Friend Factor

Introduction

While the songs may have been the result of this morning’s theme, they certainly have application and relevance to tonight’s as well. And so Scott didn’t go wrong at all in those selections. Tonight’s lesson is a repeat of what I did a week ago Friday in Irving, when I was fortunate, I guess, to address 820 souls on Friday night, most of whom, many of whom are young people. And for those of you that were there, Destie, Kayla, Skyler, Sherry, Brett, Morgan, Robert, and Martha, it is going to be somewhat of a repeat, though you’ll notice some changes. That’s your challenge tonight, since you’ve already heard this, to see where the changes are. And those of you who have already heard this, other than Brett and Sherry, they’re used to hearing my sermons more than once.

Especially when Brett was younger and we used to go to gospel meetings together. I mean, he knew some of my sermons by heart that he had heard several times. He used to be my guy who set up my projector for me, as churches didn’t have their own projector, and I’d have to set that up when I went to gospel meetings. Brett would be my technology guy, setting up my laptop, taking the projector and setting it up and tearing it down when I was done.

But this lesson, because it was directed to young people, I thought, well, there was a lot of our young people who didn’t get to hear this particular lesson, and I think you might find it beneficial, but even if you’re not a relatively young person, I’m certain there’s some benefit you can derive from this as well. If I were to mention the name of Ted Williams, Robert, who’s already heard this lesson, would already be thinking of one of the greatest baseball hitters of all time. And so those of us who are in the baseball in the sats, we might remember the name Ted Williams Hall of Famer. But there is another Ted Williams who became very popular a little over a year ago when this YouTube video went viral of this homeless man who claims he has a God-given gift, and he’s being recorded by someone in the media who sees him on that street corner, and you hear this fella, Ted Williams, you hear his voice.

And it was remarkable. He used to be a DJ and to work in that field, but now he’s a homeless man. And as a result of this YouTube video that went viral, he received offers from the Cleveland Cavaliers, the NBA basketball franchise, and he did some work with them and some other vocal work. And here he is very recently on the Wendy Williams show. He’s actually written a book that is called A Golden Voice, How Faith, Hard Work, and Humility Brought Me From the streets to Salvation. And the reason why I knew about this Wendy Williams episode was I was working out at Planet Fitness with Sherry, who drags me to such places to try to get me in better shape. And I said up in Irving, I’m not going to say it here.

Yeah, I am. That they’re going to change the name because I’m there to Planet Unfitness. See, y’all know me better and you laugh more than they did. But Sherry will plug in her little headphones so she can listen to the myriad of TV. And I do like working out there because it’s like you’re not working out at all because you’re watching television. And so there was the Wendy Williams show, and I saw Ted Williams was on there. I said, I know this guy. Because I’ve been following his story over the last year or so. And so I’m just reading the closed captioning because I don’t have my earphones plugged in. And I’m going to listen to see what he has to say. And she’s asking him about how this all happened to him, that he could become homeless.

This guy of tremendous talent. And he said it all started at the birth of one of his nine children when someone handed him a congratulatory reefer. A marijuana cigarette. That’s where his road to becoming a homeless person began. A congratulatory gift. Now it was not long after this that I was watching an episode of Undercover Boss because it was about the DirecTV CEO, and I’m a direct TV person. And he was introducing his family as they do on Undercover Boss, and he talks about his older son, I guess he’s in his 20s now, mid-20s, who is a recovering drug addict, and amazingly, he said the exact same thing. That his son’s drug problems began when someone gave him a reefer, a marijuana cigarette. Now you might remember a couple of weeks ago when I quoted my friend, the drug counselor, Kevin Simpson, whose family I knew because I was in Auburn, who talked about this very thing that he has two people in his clinic right now who have lost everything because of marijuana.

And so when people say it’s not that bad of a drug, it ought to be legal, he begs to differ. Here’s someone who’s had a drug problem himself, serious drug problems in the past, who’s now a counselor, and he says, not so. It is a real problem. And it’s illegal for a reason, folks. Our government has decided there’s something about this item that is dangerous to people. And thus it’s called a gateway drug. And I got a stat from a drug abuse website that said 62% of people that use cocaine smoked marijuana before the age of 15. 62% of those who are now having a problem with cocaine started innocently with marijuana. Yes, indeed, it is a gateway drug. But I bring up these examples to you to show the influence that our peers have upon us.

