In 'The Antichrist Part 2,' Douglas Campbell discusses the imminent presence of many Antichrists, as outlined in 1 John 2:15-18, and warns against loving the world over God. He emphasizes the importance of understanding Scripture correctly to avoid the deception of false religions, which often distort the truth of Jesus Christ. Campbell relates the 'mark of the beast' from Revelation 13 to a figurative mark represented by a life dedicated to worldly desires rather than Christ. He describes the attributes of those enslaved to sin, who may profess faith but live contrary to God's Word, and contrasts this with the mark of being a slave to Christ, which involves living a life visibly dedicated to God's teachings. Campbell calls for introspection and genuine repentance, urging believers to be marked by Christ's teachings and to live for His glory rather than succumbing to a false sense of security in unscriptural beliefs.

Chapter two this morning I'd like to read verses 15 through 18 first John 2 15 The word of God tells us, Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. Children, it is the last hour.

As you have heard that Antichrist is coming, so now many Antichrists have come. Therefore, we know that it is the last hour. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, As we ponder the words that you have given us, Father, I can't help but think of your your patience and your mercy. Father, and your beauty and how you've chosen to redeem those who would turn to you.

Father, not only as what we had just sang, how can we even ponder why you would choose to save us, why you would choose to redeem us. Yet Father, you do because you are all merciful, all loving. You demonstrate a love that that we can't even comprehend. Father, we use the word love and is so shallow, so empty compared to the love that you demonstrate. And yet, you go beyond redeeming us.

You go beyond redeeming us. You go beyond sending your son who took brutal punishment, brutal punishment from man, beating and whipping and and piercing hands and feet. As your son was upon the cross fighting for breath, fighting for air, the same air that you give us. As he endured the wickedness of men. Father, it was but nothing compared to the wrath that pleased you to pour out upon Him, because of dirtbag like us, who spit in your face who rebel against you who know better Who live for ourselves Other who will rescue us from this flesh?

Who will rescue us from our depraved minds? There is no one but You. So Father, this morning we thank you, we praise you, we worship you. And you go beyond that and you give us your word that we might know you, that we might grow to be like our Savior. And you give us the Holy Spirit who enables us, who keeps us from wandering, who changes our hearts.

That the law that we once hated, Father, you change us, that we might love it, that we might love your precepts. Father, what can we say to all of this? But what kind of a God loves like this? It is the one true God of Scripture. And Father, we praise you and we thank you.

And this morning we come to you and ask that you would Bless us beyond measure by opening our hearts and once again changing us by your word that we might be more like you. That we might glorify the one in whom saved us, who rescued us. And Father, it's all your work, it's all your glory. As a result this morning, Father, we ask that you would once again change us. Once again intervene and draw us nearer we ask in Jesus name.

Amen. Amen. Well The week before last we began a long message. We began to look at the Antichrist and Antichrist that have come. This morning I'd like to further look into this.

This morning specifically to take just a little bit of a step back and show you how this fits together or fits together with other scripture how it meshes with other revelation throughout the Bible that God has given us. First, we need to look at 1 John 2, 18, which we looked at, actually, we looked at last week. Let's look at it again. It says, children, it is the last hour. And as you have heard that Antichrist is coming, so now many Antichrists have come.

Therefore we know that it is the last hour." Last week, or the week before last, we look again at the purpose or why John has written this letter to his church, that he is primarily combating Gnosticism or this, we could even say, a new age or a new way of looking at Scripture. One that appeals directly and very much so to the flesh, one that permits the flesh to live how it wants, one that is completely contrary to Scripture. While it uses many terms, many religious things, as we see even today of different religions, and how they will use the words of the Bible. And yet, what they mean by those words is often very different. It's a very different understanding than what you and I would understand.

And therefore, it permits them to do what the enemy, the Antichrist, the devil has always done, is to confuse us into essentially being able to agree. A false religion will say this, this, and this, and you will say, oh, okay, well I believe this, this, and this, and they will say, well that's good, I believe that too. And then begins the confusion. Unless you know exactly what they mean, often times by the words that they use, you will find that for them to even say that that Jesus Christ is God can mean something completely different than when you say Jesus Christ is God. So in doing is what the enemy has always done, is one of his chiefest tools, is to just sow confusion.

