Jeff Miller

August 25, 2024

Nation Facing Judgment

Discern

Jeff Miller

August 25, 2024

Nation Facing Judgment

Introduction:

4 Clues You're Hearing a Bad Sermon (Micah 2:1-13):

The sermon Avoids hard truths. (Micah 2:6a)
The sermon doesn't Agree with something God already said. (Micah 2:6b)
The sermon Appeals to the flesh. (Micah 2:6b)

2 Timothy 4:3-4 - For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.

The sermon Attracts non-spiritual people. (Micah 2:11b)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

00:44-00:54
who would eventually become the pastor after me, one time got up to speak, and he said, "You know, God wants to shine his light through you.
00:56-01:09
And when we take his light that's in you, when we take that light, should we hide that light under a bushel?" Remember that song?
01:11-01:12
So I'm like, no.
01:13-01:25
He's like, yes, because that bushel's gonna catch on fire and it'll make the light brighter and more people will see it.
01:26-01:28
And then that's when it dawned on me.
01:30-01:32
I think that he thinks a bushel is a little tree.
01:35-01:36
That wasn't a great sermon.
01:40-01:47
And my point is, you know, sometimes it's easy to tell a bad sermon.
01:49-01:53
Other times, not so much.
01:55-01:58
And that's where we're going in Micah chapter two today.
01:58-02:01
Just as a quick review, remember we're under God's wrath.
02:01-02:03
We talked about that a couple of weeks ago.
02:03-02:10
For us in America, God's wrath isn't something that is coming according to Romans one, God's wrath is something that's here right now.
02:12-02:15
And last week we explored the question, how does that make you feel?
02:17-02:18
Are you apathetic?
02:20-02:20
Are you angry?
02:23-02:27
Are you amused at this thought that God is going to punish sinners?
02:31-02:32
Well, you know what's worse?
02:34-02:45
is the fact that God sends preachers to proclaim his truth so that lost sinners would come back to him.
02:48-02:53
But those lost sinners would rather listen to false teachers that are preaching bad sermons.
02:55-02:58
And there are lots of bad sermons being preached in our day.
03:01-03:07
But I need to ask you, church, Can you tell if a sermon is good or bad?
03:09-03:12
And when I say bad, I think you understand, I mean unbiblical.
03:14-03:25
Can you discern if a message is actually from God or if it's something that some guy made up?
03:27-03:28
Can you do that?
03:30-03:39
I'd like you to bow your heads with me, please, and I'm gonna ask that you would please pray for me to communicate God's word faithfully, and I will pray for you to receive it.
03:48-03:57
Father, I pray right now you'd open our hearts up to receive your word, and that we would be people that are fully dedicated to your word.
04:03-04:13
Not with some chip-on-our-shoulder, carmogeny way, but with joy, but with much discernment.
04:15-04:23
Father, you know we live in a day that there's people around every corner saying that they're bringing a message from God, and that can't all be true.
04:26-04:27
You've given us your words that we would know.
04:29-04:45
And I pray, Father, that we would read this message from Micah that was preached so many centuries ago, but is just as relevant right here today where we sit.
04:46-04:47
We pray in Jesus' name.
04:47-04:50
And all of God's people said, amen.
04:51-04:57
Micah chapter two, the first five verses here, Let's just break it down a little chunk at a time to get the flow here.
04:57-05:02
But the first five verses kind of gets us back to that courtroom scene that we talked about last week.
05:04-05:09
But the Lord is getting specific with his issues with the people.
05:09-05:14
You remember last week we saw in chapter one, the issue is idolatry.
05:16-05:24
But specifically, you know, there's one manifestation of idolatry that God is really fired up about, and that is covetousness.
05:25-05:35
You go to the New Testament, Colossians 3, 5 tells us that covetousness is idolatry, and it always gets God's attention, all right?
05:35-05:37
So look at the first couple of verses here.
05:37-05:43
It says, "Woe to those who devise wickedness "and work evil on their beds.
05:45-05:49
"When the morning dawns, they perform it "because it is in the power of their hand.
05:50-05:54
"They covet fields and seize them, and houses, "and take them away.
05:54-06:10
"They oppress a man and his house, "a man and his inheritance." Micah here is condemning people in power, whether these were political leaders or business leaders, they knew who he was talking about, but these are people who prey on the innocent.
06:11-06:13
And it's a sickening scene here.
06:13-06:16
It says, "On their beds," meaning premeditated.
06:16-06:25