And the truth of the matter is that peers’ influence. This CEO’s son, Ted Williams, they were introduced to drugs because someone who was a friend or an associate of theirs said, here. And they partook. And a series of actions followed that led to these addictions and all of the troubles that they experienced. And so for me to say that our peers influence us, we should know that. We know that from passages like 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 33. Bad company corrupts good morals. And I’m always quick to point out in that context that he’s not talking about the kinds of immorality that we’re often warning our young people about when we read that text. In 1 Corinthians chapter 15, first and foremost, Paul is talking about the influence of false teachers.

Those who would deny the truth of the resurrection. And basically what he’s saying is, don’t hang out with those guys who teach that error. In the context of 1 Corinthians 15, it’s all about the resurrection. And some would say that there is no resurrection from the dead. That’s a peer you need to be aware of. And so really this verse that we use so often to talk to our young people, bad company corrupts good morals, is first and foremost dealing with false teaching and that influence on us, but obviously it’s true of anything that someone else, of course, who’s behind all this, the enemy we talked about this morning, is using these people to lure us away from the faith. And so we warn people about the influence that others have over them.

And I’ll tell you, peers’ influence us, and it doesn’t matter whether you’re 15 or 55.

The people who are around us have an impact on the way we think, and sometimes the choices that we make and the things that we do. And I hear it and I see it all the time. And I made the point a week ago Friday night that when I was in Auburn, and this is why Mark wanted me to speak, Mark Roberts wanted me to speak on this particular subject, because when I was preaching in Auburn and I would see these young college students come in, I noticed the impact that their choice of friends had upon their faith. And every year, the handful of young people that we lost that ultimately started to come less and less and then disappear. All of those, their closest friends were not other believers, but unbelievers.

1. God's Plan for Your Life

Maybe they sought out that kind of person to be their friend. All I know is that when their friends were not other believers who had the same spiritual values, those are the people that we lost. Those are the young people that ultimately faded away and began not to associate with the Lord’s people and worship with them regularly. Peers influence us. And so I want to talk to you today for just a few minutes about the importance of surrounding yourself with friends who will influence you in the right direction, a godly direction, and toward ultimate living. So, the friend factor, if you will, and the influence our friends have upon us. And I want to begin with this question. What is your plan for your life? And particularly I want the young people to think about this question.

And some of us we’ve been at this plan, whatever plan we’ve developed for a little while. Perhaps we’re still making plans for our future, where we want things to go. What is your plan for your life? Where are you headed? What kind of things do you have in mind for your future? And in the immediate scope of things, we’re probably thinking about education, where we’re going to go. Some of our young people have made some decisions. We’ve got young people going in every direction. And I wanted to say some things to you in these next couple of weeks that might be helpful to you as some of you go off, and some of you are getting ready for your senior year, and you soon will be making these decisions.

You know, where am I going to go to school? And when you leave this environment that you’ve known for several years, and the high school environment, things change when you go into a college environment. You’re going to have a whole new selection of friends. Choices about what you’re going to do on the weekends and during the week for that matter. And so, what’s your plan? Where are you going? So we think about education. Okay, when we get our education done, then we’re going to have some kind of job opportunity, we hope, where we can make some money, and then we’re going to determine where we’re going to live and what kind of house we’re going to have. But probably before that, we’re going to think about this marriage thing.

Well, I’re not going to go down that road and find a lifelong mate. Then we’ve got to think about where I’m going to raise my kids and being parents to them. And we’ve got we’ve got dreams and ideas about where this thing is going to go. But overriding all of that and involved in all of that needs to be God’s plan for your life. God has a plan for your life. I think one of the mistakes that a lot of folks make is that they think God only has a plan for preachers or elders or certain people in the local church who might be more visible than others. That God only has a plan for. No, that’s absolutely not the case. If you would be faithful to the Lord, God has a way to use you effectively and powerfully in his cause.

And you may not understand what God has in mind, and you may not see the picture that God sees, and the way that you are supposed to influence and affect the lives of others. You know, this peer thing works the other way as well. We’re in the business of influencing too. It’s not just people influencing us, we influence other people. And if we’re Christians, we can do that in a very powerful way. If we live righteous lives, we can do that in a very influential and godly way, as we’ll see in a moment, to the salvation of others. You may be involved in something so great as far as God is concerned that it would blow your mind to know all the ramifications of it. And I give you just one Old Testament story, and I’ve given this to you before in another lesson, but it’s been a while, so I don’t expect you to remember it.

