Speaker 1: Now I’m going to mention something about myself and the notebook thing. What do we call this? The notebook.

That’s a good name, okay? And I have only one reason, really, for even mentioning this. On a certain page, I think it’s page 13, they list the conference speakers. My name is there, and they’ve given my home address, and that’s because I’m going to leave the place I’ve been the pastor now for quite a few years

and going into an itinerant ministry of preaching for the cause of revival. That’s the next stage of my life. And they placed in there my home address.

Now, I have no real idea why anybody would want to write me a letter, but there is a chance. But I’ve got to say something about that address on Maple Road in Vassar, Michigan. They checked with someone who should be a good authority on my address, and that’s my son.

John Flanders works on the staff here and is happily serving the Lord at Falls Baptist Church. So they went directly to John, who did not grow up in the house where we now live because we bought it after he had left home. But surely he would know his dad’s address, right?

Wrong. He got the numbers turned around. That’s the wrong address.

It’s not the right one in there. If I told you the right one, I don’t think any of you are turning back. And are you any of you turning back to my address there?

You really are? okay now I’ve got to remember my address okay 6061 Maple Road now I don’t expect you really to write me but what I was worried about was my poor neighbor you know if we had people from this meeting writing to one of my neighbors who would have that right address there they would really wonder what that was all about that’s for sure and so to spare my neighbor I want to tell you don’t

pay attention now my son and I have had a wonderful time of fellowship together I like you everybody’s been busy, we’ve been busy, and haven’t been able to fellowship as much as we would like to, but maybe the height of our experience together this week was being, at least for me, being in line for lunch and having somebody inquire if John and I are brothers. We do look quite a bit alike. How many of you have noticed that we look alike?

Okay, we do look alike. And that, I’d never heard the brother angle before, but you know what? That shows great perception and wisdom among young people.

And we were shocking them by telling them, no, it’s father and son. But you know, sometimes that happens when you keep your youth. Or maybe the principal job has been hard on John.

Now, I’m going to read with you some verses that I think all of us have heard from the church family and from the teen conference. We’ve all heard the verses before, but there’s something very wonderful in these verses that I have the privilege of pointing out. Matthew 11, down at verse 28, Jesus said, Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest under your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Now, especially thinking of the young people, but talking to all of us here who are Christians, I like to speak this evening of the easy life.

Yeah, he used that word, easy. E-A-S. E-A-S-Y.

A word that we find difficult to use in connection with Christianity. But Jesus said it. He said, take my yoke upon you and learn of me.

For I am meek and lowly in heart and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is E-A-S-Y. Easy.

My yoke is easy. And my burden is light. And you know, the picture here is the Lord Jesus was saying to the crowd that day, you’ve been working for a hard taskmaster.

You have been employed by a tough boss, the devil. Now, why don’t you come work for me? Because a yoke is an instrument of work.

Yet the work that the Lord Jesus has us do for him is so light that it seems like rest. Take my yoke upon you. And then he said it.

I’ll tell you what, I think that a lot of preachers today in our circles would be in trouble for saying it. He said, come and yoke up with me because my yoke is easy. You’re going to be living the easy life.

And I’m going to get ahead of myself and say, I’m glad to be standing up and preaching tonight. I was in a camp recently where they had whole families there, and we really saw the Lord work during those days. And I sincerely told my wife, I said, you know, we’ve seen Jesus Christ at work at every one of these services.

And some of the young people were called to ministry and a lot of great things happening. I said, Jesus Christ was working. And my part was I got to stand up and talk.

But it all didn’t really center around me. We had prayer meetings and God was at work and you could feel him in the meetings before they ever had the preacher get up. But you know what I get to do is I get up, get to get up and talk.

I’m going to tell you very honestly, I didn’t feel a whole lot of pressure. We knew God was going to work. And I’m going to tell you right now, it’s an easy thing to do what I’m doing.

This is easy. This is easy work. And you know what?

The Christian life is the easy life. And we’d like to send all these young people home with their sponsors to live the easy life. And I understand the first service that I missed.

It was, we were speaking of a four-letter word, rest, R-E-S-T. That’s what we mean. Let’s pray. Oh, Lord, I pray that you would draw us again with that attraction that only you have,

that draws us to you. May you draw the lost who are here tonight to you as their Savior. And may we you draw the saved to your side. May we glory and joy in the opportunity

of yoking up with you for life. and Lord may we learn the easy life and yes Lord your yoke is easy and your burden is light thank you for being with us tonight now just speak to us we pray in Jesus name Amen two things number one getting saved is easy it is easy it really is brother Mark Meaver and I were at a Christian camp one time for a youth directors conference. I came along just to see what was going on.

They had a snack shop, and we went to the snack shop to get a little something to eat. And we overheard a couple of guys sitting around the table with a great and deep theological discussion. Unfortunately, I overheard what they were saying. Now, I’m a polite person, and I don’t like to poke my nose in

where it doesn’t belong. But sometimes I get thinking, my nose belongs over at that table. And they were talking about all this terrible easy-believe-ism preaching.

