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James 2:14-26 - The Demons Believe and Shudder · The Bible Explained with Jenn Kokal

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  Speaker 1: Life Audio, how do their friends and faithful listeners and
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  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bible explained on this lovely, lovely morning.
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  Speaker 1: I'm excited to dive into James chapter two today and
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  Speaker 1: finish out this chapter because this is the part that
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  Speaker 1: I think a lot of people struggle with. James talks
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  Speaker 1: about the lukewarm faith, the faith that is just lip
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  Speaker 1: service to God, the same kind of faith that the
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  Speaker 1: demons have, and I think this makes a lot of
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  Speaker 1: people question their own salvation. I also think that a
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  Speaker 1: lot of people believe that James and Paul contradict each other.
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  Speaker 1: So we're gonna address all of those issues today right
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  Speaker 1: after this quick ad break from a sponsor. Okay, faithful listeners,
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  Speaker 1: let's go ahead and grab our bibles and read James
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  Speaker 1: two fourteen through twenty six. As you guys know, I'll
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  Speaker 1: be reading from the Web or the World English Bible.
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  Speaker 1: Grab your delicious hot cupasideven weeks coffee, or your cup
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  Speaker 1: of tea for you crazy tea drinkers, and will read
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  Speaker 1: James to fourteen through twenty six together. What good is it,
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  Speaker 1: my brothers? If a man says he has faith but
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  Speaker 1: has no works, can faith save him? And if a
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  Speaker 1: brother or sister is naked and in lack of daily food,
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  Speaker 1: and one of you tells them go in peace, be
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  Speaker 1: warmed and filled, Yet you didn't give them the things
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  Speaker 1: the body needs. What good is it? Even so, faith,
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  Speaker 1: if it has no works, is dead in itself. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: a man will say, you have faith and I have works.
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  Speaker 1: Show me your faith without works, and I will show
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  Speaker 1: you my faith by my works. You believe that God
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  Speaker 1: is won. You do well. The demons also believe and shudder.
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  Speaker 1: But do you want to know, vain man, that faith
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  Speaker 1: apart from works is dead. Wasn't Abraham or father justified
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  Speaker 1: by works in that he offered up Isaac, his son
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  Speaker 1: on the altar. You see that faith worked with his works,
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  Speaker 1: and by works faith was perfected. So the scripture was fulfilled,
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  Speaker 1: which says Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to
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  Speaker 1: him as righteousness, and he was called the friend of God.
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  Speaker 1: You see then that by works a man is justified
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  Speaker 1: and not only by faith. In the same way, wasn't
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  Speaker 1: Rayhab the prostitute also justified by works when she received
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  Speaker 1: the messengers and sent them out Another way, For as
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  Speaker 1: the body apart from the spirit is dead, even so
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  Speaker 1: faith apart from works is dead. Starting in verse fourteen,
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  Speaker 1: here's what it says, What good is it? My brothers?
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  Speaker 1: If a man says he is faith but has no works,
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  Speaker 1: can faith save him? Now? Notice here that James does
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  Speaker 1: not specifically say that this person has faith. He says,
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  Speaker 1: this man or this woman says they have faith, but
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  Speaker 1: they have absolutely no works. What James is alluding to
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  Speaker 1: here is the people who give God lip service. They
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  Speaker 1: say they have faith, they say that they're Christians, they
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  Speaker 1: say that they believe in God, but that faith never
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  Speaker 1: sunk down deep into their hearts. So can that kind
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  Speaker 1: of faith, that superficial, lip service kind of faith actually
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  Speaker 1: save that person? No faith has to sink down deep.
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  Speaker 1: Which is why we cannot believe every single person or
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  Speaker 1: a thing, or book or a movie that claims to
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  Speaker 1: be Christian, because anything and anybody can claim to be Christian,
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  Speaker 1: but that doesn't mean that they have a genuine faith.
