Reformed Baptist Church in O'Fallon, Missouri
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Forward, On The March Part 1

Main passage: Mark 6:14-32

Pastor Mike preaches from Mark 6 and comments on the assassination of Charlie Kirk and how the church should respond.

Sermon Transcript

The following is a lightly edited transcript generated from the audio; it may contain small errors.

Mark 6:14–29

Let’s turn to the book of Mark, chapter 6. Mark 6, we’re going to start in verse 14. It says, “King Herod heard of it.” What did he hear of? Well, let’s back up a verse.

They cast out many demons and anointed with oil many who were sick and healed them. King Herod heard of it, for Jesus’ name had become known. Some said, “John the Baptist has been raised from the dead. That is why these miraculous powers are at work in him.” But others said, “He is Elijah.” And others said, “He is a prophet, like one of the prophets of old.” But when Herod heard of it, he said, “John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.” For it was Herod who had sent and seized John and bound him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, because he had married her. For John had been saying to Herod, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.” And Herodias had a grudge against him and wanted to put him to death. But she could not, for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he kept him safe. When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed, and yet he heard him gladly. But an opportunity came when Herod on his birthday gave a banquet for his nobles and military commanders and the leading men of Galilee. For when Herodias’s daughter came in and danced, she pleased Herod and his guests. And the king said to the girl, “Ask me for whatever you wish, and I will give it to you.” And he vowed to her, “Whatever you ask me, I will give you, up to half of my kingdom.” And she went out and said to her mother, “For what should I ask?” And she said, “The head of John the Baptist.” And she came in immediately with haste to the king and asked, saying, “I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter.” And the king was exceedingly sorry, but because of his oaths and his guests, he did not want to break his word to her. And immediately the king sent an executioner with orders to bring John’s head. He went and beheaded him in the prison and brought his head on a platter and gave it to the girl, and the girl gave it to her mother. When his disciples heard of it, they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb.

(Mark 6:13–29)

Opening Prayer

Let’s pray. Father, we thank you that you are a good and gracious God and that because you are with us, we can say it is well with my soul. Whatever’s going on, whatever we’ve got, whatever we’re working through, fighting through, dealing with, struggling with, we can take confidence that you are with us, that you stand with us, that you lead us, that you guide us. Because of that, because you are the sovereign God, we can say it is well with my soul. Thank you, Father, that you have us every single step of the way, that you are with us, that you draw near to the brokenhearted, that you walk with those who walk in uprightness. So we pray, God, that today your Word would go forth in boldness, that people would receive it, that people would have ears to hear. Lord, we pray for our kids as well, that they would learn about you, the one true King, that they would learn about your Son Jesus, and that they would come into covenant with you and with your Son and with your Spirit. Bless our teachers now, God, and bless our time, Lord, as we move on. We pray this in Jesus’ name, amen.

Why Address This

As you know, we’ve been working through Philippians for probably about a year, coming up on a year, I guess. You know, there’s so many non-church holidays. You know, you have like Labor Day, Veterans Day, July 4th, Memorial Day. And then every single Sunday in the church, usually there’s something being recognized, like, oh, it’s International Adoption Day. Oh, it’s Foster Day. There’s so many different things that if a pastor tried to stop and address everything that was going on or whatever was being highlighted, it just, he would never really get to work through a book, or he’d kind of let the culture control the topics, which really wouldn’t be appropriate. But sometimes things happen, and I think it’s appropriate to stop and address those things because people have questions, people are hurting, people want to know what’s going on, people want to know what the Word of God has to say about it. So I think in light of the assassination of Charlie Kirk, this passage is appropriate, and it’s appropriate to kind of talk about that in relation to the Word of God today. I was gone last week, so this is the sermon that you would have gotten last week, had I been here. [audio unclear] and the CEO of UnitedHealthcare about a year ago, right? Because he’s an elite. But to not address it, I believe, to not address things like this at times, I believe reinforces a false notion of the sacred-secular divide. Because if we only feel like what happens in the church, and what happens in my prayer closet, what happens in my quiet time, has no impact or relation on what happens out there, then we’re not thinking biblically. And the reverse is true as well. If we just think, oh, well, the world can go to hell in a handbasket and whatever happens happens and that doesn’t really impact me, I mean, we’re not actually thinking biblical on that either. So to not address it reinforces a false notion of this sacred-secular divide.

