Revival Conference 2007 - Harold Vaughn - Part 3

Four million of them children. You realize that for every kid that gets diagnosed with ADD, adult discipline disorder, that for every child that gets diagnosed with ADD, it puts a quarter of a million dollars in the pockets of the psychologists. We'll never drug our children into behaving right and I want to tell you my friend that these are all all indications of a lack of respect for the moral law of God. When there's a mainstreaming of pornography, when there's a legitimizing of sodomy, a condoning of adultery, and the aborning of the unborn, it's a blatant revolt against the moral law of God. But my friend, what about the blatant compromise in liberal churches against the moral law of God? You know, we don't hear much about this. It's almost a taboo to even break up anything along this line, but listen to this. I just got this last week. The Seattle priest has become a Muslim while also retaining her clergy status in the Episcopal Church. Her local bishop has described the development as exciting. I look through Jesus and I see Allah, explained the Reverend Ann Holmes Redding to the Seattle Times, which reported that Redding puts on her Islamic headscarf on Fridays and a clerical collar on Sundays. She has denounced Christianity as a world religion of privilege, but she still sees Jesus as her Savior, even if not divine, and plans to remain both a priest and an Episcopalian. I got news for you. Allah and Jehovah are not the same people. Blatant compromise. One mainline denomination allowed Aaron Swenson to retain his or her status as a minister, even though he, she, or it had a sex change operation. Wouldn't you think that the right-wing activists who want us to call the secular corporation and want us to call the Congressional switchboard to protest the moral decline would have something to say about the absolute moral insanity that's been going on in some of the churches for decades? Wouldn't you think they would want us to picket and protest and boycott liberalism, but not a single word? And I want to say to my friend, when we're trying to hold the secular world and the government to a standard that we're not willing to hold people who named the name of Christ to the standard, it's duplicity and it's hypocrisy and it's time to repent. One major denomination would not make a written statement condoning homosexuality or people living together unmarried because they didn't want to reduce the faith to a list of do's and don'ts, so goodbye Ten Commandments. You know, my friend, when the American people, when the American people cannot define marriage as a union between a man and a woman for life, we're not at a crossroads. We're a long ways down the wrong road. And you say, well, Harold, you shouldn't be up there using those examples. You shouldn't be up there gay bashing. Friend, I'm not gay bashing, and if you think anything I say is rough, you ought to check out the urban renewal program that God implemented at Sodom and Gomorrah and see how he dealt with that situation. The Salvation Army gave benefits to homosexual partners before Walmart. Of course, they've remained since, thank God. But let's bring it down to this right here. What about the rank compromise in conservative churches? Let's just bring it right down here with us, a little closer home here. You know, you know, the narrow way is not narrow enough for some people, and they want to make the narrow way more narrow than it already is. But, my brethren, there are others who want to make the narrow way broader than what it already is, the rank compromise in conservative churches. The Bible says, the time will come when they will do a sound doctrine, but they're going to heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. My wife and I were going down the highway. We had this dilapidated sanctuary up on the side of the hill. It had a spray-painted sign, a handwritten sign, and it said, church for sale, easy turns. Church for sale, easy turns. In that case, it was a building for sale. But, my friend, is it not a move on today to sell out the truth of God for the sake of some sort of contrived unity or acceptance? Are we not living in a time when men have stopped contending for the faith and started campaigning for acceptance? Can I tell you, not everything is compatible with the religion of Jesus Christ. Not everything is compatible. My brethren, George Gallup said only 10% of professing Christians say their beliefs affect their lifestyles. What about the music, the media, and the magazines, who knowing the judgment of God, that they which do such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them? They tell us that pornography used to be a $10 million business about 40 years ago. It's now a $15 billion industry in the United States of America. I just got the statistic that 68 million search engine requests each day go on the Internet from our country for pornography. 2.5 billion pornographic emails are sent every day. I was in a prayer meeting with an 18 year old kid one day, and he said this, he said, I refuse to entertain myself with those things that kill my Savior. I refuse to entertain myself with those things that kill my Savior. Brother, we've become so desensitized, there's nothing I could say that would shock, embarrass, or cause a blush, or even a flush, a face, because our culture has gone down the wrong road, my brethren. Pastor called the other day, and he said, I've got a woman in my church who got on a chat room. I've never been on a chat room, but Brother, what does that say about fellowship with God and fellowship in the local church, when church members in Bible-believing churches get on chat rooms and spill their guts to total strangers? He said, why, she got on a chat room, and within two weeks, they were mailing photographs, and within four weeks, she had abandoned her husband and children, and shacked up with a guy she didn't even know. My brethren, this happens every day in churches like yours, and in churches like mine. The problem is no longer out there how easy it is to bash the sin on the left, but brethren, I believe the chickens have come home to roost. How often do we hear something like this? Somebody comes to the pastor and says, wait, you know, pastor, I believe that God wants me happy, don't you? I mean, how are you going to answer that? And you know, God wants me happy, pastor, and I don't love my maiden anymore, and I believe God wants me to get a divorce. I have an evangelist friend that went into a Christian bookstore, which they really ought to change the name, and looked up all the books on divorce and couldn't find one against it. Couldn't find one against it. But yet the Bible says, what God hath joined together, let no man put asunder. When the God-ordained institution of matrimony goes by the wayside, there's an inevitable breakdown in the social order, and my brethren, the breakdown of the home is the mother of all evils. You say, well, Harold, don't you know we're under grace? I've had a grace awakening. Yeah, I believe what we've got going on is a grace distortion. A grace distortion. You see, grace, my friend, does not override the moral code. Y'all with me on this point right here? And grace does not obliterate the consequences of wrong choices. Grace does not give me freedom to sin. Grace gives me the power not to sin. That's what grace is all about. No respect. No respect for the moral law. But notice, before the glory departed, what happened with God's people, there was rebellion against parental authority. Rebellion against parental authority. Look in chapter 2 and verse 25. Eli pled with his children. Look at what it says. Verse 25, chapter 2. If one man sinned against another, the judge shall judge him. But if a man sinned against the Lord, who shall entreat for him? And get this, not withstanding, they hearken not unto the voice of their father. Get that. They hearken not unto the voice of their father. Eli refused to discipline his children, and Eli's children refused to obey their father. Rebellion begets rebellion, and rebellion against God-ordained authority is passed on to the next generation. You see, when we violate God's law and rebel, we shouldn't be surprised that our offspring will rebel and take it to an extreme farther than we ever imagined possible. I was in the Sam's Club the other day, and this kid had on this t-shirt, you know, you're taking a big risk to read the t-shirts, and I took a chance, and I read it, and it said, question authority. Question authority. Who's the ultimate authority? God. That's a recipe for anarchy. But you understand that rebellion is not a light thing according to the Word of God? Because the Bible says that rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft. The Bible never says murder is as the sin of witchcraft. The Bible never says adultery is as the sin of witchcraft. The Bible never says sodomy is as the sin of witchcraft. But it does say that rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft. You see, rebellion, rebellion. Why is it so satanic? Sin is a crossing the line. It's going beyond the boundaries that God has established. But rebellion is a refusal to come back within the bounds once we discover we've exceeded them. Hothnai and Phinehas were living in sin. I was bad enough.