Sometimes I think when we're thinking of moments of inspiration
That we're looking for some big grand thing
Like we're waiting for God to speak from a cloud loudly
Or for the ground to shake and rumble
And for the rock to fall off the cliff
There's been hurt there for a hundred years
And all of a sudden it's going to fall
And then we hear something from God
I want you to understand that we're talking about inspirational moments
That's not necessarily what we're talking about
If something like that happens in your life and God says
Charlie, go tell everybody this
We can hear on Sunday morning
Before announcements, before the first song
I want you to say that's God said this to me
You come in here and say this I need to say
If that happens to you
Then you come and say God told me to tell everybody this
Don't wait for the inspirational moment time
The inspirational moment time we're talking about during this time
Like all the time little things that you pick up here and there
You should be listening all the time
I'll give you an example
This morning Arianna and I had kind of a funny thing going on at the house
I was making a batch of cornbread
And some of the cornbread as will happen
When you put it in cupcakes fell off the side above the cupcake wrapper
And sat on the pan
So then when it went through the oven
It came out of the oven
The bit that was on the pan had turned brown
And Arianna was like, oh my gosh
It turned brown and Arianna looked at me and she said
What those chocolate bits there
She didn't know there was chocolate in cornbread
I said, oh there's no chocolate there
That's the cornbread
It just fell off the side when I put it in the cups
And it cooked and looked like that
And she said, I bet it wouldn't taste like chocolate
And I said, you're right
It would taste like chocolate
I said, if there is an inspirational moment
It was actually the second moment that we had this morning
Because sometimes you will look at something
And it can go through a certain process
And it can start to look good to you
It can look like fun or it can look like it tastes good
It can even look like something else
If you've ever accidentally bitten into a wax fruit
Which I imagine nobody here has ever made that mistake
But if you've ever actually bitten
Or you put it in your mouth and just started getting ready to taste it
You realize it can look really good
It can be some of the best looking fruit that you can find
And yet it does not taste good
And it cannot nourish you
And those little bits that fell off the cornbread were not chocolate
And they really don't taste good
You really would have to like burnt cornbread mix
In order for you to taste that gold
Yeah, that's yummy, right?
So somebody might, a rare one in a hundred or something
Might think, yeah, that really tastes good
It tastes really better than the cornbread
But real chocolate does taste real good
And it does produce real endorphins in your body
It makes you feel good
Too much of it isn't good for you
But a little bit here and there
Yeah, that's good stuff
See how the enemy takes good things that God has made for us
And we use those very good things to lure us away from what's really good
By making you think, oh, that looks like chocolate
When in reality it is not
Relationships can be like that
You go after somebody, a boy, a girl, a friend
Could be even a parent or a cousin or family member, whatever
And you pursue that relationship
You try to have a good relationship with that person
And then that person starts leading you in a direction that you're not supposed to go
But you don't want to give up that relationship
That person won't listen to you about God or doesn't believe the same thing
But you don't want to give up that relationship
You keep pouring into that relationship
Because, well, we're supposed to be relational, right?
Bible says love your neighbor, right?
Love others
We're supposed to do all of that
And the enemy will keep you carrying there
Keep you working there in that relationship
Which is not a healthy relationship
By misusing those words of God, right?
God, we were created for a relationship with one being primarily
And that is God through His son Jesus Christ
God's the one we really were created with relationships with
And so you can have all kinds of human relationships
And the truth is, and somebody will maybe disagree with me on this
The truth is that every human relationship you have
Every person, your dad
Your son or daughter
Your mom, your sister
All of them will be flawed
All of them, your pastor
Your relationship with me is flawed
Your relationship with your team there is flawed
Because we're all flawed human beings
Even being recreated into the image of Jesus
We still have issues, right?
And so your issues are always going to come up
And they're going to rub wrong on each other
Because those relationships are always going to be flawed
But your relationship with God doesn't have to be like that
He is the sovereign authority, creator of all
And you can submit to Him
And the two of you together can have an amazing relationship
That is not flawed in any way
And the flaws are taken care of by Jesus
Okay, wait a minute
The flaws are taken care of by Jesus
He covers over those flaws to make that relationship good
And Jesus can do the same thing between two Christians
So if you have a godly person and a godly person
Even though both might make mistakes
The relationship will be flawed
But Jesus can cover over the mistakes
And bring those to people in the proper community
And that's what the church is all about
Okay, so that was an example
Now that didn't look like chocolate moment
Could have just went right on by
But then we got to talking about it
And she and I together saw something
And she said, I'm going to inspire you a lot this morning
But really not Ariana really
But a god, right? Through Ariana
So I encourage you to look for those little
They're called inspirational moments
Right? This is not the inspirational moment
People are saying, well this is an inspirational moment
We're going to have an inspirational moment
This is us talking about the inspirational moment
That we've had all week long
Now the easiest way to be inspired by God
Is to go to God's inspired Word
Which he filled with the Spirit
And he can teach you something you've never seen before
Even if you've read that passage a hundred times before
I'll give you a second, Rachel
Even if you've read that passage a hundred times before
You can get something new out of it
That happens to you all the time
I've had multiple little inspirational moments
That I've seen, and in general terms
It's the strength and power of God
What moves you up
The amount of work and the amount of motivation
That we don't have
That God can then give us to push through
And just coming together here and at the light station
Even with my family, the amount of work and witness
Together that we can have through the pain
Through the strife, through the sickness
And still get a massive amount of work and witnessing
And work done to other people
And then people saying, how do you do it?
Well, I don't, God does
And he used me to do it
And just a little bit like that
Like we talked about the past couple weeks
The words that we can use
People say, how do you do it?
One day at a time with God on my side
That's how I do it
Good word, good word
Alright, anyone else?
So, who knows what this is?
It's a circle
It's a ring
Why do people want it?
So, this is my wedding band
And I very rarely take it off my finger
Because I'm terrified that the one time I take it off
I'm going to lose it
Well, I've worn this thing every single day
Consistently, day in, day out
And even at work, everybody's like
Well, why are you wearing it at work?
You can clearly tell if you look at it closely
It's got scratches and things
Even where I almost wadded it to a car
On accident
It's got a little nub right here now
You get a free mechanic with your car
But when I got asked at work why I never take it off
And I gave them that agrees
And I was like, well, I'm afraid that I'll lose it
It took me forever to get mine off too
I'm trying to see
I don't mind not a ring anymore
It took me forever to get mine off
But one of the guys asked me
He's like, well, why don't you take it off when you're working or anything
And I told him because I'm afraid to lose it
And then not long after that
I heard a guy tell me
The reason you don't take it off is because you know who the other end of that ring belongs to
So we don't
The ring represents the unity between you and your wife
And now if I take it off
If I take it off just for a couple minutes
I feel really awkward
And when I took it off at work
So I can clean my hands better
That's when I heard God say, no, you wear that ring
Because it represents your life as well
And I think you could go
This is why you don't take the Bible off
As you know it's not that long
This is why you don't take the word out of your life
Because you know it's not that long
This is why you don't take the cross off
We don't have to wear a cross or have a tattoo of a cross
But we carry our cross daily
Why? Because he carried his cross for us
That's all connected
This, to follow your illustration
This is my wedding ring
You'll notice that it is no longer around
So, I'll start the wax prop and the light is line dry
Probably it's partly switched to the line dryer
So I almost can't take it off
Except for in the middle of the way when my fingers went down
So, but I'm very blessed to be married
It's not about marriage, but we're very blessed to be married to God
But don't take off the things that God has marked you with
As his own word
Anybody else?