John’s Boldness

Listen, John the Baptist, what does it say here? Look in the text. What was it that he was saying? Verse 18, he was saying to Herod, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.” I wrote this note a long time ago to myself, but right next to it, I have the verse underlined and I wrote to myself, I love John’s boldness. I love his boldness. Like he’s willing to call out something that was sin and he was willing to do it and he was willing to do it publicly. And that takes boldness. Herod, I mean he probably claimed some Jewishness, sort of, he kind of played both sides, whatever kind of was working for him. Kind of like politicians today do, right? Hey, whatever, whatever I need to say to keep myself in power and keep things smooth. But he’s talking to a godless man here, and he’s willing to address him and call him out for it. But really, I mean, John the Baptist wasn’t murdered because he had different views of marriage with Herod. He was murdered because of his faith that led him to say that to Herod. The same is true with Charlie. He wasn’t assassinated for being against transgenderism and advocating those views. No, it was from his faith in Christ that led him to speak on those things. Now, some of you maybe never heard of Charlie Kirk before about a week and a half ago. I’ve actually talked to a few of you that that was the case, which is fine. Some people aren’t online, that’s okay too. Maybe you should stay offline. There’s a lot of craziness going on. But many people have, and especially the younger generation had heard of him. His message was, I mean, kind of simple. Go on to college campuses and let’s have a dialogue. What was his little phrase on his booth? Prove me wrong. So, sets up an open mic and anyone on the college campus, even if you don’t go to that college you can show up, anyone on the campus can come up and ask him a question or debate with him, and what did you see? You saw a debate, you saw a debate, and you saw that he was pretty good at it. God had blessed him, and for that, what? One person hated him? I mean Charlie was murdered long before the shot was taken, in that guy’s heart. He talks about it. If you hate your brother, you’ve murdered him in your heart. So John the Baptist wasn’t murdered because he had different views of marriage than King Herod. That was maybe the thing that was the catalyst that caused it. But it’s because of who John the Baptist was and what he believed and what he advocated. Listen, brothers and sisters. Wicked men do wicked things. And we’ve seen a whole lot of wicked the past week and a half.

