You've Been Served. Now What？ — Shane Idleman

The message this morning is you have been served, now what? You have been served, now what? Some of you are laughing, you know what that means. It's not really a good thing sometimes, is it? Law enforcement in here.

Served means you've been summonsed. You've been called out. You've been given some papers that say something pretty negative. Or, in this case, it can be positive. Because here's something interesting about God's judgment.

I was listening to Alistair Begg this morning on the West Side Christian Radio Network. That is now official. So all those listening live stream, we are going to put a listen live button on. I think we're gonna have more people listening outside the area than here.

Alistair Begg, Greg Laurie, Tony Evans, David Jeremiah, a lot of heavy hitters on there that have important ministry are now on the West Side Christian Radio Network. And thank you, if you're listening, Phil, Josh, and Jim, they're in Minnesota.

Without them, this would have never happened. So thank you guys for doing that. And you can tune in locally, 91 .9 FM. And we've got four different stations up to Tonopah, Nevada. And there's gonna be, it takes time to get all the volume levels.

I'm learning more than I ever wanted to know about radio. Let me tell you that much right now. But that's out there. Also, I have this reminder. I didn't know if it was gonna fit. Well, like, what is that?

Well, guess what we need? A new roof for the whole building leaking in different rooms. And I was clueless on the price of this thing. You don't wanna know. I'm not gonna tell you right here and now. It's right around 40 ,000.

So, online listeners, if you've never been here before, we don't pass an offering plate. We don't ask for an offering. It's a George Mueller approach to church. God's bringing the money in all over. But I also think it's important sometimes to let the congregation know, hey, here's a need.

And if we're gonna leave something for the next generation, this isn't our building. This isn't West Side Christian Fellowship's building. It wasn't Leona Valley Church before this. It was God allowing people to steward his building.

So, if we wanna leave something for the next generation, our kids, our grandchildren, it needs a new roof. And it's a lot of money, a lot of work. So, if you want to put something towards that, just put roof on the envelope, let us know.

We figured if 200 people give $100, that will get us halfway there. And then we're praying for the Lord to bring the rest in as we seek him. So, I just wanna at least let you know that there is a need out there.

You've been served, now what? This is the final series, or I'm sorry, the final message in the series on the book of Jude. And three weeks ago, we talked about, or four weeks ago, contending for the faith.

And then we talked about trademarks of a false teacher. And then we talked about false teachers, what do they say? They say what? If it feels good, do it. And do you ever see those ads that say, let your imagination run wild?

No, don't do that. They're usually ads for Cancun, or Mazatlan, or Las Vegas. You know, just let your imagination run, no, it's not good to let the flesh run wild. So, this one is the last part of the book of Jude.

And this is a book of the Bible you will not hear taught from very often because it's quite pointed. It's convicting, it's necessary in the times we live. I talked about false prophets, false teachers weeks ago, so listen to those messages.

But we're picking up here at Jude 12. There's no chapters, it's just the book of Jude. Jude 12, verse 12, these are spots in your love feasts. So, he's talking about false prophets, false teachers, people who are not sincere, they are not genuine.

Are you aware that there are those type of people in the church? Just because people go to church, many times some people look at church as a marketing, an area for marketing. That's why you'll see a lot of the bigger churches, they have a lot of people who rely on marketing.

Most of the real estate agents go to big churches. Most of the other organizations that require downline will go to big churches because there's their audience. So, not everybody that comes to church is sincere.

So, he's saying about you false teachers, there are spots in your love feast. Well, I better clarify a love feast because that doesn't sound too good to us 2 ,000 years later. Love and feast meant they were coming together as a church to eat together, fellowship.

They would have food, they would have drink, and they would fellowship, to love on each other. Like a love feast. However, what was happening? People were coming there, gorging themselves, getting drunk, and taking advantage of what this was.

