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Jeremiah 16 - Part 1

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Live from Bremerton, it's Monday night bible study, Jeremiah chapter 16. Welcome those of you that are watching on Facebook. Let's pray. Father, we come before you and we thank you that we can gather together in your name, Lord. We thank you that we study your word and worship and pray for Thomas and pray for others. We lift up Stan and Vangie as they're flying to Italy. We lift up others who are Gloria, who's going to Hawaii, we just lift up those who are sick, we pray for your healing touch upon them. Pray that you anoint and bless this time that we study your word and worship and fellowship. Thank you for the meal, and just bless this time, Lord. We commit this time into your hands in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. My life is in you, Lord. My strength is in you, Lord. My hope is in you, Lord. In you, it's in you. My life is in you lord my strength is in you lord my hope is in you lord in you it's in you I'll praise you with all of my life I'll praise you with all of my with all of my life with all of my strength all of my hope it's in you my life is in you lord my strength is in you lord my hope it's in you lord in you it's in you I'll praise you with all of my life I'll praise you with all of my strength. All of my hope, it's in you. Yeah, my life is in you, lord. My strength is in you, lord. My hope, it's in you, lord. In you, it's in you, oh, my life is in you, lord. My strength, it's in you, lord. My hope, it's in you, lord. In you, it's in you, it's it's in you. Amen. Amen. Amen. Holiness is what I long for. Holiness is what I need. Holiness holiness is what you want from me. Faithfulness, faithfulness, faithfulness is what I long for. Faithfulness is what I need. Faithfulness, faithfulness is what you want from me. Take my take my my Take my will conform it. Do yours. Do yours. Your righteousness. Righteousness. Righteousness is what I long for. Righteousness is what I need. Righteousness righteousness is what you want take my conform it to yours to yours holiness holiness is what I long for. Holiness is what I need. Holiness holiness what you want from me take my Amen. Praise the lord. Praise the lord. I can feel it rising all that joy that's growing deep inside of me every time I see you all your goodness shines through I can feel this god's song rising up in me. Oh, hallelujah. Hallelujah. Amen. Praise the lord. Praise the lord. Alright. Thank you. Jeremiah 16. It's been about four weeks. And Jeremiah 16. Father, we thank you for the sweet time that we can spend together. We don't take it for granted, Lord. These are very, very special, precious times in which we're living, Lord, to be able to gather together in your name, to have a home bible study at Rob and Vicky's. And we just thank you for them and all that they do to prepare and get this all ready. And we pray tonight, Lord, that this would bear much fruit, that you would edify and build us up, strengthen us, Help us as we study here, Lord, be our teacher. Open the scriptures to our understanding. Help us be doers of your word and not hearers only. In Jesus' name, amen. Alright. The word of the Lord came also unto me saying, so Jeremiah talking, thou shall not take a wife, shall thou have sons or daughters in this place. The gift of being single. Anybody single here? Yeah. So far. So far. And so far? Okay. Thomas, do you desire to be married someday? He got find his wife find it a good thing. Okay. But women are not things. Oh. So okay. You should be a marital counselor. Yeah. Thou shall not take a wife, neither shall thou have sons or daughters in this place. In that place, but not they want to see another place. Exactly. So God's telling Jeremiah that it's better that you remain single. Do some people feel that it's better to remain single? How come the single people wanna get married and people want thinking about getting divorced? Well, I didn't say everybody, but some. Okay. Well, in Matthew nineteen twelve, Jesus said, some people are eunuchs, made eunuchs from their mother's womb. Right? Others are made eunuchs by other men. And then there's a third aspect of eunuchs of people that make themselves eunuchs. In this case here, it's God telling Jeremiah to remain single, to remain a eunuch. In the case of the Romans, a lot of the different pharaohs and the Caesars and all these different people, even still today, if you have a harem of women and you have attendants, you have those that going to attend and help and serve. Some of them are made eunuchs by men. They make you a eunuch. Others from their mother's womb, in Genesis, God says it's not good for men to be alone. The design that of marriage, the two coming together and being as one is the ideal that God designed. But there are exceptions. There are those who are not second rate Christians or second rate people or second rate anything. They have the gift of celibacy. They have the gift of remaining single. The Apostle Paul in first Corinthians seven twenty six and twenty seven, he said that it was good, it was better if you could remain single from the aspect of serving the Lord, that you don't have the responsibility of caring for a wife and kids and all those other things. So in that case, Paul, many feel that Paul was once married. And when he became a Christian, that the Jews would have a mock funeral, and you would you'd lose everything. So and the reason they think that Paul was once married is because he was being groomed via Pharisee of Pharisees and possibly a member of the Sanhedrin and one of the requirements is that you would be married. So but he was able to take to make himself a eunuch to be celibate. But he counsel people if you're burning with passion and you can't handle that, then go ahead and get married. If you're a widow, you've been married and your spouse dies, he counseled that it'd probably be better that you remain single, but if you can't do that, go ahead and remarry. So he gave some counsel in that regard. In the case here, as we move forward, the reason Jeremiah, he is an illustration to the people that times are going to get very, very tough and that those of you with families, with children, especially small children, you're going to be in greater jeopardy. It's going be harder upon you. And I'm watching people today as they're anticipating the collapse of America or the collapse of the economy or greater persecution coming against the church. I'm watching a lot of the young families have a very difficult time being in a church that teaches the collapse of America or the collapse of the economy. That's not stuff they want to hear. They want to realize all their dreams. They want everything that their parents and grandparents have had. They want the American dream. And the idea that we would come under persecution is not what they want to hear. So the pastors keep them calm and allow them to be in denial and others will say, well, I'm still going to prepare my heart spiritually and I'm going to prepare as preppers have gardens and food and things like that. But we don't want to hear about Bill Gates. We don't want to hear about Klaus Schwab or Noah Yuval Harari or any of these globalists that are wanting to bring forth a reset. We don't even like the term build back better because build back better means something got destroyed, something got wiped out and the globalists want to build it back better. So they want to try and find a place where they can focus on raising their kids and their families and all. And so too with Jeremiah, when he brings forth this kind of truth, there's gonna be a prophet named Pasher. And Pasher, his name means prosperity, and he's gonna keep promoting prosperity. He's gonna say, Jeremiah is crazy. The Babylonians are never gonna come here. They're never going to hurt us. God's gonna protect us and all, and we're not gonna go into captivity. Jerusalem is not gonna be destroyed. And so too when Jesus is weeping over the city of Jerusalem, in Luke chapter 23 verse 28 through 31, who wants to read that? What Jesus said concerning he's Jesus is being apprehended and going to go to the cross to be crucified, and a group of women are following begin to weep and wail because of it. They become very sad about it. And what is his response there? Somebody else read first Corinthians seven twenty six and twenty seven. Okay. And Matthew nineteen twelve. Luke twenty three twenty eight through 31. You got that one? Okay. And Matthew nineteen twelve? I got that. Okay. And who has first Corinthians seven twenty eight through 20 twenty six and twenty seven? Anybody want that? Sure. I didn't know what Steve said. Which one do you have? Steve has it, first Corinthians? Luke twenty three twenty eight through 31. Okay. First Corinthians seven twenty six and twenty seven. I'll do that one. Matthew nineteen twelve. Seven First twenty six and twenty seven. Okay. So we'll have Robbie read first. First Corinthians seven twenty six and twenty seven. Corinthians seven twenty six and twenty seven. Twenty six and twenty seven. Now think in terms of in the Catholic church making somebody a priest, making somebody a nun, and taking on vows of celibacy. Think about that as we read these verses. Okay. First Corinthians seven twenty six and twenty seven. I think then I think then that this is good in view of the present distress that it is good for a man to remain as he is. Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be released. Are you released from a wife? Do not seek a wife. Okay. So one time I did a wedding and the guy was an electrician and he couldn't wear a wedding ring. So he had a chain around his neck and I said, that's kinda symbolic of being married. It's like having a ball and chain around your neck. So Paul says, you're bound, if you're bound, right? You're bound. Alright. That's a little joke. Uh-huh. It's true. Robbie had twenty five years of being bound, you know. So what I like to say is that marriage is not a prison sentence. And if the guy or the gal doesn't get it, you know, rather than murder, God has allowed writing of divorcement. Right? So there's a way out. I had come back then, I'd be out of Britain already. That's it. That's it. That's it. Okay. So Paul is advising in a time of distress. From the standpoint of Paul's ministry, think of where he went. Think of him being beaten and stoned in all the different places and malaria and different diseases and places he went. What if he was like Peter and the other disciples trying to bring his wife and maybe kids with him on these missionary journeys? It would have been prohibitive, you know. David Livingston, when he went to Africa, he left his wife in Europe with the Missionary Society and people began to wag their tongues. They began to gossip about him, about how he was off in Africa without his wife and such. And he left her purposely home because of the conditions, how horrible it was and knowing the temperament of his wife that she physically may not be able to endure what was happening there. And so because of the gossip, because of all the bad junk, he wound up bringing her to Africa and she got sick and died. So there's a there's some wisdom here in what Paul is saying. You know, if you're going to serve the Lord, the Lord Jesus was single. Peter was married. It's not the same for everybody. As I was