EAN: Why We Have This Passion

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We still live in a nation where it is the easiest, that probably has been in earth history, to change the law as a citizen.

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It is the easiest for you. Shame on us if we fail. I want to announce to you this, it is now

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March. I've been now involved in four different bills for abolition. If your senator and your representative do not know you by name, you have not done enough for abolition, that's all there is to it.

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Well, it's a blessing to be here with all of you tonight for the End Abortion Now Conference.

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Yeah, it's a bit humbling that Jeff Durbin wasn't able to make it, so I am preaching in his place, pinch hitting for him, as it were.

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I think Dennis really liked that metaphor. So, as we gather here tonight,

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I want to really share with you why we have this passion to end abortion in our state and in America.

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And I guess we all have a story about how God drew us into this work.

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So I want to briefly share with you my story, and then I primarily want to open the word of God together tonight and see what the

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Lord has to say to his church about this issue. You know, I have always been pro -life.

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I grew up in church in diapers, okay? There was never a time when

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I would have not been pro -life. However, it was just something that, you know, it was like checking off a box.

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Being pro -life, yeah, of course I'm pro -life. And when I go vote, I'm gonna vote for a pro -life candidate.

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And to me, that's all being pro -life meant. But all that changed one day in October of 2008.

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I was at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and I was taking a

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Hebrew class, and my professor, Dr. Eric Mitchell, invited the men in the class.

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There was about 30 of us, preachers in training, learning the Hebrew language. And he said, men,

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I'm gonna go Saturday to the sidewalk here in Fort Worth, outside of the

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Texas Christian University campus. There's an abortion clinic. And this

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Saturday, we are going to be sharing the gospel with women before they go into that abortion clinic to kill their children.

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And if you wanna join us, I'll pick you up here at 6 a .m. on Saturday. Well, there was about a dozen of us who said, yeah,

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I'll do that. I'm gonna be here Saturday morning. Saturday morning at 6 a .m. came bright and early. I was there all alone.

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And my professor pulled up in this 15 -passenger van. I'll never forget it, because he thought he was gonna have a van load of us.

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And he brought me to the abortion clinic. It was just breaking daylight, and we got out there on the sidewalk.

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And at this abortion clinic in Fort Worth, you could get right up on the sidewalk, maybe 20 feet from the door, which if you've ever done abortion clinic ministry, you know that in many places, you can't get close to the women as they go in.

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You don't get good opportunities to talk to them. But at this one, they literally would walk right in front of us.

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And that morning, I watched 15 young women go into that abortion clinic and murder their children.

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14 of them were defiant. They were going to do this, and they cursed at us, and they were angry at us, and the derelict fathers threatened us.

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You say one more word, and I'm gonna rip your head off. They did not want to hear us plead with them for the life of their child.

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And I had never done this before, but my professor and the three or four people I was there with from his church, they did this every

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Saturday. And we pleaded, and they told me, sometimes we save a life.

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But that day we didn't. Now, 14 of the 15 women were bound and determined to have an abortion, but there was one.

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And I've spent the past 13 years, I used to go more often. I admit

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I don't go near as often as I once did. I used to go every week. But I've spent the last 13 years going to the abortion clinic many, many times.

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And this is one of a few times when I remember a woman who was truly forced into an abortion procedure against her will.

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I would say she could not have been more than 13 years old. Her mother was literally pulling her by her hair, screaming at her, calling her all kinds of profane, obscene names, saying,

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I am not going to raise your child. And the girl is literally begging her,

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Mama, no, Mama, no. I wanna go home. I don't wanna do this. And she's tearfully begging her mother.

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She's a child. And her mother pulled her into that clinic. And about two hours later, this young girl comes out, she's sobbing.

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She's crying so hard she cannot catch her breath. Have you ever cried so hard you literally began to hyperventilate and you couldn't catch your breath?

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And her mother just brought her back to the car. They got in and they drove off. Now, I've gotta admit to you,

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I've seen hundreds of women go into abortion clinics over the years. And I can only say there have been a handful of them, far less than 1%, in my experience, who

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I know were coerced. But that one was. And that is something that can happen.

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And I just wanna say, sex traffickers love abortion. Those who abuse young girls love abortion.

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Pimps love abortion. Pedophiles love abortion.

