God wants to save us unto perfection, unto a perfect end, unto a glorious death, and unto a wonderful, triumphant life beyond the grave.
Excerpts from the message:
You can’t be a leader, a husband, or wife, and talk your mouth off, and be a bitter, blabbing, gossip column for the local church. That’s gutter talk. Even if you hear something against someone that is bad, you better be sure it’s true rather than just bad. I think most people hear something bad, they feel they should tell that—it’s bad. You can only if it’s true. And the Bible says before you tell it to anybody, you must go to that person, even if the person was wrong and you are right and pure. You have to go to that person, because if you tell it, you won’t be accused of the sin that that person did, but you would be accused of the sin of gossip. There’s very few people that I have met in my Christian experience who had something to say about another Christian, ever had the guts to go to them, to say nothing of the grace to go to them. You cannot believe a thing that is not factualized by chapter 18 of the Book of Matthew. Go to your brother if you have something ought against them. You go to them. And by the way, that is easily interpreted sister. I know of nothing that can destroy a Biblical ministry more than the sins of the gutter, and the sins of the pew, and the sins of the altar.
If you love the truth, you can’t fake it. If you love the truth, you will allow that blessed spirit dip that fresh pen in that fresh ink as he reads this book and preaches this Word to people. If the heart is responding, it means they sigh and cry for Jerusalem. And those that have that spirit about that Book, the Holy Spirit will mark you, and when you go away, you will sigh and cry for Jerusalem, and not gossip and backbite and get bitter and spew your garbage across the land. You and I cannot be a part of the altar sins, the pew sins, and the gutter sins. We are living in the day of the greatest sign of the Endtime. It’s the sins not only of the gutter and abominations of Babylon, but it’s the sins of the church of Jesus Christ—the church. There needs to be a work of grace unto the uttermost in our lives.
I hope that God will allow no person to come and work in this ministry who’s a gossiper, whose tongue just—now, if something is wrong, you get your Bible and you go to that person and look them right in their eyes with it. Don’t go around and tell everybody you meet. You go to that person and get it straight. It may be that what you say is true and they need to be told to their face so they can stop. At the same time, it’s the way to kill gossip.
I wonder what the last chapter in our lives is going to be. I don’t mean out in the bar room, down at the gutter, drunk sots fornicating. I am talking about us in the church, in the pews, and in the altars. Are we going to be remembered as a talker? as one who was bitter? backslidden? Are we going to be remembered as one who was tested, and we groaned and griped and murmured till we die? Are we going to go out dying complaining about our wife or our husband or our son, rather than thanking God for His Son?
Those who are near me, know this so well in me. If I hear something and we don’t know it’s the truth, I say don’t tell it anymore. Either do something about it, or never tell it anymore. And it’s the telling of it by saints at the altar that produces the gutter. I have some enemies back in my life, in the denomination, and even when those things were happening to me, I didn’t want to think evil of them. And I’ve had people to suggest, “Ah, that man is a no count man. He’s lived in adultery for so many years.” I said, “Wait a minute. Wait a minute now. Wait a minute. Are you sure?” “Well, that’s what I hear.” “You don’t know it?” “Well, that’s what I hear.” I said, “If you know it as a fact, you have got to go to him, and if you don’t know it as a fact, you can’t tell it. Don’t tell it to me anymore. I don’t want to hear it. I will go with you and meet him with Matthew 18, but don’t tell it if you don’t know it.” We produce many of our own gutters. Now, if it’s true, deal with it and get rid of it, but if it’s not true, don’t make it so in our minds.