Now, there is such a thing as presenting the plan of salvation without presenting the plan of salvation. There’s such a thing as so-called sharing the gospel without sharing the gospel. What is the gospel?

Christ died for our sins. He was buried. He rose again the third day according to the scriptures, and we’re saved by putting our trust in him.

Now, some people will make it as simple as pray this prayer and you’ll go to heaven. That’s not the plan of salvation. John Van Gelden talks about one, two, three, repeat after me.

That’s not soul winning. It really isn’t. Soul winning is about showing people what Christ did for them and urging them and showing them how to put their faith in him.

And that might include a prayer. So there is such a thing as that. But these guys were talking about that. They were talking about not holding the standard up high enough for a Christian living before I remember overhearing a guy like this guy

another time say how hard he made it for somebody he was trying to lead to Christ to be saved. You know, are you willing to give up this? Are you willing to do that?

Are you willing to change this and change that? All before he was saved. I’m glad that the people trying to win me to Christ didn’t do that.

I don’t know about you, but there were a lot of sins I didn’t even know were sins. Before I got saved, I was in darkness. I was dead in trespasses and sins.

I wasn’t aware of anything. I was clueless, as every lost person is. He’s in darkness. so uh anyway they were talking you’ve heard people talk like this and it’s just awful and uh and you know i was sitting there and i was getting agitated just a little bit and then i got probably a little bit away from uh being polite and i moved from my table to theirs without being uh invited i don’t

know if that’s etiquette and i sat down i was a little older than they were and uh they were a little startled and I said you know I couldn’t help but overhear what you guys were saying I said you know what in my years in the ministry it has always been kind of a principle that it seems to make sense to me that when you read a verse in the Bible and you say to yourself I wish it didn’t say it

that way you know that gives the impression that and if you read a verse in the Bible you think you You know, if I were writing that, I would have put it a different way. Now, none of us would be that bold. But then I read the last chapter of the Bible where he says, whosoever will.

And he said, take the water of life freely. Freely. No strings attached.

Absolutely free. I said, would you put it that way? Very silent.

And I said, you know what? If you don’t know anything about a free salvation offered to anyone who believes, then you don’t understand the plan of salvation. And I moved back to my proper table with Brother Neal.

And I’m not afraid of the word easy. The Lord Jesus said to be saved, you have to come to him. Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

He said, if it appears to you that the burden of your sin is a heavy load. If you are tired of being a sinner, if you are tired of being not in God’s family, if you’re tired of being anti-God instead of pro-God, if you’re tired of being on your way to hell instead of on your way to heaven, just come to me and I’ll take care of it for you. That is the plan of salvation.

Did you know that? You know, in another place, Jesus said, Him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. He said, you know, if you have enough faith just to come to me for your salvation, you’ll have it. I heard a wise man, Frank Bumpus, once stand up and say,

you could come to my Christian school for 13 years and not be saved. You could come to my church for 20 years and not be saved. But you couldn’t come to Jesus and not be saved.

Come unto me, he said. It’s easy to be saved. You want to know why?

The hard part of getting a sinner saved is what Jesus did. that was the hard part you know every one of us being guilty of breaking the law of god makes it so that all the principles of justice of the universe inherent in the very nature of god demand our condemnation they all demand our condemnation they all call for our damnation now how do you work a puzzle out like that where god loves me wants to spare me but his nature of

justice and holiness demands my condemnation. Well, God came up with a plan, but I’m going to tell you what, it was a hard plan. There would have to be a substitute, and that substitute first would have to be sinless himself.

He would have to be a man, but a man who had never sinned. Well, since the fall of Adam, there has never been such a man until the virgin-born son of God, the son of man, Jesus Christ was conceived and born. Now we had someone suitable to be a substitute because he never sinned himself and would not have to pay for his own sins. And if he was inclined, he could volunteer for my,

to pay for my sins. But there’s the other problem. Talk about how hard this is. If you ever found one who was holy and never sinned himself, would he be willing to take the guilt and condemnation and filth of my sins and of the sins of the whole world, not just all the world living at one time, like six billion people a day, but all the people who ever lived, all the villains, all the criminals, all the liars, all the immoral, all the wicked people

who spent a full life living wickedness, would he be willing, the Holy One of God, to take upon himself the guilt and sins of the whole world in order to pay for them? so it’s hard to find a sinless substitute and what are the chances do you think that if we ever found such a one he’d be willing to love us enough to volunteer to take the condemnation and the kilt for our sins and pay the price ah but such a one was found

such a one was found our redeemer and then the plan needed to be executed and he volunteered himself and there he died on the cross. Friends, that was the hard part. Someone had to pay for our sins and as has been sung tonight, he cried three o’clock in the afternoon, it is finished in triumph. If you ever read the account of the cross, the one that you naturally think of as the victim

is obviously in charge. That whole thing. Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. you know and all the way through right down to it is finished he’s in charge and he finishes his work and then he rises triumphant from the tomb and you know all of that you know it’s kind of hard to raise a dead man from the dead that was the hard part so that my part is easy i come to him and let him take care

of it. And friend, I’m going to tell you, it’s easy to be saved. And the standards of the Christian life, as we’ll see in just one minute, are very, very high.