So, those of you that don't know
I'm in college
I'm currently in a chemistry lab
And in this chemistry lab
Last week
Last week we
We did a lab
About separating mixtures
Through different physical and chemical processes
And so she gave us a mixture
Like a couple grams of a mixture of sand, salt, and
Sodium carbonate
It's what seashells are made out of
And we went to the lab
And we put the mixture in water
And that dissolved off the salt
And then we put it in a funnel
And ran acid through it
To get the carbonate out
And then we were left with the sand
And then we dried and waited
And it's sort of the analog to the
We didn't ask the mixture what parts to take out
And God's not asking us what parts of our life we have to get rid of
And some of them are going to go out like water and salt
And some of them are going to feel like hydrochloric acid
Pulling the castor carbonate out of them
It's not always going to be easy
And whether we like it or not
It's going to happen
It might just be better to ask
To get a little help with it
Alright, so we're going to pray together at this time
I had an offering, a little more worship, a couple songs
So it won't be released
I'm going to ask Brother Ron now
We'll pray along with Brother Ron
Here we go
Lord Father in Heaven, we are so blessed to be here today
Lord, your ways are so far above our ways
We're so grateful that we have you
Our Savior, our Creator
To watch over us, to help us walk
To show us your way
When you're here physically with us
Jesus, we can't thank you enough for what you've done for us
And what you continue to do for us in the Spirit
I ask that you bless these tithes and offerings
One of the many, many, many things that you've done for us
Which is provide income and blessings
And Lord, we give that back to you in the form of pious
Which are commanded
And we give it back to you in offerings
Which are above our pious
Thank you
Father, I pray that you'll bless them
Help us use them to see over what we've done
Bless this body as we gather
Continue to help us worship you
I pray it'll be beautiful to your ears
Thank you, bless this day in Jesus' name
Amen
Get it.
The splinter of the king
Gloved in majesty
That all the earth rejoices
All the earth rejoices
Here at sin's help in the light
The darkness tries to arrive
And trumpets at his voice
Trumpets at his voice
How great is our God
Sing to me how great is our God
I will see how great, how great is our God
Let's sing to him how great is our God
How great is our God
Sing to me how great is our God
How great is our God
I will see how great, how great is our God
How great is our God
I will see how great is our God
How great is our God
Sing to me how great is our God
I will see how great is our God
How great is our God
Sing to me how great is our God
I will see how great, how great is our God
There's no place where mercy reigns
And heaven will arise
There's a place with streams of grace
Where we be back alive
With all the love and heaven we found
It's like a flood, it's flowing down
At the cross, at the cross, I surrender my life
I did love you, I did love you
May the love we have reigned in my sin wash white
I owe all to you, I owe all to you Jesus
There's a place where sin and chains are promised
At the cross, at the cross, I surrender my life
I will see how great is our God
There's a place with streams of grace
Where we be back alive
With all the love and heaven we found
It's like a flood, it's flowing down
At the cross, at the cross, I surrender my life
I owe all to you, I owe all to you
Here I am, on the earth I stand
Here I am, on the holy ground
Here I am, here I am
Here I am, my life is free
At the cross, at the cross, I surrender my life
I owe all to you, I owe all to you
At the cross, at the cross, I surrender my life
I did love you, I did love you
I said it was fair, I owe all to you
I owe all to you, I owe all to you
I owe all to you, to you, to you, to you
In Christ alone will I be
Though I have to pride myself in that I was wise
For I've been blessed beyond measure
And by His strength alone I overcome
Oh, I could stop an count of cremators
Like diamonds in my hand
But those trophies could not equal
To the grace my wish I'd send
In Christ alone I'll face my chore
And find my glory in the will of the crew
In every victory let it be said of me
My soul must have strength, my soul must have power in Christ alone
In Christ alone will I be
For He holds me by all His grace and grace
And only His hand of mercy
Could reach beyond my weakness to my knees
Now I could seek no greater honor
Than just to love you more
As the count of the games were lasting
To the glory of God
In Christ alone I'll face my chore
And find my glory in the will of the crew
In every victory let it be said of me
My soul must have strength, my soul must have power in Christ alone
I'll face my chore
And find my glory in the will of the crew
In every victory let it be said of me
My soul must have strength, my soul must have power in Christ alone
As I was sitting there I thought well I'm going to open my Bible to the reference before I get up there in the pulpit
And I was thinking to myself Deuteronomy 19, I thought oh yeah I think it's a lot further than that
I thought Deuteronomy 19, it seemed like we were getting close to the end of the book
And then I remembered it's Deuteronomy 29 and I was like oh yeah we are getting close to the end of the book
We are literally nearing the end of the book of Deuteronomy
Which is quite an impressive feat to work our way through the entire book
There are only 33 chapters of the book of Deuteronomy
We've been over a year with it but it's a big book
It is one of the larger books in the Bible and we've made a lot of progress
And I personally I don't know if anybody else has gotten a lot out of it or not
But I've seen a lot of things come out of this that have really affected my life
And I'm grateful to be allowed to do it and I thank you that you allow me to do it
Imagine for a moment that you were growing up a hundred years ago or more
In the United States of America where for most of the middle of America
You were dealing with a lot of small towns and some of the towns that developed to be kind of large
But there was a lot of small towns and some of those small towns faded away
Faded into bigger towns and things like that
But if you were a young person and you guys who are in the room like Jason
You just went into sixth grade, seventh grade thank you sir
So you just went into seventh grade and if you were in seventh grade
You would have kindergarteners in your class with you in school
In fact the small town schoolhouses almost all of them had kindergarten
And really they didn't have kindergarten
They had that age at which they were ready which is kindergarten first grade
Kindergarten is kind of a little bit later development
First grade through senior in high school
So you'd have been going to the same small building
And you'd be there for six or seven hours with kids and teenagers of all ages
And the only textbook that you had generally speaking to read from
Unless your teacher would bring in additional works or things like that was the Bible
So you would be learning as a first grader in the same room with somebody who was in 11th or 12th grade
So when they're talking about algebra you're mostly just waiting patiently
And when the first graders are talking about what's the difference between an M and an N in the alphabet
The tenth graders were working on their algebra work or whatever
So in the same room was all this vast range of people
And so there were farmers and then there was the general store owner's son and the smith's son
They come from different walks of life and like that
But they would all come to this schoolhouse because they knew there was knowledge there to be received
And while someone else was receiving the knowledge that they were getting
They might get some little piece of it or pick up some part of it
But if somebody was much older than them they probably couldn't understand it
Like they might be reading poetry for example or reading proverbs out of the Bible
And the first and second graders would just get just an inkling of what they were talking about
Not understanding really at all what they were talking about
And then when they were reading, when they were learning colors and stuff like that
The older kids were just basically ignoring what was being said
Small town schoolhouses between the ages of first grade and senior high school
Are very similar to the incident that we're going to read about in the text today