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  Speaker 1: And so here's an example in verse fifteen the James
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  Speaker 1: gives regarding all of this. If a brother or sister
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  Speaker 1: is naked and in lack of daily food, and one
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  Speaker 1: of you tells them go in peace, be warmed and filled,
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  Speaker 1: Yet you didn't give them the things that the body needs.
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  Speaker 1: What good is it. It's the same thing as if
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  Speaker 1: you would go up to somebody who is dying of starvation,
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  Speaker 1: dying from the elements because they don't have a home,
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  Speaker 1: or they don't have any clothes on their body, and
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  Speaker 1: you say to them, oh, I see that you're in
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  Speaker 1: so much need. Go in peace and be filled with
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  Speaker 1: good food and be warmed, and then you just like
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  Speaker 1: walk away. What good is that speech? That speech didn't
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  Speaker 1: heal that person. That speech didn't help them in the least.
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  Speaker 1: They are still miserable, they are still dying from the elements,
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  Speaker 1: they are still cold, they still don't have a house,
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  Speaker 1: they still don't have any food in the That's what
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  Speaker 1: James here says, lip service to God is like, it's
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  Speaker 1: exactly like that. It is useless, Just as useless as
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  Speaker 1: if you give a speech to somebody who is in
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  Speaker 1: desperate need. You need to actually do something with that speech.
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  Speaker 1: So if you were to give that person clothing, and
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  Speaker 1: you were to give that person a hot meal, and
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  Speaker 1: then you said this is from God, go in peace,
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  Speaker 1: be filled and be clothed, that would actually help that person,
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  Speaker 1: and your words would help as well, but action has
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  Speaker 1: to be associated with the words. This is the same
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  Speaker 1: thing as faith. We can certainly tell God anything we
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  Speaker 1: want to tell him with our lips. In fact, in
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  Speaker 1: the Old Testament, I believe it's in the book of Malachi,
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  Speaker 1: God was getting so angry. I believe the word lip
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  Speaker 1: service was actually used. God was getting angry at the
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  Speaker 1: hymns that his people were singing. He was getting angry
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  Speaker 1: at the feasts and the celebrations, the ceremonies that they
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  Speaker 1: were doing, even the offerings. He said, this is all
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  Speaker 1: lip service. You guys don't have any faith, true faith
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  Speaker 1: in your heart. You are just pretending to be Yahweh followers.
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  Speaker 1: And that's what James says in verse seventeen. Even so,
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  Speaker 1: faith if it has no works is dead in itself,
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  Speaker 1: and James stresses that point several times, that faith without
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  Speaker 1: works is dead. In fact, jumping down to verse twenty six,
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  Speaker 1: for as the body apart from the spirit is dead,
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  Speaker 1: even so faith apart from works is dead. Now that
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  Speaker 1: doesn't mean that faith isn't there. You know, the body
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  Speaker 1: of a deceased person exists, but it has no life,
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  Speaker 1: just as faith if it has no works and no
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  Speaker 1: obedience associated with it. It is dead. There is no
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  Speaker 1: life to that faith. Verse eighteen, Yes, a man will
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  Speaker 1: say you have faith and I have works. James says,
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  Speaker 1: show me your faith without works, and I will show
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  Speaker 1: you my faith by my works. Right there, he is
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  Speaker 1: stopping the argument that some people make where they're like, well,
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  Speaker 1: you know, faith is one of the gifts of the spirit,
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  Speaker 1: and works is one of the gifts of the spirit.
