The Old Trailblazer Broadcast

This is the Old Trailblazer Broadcast coming to you here from our studios at the First Baptist Church of Algiers. We're located in Walker, Louisiana now. After the storm, Hurricane Katrina relocated us and the Lord has given us grace. We built a new chapel, a new bookstore, and we're going out day by day sending out the gospel around the world and all through the country.

And the Old Trailblazer Broadcast is scattered out all over America. And if you hear me, I wish you would let me know. Let me know where you're listening at. And then, let me mention, if you have a computer, you can hear me on the internet.

Go there to our web page at radiomissions.org and you have information there to find us. If you can't, let me know. I'll help you through it. But we bring you these studies on demon possession, all of those related items, the grand aim of Satan and those things. But at this time, we just began to look at Satan, the old trickster. You know, Satan's got a lot of names in the Bible.

I may hunt all those up and give them to you. But one of the things he is is an old trickster. So I want us to look again at some of these words that describe him as a trickster. First, we notice in our last study the wiles of Satan.

That word, wild, means trickery, deceived, deception, beguile, to make that which is not real to appear as real. You see, Satan's business is to keep you as an individual from facing reality. He plays upon your old nature because our old fallen nature doesn't like to face reality. No, the reality of death, the reality of judgment, the reality of eternity, folks just don't want to hear that. I talk about death often, I talk about the judgment often, and I talk about judgment at funerals that I conduct.

And folks sometimes don't like it, they ask me not to do that. But listen, you listen until God breaks your heart and opens it and brings you by his grace to face reality. You don't want to face reality. Listen, there's a flight from reality and you don't like to face it. And if you'll write me, I'll send you a little book by Pastor Shelton on the sinner's flight from reality. Many a sinner whom I've known, the Lord begin to deal with their heart. They run like a potter's to the bushes.

Oh, my friend, they don't want to face reality. They begin to see their guilty distance from a holy God and they flee from it. Just like old Jonah fled there, the Lord told him to go down to Nineveh and preach and he fled. He went the other way and got in the ship and went down in the hole and went to sleep. And he fled, but oh, you remember the consequences? They cost him overboard and a big fish swallowed him up. You say, oh, terrible, you don't believe that, do you?

Yes, sir, I sure do. The Lord prepared the fish, I don't know if it was a whale or what it was, but he swallowed old Jonah. And he stayed there three days and three nights in the belly of that old fish. And he swam down there to the coast of Nineveh and vomited him up, throwed him up. I'm adding he give old whale or fish acid indigestion, don't you imagine? I believe he did.

Probably needed some Xanax or something, roll-aids when he got through. But oh, old Jonah came forth and went to obey in the Lord. He went up and down the city of Nineveh preaching. Never said anything except, repent, repent. Oh, my friend, now let's notice, get back to our study. The expression that we saw there, Satan's devices.

That word device means a plan or a sketch or a scheme or some strategy. You ask, what is Satan's design? It's to keep folks blinded that he may be able to lead you to worship him. Satan aspires to be like God, aspires to be God. He'll formulate every plan that he can, that he can come up with.

My friend, now this is not off-the-wall stuff, no. He'll formulate every plan that he can, every invention, every idea, every thought, imagination. He'll put forth every scheme to keep you from coming to the Lord and thereby lead you to worship him and give allegiance to him. Satan's a good old devil, my friend. Listen, it's in his plans to deceive and lead you astray, he's very prompt, he's mighty good.

That's his business. I often say here that the old trailblazer, by the grace of God, is up and about our Lord's business. That's what I want to do. Day by day, when I get up in the morning, my idea is to serve the Lord. You don't have to preach to serve the Lord.

You don't have to do anything along that line. If you want to serve the Lord, first of all, ask the Lord to lead you. And then you can hand out a track or booklet to someone. You can give your testimony of saving grace when the Lord leads you. I don't believe in buttonholing somebody, everybody you come to you want to tell.

No, no, the Lord never intended that. But if you write me, I'll send you these little booklets that we have here by Pastor Shelton. Tracks, you keep them in your purse or keep them in your car.

And many of our folks are doing that thing. And when the opportunity comes along, you can hand them one of those little tracks. Say, you know, I have a little track here I wish you'd read. Would you mind reading it for me? And they would, most people would read it and pass it on to somebody. As I mentioned before, we have a booklet here entitled, The Sinner's Flight from Reality.

I'll be glad to send that to you. Oh, we had advertised a book on playing church a while back. And we just had calls and calls and calls after that little book.

And we're still doing that. But listen, let's get back. The old devil, good old devil, isn't he? Listen, it's my business here. Just like folks tell me sometime when I get on your toes a little bit. You minding my business? You meddling in my business? Well, my business is to blast the plans of Satan. My plan is to thwart, to thwart the plans of Satan. It's the business of every messenger to blast Satan's plans. And to expose them, to lay them bare.

And to put something, put something in your path to keep you from going to hell. Let me just tell you this little story. I've told it before, but it's been quite a while since I mentioned it.

And I know we pick up new listeners and new stations along the way. But I told this little story, it's a true story. Over there and somewhere in one of the southern states, I believe it was Alabama. One night this old farmer, rancher, come a storm. And he went out in the back to check on everything. And he come across a little, where they had a little small river there. And had a railroad trussle across it. And a bridge had fallen in.