And we call it today the Lord's Supper or communion. And if you want to get technical, really coming up, grabbing away for a little cup of juice is not what it was in the New Testament. It was coming together.

Believers coming together for a time of fellowship, breaking bread together, remembering what Jesus did. Now, that's still good because it's a point of reflection and we can remember, but there was a lot more to it.

Many have said we've dumbed down communion, and I agree to some degree what it used to be. But it's where we're at. Well, let me just pick up. These are spots in your love feast. While they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves.

See, another trait of a false prophet, a false teacher. It's all about themselves. They are clouds without water, carried about by the winds, late autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots.

Jude, could you be a little more clear? He's using very strong language there. Raging waves of the sea, foaming up their own shame. Wandering stars, for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.

And I like what gotquestions .org said this about communion. First Corinthians indicates that some were gorging themselves at the feast while others were left hungry. So see, it was a time for believers to come over without Panda Express and McDonald's and Carl's Jr.

You didn't have all that. You had the poor rarely had anything available to them, and you would bring all of this food to this feast, and these people were gorging themselves. What would we call that today?

Seconds and thirds when there's not even enough for firsts? So they were gorging themselves. Others were leaving hungry. They were even getting drunk. The people were not waiting for one another. They were appropriately sharing.

They were not appropriately sharing provisions. They ate food, and they just took too much. If someone couldn't bring much, he did without. It separated the rich and the poor, and this was very evident.

So these things should not be in the church. So let me just give you a nugget of information here. Humility and genuine concern for others are often a mark of sincere faith. False teachers, false prophets, those who are not Christians have a hard time doing this.

They can manufacture it, but I'm pretty sure you're a good discerner of fake humility. Are you not? Oh, not me, not little old me. Well, thank you, and this is fake humility, and they don't really have a concern for others.

It's all on themselves, and ironically, a characteristic of genuine faith, when a person has genuinely been saved by the Spirit of God, they love God, they love his truth, their sincere repentance, and there's also humility and selflessness and a love for others.

Now, as a word of encouragement, if you haven't mastered that, welcome to the club, because there's something inside of us that doesn't love others. There's something inside of us that says, mine, watch your two-year-old.

Mine, mine, mine, so with a Christian, though, at least they understand this battle, and they say, Lord, I mean, sometimes I'm up here, Lord, help me with my selfishness. God, help me win this area. I want to love others.

Give me a heart to love others, please, God, I want that. See, that's a desire, but somebody not converted who could care less, it's not about others, and that's why you're seeing this big movement now, especially now, it's a screaming voice to be able to terminate children, even at nine months or right when they're born.

Where's that love? People are like, where's that love and compassion? Their consciences have been seared. Let's be honest. Behind this movement, what's pushing this movement? Selfishness. Selfishness.

I want to do what I want, when I want, to who I want. It's my body, my choice. Selfishness is pushing this. So you've been served in this area, now what? With selfishness and a love for others. Do you have that?

And then verse 14, now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men, also saying, behold, the Lord comes with 10 ,000 of his saints to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds, which they have committed in an ungodly way and have harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against.

And I forgot to tell you what Alistair Bakes said. I just remembered that God's judgment is inevitable, but it's not inescapable. It's inevitable, it's coming. God's judgment is coming. I'm banking on that more than the sun coming up tomorrow.

But it's not inescapable. Peter gives us a way to escape. Jude gives us, all the writers of the Bible, Jesus gave us a way to escape. Repentance and belief in Christ is the escape route. So yes, judgment is coming, but it can be escaped.

You don't have to stand before God condemned for your sin. The word will come to pass. God's word will come to pass. God's judgment is sure to come. It's that all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him will come to light.

Can you imagine all these ungodly things that they're saying at God, they're blaspheming God, they're rejecting God, all that's gonna come to light and every single person will fall on their face before God and acknowledge Christ.

The ones who used to mock him will acknowledge him. Every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Christ is Lord. That is as sure as the sun coming up. And then verse 16, he predicts the apostates.

