 Amen. So you're going to keep your place in 2 Timothy chapter 4. We're not going to get there for a few minutes, but I might have you turn somewhere else, and you're going to go back to 2 Timothy chapter 4. So keep your spot there and don't lose your place in 2 Timothy chapter 4. So the title of the sermon this evening is Santa Claus is Evil. All right. Really, Pastor, you're really going to preach a sermon. Santa Claus is Evil. That's really the title of the sermon. Yes, that's the title of my sermon. Let me first say when I start off here that I'm not mad at Santa Claus. I'm not upset at Santa Claus because Santa Claus is not real. So I'm sorry, kids. I'm sure all the kids in the church already knew that. We have the kids in this church that are the ones that are ruining it for all the other kids out there. They're out there at Home Depot probably telling everybody that Santa Claus is not real and you've got 10-year-olds crying on the ground that Santa Claus isn't real. But the point I'm getting at and the reason that I would preach a sermon like this, and I haven't preached a sermon like this really ever, I don't think. I think I've mentioned it before. The thing is though, it's not harmless. When I say Santa Claus, it's evil. What I'm talking about is he's obviously fake. It's not a real thing. I'm not upset. You can't be upset at the Easter Bunny. You can't be upset at Santa Claus. I'm talking about the idea of Santa Claus. I'm talking about the idea of these things. This is why I always find it interesting when you see these hardcore atheists like Richard Dawkins and all these people that they're literally angry at God. I'm like, what in the world? You don't believe in God. How can you be angry at someone that you don't even think exists? It's odd. It's weird. I'm not upset. I'm joking when I said Santa Claus is evil. The idea of Santa Claus though is evil. I want to show you that this evening. Just like everything else that is false today, there is a subtle agenda to the Santa Claus fairy tale or whatever you want to call it. I guess the Bible would call it a fable. So you say, are you really preaching a sermon against Santa Claus and the answer is yes. And I want to show you three reasons tonight why it's not something that's not serious. It's something that we should all take serious and it's something that we should be able to defend when people come after us and say, oh, you don't have your kids open Santa gifts or you don't perpetuate that lie to your children. So I'm gonna give you three points tonight that show you from the Bible how it is not an unserious thing. That's actually the devil's agenda by the way is to get you to take things that are serious, that make things that are serious to subtly make them not serious. As a matter of fact, one of the guys said in the promotional video for the church, I think it was Brother Alex, but he just said it beautifully where he said, you know what the Bible does is it makes sin pop up to you. It makes sin exceedingly sinful, the Bible would say to you. Whereas what Satan is trying to do is make sin less visible to you. He's trying to make sin, you know, cover it up. He's what? He's subtle, the Bible says. Meaning he's sneaky, he's silent, he's not upfront. That's why, you know, false religions many times are subtle. They're lies, but they're subtle about it. Why don't you just come out and say that you think that I can have my own planet one day Mormons? Why don't you just come out and say that I can be just like Jesus and be, you know, the leader of my own alien planet? Why don't you come out and say that? But that's not what they say. They say it subtly. We believe the Bible. We believe exactly what you believe. Why? Because they're perpetuating a lie. And subtlety is Satan's gain. And Santa is no different. So I'm gonna give you three reasons tonight. Turn to Ephesians chapter four. Keep your place in 2 Timothy chapter four. I'm gonna give you three reasons why you should, you know, defend your stance of, you know, not buying into this lie that everybody else out there is buying into with what? They're children. That's the first point right there is the first reason Santa Claus, the idea of Santa Claus is evil is it targets kids. It targets children. Turn to Ephesians chapter four. So the average age in the US, this may surprise you, especially the parents in the room, this is gonna surprise you. The average age in the US where children stop believing in Santa Claus is right between, it's about eight and a half years old. Between eight and nine years old, by 10, by age 10, think of that. Look at the small children in this room. By age 10, 20% of kids still believe in Santa Claus in the United States today. Now just, we talked about this on Sunday, but compare this to salvation. What are the general age ranges where, you know, children will get saved if they're sitting in a Bible preaching church and they're out soul winning with their parents? The age ranges where kids will get saved are way before 10. It's five, six, seven, eight