In Matthew Chapter number 7 there I want to focus on the part beginning in verse 15 where the Bible reads, "Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them."
The part that I want to focus on is in verse 15 there where he says, "Beware of false prophets." Specifically I want to give you tonight four types of false prophets that are in the Bible. Go if you would to 2 Peter Chapter number 2. God gives us certain examples of false prophets in the Bible that typify the different types of false prophets that we're going to deal with in 2015 or at any time. Sort of like God gives the seven churches which are in Asia as examples of the types of churches that can exist in any given place or given time. There are also examples of false prophets given that will help us to identify false prophets in our day.
Now look at 2 Peter 2:1. The Bible reads, "But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you," There's no doubt about the fact that they will be among us. That's why he said, beware of false prophets, they will come to you in sheep's clothing. It will not be obvious that they are false prophets, but they will be in disguise. They will seem like good people and it's easy to be deceived by these people because they seem like great people, but inwardly, they're ravening wolves. That's what Jesus is warning us about.
He says, "They shall be among you." They were there in the Old Testament, they're going to be there in the New Testament, they're around in 2015. He says that these people, halfway through verse one there, it says, "who privily" privily means secretly, privately, "shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction." These false prophets aren't just going to come right out and just openly deny the Lord, but they'll do that privately, they'll do that secretly. They will come in with subtly.
The Bible says in verse 2, "Many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of." He's saying these people will give Christianity a bad name because so many people will follow them that it will cause people to speak ill of the way of truth. "And through covetousness, shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you." Feigned words means that they're saying things that they don't even believe. When you feign something it means you're faking. It's pretty much the same thing as faking. With feigned words, it's with things that are fake, they say things that they don't really believe or don't really mean. "with feigned words they'll make merchandise of you: whose judgement now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not."
Flip over to Jude, just a few pages to the right in your Bible. I'm not going to take the time to prove this, but it is very obvious to anyone who's read these books even a few times that 2 Peter Chapter 2 and Jude are parallel passages that are just hand in glove. They fit together, they talk about the exact same subject, they even bring up a lot of the same things in the same order. It's good to put these two side by side and compare them.
Look at verse four of Jude. "For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained of this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ. I will therefore put you in remembrance, though you once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not."
The reason he brings that up is that these false prophets, these men who creep in unawares, they're unbelievers. They're not saved. They don't believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. They have a lot of feigned words, they're creeping in in order to bring in damnable heresies, in order to go against the cause of Christ.
You say why would anyone do that? You're thinking to yourself, if I didn't believe in Christ I would just go live my life and do my own thing. Why would you want to infiltrate a Bible believing church? It's hard to understand these people because you're not one of them, but there are false prophets who want to come in to churches in sheep's clothing and damn as many souls as they can. Whether you or I understand that mentality, it's a reality. It exists. I've seen it many times in my own experience and we just have the faith to know that if God said it's there, it's there.
Audience: Yep.
Pastor: Now the main verse that I want to focus in tonight on is in Jude verse 11 where it says, "Woe unto them!" and we're talking about these false prophets, false teachers, these men who creep in, "Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core." I'm going to add a fourth false prophet, but these are the [archetypical 00:05:33] false prophets of the Bible. I don't believe that God just randomly chose to list these three men, but that rather these three men represent three categories of false prophets.
I'm going to add a fourth category of someone who would creep in unawares, and that would be Judas Iscariot, is another great example. He actually doesn't fit the mold of these three, he's a fourth category. Tonight's sermon is called Four Types of False Prophets.
Let's start out with the Cain type false prophet. Okay? Go back if you would to Genesis Chapter 4. He says of these false prophets, and I'm going to read it to you in context while you turn to Genesis 4. In verse 10 he says, "But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves. Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core. These are spots in your feasts of charity, when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear: clouds they are without water, carried about of winds; trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots;"
Remember what he said about the false prophets in Matthew 7. He said they are a corrupt tree that brings forth evil fruit. Here he says that they are "trees whose fruit withereth. Without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots; Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever."
Audience: Yeah.
Pastor: These are some pretty bad people.
Audience: That's right.
Pastor: Especially when they show up looking so good. They show up in sheep's clothing. They show up and you think these are great people, this is a godly man, this is a godly woman, but inwardly they're just like [rar rar 00:07:22], this ravening wolf. It's hard to believe isn't it, but it's real.
Audience: Amen.
Pastor: It's Biblical and I've seen it many times because I've been in church all my life. Some of you that are newer to church, this is even harder for you to believe because you haven't yet experienced it. Once you've experienced it a few times, you will say wow the Bible was right on. That's exactly what the Bible said. I didn't comprehend it until I saw it with my own eyes. Sometimes it's hard to believe that people could really be like that, but they are.
Look at Genesis Chapter 4. Of these false prophets, he says they've "gone in the way of Cain. They ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward and perished in the gainsaying of Core." Let's start with the way of Cain. What was Cain's way? What did Cain do to become the example of a type of false prophet or false teacher? Look down at your Bible there in Genesis 4:3. It says, "And in process of time it came to pass, that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord. And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering. But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell."
The first thing that we see about Cain, and this is really what leads to Cain's downfall, is that he is supposed to bring an offering unto the Lord and that offering is supposed to be an animal sacrifice. It's supposed to be a blood sacrifice, it's supposed to be the burnt offering, and it's supposed to have to do with the fat of the lamb and the blood of the lamb that's going to be offered unto the Lord.