Apostates just means they have rejected the truth. They are grumblers. They are complainers. They walk according to their own lust and they mouth great swelling words, flattering people. Now I'm not gonna talk about this because what did I talk about last week?

That exact point. But this is why they're so appealing. They are grumblers and complainers and the world says like me. If a unbeliever loves grumbling and complaining, don't they? That's their fuel. Let's just grumble and complain and gossip.

See, I love these false teachers because they're grumblers and complainers too. They're telling me what I wanna hear. Let's have a church service that doesn't have anything of God in it and we can all grumble and complain together.

They'll draw people to themselves and then walking according to their own lust. Like me, I like this guy. He hates this political party. He hates this. He grumbles and complains and he lets me just indulge in my lust.

I like this guy, false teacher. They relate to that person. They flatter people to gain advantage. But you, verse 17, you're about ready to be served, so get ready. But you, see, there's always a distinction.

The world, but you. But you, beloved, remember the words which were spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. How they told you there would be mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts.

These are sensual persons who cause division, not having the Spirit of God. Are there mockers today? If you don't think there are, just get involved in ministry. Just stand up, just post something biblical on Facebook.

I dare ya. I double dog dare ya. Twitter it. Just say, Jesus is Lord. Watch out. See, mockers come in. Mockers, mocking parenting, don't they? Christian parenting is now mocked. Little Johnny can have a phone at 10 and play on video games all day and dress however they want and even change to a girl if they want to.

They should be whatever they want to be. Christian parenting, that's mocked, that's ridiculed. Mocking purity? Tim Tebow, did he get mocked? You just get this through your mind. Right now, you wanna stand up for God, you will be mocked.

It comes with the territory. It is part of the calling. It's actually a badge of honor. Blessed are those who are persecuted for my namesake. Mocking purity, you're gonna wait till you're married? You're gonna do things the right way?

Oh my Lord, wrong spirit. Mocking marriage, man and a woman, traditional values. You're so old-fashioned. Mocking, mocking, mocking. Mocking God's word so people can walk according to their own desires.

Mocking the laws so people can walk according to their own desires. Look at our legal system now. You wanna have godly legislation? It's mocked. And this might be a good time to remind you, I've told you before, but when the country was first started, there was something called Blackstone's Commentaries of the Laws of England.

They built the whole legal system on God's word from having a witness present to the death penalty to rape to manslaughter. All of these things, all the legal system was built on the word of God. Now if you bring up, well, the Bible says, oh, you can't be quoting the Bible.

Well, what are you quoting, yourself? The European Union? That's where you're gonna get your information from? Quoting themselves, looking at their own laws and their own, what's written on their own evil hearts.

See, I believe we need to bring God back. We need to bring God back. Basketball says bring back Jordan. Baseball says bring back Jeter. Football says bring back Favre. Well, I've gotta message America.

Bring back God. That's who we need to bring back. That's what's going to get us out of this situation that we're in. Bring back God. Don't reject it, don't mock it, don't remove it. Bring it back and fall on your knees before Almighty God, before the judgment hand falls and there is no hope because they have mocked him.

They have ridiculed him. They have mocked the sanctity of marriage. They have mocked the children born in the womb and there comes a time where you have to say, bring back God. That is our only hope. I'm done.

What more? Really, what more needs to be said? That's the hope. You have all these congressmen mocking God, but you, you've been served, verse 20. But you, but you, beloved, building yourself up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keeping yourself in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.

Some of you need to hear this this morning. This is exactly what you need. You need to build yourself up. What do people say? The church isn't feeding me. The church isn't feeding me. I saw something posted this week.

I just loved it. Somebody said, I didn't get much out of worship today and the response was good. We're not worshiping you. The church didn't feed me. The pastor doesn't say hi. They weren't there for me.

