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If you will, turn with me in your Bibles to Jeremiah.

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And today I'm going to be reading from verse 13 through verse 16.

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This is one of the major prophets of the Bible.

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We are in a section in which Jeremiah has an awful task.

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He has to tell God's people about their sin and their false expectations.

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And today is one of his tough messages to God's people.

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And Jeremiah is complaining before the Lord.

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Let's listen to what he says.

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What I said, alas, sovereign Lord, the prophets keep telling them, you will not see the sword

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or suffer famine.

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Indeed, I will give you lasting peace in this place.

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Then the Lord said to me, the prophets are prophesying lies in my names.

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I have not seen them or appointed them or spoken to them.

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They're prophesying to you false visions, divinations, idolatries, and the delusions

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of their own mind.

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Therefore, this is what the Lord says about the prophets who are prophesying in my name.

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I did not send them, yet they are saying no sword or famine will touch this land.

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Those same prophets will perish by sword and famine.

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And the people, they are prophesying to will be thrown out into the streets of Jerusalem

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because of the famine and sword.

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There will be no one to bury them, their wives, their sons, and their daughters.

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I will pour out on them the calamity they deserve.

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Let's now pray and ask God to bless what he has written.

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Jesus, we now ask that you will help us to see what Jeremiah was not only telling the

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people of God in Jerusalem, but also to us today.

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May we be servants who find our peace in you.

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I make this prayer in your name.

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Amen.

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We want peace.

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Who doesn't want peace?

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Harmony, agreement, accord, friendship.

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One of the worst things that can ever happen to you is to work in a place in which there

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is no harmony.

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It can also be terrible to be in a relationship in which there is constant discord.

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And it is a problem a lot of us face which upsets us.

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It is only the outliers of society who like to stir things up and create constant conflict.

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And what do we see in our world today but that type of conflict, whether we are talking

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the war in Ukraine or Israel, the deep divide in our nation, the problems in our home, and

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what often goes on inside of us because of those conflicts that we see all around us.

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The cry is for peace and harmony.

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And sometimes we will go to great lengths to try to secure that type of peace.

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Sometimes there are good methods, but often there are bad methods of trying to get that

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peace.

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Before World War II began, there was a conference in Munich.

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It was an attempt by the Allies to assuage Hitler from starting a war.

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And what they did in that conference with leaders from Britain, France, Germany, and

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Italy was to give Hitler the Sudetenland, hoping that this would satisfy him.

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And one of the famous pictures in a newspaper occurred when the British Prime Minister,

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Neville Chamberlain, stepped off a plane and said that we are going to have peace for

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our time.

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And everyone was relieved.

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But within a short time, war broke out. The peace that he promised was a vapor.

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It didn't last.

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It didn't bring any peace at all.

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And today the false prophets and priests of our own era have a way of trying to get people

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to believe in peace, but it's often a peace that won't last.

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In fact, it may be destructive.

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And what we see here in the words that I've just read is a description of the false peace.

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The promise of peace, but it will not bring everlasting peace or relief to God's people.

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Let me explain to you what's going on here.

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Let me give you the background of these words, Jeremiah.

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The kingdom of God was supposed to represent God and his faithfulness through the laws

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that he had given to his people.

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They were supposed to have one God, no idols.

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It was supposed to represent the relationship of a husband with their wives.

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But there were many gods in Israel, not one.

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They were supposed to have a just society with care for those who were orphans or widows.

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The laws were supposed to be just, but they weren't.

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In the week, the poor, the orphaned suffered.

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They were supposed to be a kingdom where God was loved as well as the neighbors.

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But it wasn't that way in Israel at all.

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There was a lot of hatred.

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There was bloodshed.

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They had not listened to the word of God.

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They had disobeyed the word of God, and that's where Jeremiah comes on to the scene.

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Jeremiah tells those people, God is fed up with you.

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He has been merciful to you.

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He has sent you as messengers to say, turn back to the ways of God, and they have not

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listened.

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They don't care what God said.

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They had a façade of religion.

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They had a façade of biblical Judaism, but it really wasn't true.

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And the false prophets came on to the scene, and they said, don't listen to Jeremiah.

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Don't listen to him that the wrath of God is going to come upon you by the Babylonians

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who are going to come into the city of Jerusalem, put it to the sword.

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Don't listen to him that that superpower of the era with its upgraded chariots will tear

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down the temple and burn Jerusalem.

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Don't listen to him.

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Instead, there's going to be peace.

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Peace!

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That's what God says.

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And so we have a conflict between Jeremiah, who represents truly what God says, and the

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false prophets, who say there's going to be peace.

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And over and over again in the book of Jeremiah, he says these prophets are saying peace, peace.

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But there is no peace.

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And you can look at verse 13, where Jeremiah really complains to God and says, alas, sovereign

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God, the prophets keep telling them, you will not see the sword or suffer famine.

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Indeed, I will give you everlasting peace in this place.

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And in verse 14 and following, you get God's reply.

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There are a bunch of liars.

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They're following the desires of their own hearts, not the word of God.