They're laying down to go to sleep at night, And all they're thinking about is how can I get what doesn't belong to me?
06:26-06:34
How can I legally, and that's in quotes, legally steal from innocent people?
06:36-06:38
How can I take their livelihoods?
06:38-06:40
How can I take their children's inheritance?
06:43-06:44
Like, why would they do that?
06:46-07:02
Well, he tells you right here in verse one, "because it is in the power of their hand." In other words, if you ask them, "Why are you doing that?" They would say, "Because I can, that's why." They're abusing their authority.
07:03-07:19
Look at verses three and four, he goes on, "Therefore, thus says the Lord, "behold, against this family I am devising disaster "from which you cannot remove your necks "and you shall not walk haughtily, "For it will be a time of disaster.
07:19-07:27
"In that day, they shall take up a taunt song against you "and moan bitterly and say, 'We are utterly ruined.
07:27-07:30
"'He changes the portion of my people.
07:30-07:31
"'How he removes it from me!
07:32-07:39
"'To an apostate he allots our fields.'" So God uses their same language.
07:39-07:41
God invokes eye for an eye.
07:42-07:43
Do you see that?
07:43-07:47
He says, "You are devising to take from people." "Guess what?
07:48-07:57
"I'm devising to take from you." God says, "I'm going to knock you off your high horse.
07:58-08:00
"You're not gonna walk around haughtily.
08:00-08:01
"You're not gonna be proud.
08:01-08:10
"I'm gonna knock you down." Eventually, what happened was Assyria conquered the 10 northern tribes in about 722 BC.
08:11-08:13
I believe that's what he's talking about here.
08:14-08:23
Verse five, he goes on, he says, "Therefore you will have none to cast the line by lot "in the assembly of the Lord." Cast the line, he's not talking about fishing.
08:23-08:27
That was a figure of speech to talk about measuring out land parcels.
08:28-08:35
What he was saying here is this, eventually Israel's gonna be restored, and we're gonna be measuring out parcels of land to divide up among the people, but guess what?
08:36-08:37
You ain't gonna be part of that.
08:37-08:39
You're gonna have nothing.
08:40-08:41
That's what he's saying.
08:43-08:44
Look at verse six.
08:46-08:48
Do not preach, thus they preach.
08:48-08:50
One should not preach of such things.
08:51-08:52
Disgrace will not overtake us.
08:54-08:56
You see, the people were denouncing the true prophets.
08:56-08:58
This is what I was talking about earlier.
08:58-09:03
There were people that were saying, hey, you shouldn't be preaching God's wrath.
09:03-09:04
I mean, come on, come on.
09:04-09:06
God's not going to punish us.
09:07-09:09
We're Israel, we're His people.
09:09-09:10
He's not going to punish us.
09:11-09:13
You shouldn't be talking like that.
09:16-09:23
Well, that's a problem, because you know, it's really hard to repent from sin that's not being preached.
09:25-09:28
He goes on, verse 7, "Should this be said, O house of Jacob?
09:29-09:30
Has the Lord grown impatient?
09:31-09:38
Are these his deeds?" Do not my words do good to him who walks uprightly?
09:40-09:43
You see, they were objecting to people who preached the word of God, like Micah.
09:44-09:51
They're like, "Hey, should you really be preaching "like this, going around, saying God is impatient "and God brings disaster on sinners?
09:51-10:02
"Come on, come on, Micah, that's not true." And Micah's response right there, "Do not my words do good to him who walks uprightly?" Micah's response is this.
10:03-10:09
Old Testament Israel, the enjoyment of covenant promises only comes to the people who keep the covenant.
10:10-10:11
That's how it worked in the old covenant.
10:12-10:17
But I would say church today, even today, I think there's a principle there for us.
10:17-10:25
And I would have to ask, why do those who despise God's words expect to receive blessing from God?
10:25-10:26
Same principle.
10:28-10:34
You want God to bless you and do good to you, but his word has no place in your life?
10:34-10:36
How do you come up with that?
10:38-10:43
There was just no market for Micah's message.
10:47-10:48
But he repeats it.
10:49-10:52
Verses eight through 10, he says it again, same thing.
10:52-10:56
"But lately my people have risen up as an enemy.
10:56-11:00
You strip the rich robe from those who pass by trustingly with no thought of war.
11:02-11:08
The women of my people, you drive out from their delightful houses, from their young children, you take away my splendor forever.
11:09-11:17
Arise and go, for this is no place to rest because of the uncleanness that destroys and with a grievous destruction.
11:20-11:21
See what he's saying?
11:21-11:25
He's saying to certain Israelites, you're acting like Israel's enemy.
11:27-11:28