At some point, you've gotta learn to strengthen yourself in the Lord. Yes, yes, we need encouragement. We need to encourage each other. Iron sharpens iron. We need to be there, but God forbid if you put your trust in me or other Christians, put your trust in God because when man fails you, he won't.

Build yourself up in the faith. What do you think I have to do on a weekly basis? I love all of you, but I cannot rely on you to build me up and vice versa. Build yourself up, building on holy faith. This is so important.

It doesn't just say building up faith, holy faith. Your faith is described as holiness. What is holiness? Come out from among them and be separate, be different, and then that's what your faith is built upon, building up your faith.

Here's what I do. Here's what you need to do as well. How do you build up your faith? You go back to the Bible and you look at those promises. Almost 20 years ago, I started putting down answered prayers, things, and I go back to that.

That's right, God, I remember you answered. You answered me, and I love that song we sing, when all hope is gone. When all hope is gone, your word is all I've got. You're still the same God that takes water from the rock.

That same God flooded the entire Egyptian army. That same God holds all of our heartbeats in the palm of his hands. We go back and we say, you're, you're on the throne. All these worries, all these fears, all these anxieties should be cast aside.

I'm building up my holy faith on the promises of God. See, you build up yourself in the holy faith. Praying in the Holy Spirit. Well, this could get controversial. I will tell you this right now. Charismatic commentaries and conservative commentaries are going to, obviously, look at this differently.

Many, you know, refer to it as praying in tongues and in the New Testament with Paul, and does that still apply today? And I'm actually, to me, I don't read any of that into this. What I do is, how I look at it, is praying in the Holy Spirit.

Are you praying in the Holy Spirit or are you praying in the flesh? D. Martin Lloyd-Jones said this. We all know what it is to feel deadness in prayer. Amen? Every head should be shaking on this one.

Difficulty in prayer, to be tongue-tied with nothing to say. Having to force ourselves to try, that's praying in the flesh. Praying in the flesh is dry and dead. And here's what happens. Many people increase the length of their prayer and not the depth of their heart.

And you know, and I know, that sometimes we think we add on length. I would say, edit that prayer time down. Edit it to, oh God, oh God. And sometimes we just go on and on and on. So you long prayer people out there, be careful.

Are you really praying in the Spirit? Now sometimes prayer meetings can go on a while, don't get me wrong. But I've seen a lot of people just tack it on, tack it on. If we get up to 10 minutes, we're really praying.

Not really, God's looking at our heart. And we know, it's electrified. Praying in the Spirit is living prayer, soul-touching, heart-wrenching, passion-driven prayer. There's boldness, there's assurance versus weakness and doubt.

So what he means by praying in this Holy Spirit is spending time with God. It doesn't, you don't just have a hard day at work, drive in traffic, get home and go, okay, let me pray in the Holy Spirit. And then all this powerful prayer life rushes in.

I like what Robert Murray McShaney said. Sometimes, I think it was him. I spend more time preparing to pray than I do pray. If we have an hour and a half morning worship, sometimes it takes an hour to get the heart right.

It's getting that heart right before God. So that's praying in the Holy Spirit. And many people don't know what that means is because they haven't been filled mightily with the Holy Spirit. See, whatever flows out in your prayer life is what you've been putting in.

So if we've been putting in the world and deadness and all this dark, demonic garbage on Netflix and TV and the computers and the people we shouldn't be hanging out with and doing things we shouldn't be doing and I'm feeding myself and then, oh, Shane said I need to pray this morning and you're gonna get up and try to pray tomorrow?

Good luck. Because what's coming out is what you've been putting in. Unless your prayer life says this tomorrow morning, God, I've been so wrong. I've drifted from you. My prayers are dead. They are cold.

I don't know what to say. God, would you light this fire inside of me? Oh, he'll answer that prayer. If I were you, I'd get that song Fill Me Up and hit the repeat button 10 times. I can already see the emails coming in.