God Is in Control

But I want to encourage you, one, with a few things and then give us a few exhortations. One, God is in control. When we talk about evil, we talk about God, we talk about sovereignty, we need to remember the Lord is sovereign. However we want to use our language to phrase it, some people say he allowed it. Some people say he permitted it, some people say he ordained it, some people say he decreed it. Here’s the thing, could the Lord have stopped John’s beheading? Yes. I mean, if you can’t say yes and you don’t believe he’s sovereign, right? If he’s sovereign, he could have stopped it. Could he have stopped Charlie’s murder? Yes. But he didn’t. Why? Listen, some of these things we won’t ever know. We don’t know exactly why he didn’t stop John’s beheading. We don’t even really [audio unclear] hear that quoted a whole lot, but you’ll hear the last part kind of cut off. “He works all things together for the good.” Well, yes, almost, for the good of those who love him. The promise is for those who love him. That’s the commitment, that he works all things together for the good of those who love him. You’re loving the Lord, he’s going to work all things together for your good. Okay. But it’s still hard for us to wrap our mind around. We can come to the place where we can be like, okay, he could have stopped it but he didn’t. He could have stopped John from beheading, he could have stopped Charlie’s assassin. He didn’t. But I mean why? Well it goes back to what I just said. There are wicked men who do wicked things. And this is hard for us. Joe Rigney, we’re going through his book in our life groups, but Joe Rigney gives this illustration. You know, have you ever read the Chronicles of Narnia? Right, great series. If you haven’t read it, you really should. You should read it to your kids. Absolutely. But here’s the question. Who killed—you know, and you have to make it past the first book to know the answer to this, okay—but who killed the White Witch? Wow, you guys haven’t read it, have you? Aslan, right? Aslan kills the White Witch, but also C. S. Lewis, the author, did. Right? So the analogy of an author and a story helps us to understand how God can be completely, totally, and exhaustively sovereign, and yet how humans can be responsible, and how their choices and actions can be meaningful and significant. It allows us to see layers in our understanding of causality. That’s Rigney. Well, why was it always winter and never Christmas in Narnia? Well, because the White Witch enslaved the land, right? But why was it always winter and never Christmas in Narnia? Because that’s the way Lewis wrote the story. Why does Aslan have to die? Because Edmund is a traitor. Why does Aslan have to die? Because that’s how Lewis wrote the story. Even if you think about the biblical character of Job, right, I mean, who took his stuff away? Well, the immediate cause was like, you know, the tornadoes and the winds and all that. But then there was wicked men. But then there was Satan. But who was Job really frustrated with? God. Job attributes it rightly to God. That can be a tough pill for us to swallow.

Resist the Enemy

Look at James, keep your place in Mark because we’ll come back to it. “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” So one, we need to resist the enemy in all his forms. Now the fact that God is sovereign over all and is directing the affairs of men, this doesn’t mean we just go glibly about the world acting as if our actions don’t matter. We just saw that. We saw that with the analogy of the story. The characters are very much involved, all right? We very much make decisions that have consequences and our ideas have consequences. So there’s a choice. There’s always a choice. Each one of us has a choice to do good or evil. So we need to resist the enemy in all his forms. A lot of times if we’re not thinking real biblical about things and it’s like resist the enemy, I mean we just imagine him coming up with his little pitchfork trying to tell us to do something. Now that’s really not how the enemy works. It’s a whisper. Maybe it’s through someone else. Maybe it’s through a friend. Maybe it’s through social media. Maybe it’s through a movie. Yes, directly. He’s got his minions, his demons, that are speaking all sorts of lies to his children and to us. But what? We have to resist. So don’t choose evil. It’s not of the good, right? Romans 12:21, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” Overcome evil with good. A lot of times, I mean [audio unclear] a person has to make the choice. Israel has to make that choice. We have to make that choice. And look how he defines it if you keep reading. “So choose life, that you and your offspring may live, loving the Lord your God.” This is how he defines choosing life. Choose life, that’s the command. And then here’s what follows: loving the Lord your God, obeying [audio unclear]. The enemy wants you discouraged. The enemy wants you scared. The enemy wants to silence you. Here’s the thing. If you walk with Jesus long enough, you’ll find something out. The enemy always overplays his hand. Always. The enemy always overplays his hand. And he overplayed his hand this time. People have been awakened. I don’t know if you’re on social media and you’ve been following stuff. I saw firsthand [audio unclear] his hand. He always overplays his hand. Don’t be dragged into the net that he casts. Because what does he want? He wants us to get upset by it, discouraged by it, frustrated by it, and then what? Throw up our hands and give up. That’s what he wants.