talking about the priests, apparently a lot of these priests and these nuns have a very difficult time. As Paul is pointing out first Corinthians seven, some have a difficult time controlling their vessel. They burn with passion. They want to be intimate with somebody. And so Paul says, hey, it's better for you to get married than to be burning with passion. If you don't have the gift of celibacy, the gift of being a eunuch, then by all means, go ahead and be, you know, and get married. So with the Catholic church, with all the pedophilia and all of the sexual scandal and things like that, apparently, there's a whole lot of them that don't have the gift of being celibate. And so there you go. Matthew nineteen twelve. Okay. For there are some units which were so born from their There you go. You guys could hear me without this. Not on here. No. Oh, okay. Sorry. Okay. There nineteen twelve. For there are some eunuchs which were so born from their mother's womb and there are some eunuchs which were made eunuchs of men and there be eunuchs which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it. Okay. So what kind of jeopardy is marriage in today? How how? Marriage is frail. Why why Marlene? Is marriage frail? Because it takes three to make a marriage. K? It doesn't nobody wants to, you know they don't wanna have any hardships. Oh, you're not doing what I'm asking. I'm out of here. Yeah. No commitment. No commitment? The young men, the typical young men, why aren't they wanting to get married? Why are why is the rate of men and women getting married? Why is it down? Why also is procreating having children down? What's going on in our culture? An empty wallet. So he's saying it's financial. It's difficult financially. Their entire role in the marriage to the state, and now it's run by the state. And that's I think that's the saddest part of it. The saddest the saddest part? That you don't wanna do both? You don't wanna do it in God's eyes? And then also Well have a marriage license. Because of the removal of God from the marriage, the church being involved in that marriage process, then you've lost the fault of the marriage. Mean, it's kinda like why our schools are failing because we took God out of it. We took the church that out of that dynamic. And I think it's the same with marriage is that the the churches have advocated their role to the state to now decide what is a marriage, and it kept it licensed. I see what you mean. And and by turning it over to the state, then you've stood back and you've you've not allowed the church to be what it should be and it always has been. So so if Obama comes along and institution. And changes the institution of marriage and says now it can be two men, three men. Right. He mentioned three in Portland. What do they call it? Palorimony? Something like that. Something like that. But I mean, and then Dobson said years ago, if you open that floodgate, it's going to be dogs, cats, animals, everything redefining marriage. God is the one that says what marriage is between one man and one woman for a lifetime. So that's it. And so they redefine it. So you're thinking that's why the kids are confused and not wanting to get married? Because there's no standard to it. Okay. It gets redefined with every presidency and every Supreme Court and every court. Even today, what is a man, what is a woman, the transgenderism and all that, and all the pornography and the robots and all this other stuff. It's basically the devil destroying the institution of marriage which God ordained to procreate and to have children and raise them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord in Christian home. So I agree with Ravi that the church needs to stand strong and be a model of the bride of Christ being married to Jesus and the wife of Jehovah Israel being married to the Lord. So it speaks of intimacy. On the human plane, the greatest intimacy that we can experience on the human plane is the two becoming one. A single person can live their life in intimacy with Jesus, you know, spiritual intimacy. So you can't force it. But it's interesting, the lack of commitment as Marlene was saying or desire to be committed, desire to be married. I'm running into a lot of and I have a lot to learn, there's a whole lot of women who are divorced, raising their children alone, and they can't find a man that wants to be married and become a part of that. Don't want to. They don't want the responsibility. And so it's bizarre. My dad married my mom when she had three kids and adopted us, gave us his name and worked three jobs and then they had another child and so he fell in love with her and was willing to commit himself and all that. There's two sides of it. The men are saying, you know, well they just they'll give me sex, they want me to work and pay all the bills and pay everything. And so I think that's where in that battle. So like Robbie is saying, if we do it biblically, the way the Lord would have us do it, maybe we'd be more successful at marriage in the church. Not outside the church, in the church. The divorce rate in the church is just as high as outside the church. You know, the church is failing at marriage. Okay. Brandon was saying that that Brandon? Who's Brandon? My son, Brandon. Who is what? Who is single? Yeah. And how old? He's 32, three, something like that. I don't even know how old he is. You guys encourage him in his walking relationship with the Lord. Right? Yep. Right? No hurry for him to meet miss Wright and get married. No. Right? He sees a lot of the women that are out there are influenced by the feminist movements, the I don't need a man for anything. They're kinda crazy. He sees a lot of crazy. Okay. A lot of not godly, not wanting to do anything but sleep around and be crazy. So that doesn't appeal to him at all. Right. And so he's like, no. So he's willing to wait for the Lord to bring the right woman at the right time if and so the Lord wants to do that. So. Yeah. And so he's content. Godliness with contentment is great gain. I I had actually had a conversation with a a young very squared away young man. He's probably in his late twenties, thirties. And what he said is that his friends are finding that because the state has taken over even raising your children that you can't discipline any anymore. He goes, that scares all of us. Oh, yeah. And I never thought of that as being an overriding factor of why people don't want to have kids because they and and he went on. He's like, we know what they're doing. I mean, they're taking kids away and and he said, my friends want no part of that and they're afraid to bring a child into the world because of the control that the state has over the family unit and raising the child, how you do it, what your goals are, what your, you know, what your methods are. It's one way, their way, that's it. And he's like, we're just we don't want any part of that, which I thought that was, like, low on the list. I didn't know young kids even thought about that. But Yeah. You have to be really strong in this world Yeah. Combat all of those I don't think you can move a step forward without faith. You're you're going to you're going to have to have some faith and some courage and stubbornness to just say, you know what? I'm doing it God's way. And anybody that tries to take my kid, God help them, you know? If you if you don't have that tenacity, you're not going make it. If you're passive about the evil, passive about this, that, and the other but that's a way for God to weed people out. That my daughter shouldn't marry a guy like that. If he's that passive, if he's that, you know, uncommitted to the Lord, first of all. You know, so but I do understand ideologically what's happening with them, how they're being brainwashed and the devil trying to destroy the institution of marriage, which God's ordained. Some of the young people that I talked to don't want to get married because they've already assumed it's going to fail. They've already assumed that everybody around them has gotten divorces. Why do I wanna do that? Then split up. Boyfriend I'm dating now has two ex girlfriends and three kids and they just see it as an absolute failure. There's no commitment to one another. It's just we can't count on anything, so why go there? So my mom married seven times. If I looked at it that way, would have never got married because it's going be a failure. There's no point in it, you know. So I took a different approach, you know. Let's jump in and see if the Lord will teach me how to be married. You know? I'm still asking for help, I'll tell you. Can't say something about Bill Gates. You know? And he before he broke up, he wondered, I cannot bring a child in this world. Look at it because it's kinda crazy. But he, but he, then he did have a child. And then because of that, he wrote the song, Because He Lives. You wanna sing it? Well, maybe maybe sometime. Okay. You're a good singer. Because He Lives, I can face tomorrow. There it is. Because He Lives. All fear is gone. Because I know He holds tomorrow, something like that. The future. I can live forever. Amen. Yeah. So the Lord comforted his heart by bringing his child into the world, as he was kind of afraid at first. Okay. So another thought, and some of you might have some other thoughts on this. This is a big issue. My dad, when he married my mom, was married for twelve years and they were unbelievers and he was all in. Loved my mom with all of his heart. My mom loved him. They gave it their best shot. And then the marriage fell apart and he was absolutely miserable. She went and remarried another guy, but he was absolutely devastated. And that devastation is what led him to Jesus. That's that's how he came to Jesus was through that. He couldn't even sleep at night. He would drink a six pack, 12 pack to try and just pass out and he was just wiped out. And then I came to the Lord and God used me to help lead him to the Lord. And once he came to know the Lord, he was able to forgive her, he was able to move forward. But interestingly, he never wanted to experience that pain again. And he was very, very content being single, being a single man and has just been in love with the Lord and serving the Lord ever since. So sometimes you impose upon people, oh, they're so lonely. We need to play matchmaker. We need to find somebody for them and all that. They're just fine. They're just they just love being single and they're not incomplete. They're not just discontent and we need to respect that that as we saw here, some of them from God's some of them, you know, God has made them single. They're happy being single. And others have gone through the devastation of divorce or somebody dying and they're also content with remaining single thereafter. So I have to tell you a comment that Greg just made. He said, if the milk is free, why buy the cow? Yeah. I've heard that. You see? Exactly. I've heard that. I've heard that for yeah. I've heard that. That's that's what does that mean, Greg? What does that mean? What does that mean? Maraj? Any other thoughts on being single or being married or Nancy? Not recognize the roles that God gave to the man and the woman. They're separate roles. He he's a provider, the warrior, the protector. All of that is what God has made men for. And women are the homemakers that nurture the home and make a place that he's welcome to come back into every night. Amen. And