years old. These kids will get saved. So you literally just wrap your head around this for a second. You could literally have a saved child out there that still believes in Santa Claus. I mean, as a Christian parent, that drives me crazy to even think about that. But look at Ephesians chapter four and look at verse number 14. The Bible says this, it says that we henceforth need no more children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive. But speaking the truth and love may grow up into him in all things which is the head even Christ. So just to break this down for a second, Paul, he's talking to adults here. Okay, he's not talking to children here, but he's saying don't be like children who are what, who are easily deceived, who are tossed to and fro pointing out that children are easily deceived by what, by the slight of men. So men will lie to you and it's the children. Paul is using the example of a child, the picture of a child to say you as an adult as church members, as brothers and sisters in Christ at the church in Ephesus, at this church everywhere, he's like you shouldn't be tossed around like a child. Meaning that you can be tossed around if you are a child. The Bible teaches all the time, I'll just read for you Proverbs 22, verse number six where the Bible says train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it. What does that mean? Train up, that means they're not trained. They're not up. They need to be trained up. They need to be taught up. Now I don't know if you ever thought about this. I actually turned to Proverbs 22, six, you can look at the verse with me. But I don't know if you've ever thought about this, this way, but you know what? What if you applied that in the negative? You ever think about that? Train up a child in the way he should go and he will not depart from it. What if you have somebody that trained a child in the wrong way? Now obviously salvation, the Holy Spirit, any adult can get saved and follow the Holy Spirit and change in their life. But this is generally true of many people. If they were raised wrong, if they were raised the wrong way, they're not gonna depart from that. You could apply this to the negative as well, even though the Bible was really saying, look train them this way and then when they're old they won't depart from it. How can I raise my children to, you know this is the big question for the Christians today. When kids get 18 years old they stop going to church. They're not going to church anymore and kids are leaving Christianity and all this kind of stuff. Well they haven't been trained up in the way they should go. That's why. That's why they're in some happy, clappy church that doesn't preach any Bible, that tells them what they wanna hear. We'll get there in just a second, back in Second Timothy chapter four. Tells them what they wanna hear, not what they need to hear. He gets somebody that stands up behind the pulpit and gets to a verse and starts talking about some sins that he knows he's staring at in the church. He's like I don't wanna say that but you know what what's not said can also be a lie. If you sit there as a pastor, as a preacher, you get up and you preach day in, day out, week in, week out, 150 sermons a year and you never preach on something else. That's a man that's lying to you. That's a man that's not telling you the truth. So a child needs to be up, when, what? When they're young. The Bible here is implying that children are very impressionable, that children can be tossed to and fro. Look, so on the first point that it targets kids, parents look, you better get paranoid. If you're not paranoid already, you better get paranoid about things being pushed on kids. Why? Because they're impressionable. Because they can be tossed to and fro. What do we see today? What do we see all the perverted agendas today? Who are they targeting? The kids. Every single time. All the sickos and perverts and all that stuff is being pushed where? It's not being pushed on adults, it's being pushed on impressionable children. Why? Because it works. Because this is Satan's subtle plan. It's evil. And look, Santa is no different. The imperative of a trainer is that you have the trust of somebody that you are training. I mean look, the best trainer is somebody that everybody that he's training just completely trusts him. So why as a parent would you lie to them? Why as a parent would you tell them anything that is not true? If the truth is what you're after. It's just like a pastor that lies to you. But that's what the Bible says. The second Timothy chapter four that people will want people that lie to them. People that want people that will tell them what they wanna hear, not what they need to hear. Look, and I'm talking about even about something small. And I'm gonna show you this evening that the idea of Santa Claus and teaching kids Santa Claus is not small. There's an agenda behind it to undo what the Bible teaches about the very basic points of salvation. Look, I was thinking about this