 But tonight I'm beginning a brand new study and so you get your Bibles out and get ready to take some notes. All of you that are online we're glad that you're joining us as well and we want you to dig into this word tonight. This brand new study this evening is not something new from the Bible as far as that goes. The Bible is the Bible but I'm bringing this brand new series to you over the next several weeks concerning the crosswalk. And dealing with the cross this week I want to deal with the sin nature. Over the next few weeks I'm going to deal with the willpower of an individual to be an overcomer. I'll talk to you about your faith what it takes to be an overcomer. Some of you are wrestling with sin and my question is why when Jesus has already taken it down. If you're fighting and struggling with sin my friend you shouldn't be fighting with sin. Jesus has already won that battle. Over the next few weeks I'm going to relay that to you. Tonight is an important foundational lesson because it is the place that separates the majority of churches today and the individual who is living for the Lord has their face towards the cross and understands the basis of why we need to be saved. And so tonight we're going to dig into it and get your Bible and turn with me over to the book of 1st John chapter five verse four. This will be the base scripture for you for this entire series. It's one of my favorite and I believe that it speaks to how we should live because the Bible is written not for your decline, your depression or your somehow defeat. The Lord, I want you to know God never made a plan for defeat. I want to try that on again. God never has a plan for defeat. If you're defeated it's because your faith has been put in the wrong thing because Jesus will never be defeated. He once and for all settled the issue. He said it is finished and if you'll follow his plan and what I'm going to be laying out to you over the next few weeks then you will always be an overcomer. This Bible was written for overcomers and I'm amazed when I read in the book of Revelation in you two of the seven churches of Asia that every one of them, every one of them the Lord allows his grace and mercy to operate in that place to say to him that overcomeeth even to the church at Laodicea who was literally rejecting God to his face and he was so sick of them that he was ready to spew them out of his mouth and the Bible says to even to the Laodicean church which represents the last day church before his coming even to them he says to him that overcomeeth. So I'm telling you tonight that God has a plan for your overcoming, for your victory but you must choose the right place and understanding what the Bible says about it will give you the understanding of how to be victorious not only in this life but of course in the life to come. So Lord open the understanding of your word tonight to us and help us God to gain the full knowledge and understanding of what you desire for us because it is your will that we are victorious in every part of our life and we praise your name for it. In Jesus' name, everybody said a good amen. In the book of 1st John chapter number five verse number four, mark it in your Bible, underline it. I want you to look at it for this is what the Bible says. For whatsoever is born of God, overcomeeth the world, stop. Are you born again? How many born again people are in here? Let me see your hand. Then if you've been born of God, then you are to be, he calls you an overcomer against the world that we're living in and this, notice this, this is the key, this is the key to that overcoming. And this is the victory, the victory that overcomeeth the world. Well what is it? You're waiting for this grandiose one, two, three kind of punch. He says, this is the victory that overcomeeth the world, even our faith. You mean faith is gonna cause me to overcome? Absolutely. If he added anything to it or took anything away from it, it would be invalid and everything Jesus did on the cross based upon the scripture would be absolutely null and void. We're gonna lay this out over the next few weeks. So before you write anything down, I want you to get this into your understanding because this is so critical for us tonight. I'm excited about this lesson series and I want you to wrap your mind around this because we're talking tonight about the sin nature, the sin nature. So in an attempt to appease the conscience of mankind and also to appease the congregants, the people coming to church, the message of the cross has been ignored or it has been changed to somehow conform to a religious culture. And what does that mean? That takes on a dynamic that looks like this. We're gonna add Jesus to your life to make your life better. This is the way it comes out. How to be successful, you can have a better life, all of those kind of things, but I want you to hear what I'm about to tell you, I'm about to lay the ax to the root of the tree because this is a false message that is absolutely designed to serve self. What can I get out of this? How do I preserve myself? Self-denial is precedes taking up your cross to follow him. You cannot carry the cross of Christ in your daily walk if you have not first, according to the scripture, denied self. Jesus said, if you're gonna follow me, deny self, take up your cross and follow me. The denial of self is so critically important because your mindset and mine is always self-preservation. It always defaults to that because of the sin nature. Now follow what I'm telling you because most of the modern church today preaches how you can have a better life. Most sermons, listen for it carefully. Most sermons are about you. You're thinking about it right now, aren't you? Most sermons are about you. Not about how I can serve the Lord or serve others. It's about how the Lord can serve me. Blessings upon me. How can I get out of this? What can I do, you know, have three ways to fix it, whatever that it may be, and it all centers itself around self or you. This is the modern message that has taken the cross and the blood and redemption and I'm gonna say it in this way and gutted the message of the cross. So it has no effect. In fact, when the true message of the cross is preached to most congregations, it becomes an offense. Now what is it offending? Well, it's right here in the Bible, I believe that, but the cross offends