God is above and then the man, then the wife. Amen. Children last. Amen. I don't know why you're We'll drink that milk, but we're gonna kill that cow to eat it. There you go. Amen. That was good. That was good. Yeah. One more. I'll add one thing. The two people getting married, it helps if you have the mutual faith and belief in in God and you stick with it. Yeah. You know, because one two of our children before they got married, I told them, I said, you know, if you're not a believer, you know, if you marry someone that's got different beliefs, I said, it's gonna be very difficult. And both of them ended up divorced. And were they believers? Well, my daughter to be a believer. They were raised all kids were raised in the faith. Our oldest son turned his back on the Lord many years ago. Now, he's been married and has his our three beautiful grandchildren, but they're still together and doing well. So it's kinda weird, you know. Yeah. But if you don't have faith in God, it's definitely a lot harder. So what verses what verses would you use with them to try and show them God's authority in that decision making? There you go. So so being not an equally yoked together with an unbeliever is a matter of some is. Right? Mhmm. So you're you have to qualify. You you say, are you a Christian? Oh yeah, I'm a Christian. Then why do you want to date an unbeliever? And oh, but I think I can win him to Christ. So now you're going to go twenty five years of living with an alcoholic that tricked you into marrying him and you think you can change him? You really want to go there young girl? Young man? You know And I have I have grandsons and grandsons can be tricked by women. So it's not just, you know, whatever. It can go both ways. So and another verse is, Can two walk together except they be agreed? So within the home, Jesus, as Nancy is illustrating, needs to be the head of the home. He's the authority in the home. And so we're going to follow the word of God if we are going to determine the direction we are going. So that's paramount because light and darkness. And so some people in our church are married to guys, people that are unbelievers, and it's very, very difficult. It's very, very hard. It's a hard way to go. And so better better to remain single and wait for the Lord to save them before you jump in and think he'll save them later. Know? That word submission today is a really bad word for a lot of people. You know, man has to be submitted to the Lord. You know, first of all, the wife needs to be submitted to the husband, not in a subservient way, but in God's way. And if you're doing it the way God says to do it, it works. It's even coming into the church from the standpoint of women pastors. It's just exploding with women as pastors even in Calvary Chapels. And that's a lack of submission. That's a lack of submission to headship and not understanding the headship. So what other ideas? What other comments or questions do you have about this? Would you want a pastor that's single? Let's say the guy is 25, 26, 27, 28, 30 years old, never been married and he is a Jeremiah. He is called to be in the ministry. Is that the kind of pastor you want as a flock? I'm not a parent. Know. We need some good stories out of our pastor. Well, mean does he have the life experience? Does he have the life experience to help you in your walking relationship with the Lord? There are guys, young guys that start out as single pastors and they later, you know, later a lot of times they wind up getting married. It's hard for a congregation a lot of times to think that, well, you know, you don't know what it's like to be married. How can you counsel me about marriage? You don't know what it's like to raise kids. You've never raised any kids, you know. So it's That's why they go to the library. Yes, theoretical. And even our sermons, the way that we teach, a lot of what guys teach are things that are theoretical. They've never experienced these things. So if you have experienced life and you go through the same thing that people in the audience, people in the congregation are going through, all of us are going through kids, prodigals, know, all this stuff, financial ups and downs and physical problems and all that. Now you're able to search the scripture to seek the comfort that the Lord can bring by His spirit through His word, and now you're able to comfort others also. Right? So it's part of it. Alright. Any other ideas? Somebody read Luke twenty three twenty eight through 31. And we're going to apply this to the time we're living in. And to the time that Jesus said this, we're gonna look historically at what was he saying. And they followed him a great company of people and of women which also bewailed and lamented him. But Jesus turning unto them said, daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are coming in which they shall say, blessed are the barren and the wombs that never bear and the paps that never gave suck. Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, fall on us and to the hills, cover us. For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry? So if they're doing these horrible things while I'm still alive, while I'm here, what are they gonna do to you once I'm gone? So picture this. Picture communism overtaking Germany, call it Nazism, communism. Hitler used the communist as a means of the people giving up their constitution, given empowering him so that he could take care of them. So if you're a Jew, if you're a gypsy, if you're somebody outside of, you know, the ideal of their religious system, what happens to families? What happens to a Jewish family? What happens to a Christian family when the government becomes and demonizes you and your family? What happens? They take away the kids. Right? First thing they do is take away the kids. They separate men and women. Corrie Ten Boom and her family, never see your dad again. The men and women are separated in different cars. The children are whisked over here. And these pedophiles, they want the kids. Right? They want to indoctrinate these kids. They want to brainwash them, groom them, the whole thing like Robbie was saying earlier. Hillary Clinton and many of them have been moving in the direction and we see it, you know, greatly in the state of Washington where the parental rights are subservient to the state rights. The state wants control of these kids from the womb to the tomb. And when we had a day care, we could see it. We could see that's what they want, but the laws weren't in place yet to have that authority, you know, that supersedes that of the parents. And so anyway, then later, once the tyranny happens, what Jesus is saying here is he is saying, you guys don't need to weep for me. You guys should be weeping because when Titus surrounds Jerusalem in seventy AD and he puts a siege upon the city, those of you that don't flee to the Judean Mountains, those of you that are caught in this siege, you are the ones going to be weeping. Your children are going to die and your children are going to suffer. Those of you that have really small ones that are nursing these children, there's going to be a time of famine, a time of war, a time of pestilence and you're going to be the one. So don't weep for me, it's going to be worse for you. So Jeremiah not having kids is sending a message to these families that it's better you'll be better off if you remain single and not have children because people with children and families and responsibilities are going to go through a horrific, horrific time when the Babylonians come. And so that's basically what's the illustration of Jeremiah there. The party is over. It's over. And it's a time of judgment now. It's a time of war. It's a time where presently the term is normal. Normal is not coming back. Right? We want normal. We want the normal life that our parents and grandparents had. And in a time of upheaval, that normal is over. And that's basically what he is saying here. Any other thoughts or questions or comments about marriage, about being single, about how does it change in the time of takeover where God will use the Babylonians to judge his own people? What happens if a foreign entity or even our own government treats you and I as the enemy of the state? What's going to happen to us as parents and families and our children? So in the state of Washington, that bill, does anybody know the bill? We were trying to get signatures to overturn it to stop it from if one of your children in school expresses that they want to change their gender, that the state of Washington can grab your child and bring them into a location you don't know about and keep them there and hormonally and surgically transform and change them without your consent. Right? Is that crazy or what? So and for me, as a as a father, if I didn't have the authority to spank my children, to discipline my children, to correct my children as a father, I would think, you know, it's better off to not even have kids. I don't I don't want to be in a situation where I have to live with a tyrant that's now gonna sue me Yeah. Because she said that she didn't ask to be born. You know. Do you do you see that? Yeah. I mean, it's ludicrous. So my thought is is, you know what? Honey, my kids, I'd sit them down. You ever go down that road, you're gonna be a member of the state. I'm not tolerating this. I'm not going to be in a situation where you have leverage over me, threaten me all the time if I don't do what you say that you're going to tell your teacher and tell somebody and get me in trouble. I mean, it's your decision. You want to live here, you need to abide by the rules. So when they turn 18, they all say, don't have to listen to you anymore. And kicking that way. You know? Support yourself. Yeah. There you go. And then it breaks your heart. Alright. Because the devil brings around a slimy guy. Anyway. Alright. Okay, so, you shall not take a wife, neither shall thou have sons or daughters in this place, for thus saith the Lord concerning the sons and concerning the daughters who are born in this place, and concerning their mothers who bore them, and concerning their fathers who begot them in this land, they shall die of grievous deaths. They shall not be lamented, neither shall they be buried, but they shall be as the refuse upon the face of the earth. And they shall be consumed by the sword, notice by famine, and their carcasses shall be food for the fowls of heaven and for the beasts of the earth. So if I take and I take you to Lamentations after all this happened, Jeremiah is the writer of Lamentations. And I take you to Lamentations one, two and three and we look at the description of what Jeremiah is lamenting over, it got so bad that women were eating their own children. There was such a famine that women were boiling their infants and eating their infants to try and stay alive. That's how horrific it reached. Okay? We hear about communists coming in and invading the village, invading the city, and taking over and having bayonets on their on their rifles. Maybe it's the Japanese doing this. And they're, you know, playing with infants and piercing them, you know, destroying children, destroying people, the Chinese, whatever. And so we come back from World War II and we have the baby boomers, the ones that our grandparents that came out of that era. They came home, victors in that war and able to buy homes and great jobs and