today. This parenting idea. And why all these kids are being targeted for all these different things. Santa Claus just being one of them. And I was thinking about this analogy to just kind of figure out how can I make an analogy about kids being tossed to and fro, kids needing to be trained up. If kids are trained in the wrong way they may never depart from that. Just like if they're trained in the right way God promises they'll never depart from it. But I was thinking about this and I thought about, I thought about I had this, I had like a real live, like most of you younger people probably don't know this but like the real red rider wagon, the metal one. You know what I mean? That's what I had when I was a kid. And I had this huge hill by my house and I decided I wanted to make a go-kart out of this wagon. And it was the wagon where if you fold the handle back you hold the handle like this and you kind of steer it with the handle. And it was the real metal wagon. And what I did was like this wagon, this is a steep hill it's gonna tip over if I go down this hill in this wagon. So what I did was I grabbed some wood out of the wood pile that my dad had and I grabbed these really sturdy pieces of wood that were like, it was like door casing. And I made these wings out of the, on the side of the wagon. And I attached them to this metal wagon with I think I used nails. I just nailed them right through the metal wagon. And so I had these wings that I thought were really structurally sound. And I got to the top of this hill, how do you think it went? I broke off and I almost killed myself. But the point is I was thinking about this analogy today about parenting. And parenting, what the Bible is telling us about parenting here is that parenting, you're getting in a go-kart and you're kinda at the top of this big hill in this go-kart and you're kinda putting your kids in the go-kart and you're riding down the hill, your kids are riding down the hill in this go-kart and at the top of the hill it's not very steep. And look, there's no brakes on the go-kart. There was no brakes on that red rider wagon. None. Once you start going down the hill, you're going down the hill. This is the parent's life right here. At the top of the hill, it's not steep. It's not steep and you have a lot of control. But as the hill goes on, the wagon starts going faster and faster and faster and you get less and less control. At the top you can make major corrections. This is what the Bible is saying. The Bible is saying that children are easily impressionable. Look, that's where salvation is in that area up there. Salvation's at that top of the hill where there's easy corrections and they're very impressionable. Four, five, six years old. But as you go down the hill and the speed picks up, the danger becomes greater. The danger becomes greater and the corrections that you can make become much smaller when those kids get to be seven, eight, nine, 10 years old. The problems that you can run into get greater and greater and greater as you continue down the hill. Remember, there's no breaks. There's no saying, oh, we need to stop. Walk back up the hill and start over. No, no, no, you're headed down the hill and you can only make corrections, big corrections at the top of the hill. At the bottom of the hill you have good destinations. At the bottom of the hill you have a good place you can end up, where's that? That's the victorious Christian life. That's the child that got saved up towards the top of the hill and not only did they get saved, they learned the Bible, they're spiritual, they're a soul winner and they wanna go out, they wanna get married, they wanna have a family and they wanna continue living for the Lord in their adult life. That's the victorious Christian life. That's the destination at the bottom of the hill where everybody wants, everybody wants that wagon to end up, everybody. But there's all sorts of other really bad destinations down there too. There's bad destinations down there like jail, like drugs, like the feminist life of misery, like the young lady that decides she just doesn't want a family and doesn't want all these things. Oh, she'll figure it out when she's 38. You're already at the bottom of the hill, you can't go back up the hill. See the problem is though, the problem is is that people don't pay attention at the top of the hill. They spoil their kids at the top of the hill. Instead of training them, they spoil them. They give them whatever they want, whatever they think will make them happy. Whatever the cultural norms say that the kids need and the kids will like, that's what they give them. All the stupid cultural norms like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny and Halloween, it's all the same thing. Then they get to the mid bottom of the hill, they get to the mid point of the hill and they're starting to see what's on the bottom and they don't like it. They don't like what's down there. The drugs, the failure, the fornication, the disease, the hordom, the hormone-ongering, the