That I love to talk about. It’s in 2 Kings chapter 11 and verse 2. When it says simply that Jehoshaphat stole Joash from among the king’s sons and hid him. Simple little statement, right? Let me tell you about Jehoshaphat. Her husband was Jehoida the priest. Jehoiah and Jehoshaphat. I have called them, I’ve written articles about them. To me, they are the Aquila and Priscilla of the Old Testament. Jehoshaphat is doing just what any sensible person would do when somebody is trying to kill all the king’s sons, David’s descendants, heirs to the throne, is trying to kill all of those sons. And here’s this little baby that is going to be killed unless she takes action. Athaliah is the one who is killing the king’s sons. Because her son, who was king on the throne of Judah, Ahaziah, has died, and she determines this is my opportunity to take control of the kingdom.

And so she’s going to kill all of her grandsons in order to assume power and control in Judah. Yeah, I know. She’s one bad grandma. Kill all of your grandsons to seize control of a nation. Now, we shouldn’t be too surprised when we understand who Atheliah is. This marriage came about with the king of Judah because of an alliance with Ahab. Athaliah is the daughter of Ahab and Jezebel. Bad alliance. You talk about bad influences when your wife is the daughter of Ahab and Jezebel. We shouldn’t be surprised that somewhere down the road that she decides, I’m going to take over this thing and kill her own grandsons. Now, Jehoshaphat, back to her. She’s the important one in the story. Did she have any idea we’d be talking about her 3,000 years later?

I mean, really, 3,000 years later, we’re still talking about Jehoshua. She would have had no idea. She didn’t think, you know, if I rescue Joash from among the king’s sons, they’re going to be talking about me for generations. But how important was this heroic act that she did just because any sensible person would want to do this. The promise made to David that he shall not lack a man to sit upon the throne. She saved the lineage of David. And that great promise in 2 Samuel chapter 7. Now, God knew that was going to happen, or he could not have made that promise. I understand that. But Jehoshaphat was the key person. She did something astounding. And now Jesus sits upon David’s throne perpetually. According to Acts chapter 2, in some part because of the noble and heroic actions of Jehoshua.

Who knows? Who knows what God may be planning to do with you in your life. And I know there’s still some people sitting here going, there’s no way my actions could be anywhere as significant as Jehoshaphat. You don’t know that, and I don’t know that. And I know that every act of faithfulness is important among God’s people. Let me tell you what God’s plan is for your life. Plain and simple, it’s about the welfare of your soul. Salvation. We talked about that this morning. The devil wants to keep you away from that. God’s concern is the welfare of your soul. And that involves your character, your service, and your worship of Him. Be imitators of God as beloved children and walk in love just as Christ did and sacrificed himself for us, Paul says in Ephesians chapter 5, verses 1 and 2.

That is God’s intention for you. That is his plan. And so whatever your plans are, it needs to coincide with God’s plan, and his plan must be first in your thoughts and in your pursuits. And I’ll tell you what that leads to. Young men, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you at the proper time. Clothe yourselves with humility. He says in 1 Peter chapter 5, verses 5 and 6, it takes humility. It takes an understanding of my purpose and what God wants me to do with my life, so that I’m going to humble myself and do his bidding and be a worshiper of him, regardless of how the world defines manhood. I’ll tell you, David was a man. He was a real man.

He was not ashamed of worship. He was the sweet singer of Israel. And so if you want to model yourself after a real man, of course, Jesus Christ is the ultimate man. But David, as a worshiper of God, as a humble servant of God. Oh, yeah, he was a strapping young man. He was a warrior. He slew the giant Goliath, but he was a worshiper of God. And that’s the kind of man, young men, that you need to be in your life. That leads to exaltation. And I will tell you, as you pursue God’s plan for your life, it has, as I said, an impact on others. And that’s where it becomes significant. Your choices and decisions to live righteously impact the lives of others. There are a number of people that I know, some sitting in this audience, who have become believers as young people because of people that they dated who practiced the truth and believe the truth.