Now Abel, the Bible says, by faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. When it says by faith, we have to understand that faith is believing God's word. In order for Abel to have offered the sacrifice by faith he must've received some kind of a directive that told him to do that and by faith he was obeying the Lord. Whereas Cain brings a different offering than that which was ordained by God. He brings of the fruit of the ground. He basically brings fruits and vegetables.
He decides that what he has produced with the sweat of his brow, that that's going to please God. Basically his own works, his own produce, his own deeds. Whereas Abel brings the fat of the firstlings of the flock which represents of course who? The Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world. This represents Abel with the right offering, the lamb, which represents of course, Jesus who is the Lamb of God and taketh away the sin of the world, whereas Cain represents the one who is bringing his own works, his own deeds.
All that to say this. The false prophet that goes in the way of Cain is the one who teaches a work salvation instead of a salvation that's through the blood of the lamb.
Audience: Right.
Pastor: He bypasses the lamb sacrifice and he brings his works, his deeds. This is a huge category of false prophets. There are so many false teachers out there that teach a salvation by works. This is what Paul was all worked up about in the book of Galatians when he's talking about people bringing in another gospel, because they're teaching justification by the works of the law, by the deeds of the law he said shall no flesh be justified in his sight. He's talking about people bringing works and the works of their own flesh, the produce of their own hands, and they somehow think that's going to earn them salvation.
I don't want to spend a lot of time on this point because I spent half the sermon this morning on this point. Half of the sermon this morning on orthodoxy in light of the Bible was just demonstrating how they're teaching it's by works. I showed all the proof that it's by faith, et cetera, this morning.
This Cain type of a false prophet is the guy who teaches a works based salvation. That would include of course the Roman Catholic church, the Orthodox church, and even Baptists who might teach works salvation. They're out there. They've gone in the way of Cain.
Audience: Yep. Right. Amen.
Pastor: The Bible teaches that even amongst Bible believing churches they'll creep in and start bringing in this doctrine of works salvation. Cain type salvation.
Now let's look at Balaam. What did Balaam do? It says in Jude, it says that "they ran greedily" notice the word greedily, "after the error of Balaam for reward." If you would, flip over to Titus Chapter 1. We're not going to read the whole story of Balaam for sake of time, but he's basically being offered money to preach that which is not in line with God's word. He really wants to do it and he keeps trying to preach lies. God stops him from doing it but then eventually he just completely defects to the heathen.
He leaves the people of God, the nation of Israel that were serving God at that time, and he defects unto the heathen. He ends up being slain because he participates in the worship of their false gods, et cetera. His motivation was money. He ran greedily after money, the Bible says. He wanted the reward of preaching lies.
Now look at Titus 1:9. This is the verse where we get the name of our church, Faithful Word Baptist, says, "Holding fast the faithful word as he hath been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers. For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, specially they of the circumcision: Whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses," look at this last phrase, "teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake."
What was the first type of false prophet? The Cain type prophet. He's just one who teaches us salvation by your works, by your deeds, what you produce instead of through the blood of the lamb. The second type of false prophet is the Balaam type. The Balaam type prophet is the one who preaches lies to get paid. He teaches things which he ought not for filthy lucre's sake. He runs greedily after the error of Balaam for reward. What motivates him? Money. What's he going to preach? Whatever gets him paid.
Flip just a few pages over to 2 Timothy Chapter 4. You're right there in Titus 1, just go back a page. It says in 4:2, "Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine." Reprove means to tell someone that they're wrong. Rebuke means to tell someone that they're wrong more sternly, in a stronger way. Exhort means to encourage someone to do that which is right.
He says, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. Teaching the Bible, teaching what the word says, "For the time will come" verse 3, "when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables."
These people will heap to themselves teachers that will tell them what they want to hear, teachers according to their own lust. What gratifies my desire and my lust, that's what I want to hear. Here's the thing. There's a guy who's ready to give you what you want to hear because he wants to get paid. He has no integrity, he doesn't care what the Bible says, he doesn't get up in the morning and pray that he might please God with his works. No instead he figures out where the money is, he finds the supply and demand chain, and he goes cha-ching and makes money preaching what people want to hear. He figures out what they want and he gives it to them. Like a business man that is just preaching lies in order to get paid. He is a Balaam style false prophet.
Go to Ezekiel Chapter 22. Notice he said that they will heap to themselves teachers. Now a heap in the Bible is a giant pile of something. It's when you just pile things up and it's just a huge massive pile. What the Bible is telling us is that there are lots of these guys out there. Heaps upon heaps of teachers that are just out there to make money.
Let's give some examples. Joel Osteen.
Audience: Yeah.
Pastor: Look these guys are multi millionaires. We're talking about guys that literally have tens of millions of dollars and they just preach whatever people want to hear, whatever brings in the crowd. This is Joel Osteen, this is Kenneth Copeland, this is T.D. Jakes, this is Rick Warren. This is- you say, oh I'm so offended that you're naming these names. Here's the thing though. These guys all preach lies. Benny Hinn.
These guys are all multi millionaires because they preach what people want to hear. It's a positive only doctrine. They don't reprove and they don't rebuke. They only exhort. It's all they do. It's a very mild exhortation. It's not a swift kick in the pants type of an exhortation, it's more of a motivational speaking type of a teaching. There are heaps of them.