And John is writing to battle this, That every person who claims Christ doesn't know Christ. Every person who says that they believe in Christ doesn't know or believe the same Christ that maybe you believe. This can be illustrated well in Mormonism who would say they believe in Jesus Christ. And I would, after such, we would say, you must repent and trust in Jesus Christ. And they will say, well, I do believe in Jesus Christ.

Do they? Does it mean the same thing? It does not mean the same thing. And you say, why? Well, let's imagine that I have a friend named John.

And I say, well, for you to have new boots, you must go see a guy named John. This guy I know named John. And you say, okay, I'll do that. You may not know that the guy, the person I'm talking about, is a guy that works at Boyer's Boot and Shoe Repair. And he is my friend, he is John, I know him well, and I'm sending you to John.

And you come back the next week and you say, hey, I talked to John. I went up to the Burlington Hospital, I went to the pharmacy area, And I talked to John, I said, John, I need new boots. And John would say, what do you mean? I don't have any boots for sale. And he would come back and he would say, I did what you said.

I trusted that John would give me boots and he didn't give me any boots. He just gave me some ibuprofen. Sent me on my way. He probably should have gave me some Valium because he thought I was crazy. Did we mean the same thing?

We did not. They were two different people. And so when you look at the Jesus of Mormonism, whom they would claim as the brother of Satan, he is not the same Jesus. And if you don't believe in or trust in the Jesus Christ of Scripture, you are trusting in a Jesus Christ who is a figment of your imagination, or maybe not a figment of your imagination, maybe as someone who really was named Jesus Christ, but if he is not the same Jesus that went to the cross and took the punishment, and the wrath of God was poured out upon him. He has no power to save, and you are not saved.

If you do not believe in the Jesus Christ of Scripture, you are not saved. You simply have religion. Religion doesn't save anyone. And part of this is what John is combating as he comes into this. And Let's come back to the text.

The first thing I wanted to look at is Scott Brown had a podcast where he talked with, I believe, the guy in Behold Your God, John Snyder. They talked about the Antichrist, and I thought this was very fitting. It kind of fit right in with where we're at, and so I listened to it. And one of the things that they pulled out, and one of the things that I think we need to visit, is what is it that this Antichrist will do? One of the things that he will do we find in Revelation 13 16 through 18 Let's look what it says it says also it causes all both small and great both rich and poor both free and slave To be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name.

This calls for wisdom. Let one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, For it is the number of a man, and his number is 666." Now come back to what does he do? He places a mark. It says, let me go back. Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked.

Now look where it says, on the right hand or the forehead. Now many of you, especially those of you who are my age, when the Left Behind series was super popular, and you can admit there are many, many movies that are all about the end times. And this is one of the terrifying things that we see in almost everything that's put out there that I have watched. And it's all about this mark of the beast, as they would call it. This mark that people would have on their hands or their forehead.

And so often this is taken in a literal sense to where in almost every movie or every book that I've ever read, it's about them putting a physical mark on your head or your hand. And this can be interpreted and dove into and thought about lots of ways and I'll admit there are times where I began to think this way and have thought about this way about it, but we look at the microchips and you know they're putting microchips in people's hands and and doing this or that connected with they won't be able to buy or sell this causes us to begin to think well maybe this could be the mark of the beast. And if so, and what I've seen both in myself and other people, they will say if they want to come put a chip in my hand, I will fight to the death. Fight to the death. Before they do that.

Any scripture is less than any other, but this is some of the greatest text in scripture. Look what it says, it says, Hear O Israel, The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command to you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your home, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise." Now look at the next text.

You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates." So what does it say? It's saying the Word of God, the Word of God. First, We must understand it rightly that God is one. But then, that when I understand the word of God rightly, what's the first command?

Teach it to your children. And what's the next part? It says, you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets to your eyes. Do you notice a similarity to the mark of the beast? Remember, it's the hand and the forehead.

