Tape 1 - The Foreshadowed Lamb of God

I'm not for sure how the rest of that song goes, quirky, but I feel like something good is about to happen, and that's the feeling of my heart. My glad pleasure to introduce to you tonight Dr. Rocky Freeman.

There are many kind and gracious things that we could say, many good things about our precious brother in the Lord. We in fact have said them by way of newsletter, other pamphlets that have been shared and mentioned to you.

But I think the thing that above all else, in fact I know it is, the real reason why Rocky Freeman should be here sharing with each of us this week is because he, as we have, found that Jesus Christ of Nazareth is his personal Messiah.

So we're glad to have him. I've enjoyed the brief excursion from the airport to the motel, and I'm looking forward to many opportunities of sharing and learning from him, and having been blessed already by the spirit that possesses his heart and soul and illuminates his mind.

We are glad also that he brought along Patricia, Patricia Freeman. Pat, may I ask you to stand please? I hope I not embarrass you, but we're so delighted to have you. Amen. Thanks for coming and being with us this week also.

God's Will, Revival, and the Burden of the Cross

So now I share with you, I believe the message for this hour for our church family, Brother Rocky Freeman. Good evening. Good evening. Pardon me? Good evening. Thank you. I'm delighted to be with you.

I don't know all the reasons why I'm here, but I do believe that I'm in God's will for my life. And I believe that before this world was ever created, God destined that you and I would be together for a reason.

You do not live by accident, neither do I, and all things are foreordained by God to bring glory unto himself and to magnify his son. And so somehow in God's infinite wisdom, he communicated to your pastor who communicated to you, and through you, you've extended to me an invitation that he gave me perfect peace about accepting.

And so therefore, you and I are together. And in a short few days, this week will be a part of human history. And it'll be written down, and it'll be forgotten in most people's minds, but it shall never be forgotten by God.

God is going to hold you and me accountable for what happens this week. Because God will only do for us what we allow him to do. So God just tells us to be available, and he'll do the work. So I'm trusting and praying.

As I look at you tonight, this place, this field, I don't know where we'd put anyone else, but they're welcome to come. And we'll do what we can. But I really believe that God wants to do something in your life and mine.

I do not come to you, and you'll permit me a few moments to just kind of get acquainted with you mentally, but I do not come to you as someone who has all the answers. I don't. My wife is here, and she will quickly give you testimony that I used to think I did, I used to believe that I did, and sometimes even now I'm not so sure that I don't have all the answers, but I'm growing in my Christian life.

I'm learning about Christianity. And I found myself a few years back in my messages preaching to God's people, messages of rebuke, which I believe are necessary, messages of scathing exhortation, which I believe are necessary, because they were not doing what God said do.

But I discovered two things amongst many. One is I wasn't doing them either. And secondly, I was preaching them for not doing something that I had not ever taught them to do. And I discovered that most Christians do want to live for the Lord, they just don't know how.

They just don't know how. I mean, in their heart of hearts, they want to. Now sometimes there's a struggle in the will, sometimes there's a battle in the mind, but if you ask them, wouldn't you really like to just be what God wants you to be?

I mean, if it just brought you joy and contentment in life, and I've never met a person who I really believe was born again who would say to the negative. And so what we're going to do this week, we're going to set out on an excursion, and we're going to move through a complete study this week in the areas that I feel are necessary for you and me to reach that point where God wants us to be, and that's a complete study as far as your life and mine is concerned, and by complete, I don't mean all there is to know about it, but I mean that you will have completed a course this week that there will be no reason as to why you cannot be an effective, faithful, happy, joyous Christian at the end of this week.

Because we will touch on those areas, and I'm going to give you thoughts, we'll give you scripture, we'll give you a handle that you can put up on the wall so that you can use it. You can use it. I'm not going to give you ideas, I want to give you some things where you can use in your everyday life.

And I guarantee you that if you'll just worry about number one this week, be concerned about other people, but be concerned about yourself more than anyone else just for this week. Reach out and touch other lives, but be concerned for yourself.

And please do not assume that there's not any more information about the cross to learn. It is a subject that you cannot fathom its depths. It is something that went on between God and His Son that you and I have not been privileged to understand the first of.