And they introduced these people whom they ultimately didn’t marry to the truth. I met another young lady, we were talking about her on the way here tonight, who was at that young people’s gathering in Irving, who was introduced to the truth by a boyfriend, and that relationship is no longer there, but she remains true to the Lord. And some of you are sitting here tonight. That is such a powerful example. You have such a great opportunity to influence people outside the body of Christ. And so if you would take your life plan and make sure it matches God’s plan for your life, you can have a tremendous influence and impact on others that me, as a preacher who stands in this pulpit every week will never have.

2. Somebody Else's Plan for Your Life

Alright. So God’s plan for your life. But now I want to talk to you about somebody else’s plan for your life. Now let me tell you about the unbelievers’ influence, the friend factor, if you will. Sometimes we’re not aware of this. C.S. Lewis points to this when he says, indeed, the safest road to hell is the gradual one, the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, and without signposts. Every preacher I know has used this quote. The devil doesn’t come along and say, hey, here I am. Like we saw in the book of Acts. He wasn’t just saying, here I am, real visible. Everybody look at me. I’m trying to destroy your soul. He doesn’t do that. It’s often very subtle. And when you head down a path toward destruction, the devil’s not there with neon signs saying, Don’t go here.

This is dangerous. You’re going to die spiritually if you come this direction. You know, and that’s really what the Proverbs are all about, especially in introduction to the book of Proverbs. I’m only going to talk about chapter one in just a moment, but chapters one through seven, the warnings that are given to the young man about the adulteress as she woos him from the path and all of that. Any rejection of wisdom really is that harlot. I mean, it goes beyond the sexual enticing that the first seven chapters is talking about over and over. Any rejection of wisdom and following the harlot’s path, it really goes beyond just a sexual transgression. It’s anything that loses us away from righteousness and from wisdom, real wisdom. And when that happens, when you’re being led down a path, you know, there’s not fireworks going off saying, don’t do this, don’t do this.

The devil keeps it subtle. As we said this morning, don’t worry about that little chink in your arm. Not a big deal. No signposts, no flashing red lights. Don’t go here. We’ve got to ascertain the danger by looking into God’s word and making sure that we’re not violating what God has instructed us to do. And unbelievers have a plan. Now I’ll tell you, they don’t come up to you, your friends, your associates, whoever they are, and put their arm around you and say, Come hang out with me. I’m here to destroy your life. Come on. What do you do? This is going to be great. Oh, they haven’t mapped it out or planned it out. They don’t sit home with their desk. Let me strategize. That Christian that goes to Decker Prairie, this is how I’m going to destroy his life.

This is how I’m going to destroy her life. I’m going to develop a plan, and here’s what it is. I’m going to entice them in this direction, in that direction. It’s not that elaborate. The scheme isn’t that specific. Oh, but they have a plan. And I’m here to tell you how, and unbelievers influence us. Here’s how it happens. This is the plea. Almost every time. Let’s have fun. Whatever it is they’re offering to you that’s a violation of the will of God, it is going to be couched in the idea of this is fun. This is real living. This is living it up right now. Let’s grab life. This is it. The soul, well, that’s irrelevant. Soul schmoll. What’s that? Not significant. That’s not part of the friend’s plan.

The friend’s plan is fun. We’re going to have a good time right now. And we need to be aware that’s the basis of the appeal. But where does that go? And that’s what the wise writer says in chapter 1 of Proverbs. Look with me there. As the son in verse 8 is being pleaded with to hear the father’s instruction and do not forsake your mother’s teaching. They are a graceful wreath to your head and ornaments to your neck. Verses 8 and 9. Verse 10. My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent. When I talk about the influence of our peers on us, this verse, that’s what it’s saying. If sinners entice you, do not consent. And here’s what they say. Come with us, let us lie and wait for blood.

Let us ambush the innocent without cause. This was the biblical times get rich quick scheme. Instead of working and earning a living, which would take some time to amass much of a fortune at all, instead of hard work and labor with your hands, here’s what we’ll do. We’ll be criminals. We’ll be thugs. We’ll get a group of guys together and we’ll overpower people who are vulnerable, and we will take their stuff. That’s why Paul speaks as we’ll study about being in perils of robbers. It was the biblical times get rich quick scheme. And so, hey, you come be a part of our group. See the acceptance. You’ve got some friends here. Acceptance. Come on in, be a part. And hey, we have identity issues. We want to be accepted.