Look at Ezekiel 22:24. "Son of man, say unto her, Thou art the land that is not cleansed, nor rained upon in the day of indignation. There is a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst thereof, like a roaring lion ravening the prey;" Now notice, the false prophets are again described as ravening. It says, "[they've 00:17:33] devoured souls; [they've 00:17:35] taken the treasure and precious things;"
You see how they're in it to get paid, they're in it to receive the treasure and the precious things as they devour souls as a wolf devours its prey. "[they've 00:17:48] made her many widows in the midst thereof. Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned [my 00:17:54] holy things: they put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they shewed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths and and I am profaned among them. Her princes in the midst thereof are like wolves ravening the prey, to shed blood, and to destroy souls," watch this last part "to get dishonest gain."
See that's what it's all about. It's about getting all the treasure and the precious things, getting the reward. Why devour souls? Why damn people to hell? Because you want to get paid that's why. What a wicked person who would sell out their integrity and destroy the souls and the lives of others just for the love of money. The love of money is the root of all evil, which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith and pierced themselves through with many sorrows, but thou oh man of God, flee these things. Follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness. Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, et cetera, et cetera.
It says here in verse number 27 at the end, "to get dishonest gain. And her prophets have daubed them with untempered mortar, seeing vanity, and divining lies unto them saying Thus saith the Lord when the Lord had not spoken. The people of the land have used oppression, and exercised robbery, and have vexed the poor and needy: Yea, they have oppressed the stranger wrongfully. And I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I found none. Therefore have I poured out mine indignation upon them; [I've 00:19:35] consumed them with the fire of my wrath: their own way have I recompensed upon their heads saith the Lord God."
Heaps and heaps of these guys who want to get paid. He's just saying I just sought for one man that would stand in the gap, make up the hedge. I found none. A good faithful preacher is hard to find. Preachers who will preach lies in order to drive the Mercedes, to drive the Jaguar, to drive the Lexus, to wear the fancy suits and the gold rings and have all of the accolades and wealth and power that go with it. They're a dime a dozen and people right now are heaping these people to themselves. There are multitudes of them.
What do we have so far as far as false teachers and false prophets? Jesus said beware. Jesus said they shall be among you. What are they? Wolves in sheep's clothing. They come in a few different varieties. The way of Cain, teaching works salvation. Then there's the way of Balaam, running greedily after the error of Balaam for reward. There's another classification of false teacher that will creep in and he will perish in the gainsaying of Korah. Those who perish in the gainsaying of Korah.
Go to Numbers Chapter 16. When we look at Cain in the Bible, there are really only a couple of things that we know about Cain. What do we know about Cain? We know that he brought the wrong offering, he brought his own works, he brought his own produce, the fruits and vegetables. The other thing that we know of course is that he murdered his brother. "wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother's were righteous." Why did he slay him? It was over that offering, because God had respect unto Abel's offering and did not have respect unto Cain's offering. That's where the anger came from that caused him to slay his brother.
That's pretty much the story on Cain. Not a big long involved Bible story is it? Then when we have the story about Balaam, it's a little bit longer and more involved of a Bible story that spans several chapters. God tells us in Jude what the problem was. He ran greedily after reward. That was the issue with Balaam.
When we come to Korah, it's not hard to figure out what Korah's problem was and the reason why is that Korah literally only talks one time in the Bible. He only says one sentence. When the Bible says "they perished in the gainsaying of Korah" you don't have to scratch your head and say oh man there's all this stuff that Korah said. I don't know which thing God's talking about. What was it? Korah only says one thing. There's only one verse where Korah talks. Remember it's the gainsaying of Korah. Notice the word saying. It's something that he said, that's the clue.
Let's go back to the story of Korah and let's see what he said. He only said one thing in the whole Bible. Numbers 16:1. "Now Korah, the son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi and Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, and On, the son of Peleth, sons of Reuben took men: And they rose up before Moses, with certain of the children of Israel, two hundred and fifty princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown: And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said unto them," this is all they said "Ye take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them: wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord?"
That's what they said. "When Moses heard it, he fell upon his face: And he spake unto Korah and unto all his company saying, Even to morrow the Lord will shew who are his, and who is holy; and will cause them to come near unto him, even him whom he have chosen will he cause to come near unto him:"
When we see the gainsaying of Korah, what it has to do with is that Moses was the God ordained leader of the children of Israel and Korah gets a whole bunch of guys together and says to Moses and to Aaron, the leaders, you take too much upon you. All the congregation are holy. Look down at your verse there in 16:3, you can see what he's saying. "Ye take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them:" Remember they're in sheep's clothing. They're trying to seem like reasonable guys, godly men, but what they're saying the Bible says is wicked.
"Wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord?" This is the gainsaying of Korah. What does this look like today? Here are a few examples that I can think of of a modern day gainsaying of Korah. It's basically people who get angry at a pastor who exercises leadership. A pastor gets up and exercises strong leadership and says thus saith the Lord, and come with me and see my zeal for the Lord, and he is ruling in the house of God as the Bible commands him to, and he's being that bishop and that undershepherd of the chief shepherd, the Lord Jesus Christ, and subjection to his word, but yet leading the church.