Water had washed out the foundation. And it had fallen in. And he knew from experience, night after night there was a train come through there. So he started towards where the train was coming. He looked at his watch, he knew he didn't have much time. But he started running down that track.

A clip of the clock with his old rubber boots and his slicker on. And his lantern in his hand. And he knew he could hear the whine of the train on them railroad tracks. I've done that as a boy. We used to lay down on the railroad track and wait for the train to come. And you could hear the train whining.

But this old man did the same thing. And he kept going, kept going, kept going. After a while he saw the light come around the curve. Big old headlights. You ever seen a train at night?

Got a big light, shines for a mile or two. And he saw it coming. He kept running, he kept running, he kept running. He knew that if that train went off in that river, it'd be eternity for some folks. So he kept going. And after a while the train got closer.

And he knew he had no way of stopping it. So he got off on the shoulder, there on the side of the track. Got that old lantern in his hand, got a good grip on that handle. And as that train come by, he slung it, or flung it, into that open window where that engineer was sitting there.

Maybe asleep, we don't know. But that coal oil went all over him, the glass shattered, maybe caught a fire, I don't know. But that man grabbed that brake and began to squall and squeal and screech and grind and start to slow down.

I've heard him many, many times do the same thing here in our little old town when I was a boy. And that little old train stopped just a few yards from that trestle. Oh, my friend, he put everything he had into stopping that train. I'm putting everything I have into blocking your path to hell, my friend. You're on a fast track to hell if you're not saved.

Don't get mad with the old trailblazer. Thank the Lord, thank the Lord every day that someone thought enough of your soul. The Lord led some poor soul, maybe not the trailblazer, maybe it was someone else, thought enough of your soul to say, My friend, how is it with your soul? Where will you spend eternity? Oh, if I could fling that coal oil lantern into your side of your, wherever you are, old trucker.

If I could stand on the side of the road and sling it into your window and tell you to wake up. Wake up, my friend. You're on the road to hell. Oh, my friend, what a great day in your life it would be to realize that your soul is on a fast track to hell.

Listen now, listen. Satan's business is to put everything in your path to keep you from coming to the Lord. And my business is to put everything in your path to stop you from going to hell. Oh, my friend, are you traveling toward eternity? I asked you, where are they bound? Where they're bound? Is it heaven or is it hell?

Which is it? Now, let's notice another expression that we found there in the verse, cunning craftiness. The word cunning means crafty or sly or clever or subtle like we described that snake. You know, snakes don't come trotting down the road.

No, they slip and slide over there in the grass and in the bushes. And cunning means the art of putting over a strategy or accomplishing a purpose. To do that, there has to be deception. Satan will make the false appear to be true. For example, oftentimes we sing in our message, we try to lay bare Satan's strategy in deceiving the hearts of individuals by pointing out to you that all of this so-called vision stuff and dreams and speaking in tongues and all those things, wide-eyed experiences, not salvation, but holy and completely the work of Satan and his demon spirit. Yet folks come back to me saying they know that their experiences are real. And I know they are real to them.

I know that. But that don't mean they're of the Lord. One man wrote me and told me that I was silly to say that speaking in tongues was of the devil. My friend, I asked you, where is your praise for the Lord? When the Lord saves a sinner, he gives him a voice to praise the Lord. Where is your new heart? Where is your new spirit? Where is your thankful heart for the Lord saving you? That's what comes when the Lord saves you. He gives you a new heart to praise the Lord with. Those things are real to individuals. I know that.

I'm very familiar with it. But my friend, there's no praise there. There's no praise. No, because Satan can't praise the Lord. Satan can't praise the Lord, my friend. He won't.

No, he can't do that. But those things are Satan's tricks, just like we're talking about. They're the tricks of Satan. Satan doesn't care what it takes to keep you blinded, keep you fooled into believing that you're all right, believing that those things are of the Lord. Oh, I had a great marvelous experience, a great light come over me, a great feeling, a light feeling.

Light is the air, light, all of those things. I've been there, my friend. I know those things. And I've seen folks who are involved in those things. I've spoken with them. And I mentioned to you, I'm going to bring you a study on where all of that began one of these days over there on Azuzu Street in Los Angeles, California, back in the early 1906, I believe it was.

And I'll bring you those things. I have it documented. It's not false. It's not a fantasy.

No. But, my friend, let me go back and tell you. The old Trailblazers were concerned about your soul. If I wasn't, I wouldn't be here, my friend.

But the Lord laid these things on my heart. To come here, be true to your soul, and asking you, wake up. Old Trucker, wake up. You're going down Highway 95 over there, lickety-split. Wake up.

Hauling a load of something that'll burst into flames if you bump on the road. Wake up. Pull off over there in the shade on a white wayside park and ask the Lord to give you grace to look to the Lord. Don't be ashamed of the Lord. Oh, no, don't be ashamed that you don't know the Lord.

Ask the Lord to save you. And if you would, pray for the old Trailblazer. If you ever, you folks go to prayer on Sunday evening, Sunday night in your church there, wherever you are, and ask your leader to pray for the old Trailblazer. Give us grace to look to the Lord. Remember my mailing address?

The old Trailblazer. Post Office Box 1810, Walker, Louisiana, 70785. Goodbye and God bless you. And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done. Count your mighty and blessings, sing them one by one. Count your blessings, sing what the Lord hath done. Count all your blessings, reign them one by one. Count your big blessings, see what God hath done.