Bad Company Corrupts
About this sermon
In “Bad Company Corrupts,” Pastor Dean Odle warns that close fellowship is spiritually formative: companions, teachers, ministries, workplaces, and churches can either strengthen obedience or normalize deception. Beginning with a reported answer to prayer for a critically ill child, he moves into 1 Corinthians 15:33, Proverbs, and New Testament commands concerning church discipline. His central claim is that Christians must take biblical boundaries seriously because “evil communications” means corrupting companionship, not merely vulgar speech.
Chronological teaching outline
Select a section heading to play the sermon from that moment.
Odle opens in worship and prayer, confessing Jesus as Creator, healer, and unchanging Lord. A congregant then recounts that a two-year-old relative had been diagnosed with extensive cancer, but a later scan reportedly showed no tumors. The church receives this as an answer to prayer and gives the glory to Jesus; the account is presented as testimony rather than independently verified medical reporting.
After another personal prayer concern, Odle introduces the governing warning: biblical instruction is not merely a pastor’s preference. He says repeated choices against Scripture lead people into deception—wrong situations they can no longer recognize clearly—including relationships, churches, ministries, and workplaces.
Using 1 Corinthians 15:33 and the Greek sense of “communications,” Odle argues that close fellowship changes moral habits. Proverbs reinforces his contrast between walking with wise people and lingering among fools; the practical question is not whether a person likes someone, but whether that relationship is helping or corrupting obedience.
Odle reads Paul’s instruction not to keep company with a professing believer who persists in serious sin, explaining that discipline protects the congregation because “a little leaven” affects the whole body. He extends the principle through 2 John and 2 Thessalonians: Christians should not endorse teachers who reject Christ’s doctrine or persistently refuse apostolic instruction.
The warning is applied to teenagers, public-school peer pressure, and churches that normalize error. Odle then turns to Romans 16, saying division contrary to apostolic doctrine often arrives through flattering language and religious charisma rather than obvious hostility.
Odle critiques teachings associated with Daniel Duval and Bride Ministries International, alleging that their descriptions of the human spirit and spiritual travel go beyond Scripture and resemble occult concepts. He then examines Hardcore Christianity, acknowledging that people may receive some help through an imperfect ministry while insisting that results never excuse doctrinal error. His test remains whether each practice and explanation can be established from the Bible.
Odle recounts the collapse of his first marriage, the loss of relationships and ministry support, and a prolonged season of emotional wounding. He describes learning to forgive, release what he could not repair, and wait for God’s healing rather than seeking a spiritual shortcut. That experience becomes a caution: genuine pain can make dramatic methods attractive, but vulnerability increases the need for biblical discernment.
Continuing his critique of Hardcore Christianity, Odle objects to material that treats Roman Catholic distinctives as mere areas of confusion. He presents prayers to saints and images as idolatry, rejects ecumenical compromise with doctrines he considers false, and applies Revelation’s call for God’s people to separate from Babylon. These identifications and historical accusations are the sermon’s interpretation and allegations.
Odle returns from ministry examples to daily life. He warns that a single unwise association can expose a person to abuse, addiction, crime, exploitation, or a destructive marriage. A prison encounter with a woman he had once counseled illustrates his point: ignored warnings can produce consequences that sincere regret cannot undo.
The sermon closes by urging listeners to retain and verify teaching through Scripture rather than chase novelty. Odle invokes 2 Timothy 3:16 as the standard for doctrine and correction, then leads prayers for several sick people and for viewers, asking Jesus to heal physical illness and reverse injury. The medical and spiritual-causation claims within the prayer remain the speaker’s statements.
Open each passage and read it in its complete biblical context.
Read and follow along
Read representative excerpts here, or open the complete indexable transcript to search every timestamped section.
Lightly edited for readability while preserving the speaker’s meaning and substantive statements.
