The Effects of Seeing the Glory of God — David Wilkerson

The Effects of Seeing the Glory of God

This morning, I want to speak to you about the effects of seeing the glory of God. The effects of seeing the glory of God. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, you're teaching us something about your glory. And Lord, it's life-changing when we see it.

I pray you make it so simple today that nobody in this building, even if they've walked in here for the first time, will have any mistake in their mind about what the glory of God is and how to see it and how to appropriate it in their lives.

Lord, I pray that you take the words of my mouth today and make them life and health and strength that would transform us. Lord, you said the vision of your glory is that secret of bringing strength and inheritance to the children of God.

And I pray, Lord, that you speak into our lives now. Lord, I want this message to bring hope to this congregation, to all who hear it. Lord, sanctify me, hide me behind the cross, and let my words be your words, I pray, because I believe you gave me this message.

I speak your mind as an oracle of God. In Jesus' name I pray, amen. Now, about five weeks ago, I spoke on the glory of God. And many of you were not here, and we have a lot of visitors, so I'll recapitulate for just a few moments before I go into the heart of my message.

I want you to know it's possible, listen closely, it's possible for every true believer to understand what the glory of God is. And the glory of God is given to those who seek it with all of their heart.

You can pray the prayer of Moses, Lord, show me your glory. And when he does, he's going to show you the same thing he showed Moses, because there is only one glory, and God defined it himself. So when you pray, Lord, show me your glory, show me who you are, is what that prayer is.

God sent Moses out to deliver the children of Israel without a full revelation of who he was. He just said, go, and say, I am sent you. But there was no explanation or definition of who I am was. And that's why Moses had this knowing, this hunger, this thirst to know who the great I am is, and what his character, what his nature was.

The glory of God is not, was not, and is not some physical manifestation of any kind. It's not some ecstatic feeling that comes upon people. It's not some kind of supernatural aura. It's not a bursting forth of some emotional, physical thing.

The glory of God is a revelation of the nature and attributes of God himself. It's a revelation of his nature, as defined by God himself. In other words, when you get a revelation of the glory of God, it is God speaking to you, telling you how he wants to be known, how he wants you to think about him, how he wants you to see him.

Not as some preacher would define him, but as God himself defined who he was. In fact, God answered the prayer of Moses. He took him up to a cleft of a rock. He hid him in a cleft of the rock, put his hand over his eyes until he passed, so that he'd take his hand off only toward the backsides.

But there was no thunder, there was no lightning, there was no emotional thing. There was no casting him to the ground. There was no shaking of this man. It was simply a revelation. And the Bible said God caused his goodness to pass before him, and then he proclaimed his glory to Moses.

And here is the explanation. Here is God's definition of what he is, of who he is. The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sins.

The Purpose of God's Revelation to Moses

Now, here's my message. What is the purpose, what was the purpose of God showing his glory to Moses? Certainly not to give him some ecstatic moment. Certainly not to just be able to tell his children and grandchildren, I had a glorious grand day one day when God took me to the mountain, and hid me in a cliff to the rock, and I saw something indescribable.

That's not it. God never reveals anything of his goodness, his grace, his power, his mercy without a purpose. There's a purpose in this revelation. Now, the purpose of this revelation to Moses, the purpose of God revealing his glory to us in this day and age, is that that glory might change us into his very image, so that the glory he defined of himself to us, we may define to the world.

We may be an expression of Christ, who is now the fullness of God. He is the goodness and the grace and the mercy of God. Jesus Christ, full of grace and mercy, the Bible says. He is the express image of who God is.

He came down to express that. It's an amazing thing that God did. He so wanted us to know his nature. He allowed a time and a place in history that man could even touch and feel it. That's what John wrote.

He said, the word of God, we saw and we touched him. We were able to touch the glory of God. Jesus Christ, who came into flesh to be a full revelation to us of the mercy, the grace, the goodness, and the readiness of God to forgive.

God wrapped that all up in Jesus and sent him as a man and said, Now, here's my glory. Jesus Christ is the manifest glory of God. That's not difficult, is it? It shouldn't be complicated for us to understand.