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  Speaker 1: And you know I might have the gift of faith,
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  Speaker 1: but I don't have the gift of works. And you
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  Speaker 1: know somebody else might have the gift of works, but
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  Speaker 1: they don't have the gift of faith. James says, no,
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  Speaker 1: absolutely not show me your faith without works. He says,
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  Speaker 1: you can't do it because your faith is dead. And
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  Speaker 1: he says, and I will show you my faith by
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  Speaker 1: my works. He says, my faith is going to be
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  Speaker 1: proven by the things that I do. Because faith can
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  Speaker 1: be alive, it does not have to be dead. Then
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  Speaker 1: in verse nineteen, I've talked about this verse a handful
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  Speaker 1: of times on the podcast already, but it says you
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  Speaker 1: believe that God is one you do well, the demons
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  Speaker 1: also believe in shudder. So what he's saying here is
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  Speaker 1: that even the demons believe in God. There has to
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  Speaker 1: be something more than that, just as the people in
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  Speaker 1: the wilderness believed in God, right you know, I'm reading
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  Speaker 1: through the Exodus account right now. And the people they
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  Speaker 1: saw God with their own eyes. They saw Him in
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  Speaker 1: the pillar of cloud by day and the fire by night.
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  Speaker 1: They saw Him perform so much many amazing miracles in
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  Speaker 1: front of them. They saw, they heard his voice, and
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  Speaker 1: they still didn't believe in God. They still didn't have
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  Speaker 1: a true faith in Him. And here's why. Because they
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  Speaker 1: did not want the truth of who God is. That
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  Speaker 1: faith never sunk down deep in their hearts. There was
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  Speaker 1: no obedience associated with that faith. There was no good
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  Speaker 1: works in the name of Jesus associated with that faith.
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  Speaker 1: Their faith was dead in the water. And there are
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  Speaker 1: so many, so many people who claim to be Christians
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  Speaker 1: who are doing the exact same thing that the people
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  Speaker 1: in the wilderness did. And this is not to make
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  Speaker 1: anybody doubt salvation, because yes, salvation can only come from
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  Speaker 1: God alone. There is not a single good work on
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  Speaker 1: the planet that can save you. In fact, a lot
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  Speaker 1: of critics of the Bible like to say that James
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  Speaker 1: completely contradicts everything that Paul says, because Paul in Ephesians
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  Speaker 1: chapter two, verse eight nine says this, for by grace
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  Speaker 1: you've been saved through faith, and that's not of yourselves.
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  Speaker 1: It is the gift of God, not of works that
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  Speaker 1: no one would boast. But unfortunately people don't continue reading
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  Speaker 1: because in the very next verse it says, for we
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  Speaker 1: are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works
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  Speaker 1: which God prepared before that we would walk in them.
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  Speaker 1: Paul and his letters never contradict the book of James,
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  Speaker 1: not once. Paul even says right here in Ephesians two. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: you can't be saved by your own good works. Absolutely
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  Speaker 1: not only Jesus can save. But once we become saved,
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  Speaker 1: we are created in Christ Jesus for good works which
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  Speaker 1: God prepared beforehand that we would walk in them. So
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  Speaker 1: what Paul is saying there is once you become saved,
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  Speaker 1: once we are born again, created new in Christ to Jesus,
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  Speaker 1: we are required to do good works which God prepared
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  Speaker 1: before that we would walk in them. Paul himself says that,
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  Speaker 1: and that does not contradict James chapter two at all.
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  Speaker 1: So when we become born again, we are prepared in Christ,
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  Speaker 1: Jesus to do these good works. Then how can we
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  Speaker 1: say we have faith if no good works are associated
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  Speaker 1: with that faith. And that is what James is arguing here.
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  Speaker 1: Even the demons believe in God, but they don't have
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  Speaker 1: true faith because they've been sinning and disobeying since the
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  Speaker 1: very beginning. They don't trust in God. They don't have
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  Speaker 1: faith in God. And unfortunately, there are a lot of
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  Speaker 1: people who have a dead faith very similar to the demons.