aerospace and all other such, plenty of work going on. And they began to have families, prolific amounts of kids. Now those kids are the ones that are starting to retire and is there going to be enough money, enough economy for them to be able to retire? And their kids, what kind of future do they have economically as Thomas pointed out, can you afford to even have a family, have kids, buy a house, all those things. In this case, this is a grievous, they shall not be lamented. So you're not even going be able to have a funeral. The bodies are going to lie in the street and not even going to be buried. They shall be as the refuse upon the face of the earth and they shall be consumed by the sword, by famine and their carcasses shall be food for the fowls of heaven and for the beasts of the earth. So there's going be terror, there's going to be carnage. And what happens at Armageddon to the globalist, the sorrows, gates, all these guys in Revelation chapter nineteen seventeen through 21. What happens to them? They get liquefied. Yeah. And the carnivorous birds come. Yep. And It's a feast. They eat their Yep. And their bodies aren't even buried. It's all over the planet. And God dishonors, degrades them to the point that the carnivorous birds, the animals are feasting upon them. So it's not and the bloods can be as high as the horses bridle. So war is not pretty. For thus saith the Lord, enter not into the house of mourning neither go to lament nor bemoan them. For I have taken away my peace from this people, saith the Lord, even loving kindness and mercies. Both the great and the small shall die in the land. They shall not be buried, neither shall men lament for them nor cut themselves nor make themselves bald for them. So they would cut their hair. They'd have a Nazirite. You'd shave your head and offer the hair as a way to lament. Today we would say, somebody in our family got cancer and they lost their hair through chemotherapy, so I'm going to sympathize with them and I'm going to shave my head. Know, they would it's a sign of mourning, a way that they would mourn. So he says, I'm going to take away the peace. I'm going to take away the house of mourning neither go to lament or bemoan them for I have taken away my peace from this people. Let's look at that word or that phrase, my peace. God said, I'm going take away my peace. We're living in a time of peace, unprecedented peace and prosperity on our soil. We go and we fight foreign wars perpetually. We're constantly going all over the planet fighting wars in somebody else's soil. But on our soil, we've had a perpetual peace in the sense that a foreign army, you know, hasn't come on, you know, on on our soil and and subdued us and taken away our constitution and our freedom and liberties and such like that. But the Lord is saying, you guys are gonna be in a very, very fragile place because I'm gonna take away my peace from this people. So our peace is preserved by the Lord. The Lord some trust in horses, some in chariots. The horses and the chariots are the means of war, the means of your military. Some trust in horses and chariots. Betty's got it. But I will trust in the Lord. So on our coin, in God we trust, as long as America is trusting in the Lord, He's going to keep His peace. He's going to protect us. We will have a great military. We're going to have a mutually assured destruction where anybody with nuclear weapons, they're not going to send them because you're assured your whole civilization will be wiped out in a second. Right? So having a powerful military, having a powerful economy, having the technology dissuades your enemies. They don't even want to try it. They don't want to try it. So walk softly and carry a big stick, right, Teddy Roosevelt. And that preserves the peace and all that here. But churches, if the churches are strong, then we have a spiritual peace. We have God's help. And in Revelation six:four, war breaks out, but the Antichrist is gonna come along as a peacemaker, gonna trick people into peace, peace where there is no peace. Right? And coming on the scene, I believe he's gonna come on the scene after Ezekiel thirty eight and thirty nine, where Israel wins five out of every six of the invading coalition alliance of nations that comes against Israel is wiped out by God and God gets the glory. Now the world, the globalist, they have to rethink what they're doing. And so, you know what, Israel is a big player in this. What are we gonna do? And you know the Antichrist wants to deceive them. Know the devil wants to destroy two thirds of them, right? Because prophetically that's what the bible says in Zechariah thirteen:eight and nine. So Israel, it's the time of Jacob's trouble in the tribulation period. Hasn't started yet because there isn't a peace treaty signed. So the Antichrist is going to come along and sign a peace treaty with the nation of Israel and people are going to think that, hey, this is a great thing. We got a peacemaker now. There isn't going to be wars anymore. Finally, we're going to have Utopia. We're going to have a new age, a new time of peace and prosperity. Now, short lived, right? When the seal judgments start to open, famine, pestilence, war breaks out, 25% of the planet is wiped out during just the beginning of the seal judgments, right? So if you've got 8,000,000,000 people on the planet, you lose 2,000,000,000 people just with the advent of the seal judgments being open, with the water source being polluted and corrupted, with food source being gone, with wars and the pestilence and such. And so you're just they want their population reduction, they got it. Here you go. And so that's Revelation six:four, war breaks out and but he says, my peace. So let's look at some verses that speak of peace because in this time of anxiety, Rob told me that two people recently committed suicide in our community. They shot themselves. And then a third one was shot in the head simply from a road rage the other day in Gorse. So we're watching people be filled with anxiety, enormous amount of anxiety, enormous amount of stress. And people deal with anxiety and stress in a number of different ways, some self medicating, some you know, marijuana, alcohol, a lot of different things. But it basically boils down to a lack of peace. There isn't peace in their heart. They're filled with turmoil. You and I as Christians, no matter what the external circumstances are around us, we have a place that we can run for refuge and experience a peace that surpasses all understanding, that guards our minds that guards our minds against the lies of the wicked one that's seeking to cause us to be overwhelmed with fear and anxiety. And that's a fruit of the spirit. It's a fruit of the spirit to enjoy this peace that God makes available for you and I. We don't need to cope a coping mechanism. Our coping mechanism is not alcohol anymore or drugs or even pharmaceuticals that the doctor prescribes. We have access to my peace. Jesus describes my peace I'm going to give unto you. Not as the world gives, give I unto you. In the world, here's a promise, you will have tribulation. So peace is not the peace that he's offering is not a peace from a separation from adverse circumstances. In the world, you will have tribulation but be of good cheer, I've overcome the world. So you're going to have external things coming at you, but you're going to be able to go into that secret place with the Lord, spend time with the Lord. And Philippians four, Be anxious for nothing but in everything through prayer and supplication with thanksgiving. And the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds through Christ Jesus. Right? So that's the only thing that gets you and I through these things. Now people that don't know Jesus don't have that kind of help. They don't have that kind of help. The help of the Holy Spirit, the comforter that Jesus said that he would send that would help us. So by way of review, let's look at some verses that speak of peace. First of all, we want to look at Romans five:one and two. Who wants to read that? Okay. And then after Romans five:one and two, we want to look at John fourteen twenty seven. Who wants that one? Okay. And then after that one, we want John sixteen thirty three. Going to go into sequence here, trying to learn something. I'll do John sixteen thirty three. Okay. And then Ephesians two fourteen through 18. Who wants that? Okay. And the Philippians four four through seven, which I already quoted, but I want you to read it. Okay. And anybody else want to read? Okay. Isaiah fifty four nine through 14. Anybody want that? Okay. And Isaiah 50 four:nine through 14. And then Hebrews thirteen twenty and twenty one. Lamentations three, twenty two and twenty three. Okay. So, he says, my piece I'm going to take from you. Romans five one and two. Romans five one and two is the first one. That was the first one. Yeah. Oh, alright. That's mine. 51And2. We have to establish something first. Therefore, since we have been made right in God's sight by faith, we have peace with God because what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us. Because our faith, Christ has brought us into a place of highest privilege where we now stand, and we are confident and joyfully look forward to sharing God's glory. So what kind of distinction would we make? Peace with God and the peace of God? How does it differ? Peace with with God is is being reconciled to him and peace of God. Because what's the problem prior to coming to salvation? Our relationship with him. Our sin. We're at enmity. With Enemy of God. Right? We're enemies. And in order for us to come into that relationship, we need to come to the terms that he lays out to have peace with him. Reconciliation, atonement, and oneness, communion. He lays out the terms. The terms of peace, to experience peace with God, is 100% absolute surrender to king of kings and lord of lords. 