That's brainwashing. No, no, no, no, no. You've been brainwashed to think you don't need to ponder and get your heart right before God. So you only got a few claps on that one because let it rain. Fill me up, God.

Fill me up. God, fill me up. God, fill me up. Please, God, fill me up. It's a heart cry. Fill me up. God, would you fill me up? God, fill my children up. Fill my marriage up. Oh, God, I'm dry. I'm dead.

I need to be filled up with your spirit. God, give me that boldness. Get me over this health issue. God, your word is dead to me. My prayers are lifeless. My life is falling apart. I don't even know you.

Church is boring. God, fill me up. God, would you fill me up? I lay here prostrate before you on the floor. I humble myself before you. God, I need to be filled with your spirit. I desire that above my necessary food.

Then watch out. That prayer will be answered. That's the type of prayer God answered. He says, I hear that broken heart. I hear that heart that is crying out to me. I will not cast away the cries of my children.

What parent hears her child crying in the other room is gonna try to go back to sleep? Especially if you hear somebody trying to break in the room. The enemy is trying to break in your homes. He wants to destroy your testimony, destroy your life.

Gene, this is a very positive day. I'm tired of positive. Positive's not gonna cut it. It's not, I'm telling you. Every single book I've read on revival, and they're this high, began when men and women were broken before God, repenting of their sin, not thinking your best life now and having wonderful thoughts of pleasure and what Jesus can bless you with.

That never brings revival, never. Because it's self-focus, selfishness. So, and then it says, keep yourself in the love of God. What does keep mean? It means to retain possession of, to keep the course, to keep away from sin that pulls you away.

So there's this keeping. I have to keep the course. And this word keep is interesting. In the Greek language, you have this image. I think Charles Wendall gave this image of this vessel on the sea. And it drifts a little bit, but it keeps the course.

You know that, right? When a boat goes from the Atlantic to the Pacific, it's not a perfect straight line. Perfect. Hey, we're off five degrees starboard. We're off, and it's keeping the course. So don't beat yourself up.

Well, Shane, I could never live up. I'm not perfect. I have this issue. Well, we all have issues. This is the issue church. The real church of God recognizes that we are saints, but we all struggle with the flesh.

And we come to encourage, not beat up. We come to build up, not pull down. But sometimes sermons will convict and will pull down. How else do you change if you're not convicted? So keep yourself in the love of God.

It means to keep the course. If you're falling off, get back on. If you know you're doing something you should not be doing, get rid of it and get back on course, keeping that. That's what the Christian faith is.

This was a mind-boggling, just eye-opening truth for me. When I first came back to the Lord, I was thinking, oh, man, I'm gonna be in God's will. Everything's gonna be great. Life's gonna be wonderful.

This is gonna be so good. And then I started to read books like Fox's Book of Martyrs. 11 of the 12 disciples were killed for their faith. This is actually a relationship to God is dying to self, dying to the world, and from time to time, dying in our physical body.

It's a message of death that has great hope. We'll be the person who thinks Jesus is going to fix their problems. And I will tell people that, though. I will say, listen, you need to turn your life over to God.

He can rebuild your life, but you need to get rebuilt spiritually first. That's the foundation. Because people say, oh, God, if you would just help me in this business endeavor, if you'd just get my marriage back, and then something works out, and then they leave God.

Because they didn't understand the depth of their sin, the depravity of their own heart. Because when you understand that and you say, God saved me from that, he's your anchor. You couldn't pull somebody apart.

Now, they might falter and they might struggle in it, but they realize what God has done for them. And then this other one is kind of hard. Looking for mercy. So keep yourself in the love of God and looking for mercy.

Who's looking for mercy? Because this is hard, because it involves loving others. Do you have a cold and calloused heart? Are you looking for opportunity to love others? Look, you have to look for those.