illegitimate children, they don't like all that. Nobody does. They like Santa Claus and all the other lies where they're just like, they're just willy-nilly with their kids, let's go over here, let's go over here. The school says I should do this and the counselor says I should do this and the TV says I should go this way and they get to the bottom and they're in hell and they're like, how did I get here? It's because they didn't pay attention at the top and you can't steer at that point. When you're going 50 miles an hour down the hill and you're almost at the destination, it's too late. It's not going to work. So the Santa thing is just, it's a lie. It's a lie. You're up here at the top of the hill and you have all the power to be the most impressionable that you can be. See, look, it's not about making your kids happy. It's about telling them the truth. The Bible is talking about training, about nurturing. It's about teaching them the truth. There should be no lies at all in that, at all. If you lie about one thing, what else did you lie about? The trainer must have the trust of the person being trained. Look, the reason that Santa targets kids is because they're the most vulnerable and they're the most influenceable. It's very simple. You say, well, what's the big deal? Some fat man flies around with his deer and gives people presents. What's the big deal? Turn to 2nd Timothy chapter four. So the first problem is that it targets kids in their most vulnerable times of their life. At the top of the hill, at the beginning of their life. When they're learning everything and they're the most trusting of you. 2nd Timothy chapter four, the second reason that Santa Claus, the idea of Santa Claus is evil is it makes Jesus fake. He's like, what? That's pretty extreme. Look at 2nd Timothy chapter number four. Look at verse number two. The Bible says, preach the word, be instant, in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine. Paul is talking to a future preacher here. He's telling them, preach the Bible, preach the whole Bible, whether they like it or not. Whether it's popular that day or it's not. Say the whole thing. Four, and he's warning them, he's telling them this, he says, the time will come. Well, they will not endure sound doctrine but after their own lusts, they'll they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. He's saying, there's gonna be a time where they're gonna take the Bible preaching pastor and they're gonna throw him out. They're gonna want some pastor to come in and they're gonna want the pastor to lie to them. They're gonna want the pastor to not tell them everything in the Bible and just tell them only good things and not the bad things, which is probably like that much of the Bible. I mean, when you think about it, I mean, God's, it's all warnings. It's all warnings and wrath. Why? Because God loves us. That's why. And they shall turn away their ears from what? Look at that. They shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned unto fables. Paul is telling this preacher here, this future preacher, that there's gonna be a time when people, they grab somebody to tell them what they want to hear, not what they need to hear, not what God has told them. See, folks, it's not about whatever makes your kids happy. That's not your job as a parent and that's the attacks you'll get on people. Oh, Santa, it's fun and all this, but being a parent has nothing to do with just doing things that make my kids happy. You know, these are the parents that you'll find a parent that just wants to make their kids happy no matter what and they will lose control of the wagon at the top of the hill. You got a parent that can't control a three-year-old or a four-year-old? You have no chance. You have no chance. The world is gonna control that child. The world is gonna steer that wagon. You can't control them when they are the most controllable, the most impressionable and you can't even be an influence on them at that point. This is why you don't spoil your kids. This is why the Bible gives all the specific ways to train your kids and to spank your kids and to discipline your kids, not to be mean or not to be abusive, but because you love them. You literally don't love them if you don't wanna steer that wagon. So the Bible is saying here, the Bible is saying in 1 Timothy chapter four if we just apply that to children and apply that to it, the Bible is saying some things are good for your kids and some things are bad for your kids. You can't just say everything's good but isn't that what we've been taught today? Don't judge, don't ever make a judgment call on anything. There is no evil, everything's great. No, some things are bad for your kids. Don't teach them lies. Don't teach them some things that are lies and some things that are true. I mean, are you crazy? Don't try to impress lies upon them. And I said Jesus is fake. How does Santa Claus make Jesus fake, pastor? Isn't that kind of an extreme statement? Well, don't teach them some true things. Don't