what? The flesh. The moment you're told to deny yourself is the moment that flesh starts trying to preserve itself. So when it comes to sin, now listen carefully to this because what this entire series is gonna challenge most people's theology here and there because you've heard for a long time that sin is a matter of choice. You choose to sin or you choose not to sin. And that is a misconception and a false message in and of itself because once you understand about the sin nature and the fact that you were born in sin according to David's writing and in sin did your mother conceive you, then it no longer becomes a choice of whether or not I can or cannot. The choice is inherited by mankind. Sin comes from the sin nature and every person here and all of you watching and every person that's ever been born with the exception of Jesus Christ was born with the sin nature on the inside of you. Now, if you don't start with that basis, which is biblical, it is a biblical doctrine and I'm gonna show you this, we're gonna walk it down. If you don't start with that and you get what most people are preaching today, okay, is we're gonna make your life better. We're gonna add Jesus to what you are. You don't have to change anything, we're just gonna make things better for you. Or if you don't start with the sin nature, you start with this premise and this is the basis of the lie from the Garden of Eden. All people are good people and if you start there and start trying to build on that, you're gonna have a crumbling foundation because the sin nature, I'm gonna show you in a moment, defined literally is the fact that every one of us, not only were born in sin but that sin nature absolutely resides in each and every one of us. The old preacher that used to mount this pulpit, Brother Clinton used to say it like this and I might not say it exactly right but you won't know cause most of you don't know him. But he would say that there's still enough sin on the inside of every one of us to send us to hell. Well pastor, I've asked the Lord to forgive me in my sins. That's not what I'm talking about. The sin nature is ever with us. And I'm gonna show you this tonight. Once you understand, I don't start off good and this is what I hear even from preachers that have massive congregations. You're good. God is a good God and you're gonna be good and everything's gonna be wonderful and you just do this and you just do that and you're gonna have wonderful success. But my friends, if you start off with your goodness, the Bible is completely contrary to that. He says your goodness, your own self-righteousness is as filthy rags in the eyes of God. You cannot start with your goodness because you'll never be good enough and why is that so important? Because you'll always be trying harder to be good when in fact the flesh or the old man or the sinful me can never please God in and of itself. Now this is what would be called an investigation. I was privileged to be on one when I was working in the fire service and I didn't really understand what it was gonna take but when I showed up there with the FDLE and the whole house was burned down and somebody died in it and we had to figure out what the problem was. The first thing that they told us as firefighters to do is get over here and we're gonna move it layer by layer and we started moving layer by layer and when they told us, all right, take the next layer, take this wood off, take these ashes out of here and we got all the way down to this mobile home and we washed it and scraped it away. You literally could see where the person who had set the fire had actually poured the chemical on the floor all the way through. This message is an investigative message, not of your neighbor. God wants to scrape away all the stuff that's piled up in your life to make you feel good about it or even bad about it because the devil is an extreme devil. He'll never let you be in a balance. He always pushes you to, you're not just bad, you're real bad. You might as well, you might as well kill yourself, you're that bad or you're really good. Oh, nobody needs to tell you what to do, pride. Do you see those extremes? Okay, so this message is gonna help you discern who you are in Christ, how it starts and what's necessary for us to be an overcomer. So the false message goes a lot of times like this and you may have said it to yourself, you know what, I failed God, I sinned or whatever that I did. Okay, all right, I'm gonna try harder and this is what it looks like, I'm gonna try harder and don't raise your hand, I'm gonna try harder so I'm gonna read my Bible more so I can feel good about myself, come on somebody. I'm gonna pray more so I can feel better about myself. I can feel like I am doing something religious that God would accept as a sacrifice. Now let me just give you a little background in the mind over here. That's the same scenario that took place with Cain and Abel. One offered an acceptable sacrifice and the other one did not. But it wasn't that both of them didn't have the opportunity to offer up the sacrifice if they would have simply obeyed God. Are y'all with me out there? So trying harder, because that's where a lot of people get trapped by the enemy in this cycle and then they try hard, try hard and it seems like I never can make it. And if you're not careful, you'll get around somebody really religious and they'll tell you because you didn't cut your hair above your ears or you didn't wear this dress or you didn't do this or you didn't do that, you can't be one of us. Now ladies and gentlemen, when you get into that stick of religious mode, you have stepped from the freedom that God asked you and wants you to have in Christ Jesus to a cult. Are y'all with me right here? I'm trying to go slow as I can, but I feel my push happening right here. So the false message of I'm gonna try harder is man's attempt to please God. But never able to attain, never able, I'm always trying and what happens? I get in this cycle of trying, trying, trying, trying, trying. I don't want you to raise your hand, do not raise your hand. I said do not raise your hand. Have you ever felt guilty over missing a service? Or felt guilty over not reading your Bible today? Or felt guilty because whatever. There's a long list of that. And the enemy always remember from Romans chapter eight. As a matter of fact, let me