- 0:05:45
Lord we worship you, we praise your holy name. The name of Jesus, the name above every name, you are the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. You're still the creator of the heavens and the earth, the healer, the deliverer, the miracle worker. Truly your word is true in Hebrews Lord where it says you are the same yesterday, today, and forever. Lord we are just grateful when you show yourself strong when you manifest yourself in our lives. But Lord even when we go through difficulties and we go through the fire, we still trust you Lord that you have all things, God you have all things purpose, just perfectly filtered through your will. I ask you Lord right now to touch everyone here today, those watching and listening we ask you to move mightily in Jesus name. Everybody said amen and amen. You may be seated this morning, welcome everybody. Before we get into the word, whatever the Lord wants for this morning, I want to share something with you real quick and so on Friday April the 4th I got a text from Scott Neely over here in the red shirt, we'll forgive him from wearing Georgia colors in here. But he said, Brother Dean I'm sorry to bother you tonight, I want to ask that you and the church pray for my sister's granddaughter. She is too and the doctors are saying she has brain cancer and tumors on her kidneys. She just spent seven hours in surgery today. I have been calling on Jesus for supernatural healing and then he says Jesus cannot nor has he ever lied. His words are our only truth. He is our great is the great healer. The only other thing I know to do is to ask you and the church to pray for her you are the most godly man I know of that is unapologetic about the real truth of God's word. You have seen a lot God has worked through so many times. So again I apologize about asking for anything. I don't know why you keep apologizing brother you don't have to do that. But would you please pray for this baby. Her name is Renly. I really do appreciate it and I will see you Sunday and he was here last Sunday and that's when I announced everybody to pray and I said no problem brother we will pray in agreement with you. So Scott come here a minute I want you to share the update on little Renly. So last Sunday
- 0:08:54
they were saying something about calcification without forget about all that but just recently they said that she had cancers in her lymph nodes and tumor was wrapped around her aorta. It was an un-inoperable or unoperable they couldn't do anything with it. So my brother actually flew out there and was with him a little while and they said that or he said that they didn't give her no hope. Like they had jumped into cancer, chemotherapy, radiation all that stuff and my nephew which is his child said is there anything else that we can do anything and you know as smug as doctors sometimes can be said no I you know I'm the expert and so he said no there is another way you might not know it but there is another way so we were just praying and praying and you know binding demons and and casting out anything anything that we could do started thinking about generational curses calling them out by name and and you know casting them out binding them breaking them whatever we could do and they said they needed to do a full-body scan to see where all the other tumors were and we just we went heavy in prayer all the whole family and Friday after they got out of the scan they called them up and said it you know we got a peculiar situation right now we don't know what's going on but the image came back negative nothing there. The lymph nodes were clear even the tumor that was around the aorta was gone there was nothing there so Jesus still does miracles. Amen come on let's just stand up and praise the Lord for a minute thank you Jesus thank you Lord for healing that little baby for intervening for that family Lord we just thank you we praise you right now we give you the glory we give you the praise and the honor you're the healer it's all Lord you you hear the cries of your people Lord you have not changed God forgive us every bit Lord for unbelief and doubt or Lord just giving up Lord on these things but we thank you Lord for this great miracle even Lord it's obvious the doctors know it's a great miracle but more than anything it's for that family for that little girl that they didn't have to go through that pain and that loss and that difficulty Lord you you intervene Lord and you show your power
- 0:11:59
and you show your great love and we thank you we thank you for doing that Lord we thank you Lord thank you Lord praise your name praise your name we should never take for granted when the Lord does a great miracle and especially for a little child suffering and a family suffering Wow you know and I've seen this before but it just you know it's just never never gets old when God really steps down and does the impossible right in front of you and it's so yeah praise God I don't even know what to say you know you know and I said there was really two miracles I will share this I won't go into detail but my middle daughter Bethany the other night her ex kind of busted in and beat her up pretty bad and you know I know it could have been much worse and but she survived with only some bruises and a broken toe and some other things I hope this is a wake-up call but it could have been a lot worse and so I thank God that she's okay and she's gonna be okay and so just pray for Bethany and my granddaughter sailor that they'll find pick up this psycho and put him where he needs to be ma'am all right y'all maybe see this morning welcome you praise the Lord you
- 0:15:00
know and this is what I've been talking about nothing's too hard for the Lord you know but we also got to remember and just like Job as I've said many times sometimes you have to go through the fire and it and really if there's no test coming our way then there's not gonna be any testimonies will there you know and boy I thank God for that I praise God for that everybody I hope you have your Bibles this morning I don't know how far I'll be able to get in this because this does apply to some situations but you know a lot of people think that fire and grace Church is all that in a bag of chips we're not we have a lot of issues and even some stubborn stiff-neck folks sometimes and even some and you know I guess some that even been here for years some that listen for years I guess what I'm really blown away about is how some of you what you've been taught is going in one ear and out the other you have ears to hear but you really don't hear and instead of applying what you've learned you keep wanting some new thing to excite you again and you know I'm a busy person so I'll hear rumors of some new thing that's floating its way in here through different people innocently mind you and then I finally take a look at it or look at the person they're listening to or whatever and I'm this I'm I guess I'm blown away that some of you don't recognize the false teachings the false doctrines and the error that's in some of these things that you chase after and I mean I've been a little dismayed by that and also people I've warned you about continuing to hang out with and yet you continue to hang out with and then when bad stuff happens because you won't do what the Word of God says to do and you won't listen when bad stuff happens then you want it everybody to pray and want God to fix it for you but you're not doing what you're supposed to be doing and I might just get very specific this morning but I'm just gonna call this bad company corrupts and that bad company can be in a church because let me just share this with you my daughter Bethany met this guy that she had a child with she met him at the Highlands met him at the Highlands imagine that he was
The complete timestamped transcript is published as a crawlable reading page so every sermon topic remains searchable without making this video page unnecessarily heavy.
Read and search the complete transcriptContinue this series and explore related resources
Teachings
01Come Out of Her
A biblical call to leave Mystery Babylon, religious mixture, counterfeit unity, and spiritually dead fellowship—and to belong wholly to Jesus Christ in truth, holiness, and living faith.
Read the study