And we owe him everything. We are to live in holiness, but the matter of salvation is easily settled because it’s simply coming to me. Did you know that what we have just read is the tender conclusion of a hellfire and damnation sermon?

Matter of fact, I want to show that to you. Look up in verse 21, Jesus is preaching, Woe unto thee, Chorazin! Woe unto thee, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, which were two key cities condemned by the prophets in the Old Testament, if these works were done in you that were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon,

they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment than for you. And thou, Capernaum, his headquarter city, where his ministry was based on the shore of Galilee, and thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell.

For if the mighty works which had been done in thee had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I say unto you that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for thee. And this conclusion of a hellfire sermon is built on other words of condemnation.

In the previous verses of this chapter, you can go home and read the whole sermon. It’s hot. Then he stops and he prays publicly.

Verse 25. At that time, Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, Because thou hast hid these things for the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight. All things are delivered unto me of my Father, and no man knoweth the Son but the Father,

neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. Now, verse 27 reads like it’s found in the book of John, but I won’t go into that. But in his prayer, he says, Lord, it’s the babes who are understanding what I’m trying to say.

You have hid these things for the wise and prudent, and you have revealed them unto babes. Did you know that a child can be saved? Matthew chapter 18, who will be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?

He brings up a little child and he says, unless you become like a little child, you won’t even enter the kingdom of heaven. Because you have to humble yourself as a little child to come helpless and put your faith in him. See, a little child can be saved.

A little child who doesn’t have awful iniquities to forsake. A little child who can believe can be saved. I’m saying it’s easy to be saved.

Then there’s that word in verse 21, repent, a very important word. You know you can’t be saved without repenting, but you’ve got to define repentance correctly. And I’m not trying to weasel around this thing.

Not at all. You have to repent to be saved. In the book of Luke, it says it over and over again.

It says that Jesus said, I’ve not come to call the righteous, but sinners too. Then in the parables, he said, there’s joy in heaven over one. There’s more joy in heaven over one sinner that repented than over 99 just persons who needed no repentance.

What he was saying is every sinner must repent. But the Greek word repent means to change your mind. And salvation repentance in the Bible is the change of mind necessary for a person to trust in Jesus for their salvation from sin.

That’s what it is. It is not a commitment that a person makes to change their life. See, some people preach repentance as if that’s it.

In other words, if someone says, I’m going to quit doing that, I’m going to quit doing that. I’m going to change the way I live, kind of turn over a new leaf, that that’s repentance. And they say the proof of repentance, the necessary proof of repentance is that you follow through and actually change your own life.

Now, friends, no matter what you do, if you define repentance that way, you have put works into the plan of salvation. And friends, it’s not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us. Follow the word repent in the New Testament.

Find out that to be saved, we must repent of our sins. We must change our mind about our sins. To me, I think of a doctor’s office.

And you know, finally you get the man to go to the doctor’s office. Women, at least my wife, she frequents the doctor’s office. But men like me, you know, we don’t want to go to see the doctor.

But here I’m in a doctor’s office. And you know what? I’m in a room, in a waiting room, full of men and other people who have repented of their sickness.

See, you know why I’m there? I’m tired of having the flu. I’m tired of aches and pains.

I’m tired of coughing. I’m tired of stomach and intestinal problems. Oh, I’m just sick of it.

So you know what? I want help. And I’ve changed my mind.

I’m not saying, oh, I can handle it. Oh, I’m just going to, you know, take some more chicken soup. take some aspirin before I go to bed.

You know, I’m actually going to the doctor because I changed my mind about my flu. And I went down there to get him to cure me. Now, you know what?

Repentance from sin, that’s exactly what it is. When a sinner says, you know, I don’t want to be a sinner. I don’t want to be anti-God.

I don’t want to be hell bound. I don’t want to excuse my wrongdoing. I want help.

I want someone to deliver me for my sins. And that repentance leads you to put your faith in Jesus Christ as the doctor who can fix you. That’s what repentance is.

See, and then you keep reading. And did you know what the Bible says? You ought to repent of your unbelief.

It says in the book of Mark, Jesus preached, repent and believe the gospel. That’s like, change your mind about Jesus Christ. Change your mind about your unbelief.

Then the book of Hebrews says that to repent in order to be saved, we must repent of our good works. you ever notice that you know when people get up and say we don’t hear enough preaching about repentance is that what they’re talking about man I need to hear a man preaching that we should repent of our good works but that’s what it means in the book of Hebrews when it speaks of repentance of dead works in other words I need to say

my good works will not save my soul I need to repent change my mind about Jesus Christ about my good works and about my sins and that repentance is the change of mind Need me to come to Jesus and let him take care of it. See, getting saved is easy. Now, I want to ask you tonight before I move.

