like it. People don't like it.

[17:56] And that's what's going on in the verse. People don't like it. But when you make peace, when you keep standing for peace, it will eventually break that resistance if it will stand.

[18:07] Another story told by Don Richardson in a book he has called Lords of the Earth is there's a guy, a missionary in there named Stanley Dale. And Stanley Dale, by the end of the story, is going over to witness to this tribe that hates him.

[18:18] They'd already shot him with five arrows one time, and they had tried to kill him, but he didn't die. And he got well, and he came back, and he was still working in those people and trying to see if he couldn't reach them for the gospel. And they came to kill him.

[18:29] And when they did, they started shooting him with arrows, and he wouldn't fight back. He actually had a gun on him. And they shot him. He reached and pulled the arrow out, and he broke the arrow and threw it on the ground. They shot him again. He reached and pulled the arrow out, broke it, and threw it on the ground. And they just kept shooting him time after time, and he just kept pulling him out, breaking him, pulling him out, breaking him.

[18:43] They couldn't understand it. And finally, he was no longer strong enough to reach up and pull the arrow out. He just stood there, and they'd shoot him again and shoot him again and shoot him again and shoot him again. And finally, finally, he wouldn't even fall down.

[18:53] Finally, he died. He fell down. And when he fell down, it looked like maybe hate had won. It looked like maybe the gospel wouldn't get through. But what happened was it so scared those people that a man could stand there when he could have fought back.

[19:07] A man could have run. He wouldn't run. And a man stood there that that tribe's God was broken. And the people started coming to know Jesus as their personal Savior. And his son, reading his own dad's testimony of getting saved, got saved when he heard about how his dad had stood and took the punishment and died.

[19:25] He was not a peacemaker dying. There was a guy named Jim Elliott. I'm sure you know the story about the Alka Indians. They're no longer called the Alkas. The Alka means savage people.

[19:35] Now they're called the Warawani or something like that, which means the people. These were savages. They were cruel. They killed people. They killed anybody that worked for the Shell Oil Company, which was working in their neighborhood. They killed people on a regular basis.

[19:47] And five young men decided that they would do whatever they could to get the gospel to them. Back in the 1950s, all five of them were killed. And it looked like peacemaking hadn't done its job.

[19:59] But over the next few years, the missionary wives would go back into that city and back into that village, back into that tribe, and win them to Christ. And several of us have actually traveled back in there where they were.

[20:10] And now there are churches, and now people know Jesus. We are peacemakers. But peacemakers often pay a price. Peacemakers often pay a price.

[20:21] So let me talk to you about how we deal with persecution, if I could. That persecution, again, is to be pursued, chased, harassed, driven away. It's persecution that is aggressive.

[20:32] It includes pain, injury, being treated evilly. It's persistent, unrelenting. It's often physical or torture. Look at chapter 5, verse 11. Matthew 5, 11.

[20:42] Blessed are you when men shall revile you and persecute you and say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake. Very likely none of us will ever get the persecution that's getting killed.

[20:54] We're probably not going to get shot with arrows. We're probably not going to be like the Jim Elliott going down to the Alka Indians when verse 11 gets us done. Look at it. You stood for Jesus, and you talk about Jesus, and you share your faith, and people make fun of you.

[21:08] Look at verse 11. They revile you. They say ugly stuff about you. They mock you. They persecute you. They say all manner of evil, and it's falsely. They say that about you.

[21:20] But I want you to put it in verse 11. You've got your Bible up in circle for my sake. You are happy when men talk bad about you, as long as they're talking bad about you because you were talking about Jesus, because you were sharing the faith.

[21:35] Now, many Christians are persecuted because they don't act like Christians. Christians sometimes are the most obnoxious, rude people, and we want to fight about things that aren't important. We want to get involved in political agendas.

[21:46] Our peacemaking is not about a political agenda. Peacemaking isn't about fighting a group of people. Peacemaking is about telling them Jesus loves them and died on a cross to save them. That's peacemaking. Amen?

[21:56] And so that's the message we have, that Jesus died so all men could come to know him and be saved. Our persecution is because of our holy living or purity.

[22:08] Look at verse 10. Matthew chapter 5 and verse 10. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for purity's sake, for holy living's sake.

[22:22] For theirs is the kingdom of God. Here's what's going on. Here's a Christian person who simply doesn't want to participate in a certain activity, doesn't act ugly about it, but they don't want to cheat on their taxes or they don't want to lie about this or they don't want to steal this or they don't want to do this thing that's wrong and they just say, I don't want to do that.

[22:41] They don't try to be ugly about it. They don't try to get anybody else in trouble. They just say, no, I'm not going to be involved in that. No, that's not who I am. That's not how I want to be. And the other people don't like that. The other people want to get rid of them because you're too holy.