That's why I make that illustration
So grab your Bible if you would and turn with me to Deuteronomy chapter 29
Amen
Thank you so much
This is God's word
We stopped last week in verse 8
We ended with verse 8 and we will begin today with verse 9
So 29, 9 says
So keep the words of this covenant to do them that you may prosper in all that you do
You stand today all of you before the Lord your God
Your chiefs, your tribes, your elders, your officers, even all the men of Israel
Your little ones, your wives, the alien who is within your camps
From the one who chops your wood to the one who draws your water
So before we go any further there I want you to see that he's making a point that everybody's there
And notice he doesn't have to do that
He doesn't have to say men and women
In other texts we don't even get that
See all of you men are here and women are not even acknowledged but they were there
Or all the families are here and that would take care of all the men, women, and children
But he's breaking them down to make a point
He's saying all these kind of different categories
And he doesn't list all of the categories that were there
So there's something that we can learn from the list that he chooses
Because he doesn't list everybody that was there
But his point is everyone is here
But notice how different some of you are from the others
Chiefs from the men who chop the wood for example is a radical difference
As leaders of families who had 10 sons and their sons had sons
And they had soldiers that had been trained up
And they were all working together as a kind of like an organized family, an organized military unit
That's way different from the guy who just goes out and draws the water
Or maybe the woman who went out and draws the water
So basically he's saying we're all here and I see that you're all different
That was his point
We're going to go on, verse 12
Everyone's here, all the different walks of life
That you may enter into the covenant with the Lord your God and into his oath
Which the Lord your God is making with you today
In order that he may establish you today as his people
And that he may be your God just as he spoke to you
And as he swore to your fathers to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
So he harkens back to the promises again
Remember this is the promised land that they're talking about
This covenant that they were making with God was based on the promise
Based on the grace, based on the holiness
We talked about all of that over the last month or so
But the bottom line is he was saying you're all here
And you all come from all these different parts of our society
Everybody is different in their own way
And that is so that you may make this covenant
See the connection? He says so that you may make this covenant
That's why everyone's there, that's why everyone's diverse
So that they may make the covenant
Verse 14
Now not with you alone am I making this covenant and this oath
So now wait a minute, not just everybody that's there
But he says now there's someone more
More than you, you all are here and you all are different
But there's someone more that's making this covenant today as well
And verse 15 he says, and he gives us the answers to who that is
But both with those who stand here with us today
In the presence of the Lord our God
And with those who are not with us here today
For you know how we lived in the land of Egypt
And how we came through the midst of the nations from which you passed
So we're down to 17 and basically what he's saying is
All of you are here today, all of you come from different ways of thinking
Different ways of living, different job backgrounds, different social economic status
Whatever, we're diverse but we're all here represented
But this covenant that we're making is not even just with you as a people
And notice that when he said those who chop wood
There's a very good likelihood he was talking about people that they had taken in battle
So not even Israelites
Not blood Israelites, not people could trace their tribe back
So the proselytes are amongst them, people who have come over to be Israelites are there
So all these people from all these diverse backgrounds
He says, but not only am I not only making this covenant with one part of Israel
But all of Israel, but on top of that I'm not only making it with Israel
I'm making it with all those people who will come to be part of it in the future
And he says, you know how we went through all the midst of those nations
We saw so much difference
So many people from so many different walks of life, the way they live, the way they think, all of that
And he's saying, basically he was saying this covenant will in theory be open to everybody
God can use it to bring anybody into relationship with him
Then 17
Moreover, you have seen their abomination
So amongst those people they went through, you saw how the evil things that they did
And their idols of wood, stone, silver and gold
Which they had with them
So they had statues that they worshipped at or statues that they sacrificed their children at
And things like that
And saw how bad it is out there amongst other people
We don't have that here now amongst us
But it's very bad out there
And this covenant will be open to that people is what he was saying
18
Lest there shall be among you a man or a woman or a family or a tribe
Whose heart turns away today from the Lord your God
To go and serve the gods of these nations
Lest there shall be among you a root bearing poisonous fruit and wormwood
And I'll break these things down in the points
So that's why I'm not breaking them down right this second
19
And it shall be when he hears the words of this curse
That he will boast saying
I have peace though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart
In order to destroy the watered land with the dry
In other words, he's saying there's somebody amongst you
There could be somebody amongst you
That would be like that
They will boast saying I have peace
Even though he doesn't have peace
Even though he is subject to the curse
He's not honoring God
He could say I have peace
Verse 20
The Lord shall never be willing to forgive him
But rather the anger of the Lord and his jealousy will burn against that man
And every curse which is written in this book will rest on him
And the Lord will blot his name from under heaven
Then the Lord will single him out for adversity from all the tribes of Israel
According to all the curses of the covenant which are written in this book of the law
That's the text for the day
May God add blessings to the reading of his word
There are three things I want you to see in here
The first two might just jump right out at you
The third one is a combination of those two and might also just jump right out
You might have done this by yourself in your own study I think
But the Lord really laid it on my heart
The first thing is I want you to see that the people that were there was everyone
All walks of life
Woodcutters and water bearers
Those who owned a hundred oxen or whatever
Those who owned fifteen flocks of sheep
Had twenty shepherds working for them
All walks of life
The single, the married
Those who had betrayed God at some point in time and then restored to the community
And those by sacrifice or by whatever it means
Those who had never betrayed God that anyone ever knew about
They were all there
All people, all walks of life
All types of education
Smarter people who know how to construct things from
Take plants and stones and bring them together
Boil this and boil that and distill this and distill that and put it all together
And get a medicine
And people who are like
You know I walk behind a plow and I know you've got to keep the rows straight because
I want to get the maximum yield from the crops
Right?
And people who don't know any of that and all they know is you get up in the morning to go get the water because it's hot in the middle of the day
Every walk of life and every education
Those who could read and those who could not
Reading was not taken for granted at all in that day
Some could and some couldn't
In fact whether or not you could read was not an indicator of whether you were educated or not
Today we want to say that if somebody can't read it's because they're not educated
That's not even true
There are people who do not read well who are way smarter than people who do read well
I know a man who went and got his master's degree and he has a reading level like fifth grade
That's all he can read
And he made it through six years of college
Right?
