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A DESENSITIZED PEOPLE

December 17, 2000 AM

Sermon Outline

Jer 8:9-12

INTRO: My father and mother, reared with the big band sounds and velvet voice of Rudy Valle, no doubt thought I had lost my moorings when I listened to Fats Domino and Bill Halley and the Comets. Mine was a different generation. Times had changed. But the moral values of my parents generation was pretty much intact in my generation. Today, however, the world of entertainment assails eyes, ears and minds with morals and values of dysfunction, sin. Little by little we have become desensitized.

I. WHAT THE ENTERTAINMENT WORLD TEACHES?

A. Personal purity, chastity are out dated

1. sex without, outside marriage, nudity, homosexual relationships can be normal, acceptable alternate

2. television/ motion pictures rarely produce programming without inferred or explicit representations of such things in settings of normalcy

3. 1 Cor 7:2 - Titus 2:5 - Rom 1:26,27,32

4. these things which so many consider normal, acceptable are sinful ... no matter the generation

B. Use of profanity, Gods name in vain, typical

1. profanity, vulgarity, Gods name used in vain flow in a torrent from the screens, the music, the printed page

2. I am told by teachers that four letter words are increasingly used by children in early elementary school

3. Ex 20:7 - Eph 5:4 - Lk 6:45

4. the speech of the world is not the speech of disciples of Christ - it cannot be

C. Use of alcohol is socially acceptable, solves problems

1. interesting: smoking - drugs unlawful or heavily discouraged by government ... not alcohol

2. Ive just got to have a drink - answer to problems

3. Prov 23:31-35 fact: alcoholic beverages are one of the great contributors to social, economic, health and family problems

4. but its use among the very young grows - why? its the social thing to do ... or so the entertainment world says

D. Problems can be solved in thirty minutes

1. over and again, we see it happen!

2. most complicated problems solved in the brief period of a television program, motion picture

3. so, we have the now generation which is antsy, stressed, angrily impatient ... unwilling to work through a hurting relationship, to understand success is a process taking time, etc.

4. Jas 5:7-11 we are being conditioned to impatience!

E. The end justifies the means

1. get what you want ... no matter how!

2. lie, cheat, steal, murder ... just get what you want

3. so, to satisfy wants and desires moderns are willing to compromise values, integrity, morals, etc.

4. Eph 5:8-11 for Christians there can be no compromise of goodness, truth in order to satisfy desires, lusts!

F. Fathers are just joke objects

1. husband, fathers are not the heads of families

2. they are portrayed as silly, comedic, weak, clueless men who are under the thumb of wife, children

3. not men to honor ... but to scorn ... and the tragedy is that this portrayal has become reality in too many homes

4. Eph 5:22,23 and 6:1,4 to manipulate this pattern to selfish ends is both sin and disaster

CLOSE: The Jeremiah text says of apostate Judah, Neither could they blush. They had become so desensitized to truth and right by their years of abomination that abomination had become the norm. How is our culture better than that? Has this sad state of affairs settled into the thinking of the children of God?

Cecil A. Hutson

17 December 2000

God's Plan of Salvation

You must hear the gospel and then understand and recognize that you are lost without Jesus Christ no matter who you are and no matter what your background is. The Bible tells us that "all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." (Romans 3:23) Before you can be saved, you must understand that you are lost and that the only way to be saved is by obedience to the gospel of Jesus Christ. (2 Thessalonians 1:8) Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." (John 14:6) "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." (Acts 4:12) "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." (Romans 10:17)

You must believe and have faith in God because "without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." (Hebrews 11:6) But neither belief alone nor faith alone is sufficient to save. (James 2:19; James 2:24; Matthew 7:21)

You must repent of your sins. (Acts 3:19) But repentance alone is not enough. The so-called "Sinner's Prayer" that you hear so much about today from denominational preachers does not appear anywhere in the Bible. Indeed, nowhere in the Bible was anyone ever told to pray the "Sinner's Prayer" to be saved. By contrast, there are numerous examples showing that prayer alone does not save. Saul, for example, prayed following his meeting with Jesus on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:11), but Saul was still in his sins when Ananias met him three days later (Acts 22:16). Cornelius prayed to God always, and yet there was something else he needed to do to be saved (Acts 10:2, 6, 33, 48). If prayer alone did not save Saul or Cornelius, prayer alone will not save you. You must obey the gospel. (2 Thess. 1:8)

You must confess that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. (Romans 10:9-10) Note that you do NOT need to make Jesus "Lord of your life." Why? Because Jesus is already Lord of your life whether or not you have obeyed his gospel. Indeed, we obey him, not to make him Lord, but because he already is Lord. (Acts 2:36) Also, no one in the Bible was ever told to just "accept Jesus as your personal savior." We must confess that Jesus is the Son of God, but, as with faith and repentance, confession alone does not save. (Matthew 7:21)

Having believed, repented, and confessed that Jesus is the Son of God, you must be baptized for the remission of your sins. (Acts 2:38) It is at this point (and not before) that your sins are forgiven. (Acts 22:16) It is impossible to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ without teaching the absolute necessity of baptism for salvation. (Acts 8:35-36; Romans 6:3-4; 1 Peter 3:21) Anyone who responds to the question in Acts 2:37 with an answer that contradicts Acts 2:38 is NOT proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ!

Once you are saved, God adds you to his church and writes your name in the Book of Life. (Acts 2:47; Philippians 4:3) To continue in God's grace, you must continue to serve God faithfully until death. Unless they remain faithful, those who are in God's grace will fall from grace, and those whose names are in the Book of Life will have their names blotted out of that book. (Revelation 2:10; Revelation 3:5; Galatians 5:4)