That's what you're acting like.
11:28-11:32
You're coming upon your fellow Israelites who are trusting you.
11:34-11:35
You're stealing from them.
11:36-11:45
So now, God's evicting you because your thuggery has polluted the land.
11:46-11:47
Look at verse 11.
11:50-12:05
He says, "If a man should go about "and utter wind and lies, saying, "I will preach to you of wine and strong drink, "he would be the preacher for this people." Again, it's a problem with preachers.
12:07-12:08
Problem with preachers.
12:08-12:10
We see here, here's how to be a celebrity pastor.
12:11-12:12
It's right here.
12:13-12:15
I mean, I don't know how I missed it all these years.
12:17-12:25
I've been looking all through the Bible for sermon content, and I don't know, I don't know if I've ever preached a sermon on wine and strong drink.
12:27-12:28
So I thought about that for today.
12:30-12:32
Like, how would you like to hear that sermon?
12:33-12:45
Like if I got up before you today and said, "Today, I'll be preaching from the book of Budweiser." In the beginning, God created the hops and the barley.
12:48-12:52
You know, greater love has no man than this, that he shares beer with his friends.
12:55-12:57
Blessed are the intoxicated, for they shall dance well.
13:00-13:01
It's foolishness, right?
13:01-13:02
It's foolishness.
13:03-13:04
We can admit that, right, it's foolishness.
13:05-13:06
That's what he's saying.
13:07-13:10
He's like, that's the garbage that you wanna hear.
13:13-13:13
It's foolishness.
13:14-13:17
You don't wanna hear from God, right?
13:17-13:18
You don't wanna hear from God.
13:18-13:22
You want somebody to preach something that's gonna make you feel good.
13:22-13:23
That's what you want.
13:25-13:25
There's a problem.
13:28-13:31
But as always with these Old Testament prophets, it's not all doom and gloom.
13:31-13:32
He gives us that glimmer of hope.
13:32-13:34
Look at verses 12 and 13.
13:34-13:38
He says, "I will surely assemble all of you, O Jacob.
13:39-13:41
"I will gather the remnant of Israel.
13:41-13:49
"I will set them together like sheep in a fold, "like a flock in its pasture, a noisy multitude of men.
13:50-13:56
"He who opens the breach," that's Jesus, by the way, "goes up before them.
13:57-14:01
"They break through and pass the gate, going out by it.
14:01-14:12
"Their king passes on before them the Lord at their hand." So he speaks of a day when Israel is going to be assembled and then liberated from confinement.
14:14-14:20
Many scholars believe that that was fulfilled in a particular event in about 701 BC.
14:22-14:25
And we're not gonna read it now, but I'll break these references down.
14:25-14:27
You know, the events talked about three times in the Bible.
14:28-14:30
It's talked about in 2 Kings 18 and 19.
14:31-14:38
It's talked about in 2 Chronicles 32, and it's talked about in Isaiah 36 and 37.
14:38-14:43
Short version, Jews fled to Jerusalem, Jerusalem under siege from the Assyrians.
14:44-14:50
King Hezekiah prayed, and God killed 185,000 Assyrian soldiers while they slept.
14:51-14:56
And that whole scene foreshadows the day that the Messiah is going to protect Israel.
14:57-15:01
At the end of the tribulation, Zechariah 14 talks about it, Revelation 12.
15:02-15:06
This is a foreshadowing when God helps Israel flee from the Antichrist.
15:07-15:10
So this prophecy had a near and a far fulfillment.
15:12-15:13
That's Micah chapter two.
15:15-15:18
And what do we learn from Micah chapter two, my friends?
15:18-15:19
Here's what we learn.
15:19-15:24
That Israel in Micah's day had the same fatal flaw that we have in our day.
15:27-15:28
Lack of discernment.
15:29-15:32
Like, didn't we just have a sermon series on this?
15:32-15:32
Yeah.
15:34-15:35
And we're gonna have another sermon on this.
15:36-15:36
Why?
15:37-15:42
Because I've told you before, that's my biggest concern for this church, is lack of discernment.
15:44-15:53
Gobbling up anything that's being spewed, as long as it's called Christian, as long as there's a Bible verse kind of attached to it, well, I'm gonna believe this and follow this.
15:54-15:56
You gotta have discernment.
16:00-16:08
And the people in Micah's day, as Micah pointed out humorously, they couldn't tell a good sermon from a bad one.
16:11-16:15
And you know, you know the great thing about the internet?
16:16-16:21
The great thing about the internet is we have access to so many sermons.
16:24-16:26
But you know a bad thing about the internet?
16:32-16:33
Some of you got ahead of me.
16:35-16:39
We have access to so many sermons.
16:42-16:47
Now listen, I'm not telling you not to be listening to sermons.
16:47-16:49
I think you absolutely should.
16:49-16:49
I do.
16:51-16:54
I listen to sermons online from other preachers.
16:55-17:00