Be Angry and Do Not Sin

Well, what’s the righteous attitude towards it? I’m going to say this. Be angry and do not sin. That’s Ephesians 4 verse 26. Be angry and do not sin. It’s possible, now most of the time, [audio unclear] usually when it’s against us personally, that’s when it can easily become unrighteous and a lot of times is. But it’s happening to other people, the young lady on the mass transit, and she gets stabbed from behind and you find out that the guy had been arrested 14 times before, and nothing really had been done. And he’s out on cashless bail for the 14th time. That should upset you because that is gross injustice. It’s gross injustice. So be angry, but then do something with the anger in a righteous way. Here’s what Bullinger, a well-known theologian, said: “There is a holy kind of anger which the Scripture does not disallow. So that unless a man is angry in that way, he will never be a good and godly man. For a good man has a zeal for God, and in that godly zeal he is angry at the iniquity and naughtiness of mankind.” Some of the horrible things going on in this world should make you angry. If they don’t, that’s more concerning. The innocent slaughter of millions of babies, that should upset you. It should upset you. So [audio unclear] drive you towards righteousness. Don’t let it stew in you. [audio unclear] call for the child of God, not violence, but biblical action.

We Reject Any Violence

Think about Stephen, right, Stephen? First part of Acts, what happens? He’s debating. He wins the debate. They murder him. He bested them in the debate and they couldn’t handle it. And what was their response? Like they throw their hands and they murder him. Violence. Violence isn’t the response. Just this past April, they did a study looking at Americans’ feelings on political assassinations, so four or five months ago. Among left-leaning respondents, it found that 55% said that killing Donald Trump would be morally justified. 40% said it’s justified to destroy Tesla dealerships because Elon helped Trump get elected. On the right, 14% said political murder can be justified. Now, 1% is too high. But 14% is too high. But let’s not pretend this is a balanced result. Other polls have confirmed these results. They did a YouGov poll, found 77% of Republicans said it’s always unacceptable to feel joy at the death of someone you politically oppose. 38% of Democrats said the same, to pursue political goals. Four percent of self-described very conservative said the same thing. Again, both percents are too high. But let’s not pretend it’s a both-sides. To put it another way, when George Floyd died, people rioted. When Charlie Kirk was assassinated, people held vigils. Even actually, in Arizona, a stadium that holds like 60,000 people, they’re having basically a church service for him. Here’s what I’ll say, you might not want to hear this, but I’ll say it. Political violence is a feature, not a bug, of progressivism. It’s a feature. It’s a feature. Why is that? Because progressivism is built on top of critical theory. It’s built on that lens that sees the world through oppressed and oppressor. I’m not sure if that’s what it is. That’s Marxism. It doesn’t have a Christian theology view. It doesn’t have the lens of right or wrong. That’s not how it looks at things. It’s oppressed or oppressor. There’s two categories. We would say there’s two categories as well. Well, they say there’s two categories, oppressed or oppressor, that leads people to see opponents not as mistaken but as evil oppressors. So if you believe someone is mistaken, what do you do? You try to persuade them. That’s what Charlie did. If you believe someone is an evil oppressor, literally Hitler or fascist or an existential threat to democracy, you’ll feel obligation to stop them, and that is why there is radically disproportionate violence on the left, because that’s the lens that they by and large use. Even one of my friends—not in front, but her friend was commenting on Charlie Kirk, and she was saying it was a good thing that he was taken out because he was an oppressor. What do you do with oppressors? You rejoice. You’re glad when they are taken out. You want them taken out. [audio unclear] to fight the violence. Brothers and sisters, this is wickedness. We reject any violence. That is not the way of Christ. Sadly, it’s carried over into our education system. We have a culture of violence that has permeated even the halls of education in our country. Teachers celebrating Charlie Kirk’s assassination. I had a friend push back on social media, “I haven’t seen it anywhere. I haven’t seen it anywhere.” All you have to do is go on to X and you can find it just by a quick little search, teacher after teacher after teacher after teacher after teacher. A Wentzville teacher came out and said something horrible about Charlie Kirk. She’s since been put on leave. I don’t know if she’ll be back or not. The governor of Texas announced that 100 teachers are being investigated. Actually, he said more than 100 teachers are being investigated. Listen to this. Calls for violence or inciting violence. These are 100 public school teachers in the state of Texas. These are the people instructing the next generation. That’s a problem. It’s a problem.