Here, it's a hand and the forehead. Look then at Deuteronomy 11, 18-21. You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your children, talking of them, when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise, you shall write them on the doorposts of your house, and on your gates, that the days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give them, as long as the heavens are above the earth." Again, if the God of Scripture is the one true God, if you have trusted in Him and trusted in the sacrifice of His Son to redeem you. Your biggest calling in life, the highest calling, is one, to know the Word of God, two, to teach it to your children.

And we come again to this idea of the sign on your hand or your forehead. And what is this sign? It is that your life is about Christ. It is about God's Word. It's about what He has said.

When we think of the forehead, what is it so specific about the forehead that's so instrumental? It's that when you go into public, Wherever you go, when people look at you, what are they seeing? They are seeing the Word of God. It's not that you have to tattoo it here. It's that it is what your life is marked as being about.

It is who you are. It is what your friends say. When they see Brody coming around the lake, they should say, that guy is about the Word of God. He knows God. He knows His Word.

He stands for His Word. He trains His children. You don't have children yet, but one day you will train your children, right, Brody? And there's lots of things we train our children about. But the most important thing is to train our children in the Word of God.

It is what you are called to do, but you're also called to be marked by it. You are called to live it out. You are called to breathe out the Word of God. In our culture, in mainstream Christianity, the Word of God is so foreign that it's impossible to be lived for. But if you don't know the Word of God, it's impossible for you to stand for it.

In fact, that is what we find in the last days. That's what the Bible warns us about in the last days. So what we find as we come to this text is that there are, again, there are two different types of people in this world. There are those who are slaves to Christ, and There are those who are slaves to Christ, and there are those who are slaves to sin. What makes, what marks the slave to Christ?

We come back to, to join this together, come back to 1 John 2.15, it says, Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Are you a slave to Christ? Do you love Him? Do you love His Word?

Do you love Him that you would willfully lay down your life and be marked as His follower, as his disciple, as his servant, as his slave. We go into the Old Testament, we read about slavery, and it was different than the slavery that most of us would understand. But still, there were aspects of it that were bad. Obviously, slavery is not good. But what I've noticed in the Old Testament, I didn't mark down the scripture, but in the Old Testament if you served your master as a slave for a certain amount of time, that they then would have to free you.

And at that point you had a choice. Because often times they loved their master. And in fact they loved the security of serving their master. They loved their master because he was a good man. They loved their master for many different ways.

And they could make the choice at that point that they could be marked They could say I have chosen to live the rest of my life as a slave to my master because I love him and the Bible gives instructions or they gave instructions in the civil law at that time in the scripture that they were to specifically about piercing their ears, that they would be a mark, that this person is a lifelong by their choice, they have chosen to live as a lifelong slave to their owner. And we think, in our American minds, is who in their right mind would ever choose to do that? Right? And yet there were men who did that. And the same idea comes to being a slave to Christ.

Those who are a slave to sin, those who love the world, will look at those who choose to be marked by Christ, and they will say, who in their right mind would ever do this? Who would lay down their life? Who would lay down their dreams to be marked as a slave to Christ? And I would say, who in their right mind would not? He has laid down His life.

He saves you. He rescues you from your sin. He gives you what you don't deserve. He gives you life. He gives you happiness, not the false happiness that the world promises but never falls through with, but he gives true joy to all those who would lay down their lives for his cause, who would turn to him in repentance and faith.

Are you marked as a slave of Christ? Is it on your forehead? Is it what people see when they look at you? Now going on to look at the other side of it, what does it mean to be a slave to sin? Richard Owen Roberts preached a sermon a while back where he listed 12 things that were the marks of the slave of sin.

And we come back to 1 John, where John gives us, he says, Do not love the world of the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. In fact, he is a slave to sin. He is a slave to the world. And so, Richard Owen Roberts, I think, did well in bringing out 12 points to what marks the slave of sin?