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It covers up their crimes. They kill the children that are conceived by their wickedness so that they can escape justice.

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It's wicked. And Planned Parenthood is happy to take their money.

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And I have seen it happen. I tell you that because that day changed my life.

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I went home and I was newly married. Trisha and I had been married just over a year at this point.

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And she was pregnant with our first child. And I thought to myself,

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I had been seeing ultrasound pictures of myself and my son, David, who's now 12 years old. And I thought to myself, my

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God, someone today killed a child just like my son, same age as my son, looks like my son.

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How can they do that? And then I looked up the statistics online. And at that time, it was being reported that about 4 ,000 babies a day were being murdered by abortion in America.

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And if you had asked me, I would have thought it wasn't even 400. 60 million plus babies have been killed in 49 years since 1973, when abortion was legalized in America by fiat, by nine justices who rather than interpreting and applying the

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Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, created laws outside of their authority and forced abortion on demand in all 50 states in America.

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And we think about the Holocaust. About 6 million

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Jews murdered. That is horrific. And in the

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American Holocaust against unborn children, we've murdered 10 times what

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Hitler did. Do we think about that? Do we think about God's wrath against a nation that would murder that many innocent children?

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And so ever since that day in October of 2008, I have not been able to get this off of my mind.

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I woke up the next morning and I thought to myself, my

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God, they are going to kill another 15 today. And I had class. And I actually thought to myself, maybe

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I should skip class and go to that abortion clinic and plead for those children's lives.

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And some might say, that's a crazy thought. No, it's not. I wanna ask you this question.

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Don't answer, but I wanna ask you this question. Have you ever been, have you ever seen it yourself firsthand?

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When I saw it myself, it changed my life.

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And 13 years later, I cannot get it out of my mind. And I'm sure if you had walked through Buchenwald and saw the piles of dead bodies in Auschwitz, you'd have reacted the same way.

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And that's what happened to me. It changed me. I learned about pregnancy centers and how they try to help mothers in a crisis pregnancy and give them resources and counsel them and help them see the humanity of the child in their womb so that they would choose life.

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And I began counseling at a pregnancy center in Stephenville, Texas. And I was able to talk to young mothers and fathers.

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And not only was I able to talk to them about sparing their child's life from abortion, but I was able to share the gospel with them.

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And lead them to faith in Christ. And even see some of them married and baptized and joined churches.

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They went from about to kill their own children to giving their life to Christ.

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Getting baptized, joining a biblical, sound local church. Getting married.

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And that child that almost was killed being born into a Christian home just a few months later.

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And then, then I got to hold some of those babies. You don't know how good that feels.

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I was pastoring a church about 70 miles west of Waco, Texas. And I had moved from Fort Worth and I wanted to go back to the abortion clinic and share the gospel.

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And so I started searching for someone. I didn't even know where the nearest abortion clinic was, but I found there was one in Waco. And it was about an hour's drive.

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And I found there was this crazy preacher that wears a cowboy hat on the sidewalk outside of abortion clinics named

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Rusty Thomas. And I didn't know him, but I just went one Saturday morning at like 5 .30

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in the morning. Because he was telling people, if you want to come out, join me on Saturday at like 5 .30 a .m.

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in front of Planned Parenthood in Waco. And so my wife and kids and I, we just, we showed up one day.

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And there was the crazy preacher. And he and I gathered on that sidewalk with other believers, worshiping

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God, preaching the gospel, calling out to the unborn. And over the next several years,

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I learned firsthand from Rusty Thomas what it means to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ at the gates of hell on earth.

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And I gotta tell you, I heard Steve Lawson say this once.

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That the gospel is just like when you go into that jeweler's shop.

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Have you ever proposed marriage to a young woman and you go into the jeweler's shop? He takes that diamond and he gets out this black velvet cloth.

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And he holds that cloth up and he puts that diamond and he's got these lights shining down.

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And when he has those lights against that black cloth, that diamond lights up like fire.

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And you can see every color of the rainbow shooting out from that diamond.

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It is beautiful. And if you take the black cloth away, you can't see the radiance of the diamond near as well.

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And Steve Lawson said, you have to have the black backdrop to see the beauty of the diamond.

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And you have to see this wicked world for what it is in all of its evil.

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To understand the beauty of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Because the gospel of Jesus Christ shines the brightest in the darkest of places.