Now he had to work harder than the other guy and in my opinion I think he's smarter than a lot of those guys that went through and could read really well
Even though he because he had to work harder even though they made it through and got the same degree he did maybe got better grades
He worked harder and learned more in that six years than they did
But he has a fifth grade reading level
Bottom line is this
All walks of life
All education levels
All work types
Wait for it
All backstories
People who came from all different places
They might be successful businessmen now
And a lot of times we look at people right where they are right now and we think that's how they've been their whole life
But that isn't so
People come from all different backgrounds
There are people who were in one career and switched to a completely different career
Right?
Completely different major in school whatever all different backstories
Notice there were people there who were witnesses
They were alive to see what God did to the Egyptians some of them
But there were people there who were converts
They didn't see any of it
They didn't see what God did the Egyptians
They didn't see God part the Red Sea
They didn't see any of it
But they understood that it had happened or believed that it had happened
But they hadn't seen it
Some of them weren't even Israelite blood
They believed that it had happened that God had converted them
They've been taken in battle and now they've become Israelites or Jews if you will as converts
What they were witnessing to was what God was doing today
What God had done in their lives
That's a lot like we are
So all walks of life, all education, all work types, all backstories, witnesses and converts
Who was gathered there? Everyone!
But it goes further than that because in verse 15 who was lumped in?
Everyone who was yet to come
Look at 15 again real quick
He says, but both, these are those who, he says, not just making the covenant and this oath with you
But both with those who stand here with us today in the presence of the Lord our God
And with those who are not with us here today
Every convert, every person who would come to be a believer
This covenant was for everybody
Everyone was lumped in
I submit to you this is a problem for me
Because there are people who just don't know
There are people that maybe will have a hard time ever knowing
They're ignorant
They don't have access to the gospel, they don't have a Bible, they don't have somebody to teach them
They don't know and the possibility of their knowing seems minimal
And then there are people that, you know, I'm just keeping my head down
I'm just keeping my nose to the grindstone
I'm just doing what I gotta do, right?
I'm being me, doing what I gotta do, day to day, in and out
And it seems like they have less chance because they're keeping their head down
Because they're not focused on these other things
And it seems to me that Psalm 131 supports, at least initially, that lifestyle
It says, and I'll read it to you real quick
Oh Lord, my heart is not proud, nor my eyes haughty
Nor do I involve myself in great matters or in things too difficult for me
So I have great sympathy for the one who says, I don't really have to worry about that covenant
I really don't have to worry about the extensions of the law, the choices that I have to make
Because that's a little beyond me, right?
Or those who look at the pashel and say, well, he knows more of the Word than I do
So that's why he's kind of goofy like that
I don't have to be kind of goofy like that
Or they look at Deacon Tony and say, well, he'll grin and bear it, he'll get it done
He was able to just set everything aside and make it happen or whatever
And he can do that because he's ordained as a deacon
He's somehow special or whatever
That's just not the case
That's just not the way it works
Everyone was subject to the same standards
And then if you go a little further in Psalm 131
He says in verse 2, surely I have composed and quieted my soul
Like a weaned child rests against his mother
My soul is like a weaned child within me
A weaned child is a child that still yearns for the breast but is now off the breast, right?
And so he wants, he needs, everything is not taken care of for him
And then in verse 3 he says, oh Israel, hope in the Lord from this time forth and forevermore
So the psalmist understood that no matter what walk of life you come from
No matter how educated you think you are or think you aren't
How capable to take on a task you think you are or how incapable you think you are
It doesn't matter
You're subject to the same standards
You're subject to the same covenant
The same call of God
The same bizarre faith that makes lost people look at us and go, that person is just weird
I don't know why they're so unfaithful to the Lord
Why does he always say he's blessed?
Why is he always praying for me?
Why does he stop and pray for me in the middle of his busy day?
Why does he witness?
Why does he talk to me about Jesus?
Why is he wearing that Jesus shirt?
Or why does he serve without any recompense?
Doesn't get paid?
And people look at people and think, that's strange
And that's the kind of people we're supposed to be because we are dependent upon God
No matter what walk of life we came from to understand
Now when I graduated high school, I'll go back
When I was in sixth grade, they took those standardized testings, right?
And my reading level was a 12th grade reading level in sixth grade
Now my boys did better than that
And that's not always the way it is, right?
So when I was 25 years old, and I found out that my name Daniel came from the book of Daniel in the Bible
The hero of the faith, if you will
I asked my dad, and he said, yeah, we named you after Daniel in the Bible
I said, well, I want to read the book of Daniel
And I want to understand what it says
Because I think that some of this church stuff makes sense to me
I wasn't saved at the time, but it was making sense
I said, I want to read it and understand it, and I can do that
Because I can read and understand the craziest of things
I can read and understand college textbooks
I can read and understand the dictionary
I could have probably learned another language
I didn't, but I probably could have
So I thought I'd read it
So I read the first chapters, the first seven chapters
And guess how much of it I understood
Next to none of it
I'm going, I don't understand this
I'm reading, it's prose, it's paragraph after paragraph
It's just word after word like any other book
But I don't understand what it is that God is trying to say through this
I couldn't understand it
It doesn't matter how educated you are
Or what your reading level is
You're subject to the same problems
And also the same blessings as anyone else
Everyone was there
And everyone was lumped in
And to say, that's above my pay grade
Or that's outside my reach
Or I don't quite understand it
And think that that's an excuse
That's just not true
In Colossians chapter 1
Paul is writing to the church at Colossi
That's why it's called Colossians
And verses 19 through 23
It says as follows
Colossians chapter 1 verses 19 through 23
For it was the Father's good pleasure
For all the fullness to dwell in Him
That's talking about Jesus
So it was God the Father's good pleasure
For all the fullness
Of everything
To dwell in Jesus
And through Him, that's Jesus
To reconcile all things to Himself
Having made peace through the blood of His cross
Through Him
I say, whether things on earth
Or things in heaven
And although you were formerly alienated
That means you were apart from God
You didn't have a good relationship with God
You were formerly alienated
And hostile in mind
Engaged in evil deeds
That's who we were
If you're not saved, that's who you are
22, yet He has now reconciled you
In His fleshly body
Through death
So He died to bring
Peace between you and God
In order to present you before Him
Holy and blameless and beyond reproach
If indeed you continue in the faith
Firmly established and steadfast
And not moved away from the hope of the gospel
That you have heard
Which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven
And of which I, Paul, was made a minister
So basically, if you become a Christian
That is to say, a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ
A child of God through Jesus
And stay the course as a Christian
By the way, if you don't stay the course
You know what that's called, right?