Are you saved? Do you know you’re saved? Are you someone who can say, I have an assurance from the Bible that when I die, I’m going to heaven? Well, I’m going to tell you, like Brother Jim likes to say,

in five minutes you can have that assurance. Because coming to Jesus is not hard. He bids you come.

His Spirit will help you come. And you can have the life-transforming experience of the new birth tonight by coming to Jesus and putting your faith in Him. Remember what He said?

You have revealed this unto babes. And if the plan of salvation was so difficult and so complicated that a little child couldn’t understand it, then, friends, most of us couldn’t understand it either. And the Lord is calling us to come to Him.

Being saved is easy. What do you think? It’s true.

Now, it’s not only easy to be saved, it’s easy to live the Christian life. Now, that’s what he’s talking about when he switches to take my yoke. Let me read those two verses again.

Verse 29. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me. For I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Now, for many years, I’ve been the pastor of a country church, a rural church. I’ve lived way out in the sticks.

I’ve worked and labored among farmers, some of them. At least some of them are what we call hobby farmers. That means that their land isn’t good enough to produce good enough crops to make a living, and yet they love farming, so they farm them and use the income just to pay the taxes on the land, and then they go to a factory and work during the day.

But there’s a lot of farming going on, so I know a little bit about it at least. And I know that a yoke, in old-fashioned terms, is an instrument of labor from a farm. Now, I think city people probably understand what a yoke is.

A yoke is a wooden instrument that ties two beasts of burden, two animals together, to do the same job. It looks like this. You’ve seen a yoke?

See that? That’s a yoke. Okay, now you’ve got one ox, and you put the yoke over his neck.

And you got another ox, that’s two, that’s oxen. And they’re going to carry the same load. They’re going to do the same work.

So when Jesus said, take my yoke upon you, here’s what he’s saying. He’s saying, we’ve got a burden to carry. We’ve got a job to do.

Now you come and work, not just for me, but with me. And I’ll be under the yoke over here. And you be under the yoke over here.

And let’s work together. And you know what? Take my yoke upon you.

Learn of me. I’m meek and lowly in heart. I’m easy to get along with.

My yoke is easy and my burden is light. Now, why is that? Well, you can figure that out, but let me tell you something that happened a long time ago.

My son, John, that lives and serves here, he grew up in a home. So, of course, I remember when he was a little boy. One time, I was down at the gym at our church and we had to move some tables.

The only helper I had was John. He was just a little guy at this time. But I let him help me move these tables. now I want to tell you as a pastor I am so grateful for those plastic white tables they came up with a few years ago and they are just nothing at all but we had man-killing tables right John and for a while him and his sisters had the job of moving those tables every Saturday and it

was but this was earlier than that and he was just a little kid he and I were going to move some tables okay what we did was we folded up the tables then he was going to be on one end of the table I I was going to be the other end and we were going to carry them across the gym. But you know what I did. You know what I do.

Of course you do. And that is, I was kind of, my arm was down toward the middle of the table. And I was hanging on to the folded legs.

And John, he was just a little guy. He was on the other end, grabbed the end of the table. He was like this.

But I’m going to tell you, I was carrying 90% of the weight. And John helped me move those tables. Helped me.

And see, I’m carrying the table like this. Come on, John, help me out. He’s on the end just like this.

And you know what? He thinks he’s working hard, but he doesn’t have a whole lot to do because I’m doing most of it. That’s the way it is with the Lord Jesus.

Take my yoke upon you. We’ll work together. You know, the Bible says we are laborers together with God. Take my yoke upon you,

but you know what? His yoke is easy. His burden is light because he’s carrying the load.

See, and you know what that is, folks? that’s the easy life that’s living the Christian life now in the Bible you need to be informed about this living the Christian life is different than getting saved everyone who believes on Jesus Christ and is saved ought to live the Christian life but there are different words used and here’s what they are living the Christian life all out is called discipleship and being saved happens when you believe. Did you know that salvation and discipleship

are two distinct things? Did you know that there is not only some difference between the two in their requirements and how they’re carried out, there’s a vast difference between the two and if you’ll forgive me for this and hear me out, the requirements for salvation are not only different from the requirements for discipleship, they are opposite. opposite.

They’re opposite. And a lot of false preaching about salvation mixes up the requirements for discipleship with the requirements for salvation. But they are much different like the invitations.

The invitation of Jesus to salvation was always come unto me. The invitation for discipleship was come after me. If anyone will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

And you see, salvation is simply receiving a gift. The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord. He told the woman at the well, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that is speaking to you today, you would ask him and he would give you living water.

When I got saved, I received a gift. It was absolutely free. I didn’t pay for it.

But you know what? Discipleship is based on giving a gift. Present your body as a living sacrifice.