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And it doesn't shine brighter anywhere in this world than in front of an abortion clinic where babies are being murdered every day.

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Do you know that in Shreveport, Louisiana right now, there's an abortion clinic where on Saturday, 30 or more babies are murdered?

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I could take you there tomorrow morning. You will go if you stand on that public sidewalk and you will see 30 or these days, because so many women are coming from Texas, maybe 40 or 50 women go in and kill their children.

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It's going to happen tomorrow. I wanna ask you a question. If you knew that on Monday morning, someone was going to go into a public school, an elementary school, and kill 30 children, would you do anything about it?

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Would you be willing to show up yourself and say, he ain't getting past me. I'll give my life to save theirs.

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I will fight him to the death if I have to, but he is not going to hurt those children.

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You see the difference between the school shooter and the abortionist is one is protected by law to murder people and the other will be tried and found guilty as a murderer.

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So I ask you this question, brothers and sisters, what are we gonna do about it?

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Louisiana law requires that by January 31st of every year that all the babies that were aborted in the state of Louisiana must be reported to the

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Department of Health. And so every year we get a number from the

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Louisiana Department of Health of how many babies were murdered last year. How many babies were murdered in abortion clinics in Louisiana last year in 2020?

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7 ,448 babies legally murdered in this state.

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That's an average of 10 ,000 babies. That's an average of just over 20 per day. Almost one every hour of your life in your state, the most pro -life state in America.

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And once an hour on average, a baby is killed by abortion.

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I thought we had a representative government. I thought we elected people who would enact laws that reflected the values of the people who elected them.

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Polls regularly show that 60, 70 % of the people of Louisiana are pro -life.

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That by majority, the people of Louisiana want to see abortion banned, ended, criminalized.

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But we're told that can't happen. I guess

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Jesus isn't on His throne. Maybe He's not King of Kings and Lord of Lords, or is

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He? And if He is, and we are His spokesmen and spokeswomen, if we are

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His servants, then maybe we need to go to the streets and bring the gospel to a world that thinks it's okay to kill children.

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And I don't care what they call me. All I care is about what my master thinks about me.

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Because when I stand in front of him one day, all I want to hear is, well done, good and faithful servant.

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So they can say anything about me they want. I fear Him. I do not fear them.

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Turn with me in God's word to the book of Proverbs chapter 24.

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I want you to hear what God says to you and to me and to all of Louisiana and America and this world today through His word.

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Proverbs 24, verse 10. If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small.

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Rescue those who are being taken away to death. Hold back those who are stumbling to slaughter.

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And if you say, behold, we did not know this. Does not

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He who weighs your heart perceive it? And does not

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He who keeps watch over your soul know it? And will

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He not repay man according to His work? Notice verse 10.

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God speaks directly to you and He says, if you faint in the day of adversity, this word to faint, it's to fall back in fear, to be afraid, to run from the battle.

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There's adversity, there's conflict, it's not popular. If I do that, people will say things about me.

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They might tweet mean things about me. They might even threaten me. They might give me the one finger salute.

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So I'm not gonna do that. Because, you know, Jesus wants us to love other people and be nice.

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I mean, Jesus would never do something like, I don't know, flip the tables of people who were profiting off the temple of God and threaten them and chase them out of the temple with a whip.

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Or would He? You see, the Jesus I read about in the Bible isn't a coward, he's a man.

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And he stands up for what's true. And I want you to hear what God's word says in Proverbs 24, 10.

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If you faint in the day of adversity, if you're afraid to stand for what's right and true because it's controversial, your strength is small.

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Let me translate the Hebrew of the second half of verse 10.

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Your strength is small, this is what the Hebrew means. You're a coward. No, that's not a literal translation of the

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Hebrew, but that's what it means. If you're afraid to do what's right because it's controversial, then you're a coward.

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Be a man, be a woman of God and stand for what's right and true, no matter what they say.

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And then the command in verse 11, rescue those who are being taken away to death, hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.

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Now, brothers and sisters, I want you to understand the language here is profound.

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The Hebrew verbs here indicate that we need to rescue, we need to save, we need to pluck from danger.

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And then it describes the ones that we need to save as those who are being taken away to death.

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The Hebrew participle here is one that says that a person is being dragged away, snatched away, pulled away, violently taken away.