Not just having a church that's a free for all, but having a leader. These Korahites, that's what they should be called because the sons of Korah were known as the Korahites. The Korahites come along, these infiltrators, that follow after the gainsaying of Korah and perish in the gainsaying of Korah, are the ones that basically say to the pastor, hey you take too much [inaudible 00:25:29]. Everybody's holy, the Lord's among all of us.
What this ends up looking like is a church that's a free for all where the teaching is hey anybody should be getting up and preaching. Everybody should be teaching the Bible, we should be listening to what everybody has to say. It's these Bible studies you go to that are just a complete free for all. You have people who don't know anything about the Bible, they haven't even read it cover to cover a single time and we're supposed to all sit back and listen to them give doctrine that is misguided.
What these Korahites will do, and these are evil people make no mistake about it, well look. Hold on a second. In the book of Jude and in the book of 2 Peter Chapter 2, weren't those who followed after Cain, Balaam and Korah unsaved? Unbelievers? Evil people? Now, here's the thing about the Korahites though. They will get people that are not evil people sucked into this. That's their goal. Do you understand? They're going to come in and basically get the unstable souls. The Bible said in 2 Peter 2, beguiling unstable souls.
What does that mean, unstable? Basically they'll get somebody who's a new believer. Not a bad guy, not an evil person, just a new believer, a babe in Christ and they'll basically start flattering that guy. Flattery is one of the tools of the wolf in sheep's clothing. Flattery is praise that is undue. Basically they'll take a guy who's a brand new believer, he's been saved for less than a year or he hasn't even read his Bible cover to cover even once let alone five times or ten times. He's a young babe in Christ and they'll basically start telling this guy you ought to be up there preaching. Really me? Basically stroke these people's ego up.
Don't let Pastor Anderson tell you. You are just as qualified to just get up and preach and teach the word of God. It's just this monopoly that they have where they're running the church and they're trying to lock you out when you have so many great things to say. Boy you're so spirit filled brother. You have the power of God on your life. It's too bad that you're not up there preaching. It's too bad that Pastor Anderson thinks that you're not qualified to start a church after six months of salvation or after reading the Bible .8 times through cover to cover.
That's what this looks like. Here's what else it looks like. There are a lot of examples of this Korahite philosophy. It's this flattering of new believers and exalting them and saying all the people are holy. The Lord's among all of them. Here's the thing. The devil always mixes the truth and lies. Yeah of course all the people that are saved are holy. Amen. Of course the Lord's among them all. If two or three people that are saved are gathered together in His name, Jesus is in the midst. What they're doing though is they're mixing that with a lie where they look at a leader, who's a humble leader, but a strong leader, Moses, and say "you take too much upon you."
They're mixing some truth with the lie, flattering the new convert, flattering the unstable soul, building him up, puffing him up, to have this philosophy that we don't need a strong leader. Here's why the devil loves this philosophy, because it is strong leaders who lead the people to do great works for God.
Audience: Amen.
Pastor: The devil doesn't want great works for God to go forward. You think the devil wants every door in Phoenix Arizona to be knocked with a clear presentation of the gospel? You think the devil wants that? You think the devil wants the word of God to thunder forth and for thousands, yea millions of people to hear the truth? No of course the devil doesn't want that.
The devil wants to tear down any kind of a strong leader, any kind of a Moses that [rise 00:29:42], any kind of an Elijah, any kind of a Gideon, and just tear those guys down so that basically no one does the big works for God. No one rallies the people. Look, in the Bible everything rises and falls on leadership. You get a bad king in there and the whole nation's worshiping the devil. You get a good king in there and he's rallying the people, he's bringing them back to the Lord.
Leadership is really important. It's important in the home that there's a strong leader there, a father and a strong mother leading the children. It's really important that we have a strong leader in the church otherwise the devil just comes in and just takes over the place and it's a free for all. Then the worst people come in and take over. When there's a leadership void, the devil's always ready to fill it with his guy. Okay.
The Korahites teach against having a strong leader. They teach against having a strong leader in the home perhaps, but they dead sure teach against having a strong leader in the church. They'll look at a Biblical pastor and call him a dictator or he's a tyrant. Just because he basically says this is the way it is and doesn't just let people do whatever in the church and bring in whatever music, whatever Bible version, whatever doctrine, whatever teaching. He actually says, no wait a minute. Here's the direction we're going. I've studied, I'm qualified, I'm leading, come with me and see my zeal for the Lord.
Follow me as I follow Christ. Be followers of me, "and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an example. (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they're the enemies of the cross of Christ: Whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame." He's saying there's all these bad teachers out there, you need to follow godly men who can lead you and teach you Biblical sound doctrine.
Okay. Here's what else the Korahites look like. The deacon run church is a Korahite type of a mentality which says we got to divide all the authority amongst a giant committee of people, most of whom aren't even preachers. Many of whom aren't even soul winners at all and basically they're going to run the church, and on and on. It's not Biblical. If I'm wrong then I want you to tell me what the gainsaying of Korah is.
It's funny because you'll explain this to people and that's not the gainsaying, that's not what that means. Okay then what does it mean? What's Korah saying? He's saying to the man of God you're taking too much on you. Everybody should be up there [teaching 00:32:17], everybody should be leading. It's like a communism where everybody rules. Democracy. The dictatorship of the proletariat. These are all unbiblical philosophies.
I don't believe in democracy, I don't believe in communism, I don't believe in anarchy, I don't believe in any of that stuff. None of it's Biblical. There should be leadership, there should be authority in place, that's what the Bible teaches.