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  Speaker 1: They believe in God, but they don't have it deep
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  Speaker 1: in their heart. And James continues on here and he
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  Speaker 1: makes the argument in verse twenty one, wasn't Abraham our
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  Speaker 1: father justified by works? In that he offered up Isaac,
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  Speaker 1: his son on the altar. You see that faith worked
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  Speaker 1: with his works, and by works faith was perfected. So
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  Speaker 1: because Abraham obeyed God, that was when his faith was
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  Speaker 1: truly perfected. In fact, I talked about this at great
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  Speaker 1: length when I did my Good Friday special, which I'm
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  Speaker 1: going to link that episode in the description of this one,
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  Speaker 1: because I really think that is an important topic if
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  Speaker 1: you want to understand what James is talking about a
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  Speaker 1: little bit more. To really go into Abraham's story and
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  Speaker 1: his obedience to God and how his faith was perfected
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  Speaker 1: through that obedience. And so James says this in verse
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  Speaker 1: twenty three. So the scripture was fulfilled, which says Abraham
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  Speaker 1: believed God and it was accounted to him as righteousness,
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  Speaker 1: and he was called the Friend of God. You see
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  Speaker 1: that by works a man is justified and not only
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  Speaker 1: by faith. So basically faith and works, or faith and obedience,
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  Speaker 1: they go hand in hand with one another. You can
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  Speaker 1: have faith without obedience. You can believe in God, but
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  Speaker 1: that's just a dead faith. Even Jesus talks about that
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  Speaker 1: in the Book of Revelation where there was a church
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  Speaker 1: that was just sitting on the fence all the time.
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  Speaker 1: They weren't either hot or cold, they were somewhere in
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  Speaker 1: the middle. They had a dead faith. And Jesus said,
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  Speaker 1: I'm gonna spit you out of my mouth, just like
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  Speaker 1: lukewarm water that is just so disgusting, not refreshing, not hot,
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  Speaker 1: not cold. It's gross. I'm going to spit you out
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  Speaker 1: of my mouth. In fact, there are many scriptures that
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  Speaker 1: warn against that type of faith, and apparently a lot
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  Speaker 1: of us have that type of faith. Our faith doesn't
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  Speaker 1: become alive until we start obeying God and having the
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  Speaker 1: truth really sink down deep into our hearts. And that's
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  Speaker 1: why James says that by works a man is justified
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  Speaker 1: and not only by faith. I do believe that once
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  Speaker 1: a person has faith in Jesus that they become saved,
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  Speaker 1: because it says, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and
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  Speaker 1: you will be saved, you and your household. But once
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  Speaker 1: that belief takes root, it has to go deeper than that.
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  Speaker 1: If you just stay a baby Christian your entire life,
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  Speaker 1: you are not going to receive your full reward, the
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  Speaker 1: reward that Jesus says he's going to give those who
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  Speaker 1: conquer in the end. And again that has talked about
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  Speaker 1: plenty of times in scripture that we need to prepare
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  Speaker 1: ourselves for meeting Jesus, for standing in front of his throne.
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  Speaker 1: That's a really scary thought. There's not going to be
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  Speaker 1: anybody with you in front of that throne of God.
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  Speaker 1: You're going to be standing there alone, and Jesus is
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  Speaker 1: going to recount all of the things that you did
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  Speaker 1: in this life. I believe that's talked about in First
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  Speaker 1: Corinthians two. I think it's two. It's either two or three,
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  Speaker 1: it's at the beginning where someday we will meet Jesus
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  Speaker 1: face to face and he's going to judge us for
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  Speaker 1: all of the works that we did or did not do.
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  Speaker 1: So this isn't to make anybody doubt your salvation, but
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  Speaker 1: more so as an encouragement that if you think that
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  Speaker 1: you have a dead faith, to really start looking at
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  Speaker 1: the truth of God, to start loving God's truth. And
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  Speaker 1: what is God's truth? Well, I believe that the truth
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  Speaker 1: of God is Scripture itself, the Bible. If you love
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  Speaker 1: God's truth, if you are clinging to God's word and
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  Speaker 1: making changes in your life based upon God's lid and
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  Speaker 1: based upon the commandments of God, then Jesus says that
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  Speaker 1: you do love him. What was Jesus's commandment to his disciples.