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The person in the first half of verse 11 that we are to rescue is a person who is being taken away to death.

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And the Hebrew words used here indicate that they're being taken against their will, violently taken to death.

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They're being murdered. And we're commanded to rescue, to save them.

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I can think of no one that this applies to more than the unborn child in the womb, who by no choice of his or her own is marched into that abortion clinic and literally ripped limb from limb.

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I remember the days at the abortion clinic before the laws that required them to dispose of the bodies.

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And they would put the children's bodies in biohazard bags and put them in the dumpster behind the clinic.

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And before the stair cycle truck came to take the biohazard bag of the decomposing children's bodies away, as you stood on the sidewalk, you could smell the rotting flesh.

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Have you ever smelled that before? Do you know what that's like? Brothers and sisters, it's real.

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It's not a joke. This happens in the United States of America.

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This happens in Louisiana. There are three abortion clinics in this state.

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In Shreveport, Baton Rouge, and New Orleans. And tomorrow, they will be killing children.

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What are we going to do about it? The second half of verse 11, we are given the second command to hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.

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Now this is a different situation than the first half of verse 11.

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In the first half of verse 11, we are told to rescue a person who is being forcefully taken away to death against their will.

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Not so in the second half of verse 11. We are told to hold back, to cling to, to pull away from those who are stumbling to death, to the slaughter.

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They're stumbling to the slaughter. This Hebrew verb is used throughout the

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Old Testament to speak of a drunk man who's stumbling around and he doesn't know where he's going.

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Someone who is blinded by the evil of this world and the darkness of their heart, and they are doing things that can ruin and destroy them.

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They're doing it of their own choice. Don't misunderstand me. They're not victims. But they are blind sinners doing reckless and foolish things that could kill themselves and other people.

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And this applies to no one better than the mother and the father. To go into those abortion clinics and pay an assassin to kill their own baby.

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Hold them back. How do we hold them back? Primarily with the gospel.

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There is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.

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I am not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of salvation to those who believe.

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The God of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the knowledge of the glory of Christ who is the image of God.

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They are blind in their sin. I'm not excusing it. I'm not calling them victims.

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But I am saying they need Jesus. Because that blindness, that veil over their eyes and over their hearts will never be removed until it's removed by the blood of Jesus Christ shed for them to pay for all their sins.

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And he can even forgive murder. Just ask the

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Apostle Paul. When we call abortion murder, it's not heartless toward mothers and fathers who've committed it against their own children.

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It's not heartless. It's the truth. I have talked to mothers outside of abortion clinics who've had four, five, six.

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I remember one who was going in for her eighth abortion. That takes the cake. I've never met one with more.

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She was going in for her eighth abortion. Hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.

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How do I do that? Go to the sidewalk, stand at the gates of hell and preach the gospel.

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And God will save the lives of children and the souls of mothers and fathers by the power of his spirit through his preached word.

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Now verse 12, God deals with our excuses. If you say, behold, we did not know this.

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Now, when are you gonna say this? Well, people say it today, but what does the author of Proverbs have in mind?

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I believe he has in mind that day on which we will all give an account of everything done in the body, whether good or evil.

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I believe he has in mind that day when you and I will stand before the

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Lord of all creation. In Revelation 20, verse 11, the great white throne judgment is depicted where there are books that are open and in those books are written everything that you and I have ever done in our lives and the books will be opened and read and Christ will read all that you've done and you will be found guilty on that day and if your name is not written in the

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Lamb's book of life, you will be cast into the lake of fire. There's books.

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In those books are written everything you've ever done and you're gonna stand before Jesus and give an account.

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What are you gonna say to him when he asks you, what did you do to rescue those who were perishing and hold back those who were stumbling to the slaughter like I commanded you in Proverbs 24, 11?

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If you say on that day, but hold Lord, I didn't know about it. I didn't realize,

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I didn't stop and think. I was busy doing my own thing.

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I had a job, I had a family, I had hobbies. I was just kind of floating through life and I just never stopped to think about it,

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Lord. If you say we did not know this, look at the next part.

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Does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Don't miss what's being said there.

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You know and God knows that you know. You know they're being killed.

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You just didn't bother to do anything about it. God weighs your heart.

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He not only knows what you've done and what you will do, he knows why you did it.

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He knows the motivation of your heart and he not only judges your actions, but he judges the motivations of your heart.