But I believe that you and I can understand enough that sin doesn't have to whip you down, guilt doesn't have to beat you down, you don't have to have a chain on your back, but you can set free your heart and life so that you can be the Christian God you want to be.

Now that doesn't necessarily mean that you'll do cartwheels up and down the aisle, nor will you swing off the chandelier lights, but I promise you, you can walk with God, and God will bless your life.

Now whether you're a deacon, Sunday school teacher, young person, old person, married, single, young Christian, older Christian, member, visitor, been in church a while, or been in church for a short period of time, I assure you that you can reach the goals that God has laid forth in your life.

And so I'm challenging you this way, I expect you to be here every night. I just expect you to be here. You expect me to be here, do you not? I mean, there's anyone that doesn't expect me to be here every night?

You expect me, and I obligated myself to come, I'll be here every night, so I'm asking you to do the same. Your pastor's schedule, your schedule, and my schedule, all of our schedules are busy, but you can find time to do what you want to do.

Now I'm asking you to be here. It'll encourage me, and I promise you that if you'll be here each night, one night builds upon the other night. If you miss a night, it's going to leave a gap. It's going to leave a gap in what we're trying to do, and by the time we reach Sunday morning, you and I will be at that point where we'll be able to lift our eyes up and see the Lamb of God as He really is, as He really is, and He'll be doing our life by then what He wants to do.

So what we're going to do, if you'll have your Bible, please, how many of you have the Word with you in written form? May I see them? Well, we've got, that's fine, three or four there that haven't been memorized evidently.

If you don't know one, would you see us after the service? We'd like to get you one. Everybody needs a Bible. It's God's guideline. It's God's book. You know what it says. Would you turn to me, please?

To the book of Isaiah, chapter 53. The book of Isaiah, chapter 53. What we're going to do for the first couple of nights, I noticed your sign, the first thing that I saw when I drove up said revival, and I was sharing with your pastor something he already knew, but it's always interesting to me.

You know, it's difficult to change, isn't it? Well, Brother Rocky, we've always done it this way for 30 years, and we just assume because we've done it for 30 years, it has to be right. Well, now, don't make the mistake of thinking because you've done it 30 years makes it wrong either.

It can be right or wrong, but the word revival doesn't communicate today like it used to, but I believe that God will send us revival, and a revival to me is nothing more than a Christian living where God wanted him to live in the first place.

You cannot revive lost people. They have to have new life. You can only revive that which has life, and that is a child of God, and those things you know. So don't expect me to run from one end of the platform to the other, screaming and running and raving, running up and down the aisles, and don't assume that we're not having a quote revival because it isn't done.

Now, I have made those trips, and occasionally I may make the trip. It doesn't matter to me one way or the other. The most important thing is whether or not God will let me minister his word to your heart and that the Holy Spirit will take that word and use it in your life.

That's the most important thing, and so get all your preconceptions out of your mind, and if you will overlook the uniqueness of my personality, I shall overlook the uniqueness of yours, and if you will be delighted that a Jew is in your presence, I'll be delighted that I'm in the presence of many Gentiles, and if you're real sweet to me, as I tell all my friends, when we get to heaven, I'll introduce you around and help you understand what's being said up there.

As Zechariah says, the pure language, which has to be Hebrew, it is interesting that Adam and Eve, they're Hebrew names. Who gave them those names? God gave them names. Adam didn't make his name up. God called him Adam.

Evidently, God spoke to him in Hebrew. He didn't speak English. I heard you said you're a Christian. It's just exciting to be a Christian. I've been looking forward to being with you. I've really been looking forward to it, and I'm just excited in my heart at what I believe God is going to do in the life of your church this week.

It seems like I should be your pastor. This conference came out of some things that God was doing in my own life. As we began to read and study, my wife and I, and we were studying materials, and we were in a crisis time, not between ourselves, but just in

We were in a crisis time because of my life, because for some 20 years, I preached that which I did not know anything about. I preached and taught, and there are people around the world. I've been around the world five times in mileage, and there are people all over this world, by the thousands, who are successful Christians because God used me to tell them how I just wasn't.