Here's another example of what this looks like, the so called house church movement. This is where people are pulling out of the institutional churches and they say we don't want to be a part of churchianity. We need to get out of these incorporated buildings and blah blah blah. They basically want to have a coffee klatch in the living room and call that church.
Here's the thing. Moses isn't there. There's no Moses. There's no Elijah. There's no Paul. There's no Timothy, there's no Peter, there's no spirit filled man of God that's leading because they don't like that. They don't want anybody to lead them, they want some little milquetoast to get up and then they can get their turn to get up and hear themselves talk. The next little milquetoast can get up and hear himself talk. There's no spirit filled man of God that's a strong leader that says hey here's where we're going, here's how we're going to get there, here's our vision. Come with me and see my zeal for the Lord. It's just this milquetoast leader.
That's what they want. Somebody that they can manipulate and push around. They have a problem with legitimate authority is what they have so they want to just have a free for all. I'm telling you it doesn't work. Even if it sounds good on the surface. Of course the wolf is dressed in sheep's clothing. You go to these Bible studies, and I spent years going to them. Listen when I was a teenager, I had a zeal for God but not according to knowledge. I had never read the Bible cover to cover and I was wrong on a lot of things. You know what? I can sincerely say I love the Lord. I wanted to do what's right but I was just misguided.
I was just kind of searching. The Bible says seek and ye shall find. Eventually God led me to a soul winning church, God led me to a Bible believing Baptist church that changed my life. Up until that point I was just seeking, just looking for something. I loved God, I loved the Bible, I loved the lost, I wanted to see them saved. I literally, this is not an exaggeration, I went to some kind of a church activity every day when I was a teenager for a few years there. There was a period where I was going every day.
I would go to my church on Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday night. Then I found a Bible study that met on Monday nights. Then I found another church that had a Bible study that met on Tuesday nights. Then I found a church that had a Thursday night midweek service and I went to that.
Between all of those churches that I was going to, like four different churches, I had my main church, Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, but I was just going to all these other services and Bible studies. Between all of those, usually, one of them would have something going on on Friday or Saturday like a youth activity, some kind of a fellowship or something. That would usually fill in Friday or Saturday. I was pretty much going to all [inaudible 00:35:46] then I went to the public school and I went to the Bible club at school every Wednesday at lunch time. Went to the Bible club and I met at the flag pole and prayed and did all- I did all that stuff. Okay?
Most of these Bible studies, and I went to three of them per week, were so misguided. I was just hungry for anything. I just wanted to learn the Bible and I wanted Christian fellowship and I had a zeal for God. I remember going to these Bible studies and it would go around the room and everybody talks. They read a couple verses and then just everybody pipes up, but nobody really knows the Bible well at these things. Nobody steps in and says okay here's what the Bible means, let me cross reference this. It's just all these babes in Christ.
Everybody's a baby. It's like literally, just let me give you a picture of what it looks like spiritually. Just picture a breakfast nook table. Everybody getting this image in your mind? Just picture five babies and toddlers at a breakfast table with no adult. They all have in front of them a different version of the Bible. It's like this guy's got the sweet potatoes, puree. This guy's got the plums, this guy's got the rice turkey dinner, but it's just slime. You know what I mean? This guy's got the pea and carrot slime, the veggie slime.
Basically it's like, just picture these five toddlers, all at the table, no adult, they're all wearing a bib and they've all got their bowl of baby food and they're just like [inaudible 00:37:29]. That's pretty much what these Bible studies are like. There's no spiritual adult. It's just babes and toddlers feeding themselves and they're just like [bling 00:37:50], just firing baby food at each other with a spoon.
I can remember going to these things and just thinking to myself, what in the world? I wasn't always just piping up. Sometimes I was a little shy, I didn't really know people as well and I wasn't just one that would always step in and pipe up. I was usually, believe it or not, back then I was a little more shy and reserved, so I wasn't really comfortable stepping up and talking a lot. I didn't talk a lot at these things.
I can remember one, we're studying Noah's ark. It's always Genesis with these people. It's just like, let's do Genesis. I'm like, again? I've done Genesis 20 times. I'm like, why don't we do Isaiah. I said to my youth leader, why don't we do Isaiah? Why don't we do Jeremiah, Ezekiel? Something that we've never even looked at so we can get something new. He's like, you wouldn't understand those books. Turn to Genesis. Like, oh no. It's always Genesis.
We're in Genesis, we're going through Noah's ark. Just this big long discussion on whether there's an aquarium on the ark for the fish.
Audience: [inaudible 00:38:55]
Pastor: It says he put every animal on the ark. [inaudible 00:39:00] like he as to save the sea creatures. Is he building an aquarium? Whether he's got to collect bugs and put them on the ark. They're just on and on. This is where the Bible says vain jangling, avoid foolish questions. All this stuff. Just blah, blah, blah. Just going on and on. Or preach the gospel to every creature. What about animals? This is the kind of stuff that they're talking about.
I remember I went to this one Bible study, it had to do with Jesus walking on the water and he calls Peter out to walk on the water and everything. They read five verses of that story and talked about it for two hours, these five verses. They're telling all kinds of stories from their personal life and had nothing to do with it. To me they passed over everything significant about that passage.