You have to go and do that. Here's how it works, often. I don't feel like going to the hospital homes. Feel, I don't. You catch that word? Feel like it. But I'm going to look for opportunities, and then once you go and you begin to help others, then the blessing of peace comes, and it follows obedience.

That's one thing else, one thing you should know also about your Christian walk is the blessing of peace, the blessing of joy comes after, often. After the right decision, not before it. That's why people, they end up praying for a while, and they're praying in the morning, then they have peace, then they have joy, because they had to battle through the pull of the flesh.

And then verse 22, and on some have compassion, making a distinction. So he's saying, okay, on some people have compassion, make a distinction, but others, save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment defiled by the flesh.

So on some people we are to have compassion, but others we are to warn. Now this is interesting, this was a garment. A garment was a symbol of things affected by the stench of the flesh. So he's saying, don't just hate the flesh, hate even the garment, the things that touch the flesh, that whatever touches the flesh.

Well, how does that apply to us now? I'm glad you asked. You should hate whatever pulls you away from God. That's why many people fall back into sin, they don't hate it enough. They actually, if the truth be told, enjoy it a little bit, and that's what pulls them back.

There's not a crucifixion, there's a comfort in going back to that sin. So he said here, hate even the garment that is defiled, whatever defiles the flesh, whatever defiles. I love when men come up to me and go, do you see this?

What is that? That's a flip phone, that's old school, what's wrong with you? Say, I'm done with pornography, I'm going old school. See, they hate what defiled, they hate what pulled them back or the person, Shane, I've disconnected all this junk in my house, I feel so alive with God.

See, that's how serious they are. It's a person that says, well, I'd like to go back and fiddle with sin, I don't want to get that extreme, that's the other thing people, I don't want to get that extreme.

You hear that guy up there at the pulpit, the bald head? Now that's extreme, that guy is extreme. Well, in Christianity, there's not a middle ground, folks. You're lukewarm or you're carnal of your void of the Spirit of God, you're quenching grief in the Spirit of God, or you're alive with the Spirit of God.

And to be alive with the Spirit of God, you cannot stay in the middle. So what you call extreme is actually biblical Christianity. The last time I checked, dying to yourself, picking up your cross and following Christ unconditionally sounds pretty extreme, unless I'm exegetically not interpreting that correctly.

And I didn't look at the Greek nuances and the verbs if they were in the present participle or if they're in the active tense. I mean, I don't know, but that sounds pretty narrow, pretty extreme. And what we found, what you know, for those of you who are labeled extreme, is it's the abundant life.

It's the Christ-centered, Spirit-filled life. Doesn't mean you don't struggle with sin, but it is this abundant life. Because I know, living in the middle, I am miserable. Remember that M and M, miserable in the middle.

And that's why most Christians leave here still miserable. Go to church miserable. I am miserable. What's wrong with me? Because you're trying to enjoy the things of the world too much. And as I often say, if you don't like what I say or what I'm saying, it's because you need to hear what I'm saying.

One of the most amazing things I think that happens, I show some people the emails that come in. I didn't realize how many people don't like me until emails come in. But they'll say, man, when I first started listening, you were to this or to that or to this, but now I've come to realize that God's Word wants full obedience, fully surrender.

I've never been more excited, more joy-filled in my life. And we often hear that. Because see, what happens, you hear the Word of God come alive and you're convicted, you have a choice. You have a choice.

Do you allow the Holy Spirit to convict and work in your life and turn back to God or do you get bitter and angry and come up with excuses? Remember, the same sun, the same sun that melts the wax will harden the clay.

This will melt your heart or it'll harden you, one or the other. You can watch on YouTube when I did that debate with the atheist at the college and had the closing remarks. Even after that, some people are so hard, so hardened.

But one person who was an atheist, he doesn't know what he was, he actually was encouraged by it. Doesn't believe in their God necessarily. What's the difference? It's always the heart. People will always mock God, mock God, until he brings them to their knees.