Present. Present. See, when I got saved after I received the gift, every time I came to church, I felt like God was wanting something more out of me.

And at first I didn’t really understand what it was. What he really wanted was my whole life. And discipleship is based on giving your whole life to Jesus Christ.

Salvation, that is, discipleship is. salvation is based on receiving a free gift from christ that he paid for you when he died on the cross you see discipleship is a commitment to absolute obedience and salvation is faith for eternal salvation they are much different as a matter of fact salvation is automatically eternal and it always works because it depends totally on him when I got saved and you got saved, I transferred the responsibility for the salvation of my soul from myself to Jesus Christ.

I transferred that responsibility. That’s what faith is. That’s what saving faith actually is. If I were to lose my salvation now, he would have to fail

because he died for me. He rose again. He intercedes for me this day. He would have to

fail for me to lose my salvation. For that reason, the salvation decision is once and for all, because it depends on him and he never fails. But the Bible’s clear that the discipleship decision has to be remade regularly. Matter of fact, at one point he said, if you’ll come after me,

take up your cross daily, every day. And you know, salvation cannot fail, but discipleship is constantly in jeopardy of failure. And some of those verses will disturb you, but when you read them in their context, you’ll find he’s talking about discipleship, not about salvation. And because discipleship depends somewhat on me,

it can fail. And we know of many who have gotten a good start and they ended up failing. Everybody turn to Luke 14. Now, I’m trying to say

that living the Christian life is easy. But I want to ask you to respond to something here. Are the commands of Christ, would you call them easy? Somebody here was talking about, don’t give me the stone face, you can talk back,

so I’ll say that too. Now really, we’re talking, you be honest with me, even if you think you’re going to contradict me, I won’t be hurt. Are the commands of Jesus Christ to his disciples, Would you classify them as easy?

Love your neighbors yourself. Love your enemies. Not seven times.

Seventy times seven forgive one who has transgressed against you. Hard commands. Are the requirements for discipleship easy?

The requirements for discipleship as you remember them, are they easy? Well, let’s take a look. In Luke 14, look down at verse 25. And there went great multitudes with him, and he turned and said unto them, let me stop a minute, just before verse 25 is a story he told

about a man who made a supper and sent out messengers to invite people to his supper. And they said, come for all things are now ready. And he said, I will compel you to come in.

And he invites everybody, anybody, the halt, the blind, everyone to come to the supper because it’s now ready. That’s the salvation supper. He’s talking about the salvation invitation.

But now after giving that parable, he walks along and a great multitude of people are following him. And he turned around and he said, if any man come to me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. Now, you know, discipleship and salvation are two different things.

They’re actually opposites in many ways. But you know what? They are definitely linked.

Anyone who comes to Christ for salvation owes him discipleship. We are bought with a price. We are not our own.

And the route of discipleship is our moral obligation. And yet, all these people came to him, and he turned around and he said, Oh, you’re coming to me. He said, I want you to know, if you hate not your father, your mother, your brother, your sister, your own life.

You cannot be my disciple. You see, we have a moral obligation to discipleship after we’re saved, but it is a hard, high requirement matter. And it’s as if he called them and encouraged them all to come to him for salvation. It’s like he discouraged them

when they wanted to follow him. When it comes to salvation, he says, Come for all things are now ready. But when it comes to discipleship, he says, you better count the cost.

In fact, let me keep reading. Verse 27. Whosoever doth not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

Let me keep reading. For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he hath sufficient to finish it? Lest happily, after he hath laid the foundation and is not able to finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him, saying, this man began to build and was not able to finish. Now, when Jesus, please stay with me now, when he said, cannot be my disciple,

he did not mean cannot be saved. He did not mean cannot begin to follow me. He was saying, someone who doesn’t make these sacrifices cannot be successful as a disciple.

See, successful salvation results in eternal life. Successful discipleship will result in eternal rewards. And he is saying, unless you hate your father, mother, and these family members, and if you don’t take up your own cross and give up all your plans and ambitions, you cannot be my disciple.

What he means is, you will not succeed. You will begin, but then you will fail to finish. And you’ll be like a man who was going to start a building, and he never counted the cost.

He never decided, how much is this going to cost me? He ran out of money. And then that unfinished building was a monument to his utter foolishness.

So Jesus is saying, if you’re going to come after me as a disciple, you better count your cost. Then he gives another illustration of what king going to make war against another king. Sitteth not down first and consulteth, whether he be able with 10,000 to meet him that cometh against him with 20,000. or else, while the other is yet a great way off,

he sendeth an ambassage and desireth conditions of peace. So likewise, whosoever he be of you, that forsaketh not all that he hath. He cannot be my disciple. Now, in the history of warfare, there have been many occasions

on which a smaller army has defeated a larger army. But before that was done, I’m going to tell you, there was a lot of consulting going on. Now, you know, I’ve lived much of my life, most of my life in Michigan.