I just wasn't successful, and I didn't know what pride could do to an individual. Pride can blind the mind. It's the most amazing thing. Pride has cousins called resentment and self-righteousness, bitterness.

Those are cousins. I always run wherever you find pride, you find those things, and pride brings forth intention, and I believe that I was the only one really walking with God. I mean, I didn't tell you that, but I can't believe that, but I didn't believe it, and I did believe it, but God, you see, said, man, you were confused, you know, but successful.

My name's known wherever you go, but you see, God doesn't judge success that way, and when I stand before the Lord, I, as you, I want to hear God say one thing to me, if he would just be so gracious to say, well done.

Just well done. Thou faithful servant. Now, if he adds anything else, that's not like gravy, that's icing on the cake. Anything else he gives is pure grace, but if God would say, well done, that would be sufficient.

That would be sufficient, and that's my desire for you, all right? We'll stay pretty close. Be with us in the morning. We'll go for a week. Be with us. Sit around tables. Study. We'll have some in-depth studies.

Totally unrelated to what we're doing, but they'll be in-depth Bible studies that we'll have together on varying Sundays, Saturday morning, about the Middle East, what's going on over there, what's happening over there.

When I was in Corpus Christi, I called the Israeli Consulate. We talked for some hour and a half concerning the things that are going on over there, and we stay very close to it. We'll share some interesting things with you, some exciting things that have happened in recent days with the people of Israel concerning the Gospel, and then Saturday night, we'll have Christ and the Passover demonstration.

We'll have a table on the platform all laid out, and we'll go to the Passover demonstration together, you and I, and see how Christ is portrayed in that which is thousands and thousands of years old that Moses himself did not see as you and I can see it.

And then we'll have a great week together if you'll be with us, alright? The first two or three nights now, as we look at Isaiah 53, what we're going to do is we're going to lay a foundation. I cannot assume where you are or presume where you are, so we're going to lay a foundation.

And we will talk about the cross of Jesus Christ all week long. Some aspect of the cross. And each one of them will fit upon the other one. Tonight will be just a very basic foundation, and then we'll build upon that.

And you and I will climb higher and higher with the Lord as we walk with him through this week. So that when Sunday morning comes, you and I will be ready to sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. And I promise you that it'll happen.

I shared a pastor letter, I don't know if he mentioned it to you, but we just finished this conference that came out of this, and it's not anything unique, I'm not going to tell you a lot of things you don't already know, but perhaps we can put them in a particular perspective.

But God seems to put us in a place where it seems to be he wants to do something particular when we do this particular conference. And we just came out of Corpus Christi, Texas, before I came, the pastor said, we got to have a movement of God.

I mean, if we don't have revival, we've had it. We've got to have something from God. And his people just didn't know what to do, and they were all up in a prison, they owed bills, they had debts, they had bills, all that.

And the two days before I came, he said, Brother Rocky, I don't know what to tell you. He said, man, we don't have no money. I said, what? He said, we don't have any money. He said, we don't have any money to pay for your hotel, we don't have any money to pay for your travel, we don't have any money to give you an offering.

He said, we don't have any money, I got bills stacked up on my desk. And I said, well, Brother, you and I believe that God wants us down there. He said, I believe that. And I said, when we come in, he said, well, where am I going to put you?

I said, put me in a motel. He said, man, the Ramadi is 45 bucks a day, and the Holiday Inn is $37 a day. Just find a motel that you think is nice and adequate, and just put us in it, and we'll trust God for the money.

We'll get it somewhere, if you don't get it, God will give it to us somewhere else. He said, what are we going to do with the plane ticket? I said, I already got that and put that on a credit card, you don't sweat that.

If the Lord comes, Antichrist will pay for that, you know, so I don't worry about it. But I believe in my heart, I want to come. And he says, I believe in my heart, I want to be here. And he said, well, what are we going to do about an offering?

I said, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it, we'll come. Now, I know, you know, the Jews gotta live. Got down there Sunday morning, I said, have a good morning this morning. He said, yeah, I just told the people what you said.

I said, what happened? He said, we got a $4 ,000 love offering this morning, church runs 105 in Sunday School. $4 ,000, I said, well, we're rolling now, we're all right. Now, I know you Gentiles wouldn't have thought anything about money, you just said, wow, we shouldn't talk about money in the church and all that.