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  Speaker 1: If you love me, then keep my commands. So loving
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  Speaker 1: God is loving his truth, loving his word. And if
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  Speaker 1: you do that, then I do believe that you are saved,
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  Speaker 1: and I do believe that your faith will start to
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  Speaker 1: come alive if it is not already. Now, this takes
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  Speaker 1: years to learn. It takes a really long time to
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  Speaker 1: learn how to obey. It's a difficult process. Even Paul
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  Speaker 1: himself said that I had to learn to be content
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  Speaker 1: in every single situation, Paul, the pinnacle of you know,
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  Speaker 1: Christian ethics, I suppose had to learn how to become content.
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  Speaker 1: It's a teaching process. But your heart has to be
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  Speaker 1: open to it has to be open to the truth
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  Speaker 1: of God. So James mentions Abraham right here, an Israelite man,
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  Speaker 1: in fact, the patriarch, the first Israelite man, I suppose,
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  Speaker 1: who was justified by his belief in God and his
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  Speaker 1: words of obedience. And now also James talks about a
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  Speaker 1: gentile woman, so that any gentile reading this letter doesn't
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  Speaker 1: think that James just left them out or that this
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  Speaker 1: is only for the Israelites. It certainly is not, it
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  Speaker 1: says in verse twenty five. In the same way, wasn't
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  Speaker 1: Rahab the prostitute also justified by works when she received
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  Speaker 1: the messengers and sent them out? Another way, Now, that
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  Speaker 1: is a woman who is discussed in the book of Joshua.
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  Speaker 1: I think it's Joshua chapter two and three, where Rehab
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  Speaker 1: the prostitute lived in Jericho. But she believed in God,
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  Speaker 1: and she knew that God was going to give her
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  Speaker 1: homeland to the Israelite nation. So when the spies came
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  Speaker 1: to her door, probably to spend the night in an
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  Speaker 1: inconspicuous location. She hid them up on the roof, away
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  Speaker 1: from the King of Jericho, and she said to them,
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  Speaker 1: I believe that God is going to give this land
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  Speaker 1: to you. And she was justified by her faith. She
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  Speaker 1: helped those spies in faith of Yahweh, and her entire
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  Speaker 1: family was saved. So she was justified by her works
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  Speaker 1: and also her faith. But if she would have just
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  Speaker 1: sat back and not done anything with her faith, you know,
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  Speaker 1: had those spies come to her doorway and she believed
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  Speaker 1: in Yahweh, but she didn't hide them out of fear
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  Speaker 1: of the King of Jericho, then she wouldn't have been
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  Speaker 1: justified by her faith. She probably would have perished along
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  Speaker 1: with everybody else in Jericho. So Rehab was justified as
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  Speaker 1: well by her works. Then, to conclude in verse twenty six,
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  Speaker 1: it says, for as the body apart from the spirit
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  Speaker 1: is dead, even so faith apart from works is dead. Again,
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  Speaker 1: the faith is still there. It says that the faith
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  Speaker 1: is there, but it is a dead, lifeless faith that
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  Speaker 1: God doesn't really want much of a part of. God
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  Speaker 1: desires a true relationship with us, a true fellowship with us,
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  Speaker 1: and not for us to just give him lipservance. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: all right, faithful listeners, I'm going to move to an
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  Speaker 1: ad break, and after that I will close up this
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  Speaker 1: episode with one last point. I just want to really
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  Speaker 1: stress again what I said at the beginning of the episode.
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  Speaker 1: We are to test every single spirit. We are to
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  Speaker 1: test people. We are not supposed to just take their
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  Speaker 1: word for it. In fact, I was just reading in
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  Speaker 1: Proverbs the other day that a fool believes everything everybody says,
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  Speaker 1: but a wise man has discernment. You have to have discernment.
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  Speaker 1: That's why Jesus in Matthew seven fifteen through twenty tells
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  Speaker 1: us to beware of false teachers and false prophets and
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  Speaker 1: avoid these people. Here's what Jesus says, beware of false
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  Speaker 1: prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly
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  Speaker 1: are ravening wolves. By their fruits, you will know them.
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  Speaker 1: Do you gather grapes from thorns or figs from thistles?