That makes me a bona fide Yankee. But, you know, I was born in Richmond, Virginia. And that’s always been a part of my psyche.

I’m from Richmond, Virginia. My dad worked for the VA and he was working in the Richmond office when I was born. Then we moved up when I was a little boy to Philadelphia, PA.

Then when I was 12, we moved to Winston-Salem, North Carolina. And I finished out before I got married. as a good old Southern boy. And like any good Southerner,

who is that, Brother Ingram? Okay, there. I know about the Civil War, and I like to think about the Battle of Chancellorsville, where General Hooker, the great hero of the Northern Army, everybody believed all their hopes were on General Hooker. He had this enormous army, and General Lee, his army had withered down, and they were in bad spot,

and he consulted with Stonewall Jackson. You know, if you don’t love Stonewall Jackson, there’s something wrong with your Christianity. He was a godly man.

And anyway, I better watch out. I’m going to lose the crowd here. Stonewall Jackson and Robert E.

Lee, they consulted. They had an army that was less than half of Hooker’s army. You know what they did?

They divided their army. They divided it. It went around the backside.

One of the charges was at night. And you know what? It is still considered today.

one of the most brilliant maneuvers ever taken in the history of warfare. And the result was the Battle of Chancellorsville, which was a big-time Southern victory. The problem was General Jackson got killed. And the next battle was the Battle of Gettysburg,

and the rest is history, as you know. But now that’s done. But there’s got to be some consulting going on.

Can we defeat this larger army? And he said, if you don’t consult and think about that and are defeated in battle, you will fail. And so likewise, I want to tell you, if you don’t forsake all that you’ve got, you can’t be my disciple.

In other words, you will fail, you won’t succeed. You know, he said three things. He says, you’ve got to give up people in your life.

You’ve got to give up your own plans. Let’s take up your cross. You’ve got to give up your possessions.

That’s forsake all that you have. To be my disciple, to succeed as a disciple. And what does that mean?

Did you know those are the three things that get people off the discipleship track? People in their life, they love a little more than they love Jesus. Plans that become so precious to them, they can’t give them up.

Or possessions that possess them, and they turn them off the track. And Jesus said, I want to tell you right here up front, if you’re going to follow me, you better count the cost. And right now, ahead of time, you better give up people, plans, and possessions.

because if you don’t, you won’t succeed. That’s what he said. Now, that’s pretty tough, isn’t it?

But do you know what? We can succeed. And I want to ask you some questions and have you think with me about this. If discipleship, if living the Christian life, is like building a tower, the question comes,

have we counted the cost? Do we have sufficient to finish? Now, I want to ask you that question.

Discipleship, the road of discipleship may require great sacrifice. And it does require absolute surrender. But I want to ask you something. If I set out to be a full-fledged, all-out disciple of Jesus Christ tonight,

to follow him all the way, will I have sufficient to finish? Will I have sufficient supply to finish? Now, anybody speak right out loud, where is that supply?

It’s in God himself. You see, the whole deal is, I’m going to build this tower yoked up with Jesus. Not myself.

It’s not going to be dedicated me. It’s going to be dedicated me, yoked up with Jesus. And that makes that tall requirement, friends, easy.

Easy. Absolute surrender. Forsaking all.

Yoked up with Jesus. It’s easy. Jesus, you want me to forsake all?

In my flesh, that looks impossible. But you know what, Jesus? Yoked up with you, I think I can do that.

And you can. Got another question for you. We have a war against a foe that is smarter and stronger and bigger than anybody here.

And our enemy is stronger, smarter, and more powerful than all of us together. But I want to ask you a question. Do we have what we need to defeat this larger army?

Yes, we do. And where is our victory? It’s in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And the Lord Jesus Christ says, yoke up with me. My yoke is easy. And friends are going to tell you, that’s the secret.

That’s the secret. Turn your back on all your sins. Sell out your life.

But don’t leave this conference without yoking up with Jesus. Say, Lord Jesus, I’m setting out to live the highest life of all, the life of a follower of you. And Lord Jesus, I am in myself incapable of coming up with all that I will need to succeed in this life.

But Lord Jesus, I will not fail yoked up with you. You know what? That yoke is easy.

It makes it easy to preach. I remember thinking about what he said. I’m the true vine, you’re the branches, and my Father expects you to bring forth fruit.

I remember thinking, you know how that helps a preacher? You know, if a preacher comes before a congregation and hopes that he might bring forth fruit, maybe there’s a good number of people out there that are unsaved, and he has some, a great desire to see many of them saved. But you know what? Most of us preachers, at least this preacher, would shrink back from the idea that there might be many people saved in a service where there are lost people there

through his preaching. Now evangelists, maybe they feel different. I don’t think they do. But if I came before a crowd and half the crowd was unsaved, somebody said, Preacher, do you think we’ll see a hundred people saved

tonight? You know, if I was thinking about me, I’m a preacher. A hundred people saved.