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He weighs out your heart on his divine scales of wrath and justice and he perceives it.

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He knows that you know and he will not let you make an excuse.

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Next question. Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it?

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God is watching over your soul. Do you think he is not omniscient?

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Do you think he's not paying attention? Do you think he's uninterested in what you are doing and whether or not you are obeying his commands?

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Third question. Will he not repay man according to his work?

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What does this mean? I have to earn my way into heaven? No. No, it means that true men and women of God will do what

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God commands and if you constantly in your rebellion reject Christ and what he has commanded, you will be repaid in full for your sin when the wrath of God is poured out upon you for all eternity.

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Will he not repay man according to his work? Yes, he absolutely will. Either you've trusted in Christ who paid for your sin upon the cross when it was the will of the father to crush his own son.

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The innocent man dying in the place of guilty men and women like you and I when the father crushed his own son with the weight of my sin and your sin and your sin is covered by the blood of Christ.

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Either that's true of you or you may call yourself a

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Christian but you have no desire to obey the one that you say you follow.

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You call him Lord, Lord but you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. I'm not saying you have to earn your salvation.

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I'm not saying you'll get to heaven by going to the sidewalk and preaching. I'm saying that if you belong to Jesus Christ and you don't want to go and proclaim the gospel in this world wherever he calls you including the gates of hell then there is something badly wrong with your heart.

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And it just might be that your heart is dead in sin and your eyes are blind to the truth and you need to repent and place your faith in Christ.

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He will repay each man according to his worth either the wrath for your sin was poured out upon Christ or the wrath for your sin will be poured out upon you in eternal hell.

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Lastly, I want to end with the instructions that Jesus gave to his disciples when he sent them out into this world.

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You get two expositions for the price of one. Matthew chapter 10.

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This one will be a little more brief because the words are incredibly powerful and in many ways they speak for themselves.

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Matthew 10 verse 16. The son of God in human flesh left his throne, came to this earth, preached the gospel among men, chose 12 disciples and as he sends them out into the world to preach the gospel of his kingdom, he instructs them in Matthew 10, starting in verse 16 of why they don't need to be afraid of the world but instead they need to be afraid of him.

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Matthew 10 verse 16. Jesus said to his disciples, and today he says to us, behold,

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I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. So be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.

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Beware of men for they will deliver you over to courts and flog you in their synagogues and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake to bear witness before them and the

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Gentiles. When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say for what you are to say will be given you in that hour for it is not you who speak but the spirit of God your father speaking through you.

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Brother will deliver brother over to death and father his child and children will rise against parents and have them put to death and you will be hated by all.

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I'm sorry if you want to be liked, don't be a Christian because Jesus makes some promises and one of them here is that you will be hated by all for my name's sake but the one who endures to the end will be saved.

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When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next. It doesn't say quit.

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It says get up, go to the next town and keep preaching. For truly I say to you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the son of man comes.

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And all my post -millennial brothers said amen. A disciple is not above his teacher nor servant above his master.

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It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher and the servant like his master.

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If they have called the master of the house of God to call the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household?

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They're not going to say nice things about you. They're not going to appreciate you.

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They will hate you and seek to tear you apart because you represent Jesus and they hate

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Jesus. So what are we to do?

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I'm glad you asked. Verse 26. So have no fear of them. You don't need to figure it out.

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You just need to be unafraid. There's no answer you're going to give to this wicked world that they're going to accept.

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You don't need their approval. You need Christ's approval. So have no fear of them.

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For nothing is covered that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known.

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What I tell you in the dark, say in the light. In what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops.

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We are so afraid to speak the truth these days, are we not? Sometimes we think we're bold when we say these things on social media.

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Now I'm not saying you should never say them on social media but if that's the only place you're saying it, you are not bold.

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Stand on that sidewalk as they go in to kill their children and then say, don't kill your own child.

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Let us help you. You will never be able to take this back.

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You will regret this for the rest of your life. You will stand before Jesus one day.

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That little boy, that little girl is going to be ripped limb from limb in a matter of minutes unless you turn around.

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That's how you proclaim it from the housetops. Verse 28, and do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.

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Jesus says, all I can do is kill you, don't worry about it. Rather, fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

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Be afraid of Jesus. Don't worry about them. Or not to spare his soul for a penny and not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your father.