The first he says is to be unaffected by God's sovereign rights in your life or the world. See what is challenging? What is shocking? So When we talk about what does it mean to be a slave to sin, it's very easily and often, I'm sure, happens to all of us that we begin to think, well, what does it mean to be a slave to sin? And we start to think about Satan worshipers and those evil people that are in the world and all these things.

And yet, that's not really what Scripture says a lot about. It says, number one, again, to be unaffected by God's sovereign rights in your life or in the world. It's in essence that you could be a slave to sin and yet come to church every Sunday. You could be a slave to sin and do nice things for people. But look at the first thing.

Let me read it once more. To be unaffected by God's sovereign rights in your life or the world. Is God the person who calls the shots in your life? Is His Word the one that determines what you will do or not do. It's His glory what determines how you will live or not live.

Does He have sovereign rights over your life? How about when you don't feel like it? How about when you don't like it? How about when it's giving up maybe lifelong dreams that you have? Will you submit to God's sovereign rights in your life?

Or will you rebel against it? Will you say, I get to call the shots in my life? If you get to call the shots in your life, you are a slave to sin. And in fact, if you think that that's true, if you think that you are calling the shots in your life, you don't even understand that you are a slave still to sin. It's sin that's calling the shots in your life.

It just has a way of tricking you into thinking that you were idea. Two, a carelessness or indifference about the state of one's own soul. If you don't care about eternity, if it isn't concerning to you today, it's a sign that you may be marked as a slave of sin. Thirdly, to sin freely without any powerful conviction of sin. This is what we find in John's time.

This is what we find with Gnosticism. The idea that as long as you're religious, as long as you make a couple of commitments, You can still live however you want. In fact, mainstream Christianities cry today over and over, even though it's terribly out of context. Is, judge not. Don't worry about what everybody else is doing.

Just worry about yourself. Don't worry about if they're a church member. You just worry about you and God will take care of that. That is completely contrary to Scripture. And in fact, if you would read the rest of that chapter, you would find that it has nothing to do with the one verse that you take out of context.

And I'm not saying, I'm saying mainstream Christianity is doing this over and over. To sin freely without any powerful conviction of sin. What I have found in my time in ministry is so often that I will come to someone, or maybe they'll come to me and they'll say, well, I think we should do this or do that. And I will go to Scripture and I will say, well, I could never be for that because Scripture says this, this, this, and this. And they will say, oh yeah, I know that, but wouldn't it be really nice if we could just do that?

No, it wouldn't. It wouldn't at all. Why is it that we have no dread of what Scripture says? Why is it that we can so easily dismiss it? Why is it that we can look at Scripture when it says something contrary to our lives, we can just brush it off with an excuse and move on and say, oh, God is good.

It's completely contrary to Scripture. It's completely contrary to Biblical salvation. It's completely in agreement with the deception of the enemy who is more than happy to leave you deceived in some form of religion until you die and go to hell. I believe a majority of those attending church in America today, or what the, let me rephrase that, a majority of those who are gathering together into what they call church in America, a majority of those are on the wide path to destruction, and most of them don't even know it. Why?

One, because they don't read their Bible. Two, if they do read their Bible, and they see something that's against what they believe, they just move on. And three, because I believe a majority of pastors don't read their Bible. And they have no idea of what it teaches. It says, George Mueller's father said to him that you should go into the ministry because It's a good profession, it's a respectable profession, and it will provide for you for the rest of your days.

Thank God George Mueller came to know Christ. But brothers and sisters, I believe there are a lot, a majority of people speaking in the pulpits today who have no knowledge of Christ. They're simply repeating what they've been taught. But it's more than the pulpit, it's those who sit to be fed. This morning I have a writing by A.W.

Pink that I've copied for one of my boys to give to every family as you leave. But he talks about how those who aren't reading the Bible are gathering together in some form of a religious ceremony, where those in the pulpit aren't reading the Bible. And the result is that we have a whole group of people who think everything is going well and they will find themselves into hell for all of eternity because they never knew the one who could save them. Do you sin freely without any powerful conviction of sin? When someone comes to you and says, brother or sister, this is what the Word of God says, and I believe that you aren't seeing this, and you say, well, it says contrary to what I'm doing, but judge not, leave me alone, Quit judging me.