But we all with open face, beholding as in a glass or a mirror, the glory of the Lord. We are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of God. Now, simply put, that means once you get this revelation of the glory of God, of his love, how loving he is, of his graciousness, his tenderness, his long-suffering, his readiness to forgive, and his forgiving multitudes.

Once you get that and once you appropriate that, the Bible says that will change you moment by moment as the Holy Ghost reveals you the fullness of that truth. As you go into the Bible and little by little you see it on every page of the book.

You begin to see it. You take it. You claim it. The Bible says it will change you little by little. You will become like the glory. The glory. I'm going to show you that the glory of God is not out in the cosmos, but it is in you, in Jesus Christ.

We'll get to that in just a moment. Now, Paul explained it even stronger. He said that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, he said, I want you to know me in my glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him.

God said, I want you to understand him. Moses understood it. I want you to understand it. I want to open your eyes by my spirit, and I want you to see who I am to you. I'm not just a God of wrath and judgment.

You've got to know my nature. There is wrath in me. There is anger in me. But my nature is love. God is love. That's what he is. Wrath and anger is what he does. This is what I am, he said. The eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory is of his inheritance.

In other words, how this rich glory is going to be a part of you and in you, and what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us who believe, that you being rooted and grounded in this love. He said, I want this revelation to be so real to you.

I want you to see it, because that's how you're going to become rooted and grounded in love. You may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and the length and the depth and the height, and to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge, that you might be filled with all the fullness of God.

The fullness of God is his glory. That you might be filled with this revelation, and being filled with the revelation, it is the power that changes you. Now, when God shows us that Jesus Christ is his full expression of who he is, in other words, Jesus came as the glory of God, loving, merciful, kind, tender-hearted, gracious, long-suffering, even to the sinner, the rankest sinner on earth, God loves and is merciful.

And he said, once you get that vision, it will root you, it will ground you, it will fill you with the vision of Christ, and you, as you keep looking at the Word, and seeing it, and studying it, and claiming it, and appropriating it in your life, you're going to be changed, changed, changed, keep changing from glory to glory.

It means from revelation to revelation to revelation of this one truth. The Bible said we're changed from glory to glory. That means you're affected by this vision. The first and foremost effect of the revelation of the glory of God that is in Christ Jesus, that it changes your relationship with the Lord.

Seeing God's Glory Changes Our Relationship With Him

It changes your relationship with the Lord. Now, immediately after Moses gets this revelation of the love of God, the mercy, and the grace, and the long-suffering, he is so overwhelmed by it, he quickly finds a place to fall on his face, and the Bible says Moses made haste.

He had just seen this revelation of the great love of God. How long-suffering, how patient God is with His children, with stiff-necked people, with idolaters, and with those who have grieved Him, and how merciful and gracious.

And he's so overwhelmed by this vision of the glory of God, he finds a lonely place. The Bible said Moses made haste, bowed his head to the earth, and worshipped. Now, folks, this is the first mention in the Bible of Moses worshipping.

Church, you will find prior to this revelation of the goodness of God, you'll find this man praying many times. He talked face-to-face with God. You'll find him pleading with God for the people, interceding and weeping.

You see him singing God's praises at the victory site of the Red Sea, after God had destroyed Pharaoh and his army. You hear him crying to the Lord at the bitter waters of Merah, when there was no water, and the people were murmuring, complaining, and he cried out to the Lord.

He cried out to the Lord at Rephidim, when they were ready to stone him. And you find this man taking, he goes outside the camp and he prays, he seeks God, but, folks, you can be one who prays constantly, you can be one who intercedes for your family, for nations and for churches, you can be one who cries out to God for the needs of yourself and your family, your friends, and still not be a worshipper.

And still not be a worshipper. Moses knew how to pray. He knew how to intercede. He had intimacy with God. But he, for the first time, worships. It's the first time you hear it said, Moses worshipped.

I'm telling you that there are many people who pray diligently, who have never learned to worship. Now, folks, I'm not going to add to all the confusion about what worship is. So many books on techniques of worship.

I have to tell you honestly, I don't believe there's a technique of worship. That is contrary to everything in the Scriptures as far as I'm concerned. You can't learn worship. Worship is a spontaneous outbreak, a spontaneous outbirthing of a revelation of who God is, of His mercy and His grace, His love to you, how you should have been cast aside, how you should have been destroyed long ago, how you should have had the wrath of God for all your failures, our failures and our faults, and then suddenly God comes to you with a revelation, I still love you.