teach them about this guy. I had a parent one time that I knew and I heard them say to their kids, Jesus and Santa are friends. I'm just like, what is happening here? Don't teach them about this man, Jesus Christ who was God in the flesh. Don't teach them about that. Don't teach them about this man that came to earth that was born of a virgin that was God in the flesh. All the miracles that he did, all the amazing things that he did, the kindness that he had, the love that he had, the sacrifice that he had. And guess what? The eternal kingdom that he is reigning over and that he will reign over for eternity. Don't teach them about that, that truth. And then teach them all the same things about fake Santa. I mean, what are you trying to do? That he's this loving father figure. He has all these magical powers. He can magically fly around the world and do all these amazing things that, I mean, he's basically, he must be God to do this. He's eternal. Santa's been around forever, right? Centuries. He must be eternal. He literally has the same attributes of God and Jesus except it's all a lie. It's all not true. You don't think that's gonna shake someone's faith? Shake someone's confidence when parents lie to them for eight, nine, 10 years of their life? Just to do what? Just to make them happy? Just to spoil them? To give them what they want? It's wicked. It's evil. It's the epitome of bad parenting. So that, I mean, he takes the place of Jesus. Except Jesus is true. That's the problem though. Jesus wasn't, isn't some moral story. Jesus was really born of a virgin. Okay, we're celebrating Christmas. I don't know if he was born on December 25th. Probably not, but we're celebrating the birth of the Messiah that God sent, his son to die for the sins of the world. That really happened. And if you trust in that, you will really be passed from death to eternal life. Really. It's true. So don't teach all these parallel lies to your small children. Like the idea that people could do this, it just, I know it's shocking. But here's another one. It gets even worse. Here's the third one. So Santa, I mean, he tries, he's a lie that tries to replace Jesus or takes the same attributes of Jesus. The second one is this. It promotes works-based salvation. The idea of Santa Claus is a subtle, a subtle attack on the gospel itself. You say, what? Look, turn to Revelation chapter 20. Here's the important list in the Bible in Revelation chapter 20. Look at verse number 15. But what does Santa teach? It says, be good, get a reward. Do good things, get a reward. He makes a list. He checks it twice. Just make sure he didn't make a mistake, I suppose. But you're not on the list. Coal or whatever, right? We'll get to that in just a second. But look at Revelation chapter 20, verse number 15. I mean, this is kind of a parallel to the Bible. The Bible says that whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. Whosoever is not written in the book of life is not getting a lump of coal. Whosoever is not saved, the Bible is saying here, is gonna spend in eternity in hell, which will eventually be in the lake of fire. See, but here's the problem. You say, what's the big deal? What's the big deal? This is Santa Claus, it's not real. Here's the problem, folks. Salvation is not a reward. You're like, what? It confuses the gift of salvation. It confuses the very idea of a gift. I mean, how many times have you gone out soul-winning and you do the gift example to somebody and you say, what if I gave you this pen or this invitation, and then I said, okay, but you have to go wash my car once a week. Is that a gift? How many times has anyone ever said, yes, it would still be a gift? Never. Because people know what a gift is, but this confuses the gift of salvation. Work hard, be good, get a gift. But wait a minute. I mean, kids all across America, listen to me, they believe in Santa Claus. You need to revolt right now. You don't work for a gift. All the kids that believe in Santa Claus should be against all these presents from Santa being gifts and they should look at it and they should open it and say, I earned this. Because that's what they did, right? They worked for it. There was a list that Santa checks. They earned that gift thing. And you'll see this with what Christian churches teach today. Nobody really gets coal in the Santa story. I wonder what the percentage of parents out there that teach this lie of Santa Claus to their kids that are like, you know what, you're a brat. Here's a chunk of coal. You probably couldn't find a chunk of coal in California to save your life. But it never happens. You know what this does? This promotes this idea that yeah, as long as you try, everybody's going to heaven. And how many people believe that? That's what everybody believes. Everybody believes that if they're pretty good, they're gonna make it to heaven. That's, in one version or another, that is what the vast majority of people believe. Do you know if you're gonna go to heaven and they will give you some version of I think