Oh, yeah, I understand. But you know, God moves. God moves in strange and wonderful ways. And God just blessed each night we had people saved. Just a little church dinner and God saved some people and saved a whole group of older men on Sunday morning service.

A whole group of older men, their wives, and it's just amazing. So God does the same here. God has something for you during this week. So let's just meet together and dine together, devour God's word, and let the Holy Spirit of God minister to our hearts.

The Foreshadowed Lamb of God in Isaiah 53

The basic message in Isaiah 53, 753 years prior to the birth of Jesus Christ, the great prince of the prophets of Israel, Isaiah, in Israel they call him Isaiah, but Isaiah the prophet, Isaiah the prophet was a man chosen by God.

In chapter 6, he got a vision of the holiness of the Lord. And when he got a vision of the holiness of the Lord, he was never the same. And God instilled within him the ability to go and proclaim God's word.

And then we come to two or three chapters that are quite unique. Isaiah 53, which is so marvelously, wonderfully unique, is a perfect graphic portrayal of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. In fact, I have no hesitancy in suggesting to you, ladies and gentlemen, young people, that without the gospel accounts other than Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, there is no more vivid portrayal of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ found recorded in the 66 books of the Bible than was written by this man 700 years before Christ was ever born in Bethlehem.

Now in this, you have the foreshadowed cross. Now I know we say, well, it talks about the Lamb of God, but it has more than that in it, and that's what I want us to see this evening. Now, so let's just pick it up, and let's look at the first four verses, and think with me, not only the foreshadowed cross, but obviously the foreshadowed Lamb of God.

Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God. When you go read the Revelation, which reveals to us the majesty and the glory and the splendor of the Son of the living God, it is in heaven that he's honored as the Lamb of God.

He always and ever will be the Lamb of God. Any other thing, any other name, would narrow what God had set forth in his eternal purposes. Now look at verse 1. Who hath believed our report? I'm reading from the King James Version.

For those of you that have it memorized, sleep for a moment or two or whatever, if you don't have the Bible. Who hath believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? For he shall grow up before him like a tender plant, and like a root out of a dry ground.

He hath no form nor comeliness, and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from him.

He was despised and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. There's the foreshadowed, obviously, Lamb of God.

Now notice the phrases with me, please, in verse 2. He hath no form nor comeliness. That's interesting to me because that's basically the same word that you use when it says that God created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was without form.

What does that mean to you? It means he had no purpose. As far as humanity was concerned, it looked as if this Jesus of Nazareth, the Lamb of God, the Son of Man, there was no purpose in what he was doing.

I mean, the government didn't like him, the religious people didn't care for him, his family said he was mad, one of his own turned against him. I mean, it just seemed like there was no purpose, there was no format, there was no guidelines to what he was doing.

He was all alone. He was standing out there by himself, and you could see him readily, and only those who had the eye of faith would ever see what he was actually doing. It just didn't seem like it mattered.

It was just an existence. It was just a... What do people say today? He was just a man. He was just maybe a teacher. Perhaps he was someone who had just kind of gone off the deep end, so to speak. He was just a fanatic.

He was just a rebel rouser. He was just a rebel. He was a revolutionary, and all these terms that were thrown at him, but he never claimed to be any of those. He said before Abraham was, I am. He claimed to be God in the flesh, and the scripture confirms to us that in him dwelt the fullness of the Godhead bodily.

They said, all right, show us God. He said, if you see me, you have seen God. I am God in flesh. That not only destroys the Jewish mind, but it also boggles a lot of Gentile minds. But nevertheless, it is true.

It is true, and it says that he had no form nor comeliness. The next phrase goes along with it, and when we shall see him, there's no beauty that we should desire him. There wasn't any attractiveness in him physically, and I am perfectly convinced in my own mind from a study of not only this passage of scripture, but many others, that the pictures you see painted of the Lord Jesus Christ are no more biblical than the exit sign is.

You see, no one saw him, and they are the figment of an artist's conception, and they always try to beautify. They always try to make aesthetically appealing. They always try to make everything attractive to the eye that will appeal to the emotions.