This man now has hope, even though he'd interceded for the children of Israel when God wanted to destroy them for idolatry. You know, when you look at that story, here's God saying, Moses, let me alone.

They build a golden calf, they worship around it, now let me destroy them. Moses is pleading, no God, don't do that. That makes Moses sound more compassionate than God. But that's not what it was all about.

God had no intention of destroying these people. This is a mercy test for this man. How are you going to represent me to the people? God all alone, because God had some promises ready, already in His mind.

He said, I'm going to do great things such as never been done for Israel, and my presence is going to go with you. That was His heart all alone. But you see, even though Moses had pleaded with Him, He went down from the mountain and He killed 3 ,000 of them.

The ringleaders, in anger, the Bible says. And He broke the tablets. And even though He pleaded with Him, I know that after that, He thought to Himself, Oh my God, my Lord, how am I going to lead these people?

They are stiff-necked, they're stubborn. And He knew that they had hidden in their tents the idols, those little golden mice they brought, and the two most lurid gods they brought out of Egypt, and still hidden in their tents.

Amos said so later, that all through the wilderness, they had them hidden in their tents. He knew that. He thanked Himself, Oh God, what day, what hour, what time are you going to get fed up, and lose your patience with these people?

They're so stiff-necked, they're so hard, they're so rebellious. Lord, I don't know how I'm going to lead them. At any time this could break out, and Lord, you might have to destroy them. But now, here comes this revelation.

I am merciful, I'm long-suffering, and now Moses is saying, Oh God, they're stubborn, they're rebellious, we're stiff-necked people. And you said that you have mercy and forgiveness for thousands. We're those thousands.

We need that mercy. And while he's still worshiping, he's claiming it. I appropriate the glory. I appropriate it right now. Now, folks, that is an integral part of worship. Now, we may have our ideas how we please God with worship, but did you ever think that God has His own ideas as to how He's being worshiped?

And I, as way I see it interpreted in the Scripture here, God knows He's being wholly, truly worshiped when you and I lay claim to His glory. When we, in our difficulty, we, in our guilt, and in our condemnation, we simply turn to Him with all of our hearts and we say, God, You have told me that You have mercy and long-suffering.

I need long-suffering. I need it now. I claim it. And God is worshiped when He sees His people laying hold of those rights that He has given to them by His own words. It's not somebody going on and on and on in prayer saying, Oh, Lord, I love You, I love You, I love You.

Just words. God's saying, No, wait a minute. I love You. You're going to worship Me. You're going to lay hold of My love. How many see that? That means it could be one of the greatest worship services of all if we just come into His presence and fall before Him and just glorify Him for His love and just soak it in and say, Embrace me, Lord, I need it.

I need a hug. You ought to get up every morning and say, Lord, I need a hug. Go before God. Before you go to bed, Lord, I need a hug. I'm hurting. The Holy Ghost is right there to show you the arms of Jesus to embrace you.

Hallelujah. Do you know that's the spring of my worship? That's the spring out of which my worship goes to Him. Father, I know You're holy. I know You're just. I know You don't weaken sin, but I've seen Your glory.

You're not out to destroy me. You're not condemning me in my struggles. You've showed me how loving and long-suffering You are to me. I deserve rejection. I should have been cast aside. I've failed You so often, but You revealed to me that Your mercy, grace, and tender heart, and I claimed that I need it.

Like one young man prayed, God, I guess I'm your bad boy. You're going to have to help me. Have you ever felt like God's bad boy or God's bad girl? Now, if you know God revealed in Christ as a merciful Lord, you can say with Jeremiah, and I want to give you a scripture, folks, that at a time, even while I was passing this church, became a life-strengthening word to me.

In fact, one day, God had to give me this word. Many of you that are sitting here don't know the battle I went through three or four years ago. There were all kinds of accusations and slander and all kinds of things, so much so that I would sit in my apartment and weep and say, Honey, I just can't go to church.