We want other people’s approval. Hey, I can be a part of a group here. You can be one of us. That’s what they’re saying here. And they said, we shall have one purse. We’ll even share all the proceeds. But keep reading. He says, but as they lie and wait for others in verse 18, they lie and wait for their own blood, and they ambush their own lives. So are the ways, verse 19, of everyone who gains by violence, it takes away the life of its possessors. Verse 22 How long, O naive ones, will you love simplicity, and scoffers delight themselves in scoffing, and fools hate knowledge? In verse 26, I will even laugh at your calamity. I will mock when your dread comes. Verse 29, because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord.

Okay. So here’s the unbeliever’s plan. Hey, you got acceptance here. Come join the group. We’re going to have fun. Remember, the soul’s irrelevant. We’re going to have fun. What’s the end result of that course, of that plan? Well, it’s not God’s plan. This is going to be ambush and ruin. Fools reject wisdom and knowledge. And so be careful of the friend’s plan. Now, some of our young people are going off to college. You’re going to have to make some decisions about worship. And where you’re going, what you’re going to do on the Lord’s day, and where you are going to attend or not attend. Let me tell you what some of the influences are going to be. Ah, choose easy. Stay at home, sleep in. You’re tired.

You’re up late studying. You spend so much time studying. We’ll go out and do something Sunday afternoon or Sunday evening. That’ll be a lot more fun than worship. Choose easy. Worship, that’s not really that important. That’s for older people who don’t have a life. Worship is optional. And as far as worshiping with those who are practicing the truth, well, this group is sort of like the group you’re used to. But maybe practicing the truth in regard to corporate activity, as we were talking about in our adult Bible class this morning. Maybe they’re not exactly like us in every way, but those things aren’t all that important. You see, truth isn’t really that significant either. And you could have unbelievers influencing you in this matter as well.

3. Not Safe Merely Because You Are With Another Christian

And again, the result of that is fellowship forfeited. Beware of these influences and God’s plan. And as I wrap this up, refuse to settle for less. Stay with God’s superior plan for your life. And I want to give you five things that you need to think about in regard to the influence of others as we wrap this up. Number one, you are not safe merely because you are with another Christian. You ever hear about two young people in the body of Christ get into trouble? They weren’t with worldly friends from school. It was two people in the local church. Maybe two or three. And one of them gets a bad idea. Hey, let’s go smoke some weed. Well, this is another young person. Well, at least we’re in it together with another Christian young person.

Bad idea. You know how many people who are 20 years older than you, high school students, in this auditorium tonight, could tell you stories about a couple of young people in local churches who sinned together.

4. Go Against the Current

Sometimes the evil influences I’m talking about are not necessarily from without. Beware of the influence of one who may be a Christian, who is encouraging you to do evil. You’re not safe merely because you’re in the presence of another Christian. And how many of us can even talk about a situation where we were in the presence of other Christians when an off color joke was told. Or when gossip was uttered. And we feel like chiming in that circumstance. Sometimes we let our guard down because we’re with people who should know better, but Christians have struggles too. So let me offer that warning to you. Secondly, when you choose God’s plan for your life, and by that you’re going to reject the unbelievers’ plan that I mentioned earlier.

You must be prepared to go against the current and go against the flow. This will not be the majority decision. Most of your friends won’t understand your choices. They may even ridicule you for the choices that you make. But the Lord’s people have always been in that kind of minority. People that didn’t understand, who ridiculed them for the choices that they made. You’ve got to be prepared. You can’t find yourself in this circumstance of coming under the influence of someone and then make a decision, okay, now which way am I going to go? You’ve got to be ready to flee from youthful lusts. 2 Timothy chapter 2 and verse 24. And not only must you be ready to refuse temptation, you need to be convinced before those occasions ever happens of the surpassing wisdom and value of doing right.

5. Be Empowered

The surpassing wisdom and value of doing right and being able to explain that to others. Because if you say, you know, I’m not doing that, the first thing you’re going to say is, why? Why? What’s wrong with you? Well, I’m not supposed to. I’d be a disappointment to my parents. It might cause me some harm. Let’s come up with some better answers. Let’s talk to people about our allegiance to the Lord, and that’s why we’re making such and such a decision. Be empowered. Be ready for these occasions by developing spiritual traits such as meditation and prayer and self-control. Young people, we need to work on ourselves in the development of self-control so that when we get in these situations, we are able to exercise that restraint.