There was this really cool verse in the passage that they read from Mark where it says that Jesus would've passed by them but then they called out to him. Then he came to them. That was the thing that I thought was cool. He would've passed by but they called him. They just don't even bring that up. They didn't even mention that, because they're Presbyterians. It's all foreordained, it's all Calvinists so to say that Jesus was going to do one thing and then man calls out and Jesus responds, that doesn't fit in with the doctrine or whatever.
Yeah. I did go to this Presbyterian Bible study one time. Anyway. My parents didn't know or else they would've been really upset. I used to go to this one- I was allowed to go to this one Presbyterian youth group because I convinced my parents they never open the Bible at this thing. My dad's like, you're going to a Presbyterian church? What are you doing? I'm like, Dad they never open the Bible I promise. It's just like a party. He's like, okay, all right. He's like that's okay then I just don't want you to learn that Presbyterian doctrine. I'm like it's okay I'm not learning it. We're not learning anything.
I said dad they never open the Bible and if they do, they'll just tell you that it's creation and not evolution or they'll just tell you don't fornicate or don't do drugs. I said that's the three sermons and they cycle them through. It's five minutes max. Don't do drugs, don't fornicate, and God created it. That's what you learn. That's it. Not joking. I'm dead serious right now. That's what it was, I went there for like a year, every Thursday night.
Most of the time I was going to the Baptist or evangelical, non denominational, whatever. I didn't know what I was doing. I'm just a babe in Christ. You know what I needed? A strong leader. You know what I got when I walked into an actual independent fundamental Baptist soul winning church? I walked into a church where the pastor was a strong leader. What I could not accomplish in all the freestyle Bible studies in the living rooms for years, within weeks that church had me out soul winning. Within weeks that church had me fired up, making changes in my life.
My life was transformed in that church within six months. Whereas I'd spent years spinning my wheels in all these free for alls. Look. There are people out there who attack me and tell- you need to get out of these institutional churches. They call it Faith Forward Baptist Incorporated, blah, blah, blah. It's a business and all this stuff. You know what though? Look at what they're accomplishing, look at the fruit, and then look at our fruit. Case closed.
Audience: Amen. Amen.
Pastor: Case closed.
Audience: Amen.
Pastor: Where's the fruit? Where's the fruit of your coffee klatch? Where's the fruit of sitting around in your living room and pontificating about yeah this is just like the book of Acts. No there weren't three people in a living room in the book of Acts. They had hundreds and hundreds of people being saved and baptized and thousands and they were multiplying. You know how they did it? With strong leadership. You know how they did it? With people like Peter stepping up to the plate, people like John, people like the Apostle Paul. You've got to have strong leaders.
We need to train more leaders but what we don't need is this Korahite mentality that says tear down every leader. Oh Pastor Anderson is trying to serve God and trying to lead the church? Tear him down. Tear him down. He actually is telling us what direction the church should go. That's pride. Take him down a notch.
Look, I'm not trying to dictate anybody's personal life. I'm not trying to tell you what to do in your personal- you can do whatever you want in your personal life. You can believe whatever you want. You know what? This church needs a leader that's going to take it in the right direction.
Audience: Amen.
Pastor: And that when things start to deviate from that, that's going to stand up and say hey wait a minute, we're a soul winning church. We're not going to stop soul winning. Wait a minute. We're not going into lifestyle evangelism. Wait a minute. We're not switching Bible versions. Nope. Oh that NIV calendar on the wall? Rip it down and throw it away. It's accursed of the Lord.
Somebody's got to be here to say no we're not bringing in this sissified contemporary music. We're sticking with the old hymns. Say well I don't understand that, I don't know why. Yeah but the leader does. The leader does know why. This attitude that wants to tear down leadership, it's just playing into the devil's hands. I think a lot of good people get sucked into this.
Listen, the people that are behind it are bad people. The Korahs the Dathans and Abirams are bad people, but they suck in good people and especially they use flattery. They know that you want to get up and hear yourself talk so they'll stroke your ego and whatever. Look I would love to train more people to get up and preach and be leaders and I would love to lift people up and point people to them and say hey this is who you ought to be listening to. Here's a godly man.
Look I promote the ministry of other pastors. I promote the ministry of guys that we've trained and sent out who paid their dues. Who served humbly, who learned the Bible, who read the Bible cover to cover ten times, not a tenth of the time. There's a method to the madness. You can't just sit there and have a free for all where everybody who's been saved for five minutes is teaching the Bible. That's the gainsaying of Korah. You can't have a bunch of deacons running the church where it's all committee run by a bunch of people that are cold dead mossback deacons.
Anyway, let's move on to the fourth type. I don't want to get too bogged down there although it's tempting because it's a major problem today. With the internet it basically allows people to just stay home from church and not have a man of God in their life, which is like a Korahite type of a philosophy, the Korah.
The fourth type is Judas. Go to John Chapter 12. We're going to look at some scriptures on Judas and they're all going to be from the book of John. We're just going to look at the book of John right now.
We talked about the three types in Jude where he said, "Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, they ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and they perished in the gainsaying of Core." Three types of these wolves in sheep's clothing. The works salvation teacher, the guy who is basically teaching lies in order to get paid, and the guy who is a layman who basically wants to tear down the authority of the leader and say we're all equal, we're all in charge, communism, dictatorship of the proletariat, democracy. We need to all- let's vote on which- this church is not voting on which Bible to use. We're not voting on the music, we're not voting on the preaching, we're not voting on the doctrine.