And there were some that had risen up in telling awful lies, and I would meet young people backstage and say, Are you a phony like they say you are? And I'd say, What? And I would go home and say, Honey, I just don't understand this.

I've given my heart. And I got to the place where even a pastor was visiting. He said, Brother Dave, I've heard about some of the suffering going through. He said, Is it God or the devil after you? And it offended me.

God or the devil? But it planted a seed in my heart, and I went home and said, Lord, if I'm under discipline, show me why. If you're correcting me, show me what it is. And there was about a month that I could hardly come into this church.

I would sit in my study, and my wife would have to pick me up. And I'd get halfway to church, and I'd say, Honey, I can't do it. I can't go on. I can't face another young person or another person asking me if I'm a phony.

And so it got to a place where I was so grieved that I came upon this Scripture. Because I said, Oh God, if I hear another rebuking word, I'll be reduced to nothing. It will reduce me to nothing. Have you ever been to that place where you've gone through it, and then you pick up the word?

I used to go into word during that time, and then I shouldn't have been so much in Jeremiah, I guess, and Ezekiel, but, you know, blind shepherds and the wrath of God and everything else. And I said, Oh Lord, what's going on?

And then one day the Holy Spirit literally spoke a quiet word into my heart to turn to Jeremiah 10, 24, and this is what I read. Oh Lord, correct me, but in a just way, and not in your anger, lest I be reduced to nothing.

God said, Listen, David, if you're going to discipline one of your children or grandchildren, are you going to go out and find the most vicious criminal on the street and give him the belt and say, Go spank my child?

No, no, no. God said, If I correct you, it's because I love you. He said, That's not what this is all about. Just stand still now and see the glory of God. Folks, God's Spirit came upon me. Many in this congregation didn't know the battle that I'd gone through.

Pastor Carter, God sent him to stand with me through that time, like a giant. And God undertook, but this scripture, Oh Lord, correct me, but in a just way, not in your anger, lest you bring me to nothing, lest I be reduced to nothing.

And folks, there comes a time where you come to the house of God and you're so down and you say, If I hear one more word from anybody putting me down, I'll be reduced to nothing. And God knows that. That's why He brings an encouraging word.

That's why He brings the message of His glory to your heart. Hallelujah. Now, with Moses, the revelation changed him in another way also. The second effect of seeing the glory of God is a change in countenance.

God's Glory Transforms the Believer's Countenance

The scripture says, And the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, and the skin of Moses' face shone. Now, a person's countenance is the outward expression of something accomplished in the heart. Now, listen to me closely, please.

Moses had already been on a mountain another time for 40 days and 40 nights, and he came down and his face didn't shine. In fact, he came down and dealt with this idolatry at the golden calf. There was no evidence of his face shining.

You see, you can be in the glory, but it doesn't shine until the glory is in you. He had been in the glory of God, but the glory had not come in. And this comes to what Paul says, It pleased God to reveal His Son in me, that I may preach Christ.

Not to me, but in me. God revealed it in me, the scripture says. Paul means, I have more than a doctrine someone taught me about Jesus. I have more than a head knowledge of Jesus Christ. I have a revelation of who this man is that I serve.

I know his nature. I know who my Christ is. And He abides in me. That's what I preach, and that revelation becomes the source of my life, so that the very life that I live is the life of Christ. I live on His love, His glory, His mercy, His long-suffering.

I live on it. It's changed me. It's my life. It's what I live. It's what I preach. It's what gives me meaning in my life. This revelation of Jesus Christ and His nature, the expressed image of God, the fullness of God that is in Jesus Christ.

Hallelujah. You know, it's not enough to go about saying, I gave my heart to Jesus. Jesus lives in my heart. That's fine, but you know who He is. It's just a cliche if you don't. It's just a meaningless word unless you can say, well, I know who Jesus is.

God is love, He's mercy, He's grace, He's long-suffering, and He has a readiness to forgive. And one day, He invested in His own Son all that He is, His own nature, His own character, and He sent Him to this world in the form of a man.

And Jesus came to this earth to let all mankind know that He loved them. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.

God's Nearness to the Sinner

Sinner, I'm telling you right now, I've said this all my ministry, God's not mad at you. I don't care what you've done. I don't care where you are. I don't care if your back's slidding right now. God's not out to get you.