When I was younger, I saw, I don't even know what show it was, when I was first married, it was about these people that were in the South of America, so they had the Southern accent, and every ridiculous thing the girl said she was going to do. She would say, I'm going to go to town and punch that guy right in the face. Don't you judge me. What's wrong with empty religion? Don't judge me.

It's contrary to what Scripture says. And not only that, if we have the idea that what we are doing is sinful and then reply to it with, don't judge me, it is equivalency to saying, I don't care if I sin. I don't care what I do against God. And in fact, it is the mark of the beast. Four, to have no dread of hell or the propriety of God to send you there.

God should send you to hell. God should send me to hell. We should dread that. It's what we deserve. And yet by His grace, He will save you if you repent and turn to the work of Christ and His righteousness.

Number five, to be unchanged by what you know and confess to believe about Jesus Christ. If you believe what the Bible says about Jesus Christ, you will be changed. The Bible says it's such a dramatic change that you are born again. It's like you aren't even the same person anymore because He becomes your your chief and your master. He becomes your king.

He becomes all that you desire. Yet we live in a world if you just come forward and say a prayer, live like everyone else, and surely you'll go to heaven because you believed in God. That is from the pit of hell. That idea is from the pit of hell. It is not what the Bible says.

And yet, many, a multitude in America will go to hell thinking that they're going to heaven because they never knew Christ. Number six, to be Pharisee-like with an interest in forms of religion rather than truth and heartfelt religion. To be amongst those who would, the many different false religions out there that say we should all just set aside our differences. And in fact, if you think that our world isn't tumbling out of control right now, there are big plans for next year when in the Middle East they will complete the building of this big structure where every major religion will share it together in harmony. And the Catholic Church is one of those pushing it.

And in mainstream Christianity, we find many people who are trying to push that we join with the Catholic Church to forget about their past, to forget about their present of ignoring Scripture, to just join together and hold hands and and sing songs together and just all get along. This one world religion. But while we might have differences, we can still get along because Heretically said, we all serve the same God, we do not. There is only one God. He is the God of Scripture.

Amen? Our world is marked by the beast. Number seven, to be indifferent to the means of grace. And what does this mean? What are the means of grace?

To be indifferent to reading your Bible, to be indifferent to praying, to be indifferent upon meditating on the Word of God, to memorizing the Word of God, to be indifferent to all this. Not to be against it. Let me remind you, let me come back to the beginning. It's not that people are against it. It's that they're indifferent.

They shrug their shoulders. They come hear the Word preached on Sunday, and then they shrug their shoulders and they go back to life. It's an indifference. It is why mainstream Christianity is where it's at, is that those who profess to follow Christ don't know Him at all. They profess to know Him, and they will not take time to read His Word.

They will not take time to come to truly know Him. After all, they're smart enough to figure out who God is and what he should be like, and therefore form idols that their mind likes, and they heap them up before themselves and say, we're all going to heaven because we have Christ. He's the Christ that you've invented. He's not oftentimes the Christ of Scripture. Number eight, to want enough religion to be free from the penalty of sin, but not its power.

And again, this is rampant in mainstream Christianity. People come to God because they don't want to go to hell. In fact, when I was a children's pastor, I used it to my advantage all the time. And I said, Well, how many of you little kids want to go be in heaven with Jesus when you die? If you want to do that, raise your hands and pray together.

What does that mean? Christ could never replace Christ. And if Christ was in hell, I would want to be in hell. Is it all you want in Christianity? But then to continue on sinning?

To not be free from its power, to still dive into sin, But one day you trust that you prayed a prayer and see a good heaven. That is not from the word of God. It is deceiving multitudes. Imagine this. This morning I...