Say who are you to deci- the pastor. Let me introduce myself. I'm the pastor of the church. I'm the God ordained leader who basically has studied, knows the Bible, has paid my dues. You say, I don't like that. I just think that everybody should just run it equally. Well you know what then? Go down to Korah Baptist down the street and run it that way. That's not the way it runs here.
Then there's a fourth type and I believe that this fourth type is distinct from the other three types. I think that the Judas Iscariot is different than the other three. Let me explain why. I don't believe Judas Iscariot taught works salvation. Judas Iscariot was out soul winning with the other disciples. They went out two by two if you remember and none of the other disciples suspected that there was anything wrong with him. If he would've been going to the doors and just teaching works based salvation, Peter and John and James and Bartholomew would've been coming to Jesus and saying hey this guy's teaching a false gospel. He's not preaching what you told us to preach.
We know that Judas wasn't preaching works. Okay. Now you say well Balaam. Okay. Balaam is the one who taught lies in order to get paid. Here's the thing about Judas. He was a thief. Look down at your Bible in John 12:4. "Then saith one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, which should betray him, Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence and given to the poor? This he said, not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag, and bare what was put therein."
Judas is not teaching lies in order to get paid. He's not a Joel Osteen who tells people what they want to hear and rakes in a big offering. He's actually one who does not teach lies because otherwise the disciples would've known that he was bad. What he is doing is stealing, just flat out stealing when no one's looking. Just plain reaching into the offering plate and just stealing money out of it. That's what Judas Iscariot's doing. Right? There it is. He had the bag, he handled what was put there and he's embezzling money.
Now go if you would to John Chapter 6. You're in Chapter 12 go back a few pages to John Chapter 6. I don't think that Judas is really a Cain in that sense. I don't think Judas is a Balaam in that sense. Then the third type was the Korahites. I don't really see Judas doing the gainsaying of Korah, saying why are we all following Jesus? What about Peter? What about Andrew? He's got a lot to offer. What's up with Jesus being the boss? You don't really see that of him. All 5,000 of us are holy at the feeding of the 5,000. Let's let everybody get up and preach instead of listening to Jesus's sermon.
Okay you don't really see that out of Judas either. I think that Judas represents a fourth type of infiltrator. Now look down if you would at John 6:63. "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life. But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him."
Jump down to verse 70. "Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? He spake of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon: for he it was that should betray him being one of the twelve."
Now flip over to chapter 13. Judas is one of the twelve, he's an unbeliever. People will try to say Judas lost his salvation. No one can lose their salvation.
Audience: Amen. Right. Amen.
Pastor: Judas believed not, even in the beginning. It says he knew from the beginning who believed not. Judas was an unbeliever. Why is he there? He's an infiltrator. Why is he there? He's there to steal money and he's there to betray Jesus.
What does that look like in 2015? The Judas Iscariot type. This could be somebody who creeps into a church. They say all the right things. See, these three guys, these are all saying the wrong things. Cain is saying the wrong things, Balaam is saying the wrong things, Korah is saying the wrong things. Judas is the guy who comes in and he says all the right things. At least enough right things to go under the radar. He'll just repeat and regurgitate the things that he hears Biblical preachers say.
It's not that he's spirit filled and studying the Bible on his own and getting these things, but he's able to just repeat what he hears and he's like a chameleon that comes in and fits in and this guy's impossible to detect because the disciples couldn't detect him.
Look down at your Bible there in John 13:2. "And supper being ended, the devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him;" Jump down to verse 21. "When Jesus had thus said, he was troubled in spirit, and testified and said, Verily, verily I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me. Then the disciples looked one on another, doubting of whom he spake." They have no clue who he's talking about.
"Now there was leaning on Jesus' bosom one of his disciples, whom Jesus loved." Of course John is the disciple whom Jesus loved. "Simon Peter therefore beckoned to him, that he should ask" of who it is that he spake. Basically Peter is telling John, hey ask him. John's kind of leaning on him. Ask Jesus to tell you. You're leaning on him, ask him.
Peter and John are trying to kind of figure it, maybe he'll just tell us. Jesus, it says, has John lying on his breast. It says in verse 25, "He then lying on Jesus' breast" or chest is what that means, "saith unto him, Lord, who is it?" He asks him quietly who is it. "Jesus answered, He it is, to whom I shall give a sop, when I've dipped it. And when he dipped the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot the son of Simon. And after the sop Satan entered into him. Then said Jesus unto him, That thou doest, do quickly. Now no man at the table knew for what intent he spake this unto him."
Here John asks him, who is it Lord? He says it's the one that I give the sop to after I've dipped it. Dips it hands it to Judas. "That thou doest, do quickly." Judas gets up and walks out of the room. Nobody gets it. Even when he flat out just tells John and Peter, this is who it is, John and Peter just can't believe it. Just goes right over their head like no there's no way, can't be.
Look what it says, "No man at the table knew for what intent he spake this unto them. For some of them thought, because Judas had the bag, that Jesus had said unto him, Buy those things that we have need of against the feast; or, that he should give something to the poor." So when he said that thou doest do quickly, he thought he was like, hey hurry up and get back from the store. That's what they thought that he meant. "He then having received the sop went immediately out: and it was night."