That's called a liar
You said you were a Christian following the Lord
Doing what it was that God wanted you to do
But things got ahold of you
Things got you distracted
Things got you challenged, whatever
You went after the cares and riches of this world
And you thought, well, I want more social media
I want more phone games
Or I want more sports
Or I want more hobbies
Or I want more sex
Or I want more pleasure
Or whatever, as you pursue after those things
And eventually you get wrapped up in that
So you're not producing any fruit
And if you are a Christian
You are a liar because you said
He was Lord and you're not living for Him as Lord
But the truth is, you're probably not
A Christian, you were just lying
When you said you were
Let's be factual, shall you? Everyone was there
Everyone from every walk of life
Everyone from every education level
No one was able to say that's above my pay grade
When the pastor preaches it or the word says it
If the pastor preaches it and it lines up with the word
Or the word says it in your own
Private reading time, you have a responsibility
To respond to what it is
That God says
There is no teaching of Christianity
That is above your pay grade
It is for everyone
All of it
Second thing to be seen in here
Is that God is calling
For faithfulness
Ruling out the adultery
With idols that they had seen
Amongst so many other people
The fact is
Systems, all systems everywhere
Must learn to excrete
You know what I mean by that, right?
Your body's got to poop
Right? I was watching
A cute movie last night with Sherry
On what was left of date night
And they were talking about their favorite animals
And she said, what's your favorite animal?
And he said, birds
And she said, birds?
And he said, why, what's yours?
She said, birds are nasty
And he said, why, what's yours?
And she said, dogs
And he said, why are birds nasty?
And she said, birds are pooping all the time
Everywhere, they poop all the time everywhere
And he said, yeah
So are dogs
And the point is
People excrete, systems excrete
You've got to learn to put out that
Which cannot be beneficial
You've got to learn to proficiently
That is to say, sort out what's good for you
Or good for the system
And whatever is not good for you or good for the system
Has to efficiently, indefinitely
And regularly be put out of the system
Here's how the system
Actually works in your body
You eat food, right?
When you eat food, and because of the day that we live in
Pretty much all food that you eat
You can almost get there with organic food
But even, and only certain organic foods
Like fruits and vegetables
All food has stuff in it
That's not good for you
Even if it's stuff that normally might be good for you
Or might be good for somebody else
It could not be good for you today
Right? Water soluble vitamins
For example, once you get enough of them
You excrete them
So your body measures, oh I need more vitamin C
Oh I don't need more vitamin C
When you cap and get too much
And don't need it, you excrete that
So that would be good for somebody else
Which means, as disgusting as this sounds
If somebody else ate your poop
That had the vitamin C in it, they could be healthier
What?
All systems have to
Learn to excrete
And they excrete what they don't need
They excrete what's not good for them
If you drink alcohol, your body has to process that alcohol
Takes the energy out of it, and then you have to
Urinate it all out
Which is why you wind up with liver poisoning
It's why you wind up with kidney failure
Because your body has to process that
And it's not good for you
By and large, however
If you have a problem where you have high blood pressure
And your blood is thick, a little bit of alcohol
Will thin your blood and keep you from having a heart attack
Wait a minute
Is it bad for you or isn't it?
The truth is, everything that's in the world
Is good
And you're gonna take it in, people are gonna say things
To you, do things to you, give things to you
Call you to things
Try to teach you to promise things, promise you things
And you have to be willing
And able to absorb
What comes at you
And excrete what isn't good for you
So when you eat that food, and it's got some bad stuff in it
You gotta excrete it
You gotta get rid of it
Get rid of the bad stuff, and the good stuff stays and builds your body
That's how it works
So if you eat 5,000 calories tomorrow
Burn 2,000 calories tomorrow
And excrete 1,000 calories tomorrow
You took in 2,000 calories too much
And you will weigh 2 thirds of a pound more the next day
That's exactly how it works
It's just that simple
All this, you need a fad diet
You need a bunch of exercise
It's just this simple
You take in the calories, you burn the calories
If you don't burn it, you store it
Or you excrete it
Right?
That's it
The building is the same way
We bring stuff in
If we keep bringing stuff in
And don't get rid of some stuff that we don't need
If we fill up, there will be no room for people
Sylvia Cynthia Stout
Who would not take the garbage out
The poem in Where the Sidewalk Ends
About a girl who wouldn't take the garbage out
Eventually, the garbage blew up out of her whole house
And out of her whole state
We laugh about that
Said, no, that could never happen
But the truth is, if our state, the state of Ohio
Doesn't figure out how to deal with the garbage that people are producing
Yeah, it will be thousands of years
But eventually, there won't be anywhere for people to be
That's just the reality
And that's telling us for faithfulness
In ruling out or excreting
Getting rid of the adulterous behavior
That is attached to idols
The bottom line is
We have to learn to proficiently
Efficiently
Indefinite
That means as long as you're going to live and continue to walk in the faith
And regularly deal with the stuff
That's coming at us
And decide what's good and what goes
And God would say your worship
Goes in one place and one place alone
And that is to Him
But let's be realistic
Can somebody own a small action figure
Idol, doll, made of gold
Silver, wood, plastic
Doesn't matter, and not worship it
Absolutely
Can someone be involved with
Sports and not worship sports stars
Absolutely
Can someone be involved with music
And not worship music idols
Absolutely
That's possible
So these are all things that are in the world
That God has made it possible
To partake of and even to use for His glory
But you're going to learn
You have to learn to process them
And God says you cannot process them
This way
You cannot let them become idols of worship
This processing that has to be done
Is done to maintain
But more to benefit
The purposes of the system
So the believer
Needs to process everything
That happens to them in a way
That it makes them more able to follow God
Not less able to follow God
And God was calling them
To do that
Also making them aware
Of the fact that those other people
Those other nations who were already into idol worshiping
Could potentially
Turn from idol worshiping, put God first
And be lumped into the covenant
That is what you and I have done
For the believers in the room
We have said there are these things in my life
They're good things but they're not as good as God
So God will be first
Through Jesus His son and everything else
Will be processed according to that one
Standard
That's what it means to be a Christian
That's why you said that you would be His God
That you would be His people and that He would be
Your God, right? That's what that means
A couple of quick illustrations
From the New Testament before we go on to the third point
You've heard maybe the parable of the four soils
Basically guys going out to
Lay seed and some goes on the road
Some goes on the thorns, some goes on the field
Or some goes on the thin soil
Some goes on the thorns, some goes on the field
And what goes on the field produces a lot
Of fruit and it's good
What goes in the thorns gets choked out
By the thorns which is the cares and
The riches of this world
And so what we say is we never want our growth
As a Christian to be choked out by the cares and the riches of this world
Because we have to learn to process the things that are happening
So we have to go, okay, look, I like food
I do, but if I eat too much food
In about five to ten years
I'm not going to be able to be functional
Doing what it is I want to do for the Lord
And therefore I can't do that anymore
I don't like push-ups, sit-ups, crab walking, lifting weights
I don't like doing that
But if I don't do that on a semi-regular basis
Then by the time I'm 55
Or 65 or 75
I may not be functional to do some of the things
That I want to do for the Lord
I don't like blocking time out of my day
To study my Bible, just plain study it
And write things down like the pastor is always trying to get me to do
That's hard work
Academically, physically, it's time-challenging, etc.