Here's what I am saying, you've gotta use discernment, people, and you've gotta watch for red flags.
17:02-17:10
And there are so many red flags, and Micah gives us a few, all right?
17:11-17:14
Micah gives us a few, so let's highlight those.
17:14-17:16
On your outline, four clues you're hearing a bad sermon.
17:20-17:22
Four clues you're hearing a bad sermon.
17:25-17:31
Keep these things in mind anytime you're listening to a sermon, even here, okay?
17:32-17:32
Even here.
17:35-17:37
Number one, the sermon avoids hard truths.
17:39-17:40
The sermon avoids hard truths.
17:40-17:42
Go back to verse six.
17:42-17:43
See this?
17:44-17:45
Do not preach lest they preach.
17:45-17:47
One should not preach of such things.
17:47-17:49
See, Micah was talking about the judgment of God.
17:50-17:59
They're like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, nope, "we shouldn't be talking about these things." Many people evaluate a sermon based on how it makes them feel.
18:01-18:05
If the sermon makes me feel good, then it was a good sermon.
18:06-18:10
And if a sermon made me feel bad, then it was a bad sermon.
18:12-18:12
(buzzer buzzing)
18:13-18:13
Incorrect.
18:14-18:16
That is not how you evaluate a sermon.
18:18-18:20
People just wanna hear the good stuff, right?
18:20-18:21
Oh, just tell us the positive.
18:22-18:23
We don't wanna hear the negative stuff.
18:24-18:30
I don't wanna hear, just, can you, can you just preach like comfort to us?
18:31-18:39
Not so much of like the commandments and what God expects from me and disciples stuff.
18:39-18:42
Can you just affirm me?
18:43-18:44
Give me the good stuff.
18:45-18:46
That's what they were saying.
18:48-18:52
Nothing about guilt, nothing about, hey, you're in sin and you need to repent.
18:54-18:59
Nothing about, God's wrath is on people who do not obey the gospel.
19:02-19:03
They say, you shouldn't preach about things.
19:05-19:08
But Pastor Jeff, you're making people feel bad about themselves.
19:12-19:18
You know, it's funny, over the years of ministry, I've preached about hell many times.
19:20-19:23
You know, so many times that I've preached about hell, I've gotten pushback.
19:25-19:25
You shouldn't talk like that.
19:25-19:26
You shouldn't say those things.
19:27-19:28
Pastor Jeff, you shouldn't talk like that.
19:28-19:33
You know, that scares people and doesn't make people feel good.
19:33-19:38
And I've gotten so much pushback when I preached on hell.
19:38-19:44
But you know, it occurred to me this week as I was thinking through these things, I've preached on heaven a lot too.
19:45-19:47
And you know I've never gotten any pushback on that.
19:49-19:51
They're like, "Oh, that's a truth that's delicious.
19:52-19:58
"Tell us more about that." But hell, that's a truth, now we're not really interested in that one as much.
19:58-19:59
Do you see a problem?
19:59-20:03
When we start picking and choosing what it is that we want to hear from God?
20:03-20:04
That's a problem.
20:08-20:18
If hell isn't real, if sin isn't a problem, if guilt isn't a valid feeling for sinners who are disobeying God, then what is the purpose of the cross?
20:21-20:29
What moves us people to cry out to God for mercy and forgiveness from our eternally terminal condition?
20:30-20:39
If we don't address the reality that we're broken people and Jesus Christ came into this world to rescue us from our sin.
20:43-20:47
How are we gonna do that if we're avoiding the hard truths?
20:50-20:53
You know, just imagine with me, imagine if I went to the doctor.
20:53-21:45
Imagine I go to the doctor and I'm sitting down in a room and the doctor goes, "You know, Jeff, "your blood pressure is pretty high." And I say to him, "Too scary, what else you got?" And the doctor says, "Well, Jeff, you're a bit overweight." And I say, "I don't really want you making me feel bad about eating cake." "Next." And the doctor says, "Well, you know what, Jeff, as you're approaching 50, you know what What we recommend is that men about your age get a colonoscopy, and I say, that doesn't sound like fun.
21:49-21:57
The doctor says, Jeff, hey, we got your blood work back and it's giving me a lot of concern.
21:59-22:03
And I'm like, dude, you are really bumming me out.
22:05-22:07
Can we just talk about what is working?
22:07-22:10
My left elbow feels amazing.
22:11-22:12
Not a bit of pain.
22:12-22:13
Look at that, full range of motion.
22:13-22:14
Are you seeing this?
22:15-22:16
Can we just talk about this?
22:17-22:19
Let's just talk about how great my left elbow is.
22:19-22:20
Can we do that?
22:21-22:23
Truth be told, it's about the only thing that still works.
22:26-22:31
But wouldn't that be foolish of me to so address the doctor?
22:31-22:33
That's exactly what Mike is talking about.
22:33-22:37