Here we see how under the radar Judas is. Let me say this. If it was impossible for the disciples to detect, don't you think these are smart guys? Jesus handpicked these guys. These guys forsook all and followed Jesus. These guys in the book of Acts are going to turn the world upside down with the doctrine of the word of God. These are not fools. These guys are greater spiritually than I am or than you are. These are great men of God and yet they could not identify Judas. Don't you think it's possible that you're not going to be able to identify the Judas type either.
This Cain guy, yeah you'll see him coming. You'll see Mister gold rings and gold chains and multimillionaire prosperity preacher. You're going to see him coming a mile away. The Korahites are a little tougher to see because they basically come in and they flatter you and they make you feel good and they sound real spiritual, but you still, once you get a feel for what these people are all about, you start seeing the pattern. You start being able to identify that guy.
Judas is the one that nobody can identify. Not even Peter, not even John, not even James. These guys had no clue. Why would a person do that? What does this look like in 2015? It's the person who creeps into our church or any church and they say all the right things, but they're there for some secretive purpose, like for example to steal money, like Judas where he was taking money out of the bag, or to betray someone. To be a traitor, to be a back stabber, to get in there and then stab in the back. That's the goal.
What do we hear about so often? People coming into churches to molest children. That would fall under the Judas category. They come in say all the right things and they're there. What does the Bible say in 2 Peter 2? "Having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin; beguiling unstable souls:" "Cursed children." You could see how the Judases could come in and pretend to be a Bible believing Christian and they're actually a pervert.
Listen. It exists. It's out there. It's been in churches. I've seen it in churches, you've heard of it in churches, maybe you've seen it if you've been in church a long time. There are perverts that creep into churches because they know that it's a target where people are just asleep at the wheel and they just kind of trust everybody.
See, pedophiles are looking for people who are very trusting people, where they can get in and get their confidence and get alone with their kids and destroy their lives. That's what they do. That's the modus operandi of the pedophile. Okay. A church, a school, these are the type of targets they look for because they're considered safe places.
What we need to learn from this is that we need to always realize that there's a possibility of people in church being a Judas. Therefore, we should keep our children under our supervision. You can't just say, oh well it's church people. Let the kids stay over at their house for the night or let the kids be unattended with them for days or hours or whatever. You need to watch your kids. You can't just trust people because they're from church. He said there will be people among you that are Judases.
Also, obviously money is not the most important thing in life, but if you value your money you should also be careful of getting into business dealings with people from church that could be a Judas, who comes into a church to rip people off. There have been guys who come into churches and they prey upon the elderly. They're like, oh I got this investment for you. I'm a guy from church. Boy isn't God good? Let's pray about this, let's talk to the- let's get Godly counsel and then sign on the dotted line right here. I just took your life savings and sunk it in a worthless investment and I just made out like a bandit.
I just heard about a guy that I personally knew at a church who went to prison for that a couple years ago. He was running an investment fraud scheme preying upon seniors, going from Baptist church to Baptist church. He was talking the talk. He's there for gain, for financial gain. He's a thief.
Even worse than that is the molester. The pervert. We're living in perilous times where these type of perverts abound. Why? Because they're not dealt with in our society. They go through a revolving door of the prison. There's no real punishment for these people. Biblical punishment which would be [kk 00:58:51] death.
Audience: Amen. Yeah. That's right.
Pastor: We see that they could come in also just to sabotage the ministry. Just to come in to sow discord, to cause problems, to steal money. Whatever the case may be, whatever the reason, we need to beware of these people.
I'm not saying that we should go on a witch hunt and try to unmask the Judas tonight. In fact, I want those doors locked right now, I want all these doors locked. We're not leaving tonight until we know who it is that's the Judas. No one's leaving until we get to the bottom of this. We will unmask the traitor.
Here's the thing. Jesus knew and Jesus just said one of you's a devil. I think the reason that Jesus left Judas in his ministry for three and a half years was just as a reminder to us that if he was in Jesus church he'll be in our church.
Instead of going out and trying to unmask the Judas, we just need to keep it in the back of our head that we just need to beware of everyone.
Here's my motto. Suspect no one, trust no one. I don't want to go around suspecting everyone. You know what I like to do? Give people the benefit of the doubt and assume that everyone loves God. I don't suspect you. I assume that you love God. I assume that you're legit. At the same time, not leaving my kids with you, not overly trusting with you because I just need to always keep in mind that anything I hand over to you I need to be ready to kiss it goodbye, because Judas is pretty hard to spot.
We just need to keep that in mind, especially with our children. Just keep our children supervised and not just assume that because people are from church they can do no wrong. That's the lesson of Judas. He's there to steal, he's there to betray, he's there to molest, he's there to sabotage, whatever the case may be. It cannot be readily identified so we just need to keep in mind that he's out there.
These are the four people that God warns us about. We need to understand all four types here. He gave us these four examples for a reason. We need to be able to identify the Cain, identify Balaam, identify Korah and the Korahites, and then we also need to just keep in the back of our head that there's a guy that we can't identify because he talks such a good talk and walks seemingly such a good walk that you'll never figure it out with this guy until it's too late. We just need to keep it in our mind not to be overly trusting of church people.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father we thank You so much Lord for these warnings and these lessons from Your word. I pray that we would be wise tonight and that we would let these things sink into our ears Lord and when we start hearing the lies of Balaam and the lies of Korah, we will stop and say wait a minute. This sounds familiar. I read about this in the Bible. Help us to be wise and to not be ignorant of Satan's devices. And in Jesus name we pray, amen.