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He's sovereign over all, brothers and sisters. When you go out there into this world, he goes with you.

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But even the hairs of your head are numbered. Fear not, therefore. You are of more value than sparrows.

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So everyone who acknowledges me before men, if you're willing to proclaim the truth as controversial as it is before men,

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I will also acknowledge him before my father who is in heaven. Once again, you're not earning your salvation by preaching the truth.

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Those who belong to Christ are unashamed of the truth. That's what he's saying.

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But whoever denies me before men, I will deny before my father in heaven, which is to say, those who are ashamed of the truth are ashamed of the truth because they don't know

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Christ. Because if you knew Christ, you would not be afraid to preach the truth.

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Do not think, verse 34, do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth.

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I thought Jesus was peaceful and kind, would never hurt a fly.

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Well, you need to read your Bible. Look at this. Jesus says, do not think that I've come to bring peace to the earth.

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I have come not to bring peace, but a sword. I have come to set a man against his father and a daughter against her mother and a daughter -in -law against her mother -in -law.

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A person's enemies will be those of his own household. You might even have family members that hate you.

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Did any of you have that experience this past Thanksgiving? Are you looking forward to Christmas dinner? This is true, isn't it?

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If you don't have someone in your family that hates you for following Christ, you're a rare bird.

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Because most Christians I know have people in their own families who despise them for their faith in Christ and for following what

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He says in His Word. But whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.

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Look, if you would choose your father or mother who tells you don't follow Jesus, you don't want to be a

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Christian. You don't want to do that. You don't need to go out there. Stay off that sidewalk.

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Don't be so crazy. If you love mother or father more than me, then you're not worthy of me.

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Jesus is saying, you better choose. Me or them, who are you going to obey?

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Because you can't obey both. Whoever loves son or daughter in every parent's heart is terrified.

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Like when that little boy or girl says, I think I'm gay.

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What are you going to say? Are you going to tell them son, daughter? This is sin.

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You need to repent of it. If you continue in this sin, 1

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Corinthians 6, verse 9 says, do not be deceived. You will not inherit the kingdom of God if you continue in this sin.

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But if you turn to Christ, you will be washed. You will be sanctified. You will be justified in the name of the

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Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. Or are you going to say to them, oh,

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I love you just the way you are on your way to hell? Are you going to tell them the truth?

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Or are you going to do the easy thing? Jesus is watching. Which are you going to do?

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Whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.

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Look, if you're not willing to be publicly hated and even killed for following me, then you're not worthy of me.

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Look, turn back. If you don't want this life, don't call yourself a Christian.

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If this sounds too hard for you, then just go do your own thing.

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But if you want to follow Jesus, it's going to cost something. Salvation is free, but it costs you absolutely everything in your life.

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Because you have to lay it all down to follow Jesus. And that's in every area, including rescuing those who are perishing.

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Whoever finds his life will lose it. If you try to hold on to your life, if you try to take the easy way out, do what's comfortable now, you'll lose it.

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You find your earthly life, but you lose your eternal life. Or, whoever loses his life, if you would take up your cross, if you would hand over your life to Christ and say,

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Lord, I'm going to follow you no matter what it costs me. Even if they kill me,

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I'll follow you, Jesus. Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it in eternity.

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When you reach your eternal reward, and he says, well done.

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Lastly, Jesus sends his disciples out with these words, verse 40.

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Whoever receives you, receives me. Because you go in my name. You represent me on this earth. You bring my gospel.

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You're my messengers. You're my children. Whoever receives you, receives me.

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And whoever receives me, receives Him who sent me, that is the Father. The one who receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet's reward.

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Now we heard earlier that the job of a prophet was not to make the people feel good about their sin, or merely to tell them what was going to come in the future, but to tell them, thus saith the

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Lord. And if they receive God's word as you proclaim it to them, then they'll receive a prophet's reward.

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And the one who receives a righteous person, who is that righteous person? The ones whose life is totally different from everyone else around him or her, because you don't live like the rest of this pagan world.

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They can smell how different you are. They can see you coming from a mile away.

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You don't look like them. You don't act like them. You are totally different. It's amazing.

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Some Christians today think that our job is to look as much as possible like the world so that maybe the world will accept us.

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When Jesus says, no, you need to be holy. You need to be set apart. You need to be so different that you stick out and bring glory to me.