He's not out to bring you down. He sees your struggle, He sees your cry, and He's only a breath cry away. He's only a heart cry away from you right now. He stands by the door knocking, seeking entrance right now into your heart.

God is not mad at you. If you'll understand that today, you'll begin to see that you can have the glory of God when you invite Jesus Christ into your heart. You bring into your very being. He abides, He lives here as the fullness of God.

He lives in you so that you don't have to go for your grace and mercy out somewhere. The Lord said the word is nigh you even in your mouth. You don't have to wake Him from the dead. You don't have to scream at Him.

I've been in churches where everybody's screaming at God trying to get His attention. Oh, I love loud praises to the Lord. He said, let everything I breath praise the Lord. Make a loud noise unto the Lord, the Bible says.

Loudness doesn't bother me, but screaming at God to get His attention does bother me because that's unbelief. He is nigh us. The revelation of God's character. Listen to me closely. This whole thing can be abused.

The Bible makes it very clear. In fact, Jude speaks of those who will turn the grace or the love of God into lasciviousness or as an excuse to sin. They sin that grace may abound. In other words, if God's mercy and He loves to give His mercy, if God loves to express Himself through forgiveness, then I'm going to give Him plenty of opportunity.

I'm going to sin and let Him just keep loving me and let the grace flow. And what a testimony to the world. I am an object. All of this love that I am bringing down from heaven, I'm going to sin that grace may just flow.

And people can see I'll be an example. I'll be an example that you can sin and God is everlasting love. And as long as you sin, His mercy is everlasting. And I'll be an example of His grace. Paul said no, no, no.

He said that's not what it's all about. That is despising the grace of God. But those who despise the glory of God are easily spotted. You can see them. In fact, Isaiah said of the Israelites who provoke the eyes of His glory, listen, he said there are some that provoke the eyes of His glory.

The show of their countenance witnesses against them and they reveal their sin as Sodom. They can't hide it. I want to tell you something. There are Christians, and I say this lovingly, that hear the message of grace and they grasp onto it.

This great love of God, ooh, that's wonderful. Now, isn't that good news? Because I've got a problem in my life. I'm an adult. I'm in a situation that I just can't let go. I'm not convicted of it enough to let go of it.

Oh, but it's so comforting to come to Chimes Square Church this morning and hear about how much I'm loved and how long-suffering the Lord is. So maybe next year at this time, after the Lord's suffered with me long enough, I'll let this go.

But I want to tell you something. Your sin witnesses against you. Whatever's in your heart is going to show in your countenance. It can't be hidden by a smile. Now, countenance has to do with the way you walk, your talk, your whole disposition, your character.

Everything that you are is your countenance. Even the rankest sinners realized who the disciples were, that they'd been with Jesus. How could they tell? They didn't look like anybody else. They'd gone around with a silly grin on their face.

They weren't trying to cover anything. It was so much so that the very shadow of Peter, they just wanted to get in the shadow of Peter because there was something they recognized. This man's been with Jesus.

I can tell when people have been with Jesus. There is a radius. They may not even be smiling, but there's something about them. I'm not talking about auras. I'm talking about a recognition in the Holy Spirit that this person is right with God.

There's nothing hidden. There's nothing secret. There's an open face. But somebody that's hiding something, somebody that will not come to this love and say, Lord, let your love cleanse me. I don't want to have to be beaten down by the wrath of God to see it.

Lord, I see it in your love. You have loved me through all this. Now, Lord, I won't do despite your love. And you can tell the person that's hiding something, even the sinner on the job can tell, hey, something's not right with that one.

That Christian, something's not right. Folks, I have walked into churches, large churches. Believe me. And I could tell the moment the pastor walked out and sat on the stage, on the pulpit, the Holy Spirit said, there's something wrong here.

There's something wrong. And as soon as he got up to preach, I knew it because there was a lightness. Everyone who has hidden sin, there's a lightness. There's not that wonderful spiritual mindedness.

You sit at the table and you can tell the lightness. Those who have it right with God, those who have appropriated this glory, and it's changing their countenance. They're changed every day. They're becoming more and more like Jesus.

