The Best Preaching Is Worthless If Wrong On Salvation

A web visitor was excited to send me a sermon today by a new preacher in Tennessee that he found on social media. The preacher's name that he found is Pastor Billy Mitchell (1936-2019).

I was disappointed as I heard the sermon. Pastor Billy Mitchell ended it by quoting 1st Corinthians 6:9-10 about fornicators not being allowed into Heaven. He didn't bother to quote the phrase verse 11, “but ye are washed.” Every born again believer's sins (past, present and future sins) were all forever washed away by Jesus' precious blood (1st Peter 1:18-19), so that our POSITION in Christ was forever settled at the moment we trusted Jesus as our Savior (i.e., the moment we believed the GOOD NEWS of Jesus' death, burial and resurrection). Now, our CONDITION in Christ (the way we choose to live) is a matter of discipleship (service and sanctification), not sonship (salvation and justification).

Pastor Mitchell said that when you get saved you're supposed to become a new creature, based on 2nd Corinthians 5:17. I was excited at first when I heard the sermon, to hear Pastor Mitchell preaching against sin in American society today, but as I feared, he tied it into Lordship Salvation at the end. When any preacher leads the audience to think that God's free gift of salvation is conditional upon their life and behavior changing, it is Lordship Salvation, which is clearly what he is implying, sadly. Pastor Mitchell is subtle. careful not to come right out and require works for salvation, but it is very clear from listening to his sermon that he is associating one's behavior with the new birth.

Don't get me wrong, when a lost sinner comes to Jesus Christ and is born again, something will change. The only thing that changes is that God gives that new believer the gift of the indwelling Holy Spirit. One's behavior does NOT change when they get saved. They are still the same rotten, filthy, horrible, sinner that they were before they got saved. Rights of ownership have transferred from Satan to God, but now that life must be renovated. ...

Romans 12:2, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”

This Scripture passage from Romans 12:1-2 speaks about the Christian's service, not salvation. It speaks about discipleship, not sonship. We must keep these two things separate, or else we will be guilty of teaching Lordship Salvation!

The problem is not the Gospel; but rather, pastors today are not preachers! Pastors no longer preach against sin in the churches. I have been reluctantly attending a corrupt local Baptist church in Pensacola for the past 3 1/2 years, but the young pastor is incompetent. It is very difficult to find a good church nowadays. That young pastor is a fool who admitted to me that he is not a fundamentalist. He is clearly a wicked neo-evangelical. He has a group of sincere people in his congregation who overlook his immaturities and settle for mediocrity. They love him and don't want a better church. They are complacent with just having a social club. This is what is wrong with 99% of Baptist churches today!

That pastor's backslidden wife wears sexy tight blue jeans in public. That wicked pastor actually scolded me for my website ministry, because I biblically preach against women wearing pants. I stood my ground and told him I totally disagreed with his unbiblical views. Woe unto that ungodly pastor and his Jezebel wife on Judgment Day!

The church's Statement of Faith foolishly says you must “Repent of your sins” to get to Heaven, which is unbiblical. Baptist pastors are intentionally sitting on the fence (Twitter link) concerning repentance, refusing to choose a side. Shame on those incompetent pastors!!! I have spoken with the pastor about repentance and I am okay with his use of the phrase (to acknowledge that we are a needy sinner in God's sight to be saved), but I still don't think they should use a phrase that is not found in the inspired Word of God. Cartoon evangelist Jack Chick (1924-2016) gets repentance 100% wrong! 

To get to Heaven, you only need to repent (change your mind) to admit you are a needy sinner, and Jesus is the only Savior. Your sinful behavior has absolutely nothing to do with the new birth! A changed life is the fruit of the indwelling Holy Spirit, which only comes with growth over time (1st Peter 2:2; 2nd Peter 3:18). No one has ever turned away from their sinning! You may live above reproach, but you'll never live above sin as long as you have a human body (the flesh). At best, all we can do is pray for God to help us do better each day in His strength (Galatians 2:20). There is no such thing as a “good Christian.” We're all rotten sinners!!! Psalms 106:6, “We have sinned with our fathers, we have committed iniquity, we have done wickedly.”

I have oftentimes thought of leaving the church I have been attending, but I need somewhere to attend church. The other local churches are even worse! I am praying for God to send a King James Bible only, free grace salvation, soulwinning, sin-hating, people-loving, Christ-honoring, truth-telling, Baptist church to Pensacola. I do not know of one local church in Pensacola that goes door-to-door soulwinning. The Bible method is door-to-door preaching of the Gospel (Acts 20:20).