Maybe to lighten this up a little bit. This morning I went to my computer to type the notes for Sunday school and I've I'm always mangling my computers and doing this and that and I'm never happy with them for some reason but anyway So now I have a computer here and a computer at home, so I don't have to transport them back and forth But the computer here I have what I've never liked and it's a wireless keyboard and a wireless mouse specifically a wireless keyboard because I always have this problem I start to type and it puts garbage up and it puts two E's and this and that. I'm like, I am typing correctly and it's doing weird things. And this morning it was especially doing that. I'm like, this is going to take me all morning if this doesn't stop.

But do you know what my other thought was this morning? I have to buy a keyboard this week that has a wire that plugs into my computer. I have to get rid of this piece of junk. Christ came to earth. He lowered himself to take upon the flesh.

In his meekness, he refrained from wiping out humanity when humanity was pulling out his beard. He lived a sinless, perfect life, willfully went to the cross to be beaten. And even more so as he thought about this time coming, he knew the wrath of the Father was coming behind it, which was infinitely worse. And he bought you with a price. That's what scripture says, he bought you with a price.

It's a price that you and I cannot comprehend. And do you know what our flesh wants to do? He starts to push buttons on his keyboard, and it does whatever it wants. That's not salvation that we find in Scripture. It's that Christ bought us with a price.

We are His slaves. He is a good master. He always does what is best. He always guides us into what is best. He loves us more than we love ourselves.

And that's almost unimaginable when I look at my flesh. And he says to jump, and we say, I'm busy. I've got better things to do. Why? There's two reasons for it.

The first is we still have this flesh that is still trying to deceive us. The second reason is maybe we're not changed at all. Maybe we're not a keyboard at all. Do you only want God because of heaven? If so, you're not saved.

I say that I love you. And in fact, this is why ministry, this is the hardest thing of ministry. It is so hard. I would rather you punch me in the face. Just punch me and get it over with.

But to lay down my head at night and to look out and to think we see the text. And yet, multitudes will not conform to the text. And when we come to Scripture, what it all boils down to, if we refuse to obey Christ, it's because we don't know Him. And if we don't know Him, we are not saved no matter how religious we are. Do you want enough religion to be free from the penalty of sin, but not the power?

I'm sorry. Do you want enough religion to be free from the penalty of sin, but not as power to deliver you from sin. Recognized by the world of one of its own. This is to have no mark at all of one who follows God. It's when The world looks at you, they see one of their own.

You're just like they are. You are no different than they are. If that is true of you, you do have a mark, but it's not the mark of Christ. It's the mark of sin. Number 10, to fail to love God with all the heart, soul, mind, strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.

That is our chief marching orders. While all of us fail in this, is it that you're getting better and better and better at it? Number 11, to be uncaring concerning the glory of God and the spread of His kingdom throughout the world. Are you sharing the gospel? If you aren't sharing the gospel, it's very likely that you aren't wearing the mark of Christ.

You are wearing the mark of the beast. And number 12, to be earthly minded instead of heavenly minded, to be consumed with the things of this world, our future in this world, our goals in this world, or is it for the glory of Christ? Now let me back up just a little bit because here's the thing and this is why I believe so many take the mark of the beast wrongly. If today I said in the middle of Carthage, they were going to be forcing everybody to line up and they're going to put a computer chip into your hand and they're even going to put one on your head, but you won't notice it. I would bet that almost all of you would flee.

You would be terrified. Even more so if they said, well, yeah, this is a mark. And added to that, to go along with text, And if you don't have this chip in a month, you won't be able to buy any food or clothing or anything. You won't be able to buy gas for your cars. You won't be able to buy anything.

Now you all would say, I love these things. We love food. God made us dependent upon food. We love gas. We love driving around.

We love doing these things. And yet, because you know some of Scripture, this would terrify you. And most of you would flee. But I believe that we think of it this way Because it enables us to put works into it. It enables us to say, well, I can live as the world lives, as long as I just don't take that mark.

That's not what scripture says anywhere. That doesn't support that idea. And I'm not saying it could be a physical mark. I don't know. I don't think it's likely.

I don't think that if we mesh this all together with Scripture, it's likely that it's just the mark of the world on you. It's the mark of being a slave to sin. And yet, all of us would lose our minds to think they were coming here today to mark us. And yet, at the same time, when we look at the real mark, it's easy to shrug us, shrug off, reading our Bible every day. It's easy to shrug off sharing the gospel with our neighbors, which I think is the real mark.