give you a little homework assignment right here. Romans chapter six, seven and eight, you need to read it and reread it and reread it again over these next several weeks. If you can get those three chapters in your spirit, my friend you will be an overcomer in every situation that comes into your life, no matter how desperate that you have tried to overcome. So when we get in this cycle of trying harder and harder and harder, after a while, it wears the flesh out to try to be godly in our own self. So trying to be good, trying to, trying to produce the fruit that actually belongs to the spirit, like the day that you say, you know what, I'm gonna love everybody, is the day that the Antichrist comes to visit. Am I right? The day you say, you know what, I'm gonna do my best to be patient. I'm gonna try hard to be patient today. How many of you know at that moment, everybody's late to work, you forgot your keys, the car broke down, come on somebody. Believe me, it happened to me yesterday. I'm just telling you, I pulled up in the parking lot, already had my stuff in my head, I knew what I was gonna do, and I never made it to my office until afternoon, because we had a leak out in the middle of the parking lot. But George, in the middle of the parking lot, there's no faucets, nothing, asphalt. But all weekend long, it's been bubbling up, and we got this clay that's coming down. Some of you might have seen it out there, it's still out there, still busted up. So we spent the morning trying to figure out what in the world's going on, and there was a devil, three feet down right there, called a compression coupling. Are you hearing what I'm saying? Right? So, I won't talk about you, I'll talk about me, all right? All right, so God never asked you to try to be saved. Are you hearing me? Instead, what are we supposed to do? We should surrender to the already finished work of the cross, and start walking the crosswalk, if you will. This is the assurance that we read in 1 John 5 and 4, that is our victory, our overcoming victory, by faith. Now you know why God made it that way? So that Bill Gates and me could be saved, because if the fee was too high, Bill could pay it. Come on somebody, if it was too high, he could pay it, and it wouldn't even be a sacrifice. But faith is required for the pauper and the prince, and it's the only way you're gonna get to God. Okay, so we're breaking it down. So without a proper understanding of the cross, and the work of the cross, there is the work of the cross, and there is the way of the cross. The work of the cross has been done by Jesus Christ, and finished, and I wanna just tell you right now, there are certain things that the cross accomplished that you and I have not received yet. And we will not receive until we're into the future. I want you to know the cross is not just one time event where he gave his life, Jesus gave his life for our sins, and then all that's done, no, no, what he did on the cross happened then, and for our lives now, and into the future. There are certain things that the cross purchased that we have not even yet received. Let's just throw a couple on, of the glorified body that you shall have, and the cross made provision for that, he paid for that. How about dominion of the entire to the world? Right now, the prince of power, the heir, Satan, is in control of the situation. But one day, Jesus said, the appropriation of the cross is gonna be completed by me taking that dominion back and giving it to my people. Are y'all with me? That's just two things. There's many things that the cross has done, so I don't want you to get in your head that, oh, it's just the cross, it's just salvation. My friend, it's not just salvation, it's justification, it's sanctification, it's redemption. Come on, somebody. And all of those theological terms describe what the Lord does inside of our life on a daily basis. But without a proper understanding of the work of the cross and the way of the cross, there is no victory to overcome sin and live a victorious life. It starts with an understanding of how we got to this place of a sin nature to start with that we were all born with. So now, write this down. The Bible is about the work of redemption from the book of Genesis to the book of Revelation. The cross being then the central object of our faith. The cross is the object of our faith. You're gonna hear this frequently. Because I'm gonna tell you, for all of you that have been in church for a long, long time, this is gonna break the ground of your theology in a major way because many of us have been raised in a religious environment until we don't even know many times truly what we believe. But more importantly, what the Bible has to say concerning our faith, and we like to attribute our faith and connect it to works, and the next thing you know, we've made a law to ourself that we can't even keep ourselves. For example, we're only a few months away from turning another year, 2023, and on the first day of the year, even church people, Christian people make New Year's resolutions. I'm gonna lose weight. Great, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that. And people make this, I'm gonna read the Bible every day. And I'm gonna pray every day. And so you make a law to yourself. You don't know it, but you make this law to yourself. And now that religious thing kicks in and says, now you made a law, now you're gonna have to keep it in the back of your mind, it's still there. So you wake up the first morning, you read the Bible the second morning, third morning, fourth morning, you did good the first week, but then all of a sudden something happened and you didn't get to do that on the sixth day. But you said, I'll make it up. But here comes the devil, because the devil brings condemnation to you and says, look at you, look at you making, look at you, you said you were gonna do it, but now you're not doing it. Well, I'll do it tomorrow. You're having this conversation with yourself. And God's saying, what are you doing? You just put yourself under pressure that I didn't put you under. You made a law that I didn't tell you to keep. If you're gonna serve me, you're gonna have to serve me by faith. I'm about to make it easy for you. Not easy, but easy. So where does this sin nature start? Well, here it is in a simple phrase. Because of the fall of Adam, man every person