But my dear people, neither on the cross or off the cross was there anything physically that would attract people to him. Why? So that anyone who did come to him, it would be by the spirit of the living God, and no other way.

No man comes to the Father except through Jesus Christ, and no man can come to God and Christ except the Holy Spirit speaks to the heart, opens up the deadness, quickens that life, and allows the person to respond with the faith God gives it, and then as that person responds in that faith that God gives that dead person sins and trespasses, then God creates in that person a new creation, and they become born again, child of God.

But there's nothing attractive in this carpenter Nazareth. Someone looks, they look at him as if he was some violin player. They look at him as if he's the movie character, Jesus Christ superstar. Jesus Christ wasn't a superstar, he is God.

Superstars die, and they rot, and they corrode. Use all the max factor in Revelation, you want them to die, and they'll corrode, and the worms and the canker are their reward alone. But the word of God says thou will not suffer my soul to allow my soul to suffer corruption in Sheol.

He arose from the dead, and he's God, and he's coming again as the ruling reigning king. You and I better understand, dear people, that he's coming again, and if he isn't coming again, then you're still in your sins, and of all people most miserable because you've been deceived.

I believe he's coming again. I've been looking for him, haven't you? Well, I don't know, Brother Rocky, I don't get excited about it. I believe he'll probably come again, but well, after all, praise God, maybe he will, I don't know.

That's the way most of us are. In our hearts we say we believe it, but in our life it doesn't make much difference, does it? What? No beauty that we should desire him. It isn't anything different today.

What's the next phrase? He is despised and forsaken of men, rejected of men. People despised him. Jesus Christ went cross-grain with every individual he met. You will find very few people through the scriptures that just came to him and said, oh, yes, you are he.

There was a conflict almost immediately. Why? Because he wasn't the norm. He was supernatural. He was supernatural. He walked in perfect obedience to the will of God. And dear people, if you and I walk in obedience to the will of God, in instant obedience, you're going to go cross-grain with most of the people you meet because they're going to misunderstand you just like they did him.

He didn't want to be misunderstood, he didn't come to be misunderstood, and neither do you and I, but we will be. He said the world hated me and it'll hate you, don't worry about it. No one wants to run around getting hated.

If you got a martyr complex, you got a problem. That's really self-righteousness. Who in the world wants to be hated? I don't. I like to be loved, don't you? Well, Brother Rocky, I don't mind. I don't understand.

But this is what we're talking about here. What else does it say? Look, please, verse 3, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Jesus knew what it was to hurt in his heart. His family turned away.

His friends turned away. He came and preached the greatest messages that would ever fall upon human ear. He performed miracles that no doctor would ever perform. He spoke the wisest words man would ever know, and the scripture says that if all the books could be written about everything he did and said, the libraries of the world couldn't contain it.

But dear people, listen carefully. He hurt over a city that he tried to reach. Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem. Why should you and I be any different? Why would you think, young people, that you should be any different in school?

Why should you think it'd be any different that someone would ridicule you for your Christianity and try to tear you down? They did him. They've done every Christian that's ever lived who's ever tried to stand for the Lord.

The same thing. He knows. He understands what's in your heart. Do not believe that you have a high priest who cannot be touched with your feelings. He knows what's going on in your heart. He knows and understands because he was acquainted with grief.

He was a man of sorrows, and he was under the threat of death almost everywhere he went. I mean, there was a government contract out on him, to use modern terminology, and when the government puts one out on you, you know you can go nowhere that they don't understand and would not be looking for him.

And what does it say? It says, and we hid, as it were, our faces from him. The literal reading there in the Hebrew is, as one from whom men hide their faces, I try my best to understand that. And the only way I could understand it was look in my own heart.

When I'm not right with God, I don't like to get before him. When you and I are not right, a man cannot look into the face of Jesus Christ and stand there very long without either crumbling at his feet and saying, my Lord and my God, or walk away and say, you must be a devil himself.

You have to make one of those choices. Either he is who he says he is, or he's the biggest liar and fake who ever existed. There are no alternatives left open to you and me. And I find that many Christians do not like to get before the Lord because they cannot stand the brightness of his personal presence.

They don't like for him to look into their heart. They don't like for him to look into their mind and find out what they think. They don't want to, some people believe they can get in a car and turn the lights out and God can't see.