'Cause that's the mentality that people have.
22:37-22:39
We just wanna hear about the good stuff.
22:39-22:41
Don't tell us any of the bad stuff.
22:41-22:42
Don't give us any warning.
22:44-22:49
That's why at Harvest, we preach through a book of the Bible, verse by verse, chapter by chapter.
22:49-22:50
Why?
22:50-22:51
Well, lots of reasons.
22:51-22:52
Here's a reason, we don't wanna avoid anything.
22:53-22:55
We don't wanna avoid anything.
22:58-23:00
Because you know, Jesus went right after the hard truths, didn't he?
23:01-23:16
Jesus said things like, "Deny yourself." Jesus said things like, "You need to carry your cross." Jesus said things like, "Oh, you wanna be great?
23:17-23:23
"Well, then you need to be a slave to everybody." And how did people react to Jesus?
23:25-23:40
Jesus often had people walk away from him, saying, "This is a hard saying, who can accept it?" Listen, my friends, whoever avoids hard truths isn't following the pattern of Jesus.
23:42-23:49
They aren't preaching the whole counsel of God, and they aren't being faithful to their ministry.
23:51-24:02
So when you hear a sermon that avoids hard truth about sin, about guilt, about repentance, about God's wrath, about costly discipleship.
24:02-24:06
If you hear a sermon like that, well, you're hearing a bad sermon, okay?
24:07-24:09
Here's another clue, number two.
24:09-24:10
Four clues you're hearing a bad sermon.
24:10-24:12
The sermon avoids hard truths, number two.
24:12-24:14
The sermon doesn't agree with something God already said.
24:15-24:16
How about that?
24:17-24:19
No brainer, look at verse six again.
24:22-24:24
He says again, "One should not preach of such things.
24:24-24:29
"Look, disgrace will not overtake us." Boy, that's a definitive statement, isn't it?
24:29-24:31
Disgrace will not overtake us.
24:31-24:32
It will not.
24:32-24:32
Wait, wait, wait.
24:33-24:40
You're saying, are you saying, Micah, that God is going to bring discipline on people who disobey him?
24:40-24:41
That's poppycock.
24:42-24:42
No way!
24:46-24:48
And you know, I thought so much about that this week.
24:48-24:58
You realize Micah was not the first preacher to warn of God's judgment on unbelievers, to warn of God's judgment coming upon the idolaters.
24:58-24:59
Do you know that's all through the Old Testament?
25:02-25:16
For example, Leviticus 26, 17, Deuteronomy 28, 15, Deuteronomy 30, 18, Deuteronomy 31, 17, 1 Kings 14, 16, Jeremiah 7, 15, Jeremiah 15, 1, Hosea 9, 17.
25:17-25:17
Do I need to go on?
25:18-25:18
Do you get the point?
25:19-25:23
This was a consistent message of God all through his prophets.
25:23-25:26
And then Micah says it and they're like, nah, that's not gonna happen.
25:28-25:28
Excuse me?
25:31-25:39
The preachers in Micah's day, these false teachers, they just, they were flat out contradicting what God already said.
25:41-25:43
Either that reminds you of Satan.
25:44-25:45
Remember Garden of Eden?
25:46-25:51
Tempting Eve to eat off the tree and Eve's like, Well, God says we're not supposed to eat that or touch it or we're gonna die.
25:52-25:53
You remember Satan's response?
25:53-25:54
You're not gonna die.
25:54-25:56
That's exactly what he's talking about here.
25:57-25:58
No, you're not gonna die.
25:59-25:59
No.
26:02-26:04
Satan's tactics never change.
26:04-26:07
All he does is recruit more spokesmen.
26:10-26:12
And the only remedy for this is to know your Bible.
26:13-26:20
You gotta read it and you gotta reread it and you gotta memorize Scripture Are you gonna meditate on the word of God?
26:20-26:31
And you have to be so familiar with God's truth that as soon as someone spews a lie, it is so obvious to you, like, "Man, that's not what God says.
26:33-26:39
"Caught that right away." It's gotta be so obvious to you.
26:41-26:49
You know, like when somebody gets up and says, "Okay, my friends, listen, "You know, God does not give you any more "than you can handle." Well, that's a popular sermon, isn't it?
26:49-26:50
You ever hear that one?
26:51-26:51
(slurps)
26:51-26:53
Sorry, I gag a little bit when I hear that.
26:54-26:54
(congregation laughs)
26:54-26:58
Threw up a little bit in my mouth when I hear people say that, because that is not in the Bible.
26:58-27:00
I've had people fight me on that.
27:00-27:01
That is in the Bible!
27:01-27:03
I'm like, that is not in the Bible!
27:03-27:04
It's not in the Bible.
27:05-27:08
Show me where that's in the Bible, that God does not give you more than you can handle.
27:10-27:17
I can show you where the Bible says God gives us way more than we can handle learn to depend on him and not ourselves.
27:19-27:27
So this idea that God doesn't give you more trials than you can handle, the Bible says God's not going to allow you to be tempted beyond what you can bear.