[22:53] You make me feel dirty. Darkness hates light. If we're all dark together, we'll all be happy in darkness. You let one guy full of light in the group and everybody's like, man, he makes me feel dirty.

[23:06] And they want to get rid of him. And so it's for righteousness' sake. You got that written down there? If you underline that, our persecution is not because we're a rude neighbor. Our persecution isn't because we're ugly to people.

[23:18] Our persecution isn't because we're in their face and being rude to them about a political agenda. Our persecution is because we're trying to do right. We got a sweet spirit, a pure spirit. We're doing it for his sake.

[23:30] Persecution is because of our stand with and for Jesus and his teachings. Chapter 5, verse 11. You know, there's a church that says God hates fags and they're just as rude and ugly as they can be.

[23:42] That is not. When they get persecuted, they get persecuted because they're idiots. They get persecuted because they're idiots. That's not us. We're not here to be ugly about anything. We're not here to take a political agenda.

[23:52] We're here to say this. Jesus loves you. God loves you. And God sent his son to die on a cross for you so that you can be saved. So it is for his teaching. For my sake.

[24:05] Doing right makes the wicked angry. Proverbs chapter 29 and verse 27. The Bible says, an unjust man is an abomination to the just.

[24:16] And he that is upright in the way is an abomination to the wicked. Let me read that verse to you in Tennessee Hillbilly. A guy who walks right in his life makes wicked people angry.

[24:28] A guy who walks right in his life makes wicked people angry. The wicked people are like, why are you like that? Why don't you do what we do? Why don't you run to the same extremes that we do? Why don't you get involved in sin?

[24:39] And so, righteousness. Living a right life. Doing right. Want to know why you still love your wife? And you aren't cheating on her?

[24:50] They want to know why you still live an honorable life. Why you still do those things? And you're telling them it's because you love Jesus. That angers them. A couple of more things about persecution. It ought to be expected.

[25:02] We need to know that we're going to be reviled. They're going to talk ugly about us. They're not going to like us. That's what it says in Matthew 5.10.

[25:14] Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness sake. It says, happy. You ought to be happy. Verse 11. Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you. Verse 12.

[25:24] Rejoice and be exceeding glad. For great your reward in heaven. So you and I should know this. If these beatitudes are true. If you came to him broken. You came to him knowing you needed him.

[25:35] And you trusted him. And you did a work in your life. And you hunger and you thirst after righteousness. You're like, man, I want to know Jesus. I want to know more about him. And that's a lifestyle you have. And you're living out your faith.

[25:46] People aren't going to like it. That's exactly what's going on in the verse. People are not going to like it. People want you to be just good. Not righteous. They want you to be nice.

[25:57] But not a fanatic for Jesus. They don't want you to be like that. You should know that you're going to get persecuted. Because that's what happened to Jesus. In John chapter 15 and verse 18.

[26:08] He said, if the world hates you. Y'all just remember it hated me first. You ought to know the world's not going to have you. Because they persecuted me. It says in verse 20.

[26:19] So you should look for that to happen to you. I follow a guy. Who went about doing good. He healed sick people. He raised people from the dead. He fed people.

[26:30] He was good and kind and merciful. They brought a woman taking an adultery to him. And when they brought her to him. He said, wait lady. Where are your accusers? He was a kind and good person. He just lived out exactly what we're supposed to do.

[26:42] You know what they did to him, don't you? They killed him. They grabbed him. They drug him down the road. They pulled out his beard. They beat him. They covered his eyes. And hit him and said, why don't you tell us.

[26:52] Who's hitting you right now? And Jesus died. I follow him. What am I supposed to expect? Jesus said if they do that to the teacher. They'll do that to the disciple.

[27:04] If they do that to the leader. They'll do that to the follower. You just need to know. Just be happy when it comes. Because you're being like me. In John chapter 16 and verse 33.

[27:15] Jesus has not longed for the world before he'll die and be buried and rise again. And he tells his disciples this in John 16, 33. I've told you these things. These things have I spoken unto you. That y'all might have peace.

[27:27] In the world you will have tribulation. In the world you are going to have problems. People are going to persecute you. Things are going to go wrong. But be of good cheer. I have overcome the world.

[27:42] In Acts chapter 4 and verse 12. 14 and verse 22. Excuse me. Acts 14, 22. Paul talks to him and says he confirmed the souls of the disciples. And exhorted them to continue in the faith that we must through much tribulation.

[27:57] Much tribulation. Somebody sold you a bill of goods. And they made it sound like if you'll accept Jesus Christ. Everything's going to smell like roses. And everything's going to go good. And you're never going to have problems. It's totally foreign to the scriptures.

[28:09] If you live a righteous and holy life. If you live a righteous and holy life. If you live out your faith. You can expect to be surprised. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 3 and verse 3.