On page 115 in his helpful book, “I NEVER KNEW YOU,” Michael P. Bowen says:

God gave to us through Paul in the book of Galatians, you should never listen to anyone’s message that runs counter to the message given to us by Christ, and you should never attend a church where the pastor tells the flock that they must add works of discipleship to faith in Christ’s “finished work” as the way to enter heaven. That’s exactly the reason why I no longer attend any of the local churches in my current hometown.

I empathize with my dear Brother in Christ. I also know the frustration of not being able to find a good church to attend. Sadly, people are leaving the churches to find God. The greatest threat to Christianity in America today is the dead Sunday morning worship service!

Getting back to what I said at the beginning of this blog, Pastor Billy Mitchell had the fire in the pulpit that we need today, but unfortunately he was caught between works and grace. He thought that repentance meant to turn from your sinful bad habits. He says that repentance cannot be separated from faith. I agree that repentance is necessary to be saved, but the fella who knows what repentance is knows it's included in believing. This is why we find the word "believe" mentioned 85 times in the Gospel of John in the Bible, but the word "repent" doesn't appear even once. The man who believes has repented, and the man who repents has believed. That is, he has changed his mind from unbelief to belief. He has changed his mind to admit that he is a needy sinner, and Jesus is the only Savior. Nothing more is required or allowed to be saved. To get to Heaven, you just need to believe that Jesus did it all for you!

I thank God for Bible preachers! God knows that we need tough preachers who cry aloud and spare not against the sins of American society today (Isaiah 58:1). That being said, we must never associate the new birth with turning away from our sinful behavior, because that is works. In Jonah 3:10 the Bible says that GOD SAW THEIR WORKS, that the Ninevites turned from their evil way. Repenting of one's sins is works! Nowhere does the Bible teach to "Repent of your sin" to be saved. Ungodly religious men added those unbiblical words to God's inspired Word (Proverbs 30:5-6). We all need to, “Quit Meddling With God” (MP3 sermon, Dr. Jack Hyles).

“What is preaching? It is throwing a fit!” —Pastor Jack Hyles, “Quit Meddling With God”

I am throwing a fit, praise God!

It is tragic that 99% pastors are guilty of going to one of two extremes. Either they preach love and tolerance for sin, compromising and coddling the LGBTQ pervert crowd. This includes Hillsong, Joel Osteen, Steven Furtick, et cetera. Or, they hate sin so much that they hate people. This sadly includes Steven Anderson, Fred Phelps, Jonathan Shelley and most of the New IFB movement. Both extremes are wrong and unbiblical. We must never reject the sinner with the sin, nor accept the sin with the sinner. There is a proper balance. I agree with 99% of what Billy Mitchell says, but it is dangerous that he fails to make a clear distinction between service and salvation. John Bunyan said it best, I humbly think...

“If you do not put a difference between justification wrought by the man Christ without and sanctification wrought by the Spirit of Christ within, you are not able to divide the Word aright; but contrariwise, you corrupt the Word of God, and cast stumbling blocks before the people.” —John Bunyan (1628-1688)

Yes, well said. Bravo!

Very few pastors today understand this truth. Sadly, nearly all pastors are not preachers! A pastor administrates the church and cares spiritually for God's flock, but a preacher upholds the truth. Preaching is the heart of a church, without which a church merely becomes a social club for idle saints. Sadly, that is exactly what I am attending now in Pensacola, a spiritual social club sitting idle for God. There is no public soulwinning. The pastor refuses to take a stand against anything, except against people like me who take a stand. Shame on him! I have seen many people quit the church because of the pastor's horrible bad attitude. One elderly man who is 47 years older than the pastor, told him that he should be warning people about the corrupt bibles, but the pastor was upset and told him to leave and never come back again, so now they are enemies. Shame on that bad pastor!

I know that in eternity my Bible preaching will be vindicated. My preaching against Christian women wearing sexy blue jeans in public will be vindicated, and others will weep bitter tears who condemned me for my truthful Bible preaching. We need preachers who preach against sin, but a thousand times more we need doctrinally sound preachers who do not mix discipleship with sonship in an effort to force people to forsake their sinful lifestyles. Our churches today are a disaster that has already happened! Truth is hard to find anymore. Very few clergy are able to rightly divide the Word of Truth. The accursed Bible colleges (e.g., Pensacola Christian College, Bob Jones University) and religious seminaries (e.g., Faith Baptist Bible College and Theological Seminary) are primarily to blame, who produce impotent pastors who are utterly incompetent. To Hell with these wicked institutions and their Lordship Salvation!!!

I thank God for preachers like Pastor Jack Hyles, who is 100% correct on God's simple plan of salvation...

3,336 Sermons By Pastor Jack Hyles

Thank you for reading my ministry blog, to God alone by all the praise, credit and glory.