And part of what you see going on is I’d call it a reverse salvation. I mean, so you see someone and, you know, actually it happened to me. I got saved my first semester at college, actually my second semester, but I could say my first year of college, right? And my life radically transforms. But you also see what I would call like a reverse salvation where people go off to college and what happens within like a semester or two, they are radically changed in a bad way. They’re radically changed. It’s like a reverse salvation. It just happens just like that. They see it, they bite onto it, they grab it, and the hook is in there. Let me say this though. The gospel breaks the hard-heartedness of men. The gospel breaks the hard-heartedness of men. And we need to speak out for Jesus. This is not a call to be more vocal online, but it is a call to be vocal for the gospel and gospel issues. It’s a call to advocate and stand for a biblical worldview. It’s a call to speak out to neighbors and family members. John the Baptist, he spoke boldly. One of my friends was talking to Andrea’s uncle at our wedding. So it goes back a few years. But he was talking to Andrea’s uncle: “You need to be a godly father for your boy.” We didn’t even know about it at the [audio unclear]. It upset me at the time. And I couldn’t get rid of it. Just that little tiny comment kind of hung with him. And he remembered it. And it spoke to him. And it bothered him because he knew it wasn’t true. And part of what you’re seeing online is that many on the left resort to this. This is what secular progressivism gives us: a culture of violence and death. What’s the Christian’s response? Romans 12, “Repay no one evil for evil.” Well, we don’t return evil. That’s God’s economy upside down. Someone insults you? Yeah, you want to insult them back. That’s not the way of Christ. Someone does evil to you? You want to do evil back? Yeah, that’s the fleshly desire. That’s the natural man, but it’s not the way of Christ. So “Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable.” Buildings weren’t burned. We don’t return hate with hate.

Love Your Enemies

Here’s what Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 5: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.” Every single person is made in the image of God. Every single person. That means every single person, not just people we like, not just people we agree with, not just people on our side of the aisle, so to speak. Not just Christians, every single person, every single person. There’s whatever, roughly eight billion people in this world, every single one of them, and all the ones that have come before, and all the ones that come after, they’re image bearers. What does that mean? Their life is precious. Their life is precious. So we don’t celebrate when innocent people have their life snuffed out, whether we agree with them or not. There was a well-known blogger a few years back, ended up getting sick, and she’s like one of those one in whatever, 50,000 people where you’re sick but you actually end up dying from what most people will be fine with. She was very liberal and said all sorts of things, and had a pretty large following with a Christian contingency of sorts. And I grieved, I grieved. I’m like, she had a husband, she had, I think two, I know she had a couple kids, maybe more. And I was, that’s not good. It’s not good. And I don’t know where she stood with God, but I was concerned for the state of her soul. And [audio unclear] “and he sins against you, and he sins against you, and he sins against you, and it’s the same person for like the 100th time. Well, how many times are we supposed to forgive him?” So we don’t fight fire with fire. We fight it with the Holy Spirit. And Scripture is filled with what appears from a worldly perspective and a human perspective to not make sense. We should definitely fight fire with fire. That’s what makes sense. We should definitely, someone does something bad to us, I’m going to do it back and even worse. That makes sense, yes, from a worldly perspective. But we’re talking about a heavenly perspective. We’re talking about the kingdom of God. We’re talking about, what does God say, how does he want to handle it? Everything in us, I understand the flesh. It’s hard. If you really want, you want to try just loving your enemies, that is hard to do in the real concrete, especially when they get around you. I mean, that enemy that lives two states away that moved away finally that you’re glad about, it’s easy to love them because you don’t ever see them. Or that person that used to be in your church that left and you’re like kind of irritated with, it’s easy to love them, you never see them. The people that’s hard are the ones in your midst. That’s what’s hard, but Jesus tells us, love your neighbor, pray for your enemies.