if I'm pretty good, I'm gonna get to heaven. You know, none of those people that think that will be in heaven. The Bible is super, it's either works or it's grace. It is not a mixture of the two. The Bible is very clear about that. I remember, I recognized, see, this is such a Protestant, even Catholic belief out there that nobody really goes to hell. I started to recognize this scam when I was just a teenager. I remember going to Lutheran funerals. I was decades away from being saved. I remember going to Lutheran funerals and listening to the pastor at the funeral talk about the person that was in the casket and just be like, we know they're in heaven because of their baptism or because of this or because of that or whatever. And I'm just like, I started to realize this is a scam. I'm like, you know, you go to a funeral, you're like, I knew that guy has never been in church. That guy hated church. That guy was a drunk. That guy, I mean, you believe in work salvation and you're looking at somebody who was a terrible human being who hated church, everything it stood for and the pastor's up there preaching like he's in heaven. I'm like, this doesn't seem right to me, but it wasn't right. None of it's right, because nobody's getting to heaven by their good works, because if they have at least one bad one, you got one sin, you're done. So you say, why Christmas gifts? Why do we even give Christmas gifts? Turn to Matthew chapter two. So look, it confuses the gift of salvation because we don't earn our salvation, folks. You got your salvation as a gift, like a real gift. You didn't do any work to get it. You say, well, where does the idea of Christmas gifts even come from? In my opinion, it's one of the dumbest things we do as Americans. We get each other these Christmas, look, I do it too in my house. We give Christmas gifts and we buy all these gifts and we ship all these gifts across the country and then people ship all these gifts to us and then some gifts get stolen and then we're all like, oh, I got stolen. And then some guys running down the street with my Christmas gifts and I'm in my car like, what are you doing with my Christmas gifts? I shouldn't, I wasn't supposed to tell this story. But it's just a really dumb thing that people do as Americans, but where did the idea of even gifts for Christmas come from? Now no one's gonna get me anything. Look at Matthew chapter two, verse number 11. Here's the first, there's two leading theories here. The idea of where the tradition of gifts came from. It's Matthew chapter two and verse number 11 that the wise men gave the child Jesus gifts. Look at verse number 11. It says, and they were coming to the house, they saw the young child because they weren't there at the birth, okay? Even though the nativity scenes say that. And when they were coming to the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother and fell down and worshiped him. And when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. So there's kind of one of the theories of like why we give Christmas gifts as the wise men, the kings brought gifts to Jesus. But really, I mean, the main reason that I believe that Christmas is surrounded with this idea of a gift is because Jesus is the gift. God gave his only begotten son. God gave us this gift. But look at Romans chapter five and verse number eight. But the problem is this folks, and this is what Santa Claus twists. We didn't earn that. As a matter of fact, the Bible is very clear to point out that we did the opposite of earn it. We did the opposite of earn Jesus coming here. We didn't deserve it. We didn't try. We didn't even get right. Nobody repented of their sins. And then God's like, oh, they repented of their sins. I'm sending Jesus. No, nobody earned anything. It was just a gift. Look at Romans five and verse number eight. But God commendeth his love toward us. That means he showed his love toward us in that while we were yet what? While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God gave us this gift when we were sinning against him. We did nothing to earn it. We did the opposite. We should have got coal. We all, everybody deserves coal. Everybody deserves, hell is what the Bible would say. Is what the Bible clearly teaches. Every single person that has ever lived is a sinner and deserves to go to hell. But God, while we didn't deserve it, gave us a gift. He gave us a way out. Because there's no way we're getting ourselves out of this. You can't be good enough. You can't be good enough to cover up something you've already done wrong. It's not possible. You can't go and murder someone or steal someone's car and then say, well, I'm good. You're going to jail. And God is the ultimate judge. He is the righteous judge. He never makes mistakes. So we didn't work for our salvation. If you're saved tonight, you didn't work for that. You trusted on what God gave you and he gave it to you as a gift. And the word gift, everybody understands. Even a child understands. Just that word means it's free. Salvation is not a reward. And the gift from Santa is a reward. It confuses. It confuses. Turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 14. I mean, was work done for either of those gifts? Did Jesus the child work for the gifts that the wise men gave him? No. Did we work for the gift of salvation? We didn't work for Jesus. No. Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 14. You still think it's harmless? Folks at the top of the hill, that's the time to be focused, not sowing confusion with your children. Look at 1 Corinthians 14, 33. The Bible says this. It says, for God is not the author of confusion. It's in all the churches of the saints. Turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 11. Turn to 2 Corinthians chapter number 11. See, at the top of the hill, the major corrections can be made. But also the major errors. You can steer either all the way the right way or you can steer all the way the wrong way at the top of that hill. So don't do anything as a parent to do these two things. Don't do anything as a parent to contradict God's word. This is why the Bible speaks so harshly against hypocrisy, about a parent being a hypocrite, about a parent telling his children one thing and then doing another. This is why God made children at the age of three, four, and five years old hypocrite detectors. This is why children are so in tuned to what their parents say, but they also, and more importantly, they watch what their parents do. God gave them that. Do not do anything as a parent. Look, no one's a perfect parent. But do not do anything purposely like Santa Claus and these lies to contradict the word of God. The second one is this. Look at 2 Corinthians chapter 11 and look at verse number three. The second thing that you should never do as a parent is never do anything as a parent to confuse the simplicity which is in Christ. You see, Satan has no choice. God has made the gospel simple. You go to a Pentecostal church and ask them what it takes to be saved. You can get some confusion there. You can get some confusing answers there. They're gonna be like, well, you gotta do this and you gotta do this and don't sin seven times in a day and do this and you gotta go whoo! You gotta just do all, you're gonna get some serious confusion. You gotta let this snake bite you and you gotta watch me die. I mean, whatever, I mean, it gets weird. But it's confusing. It's sowing confusion. Don't do anything as a parent to confuse this simplicity. See, the gospel is already simple. Satan has to confuse it. He has to make it complicated because it's already the simple best answer. Imagine being up against that. Somebody's got the best answer. Occam's razor. Occam's razor, the simplest solution is usually the best. That's the gospel right there. And he's got it. He has no choice but to confuse it. Look at 2 Corinthians 11, verse number three. The Bible says, But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve, how did he do it? Through his subtlety, so your mind should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. The gospel is simple. It has to be corrupted and made complex and confusing in order for it not to be accepted. Don't do anything to confuse that simplicity. It's like God's packaged it up for you. He's packaged it up for these kids. And it's so simple that literally we will be out soul winning and a 10 year old will get saved. An 11 year old will get saved. A 12 year old will get saved. You'll have bunches of kids just understanding who Jesus is, what he did for them, what they have to do to get the gift of salvation and they'll just get saved right on the spot because it's simple. Don't do anything to confuse that, especially in these crucial years. I mean, the idea of Santa is evil. It's to confuse children. And it has direct targets on salvation in their Christian life. Now, I want to take a couple of minutes and just go over some accusations that Christian parents are gonna go through if you just shun Santa from the moment your children are born, which you should. And for your grandchildren and your great grandchildren and Santa is just not a part of your household. The first one is this. Oh, you're no fun. You're no fun. Let me tell you something. I was very joyful in my house. And Santa has nothing to do with it. That's a ridiculous, even statement. I mean, is there any other joy that is the joy that is in Christ? Is there any other better joy than knowing that while I deserve to go to hell, I have been given a gift of salvation and I don't have to go there anymore. And not only do I not know that I'm not going to hell, I don't ever have to worry about ever going to hell. God has made me that type of promise through Christ. No, and now I'm gonna spend this December 25th remembering that God sent this savior for me who deserve nothing of it. And that's not gonna be joyful because of some fat fairy tale. Give me a break. It's ridiculous. So that's ridiculous, but here's another one. And this is for the moms out there. Moms, homeschooling moms need to get