Now, if a person says, “I don’t care about false doctrine. I don’t care what it does. I just want to love everybody and be happy,” you told lots more than you think you did, mister. You have said that the cause of God “doesn’t mean much to me.”

And then, number five: Teach the Truth, and oppose false doctrine with love, with kindness, with regard to the feelings of other people, but with…a…clear…determination that “I will not yield on this point.” Now, that is a very painful thing to go through. Never fun. And yet, if the Truth does not have those who love it, and those who will stand with it, and uphold it, Truth falls to the ground. And it takes a long time to resurrect it.

Some of you older folk (don’t hold up your hands, now; we don’t want a self confession) [Laughter], but some of you older folk remember that in the forties [the 1940’s] Cordell Hull was Secretary of State—not bad for a boy who grew up in the hills of Tennessee. [Cordell Hull: Preeminent Tennesseean, renowned statesman, longest serving Secretary of State of the United States, and Nobel Prize winner, was best known as the “Father of the United Nations.”] His father told him when he left to go to school… He said, “Cordell, you stick with the truth! You stick with the truth in school and in your work.” He said, “You may go down with truth, but truth will always come back, and if you go down with truth, when it comes back, you’ll come back with it.” I believe that’s a pretty good thing to think about. When we, as a body of God’s people, determine that we stand in love with Truth on every topic of God’s Word, and will do so to the very last moment of our lives—if Truth, in a moment, goes down and then comes back, we will be with it.

Our brotherhood underwent, a hundred years ago, a most painful division. Very sad. Families were divided. Brothers and sisters were divided. Churches were divided. The results were devastating. BUT, godly men and women picked up the pieces. They built shanty-type church buildings across the railroad tracks. They met in abandoned buildings, and they huddled together in a small band here or there. And little by little by little they began to grow—and they’ve grown. And over the years, they have become a strong and good brotherhood. And you and I love and appreciate that, and we enjoy the benefit and the blessing of it.

But we have in our midst now some—by no means all, and not even the majority—but we’ve got some among us who would sell out the church, and have done so—AND are still doing so. If those of us who oppose these things in the 1980’s had said that there are churches of Christ in Nashville, Tennessee, that will aid and support a Billy Graham campaign as an evangelistic service, we would have been branded as mean, harsh, lying people. What’s happening in Nashville next month [May, 2000]? A Billy Graham Crusade, and there are four or five churches in Nashville, Tennessee—churches of Christ—who have been providing places for the Billy Graham people to do what they call “prepare the counselors,” have been providing encouragement and support, and will be providing people who will serve as counselors to enable folks to learn how to be saved without obedience to God. And there are some people among us who are going to be there. Nobody would’ve believed that. Nobody would have sat for a moment and said that could happen. It IS happening.

In 1993, in Nashville, there was what was called “a post-Easter celebration.” Here’s what happened. The Woodmont Hills church of Christ met with the Disciples of Hillsboro, two Presbyterian churches, two Methodist churches AND they met with the Baptist church. They were going to have a worship period—an after “Easter” celebration. [Break in tape.] And they went on down the way. And the preacher was a man who stood in pulpits of churches of Christ in former years. Nobody would’ve believed that. If ten years before we had said that would happen…[the response would have been] NO! How dare you think such a thing!

I don’t want to be an alarmist, but I also don’t want to be asleep with what’s happening. We are experiencing in our brotherhood tonight in many places the targeting of churches of Christ so that they will be subverted, and when the subversion is over, there will be ingredients of the church of Christ, of the Baptist church, of the Christian church and of Pentecostal church. And this will be a composite thing. And when it is in function, it will create turmoil and division and discord wherever it appears. It’s happened too often. We know that.

Now, we must avoid extreme actions. That won’t do. That’s not right. We do not dare to destroy anybody physically. We don’t want to hurt anybody. What we want to do is to uphold the Truth of God and refuse to have that Truth of God perverted. But if there is one or more who would destroy or corrupt the purity of the Truth and the church, we must refuse to go with it. That may entail, as it did with others in days gone by, a breaking of fellowship with an individual or the individuals involved.

I believe that it is a very…wrong…thing to do—to subvert a church, but if it happens, that doesn’t mean that we quit serving God. That doesn’t mean we quit hoping for the best. That doesn’t mean we give up. That doesn’t mean that we hate anybody. It doesn’t mean that we want to be bitter, or will be bitter. To be bitter will eat you up inside. Sometimes, we have to say, “As hard as it is, we pick up the pieces and we start again. And with God’s help, we will do better. We will build a church that we love. We will serve God therein, and when life is over, we will look to our God in love, in trust and in hope that He will protect His people, and we will enter into His presence forever.”

Ah, but the time is gone. I do enjoy being with you good people. It’s really delightful to be with you. I appreciate it. I hope these thoughts have been helpful to you.

If you’re not a child of God, I would encourage—indeed, I would ask you to think seriously about becoming a Christian. To believe in Christ, to repent of sin, confess faith in Him, and be immersed in water for the remission of sins will mean that you are forgiven of God by His grace, added to the church and walk in newness of life.

If you are a Christian and have not been faithful, have not been what you should be, and have brought a kind of shame or reproach on the people of God, and you need to turn away from a public wrong, you are to repent of that sin, confess it unto God and ask that brethren pray with you and for you that you may be forgiven.

In these terms, we invite you to come as we stand to sing. Will you come?