100%. No negotiating. There's no negotiating. We come on his terms. You want to experience peace with me, you're going to have to surrender. Do you hear that? That's right. Not raise your hand and I'm going to ask Jesus in my heart and then I'm going to dictate to him and tell him what he needs to do. Right? But he is your savior and your lord and you come on his terms. And the king of kings and lord of lords, he is saying, okay, I will reconcile you. I will bring reconciliation. Now he doesn't need to be reconciled to us. We need to be reconciled to him. We are the ones that are the enemies. We are the ones that are stubborn, arrogant. We are the ones that ran away. And so we come on his terms, is 100% surrender, and we experience justification just as if we've never sinned. By grace through faith in him, we experience this justification. So he takes our sins, he casts them east to west, remembers them no more. No longer are we an enemy of God. He extends forgiveness towards us. We've been pardoned. Our sins have been paid for and washed away. Alright. So peace with God. We have to have peace with God. Then, John fourteen twenty seven. Peace I live with you, my peace I give unto you, not as the world give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. And so it's expedient that I go to be with the father because if I go to be with the father, I'm gonna send the comforter, the holy spirit, and the holy spirit is going to be able to comfort you. So I'm I'm I'm leaving you with my peace. I'm gonna give you the peace which is a work of the holy spirit. And then John sixteen thirty three. I have told you these things so that you may have peace, my peace. In this world, you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world. Amen. So take heart, take heart, I've overcome the world. Ephesians two fourteen through 18. For he himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall by abolishing in his flesh the enmity, which is the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in himself he might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace, and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross by having it put to death the enmity. One more. Right. Go 14 to 18. And he came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him, we both have our access in one spirit to the father. Okay. So do you see what's happening there? Do you see what's happening in Ephesians? There was a gulf between Jews and Gentiles. The Jew would wake up in the morning and he thought he was better than all Gentiles. In fact, he thought in his mind that Gentiles were simply fuel for the fires of hell. So he'd wake up in the morning and he'd pray, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God. And then he would thank the Lord. He would pray in his prayer, he would thank the Lord that I wasn't born a woman. Thank the Lord that I wasn't born a Gentile. Right? So they had a tremendous hatred toward Gentiles. And they were all puffed up. And so what's happening is Jesus says in the last days that there would be nation rising against nation and kingdom against kingdom. People are going to be divided once again over ethnic groups, different ethnic groups. Jews against Gentiles, blacks against whites, browns, yellows, whatever. Now Jesus is the savior of the whole world, you know, black, white, brown, of every tribe, nation, tongue, kindred, and people. Right? But men want to divide. So what's happening here is the nation of Israel never saw the church. It was a mystery hid but now revealed. And so the church wasn't even in the mind of the Jew. Peter, James, John, remember Peter how hesitant he was at the house of Cornelius, you know, to eat with Gentiles. You're not even supposed to eat with them, you know. And so that middle wall of partition, that division, if you were to try and go to the temple, they had what's called the Gentile Court. And at the Gentile Court, there was a wall of separation and the wall was was there was a sign there that said, any of you Gentiles that go past this wall, your death is upon your own, you know, your own shoulders. You know, don't go past it. So Paul is saying that middle wall of partition has been taken down now because of Jesus. And so the church starts out all Jewish, but moves in the direction of the Samaritans in Acts chapter eight. And then Paul is all the way to Damascus trying to grab hold of Christians in Syria. And in the house of Cornelius in chapter 10, full blown Gentiles are coming to the Lord and the Holy Spirit is being poured out upon them. So Paul is saying, this enmity, this angst that people had of Jew and Gentile is no longer there. The middle wall of partition is taken down and the church is made up first of Jew, Gentile, barbarian, Scythian, bond free, male, female, whosoever will, let them come. The invitation is open to anybody to come. Nobody has greater a sense of access. The priority is to the Jew first and that the gospel goes to them. Paul brings the gospel to them. Peter brings the gospel to the Jew. He is more the apostle to the Jew. Paul is trying to, but since you reject and you see yourselves not worthy of salvation, I'm going to go to the Gentiles. Right? And so the church, the bride of Christ is predominantly Gentiles. Now, what's good about this is if you've ever had been raised in the South or been raised in a place where people are prejudiced, one of the things that blew my mind was when I grew up in Southern California, I didn't even know what a Jew was. I didn't know what there wasn't any difference among us kids. There was no difference. It was we it were all just kids. Now recently, this past visit down there, Eric reminded me of all the different people that I grew up with that were Jewish. I didn't know they were Jewish. How would I know that? I didn't go to their bar mitzvah. They didn't wear a yamaka, you know, and all that kind of stuff, but it's from their names. So he can identify names, Cohen, Tobin, Clark Corey. I didn't know these guys were Jewish. Why why would I care? And but now, this friend Clark Corey that I grew up with, apparently, he's a Jewish atheist. Why did he even know he was Jewish? We we played basketball together. We played sports together. There's no middle wall of partition. There's no angst. There's no prejudice. There's no none of that growing up. And we didn't have very many blacks at our school, but we had a lot of Mexicans and, you know, from San Diego area. Then we had with the Vietnam War, we had an influx of Vietnamese move in, in Westminster, Little Saigon. And so we were just inundated with all sorts of people from Cambodia and Vietnam and all this, and their culture and all. But we were never taught to hate. Never taught to hate. Parents teach their kids to hate. They teach them to hate people because of different color skin or whatever, you know. We weren't like that. It wasn't there. But now we're watching people being taught to hate whitey, hate white guys, old white guys, you know. They were the problem, you know. And all those in control are the white guys, you know. So it's like, you know, it's it's bizarre. They're the bankers are all white guys, you know. What do you guys so Michael Jordan is a billionaire now and Magic Johnson just bought a football team and Obama, he's I forget what Obama is worth now. But in any event, it's a lot of work to hate somebody. It's a whole lot of work. So when I was invited down to Kentucky to start a church, one of the things my father-in-law, Bill, came over to me and explained to me because he did a lot of business in Savannah, Georgia. He said, Rick, there's a separation in the churches down there. I said, what do you mean? Yeah. They have black churches and white churches. Oh, come on. No way. Not this day and age. How could you do that? How could you segregate that this is a black church and this is a white church? What what Rick Rick, they don't mix. They don't mix. They bomb churches if people try to mix and stuff. It's very, very deep within their culture to be separate as ethnic groups. And I'm like, that's not Christianity. And so I called the guy that was inviting me down there, and I explained that to him. And he goes, well, you need to understand, you know, how deep this goes and all that. And I'm like, done. I'm not going there. You know, that's not Christianity. That's just not Christianity. And so I came up here and we don't seem to have a problem with that. Hope not. Everybody is welcome. You know, it doesn't matter. So the church here, they had an odd. They had an enmity. And Paul is saying that middle wall of partitions dropped down now. So we have peace. We have peace among us now. So you could see Jews and Gentiles having a meal together. And Peter, culturally, it's really hard for him to do that. And then, alright, I'm Paul, I'm going to check out I'm going to check you out about your liberty of whether or not you're living according to the law. Pastor Chuck did this with a Seventh day Adventist pastor that wanted to become a Calvary Chapel. So what Chuck did is took him out to lunch and gave him a cheeseburger. See if he'd eat that cheeseburger because dietary wise, you weren't to mix you weren't to mix. You weren't to mix milk, right, with meat, right? Right? So you don't do it, right? So he wanted to test the guy. Well, Paul would say, hey, try this bacon out. Try this bacon, right? Let's see. So I go to Oak Table and I cross all the lines, man. I do it all. And so in any event, now where we need to be aware of is that the devil is going to try and divide the church and try to divide the church along ethnic groups, ethnos, nation states, and black against white, white against black, brown, yellow, whatever. And when we went to California, the California is being invaded by Chinese now. Just enormous amounts of Chinese. And the colonization of California is taking place. And so this couple comes up to me, Kathy and I are sitting there by the pier, and they begin to ask me about my bicycle. And so it's very common. Kathy says, I don't know why all these people always come up and want to talk to you. Everywhere we go, they want to for some reason, they want to come up and talk to you. And so this guy comes up and he starts asking me about the bike. My first thought is, you want to try it? And they can barely speak English and okay. And so he starts, you know, starts riding it and all. But I noticed some of the other people around me are like, why would you do that? Why would you let this guy ride your bike? You know? And it was kind of strange to them because you're supposed to have this supposed when I grew up in Huntington Beach, there was a strong sense of localism. Yeah. I'm a local, you know. Well, you're being invaded, buddy. You're being invaded by everyone from all around the world. If you're evangelist, as Kathy pointed out, that's a good thing because you don't need to go to China. They're they're coming to you. You know what mean? All the countries are coming to you, so you get to share the gospel with all these groups, you know. So anyway, don't ever, ever, ever, ever tolerate prejudice along any lines. Even socioeconomic. A lot of times, churches mistreat wealthy people, or wealthy people mistreat the poor people. What I mean by that is if you have a wealthy person comes into your church, they get harangued and harangued and harangued and harangued, everybody with their hand out, you know. Or they pontificate and say, wow, that really is an expensive car, an expensive house. Leave them alone. None of your business. And nor should you belittle poor people. I've had people in our church that belittle poor people. And it was horrible, horrible. We had guys at the church that knew that Kathy and I were anyway, they just knew Kathy and I. And he take his wallet and he would show Kathy how many $100 bills he had in there, you know. Just kind of flash it, you know. Look at this lettuce, know. Just boastful, you know. And then he caught one of our guys down at Starbucks one day and he began to berate him that the reason he's not more affluent financially is because anyway, he just totally destroyed the guy. Just totally destroyed him. It was horrible. Absolutely horrible for people to be that unloving, that unkind. And so within the church to see Jew and Gentile, male, female, barbarian, Scythian bond or free come together. It's all about Jesus. All about Jesus. He's the savior of the whole world. And I love the melting pot of little Calvary Bremerton, and I hope and pray it continues to be a melting pot of Filipinos, blacks, whites. We need some South Americans. We need their food. We need some burritos, tacos and all that. Need them. And that's I love I love the different ethnic foods and stuff and culturally different things. And so I love lumpia. I love bacon. I love it all. Alright. Okay. So, Jesus said, nation is going to rise against nation, ethnic group. Do not tolerate, ever tolerate division within the church. The devil wants to divide and conquer along those lines. It's a lack of peace. It's an angst. Alright. And so, now we have what, Philippians four:four through seven? Rejoice in the Lord all way and again I say rejoice. Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand. Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be made known unto God. And the peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. So peace with God, my peace, and now the peace of God. That's That's a fruit of the spirit. The unbeliever cannot experience the peace of God that surpasses all understanding because it's a fruit of the spirit. It's predicated upon abiding in Christ, his life flowing through you. He will keep thee in perfect peace whose mind has stayed on thee. The devil's battlefield is your mind, and the devil's tool is lies. That's why with COVID, we could see people freaking out. Right? And so it comes down to faith or fear, and God isn't hasn't given us a spirit of fear, but a power of love and a sound mind. And so I was listening to a song today by Jaden Lavik, and it was very interesting that this particular song he talked about when his life is a mystery, when he doesn't understand, you know, what's going on, that he's still able to walk by faith and in fellowship with God. So a big part of our life, we don't know the mystery of today. We don't know or understand all the things that are happening today. Just today. And we can choose to walk by faith, and when we choose to walk by faith, the byproduct of walking by faith is peace. The anxiety goes away. But if we cease walking by faith, we lose our joy, we lose our peace, we fall into the flesh. And some people are stubborn where they're going to stay there until they fix the problem. You may not be able to fix that problem. You're going to miss out on hours and hours and days and months and years of peace. Another part of a song he said, I'm going to quit visiting the scene of the crime. Yeah. Revisiting it. The past. And Bremerton, downtown Bremerton is the seed of the crime for me. I don't want to go down there ever, ever, ever, ever. I hate that place because it reminds me of a certain season in my life that the devil just destroyed everything. And but I need to leave that in the past. I need to leave all that in the past, you know, and not allow the I need I need to enjoy what the Lord is doing right here, right now in this moment. And not allow the past, anybody that's done anything to you, not allow them to continue to have leverage over you and to get in your head. Alright. So he that keeps us he'll keep him in perfect peace whose mind has stayed on thee. I'm gonna keep my eyes on Jesus. I'm gonna keep thinking about Him and trust Him and walk by faith. Proverbs three, five and six, I saw it on the bottom of an In N Out cup. It's there in understanding, in all your ways acknowledge Him and He'll direct your path. That's the secret, right? Okay. Hebrews thirteen twenty and twenty one. Now the God of peace that brought again from the dead, our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is well pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ to him be glory forever and ever. Amen. Our God is the God of peace. The devil is a pretender. The antichrist is a pretender. They can't bring peace. Peace, peace where there is no peace. They promise things they can't deliver. And but we have a God. He's the God of peace. And Jesus is going to bring his peace because he's the prince of peace. Right? Amen. And of his peace and his government, should be no end. But how does he get us to that point? War. War. Armageddon. There's not going to be any peace like he's describing in the millennium till he deals with his enemies. He's got to deal with all his enemies. Vengeance is mine, I'll repay, saith the Lord. And he's going to subdue the devil, the beast, the false prophet, all of these enemies. In Psalm two, Oh, the heathen rage, imagine of anything against the Lord. The Lord laughs from heaven. He's got a plan for these guys. He's setting the stage. He's setting the stage to be glorified. Just the sword of his mouth and the brightness of his coming destroys them all. Right? But he has to go to war with them because he's tried to negotiate and they won't come to terms with what he's asking, which is surrender your heart and life to Jesus. No, I don't want Jesus. I don't want him. And so he's going to have to deal with them the hard way. Okay. So Isaiah 50 four:nine through 14. For this is as the waters of Noah unto me. For as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth, so have I sworn that I would not be wroth with thee nor rebuke thee. For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, sayeth the Lord that hath mercy on thee. So we're living in a time of the lies of the religion of climate change, the lies of hydrocarbons and the environment being destroyed, and the polar ice caps are gonna melt and they're gonna cross over the boundaries that God's established. Right? The Lord says, if that could happen, if that could possibly ever happen, then my promises to Israel could be taken away. But that's never gonna happen. The sun sun comes up, the moon comes up, goes down every day. There's a cycle. He's a god of order. And that ordinance, all of that that happens, is going to continue to happen as an illustration of he's on the throne, he's in control and the chaos, the confusion, the lies of world being drawn into worshiping the creature rather than the greater in their luciferian religious system is going to fail. And we have the comfort in knowing that He is a God of order, that He is on the throne, He is in control. And His promises to the nation of Israel are Yea and Amen. He is going to complete it. Alright. So now, says, my peace from this people, saith the Lord, even loving kindness and mercies. In two Thessalonians three sixteen, it says, the Lord of peace, we saw the God of peace. Now the Lord of peace himself give you peace always by all means. So always. Paul says we're triumphant in all these circumstances who causes us always to triumph. We triumph spiritually. Our outward man can be perishing, but our inward man is renewed day by day. Outwardly, I may be getting beat on. It may be horrific. And mentally and emotionally, the enemy is trying to destroy me, but within spiritually, if take and do that one thing that Mary was doing, this one thing is needful Martha, and Mary has chose that better part, you know? She's going to sit at my feet and hear my word. It's amazing to me how few, few people that call themselves Christians will avail themselves of the help that God makes available by simply sitting at His feet and hearing His word. No wonder, no wonder the church is a mess. They don't have time. They don't want to. They won't read their Bible. Won't get into the word. And the Lord Jesus is saying to Mary Martha, Martha, Martha, you're busy with all this stuff. You know, it's great. Good. Washing dishes cooking for me and all that. But this one thing, there's one thing needful and Mary has chose that better part, right? We need to remember that. And then that piece is there for us. Martha, Martha, Martha. We need Martha's. We need good cooking, good food and cleaning, but we need the marriage too, right? Just joking. Alright. So notice he says, even loving kindness and mercies. Who has Lamentations three, twenty two and twenty three? I do. Okay. Mercies, plural. Because of the Lord's great love, we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning, Great is your faithfulness. Amen. And so Jeremiah there, the context, the Babylonians have come destroyed Jerusalem, destroyed it. Famine, pestilence, war, carnage, dead bodies everywhere, and he comes back to like Job does, he comes back to a place of faith. Great is your faithfulness, your compassions fail not, your mercies are new every morning. And so I can't do nothing about what happened, but I can focus upon you. I can enter in and have fellowship with you and experience your mercies that you're a merciful God. Alright, so he says, both the great and the small shall die in this land. They shall not be. So the great also, Kathy always says that she says, don't these globalists understand that they and their children are going to suffer too? Do they actually think that they're going to make everyone else to suffer when they destroy the food and water and the planet and it's not going to affect them. God says here, both the great and the small, they're going to the small shall die in the land, they shall not be buried, neither shall men lament for them, nor cut themselves, nor make themselves bald for them. So the communist have a term called the useful idiots. The useful idiots are typically the college professors and the ones that will join Black Lives Matters and Antifa and they're the anarchists, they're the ones involved from a liberal standpoint to destabilize, to undermine like a color revolution where they're constantly starting breaking down order, the law enforcement, all of it. But when the communist finally take control, those are the first ones they kill, the useful idiots. Because if you aren't loyal to your own country, you're not going be loyal to us. And they take them out and kill the useful idiots. I love those terms, useful idiots. So there's not going to be people with any kind of sense of mourning. You're going be left to rot. Neither shall men tear themselves for them in mourning to comfort them for the dead, neither shall men give them the cup of consolation to drink for their fathers or for their mothers. So no funerals, no food, no drink. And we have the Lord Jesus given us the bread and the cup, this do in remembrance of me. And so we're constantly looking back to the cross and remembering His sacrifice for us and we're also looking in anticipation of His soon return. Thou shall not also go into the house of feasting to sit with them to eat and to drink. So the party is over. Who had the greatest, greatest shock in Daniel chapter five, the handwriting on the wall? Belshazzar. Belshazzar. Belshazzar in chapter five. Well, Nebuchadnezzar too in chapter four. He's led out to eat grass for seven years. But Belshazzar is partying. And they're drunken partying. Medes and the Persians Cyrus are outside. It's an impregnable city. They got a hundred and twenty years of food stored up. Nobody is going to be able to come in here and bother us. Let's have a party. And you know what? Let's take all the Jewish, you know, basins and cups and saucers and all the stuff that dad brought from the temple in Jerusalem years earlier. And let's party using those and let's go for it. And then he sees a hand on the wall. Right? You've been weighed in the balance and found wanting and your kingdom is divided from you and given to the Medes and the Persians. And Daniel interprets it for him and that very night Cyrus, Darius, the Medes and the Persians come underneath the levee gates as they dammed up the Euphrates and caused it to flow a different way. And they came underneath the levee gates and came into the city that very night, Belshazzar died. So the party's over. Now, one of the ones that really bothers me bothers me just deep within my my spirit is when John the Baptist is incarcerated for simply letting Herod, Herodias, and Salome, letting them know that you taking your brother Philip's wife, Herod, is