I don't want to do that hard work
But if I don't do it
Then in a few years
I will be missing some key piece of my faith
That God is calling me to
And whatever you are replacing that time with
That you're not spending alone with the Lord
That's your idol
Whatever you're replacing
The time you're meant to be worshipping God
Or loving others with
That's your idol
Check it out, figure out what it is
And realize that
The cares and the riches of this world
Are what's choking out your growth
But let's be really simple about this
There's another parable called the wheat and the tares
That Jesus tells
Another farming parable
The farmer goes out to sow, his servants actually sow
And then when the crop comes up
They see wheat and tares
The funny thing about wheat and tares
Is they look very similar
But one produces fruit and one does not
Then they say, well, should we tear out the tares?
And he says, don't do that
Because if you do that, the roots of the tares
Will tear out the roots of the wheat
So leave them there, and then I will come and harvest
And everybody's like, well that means
And it does, that when Jesus comes
He's going to harvest it
There will be people who said they loved the Lord
They loved the fathers, they were lying, they weren't really following Jesus
And those people will be
Harvested and thrown into hell for eternity
People like to use it that way, and I'm not
Disagreeing with that use of that
Parable, right?
But I submit to you that the soil
In the parable of wheat and tares
Is good soil
Right?
They went out to farm and all the seed made it
To the field, but then the weeds came up
And they asked, how's that, how'd that happen?
How'd you get tares in there? And he said because
The enemy has sown in bad seed
In with the good seed
Right?
So this is the issue
You've got to be able to process
What the enemy does
In you
The things the world does, the things your family does
Listen, you may have a great
Christian family
They may love the Lord, they may be trying to serve the Lord
But the reality is they're all human
And they will make mistakes
And when they do, they may bring something to you
That if you absorb it
You're in a good field
Supposed to be producing fruit and now all of a sudden you have a
Tare right next to you sucking the
Juice out of the soil so you can't grow big
And produce fruit, right?
You still have to be wheat
You still have to be wheat when the harvest comes
And I submit to you
That the harvest comes according to the text that we just read
More frequently
Than only at the end of the world
Now I'm not trying to blaspheme against
The holy scripture, clearly Jesus was using
That parable to teach about
His second coming, right?
I'm not saying he wasn't doing that
But I submit to you based on the text that we read today
Deuteronomy 29, the harvest
Comes more often than
Only at the end when Jesus comes again
Everybody's thinking, I'm safe
And then that brings us into our third point
When, here's the
Question, when is a person
Singled out by God for punishment?
When I was in sixth grade
I had a teacher, he was my social studies teacher
And there were about 25 boys
No girls in my social studies class
Now I don't know if they did that on purpose
Or what not, but we were
Going through a rotation and it turned out
That we had 25 boys, no girls
In the class
And there was a young man who'd been
Pretty much a trouble maker, the whole time I'd known him in school
He would do things to get other kids to laugh
You know what that's like, right?
Is the kid that does something to try to get everybody laughing
And everybody starts laughing and they don't realize
That they're actually leading the kid to continue to do bad stuff
Well he was that kid
So this teacher
Of the second week of class
I think it was maybe third week, but it was in the very beginning
Of the second or third week of class
Came around and we were all sitting in our
Seats working on paper and he walked up
Behind that student
And took two of his fingers and put it in this hole
Right here, between your shoulder
And your neck, and he pushed down
Real hard until the student
Was slipping down in his seat
But then, because he had a big hand
And we were still pretty small at that time
He had his thumb under his shoulder blade
Or something on his back, or maybe it was his shirt
And he was holding him so he couldn't shrink completely
With it, and they called it the claw
Right?
And so then whenever
This kid would be acting up, he'd say, I just want you to know
I've heard stories about who you are
And anytime we have trouble
You're gonna get the claw
Now he pretty well behaved
Most of the semester
But three, four times, he'd come
And got the claw, because he'd be goofing off
He'd throw something, the teacher would know it was him
And he'd go and he'd give him the claw
And there was a few other boys that got the claw
There was a few boys that got the claw
Just because they wanted to know what the claw was like
They did something wrong, just like they never did it again
But the first time they said, I'm gonna do this
Just to see what that's like, and they got the claw
So what I'm asking you is, when is a
Person singled out by God
For the claw, because it sounds wrong
He hadn't actually done anything wrong
When the fingers went down in his shoulder the first time
That was just to show him what was gonna happen
When he did do something wrong
Right?
Then he did do something wrong and he got it
And then a couple weeks later he did it again and he got it
When does God
Bring the claw
On somebody who is amongst his people
On somebody who claims to be
His followers
So in this text, and what we just read
There are three notable
Failings
That bring a person to the point
Of God's claw
The first one is false teaching
If you'll look
And it says
At the end of
Verse 18, so we'll read 18
Lest there shall be among you a man or a woman
A family or a tribe, whose heart
Turns away today from the Lord our God
To go and serve the gods of those nations
Lest there shall be among you a
Root bearing poisonous fruit
And wormwood
So the first thing here is poisonous fruit
Right? Now he's not just talking about
A tribe here, because in the very next thing
It'll say, and it shall be when he hears the words
He hears the words of this curse
Right? Talking about an individual
An individual who brings
Poisonous fruit
Poisonous fruit is when you produce something
That sends somebody else
In a bad way
Right? So you're producing fruit
Maybe instead of love, joy, peace, patience
And so on
You're producing
Anger, wrath, malice
Disappointment
Frustration, whatever
You produce this fruit that becomes
A stumbling block for somebody else
And then they do it too
And now we have
A notable failing
On the road to becoming somebody
Who gets God's claw, according to what it says
The first one is poisonous fruit
The second one is wormwood
Now every single time you find wormwood in the bible
It always means bitterness
It's gall, it's that
That people get, bitterness
Alright? And so
If the individual becomes
Bitter
So we've got one possibility, false teaching
Another possibility is bitterness
And then the next one starts in 19, it shall be when he hears
The words of this curse, that he will boast
Saying, I have peace, though I walk
In the stubbornness of my heart
And so it's false peace
So the three things
That put somebody in line for the claw
Of God are
False teaching
Bitterness, false peace
So I'm going to give you
Everything you need to know right now
To have those things and avoid
The trouble, except there's
A problem with each one and we'll do it
Together, alright? So first of all
If you don't want to be a person
That bears false teachings, but also you're
Not truly following the Lord, what do you do?
If you don't want to be a person
That's bringing false teachings and therefore
In line for the claw, so if you went in his class
And you know he's going to get a claw
Whenever you act up, and if you bring a
False teaching, you're going to get the claw
What do you do?
And you believe the false teachings
So what do you do?
Anybody want to take a stab at it?