See, saying it's some sort of a physical thing frees our flesh to not be concerned. Brothers and sisters, I don't think this is what is in Scripture. I think you should be terrified if you're not living for Christ. Works never save us, but Christ always saves us unto works. If there are not works in your life, you should be deeply concerned, gravely concerned.

If you're not becoming more like Christ, you should be the one not sleeping at night, not your pastor. Well, your pastor too. Look at Galatians 1, 6 through 8. It says, I'm astonished that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel. Not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.

But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel, contrary to the one we preach to you, let him be accursed. Let me bring this into modern day. If anyone preached you a gospel that's not contained here, He is accursed. You are deceived. You must serve the God of Scripture.

He is the only one true God. He even says this here in the letter to the Galatians. Not that there is another gospel, there isn't one. There is no other way to be saved than it's only repentance and trust in the work of Christ. It's only to be born again, to change from the mark of the beast to the mark of Christ.

Is that you? In conclusion, in the writing of A.W. Pink, one of the quotes that stood out to me, listen to what A.W. Pink wrote, and this is decades ago. He said, again, thousands are deceived into supposing that they have accepted Christ as their personal Savior, who have not first received Him as their Lord.

The Son of God did not come here to save His people in their sin, but from their sins. Have you been saved from your sin? See, we come back to John brings up the Antichrist, And we see this mark that follows the Antichrist. And what does John say right before that? He says, don't love the world or the things in the world.

If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. That in fact, It is the mark of the Antichrist, the one who loves the world. They don't have to put a tattoo on your forehead. They don't need a computer chip. We find our command all the way back to Moses was to put the mark of Christ on your hand, on your forehead.

He didn't have them tattooing anything. He had them standing for the word of God. Amen? Are you marked with Christ? Are you marked as a slave for Christ?

Or are you marked by the Antichrist? Today if you examine yourself and you see that you are marked by the Antichrist. The Bible says you must repent, you must turn to Christ to seek after Him until He gives you a new heart with new thoughts, new desires, new cares, new wants and a new mark. Amen? Amen.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we Thank you again for your grace and your mercy and your goodness. The Father, as we examine our lives, each of us will know that there isn't a one of us in here that haven't been marked by the world, that haven't been born into this mark, that haven't been born into a caring for the world and myself above all. And God, your command is always to repent and to turn to Christ. You have been so gracious, so kind to change us, to give us real joy, to give us a real Savior, to show us real love.

How could we not but submit our lives to you, that you would be our Lord, that you would be our master. Father, I pray for all those here this morning that they would genuinely examine their hearts. Because this isn't just in our minds speaking of the worst of the worst. But God, if we're without Christ, we are the worst of the worst. Father, I think of the Church of Laodicea, whom was lukewarm and you spewed her out of your mouth.

Why is it, Father, that we believe that we can be lukewarm Christians? Father, help us to draw near. Father, help Your Church in Elveston that we might be marked as slaves for Christ, of Him being our all. Father forgive us for our multitudes of shortcomings. Of shortcomings.

Father, this past week, I believe it's by no accident, I've been thinking of and reading of the revival in America that happened many years ago. And my father, we know that We see that we should be judged. We should see your punishment upon us as a nation. We should see fire calling down from heaven and raining upon us. God, we also know that you're a God of mercy and Father we pray God you would bring revival You would bring a reformation back to America that we would once again put our eyes upon your word that we would make it a sign on our doorposts, that when people would see us they wouldn't just see a person, but they would see the Word of God.

Father, I pray you would begin with us in Elveston. That God, we would once again wholeheartedly turn our eyes back to your Word. That we wouldn't be deceived by the enemy of a lukewarm life or life that's just okay with believing in God and living like the world. Father I pray that you would set our souls on fire, that we must know you, that we must share you, we must glorify you, that you are our all in all, you are everything to us. Father, start in us, I ask, in Jesus' name.

Amen.