[28:20] Paul was talking to that church. And he said to them guys. Don't be surprised. I'm getting persecuted. We were appointed for this. And I told you when I was with you. That persecution and tribulation was coming.

[28:33] And it's just happening. Like I said it would. It's our privilege. We get to suffer for and with Jesus. We get to suffer for and with Jesus.

[28:45] It's a privilege that we get to do that. So they were to rejoice. In Matthew chapter 5 and verse 12 it said rejoice. And look at the word. This is a ridiculous word.

[28:56] Honestly. This word is like shocking to read it. He said rejoice and be exceedingly glad. I mean be jumping up and down with joy. And said wow. Can you believe it?

[29:07] They're persecuting us. Hey. High five me boys. Just fuck me boys. They're persecuting us. That's like what? You are crazy. That's what it says though. Rejoice.

[29:17] And be exceedingly glad. For great is your reward in heaven. For so persecuted they the prophets. By the way. They understood that in Bible days. You and I are like. Man. Somebody said something. I gave them a gospel track.

[29:29] And they were kind of ribbed at me. That's how we feel. But in the New Testament they were like. Hey. They beat us up. They beat us up. And I'm excited about it.

[29:40] In Acts chapter 5 and verse 41. They departed from the presence of the council rejoicing. That they were kind of worthy. To suffer for his name. They were like. Man.

[29:51] They whooped us. They came back to the church. You know. If it was a church in 2014. That would come in. We would all be going. Oh. Oh. Oh. Baby. Oh. I'm so sorry.

[30:01] They beat you. When they came walking in the door. These guys just got beat. They come walking in the door. They said. Can you believe it? Woo. They just beat the slop out of me for Jesus. And everybody in the church.

[30:11] Yeah. Give a round of applause. That's crazy. Isn't it? Isn't that what it's saying though? Isn't that what it's saying? You have your Bible open. I'm not making this up.

[30:22] It's right there in the Bible. Happy. Blessed. Fulfilled. Satisfied are you when you suffer persecution. When people talk bad about you. Get excited.

[30:32] Exceedingly glad. When you get persecuted. When things are going wrong in your life. Now how can we be excited about being persecuted?

[30:43] How can we be excited about being persecuted? By the way this is really real for our guys that are in China today. And Egypt. And Tunisia. And Morocco. They're in places where teaching and preaching the gospel.

[30:57] Can cause trouble. And people can be angry. But let me tell you something. Persecution is a pretty good sign. You're on your way to heaven. If you're being persecuted for righteousness sake and for his sake.

[31:09] Look at your Bible. If you would at Matthew 5.10. Look what he said. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness sake. For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. So here's a guy who's living for Jesus and doing right.

[31:21] And sharing the gospel and sharing Jesus. And just doing the right thing. And he's happy. Man they beat the slop out of me. And he's going I must be saved. There must be something really different about me.

[31:33] It also means I have God's blessings and God's happiness. If I suffer correctly. Matthew chapter 5 and verse 11. Blessed are you when men revile you.

[31:43] When they talk bad about you. When they curse you. When they mock you. When they persecute you. When they say all manner of evil against you. And it's a lie. For my sake. You say guys.

[31:54] God said blessed are you. Men you are blessed. You know what we mean when we say God bless you don't you? When we say God bless you. Usually what we mean is poor poor you. You ever been in that church.

[32:04] You ever been in a country church. And some lady gets up to sing. And she can't sing. Worth a flip. I mean and everybody in the church knows it. And she's standing up in his harbor. And the people in the church are going bless you. God bless you my sister.

[32:15] That means the Lord help us get her through quick. We use God bless you like when you're poor and things are going wrong. But here's what he said. Oh they beat the slop out of you. Man you are already blessed.

[32:27] You're already blessed. Because of that. I can be excited about being persecuted. Because I have an eternal reward. He said in Matthew 5 12. Rejoice and be exceeding glad.

[32:38] For great is your reward in heaven. For so persecuted they the prophets which were before you. Maybe we won't get rewards here. Maybe nobody will sign a book deal with us.

[32:48] And maybe nobody will write our names. And maybe they won't put us on TV. And maybe we won't get a gold, silver or bronze medal. But God said you love me. And you serve me. And you live right. And for my sake you suffer. I'll take care of you.

[33:00] I will give you great reward. I can be excited about being suffering. Because look what happens in Matthew 5 and verse 12. Rejoice and be exceeding glad. For great is your reward in heaven.

[33:11] For so persecuted they the prophets which were before you. I don't know when Austin Gardner's name could ever be put in the line. With Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Abakha, Sevanah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi.

[33:28] When in the world could you ever mention my name with the great men of God of the past. But here's what he said. Hey guys. You're getting beat up. They're throwing you in a lion's den. Things are going wrong in your life.

[33:39] People are picking on you. People are beating you. They threw you in a pit. And left you to die. All that's happening to you. You can be happy about it. Because you're lining up with the great prophets that have gone before you.