We need to spend some time in meditation thinking daily about God and his plan for us and communicating with him about his plan for our lives. If the only time we ever pray and think about God is in a church building, we’re in trouble. Our peers are going to kill us spiritually. Did you just hear what I said? If the only time you think about God and pray to him is in a church building, the unbeliever’s plan for your life is going to be a problem. So we need to prepare ourselves, be empowered by developing these important traits that the Bible talks about. And as we’ve seen by our opening examples tonight, and how the peers influenced them to start down a path of addiction, we need to absolutely rule out addictive behaviors.

6. Choose the Fear of the Lord

Because once we start dabbling in whatever it is, whether it’s alcohol or drugs like marijuana and cocaine or pornography or gambling, whatever addictions you see that control and dominate the lives of others in the world, you need to be watchful of even a small partaking in those things. Or you’ll find yourself with Ted Williams. And if it doesn’t go that far, still fellowship with God is forfeited. As we talked about earlier. Some important things in dealing with the influence of our friend. So as we’ve talked about the friend factor or peer factor, you might have thought about the television show. Fear factor. I’m sure that’s where Mark gave me this title to use for that lecture in Irving. Oh, yeah, fear factor. But you know, there is a fear factor in all of this.

And that fear factor is what we read in Proverbs chapter 1 about embracing knowledge and choosing the fear of the Lord. And so as we reject the influence of peers that have it in their minds, our destruction. We need to choose the fear of the Lord where there is salvation. We need to fear him more than we fear our peers. And there is a fear there. Nobody likes rejection. You don’t wake up in the morning and say, you know, I’m really looking forward to my rejection when it comes. When somebody who’s a friend of mine asks me to do something, I get to say no, and they get to treat me the way they sometimes will treat me. I’m really looking forward to that. That is so much fun.

Conclusion

Well, it’s not great. It’s not enjoyable. I wish those situations didn’t happen. But what’s the worst that they could do to you? Well, the New Testament says the worst thing that they could do to you is kill you. Literally. Now I don’t think you’re going to have to worry about that. So if you don’t have to worry about them killing your body, but even if you did, you ought to fear him who was able to destroy both soul and body and hell above them. Choose the fear of the Lord. Now I want to conclude tonight with the story of a young man named Tyler who worshipped with the Eastside Church in Baytown. His family started worshiping with us while I was preaching there. It started with his grandparents, who I have a great deal of respect for godly people.

They started worshiping with us, and finally they convinced their son and daughter in law. The daughter in law was actually one of Brett’s teachers in elementary school. And they started worshiping with us, and they had two children who were off at college at the time, so we didn’t see them very often, but every now and then the children would come in and worship with us. Earlier this year, they were at Eastside on a Sunday morning, and this young man Tyler was there. That afternoon.

And there was drinking involved. There was a lot of reckless driving of the boat. There were pictures posted on Facebook to that effect.

And about the time that evening services began for the Eastside Church, which would have been a good place for Tyler to be.

Tragedy was in the assembly of the saints on Sunday morning and died under those circumstances on Sunday afternoon. All I could think about, but not just the tragedy of what’s happened to this young man and his life is over, but I thought about those godly grandparents specifically. His parents. The misery that is left behind.

Nobody expects the worst thing to happen. When people take the first puff of the reaper of the marijuana cigarette, they’re not expecting the addiction that leads you to be in Kevin Simpson’s counseling sessions every day. They don’t see becoming like Ted Williams on the streets out of a job, unable to support his family, having very little relation to his family. They don’t see the worst things that happen. They don’t see the drunken driving and killing people in their car and the manslaughter charges and the murder charges that result. People don’t see all of that. Nobody plans for the worst thing to happen. The devil doesn’t want you to think about what could potentially occur. But those choices and decisions can take you to places that you never dreamed.

So I tell you, young people, as I love your souls, be careful. We wish you well as you approach adulthood. We hope the dreams and plans for your life are wonderful. They come to fruition, but be careful. There are many dangers out there.

Well, if your soul is not right with God, that danger is an ever-present one. And you need to remedy that while there’s time and opportunity. If there’s someone who needs to respond to the invitation of Jesus Christ tonight, come now as we stand inside.