Use the Sword

Now, do we have any weapons of warfare? Yes, Ephesians 6 talks about it. You can read it on your own. But Ephesians 6 talks about our warfare. We’re given one. One weapon of warfare for offense. What’s that weapon? It’s the sword, right? We have a sword. And it’s the Word of God. Ephesians 6:17. But we have a sword. It’s not meant to be kept in its sheath. We have a sword. It’s not meant to be placed above the mantle. We’re supposed to use our offensive weapon. That’s what demolishes strongholds that 2 Corinthians talks about. That’s what takes down the lofty arguments, is the Word of God. That’s what pierces the soul that Hebrews talks about, right? The Word of God. So these people desperately need to hear the Word of God. We desperately need to hear the Word of God. So whatever has been going on in your lives, like this is where you should turn. Turn here to see what it says. I turn here. Are you dealing with something? Like God will use the Psalms to minister to your broken [audio unclear]. And God uses instances like the assassination of Charlie Kirk to wake some people up. We need to awaken, church. There’s a battle going on. It’s for the hearts and minds of men. It’s very near and very real. And we got to speak out to reach those people with the truth of the gospel. Those are the ones that need to hear it. So we have a sword, let’s use it.

Silence or Destroy

Look back in Mark. Herod is mad at John. That’s usually what happens when you get called out on your sin, right? Herod’s mad at John, so what does he do? He silences him. Verse 17, “For it was Herod who had sent and seized John and bound him in prison” [audio unclear] because of that, right? [audio unclear] But what does Herodias do? I mean, she’s mad at John too, right? It’s kind of, I mean, they must have had a weird relationship. It’s just like he’s supposedly here. It says he’s protecting John. Well, she doesn’t. You want him killed, you’re willing to be the murderer. That’s wickedness. But silence or destroy. Mark 6:19, what does it say, Herodias had a grudge against him and wanted to put him to death. We can’t be silenced with our faith. Don’t be silenced with your faith. People will try to silence you with intimidation, by deplatforming you, by discouraging you, by shaming you, by calling you names, by defriending you. Do you know what people do when they don’t have an argument? They call you names. They call you names. But that’s the two options that the enemy tries to take, silence or destroy. They’re more than happy to destroy your livelihood, or even your own life. Why? Why? Because you’re just believing things that literally the Bible says. Charlie was not very extreme now. If you’ve watched any of his videos, he wasn’t some far-right extremist. In many ways he’s plain vanilla Christian. Just like you, just like me. Why are they going to silence you? Why are they going to try to take you down? Because you believe marriage is between one man and one woman. Why are they going to try to silence you or take you down? Because you believe God determines sex at conception and it’s immutable, not changeable. Why are they going to try to silence you or take you down? Because you believe all life is precious and to murder innocent life is an abomination before God. Why are they going to try to take you down or silence you? Because you believe God is the creator of the world and what he says goes. We don’t get to decide what we want to do. We got to do what he wants us to do. Why are they going to silence you or try to take you down? Because you believe Jesus is the only way to heaven. There’s no other way. There’s no other way. People hate that. People don’t like that. How dare you, you bigot, to say something like that? No, it is a loving thing if a building is on fire to try to go in and rescue the people of the burning building. Am I right? The loving thing. That’s what you’re doing with the gospel. The building of this world is burning and you are trying to rescue people out of it. You’re trying to rescue people. And guess what? Yes, some of those people don’t even realize, many of them, that the building’s burning. Listen, if you just ran into someone’s house and started dragging them out, yeah, they’re going to not be happy. The smoke, what are we doing? We’re telling them there’s smoke. The building is burning. We’re trying to get you out. Trying to save you. All people had to do, I mean, it was a moral test that was given a week and a half ago. All people had to do was be against murdering someone for their political opinions. That was the moral test 10 days ago, and it’s shocking how many seem to have failed it.