after that, with the exception of Jesus Christ, was born with a sin nature. You'll find that in Romans chapter six, verses three through six. This is so important for you to get a hold of. Because if you don't start with this foundation of Romans 3.23, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, well, I'm a good person, Pat. That's the reason why people get offended when preachers, if they still do in many places, call people sinners. The word sinner has been outlawed by the modern church. I want you to hear what I just said. The word sinner, Jesus called them sinners, hypocrites, vipers. How many of you know that will offend some folks? Especially the Pharisees. Now, I'm gonna say it like Jeff Foxworthy. You might be a Pharisee if you get offended by the name sinner, right? There's a little test whether or not you're a Pharisee or not, whether you're a religious person or you have a relationship with Jesus Christ. Because, ladies and gentlemen, the word sinner has been outlawed because when you say someone has sinned or they are a sinner, suddenly the flesh repels the very thought of it and starts into self-preservation mode. So because of the fall of Adam, so some of you may not know what the fall of Adam is, it's very simple. It's Eve's fault. I'm just trying to do a little shock and awe on you, some of you are falling asleep. So, here comes Lucifer, he's in a different form, hanging up on a tree like a snake and he starts making the suggestion to Eve that it's all right for you to do what God said for you not to do. So sin by any definition is simple disobedience to what God said. Okay, period. And none of us can claim ignorance because you'll find out even our human nature which came from God puts a check in our spirit on things that are not right. Now, the further we get deprived away from God in our society, consciousness gets seared and people don't know right from wrong and that's where we are today. That's the reason why you as a believer must have an understanding of this. Because what you're gonna be confronted in in the days ahead is relativism like you have never seen. Don't tell me I'm a sinner. Don't tell me I'm going to hell. Don't tell me this, don't tell me I'm wrong. I'm not wrong, you're wrong. This is the atmosphere that we're in right now and unless you have an understanding of this, it's very easy to slide into a place of a nice, sweet religious location. That never bothers you but I'm gonna tell you something my friends. I don't care if you come to this church or to another church, you need to hear what I'm telling you. Wherever you go to church at, it better be a church that preaches the whole counsel of God that will challenge your own heart on a daily basis. And that's not about the preacher yelling and screaming and throwing a mic and spitting on you. I'm talking about the convicting power of the Holy Spirit. You hear what I'm saying? It's not for me to impose my convictions upon you. It's for you to find out what this word says and let the Holy Spirit do the convicting. Are you with me? So the fall of Adam happened because Eve took the fruit, Adam was out of place. He was not in his rightful place where God put him. He should have been between her and the devil but he allowed her to get to a place where she starts hearing this. She takes the fruit and then the Bible says she gave it to him and he partook of it and the next thing you know, sin entered in because they disobeyed God, period. Not because the fruit was good, not because this, because we understand that she saw it and it looked good and she tasted it and so did he and it tasted good and I have to ask you what sinful thing have you ever done that hasn't been tasting good or looked good or acted? I mean, if it tasted like, if all sin tasted like cash roll, why would we be doing it? Right? If the Lord would just put like some nasty in it that when we tasted it, that's what makes it so comical for me when I like to watch westerns and so the cowboys belly up to the bar and they grab, give me a whiskey and they grab the whiskey and they go, yeah! Well, they didn't call it rotgut for nothing, right? That was good, really? You understand what I'm saying? So Adam, because we are of the Adamic nature or from our Father Adam, everything after Adam, according to the scripture, you'll find it in the book of Romans that one man sinned, that's the reason why when Jesus came in, he was the one man who took away sin. But when Adam sinned, we all fell with him. So that's where you get thorns and that's where you get all the other mess that we're having to deal with. Don't you just want to kick that joker? Oh, you calm people out there, I know. The sin nature then came into our lives as a result of the fall of Adam. The only one sinless who never had a sin nature is Jesus Christ. So the sin nature totally and completely, now follow this right here, listen carefully. The sin nature totally and completely control before you were born again, every area of your life as an unbeliever. Now, when a person comes to Christ, you're coming from a life that has been totally and completely ruled and controlled in every capacity by the sin nature. But as a believer, when you look back on that life before you were saved, in one way or another, you may say, well, Pastor, I don't see everything that was bad. No, no, it's not that it was bad. Remember, the enemy wants you to talk about good and bad. Right? What you're looking at is the sin nature that is the basis of everything. So out of that depraved mind and spirit, out of that, you're living as an unbeliever with that sin nature. Now, every one of us have it, every one of us were born with it. You may not have understood it at the time, but now when you have given your life to Jesus Christ and you look back on your old life, you understand, wow, I see the thread of that sin nature and that's weaving through my entire life, my attitudes, my actions, the things that I did, the things I didn't do, you know, the people that I told off and there was no excuse for me to do that, blah, blah, blah, just you can make your own list, don't do it. In other words, when you got saved, the old man, that's what Paul calls that old nature, that sinful nature, that adamic nature, Adam nature, the old man, when you got saved, the old man died being crucified with Christ. Now, look at this scripture in Romans chapter six because it'll give you the understanding. Know ye not that so many of us, as were baptized unto Jesus Christ, were baptized unto his death. Therefore, we are buried with him by baptism unto death. That's the cross. That like us Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in the newness of life. That's another whole lesson. That's the resurrection. Now, follow verse five. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, if we have been crucified, if we came to the cross and we said, Jesus Christ, forgive me all my sins, I have an understanding that I'm a sinner and I need to be saved and this old sinful nature is gonna send me to hell, if we've been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection. Look at verse six now, this is the key. Knowing this, now Paul uses that term knowing a lot in Romans. What's the point here? Let's just keep it simple. Knowing this, now that you know this, you've just read the plan of salvation, you've just read how and what. Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him, watch this wording, that the body of sin, that old man, that old nature of mine, that old Adamic nature, that sin nature, might be destroyed that henceforth we should not serve sin. Now watch this, when Jesus saved you and me, we were not placed from the sinful nature into a rehabilitation program. You're not in here and watching online, this is not a rehab house. Now I want you to get this right here because this is the humanistic philosophy. Boy, I feel my help now. This is the humanistic philosophy that is infiltrated the church today, where now it's not about coming to the cross and surrendering your life to the cross and making that flesh submit to the will of God at the cross. Now we counsel everything that comes down the line, or we've got a step and I'm not against any helps that come around, but I am against things of humanistic philosophies that have infiltrated the church that take the power and the message of the cross away from an individual for their deliverance and give them some other gospel, as the Apostle Paul says, to satisfy and appease the flesh. I once was a drunk, but I gave my life to Jesus and I am not any longer. Now the program says, you got to say, hey, my name's Joey, I'm an alcoholic. Well, the devil is a liar. Come on, somebody. If that's true, then there is no hope for any of us out here. Boy, that alcoholic, that drug addict, that no, no, no, forget all of that. There's no number one sin and number 10 sin. For all of sin that comes short of the glory of God. And if you don't start on that basis right there, then my friends, you'll keep thinking, I'm better than them because I don't take drugs or I'm better than them because I'm not an alcoholic. But the sin nature puts us on the same plane. And Paul says right here that if our old man, that our old man is crucified with him, I want you to get this, that the body of sin might be destroyed. Now the word rehabilitation is not found in the Bible. God does not rehab anybody. Why? Why are you saying that, pastor? Let me get this to you. The word rehabilitation comes from the world, from the world of humanistic philosophy and psychology, and has no biblical foundation for your salvation or your sanctification. In other words, there is no hope or help in a rehab God. Come on. God is not a rehab God. Now why is that, pastor? Because today's preaching and ministry comes from a place, again, of self-preservation or trying to make me better or me get a better life, and all that is is adding Jesus to what I am. Now if I start with being a good person, then I'm gonna be a better person because I got Jesus. Well, maybe I'll be a better person because I got Jesus and Buddha. Maybe I'll be a better person because I'm a good person and I got Jesus and I got Buddha and I got money. Come on, somebody. Unless you start with the sin nature and there is no good thing in our flesh, then you keep trying to add something to it. So what is the world's philosophy? Look at it right now, it's happening. And the reason why this has happened is because humanistic philosophies have infiltrated itself right into the pulpit, right into Sunday school curriculum and everything else that we've ever had. And now what do we got? We got New York City that has said, you know what, we can't fight the drug problem, so we're gonna set up whole places over here where people can shoot up and drug up without us having to do, we're just gonna give them the money, we're gonna fund it, we're gonna grant it because we don't know how to deal with it. And the church has accepted that kind of mentality to the degree because we don't think, oh my God, we don't think that God is powerful enough to deliver somebody on the first time. So there's gotta be one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 12 steps. Ladies and gentlemen, I don't have time for 12 steps and God said I'm not a rehab God. He said come to the cross and I shall deliver you from that, oh man. Now you gotta get this because there's false doctrine that's going on on our world that's swirling and I told you about this several weeks ago and I offended some folks right out of this church but I'm not gonna back up just because they sit on the front row, that's not any of y'all. But I had people get all up in my face and weeping and crying over the fact that I said that Christians cannot be deemed possessed. Now you better listen carefully to me. The real, oh my God, now we're here, see. The reason why, the reason why that people want to claim that it's a devil is because they don't wanna deal with their flesh. I'd rather call my lion tongue a devil and have somebody come up and prophesy over me and cast the devil out than for me to go to this altar. Pastor, what happens if they see me? Who cares if they see you a hundred times? This altar is wide open, come all the time. If you've gotta ride the altar to heaven, get on and ride, baby, and let that flesh be crucified cause you can't do anything else with it. Are you hearing what I'm saying? He's, what did he say in 2 Corinthians 5 and 17? He said, when you come to Jesus Christ, all things pass away and behold, how much? How much? All things. So what is he saying? He's saying, there's nothing there to rehab. You can't offer me anything for me to take and make it good. You have to kill it at the cross and let, what