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  Speaker 1: Even so, every good tree produces good fruit, but the
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  Speaker 1: corrupt tree produces evil fruit. A good tree can't produce
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  Speaker 1: evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree. Produce good fruit.
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  Speaker 1: Every tree that doesn't grow good fruit is cut down
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  Speaker 1: and thrown into the fire. Therefore, by their fruits, you
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  Speaker 1: will know them, and you might be like, well, Jen,
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  Speaker 1: some of these people seem to be, you know, really
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  Speaker 1: showing good fruit. They seem to really be doing good things,
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  Speaker 1: like their churches are really big, or their ministries are thriving.
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  Speaker 1: I just want to give this warning that sometimes people
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  Speaker 1: can paste good fruit onto corrupt trees, and a lot
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  Speaker 1: of times it's good fruit from the backs of other people,
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  Speaker 1: like people that genuinely are trying to do God's will,
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  Speaker 1: but maybe they're deceived. Sometimes these people will take other
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  Speaker 1: people's fruits and paste it on to theirs, and they
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  Speaker 1: are deceivers and they are liars. But here's what Jesus says,
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  Speaker 1: Not just their fruit will you know them by. But
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  Speaker 1: you're also gonna see that God will cut down those
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  Speaker 1: bad trees that don't produce any fruit. Even if you
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: think that somebody has good fruit, if God fully cuts
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: that tree down, then you can know that that person
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: was a false prophet in sheep's clothing. So we are
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: supposed to avoid these people, and we are supposed to
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: beware of them and I'm telling you this problem is everywhere.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: It is not just the church in California. It is
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: not just the church down the street that has weird beliefs.
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: Chances are these people are in your church as well.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: It is not just a problem for somebody else. It
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: is a problem in our very own churches. And we
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: need to watch out for this. That's why Jesus tells
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: everybody on the Sermon on the Mount, everybody, the entire multitude,
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: to watch out for these corrupt people. Why would he
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: tell so many people if this was only a problem
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: for big churches. It's because it's a problem everywhere. And
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: Jesus understands that that these false prophets and these false teachers,
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: they are going to come in looking like a sheep.
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: They're going to have sheep's clothing on, but they are
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: going to be a wolf who devours the sheep. They're
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: going to be people, unfortunately, like James chapter two, who
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: only give lip service to God. And if you keep
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: on reading down through Matthew seven, you're going to see
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: that there are plenty of fakers out there. Here's what
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: Jesus says in verse twenty one. Not everyone who says
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  Speaker 1: to me, Lord, Lord, will enter into the Kingdom of heaven.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: But he who does the will of my Father, who
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: is in heaven. So there are people who are going
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: to fool others, these wolves in sheep's clothing. They're going
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: to fool others by saying, yes, I believe in the Lord, Lord, Lord,
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  Speaker 1: I believe in him. And yet they are not doing
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: the will of the Father. They are doing their own will.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: They are using the sheep. They are pretending to believe
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: in God. So again, these verses are not to scare
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: you about your salvation, but more so to convict if
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: somebody here listening does have a dead faith, start taking
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: these truths of scripture and sink them into your heart.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: And it's also to keep you, guys aware of anybody
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: that might be doing this in a leadership position in
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: your church. Be careful of this kind of stuff because
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: this can cause many people to go astray. Faithful listeners
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: have a fantastic rest of your Thursday. Check out all
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: of the links in the description for the different things
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: that I do with the Bible explained, including the Friday
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: podcast which is for the members. You'll find out how
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: to become a member in the link that says Koffee
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: down below if you would like to gain access to
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: the Friday podcast. Faithful listeners, have a fantastic rest of
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: your day, happy listening, and God bless. I just want
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: to take a second to thank the team at Life
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: Audio for their partnership with me on the Bible Explain podcast.
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: In fact, if you go to lifeaudio dot com you'll
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: find dozens of other faith centered podcasts in their network.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: They've got shows about prayer, Bible study, parenting, and more.