The world is becoming less and less attractive to them. Material things are losing their hold. They're cleaving to the Lord. And it changes you, brothers and sisters. It changes you. And oh, what a glory in a church when the whole church is that way.

Hallelujah. According to the apostle Paul, Moses saw the glory and the revelation in his heart, so filled him, it changed him. Now, I honestly don't believe it was just some physical emanation from his face, even though he put a veil over it, because if you read Hebrews, the Bible said it was because their hearts were hardened.

They were so afraid of the righteousness that this man had seen, the glory and the revelation that was in his heart, and it brought such peace. And the rest of this man, it was not just some bright emanation, because if you read one of the prophets also, it talks about the horns.

Or rather, I don't know what the chapter is. It also talked about the horns in his hands. He had no physical horns. There was a power that God had entrusted in his hands. This was something that had changed this man so much.

All his people, his brother, his sister, everybody, said this man has had some experience with God. He's gone beyond. Folks, there is a place beyond the norm. There's a place beyond where so many Christians live.

It's a total commitment to walk with Jesus. It's a commitment. I give my life. I give my all. I'm going to seek His face till I find Him. Hallelujah. Now, folks, that glory abides in us now. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined now into our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face or the person of Jesus Christ.

Did you get that? You've read that, but now God help you understand. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, now has shined into our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face, that means the person, in the person of Jesus Christ.

That when you receive Jesus Christ, you receive into your life the very glory of Almighty God. All of His character, His personality, that is in Christ Jesus. Jesus didn't come and leave His glory somewhere else.

He brought His glory with Him. And I'll tell you what, that glory in you teaches you how. Now, listen very clearly to the Scripture. For the grace of God that bringeth salvation has appeared to all men.

Now, that grace of God is nothing more than Jesus Christ. He is the grace of God. He is the love of God. And He abides in the heart, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lust, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world.

How do you learn to walk holy? How do you learn to be sanctified? Through the glory that abides in us. He said, if you will allow Me, through My Spirit, I will teach you. Teach you sanctification. Glory will open up righteousness in your being.

Hallelujah. And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, abound to every good work. Now, I must hurry on to the final. There are many effects, but the final one I want to discuss with you this morning.

The Glory of God Changes How We Treat Others

One of the most important effects of seeing the glory of God is a change in our relationship to others. A change. Once you get this revelation of a loving God, the love of God in Christ Jesus, once you get that, you cannot continue in old ways of treating other people.

You can't do it. You've got to have a change, the Bible says. Paul warns, if God has shown you how tender and kind and loving He is, especially to you, you'd better show it to others. In fact, if you do not show the love of God that He has shown you to others, you misrepresent Him.

Now, listen to what the Scripture says. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving. Now, this sounds like the nature of God, doesn't it?

It sounds like the glory. Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven you. He said, you saw the glory, you know what I am now. You must express who I am to others.

Now, God dealt very severely with Moses, even though he had this revelation. He, at one time, misrepresented that glory before the people. This is the second time he goes to a rock, and in anger he smites that rock as if to say, you stiff-necked bunch of rebels.

And God doesn't take kindly. That's one thing God's patience will not endure. That once he shows you who he is, his glorious kindness, and you've had it expressed to you, and you've lived the joy of it, and you turn right around, and you become that man who was forgiven a great debt because his master had love and compassion and tenderness to him.

That's our Christ. And you turn right around to a brother or sister, and you hold bitterness, you hold a grudge, you will not forgive, you will not be kind-hearted to that person. God said, you misrepresent who I am.

You've been given a touch of the glory, you've seen it, you've touched my glory, and now you've misrepresented who I am to the world. And, folks, that's why you remember the time, some of you were here when God smoked me right on this pulpit because I'd preached a rather hard message, and I was laid out, and God made it clear that we are not to condemn the righteous or to offer comfort to the wicked in their sins.

We're not to encourage people in their sins, but we're not to rebuke the righteous. Now, I've had somebody come to me and say, well, brother, didn't Paul say rebuke and reprove? But read the next verse, with all longsuffering, with God's glory, with grace.

He said, with all authority, in grace. Read it. Reprove, rebuke, with all authority, and in longsuffering. But once you have had that longsuffering offered to you, and you will not show that tenderness and mercy to others.