27:27-27:29
That's a different thing, but that's not what people are preaching.
27:31-27:34
You gotta know what the Bible says.
27:34-27:35
Here's another one.
27:35-27:40
People say, well, you know, God's done with Israel, and the church has replaced Israel.
27:41-27:42
That's not true.
27:43-27:44
Read Romans 9, 10, and 11.
27:46-27:48
God has not replaced Israel with anything.
27:49-27:58
God made a covenant with Israel, and God's going to fulfill that covenant, but there's people that preach that, and it's wrong, and you've gotta know your Bibles.
28:00-28:01
Here's another one.
28:02-28:06
You know, women are just as qualified to be pastors of churches as men.
28:09-28:17
Look, I know somebody right now is like, "Oh, that's a sexist statement." My most favorite human being on the planet is a woman.
28:20-28:21
By far.
28:23-28:28
Look, it's not speaking about ability or talent.
28:32-28:36
The Bible says there's roles that God has for men and roles God has for women.
28:37-28:39
And you can take that up with him, but that's what he said.
28:42-28:49
By the way, don't assume that a sermon is biblical just because a Bible verse is read.
28:51-28:52
That happens a lot.
28:53-29:02
People get up and they read a verse and then they start spewing trash and you're like, "Well, he read a verse, so this must be biblical." No, no, no, that's not the evaluation.
29:02-29:08
You need to ask yourself, "Is the preacher expositing?" Meaning this, "The preacher, is he representing the text?
29:10-29:15
Is he echoing what's in there, not using it as a springboard to launch into his own thing?
29:17-29:21
Is what he's saying agreeing with everything else that God said in his word?
29:21-29:24
And if the answer is no, then you're hearing a bad sermon.
29:27-29:29
Four clues you're hearing a bad sermon.
29:29-29:33
The sermon doesn't, I'm sorry, the sermon avoids hard truths.
29:33-29:36
The sermon doesn't agree with something God already said, number three.
29:37-29:39
Here's another huge clue.
29:39-29:40
The sermon appeals to the flesh.
29:43-29:44
The sermon appeals to the flesh.
29:44-29:45
Look at verse 11 again.
29:45-29:58
If a man should go about and utter wind and lies, old windbag, saying, I will preach to you of wine and strong drink.
30:03-30:04
I will preach to you of wine and strong drink.
30:04-30:07
Some people are like, oh, I hope this is a sermon series.
30:08-30:09
I wanna hear about this.
30:10-30:11
It's an appeal to the flesh.
30:13-30:23
There's a huge clue, listen, huge clue that it's a bad sermon when the spotlight of the sermon isn't on Jesus Christ, but the spotlight's on you.
30:26-30:30
See, here's the message of the gospel, the short version.
30:32-30:35
The message of the gospel is the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
30:36-30:41
He died to take away our sin, and He rose from the dead to give us eternal life.
30:42-30:53
And upon believing in Him, His Spirit indwells all believers, and His people are to grow as disciples by the power of His Holy Spirit, by the wisdom that comes from His word.
30:55-30:56
That's the gospel.
30:57-31:02
But that has been replaced in our day by sermons that are all about my benefit.
31:03-31:07
Sermons that cater to, God wants me to be happy.
31:10-31:11
God wants me to be happy.
31:12-31:13
Like, what do you mean?
31:13-31:16
I'm gonna give you a couple examples of these kinds of things.
31:17-31:22
One is, we can call it the psychologized message of self-actualization.
31:24-31:25
Oh, that sounds so technical.
31:26-31:29
The psychologized message of self-actualization.
31:29-31:29
What does that mean?
31:32-31:37
I mean, so much preaching in our day is that Jesus is our divine psychologist who wants us to learn how to love ourselves.
31:38-31:47
Jesus' main concern for me is that I have positive feelings, that I stop thinking less of myself and I start thinking more of myself.
31:52-31:59
And in this message, I need to see myself as a victim of psychological disorders rather than an offender of God's law.
31:59-32:08
What I need is healing and purpose in my life rather than mercy and forgiveness.
32:10-32:11
Do you see the problem?
32:12-32:21
You see it, it's self-centered, it's self-loving, it's self-pitying, and it's producing a non-serving generation of churchgoers.
32:25-32:34
Because instead of denying yourself, instead of spending myself for the sake of the gospel and his kingdom to make disciples.
32:34-32:37
We've turned that all into self-fulfillment.
32:41-32:43
Another example is the prosperity gospel.
32:44-32:47
If you have enough faith, God's gonna make you healthy and wealthy.
32:48-32:56
And there's whole ministries built on persuading people, sow your financial seed and reap a financial harvest.