If I believe the false teachings
But I know if I teach the false teachings
And give the poisonous fruit
I'm going to get the claw, what do I do?
Don't do it
Keep your mouth shut
Alright, shut up
So if you have a false teaching
Brewing in you, or a thing
About you that could easily become
A stumbling block for others
Then you could prevent the claw from
God by bearing no fruit
Whatsoever, except
What's the problem with that?
John 15
1 and 2 makes it very clear
He says, I am the true vine and my father
Is the vine dresser, every branch in me
That does not bear fruit, he takes away
And every branch that bears fruit
He prunes it, that it may bear
More fruit
So if you say, I'm not
Going to bear fruit
God says, that branch
If that person legitimately is
Even saved, they're going to be taken
Away, and if they're not
They're headed for hell and it's going to be bad
Right?
So there is, what I'm saying to you is
There is no escape
If you are a person who is bringing
False teaching, poison fruit
If you will, then
There is no escaping the claw
Of God, according to this text and what the Bible
Teaches. Next is bitterness
So what do I do if I have
Bitterness or gall within me?
In other words, I feel
Yucky about other people
And what they do are about situations
What do I do?
When
Whatever is going on in the world makes me
Want to gag
But if I act out
In that
Then I will pay the price
Of the claw
So what do I do?
Don't do it
Larry's got the
Cheat sheet today apparently, alright?
So I don't act out of my bitterness
I don't let anyone know that I'm bitter
That's not like a good plan
It's the best chance you got of avoiding the claw
Based on what we're reading
Except
John 13, 34
A new commandment I give to you
That you love one another, even as I have loved you
And that you also love one another
By this all men will know that you are my disciples
If you have love for one another
Guess what I'm saying
It ain't gonna work
If you have bitterness in you
And therefore you just clam up
And don't let that bitterness out
Because you don't want anyone to think bitterness
Is gonna come down on you
Guess what's gonna happen
You're gonna fail in the commands of God
And therefore pay the price
Last one is false peace
So
I wanna be okay
Right?
I wanna be
Even though I know I'm doing wrong things
I wanna say
God will take care of it
I've sat in the living room with a number of people
At different times that made that very argument to me
They say, well, I believed in Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior
So now, whatever I do, God is going to take care of it
So what you do
In order to feel that way
And not have to claw
Is you have to have a healthy fear
You have to recognize that God is who God is
And He can crush you completely like a bug
Right?
So I've pieced God's grace is covering it
I'm still gonna do it
But I know God might crush me
Right? And humility, like, oh, I'm worthless
I'm no good
Right?
I'm not a good Christian, I'm not good at being a Christian
I don't ask anybody to follow me
I don't ask anybody to listen to my teachings
Because I know I'm no good as a Christian
Fear and humility
And
If God wants to punish me for what I'm doing
That would be perfect justice and I'm okay with that
I don't think He's going to because of grace of Jesus
But if He wants to punish me, I'm okay with it
I'm prepared to take my licks
That's what you gotta do
To avoid the claw of God, except what?
Why doesn't that work?
Because
According to the Bible
Luke 13, 34
Says this
Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that
Kills the prophets and stones those who send her
How often I have
Longed to gather
Your children together just as a hen
Gathers her brood under her wings
And you would not have it
Behold your house has left you desolate
And I say to you, you shall see me
Until the time, you shall not see me
Until the time comes when you say
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord
You will not have God
You will not have
Faith
You will not escape by saying
Yes, I'm willing to take my punishment
Oh I fear God
By having a false humility
You will not have
God in your life
And therefore
When the time comes
You will spend eternity away from him
False peace does not work
And there's no way to avoid the claw
That brings us then
To our conclusion
Real quick
Recapping what we've talked about
Number one, everyone was there
Every Israelite and lumped in by
Moses was everybody who would keep coming
Everybody who would ever hear the gospel
Everybody who would ever hear the word
Everybody who could become a convert
Those who would be taken as slaves
Against their will
Everybody
Everybody in every season of life
From every walk of life
In all education, all work types
All backstories, all witnesses
And all converts, everybody
Was lumped in
And from that group, God was calling
For faithfulness, ruling out
Any kind of adultery with idols
Nothing else
Could be worshipped except God
God claimed them as his people alone
Those who were there
And those who would become converts
He claimed them as his people alone
And they were to claim him alone as their God
And a person would be
Singled out for punishment and wrath
Notably for three primary reasons
Number one
False teaching
Number two, bitterness of soul
Number three, a false peace thinking they were going to be okay
And that brings us to our conclusion
You are safe
Amongst the called
If you trust God
In Christ and remain faithful
But you could be singled out
For destruction
If you adopt false teachings
Become bitter
Or conceive false peace
The truth is, if you are
A person who is
For the sake of Jesus
Then you are going to hell
You are going to hell
For an eternity
And worse maybe than that
Right now in this moment while something could potentially
Be done about it
They are suffering bitter
Endless
Loneliness
Subjecting their worship, which could be of the highest
subjecting their worship to things of this earth because they cannot find God.
And all their life has been orchestrated.
All the places in which they live and will ever go has been set up.
All the difficulty that they have ever faced, all the education that they have ever or never received,
all the troubles and all the successes were orchestrated so that that person, the person in question,
instead of adopting false teachings or having a bitterness amongst them or having a false peace,
might believe in the one whom God has sent, his son Jesus Christ, and be saved.
And having been saved then, realize they are subject to all the teachings of the scripture,
all the covenant, old and new, all the callings on their life by God.
And there's no, that's too high for me to understand.
There's no, that's too low or menial for me to deal with.
There's no, that's too expensive, it will cost me too much.
There's no, well, I like this teaching over that teaching,
I'm going to go with this one because it doesn't make me feel uncomfortable.
None of that.
There's no, I go here because it's prettier.
I go here because it's louder or quieter.
I ran into a man this last week who has visited New Heights.
Now, ironically, he's visited in two separate seasons of our existence and he doesn't know it.
He visited us on Main Street in 2009 or something, 2008.
We were in the 613 building, the small building, and we were meeting in two services
and he visited one of our services.
And after that service, I visited him at his home and he told me that he would not be back
to New Heights and the reason is because it's too loud.
The music was too loud, the people were too loud, the kids were too loud,
everything was too loud and he's very deathly afraid that he will be deaf
when he gets older, that he will lose his hearing.
And the doctors have told him because of his time early on in his life,
whatever he was doing, demolitions, something, blowing something up, whatever,
and he would mess with his head, his ears, and he would lose his hearing as he got older
and he should be very protective of his hearing.
He said, I will never be back to New Heights because it's too loud.
That's what he told me.
Now fast forward about 12 years, maybe 13, 2020, 2021, something like that,
he visited New Heights here.
Now when he visited New Heights during the inspirational moment time, somebody,
one of the kids, I think it was Jason actually played a song on the back
and it was from a Disney movie.