I don’t think so. I don’t see how that could be done. But you know what? What I have in my mind

I’m just the branch and he’s the vine. That means the fruit is his. If the question is this, do you think that Jesus Christ could bear fruit a hundredfold in this room tonight?

The answer is absolutely yes. Are you willing to hook up with him and be the branch through whom the life-giving sap flows for the fruit to be produced? Why, yes.

A young person here says, I want to go home and be a light in the world. But do you think you really will succeed? Do you think it will be possible for you to go home and win people to Jesus Christ?

Maybe your family members or others. Those hopes and dreams of this day, do you think they will be fulfilled? If you have the idea that Jesus is going to work through you, it looks easy.

Yoke up with Jesus. You know what’s happened? In a lot of fundamental churches, living the Christian life has not been the matter of yoking up with Jesus. Oftentimes what’s happened, and older people here will probably relate to this,

is you got saved in church and God gave you a new heart and a new life. Boy, you were happy and you started coming regularly. They said, come back Sunday night.

You came back and you’d come back Wednesday night. You came back for that and taught you how to tithe. And man, here you were moving along.

But then you failed. And you came forward with a tender heart and said, preacher, this week I did something wrong. They had the deacon pray with you, and he did talk with you and showed you 1 John 1, 9.

And you got cleansed of your sins by confessing them. Then the deacon looked at you, and he said in so many words, now that you’re forgiven, go back and try harder this week. So you did.

And your area of besetting sin, your weakness, you especially tried harder about. You made stronger promises. You said, God, I will not do that. I can remember in my early Christian life,

there was a particular thing I repented of, Brother Van Gelderen, every day. And the night before I went to bed as a teenager, I asked God to forgive me for failing again today. And the next morning I’d say, Lord, I’m not going to do that again today, and I would.

And you know what happens after a while? Frustration. Also limitation.

You know, after a while, a lot of people in Baptist churches think they have found their limits. Now, they don’t talk about this out loud. You know, I got saved and I moved forward and I did everything they told me to do.

But you know, after a while, I found my limits. You know, I can tithe, but I can’t witness. I tried witnessing.

I went out two Thursday nights in a row and I was too scared and I didn’t do any good. I can’t witness. I can’t give out a track.

You know, and I can give 10%. That was tough enough, but this mission conference faith promise thing, no way, I can’t do that. You know, I can pray at home by myself, but I can’t lead my family in prayer.

I’m intimidated by it. And I don’t really come Wednesday nights anymore because the men get together to pray, and I can’t pray out loud. I just can’t.

You know what? It isn’t too long. It may take a few years, but a lot of people in Baptist churches have found their limits because they were told wrong.

From the very beginning, they should have been told, you know what? You can’t live this yourself. But the Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of Jesus Christ, lives in you.

He will help you obey His commands. Did you know that’s what Jesus said? He said, if you love me, keep my commandments, and I will pray the Father, and He will send you another comforter, even the Spirit of truth.

The main reason that the Holy Spirit came into our heart was to help us obey the commands of Jesus. It wasn’t God over us with a bat saying, you live right, you do what I say or I’ll whop you. It was God, our Father, coming to our side and saying, I’ve got a new way for you to live.

And I’m going to show you how to do it and I’m going to help you do it every single day. And that’s what it is. Yoke up with Jesus.

And after 20 years of this kind of Christianity, if you’re still in church, you’re frustrated. You might be bored and empty. you might be having a real tough time putting one foot in front of the other.

See, and you know what? If we actually talked to you and you were honest, you know what you would have to say? If I said, what’s 20 years of being saved like?

You would say, well, I’m glad I’m going to heaven. But the fact is, I know I’m never really going to be much for God until that day. I’m just thankful for eternal security.

And I have besetting sins that keep besetting me. And it’s frustrating, but I’m still in church. A lot of people aren’t still in church.

ought to give me some credit for that. And you know what you’d be doing? You could take 10, 15, 20 minutes telling me about yourself. When Jesus said,

take my yoke upon you and learn of me. For I am meek and lowly and hardy, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. You know someone who is told right, and that is the only way you can live the Christian life is yoked up with Jesus. And if they consciously depended on him each day for the power, like we’ve been taught to do, to live the Christian life in 20 years,

you know what you’re going to be doing? You’re going to be smiling and singing the praises of Jesus Christ. And if someone says, tell me what the Christian life has been like the last 20 years, you would say, you know what? All these 20 years, I have found out more and more

how wonderful, merciful, gracious, and powerful my Savior is. And I have learned more and more about the power of His resurrection. And I’ve seen Him work through me in ways that I never dreamed He would work through me. and I’ve been doing things for 20 years

I never dreamed I could do. I said at the beginning, I’ll never give out a tract, but I give them out every day today. I said, I can’t lead in prayer and I lead my whole family in prayer.