33:02-33:06
Do I believe that the more you give to God, the more God gives back to you?
33:06-33:08
100%, I believe that.
33:10-33:14
But see, people have turned that into the whole thing.
33:17-33:21
And sermons have turned into motivational pep talks, not calls to discipleship.
33:22-33:25
And you listen to those sermons, actually very little is said about Jesus Christ.
33:26-33:33
Very little is said about the cross, but much is said about how God wants you to be rich.
33:33-33:34
It's a problem.
33:38-33:40
Other examples, the word of faith movement.
33:41-33:47
You have the power to speak things into existence, name it and claim it, believe it, speak it, receive it.
33:50-34:00
I could go on, but I think you see my point that like in Micah's day, so much in the church today is all about me.
34:00-34:08
It appeals to the flesh, and it turns the gospel of Jesus Christ into self-serving lies.
34:12-34:20
And by the way, the Bible totally predicted this was going to happen in our day, just as it happened in Micah's day.
34:21-34:23
Like look at 2 Timothy 4, verses three through four.
34:25-34:26
Look at this.
34:28-34:44
For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to, oh, there it is, suit their own passions.
34:44-34:52
Not teachers to tell me about Jesus, not teachers to explain the gospel, not teachers to tell me how to be a disciple, suit my passions.
34:53-34:57
We'll turn away from listening to the truth, wander off into myths.
34:58-35:01
You see, Paul says the time is coming and I would say it's now here.
35:04-35:10
When a sermon focuses on you, when it appeals to your flesh, that's a clue that you're listening to a bad sermon.
35:12-35:13
And finally, one more.
35:15-35:17
The sermon attracts non-spiritual people.
35:20-35:21
Look at the end of verse 11.
35:22-35:26
Again, he says, you know, the person says, I will preach to you of wine and strong drink.
35:27-35:30
Look at this last statement, he goes, he would be the preacher for this people.
35:30-35:39
Wow, that's an indictment on the spiritual condition of Israel, and it's not good, not good.
35:40-35:41
That wasn't a compliment from Micah.
35:44-35:49
And I have to tell you, church, don't assume because the church is big that the truth is being proclaimed.
35:51-35:59
Somehow we get in our minds that the size of the church shows you how faithful the church is being to the Lord, and that's not always the case.
36:00-36:07
You know, Islam has like 1.8 billion followers, and they're not exactly representing the gospel of Jesus Christ.
36:08-36:10
When I say not exactly, I mean not at all.
36:14-36:22
But when you avoid hard biblical truths, but instead you seek to appeal to the flesh, you're gonna get a large following.
36:25-36:27
But not of people that know their Bibles.
36:29-36:43
You're going to want, you're going to get, excuse me, you're gonna get people that just want some personal benefit, even if that personal benefit is, you know what, I feel really good about myself because I went to church today.
36:46-36:50
A sermon that doesn't have the gospel attracts people that don't want to hear the gospel.
36:52-36:53
And that's a clue.
36:54-36:55
It's a bad sermon.
36:58-36:59
Micah chapter 2.
37:02-37:05
Church, I would say again, no, no.
37:07-37:13
The message of Micah is the message for 2024 America.
37:17-37:19
We're facing God's judgment right now.
37:21-37:27
And when someone stands up and says they're speaking for God, you better know how to discern.
37:29-37:29
Let's pray.
37:31-37:38
Father in heaven, it's just astounding to me how relevant your word is.
37:39-37:41
I mean, your word tells us it's living and active.
37:43-37:58
But when I get to a passage like this and look at the state of the Christian church in America, it's staggering how directly this applies.
38:01-38:09
Father, I could bemoan what's happening in other churches, but really you've called me to focus on what's happening in this one.
38:10-38:14
And I pray for my brothers and sisters here that we would grow in discernment.
38:14-38:16
Your word tells us it's something that we learn.
38:17-38:19
It's something that we have to grow in.
38:19-38:22
And I pray, Father, that we would grow in this discipline.
38:22-38:34
We would grow in the ability to immediately be able to recognize garbage when it's being spewed, but it's being called the word of God.
38:37-38:54
Father, we thank you that you've given us a book, something that can be analyzed and read and re-read and compared and meditated on, and you've given us this book so that these truths are frozen.
38:58-39:04
Father, for Harvest Bible Chapel, help us to grow as discerners of your Word.
39:05-39:07
We pray in Jesus' name, amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Micah 2:1-13