does he say? All things pass away, behold, all things. I make you a new creation. You're nothing like you were. You're a brand new creation in a new world with a new set of friends, a new attitude, a new kingdom, a new, oh come on somebody, a new mindset, a new body. Come on now. Are you getting this? I need you to get this. I don't have time to counsel everybody and you don't have time to sit around and find out 50 different ways. Cause if you ask 50 different people, they're gonna give you 50 different ways. Well, this is how I got out of it. Well, this is how I got out of it. And then you'll get some religious people and tell you, just pray more. Well, you need to read your Bible more. Okay, that's a good thing. Come on, that's not a bad thing. That's a good thing to read the Bible. How many of you know it's a good thing to pray? How many of you know that's a proper Christian discipline for you to do? How many of you know prayer cannot save you? How many of you know you can read this Bible from Genesis to Revelation all the way into the maps and the Bible cannot save you? What did he say in 1 John 5 and 4? And this is the victory that overcomeeth the world, even our faith. Now, without doing damage to the Scripture, I want you, whenever you read the word faith, to add the term or the phrase faith in the cross of Jesus Christ. So watch this, because people have had a trouble, I'm off script now, for people have had trouble describing faith, and we've had faith preachers and ultra-faith movements that have told you to confess that you don't have a broken arm when your cast is from your neck down to your ankles. It ain't broken, it ain't broken, yep, it's broke. You are broke. Confess that you got money. One preacher get on television, reach your hand out and say, money cometh to me now. Look at y'all laughing, cause you watched this program. Furthermore, you sent him some money, and still you had got anything out of it, because God's not a lottery machine and he's not a slot machine either. Try this on for size. With 10 million people out of work, get a job. I'm off script. Faith, somebody say faith. Faith, come on, say faith. You know what faith is? This is our description of faith. Okay, I'll define faith. Now faith is a substance thing. Hope for the evidence of things not seen. Woo-hoo, what is it? I don't know. Is substance in its evidence? Is substance in its evidence? Well, what's the substance? I don't know, what's the evidence? I don't know. Watch this. I'm about to take your mind now somewhere. Are you ready? Now faith in the finished work of the cross is the substance of things hoped for. The evidence of things I cannot see. Did you just realize something? Let me try it on again. Now faith, not in the abstract or obscure or faith in faith or faith in a preacher or faith in yourself, faith in the finished work of the cross is the substance. Now I got something. Now I got some substance. I'm about to shout right over the top of your heads right now. Faith is the substance. Faith in the finished work of the cross is the substance. You needed something to put your faith in? There it is. The cross is the object. It is the substance of my faith. Now I got somewhere to hang my faith because up to that point, up to that point, I couldn't hang my faith anywhere. Faith, faith in my money, let me down. Faith in my education, let me down. Faith in faith, let me down. Faith in church, faith in people. But wait a minute, wait a minute. Faith in the cross. Now I got something to hang my faith on. Now I got somewhere to go. Come on somebody. Now I'm not fishing around trying to ask you, what about? Have you got faith? Have you got enough faith? I mean, if you got enough faith, we can get together and I could borrow some of yours. No you can't. You gotta have your own faith. Well I'm married to her really. You gotta have your own faith. Faith in the finished work of the cross is the substance of things I'm hoping for. Based upon what Christ did on the cross, I can have confidence and faith in Him and what He has done that what I'm hoping for in the future will come to pass. Why? Because I've got evidence now. Faith is not only the substance, but it is the evidence of things I can't see. Try to explain faith, try to explain God to somebody. Explain this. Woman I talked to the other day, massive tumor inside. They said of her body? Three? Do I tell them? Good. I'm not one to steal her thunder. My sister was diagnosed several weeks ago with a massive tumor on the inside of her, touching three major organs. Very concerned obviously. Went to the doctor, they said we're gonna have to run some tests, gotta do this, gotta do that. Long story short, they looked on there, the doctor called her earlier the part of the week, said we look for cancer, we can't find any, but the mass is still there. Wait, faith is the substance of things I hope for. The evidence of things I can't see. I don't know what God's doing, but I trust Him. My God y'all, I don't know why you're not ripping this house down. So here's the rest of the story. She texted me earlier today, I don't have my phone. She texted me, I'm on my way back from Birmingham. I wanna let you know they can't find the mass anywhere. Faith is the substance of things I hope for. The evidence of things I cannot see. Lord I trust you because you're a miracle worker. Do it when you wanna get all the glory. Come on somebody, you need a miracle in your life. I thank Him right now that my faith and my hope is in you. Now why is that so important? See some of y'all can't shout or nothing until you get to the ball game. Go on with your bad self. Put your faith in the Wahoos, put your faith in your college football, put your faith in your money, put your faith in what you can do, and I'll tell you that things are gonna get so difficult in the days ahead that if you don't have your faith hanging on Jesus Christ and Him crucified, you'll fall like the rest of the world and you'll point your finger at God and say, God, where are you? And He said, if you put your faith in the right place, you would've know where I was. I was in the elevator on 9-11, I was right there. I was in the planes when they flew in to the Pentagon and I'm sit right beside you right now. I wish I had some help on a Wednesday night. So God is not rehabbing you and God knows we need some rehab. Say amen for