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There will not be peace, but there will be destruction for those false prophets and even

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the people who listen through them.

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Now that was Israel's day.

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What about our own day?

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Do we often have a desire for peace, and we place our trust in institutions that do not

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deliver?

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Ever since the First World War, there has been an attempt to have international organizations

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that will bring peace, such as the League of Nations.

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Did it work?

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No.

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Since World War II, you have had the United Nations, because the nations of the world

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did not want to see conflict.

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Did it stop conflict?

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In the world, did it bring everlasting peace?

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No, it didn't.

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And in our own country, we turn to the prophets and priests today, the diplomats, the elected

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officials who are promising peace, peace, and they will always have a program, but it

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doesn't bring peace.

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In fact, it seems to have made things a lot worse.

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And another way we try to find peace personally is we either turn to drugs or alcohol or

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even to the modern psychological movement.

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Now I am not against counseling.

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I am not against psychology.

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But I've got to tell you the truth.

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Most of the research that is done in psychology can't be repeated.

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In other words, it works in one place, won't necessarily work in another place.

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I was listening to an Ivy League educated counselor.

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And he was telling about his work in counseling at a very prominent mental hospital in Northern

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Virginia.

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Here's what he said.

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After working there for years and using the cutting-edge techniques of counseling in psychology,

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not one person changed.

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Not one.

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And we have people, and this is another insight he said, that we have people who are in bad

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relationships.

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They want unconditional love.

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They want that unconditional peace.

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So they'll go to their counseling group where they will seemingly get that unconditional

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love and peace.

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And he said, you know what the problem is?

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They have changed one idol for another.

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They have tried to seek it in a relationship.

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Now they've tried to seek it in a group.

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But it is not coming from God.

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Can counseling be good?

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Yes.

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I'm not against counseling.

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I'm not against psychology.

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But just beware, it can be a false idol.

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It can be an idol that brings a false sense of peace.

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And how does that song go, looking for love in all the wrong places?

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Sometimes we're looking for peace in all the wrong places.

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What we want is not false peace, but true peace.

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Matthew Henry, that Puritan commentator, put it this way, peace is such a precious jewel

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that I would give anything for it, but true.

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To have peace, it has to come from truth.

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It has to come from peace with God.

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Now one day God will bring peace to this world.

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It's going to be transformed.

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But it does not promise us in this age that there will ever be peace amongst nations or

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even people.

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In fact, Jesus says, I have not come to bring peace but a sword.

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And that is often the place that we find ourselves in this conflict, conflict, conflict.

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But the Bible tells us we can still have peace with God.

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And what does Jesus say in John chapter 14, when he's telling his disciples he's going

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to go to the cross, his face is set towards Jerusalem.

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He tells them he is going to be betrayed.

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And he's going to leave them.

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And what does Jesus say?

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Peace I leave with you.

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My peace I give to you.

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I do not give to you as the world gives.

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How Jesus are you going to give them peace?

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Because Christ went to the cross to die for our sins.

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And the ultimate reason we do not have peace with God, and we often feel guilty, unloved,

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is because we have never realized truly that Christ died on the cross to do away with the

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enmity between God and man.

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The warfare between you and God has ended.

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And Jesus is the peace bearer.

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Now let me tell you why this is important.

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Because you're going to face experiences in your life which are going to make you feel

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like you are responsible for the troubles that are brought upon you.

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Whether at work or in your personal relationships.

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You will be rejected.

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You will suffer devastation.

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You will suffer loss.

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And what is the mindset of God's people at times?

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It's my fault.

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And we go a step further and we say, God is against me.

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Why have you forsaken me?

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Oh God.

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And if there is an individual in the Bible where the world around them could say, you

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see, this is what happens to you Christians when you start preaching the gospel.

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You get martyred and it's your own fault.

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And we can think of Stephen who told God's people the truth and they stoned him.

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Now I wonder if in Stephen's mind or if we were in the situation, what would we think?

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I shouldn't have done this.

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God's mad at me.

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But God wasn't mad.

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And what does it say that when he was breathing his last breaths, Jesus was standing on the

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right hand of God.

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He was swimming Stephen into the heavenly kingdom.

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He had that type of peace.

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Some time ago Billy Graham had a wonderful story.

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It is a beach scene and there are rocks near the beach.

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I guess it was a cliff.

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And inside one of those crevices by the sea was a small bird that was at peace despite

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the storm.

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The storm raged but the little bird was at peace.

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And what Billy Graham said is that is what it's like to have the peace of God.

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To know that life can be full of conflict but it doesn't mean God is against you.

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That's the true peace for those who follow Him.

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And the reason it is that way is because Christ took the storm.

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Christ took the heat.

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Christ took the punishment that you and I deserve.

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And that's why we come to the Lord's table.

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The peace that is true.

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The peace we should prefer.

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Let's pray.

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Our Heavenly Father, we come before you now.

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Help us to take off the blinders of this age so that we can see you, Jesus, as the offering

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of peace to God.

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And help us, our God, to find rest for our souls in Christ.

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Help us this morning as we come to the table where peace is found.

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Amen.