I’ve led each of my little children to Jesus Christ. When I started out, I said, I could never do that. And a lot of the habits I had, tobacco, liquor or whatever, they’re gone. And it’s been my Lord Jesus Christ

that gave me the victory. It’s been Him living through me. And I’m going to tell you what, the next 20 years or the first 20 years of your Christian life will be much different if you’re yoked up with Jesus.

Yoked up with him. I can’t do it, but you can do it with me. We’re under the same yoke. We had a prison ministry up by our rural church for quite a few years, I think about 15

years. In Michigan, what they do is they do the crime in Detroit and they send the prisoners out into the country where we live. They open up prison camps and it’s all Detroit people. I’m not against but anyway so we had a ministry in the prison and we had men from our church preach every sunday afternoon and i had i was on a rotation i preached once a month and if there were five sundays i would

preach the fourth sunday and the first or whatever or fifth sunday in the first one other words a few times a year there was two sundays in a row when i preached up there and the men would gather voluntarily into a room and sit around a table and we had service well one day i went up by myself didn’t have a partner, and God spoke to me almost out loud about what I would speak on today.

Today I was to speak on, walk with the Spirit and you’ll not fulfill the lust of the flesh. So I went in prepared to preach that sermon. We had a prayer and testimony time, and a man stood right up to give a prayer request right up in front of me, just across the table. And he said,

I’d like to have the men pray for something, and a lot of you know what it is. And I’m not going to tell you exactly what it is, but I’ve got a problem. I’ve got a weakness. I’ve got a sin I keep falling

back into. And a year or so ago in the correction system, I got saved. And I come as faithfully as I can here, and I read my Bible, but there’s an awful thing I keep going back and doing. And the guy

sitting next to where he was standing was patting him on the back. And he said, a lot of you guys know what it is. And today I would like us to pray that God would help me overcome this weakness of mind.

Well, I said to him, you know what, what I’m speaking on today is going to really help you. Will you listen carefully? He said, sure I will. Well, then after we went through our song and our

prayer time, I preached on walk in the spirit and you’ll not fulfill with us to the flesh. And I taught it in a very simple way about how you lean on the Holy Spirit for the victory over your flesh. I asked if any of them who were Christians would ask God to teach them how to live that and would seek this very week to lean on the Holy Spirit of God for the victory over their sins and their flesh.

Well, hands went up all over the room, including this man’s hand. We had a prayer. Well, it was the time when I would go back the next week.

So I was back the next week. When I went back there, I was just a little bit early. I went in and sat down, and one of the prisoners, not the one who stood up and asked for prayer, but one of the other prisoners came running in the room, He said, Mr.

Flanders, I am really glad you’re here early. I have really got to talk to you. I said, okay, what is it?

He said, do you remember what you spoke on last week? And I said, yeah, I do. He said, that works. He said, I never brought this up last week, but I’ve had another awful thing that I’ve continued to have in my life,

even after I was saved. And when I listened to you about that, I said, that makes sense. I think I’ll try that out.

And, you know, I’ve been getting up in the morning and saying, Lord, I can’t do this. You can do it. And I’ve got to lean on you.

And, man, I haven’t even one time fallen in the last seven days into that sin. I said, well, I’m glad to hear that. He said, this is great.

Could you give me some more verses? So I was giving him a few more verses. Everybody filed in.

Now it’s time for our song and prayer time and testimonies. And guess who gets up? This man, Kitty Corder, for me, he stood up and the guys were all smiling because they knew his testimony.

He said, Mr. Flanders, I am really thankful for what you preached on last week. Because this thing that has defeated me all my life, and even since I’ve been saved, has been vanquished.

He didn’t use that big a word. It’s been defeated. I’ve had, I don’t think he used this word, I’ve had the victory this week for the first time in my life.

I’ve gone throughout this week without falling into that same mud hole. And I want to thank Jesus Christ for that. And I want to tell you what.

It does work. It makes a huge difference. And you can be a witness for Jesus Christ.

And you can live a holy life. You can forsake everything. And you can turn your back on your sins.

And you can stand upright and be a testimony for Christ. And you can be far more than you are today if you’ll yoke up with Jesus Christ. And when you do, it’s easy.

Easy. Let’s bow our heads and pray. Oh, Lord Jesus, we thank you for inviting us to come to you for salvation and then also for victory in the Christian life.

Lord, we confess to you the failure that’s resulted from us seeking to do all of these things on our own. And we thank you that you never intended us to keep those commandments, those high standards of discipleship on our own. But Lord, we thank you for offering to go through our entire life as a partner, yoked up with you.

And that’s the way we want to live it. That is the way we want to live it. And I pray that some tonight who have heard this kind of teaching all week long, but have not responded to it, will before they go home, I mean this very night, respond to your invitation, take my yoke upon you. And Lord, I pray that you would also firm up the faith and understanding

of those who are already seeking to live the Christian life. And may the idea of going through life in partnership with you help them to stay with it right to the end

Speaker 2: and to the day when you say, well done. Help us tonight, we pray. With our heads bowed,