your neighbor who didn't say nothing. They're so saved. But God said, I ain't rehabbing you. My God. He said, here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna restore the years that the canker worm and the palma worm and the caterpillar and the locus. How you gonna do that, God? Just put your faith in me and I got the rest of it. I have a moral sinful nature wants to tell you what to do. Crucify your sinful nature, I got this. Can we go a little deeper right here? Get this right here, at the moment of your conversion, the sinful nature based on the passage of Scripture in Romans 6 and 6 goes into an ineffective or dormancy your sin nature does. Get this, Romans 6-6, the word destroy there means in the Greek, it means to make of no effect. So when I give my life to Jesus, that old sinful nature that's been telling me what to do and leading me around like a dog on a chain, God breaks that dominion. Romans 6 says, and what happens? Now, he makes the sin nature dormant. If I have my whiteboard out here, I'd show you. I'll have it next week. He makes it dormant. It does not go away. Why? Because we're still in the flesh. We've yet to be glorified. We're still in the flesh. Now you gotta follow this right here and you have to rehearse this in your mind because some of us have been in church so long that we've had such a mindset that we're either way saved or way lost. Trying to be better. When in fact, Jesus says put all your trying away and put your faith in me and keep it there positionally. There's a lot of people who run around and wanna boast their position. I'm the king potentate of the fried chicken committee. They got him a title, went straight to their head just like Satan. Come on somebody. They got him a title. God said the title, you don't have to boast it if you got it. You don't hear God going, I'm God. Hey, I'm God. Now I'm God. How many of you know God's God and God knows it? Tweet that. Come on somebody. Some of you didn't answer for nothing. Is he God? I can assure you God is God. And I can also assure you you're not. Neither am I. Come on somebody. Cause I'd be killed some people. I know none of y'all have any of that kind. Oh pastor, I'm so meek and mild. Yeah. Yeah. God ain't, titles, I'm a Christian. You don't have to run around. I'm a Christian. I'm a Christian. I'm a Christian. I'm a Christian. Uh-uh. Your acts, they'll know you're Christians because you love one another. Well isn't that a philosophy and an ideology and a theology that we need to pick up today? Cause we got so much hate going on and it's being force fed down our throat and into our veins like an IV at a hospital that even Christian people are such a place where we build our little walls around and God said break that wall down. I need some people that are willing to touch people and tell them there's only one God and there's only one way. He's not interested in rehabbing you. He's interested in delivering you and setting you free. Come on somebody. So he destroys, he makes it of none effect in your life. Doesn't go away, he just makes it of none effect. Now this is so important because since it's still there we feel like somehow what if I mess up? I want you to know that grace is much bigger. This is not my subject tonight but grace is much bigger than what you think it is. You all right out there? But since the sin nature becomes dormant or it's destroyed, it's not annihilated. It's still there because we're still in this sinful flesh. But what does the apostle Paul tell us? Go back to Romans chapter six, verse number 11. Likewise, reckon that's an accounting term. Go ahead and go ahead and calculate it up. You also yourselves to be what? Dead indeed to sin. Are you dead to sin? How much temptation can a dead man be tempted by? Some of you are still contemplating it, I know. So you walk up to the casket, the old boy had an alcohol problem and you bring him a fifth. Do you expect him to jump up out of there, grab it by the bottle, the neck of the bottle and start chugging it? Nope, he dead. I stood right up here at the cemetery one day. Everybody's filing by, they lifted the lid. Everybody's coming by. Old boy walked by, reached in his pocket, put a file over a bill up in that as if he's gonna spend it down there. The next guy comes up, he got him a pack of smokes. He pulls his smoke. Now, here was the problem I got. It wasn't even a full pack. You short-changing joker. If he was alive, he might have popped you in the nose. You can't even afford a full pack, I'm over here dead. But I promise you, as I stood at the head of that casket, he dropped them cigs in there and I thought to myself, probably won't need a light where he's going. It was just my thought and it was only a moment, but it was a thought. Just saying. I'm standing there, I'm looking at the corpse and every time somebody would drop something else into that casket, the corpse would not move. Because, now ladies and gentlemen, if you don't reckon yourself dead to sin, then you'll keep playing with it. Why? Because it always appeals to that sin nature. In fact, James even goes further and says that when you're drawn away, you're drawn away of your own lust. How many of you know you got your own lust? Let me tell you what it is for those of you who don't understand what I'm talking about. You have your own kryptonite. How many of you know what your kryptonite is? Now, this is a good place to raise your hand right here. How many of you know what your kryptonite is? Some of you haven't gotten any kryptonite, that's amazing. I'll bet you before you get up tomorrow morning, your kryptonite will hit you. Because the devil knows your kryptonite. Come on somebody. And you know what? God knows your kryptonite. And if you don't keep your faith in the cross, firmly positioned there, not moving, don't care what suggestion, what temptation comes, then your kryptonite will get you every time. Now, for those of you who don't know what kryptonite is, go home and watch a Superman movie or something. Superman, Superman, Superman could leap tall buildings in a single bound when he was in the influence of the Holy Ghost. He could catch a speeding bullet under the influence of the Holy Ghost. Everything the devil shot at him, bam, bam, bam, bam. But from another planet came some kryptonite. And the enemies of Superman were always trying to get him around that