[33:50] And that's what happened to them. So when you suffer as a Christian, don't be embarrassed. 1 Peter 4.16 says, If any man suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed.

[34:02] Let him glorify God. When you suffer for serving Jesus, be excited about it. So we remember some things while we're being persecuted. And we will be. Let me just tell you, even other Christians.

[34:15] We'll try to pull you down and get you to not witness. Pull you down not to share your faith. Pull you down not to be fanatical. When a new Christian gets saved and they just get really excited about Jesus.

[34:26] They're telling everybody about Jesus. And they're excited. Even older Christians are like, Calm down. You don't need to be so excited about serving Jesus. This is not a sprint. This is a marathon. So don't get too excited about Jesus.

[34:38] The people at work are making fun of you. The family's making fun of you. And everything's going wrong. And you're feeling like, Man, I just don't know if I can take it. I don't know if I can do it. Here's a Bible truth for us. When we are weak, then he is strong.

[34:51] 2 Corinthians 12, 9, and 10. When we are weak, he is strong. And Paul's goal in life was to know him in a more intimate way.

[35:03] And he said there was no more way to know him better than through suffering. In Philippians 3, 10, he said that I may know him. That I may know him. He was already saved. But he said, Man, I want to really get to know him.

[35:14] I want to close this in my relationship. I want to know the power of his resurrection. The power to overcome death. The power to overcome all these things. And then he said something really crazy.

[35:26] He said the fellowship of his suffering. I'd like to get involved in his suffering. I'd like to get involved in his suffering. And I'd like to be made conformable to his death.

[35:37] I would like to be like him, dying. You know, Paul has one really bad run of bragging in the whole New Testament.

[35:50] And I mean, he just cuts loose and starts bragging. He said, And y'all can call me a fool for this, but I'm fixing to cut loose and just tell you what great things God has done for me. And then he says, about six, seven verses, he says, I suffered this.

[36:03] I suffered this. I suffered shipwrecked, beaten, left for dead, going hungry. All this I've done for Jesus. And that comes on me daily, the care of the churches. Being involved in suffering.

[36:16] Being involved in suffering. A great saint of God was called before a king. And the king said to him, You will cease and desist teaching this stuff, or I will take your life.

[36:28] And the Christian looked at him and said, Sir, you can't take my life. Jesus already has it. It's not mine. He said, I will take your stuff. He said, All my treasures are laid up in heaven where thief and moth and rust do not corrupt.

[36:40] And you can't have them either. He said, I'll banish you and you'll have no friends left. He said, Can't do that either. Jesus is my friend. And you can't take away that relationship. And he went through everything that happened.

[36:51] And they finally banished him and he ends up dying before he ever gets to the place where he's banished. But he knew this. My relationship with Jesus is worth far more than anything, any king, any man could ever do to me.

[37:04] I read this week about a man who said, The time I grew closest to God was while I was in jail. Suffering for Jesus. By the way, Pilgrim's Progress will be written by John Bunyan while he's in jail.

[37:19] Suffering for Jesus. It will become a classic, become a best-selling book. And it's still influencing our society today. I'm just telling you that you and I are told this. We are to make peace.

[37:31] We're to make peace. We're to share the gospel. But we're also told this. And when you do, you can expect resistance. You can expect people being angry with you. You can expect to be hurt for doing that.

[37:44] Because people don't like the truth. They don't like the truth. I have a couple of questions for you. Are you sharing the gospel? Do you tell anybody about Jesus?

[37:55] Has it ever come up? Do you ever share it with anybody? Do you share the gospel with people? The second question I would ask you is this. Are you ready to deal with whatever persecution, whatever bad goes wrong in your life?

[38:06] Are you ready to deal with that? Are you ready to say, I love Jesus and I'm willing to pay the price? Yes. Because blessed are you when you're persecuted. When people talk bad about you. When they do all kind of ungodly, horrible things to you.

[38:18] Blessed are you. That's what he told us. Be ready to pay the price to love Jesus and to serve him. Father in heaven, I love you. And I thank you for the opportunity to read your book.

[38:29] I thank you for the opportunity to see what the passage says. And I pray, God, that it would become alive and real in our hearts. And I pray that we would love you more than we ever have. And I pray that you would do a great work here. God, I pray that you would help us to become peacemakers and share the gospel.

[38:43] Give out gospel tracts. Invite people to church. Tell people about Jesus. Pray for lost people. I pray, God, you would help Christians here to say, I am ready to pay the price. Whatever it costs, I want to love Jesus.

[38:54] I want to live right. I want to share Jesus. And I'm willing to pay the price to be a servant. This message was recorded at Vision Baptist Church in Alfred, Georgia. For more information, log on to www.visionbaptist.com, where you can find our service times, location, contact information, and more audio and video recordings.