They believe they can get in a house and turn the lights out and God can't see. And you go to the bars and the taverns and the clubs and they think just because they turn the lights down or turn them all off and throw a strobe light on, about every three seconds that God can't see.

But though mountains would cover you, you cannot hide from God. God knows everything you think. God knows everything you say. And God knows everything you do. And the amazing thing is God keeps books.

God, now that blows your mind. That scares you. It ought to, God keeps books. Books about what? Books about what you think and what you say and what you do. You mean tell me you believe that's what the book says?

Now you know what's immediately going through your mind? Boy, I must have a big one, you do. If you got one at all, it's a big one. I'll promise you because God keeps records. And I don't know how he does it, but he does.

And so I look at him. What was the result of what happened? Look at verse four. For surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

Tear off his clothes, humiliate him in nakedness, humiliate him before mankind, just stripping the mane of his clothes. That's humiliating, embarrassing. Tie his hands together, strap him to a pole, and the scourging lasted for over a quarter of an hour.

And the bits of bone and metal that were designed for one purpose, and that was to grab hold of the flesh, dig in, and to rip from the recipient of those blows the flesh. His back was one enormous wound, and those bits of bones and metal didn't tear on the outer levels of flesh, they dug down to the very marrow of the bone.

They ripped and they tore, that's what they were designed for. And then they threw an old purple robe over that gaping wound in his back. And they twisted together a little crown of thorns and pressed those down upon his brow.

Look at me please, just turn back over to Isaiah 52 verse 14. As many were astounded, it means, as many were astounded here, astonished, astounded, at thee his visage, his countenance, was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men.

To that point in history, no human had ever been beaten as the Son of God was beaten. Turn with me please to Isaiah chapter 50 verse 6. I gave my back to the smiters and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair, I hid not my face from shame and spitting.

They spit upon his face, they plucked his beard out by the roots, they slapped and smote the Son of the living God. Now may I just give you in one word why. One simple word that will answer to you and me the question why he would do something like that.

You, you, and you could say the same to me, you, you, if no one ever lived on this earth but you, God loved you so much that he sent his Son, that if you would believe in him, you would never perish, but that you could have everlasting life.

You, you caused it, and I caused it, mankind caused it. Well what happens? This was God's way and this was the foreshadowed Lamb of God and it amazes me that a man Isaiah who was wrapped up in the people of Israel and preaching to them God's word that God would give this man such a vivid description that the Jews cannot see today.

My people are blinded to this. But it gives us more than that. Let's pick back up at verse 4 and incorporate it through verse 4, 5, and 6. We're talking about the cross. Here you will find, if you're making a note, the purpose of the cross.

This is the purpose of it. Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement for our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are all healed.

Now you'll know that 5 is the Bible number for God's grace. And if you will notice, there are 5 of those in verse 4 and 5. If you'll look, it says, Surely he hath borne our griefs, our sorrows, our transgressions, our iniquities, and for our peace.

And there are 5 of those. And those 5 things will incorporate for you and me what God has marvelously, wonderfully done for you and me by his grace. Grace simply means you get what you do not deserve.

You just don't get what you deserve. We deserve judgment, but God says, I'll forgive you. God says, I'll forgive. So God's wrath says, destroy man, God's love says, I'll redeem man. But God's wrath and love meet together in the character of God, and they both say, well, it's got to be paid for somehow or other.

And God says, I'll just send my son, and he'll pay for it, so that I can hide my wrath and my love, and I'll wrap it all up in my son, the Lamb of God. And this is what happened in the Word of God. Now, you and I both know it never says in there that he would be our substitute.

You don't find the word substitute mentioned. But it's certainly implicated, and it's certainly implied in those scriptures. Well, why could it be? Verse 6, all we, like sheep, have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way.

Now let me just pause there for a moment. Let's start our week out together. The biggest problem in your life and mine, if you will just let me say it from the speaker's platform, the biggest problem in your life is not your pastor.

The biggest problem in your life is not a deacon or a Sunday school teacher, not a friend or neighbor. Your biggest problem is the one you see in the mirror every day. Nobody makes you do anything you don't want to do under the normal circumstances of life.