kryptonite. Because we knew, they said, if we can get that kryptonite around him, it'll render him powerless. I gotta stop right here. I kinda wanna fly back, but I know that I can because I am not Superman. But I have to ask you this question as we conclude here tonight. I'll come back to this lesson, believe me. It'll probably go on to the end of the year. Let me ask you this very important question because it hit me before I left the house this evening and I know it was the Holy Ghost. So question, where did you get saved at? What place did you get saved? Now, hopefully all this lesson tonight has taught you where you came to in order to get saved. Where'd you get saved at? The cross, that is correct for 20 points. Come on, to the cross, all this teaching. So here's a question. When you got saved, how many of you know your sins were forgiven? You loved everybody, the world was off of your shoulder, the pain, the guilt, the shame, all of that kind of stuff went off, the blood of Jesus was applied, you got victor, you stood up, it was a wonderful day. Right? Whole things passed away, behold, all things became venue. Here's my question. If the devil recognizes that place is his kryptonite, the cross, that is. Why do we keep going to other locations to get our victory? And we wonder why the enemy keeps picking us off because there's only one place that is the devil's kryptonite. Man, I'm gonna have to preach that as a sermon right there. The devil's kryptonite. Will you come and hear that one? I'll preach it to myself. The devil's kryptonite is the cross. And as long as you stay there, your elder brother will box his lights out and he will always lose. Amen, every time. But if you take your faith and put it somewhere else, then the enemy's gonna, every time. Cause your faith is in the wrong place, but if you'll stay where the cross is. I said, if you'll stay where the cross is. If you'll stay where the cross is, keep your faith right there. Anybody that tries to pull you away, anything that tries to pull you away, mm-mm. I think that's the reason why the songwriter said, I will cling to the old rugged cross. Because if I move any other place other than my faith being right there, the enemy's gonna take me out. But, and this was the challenge the Holy Spirit hit me with before I left the house. Where else are you supposed to go? Why are we going to other locations? And wondering, I got saved at the cross, but we can fix it okay over here. This is a reason why we've got churches that are preaching a gospel that has no power to deliver. Preachers that are preaching, and watch this, and I'm speaking this as a preacher, a pastor, pastors that are frustrated because they're preaching other locations to get victory, make a better me, and God don't want a better you. He wants a new you. You gotta get that in your head. Anything you offer to God is not gonna be acceptable. But once you come to Jesus Christ, everything you offer to God is acceptable. It's the difference between Cain and Abel. Come on somebody. Well, he rejected me because my name is Cain. And by the way, because Cain went away from the presence of God, his descendants go all the way down to the book of Jude, I believe it is, and is identified with the line, the lineage of the antichrist. But Abel's all the way down to Family Tree comes to Jesus. Right there in the book of Genesis. Are you hearing what I'm saying? But watch this. Well, he didn't like me because I'm Cain. No, had nothing to do with that. He said, Cain, didn't I tell you that if you would have offered the same thing with the same heart as Abel did, if you would have done what I told you to do, if you would have done like I told you to do in obedience, didn't I tell you I would receive you and your sacrifice? And now why is your countenance falling? And you're acting like I'm not God and you can't get in and it's too hard and blah, blah, blah. If you would do like you're supposed to be doing, I would receive you. But because you're wanting to do what you want to do, sin is crouching at the door. Your kryptonite is waiting just outside the door. Are you hearing me? Everything in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation has its tether tied to the cross and in the days that are ahead, when your faith is challenged and you're mocked and you're rejected and that Bible and all that, there's gonna be a temptation for you to step away from the cross so that you're accepted by the crowd. You hear what I'm saying? Because when you identify with Jesus Christ and Him crucified, you set yourself apart from every other God. Are you hearing what I'm saying? But when I place myself where I'm supposed to be, there is a guaranteed victory based upon the Word of God every day of my life. Don't let the enemy pull you away. You have to live by the principles of God's Word and place my faith right there in Jesus Christ. No works added, nothing added to the cross, nothing taken away. Well, Pastor, I was baptized in water. I don't care if they held you down and read the 119th Psalm. There's not enough water to wash away our sins. I'm about to shout. Well, Pastor, I rubbed some beads and I've been praying, you know, Mary, help me, Mary, help me, Mary, help me. And I'm just coming to tell you those beads are useless. The only help you're gonna get, you don't need to go to Jesus as mama. You need to go straight to the man. Come on, somebody. Nothing added to it, nothing taken away. Because the moment you add anything to it, it becomes works. And if you can work your way into heaven, then it's not grace. And we'll jump on that next week. Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, I pray that you let the seed of your Word now get into the ground of every heart that is here and those that are watching. May the Spirit of God germinate this in their mind. May they search the Scripture to know what is the truth. And tonight I decree and declare over this congregation and those watching, the victory goes to the overcomer who places their faith solidly in the cross of Jesus Christ. We give you glory and honor and praise for it in Jesus' mighty name. Everybody believes it? Shout a great big amen. Get up and shake hands with somebody who loves the Lord. If they won't shake your hand, don't call them kryptonite or nothing, but just stand there until they do. Amen. We love y'all. See you Sunday morning.