And then verse 24, now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling, you better get encouraged right now. Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling, I believe that God is able to keep you from stumbling.

I believe as a child of God, God holds you. I thank God I don't hold myself. I don't hold myself to the cross. Okay, I'm doing good today. Feel pray for me, it's gonna be a tough week. And then now I'm distant from Christ.

Now I don't know him anymore. Now I'm not saved anymore. Then I have to run back and gosh, that was close call. No, he holds us. He keeps us from stumbling. And to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy.

There's exceeding joy in the fact that he keeps us. And that's something if you did not know about this church, I am unapologetically, and I have friends that disagree, I do not believe a person is saved, sealed with the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit's given to them as a guarantee.

He is right here, he keeps us from stumbling, that that person can walk away and reject God and lose that salvation. Because it wasn't earned, it wasn't bought for, they didn't save themselves, they were born again.

They had a spiritual experience where Almighty God has taken them in and holds them as a child. But people get upset. No, you're giving people license to sin. No, I'm not, if they're sinning and they don't care, they're not saved.

I just, I see scriptures of warning, I do. But I also see scriptures like this. If God saves us, and you are born again, you are a child of God, you can't undo that any more than you can go and do your birth, your physical birth.

God holds us, he makes us stand firm in Christ. The Holy Spirit is given to you, the Bible says the Holy Spirit is given to you as a guarantee. So is it a partial guarantee, based on what I do? God help, I hope not.

And you are sealed until the day of redemption with the Holy Spirit. Oh, wait a minute, that's a partial seal. You can undo that seal. See, I can't, I can't go there. I can't see that. But Shane, what about Hebrews six?

Those who have been tasted the good things of God, those who have been enlightened by the things of God, those who have partook of the things of God, if they fall away, they will not be able to renew to get into salvation.

What about that? Well, Judas Iscariot partook in the things of God. He was enlightened, he participated. What happened to him? He was not renewed into repentance. And I know, people, can you lose your salvation, can you, and there's a big debate.

And I love pastors that, you know, we can agree to disagree. Many of you know I was on Dr. Michael Brown's show, and we disagree in this area. We don't talk about it, we don't argue about it. There are scriptures that warn of holding on to Christ, abiding in the vine, don't fall away, don't turn back, but there's also a lot of scriptures on God keeping me from stumbling, holding me together.

He's my Father, a loving Father who has saved me. And that saved is not a condition on my performance. That salvation is not a condition on, okay, if I hold on this week, if I hold on really strong and really tight, it's based on assurance.

Today you will be with me in paradise. You didn't tell the thief on the cross? Well, hold on, hold on until that last minute because you could go either way here. And I'm not trying to mock that. I just don't see how a person supernaturally infused by the Spirit of God, who now has the Holy Spirit residing in them, is now saved by the Holy Spirit, sealed by the Holy Spirit, how they can just throw that in the trash and go back to it.

I love this sin. Now I'm not saved. And then can they go to Billy Graham's gone, but Great Glory Crusade, and now they're saved again? And then here comes that sin again three years later. Man, I was saved two years ago.

And let's go back to it, you know? And this constant battle, I don't see that. I just don't see that in Scripture. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna go into communion just a minute. And it says, whoever eats this bread or drinks of this cup of the Lord in a worthy manner may be guilty of sinning against the body and the blood of Jesus.

Did you catch that? Paul, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in a worthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. See, sometimes we need to hear the hard things to soften our hearts.

Lord, I don't want to do this. So Paul is saying we need a heart check. We need a heart check before communion. But there was a verse that all week I've been just contemplating and meditating on. In verse 23, I don't know if we can put that up there at all, the portion of it.

If not, it's not a biggie. It says, but others save with fear. Others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire. Because they're following, they're following false teachers, clouds without water, carried about by winds, late autumn trees, twice dead, raging waves of shame, foaming up their own shame, wandering stars from whom it is reserved, the blackness of darkness forever.