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Whoever receives a righteous person because he is a righteous person will receive a righteous person's reward.

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And whoever gives one of these little ones, even a cup of cold water, because he is a disciple, truly

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I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward.

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It's interesting that Jesus ends his commission of his disciples in this way.

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He talks about how we need to bring the gospel to this world. And he ends by saying, if you give one of these little ones a cup of cold water, there's something about mercy toward children, compassion, concern for children.

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There is a fragility and innocence in children.

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I know parents, they're all filthy sinners. We all know it. We're raising them. We know it every day.

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But in a very real sense, they're just children. And this world is chewing them up and spitting them out and tearing them apart and mutilating their bodies and ripping them limb from limb.

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And if you would just give them a cup of cold water, does he literally mean you need to get a cup and find children and give them water?

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No. He's talking about if you would give them relief from the evil of this world, if you would bring the gospel to everyone, especially to children and have this world stop being so wicked in its treatment and its torture and its murder of children, then he is a disciple.

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And I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward.

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Dietrich Bonhoeffer, he was a

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Lutheran preacher. We'll disregard that. It's not important. But Dietrich Bonhoeffer stood up against the evils of Adolf Hitler.

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And at the end of his book, The Cost of Discipleship, as he talks about how he was seeking to put an end to the horrors and the wickedness and the totalitarian murderous rampage of Adolf Hitler in the

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Nazi regime. He writes at the end of The Cost of Discipleship why he is risking his own life.

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And if you do not know, he was killed for his efforts. A mere two weeks before Adolf Hitler killed himself.

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It's really tragic. He almost made it to the end of the Nazi regime. And Bonhoeffer explains to us at the end of that book why he is risking his own life to secretly try to subvert and even kill, if possible,

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Hitler to stop this wicked reign. And this is what he says.

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Silence in the face of evil is itself evil.

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God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak.

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Not to act is to act. Brothers and sisters, we are living in the midst of a time that is even more wicked than 1930s

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Germany, where 10 times the number of innocent people are being slaughtered.

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Are we gonna speak? Are we gonna act? Are we gonna do anything? God will not hold us guiltless.

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Brothers and sisters, I'm pleading with you. You get one life on this earth.

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Make it count for something. Do what's right.

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Let's establish justice, equal justice for the unborn, that their lives would be protected and defended the way everyone else's lives should be protected and defended in this nation.

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And our Savior, who is upon His throne, who rules and who reigns and who weighs men's hearts in His hands, will by His power give us the victory.

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Now, I don't know how soon that victory is coming, but the Word of God tells me it is coming and we will win and this evil will end and Christ will get the glory and we will be there to worship

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Him for all eternity. And brothers and sisters, it will be worth it on that day.

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So make your life count for something. Stand up for truth in all areas of your life, but especially in the single most wicked evil that exists in our day, the

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Holocaust of abortion. May God give us victory and may

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Christ receive all the glory. Let's pray. Father, we ask,

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Lord, as the psalmist says at the end of Psalm 90,

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Lord, establish the work of our hands. Yes, establish the work of our hands.

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Lord, God, put an end to this. God, we plead, we pray, we beg of You.

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Lord, You are sovereign over the heavens and the earth and we know You're working out

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Your perfect plan, but Lord, we ask You, use us to make this evil stop.

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God, we plead and we pray. If we have to fight this state by state, if we have to fight it city by city, town by town, person by person, heart by heart,

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Lord, whatever it takes, we'll do it. Let us never forget that we will only prevail if we bring the gospel of Christ and proclaim it.

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Let us never forget,

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Lord, that we are but men and women. We are dust.

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We can do nothing apart from Christ, but by His grace and for His glory,

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You tell us that the gates of hell will not prevail against Your church.

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And so, Lord, we ask You, give us the victory even now.

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As we fight in legislatures, and Lord willing, one day soon, even

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U .S. Congress to end the holocaust of abortion in America, Lord, we ask that You would give us the victory because if You do not, we will fail.

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But if You go with us and You establish the work of our hands, the gates of hell will fall and Christ will put

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His enemies under His feet and He will establish justice in this land and it will finally, finally, finally end.

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Lord, make it happen. Use us,

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Lord. Here we are, Lord. Send us. In the name of King Jesus we pray.