Now, Herod here, he represents the state, and he represents all that’s bad about it. He had a godless kingdom built on godless pursuits. And he had nepotism to the core if you ever studied his lineage. Listen, part of doing what 2 Corinthians talks about, we’ll probably look at that a little bit next week, about taking down strongholds, destroying every lofty argument, attacking the worldviews of the day, is yes, we are trying to destroy secular progressivism. Why? Because it is against the Word of God. But let me tell you something. This is interesting. I’m going to say this is a tier-one issue. That’s what another pastor talked about. I’m kind of quoting him, but he called it a tier-one issue. Love-your-neighbor issue. Why? Because it’s mission-critical to the accomplishment of the Great Commission. If you take a map of the most progressive states, then you take a map of the states with the fewest churches per capita, it’s the same map. Everyone knows, every church planter knows the hardest states to plant and scale churches in are blue states. If you want to make building the church and spreading of the gospel ten times harder, it’s really easy. Just let your state go blue. I mean, the stats show that time and time and time again. But we’re in a red state, which means what? Ten times easier. So those people and those pastors and those churches in those states, they’ve got a mission and a job, and us in our states, we’ve got a mission and a job. We’ve been placed here in Missouri and O’Fallon for now, for such a time as this. So we have to be the salt and the light. We have to be willing to go forth.