It wasn't a particularly loud song or whatever like that, but he said,
he asked me when I saw him this week, he said, do you still allow young people
in your church to potentially choose a song to play?
Now we don't do that as much as we used to because we're going live right now
to Facebook and we don't necessarily have copyrights on all those things.
So it's tricky.
So we haven't been doing that as much.
We've been doing more reading the lyrics and talking about the songs.
But legally, we are within our rights to show a song and talk about efforts.
That's allowed.
You're allowed to do that legally because you're talking about the song.
But that being said, we do still do it.
And so once I figured out that's what he was talking about, I asked him,
we was talking about inspirational moment time, he said, no, no, I'm talking about.
And I said, you mean when?
He said, no, no, not then.
I'm talking about, he kept telling me I was wrong.
But ultimately we decided that's what he was talking about.
And he said, that's why I'll never be back to your church.
He said, I have to protect my hearing.
I have to know what's coming, what it's going to be like, blah, blah, blah.
And he said, so he'll, and I said, so what church are you going to?
And he said, well, I'm not going anywhere.
And I said, well, has God told you to go to church somewhere?
You know, I mean, you know, as a believer, you're professing Christ, right?
Yes, I am.
He said, then you really should be in church, right?
And he said, well, but everywhere I go, I run into a problem.
Now, as he said that, he was storming away from me.
I was standing in a Maccabah Conception Outreach Center,
and I was getting groceries from them that they had left over.
You know, I'm going to take them back this Wednesday, take them back to the life station.
And he stormed out past the old ladies, you know, and he said, well,
everywhere I go, I find a problem.
I said, I'm out of here.
He threw up his hand.
I'm out of here.
Yelling, mind you, with old ladies right in front of him.
So I'm sure that wasn't really protecting their hearing.
But anyway, he's, and I said, I'm out of here.
Everywhere I go, I find a problem.
And I did what I didn't get to say to him, but what the Lord said in my heart at that time,
and I almost followed him out, but it would have been hard, and I didn't,
was it's not about whether it's loud.
It's not about whether or not he finds some other problem or some other reason.
It's about his faithfulness.
Hear me now.
In the small schoolhouses of old, there were first graders and there were 12th graders.
And when it comes to what the Bible says, you may be in this room right now,
and you may be a third grader, but you're responsible for all of it.
You're answerable to God for everything that God says in His covenant, in His grace,
and everything that Jesus ever taught.
You're responsible for all of it.
So you need to make sure you get every bit of it that you possibly can.
And you'll get whatever.
So if it's something that's, you're just not dealing with it yet, you're not there,
and you don't understand it's even an issue, you may only get 40% of it.
And you're responsible to get that 40% of it.
Or if it's something that you've dealt with before and it's totally taken care of in your life,
and you've totally put it behind you, you may get 100% of that,
and you're responsible for 100% of that.
And before you say, why do I got to hear it again, something I already heard,
you got to understand that I have seen people who have heard something 20 times.
I have a person that I'm ministering to now that has bitterness of soul.
They have allowed themselves to become bitter.
And I am trying to work with them and help them, but I cannot bend over backwards,
and I cannot resolve that, only God can.
Okay?
So I'm hoping that we'll get there.
But the problems that person has had, that problem did not give them bitterness of soul.
They have a responsibility to excrete.
They have a responsibility to take in whatever the will throws at them,
and to go, this is not for me, I'm going to let it go.
This is for me, I'm going to take it in, I'm going to use it, I'm going to build myself.
This is for me, but it's a little bit too much, so I'm going to let it go over the top.
Whatever I can't handle, I'm going to let that go, and I'm going to take what I'm supposed to take in.
This is for me, and this is not.
I take some of this which is not, I decide not to take some of this which is.
You're responsible.
That's poison fruit, it's bitterness, it's false peace.
You're saying to God, God, I am your child, I will do whatever you tell me to do,
then He tells you what to do, and you don't do it.
Either you're a liar or He is.
That's the bottom line.
And if you have poison fruit, or bitterness, or false peace, you're in line for the claw.
Because the end of that text that we read says that God will single that person out for destruction.
It says that He will bring the curses of this book down on their life.
Not when they die and go to hell.
When He does, when He realizes they have false peace, when He realizes they have poison fruit,
when He realizes they have bitterness of soul.
That's when He'll bring it.
And He'll single me or single you out from our families.
You think God is not able to deliver a nuclear explosion and contain it to one body size?
He absolutely can.
With the cells in our own bodies, He can.
He doesn't need anything else.
He is able to do it.
And He can single us out.
So what do you do?
Well, if you're a producer of poison fruit, you need to repent.
You need to stop.
You need to say, I'm not going to do this anymore.
I will not teach something or I will not fail to teach that which is in God's Word.
I will not teach anything contrary to God's Word and I will not fail to teach what's in God's Word.
If you're a person filled with bitterness, you need to repent.
You need to repent.
It doesn't matter who did it to you.
You need to repent of your bitterness.
They are not at fault.
If you still have it, they are not at fault.
You are.
Repent.
And turn to God and say, I will not have bitterness of soul.
Not me, God's Word.
In false peace, you say, I'm OK.
Jesus died for me.
He covers all my sins, whatever I do.
And then you go and do something that you should not do and you know you should not do it.
You talk away you shouldn't.
You don't do what you should do.
That's false peace.
You have false peace.
You need to repent and turn to God and get real peace.
Real peace is when you say, I will not intentionally do anything that God doesn't want me to do.
I will not intentionally fail to do anything that God wants me to do.
Not for anything this world has to offer.
When the cares and the riches of this world come, they're going to come because the tares
are still growing in the good soil.
So they're going to come.
And when they come, I will be wheat.
I will be producing.
If they hate me, if they kill me, if they persecute me, if they chase me out,
if they take my money, my job, my home, my family, if they kill my wife and my kids,
I will be wheat because I know who God is.
Maybe you're just a convert, but I hope not.
I hope you've witnessed something amazing that God has done.
And if you have, then I hope you'll bring real teaching and real love and real peace
into your day and the problems that you face and the family that you're living in
to the strangers that you meet on the street.
And when we do that, not only will we not be in line for singling out for the claw,
but on top of that, we have the opportunity that the people that we see wrapped up in
idol worship and doing abominations in the world, will win.
Next time you run into somebody who's doing something really, really stupid,
I mean something that gets your goat, I cannot believe that they would do that,
you go up to them and say, can I talk to you about Jesus?
Let them say no.
What happens if they do?
What's it going to hurt?
You'll be found doing what it is that God called you to do.
Instead of going, ah, stupid, ah, I can't believe it.
Walk up to them and say, can I talk to you about Jesus?
Well, you might be persecuted.
If you're persecuted for the faith, God will reward you.
If you're unwilling to be persecuted for the faith, then you have a false peace.
And God will reward your false peace with the destruction that you are not interested in.
Let us repent and turn to the Lord God.