 We're looking forward to January. We are at the end of this month having our 2015 call for discernment conference That conference is entitled hope and a homosexual agenda, and it's going to be January 23rd through the 25th 2015 you can find more information at the website hopeintruth.org We're at Cornerstone Baptist Church 3370 Snow Hill Road in Chuliota, Florida 32766 and it's a joy to have on the phone with me Mike Gendron, Mike is going to be our guest speaker for this conference. He's with proclaiming the gospel ministries. How are you doing Mike? Well, I'm still blessed and enjoying God's creation and all of the beauty of His Majesty and Abiding in his word. It can't get any better than that mark Amen, amen, and that's what we want to do too with this conference We're abiding in God's word We want to be faithful to God's word and we want to present the truth of God's word to people at this conference Hoping the homosexual agenda and we're grateful to have you as our featured speaker And I wanted to ask you Mike for our WTL and listeners those who might be listening in and wanting to know more about what this conference Is going to address you know often we We hear the accusation if you will that we tend to focus in on or in fact, you know pick on or Talk about homosexuality as if it's a sin set apart unto itself and How would you address those that might say well you're just picking on homosexuality or you're just picking on that particular sin You know, why would we address this particular? Why would we do a conference like this? How would you answer that question? Well, mainly we're addressing the topic of homosexuality is because there are many pastors and denominations that are normalizing Same-sex relationships. We now see that 36 states in America are approving gay marriage And so this is an issue that's not only affecting our culture, but also our church We have people that call themselves gay Christians and One of the things I'm going to address in one of my messages that there are false converts in our churches and those who think They can be a Christian and also practice homosexuality. They're just false converts And so there's a special method of reaching false converts They're either victims of self-deception Hearing God's word but not doing what it says or the victims of external deception where people have told them that homosexual Relationships are not sinful in the light in the eyes of God And so we have to be careful how we address them. We always have to lead with compassion and love Speaking the truth in love. In fact, one of the messages that I will be doing Deals with how we are to approach them. We need to be kind and gentle and correcting those who are in opposition to the truth of God's word Of course, Mark This doesn't mean that we don't contend and fight for the truth with spiritual weapons We just need to do it the right way the biblical way. We need to be approachable We need to be easy to speak to compassionate and sensitive We need to avoid being harsh. We need to avoid being abusive or pugnacious overbearing or contentious We need to be kind and loving because that's the only way to reach people People are going to run if we don't speak the truth in love and of course This is all only possible if we maintain a humble spirit We know that that's what God extends grace to those who are humble and so We're dealing with very proud people who are Aggressively pursuing the homosexual agenda and we need to let them know that God Extends grace to the humble but he opposes the proud and so we need to model that true humility is when our focus is Defending the Lord Jesus in his word and not defending ourselves because We're going to be attacked people are going to come at us and say that we're homophobic and We just need to let that slide off our back and proclaim the word of God because In the word of God it's an inherent power To convert the soul and to save people from the power of the sin That actually entraps them whether it be homosexuality or any other sin That people are involved in Jesus Christ is the only hope And so we need to approach the homosexual community For the glory of God and doing it his way and not our way Amen i'm reminded of So many examples that we've seen in the past of professing christians Maybe a professing church and not a church at all in fact that would like west borough Baptist We've seen them on the news Confronting this movement in very unbiblical and unloving ways How do you think that kind of Approach to addressing this issue has hurt the cause of christ or the the cause of churches in addressing this agenda Well, we need to be christlike and they're definitely not christlike if we read How the lord jesus engaged centers he did it with great compassion and with love And that's what we need to do You know when you look at the ministry of our lord jesus on this earth He got on the face of religious leaders that were deceiving people But he showed great compassion for centers And so mark we need to ask ourselves are we are we a bridge or a barrier to homosexuals coming to christ? Are we pointing them to christ or are we pushing them away from christ? And so those are the questions we need to ask and again we need to approach people with Humble hearts and with great compassion speaking the truth and love Yeah, that brings up a very good point. You know you mentioned how Often the the christian or that that loving brother or sister who is trying to bring the love of christ the gospel of our lord And savior jesus christ to someone enslaved in that sin And they often get labeled with accusations of homophobia or gay bashing How might you encourage a christian genuine brother or sister who wants to share the gospel? With someone enslaved to that sin. How might you encourage them or exhort them to approach them? How might they answer that accusation of homophobia or gay bashing? How would you Help them with that? Well, I think again it comes back to the attitude of our hearts We shouldn't be intimidated by the aggressive pro-gay culture We we need not to run from our god-given responsibility and that's to publicly stand for the truth of god's word and so No one needs to shrink back just because we're called names We need to be patient when people Are speaking unkindly of us recognizing there but by the grace of god go I So that's what um part of my message will be in 2nd emity chapter 2 that we are to Be able to teach and patient went wrong And so we must be forebearing and able to endure mistreatment Without retaliating and anger and that's what that's what the flesh wants to do and I could say I've been guilty of that in the past, but if we go into each witnessing opportunity Equipped with the word of god with a humble lovable Spirit and then I think we will draw people to christ rather than push them away Amen, you know and considering our lord and savior jesus christ who endured such hostility from centers against So you know following his example to get the gospel out the lost people But thank you for that very much brother. We're so looking forward to having you here for our conference Again, that's hope and the homosexual agenda It's our 2015 call for discernment conference January 23rd through the 25th 2015 at cornerstone baptist church There's a limited seating. So please register today at hope in truth dot org Or you can call our church offices at 407 971 7685. We look forward to seeing you there and god bless you You