meaner. They need to get meaner when people attack them because you know what, moms? I would have loved to have been there every single time my wife got attacked for our beliefs or homeschooling or raising our children according to what this book we should do. I would have loved to have been there every single time but I was there for very few of those times actually because people won't say anything when I'm around. But moms need to get, homeschooling moms especially, Christian homeschooling moms need to start turning into Wolverines in this country. I read, you know what they'll say, here's the second one they'll say, oh, you're too serious. You're too serious. You're taking this stuff too seriously. Yeah, you bet I'm serious about my children. You bet I'm serious about how I bring up my child according to what God says I should and shouldn't do. I read a blog post a few days ago about a mother's reaction and I wanna read this for you. And moms, you need to get like this. Especially amongst other women that would come at you and subtly throw in digs about how you're doing things. Because guess what? You're right. And if you're doing things the correct way, you know what, don't feel bad if you've hurt somebody's feelings. Who's being outright rude to you. But I wanna read you this blog post. And it was this woman, she was asked and like this has to do with homeschooling but you just apply this everywhere in your life ladies. This lady was asked and you'll be asked this very question because my wife has been asked, I've been asked it just maybe a handful of times, my wife has been asked this many times. And what people will do is this lady says we were asked why we homeschool. And she was explaining how when people ask her why they homeschool, it always turns into this rabid, angry response from the person defending why they do things the way they do things. So get the picture here. You have a homeschool mom who has asked a question. And this is her response. She said when I started homeschooling I would get asked why I chose that path. Honestly, or honesty would get them immediately defensive of their choice and then instead of listening to me they would start telling me why they would, could, never do it, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. She says. So look, here's another thing. If you ask a homeschool mom genuinely on it, like why do you homeschool? They will be more than happy to tell you. But this woman is explaining that every single time she was asked, she was almost immediately cut off and the person just started angrily, I've seen this so many times, started angrily defending why they don't do it that way. Before she could even get her answer out. And then she continues, she said to which, she's saying this is the reaction that I get. And she says to this reaction I generally respond, I don't care. I didn't ask you, you asked me. More moms should say that. Just when they start going off on why they do things, why they have a career, why they're leaving their children at daycare, why they don't think that homeschooling is it, why they think the public school is fine, why they think all these things are the right way to go, I don't care. I don't care. I didn't ask you because what homeschooling mom would ever want to know? She already knows why they made that decision. Because they're greedy. Because they're not saved. Because they don't believe the Bible. Even if they are saved, they're not gonna sacrifice anything in their life for their own children. She's like, I don't care. I didn't ask you, you asked me. Memorize that one ladies, use it. Get used to people not liking your choices as parents. But guess what, they're all asleep at the wheel. They're all asleep at the wheel and they're asleep at the wheel the whole way down the hill. And you may think, you parents of young children, you may think that they're gonna get down to the bottom of that hill. And when the destination they arrive at is jail, or death, or disease, or fornication, or a ruined life in whatever form that may be, you may think now that oh, they'll realize then, they will never realize. Unless they get saved and have the Holy Spirit in them and start listening to this, they will never realize. They'll blame other people, they'll blame the system, they'll blame their own children at that point. But they will never realize. So just get that pipe dream out of your head. I used to have it too. They're all asleep at the wheel. Get used to people not liking it when you steer at the top. Because they're all laying down in the wagon. So it's not a small thing. All these lies that are told to our children. There's agendas behind everything. You look at anything that is being pushed on kids. You go into any cartoon. You go into any media that is targeted towards children. And there is a wicked evil agenda. And you see why? Because everybody wants in the wagon, in your kid's wagon, at the top of that hill. If you don't steer, somebody else is going to. That's by our heads and have a word of praise.