Don’t Be Herod

Let me just say one thing to a couple people here, more than a couple. Verse 20, back in Mark. Such an interesting verse here. So we put him in prison. Herodias wants to kill him. It says at the end of 19, but she could not, for Herod feared John. I’m like, he feared John, like he put him in prison. That’s a weird kind of fear. But he wasn’t willing to go all the way. Why? Knowing that he was a righteous and holy man and he kept him safe. But then notice what it says. “When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed, and yet he heard him gladly.” Greatly perplexed. Let me tell you something. Greatly perplexed about the message that John was giving, greatly perplexed about the message Jesus was giving, that doesn’t save you. There’s no indication whatsoever that Herod ever became a believer. If anything, it’s actually quite the contrary. So yeah, oh, I mean, he liked hearing John. It kind of tickled his ears a little bit, you know, going on about the Old Testament, talking about the different prophets, all those things. Yeah, greatly perplexed him. He gladly heard him. Did Herod absolutely no good. Why? Never responded in faith. Never made it his own. The God of the Old Testament, that wasn’t his God. So you’re hearing this message. It’s important for us to make sure that we make truth our home. You can hear all these words that Jesus talks about, all the words of the Scriptures. And they might tickle your ears a little bit. But it has to do more than that for it to do any good, brothers and sisters. There has to be action. There has to be change here that leads to action. And maybe you don’t know Jesus, or maybe you’re not sure you know Jesus. But again, just listening to the words of the Scriptures and not doing anything about them. You’re like, oh, that’s a really interesting subject that we heard today. Let’s discuss that at lunch. Well, you can do that rightfully, and you can do that in the abstract. You can keep truth at a distance so that it never finds a home in your heart. Don’t be that person, don’t be Herod. Like, I don’t know what he was saying today, on Sunday, it was kind of interesting, but I’m not sure. Like, you’ve got to make a decision between you and the Lord whether you’re going to accept his truth or not. And you can turn here and decide for yourself. I encourage you to accept the truth. We all have to have a standard from which we operate. We have to have a standard from which we turn to. The modern man, it’s kind of just like, hey, well, what do you feel like? And what do you feel like? You do you. That’s the motto. Great job, Nike, right? Just do it. You do you, that’s the modern motto. Whatever feels good for you. What do they base that on, themselves? I don’t know about you, but it’s probably a wise idea to place the way you live your life on something outside of yourself, on a higher standard, purpose, or being. And that would be God. Now let’s place it on what God says about these things. When I first got saved, I did not think rightly on a number of biblical topics. But what happened? Did I just come to church and sit there for an hour each week and listen a little bit and then walk out? No, I was reading my Word, I was praying, I was fellowshiping with other believers. And what happened? The Lord opened my eyes on those different things. And so he’s doing a work, right? How did he do the work? I’m in the Word. I’m in fellowship with brothers and sisters. I’m in prayer. I’m worshiping at church each week. I’m making those things a priority. And then what happens? Slowly, slowly, slowly, God’s conforming me to the image of his Son. I’m taking in all the Scripture. I’m taking in all the prayer. I’m taking in all the fellowship. I’m taking in all the worship, right? And what’s it doing? God’s using it to transform me. He’s transforming me. I mean, what we take in, what we surround ourselves with, good company, it says what? Doesn’t say anything about good company. Bad company does what? Corrupts good morals. We don’t want to be like that guy in Psalm 1 that’s sitting in the seat of scoffers, standing with the mockers. We don’t want to do that. No, we want to be the person who receives the Word of God, who gladly receives it, gladly receives it, and does something about it. Exceedingly perplexed, greatly perplexed. I mean, each one of us has to stand before the Lord someday. What are you going to do? You’re going to be like, yeah, well, I was greatly perplexed at those sermons that Pastor Mike was giving. I gladly listened to them. I didn’t make any noise. No, he’s concerned about you knowing him. Do you know him? Do you have a relationship with him? Have you entered into that relationship with him? That comes by God’s grace through faith. Through faith. And what does he do? By faith you trust in him, and what does he do? He gives you his grace and his mercy. He showers it out upon you. He wipes away all your sins. If you’ve never experienced that, it is the most amazing thing. It’s amazing. Now sometimes, you know, you grew up in a Christian home and you experience it at a younger age, you probably actually experienced something amazing, you just maybe don’t remember it. But maybe you don’t, even if you didn’t experience something amazing because you were so innocent in your sins, so to speak. But for those of you who have been saved later, you know the change quite clearly. You can point to the darkness, unfortunately, but you can point and point and point to all those years. But now, you can point to all the righteousness that God has done through you. And how you’re walking with him. How you’re fellowshiping with him. And how he’s using you to make a difference for God. We, by God’s grace, can walk with him. Listen, you are made in God’s image. The Creator of the universe created you for a fellowship with him. He wants a relationship with you. The call goes to all and the call is to repent of your sins and turn to him and be forgiven. When you do that, what you realize, repentance is like you’re heading in one direction, and repentance is turning around. You’re headed towards the cliff, you’re walking in sin, you’re about to fall into the chasm, you turn around. What you find out as soon as you turn around, like God’s been around the whole time. It’s not a long distance back to the Father. It’s very short. It’s just two words. Three. Please forgive me. Please forgive me. And then four words. I trust in you. And then just like that a whole bunch of fancy biblical words happen. Sanctification, justification, even the Bible says glorification, rebirth, all those things. New life is breathed into you. New life. And you have the Spirit of God living inside you, and you can fellowship with the Creator of the universe who is now your heavenly Father. I encourage you to make that decision. Come into covenant relationship with the Father. Receive what Jesus did on the cross. Receive it. He took your place. He lived the perfect life. He laid down his life for you so that you could be forgiven, so that when you repent, the forgiveness is provided through Jesus. I encourage you today to make that decision. Let’s pray.

Closing Prayer

Lord, we thank you that you are a God who is very near to us, who offers each person the gift of salvation. The call goes to all, but each person has to make a decision. So I pray for anyone here, Lord, who doesn’t know you, that they would say those three words to you, please forgive me, and then say those four words, I trust in you, that you would do a radical work in their heart. Transform them from the inside out. I pray for the rest of us, Lord, those that already made that decision, that we would stand firm as Ephesians 6 talks about. We have the full armor of God. We’ve got the sword with us. Let us stand firm and go into the battles that you call us to go to, that we are warriors for Christ, not of physical violence, but very much so a spiritual violence. We are taking things away from the enemy of this world, Satan. We’re taking back people headed to hell. By your grace and mercy you are using us to reach people. So Lord I pray that your kingdom come, that your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That you would do all this for your glory. Amen.