against the law. He's he's telling the truth. Right? Well, he's grabbed hold of, put into prison. He starts to waver in his faith, great John the Baptist. He sends his disciples to Jesus and say, are you the one or do we look for another? There's hope for you and I because sometimes we're really filled with faith and we say, Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. We're victorious in faith. We got great amount of faith. But now when we're tested, when we're in a situation where we're in jail, we're like, hey, is my cousin really the Messiah? A whole lot of people said that he's not. I saw the Holy Spirit come down upon him in the shape of a dove when we baptized him and all. But if he is the messiah, why would I be here? Wouldn't he overthrow the Romans? Wouldn't he overthrow all them, you know? And so you go back and you tell John, you know, that the dead are raised to life, the deaf are able to hear, the blind are able to see, the poor have the gospel preached unto them. Those are my credentials, you know. So John continued to walk by faith. But here's the part that bothers me. His head is cut off simply for a party favor. How humiliating that these globalists, these people in power can have Salome go there and do this provocative, exotic, you know, erotic, not exotic, erotic dance. As a party favor to the people in attendance, she is being coached by her mother Herodias demands the head of John the Baptist on a charger on a platter. The executioner goes and cuts his head off and all. Man, I just can't wait until in Acts chapter 12 where this other Herod, the people are crying out saying this is the voice of a man but the voice of a God. And he's wearing a Armani silver threaded suit and the light is shining on. It's all shiny. It's all decked out. Really cool sunglasses on and all that. And then it says he's consumed with worms. That's what I want. Consume them with worms. Right there in front of everybody, consume Bill Gates with worms. Let him reap what he's sown. All the people in Africa, the children, the enormous amount of people that he's killed as a butcher, you know, with his vaccines and such. Let him be consumed. Let him reap what he's sown, you know. And so one day, one day it will happen. But that's the kind of vengeance I'm waiting for. Vengeance is my anaro pay. Poetic justice, you know. And so the party is over for these guys. For thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, behold, I will cause to cease out of this place in your eyes and in your days the voice of myrrh and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride. So no more weddings, no more parties, we're under war conditions, it's over. And it shall come to pass, you know, they're going say stuff like, you guys can't meet anymore as a church because churches are non essential. But we're going to allow the strip clubs to continue to meet in San Diego. We're going allow the bars to stay open because that's an essential business, you know. But you guys, you church, you're not allowed to worship. Don't even sing. Don't worship. Don't partake in communion, you know. The party's over. That's what they tried to get us to think. Right? And Robin and Vicky went and saw the movie tell us about the movie that John McArthur made about Essential. The essential church. Very good. Very good? Oh, yeah. What was the what was the message in it? That they exposed the lie. Yep. And that that they stood against yeah. The church is essential, and they stood against the tyranny, and the tyranny backed down. Praise the Lord. They had to back head shift in Jesus. Amen. Not the state. Amen. They made an analogy to the the the Scottish in the sixteen hundreds, the Coventeers, which I thought was a really interesting Yeah. Kind of a not even an allegory. I mean, was it it's exactly what happened to them where they had to pledge allegiance to the king, and they refused to do it. And they were horrifically tortured tortured with just horrific. They would they would wait till the tide went out, they put them on stake and tie into it. And as the tide came in and as they rose, they're like, pledge allegiance to the king. Led your allegiance to the king. And they didn't. And they were strapped to a stake and drowned. And they just it it was pretty telling the the the the Scottish Coventeers. That's that's a very good testimony. They love not their lives on the death. Right? They're willing to die. Willing to die. And what Nero did to the Christians who were unwilling to simply pinch incense, say Caesar is Lord, he went insane. Paul was in church of Philippi, he said many many came to Christ and Caesar's household. So many feel that Paul had a chance in his first visit to share the gospel with Caesar. And in his rejection, he went insane. And part of that insanity, he would take an impale Christians on a pole. But first of all, roll them in pitch, and then put them on a pole suspended above the ground. And then he would go through his garden with these Christians on these poles all through there, shrieking, what's it feel like to be the light of the world now, Christians? And he'd light them on fire like like lamps. You know? So it's just crazy that these demons, these guys can get away with that. But for us to be absent of bodies, be present with the Lord, we love not our lives unto death. We overcome him by the blood of the lamb, the word of our testimony. And when a push comes to shove, King Jesus, we're willing to die for him. We're already dead. We're dead men walking, really. If you understand it, we're already dead. And Interesting thing in that one thing, Pastor, about those people who opposed the church, the king that was trying to come against them. The first woman who opposed the the guy who was speaking the prayer the book of prayers, she was sitting on a three legged stool. She stood up and she threw that stool at him and told him, we are not going to we're not gonna substitute the king's prayers for the gospel of truth, the Jesus Christ. And she threw that at him. And he was totally stunned that she that she rebelled, but then she was like, there's no way. No way. No way. Nonnegotiable. Nonnegotiable. And remember when we watched that Sophie about the white rose? Yeah. Same thing. Right? Same thing. She's in court there and she's just not backing down, is she? Not backing down. So praise the Lord. Maybe some of us will have the privilege and blessing of being martyrs, martyred for the Lord. Maybe we'll be tested in that way. I don't know. I really don't want to. I wanna go in the rapture. Yep. Amen. But It's kind of sad. But God. See that now with everything that happened during COVID. But people who lost their job, you know, they'll they'll write and they'll say, well, they're offering me to come back, and we're seeing all sorts of agencies offer for them to come back. But to offer to come back, we'll you have to waive your rights to any kind of litigation. Mhmm. And you have to also you waive your rights to litigation, and you will then apply for reinstatement. And you have to go through the polygraph and all the things you to to look at your life from the time you were terminated to today. Woah. And and and sometimes they're saying, oh, and we'll throw in a week of back pay. They're like, well, you know, it's not you know, they're taking us back. And I'm like, we can't tell you how what is best for your family and what's best for your economic situation, but they're offering you nothing more than what they stole from you and not even that. You know, we can't guarantee you'll have success, but under the statute, you get full back pay, double damages, so two times that, plus interest, plus violation of your civil rights. But if you wanna take two weeks of back pay and the chance to reapply for your job, that's a decision you have to make. And I just think, how do you get through to these people? I mean, God bless them, they did what was right. They walked away and and now they've struggled for two years economically, but they you wonder if they get it and how much are you willing to suffer. Yeah. It's it's it's just right over their head. You you it's hard to to Fell them. It's hard to to get through that. Like, are you nuts? Hope that Go get a people greeter at Walmart, but don't do it. I mean, but you can't tell them that, you know. It'd be nice if they made a movie about you and Nate, what you're trying to do to to expose and help these people. And if if people don't stand up against the tyranny, they're just gonna do it again. They're gonna do it again. Yeah. And they have to wait. I'm like, don't you get it? You have to waive your rights. You have to sign this document waiving your rights before you can move forward to that alleged reinstatement process. Right. That Don't trust them. That's not to trust them. Yeah. Yeah. For two weeks of back pay. Yeah. Well, thanks for sharing that. It's horrific. It'll be good to have them a part of our podcast. There you go. That's right. The episode. Verse 10, And it shall come to pass when you shall show these people all these words, and they shall say unto thee, why has the Lord pronounced all this great evil against us? Or what is our iniquity? Or what is our sin that we have committed against the Lord our God? So, why are you bringing this doom and gloom here? Why are you teaching prophecy? We're innocent. We haven't done anything wrong. God's not going to allow anybody to judge us or stop us or quit the, you know, the gravy train. Then shalt thou say unto them, because. Why is this happening? Why is this happening? People act like they're clueless, why? He's a God of love. Then shalt thou say unto them, because your fathers have forsaken me. That's apostasy. The apostasy, there's a great falling away, people forsaking the Lord, saith the Lord, and have walked after other gods, idolatry, and have served them, and have worshipped them, and have forsaken me, and have not kept my law. So it's basically your rebellion, your anarchy, your falling away from the Lord. That's the because. And ye have done worse than your fathers. For behold ye walk everyone after the imagination of his evil heart that they may not hearken unto me. And so what trumps the word of God today? Feelings. In our culture. Oh, in our culture. Feelings. Yeah. My imagination of my heart. Yeah. The imagination of my heart. I feel like this is God's will. I feel like this is okay. I feel like, you know, that's your interpretation. So you give them the words of God, you give them God's will. Well, that's your interpretation, you know? And but I feel, and they make me nauseous, Jesus says he's going to throw up. You haven't kept the law. You have done worse than your father's, and it's the imagination of your heart. In the book of Judges, every man did that which is right in his own eyes, rejecting of God's word. Therefore, will I cast you out of the land so the discipline. You're going ask why, this is the reason why, because, now this is the discipline. You have done worse than your fathers, for behold you walk everyone after the imagination of his evil heart that they may not hearken unto me. Now we get into chapter 17, the imagination of your evil heart. Oprah and everybody else said, well, follow your heart. Follow your heart. How am I to guide my life? I'm going to follow my heart. I feel like this is okay. And Jim says to his kids or I say to my kids, well, the Bible says, oh, you're a Bible thumper. Yeah, you're one of those. The Bible says to not be unequally yoked together with an unbeliever as a man of some is. Very clearly says, unbelievers, you as a believer are not to join together in business or marriage or whatever with an unbeliever. For what does light have in common with darkness or darkness with light? Well, I feel like it's okay. We're in love. Alright. Well, learn the hard way and God is trying to protect you. So therefore I cast you out of the land and the land that you know not, neither your fathers and there you shall serve other gods day and night, where I will not show you favor. So you're going to be deported. You're going to be deported to Babylon. And there's going be no grace. Mega idolatry. Babylon is the center of idolatry. And after seventy years, the Jews were so sickened by the degree of idolatry that they were surrounded with them that for the most part, they didn't fall for that again. Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no more be said, the Lord liveth who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt. So a temporal rejection taking place. And but the Lord liveth who brought up the children of Israel from the land of the North and from so so the the rejection that God's bringing against them is just a temporal rejection. And before it was these are the people that God delivered from Egypt. But now for a period of time, the way people are going to refer to the nation of Israel, therefore behold the days come, sayeth the Lord, that it shall no more be said. The Lord liveth who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt, but the Lord liveth who brought up the children of Israel from the land of the North and from all the lands where he had driven them. And I will bring them again into their land that I gave unto their fathers. So what's that speaking of? Yeah. Ezekiel thirty six and thirty seven fulfilled. Who wants to read Jeremiah 31, 31, and 32? Alright. Who wants to read Leviticus 2six 44? Okay. Deuteronomy 30 verse four. Are we allowed to study the Old Testament? Sure. Absolutely. Alright. So, Jeremiah 3one 31 and verse 32. Or it might be a seven there. Let's see. It's probably a seven. There's a 31 that sounds like that. 31, 31, through 37. Yeah. The day will come, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah. This covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors when I took them from the took them by the hand and brought them out of the land of Egypt. They broke that covenant, though I love them as a husband loves his wife, says the Lord. But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel on that day, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and I will write them on their hearts and I will be their God and they will be my people. And they will not need to teach their neighbors nor will they need to teach their family saying, you shall know the Lord for everyone from the least to the greatest will already know me, says the Lord, and I will forgive their wickedness and will never again remember their sins. It is the Lord who provides the sun to light the land and the moon and stars to light the night. It is he who stirs the sea into roaring waves. His name is the Lord Almighty, and this is what he says. I am as as likely to reject my people Israel as I am I am to do away with the laws of nature. Just as the heavens cannot be measured and the foundation of the earth cannot be explored, so I will not consider casting them away forever for their sins. I, the Lord, have spoken. There you go. Unconditional promises. Okay. And Deuteronomy 30 verse four. Leviticus twenty six forty four. Wait. Did you say Deuteronomy 30 verse four. Have the 30. Okay. Yeah. I got it. 30 verse four. Okay. If any of thine be driven out of the outmost parts of heaven from thence will the Lord thy God gather thee and from thence will he fetch thee. Is that the right verse? Yep. Okay. And then Leviticus 2six 44. And yet for all that, when they be in the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away, neither will I harbor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them, for I am the Lord thy God. So do you understand that this is unprecedented in all of history, that a people, that their identity as being Jews, that they would be deported and be scattered at the diaspora for over two thousand years, and then that God miraculously would regather them on 05/14/1948 is unprecedented in history that they would maintain their identity in that way and be regathered and the nation be reborn in Ezekiel thirty six and thirty seven. Now when Jesus returns, again, the Jews can be scattered all over the earth and he's going to send angels to regather them. Right? From every the North, you know, from every quadrant. And behold, I will send for many fishers, saith the Lord, And they shall fish them, and afterward will I send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and out of the cliffs of the rocks. So bounty hunters are going to be set, traps are going to be set, Net. They're gonna be net, and and there's gonna be deportation. Jesus said, I'll make you fishers of men, and that you seek out, you know, with the gospel to save them. But he's saying, I'm gonna send people out to They're gonna hunt you guys down. For mine eyes are upon all their ways. They are not hidden from my face, neither is their iniquity hidden from mine eyes. Our God is all knowing. He's omniscient. Amen. Everything is naked and open for the eyes with whom we have to do, And he loves us. These guys aren't getting away with anything. There's nothing that they do in secret one day is going to be shouted off the rooftops, you know. And so people think that, oh, nobody sees. God doesn't see. You know, I'll get away with this. And no, your sin is going to find you out. And first, will recompense their iniquity and their sin double because they have defiled my land. They have filled my inheritance with the carcasses of their detestable and abominable things. So we're always talking about pollution. We're always talking about, you know, the environment and mother earth and, you know, flatulence from cows and all these kind of things. Well, the Lord is saying, you polluted my land with your idols, your ideology. You polluted the minds of my children in your public schools with idolatrous belief systems. He's, O Lord, my strength and my fortress and my refuge in the day of affliction. Psalm 18 verse two, protection. We Psalm ninety one one, call 911, you know, we flee for refuge unto him. Nations shall come unto thee from the ends of the earth and shall say, surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things in which there is no profit, the idols, the idolatry. Shall a man make gods, little g gods unto himself, And there are no gods, these false gods, you know. Eyes they have but they can't see. Ears they have but they can't hear. The robots that are coming, artificial intelligence, they're going to try and make them as lifelike as they can, but still they're idols. They can't breathe life into them as only God can. He's the creator of life. The devil can't create life. The devil is simply a counterfeiter. He counterfeits God's design. Shall a man make gods unto himself and they are no gods? Therefore, behold, will this once cause them to know, I will cause them to know mine hand and my might, and they shall know that my name is the Lord. And so, it's Jehovah, Yahweh, the eternal self existent one. The whole world is going to know, right? Okay. Any other questions or comments or things the Lord is stirring in your heart? Anybody want to get married? I do. Weddings. Anybody want a funeral? I do funerals. Weddings and funerals. Anybody wanna get baptized? Wanna get baptized? Yeah. We have a picnic coming up on the twenty seventh of this month across from the church. Anybody listening that wants to come with lots of food and baptism and and and all that. One thing about marriage, you have a triangle, right? You've seen that illustrated triangle. The wife is on the right side and then her husband's on the left side or Yeah. I always saw it as an inverted triangle with my wife at the bottom. Still won't call me Lord though. She won't call me Lord. Right? Sarah called Abraham Lord. No. I'm just kidding. Yeah. We used that example. And also the cross, example of the cross. On the horizontal plane, husband and wife, the closer you get to Jesus, seek first King God, His righteous, the closer you get to each other. Horizontal means love your vertical means love to God, and horizontal means love your brother. Right. And if there's problem on the horizontal, the problem is the vertical. Get the vertical right, and then the horizontal will come back into balance. Alright. So Thomas needs prayer. We're going anoint him with some garlic. What kind of oil was that? Is he a vampire? We want a garlic and a steak and what what do they do? Put it around his neck? Alright. Well, let's pray. We'll conclude our study and then we'll stay after and pray for Thomas. If there's any sick among you, let him call for the elders and ask for prayer, anointing his head with oil. Father, come before you and we thank you for Thomas, all the all the physical challenges he's come through. We thank you for the he's a worshiper, loves to worship you, and he lifts his heart in song and adoration unto you all the times that he can, Lord. Thank you for each and every person here, and Lord, we thank you for the time that we had spent in your word. We pray you undergird and strengthen us and help us to yield to your holy spirit and not succumb to worry and anxiety as the times in which we're living become more intense. Perilous times as Paul said within your word. And this perilous times where men are going to reach a place where circumstantially there's no way out. Men's hearts failing them for fear, heart attacks, and just anxiety, just overwhelm. And Lord, in the midst of the storm, the huge storm that's coming upon this planet, Lord, preceding the rapture, Lord, if we're here and we see these times begin to escalate, Lord, we pray that we would have that peace that surpasses all understanding, that we'd be in the eye of the storm in fellowship with you like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were Lord, in that fiery trial, and that we'd spend time at your feet getting to know you as Mary, wanted to to emphasize that one thing, Lord, to hear your word. So blessed now, we pray. Thank you for this time that we could spend. Pour out your Holy Spirit upon us. Watch over and protect our children, grandchildren, family, and friends, and give us great open doors of utterance, great open doors, opportunities to bring the hope of the gospel, the hope of your coming, that blessed hope to those who are perishing, Lord. Cause the the anxiety that be turned around in that that it's opportunities for us to share the hope that is ours in Jesus Christ. In your name, pray, Lord. Amen. Okay. Brother Thomas.

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About This Podcast

Calvary Chapel Bremerton - Home Bible Study

Listen to Rick Beaudry, Pastor of Calvary Chapel Bremerton, lead our home Bible Study session in worship and teaching the Word of God. Be edified and built up in your faith with solid Bible teaching. New episodes released on Tuesdays in the Pacific Standard Timezone.

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