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
Tell of a bad sermon you’ve heard. What made it “bad”?
What would you say to a friend that excitedly follows a pastor that you know preaches unbiblical sermons?
Which of these “4 clues” catches your attention the easiest when you detect a bad sermon?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Jeff Miller

August 18, 2024

Nation Facing Judgment

Mourn

Jeff Miller

August 18, 2024

Nation Facing Judgment

Introduction:

How does the thought of God's judgment on sinners make you feel? (Micah 1:1-16)

Are you Apathetic ?
Are you Angry ?
Are you Amused ?

How Do I Mourn If I Don't Feel Like Mourning?

Confess your own sin.
Isaiah 6:4-5 - And I said: "Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!"
Consider the condition of sinners.
Luke 19:41-44 - And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, "Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation."
Concentrate on the cross.
Romans 5:8 - God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

00:43-01:19
Micah chapter 1, verse 1 says, "The word of the Lord that came to Micah of Moresheph in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem." The name Micah means "who is like Jehovah." And he prophesied during the reign of these kings of Judah that are listed here.
01:19-01:25
We're talking about 735 to about 700 BC.
01:26-01:34
And it was a nation that was very outwardly religious, but very inwardly sinful.
01:35-01:35
Sound familiar?
01:39-01:40
It was a day of idolatry.
01:41-01:43
It was a day of impurity.
01:44-01:46
It was a day of injustice.
01:46-01:47
Sound familiar?
01:49-01:54
And Micah's message is this, judgment is coming.
01:57-02:06
And during Micah's ministry, it came to Israel, the Northern kingdom, about 722 BC as the Assyrians conquered them.
02:06-02:19
And long after Micah's ministry, his word, the word of the Lord through him would come true as judgment would come to Judah by the hand of the Babylonians about 586 BC.
02:22-02:32
But there's a message that's here for 2024 America because as we saw last week, We are under the wrath of God.
02:33-02:38
You can't read Romans chapter one and deny the wrath of God is here, people.
02:42-03:04
So Micah's message applies, and here's Micah's message, despite judgment, despite judgment, pardon is offered, restoration is promised, And there is hope, despite the circumstances we see around us.
03:06-03:09
So let's bow our heads as we dive into chapter one.
03:09-03:19
I'm gonna ask quickly that you just pray for me to be faithful to communicate God's word, and I'll pray for you to be ready to receive it today.
03:20-03:20
Let's pray.
03:23-03:29
Father, we believe your word is living and active, You have a message here for us today.
03:32-03:40
May we understand it clearly and accurately, and may we receive it wholeheartedly.
03:41-03:47
We pray in Jesus' name, and all of God's people said, amen.
03:48-03:49
Do you love ice cream, my friends?
03:50-03:53
All right, on the count of three, I want you to shout out your favorite flavor.
03:53-03:54
I'll give you a second to think about it.
03:56-03:58
On the count of three, just shout out your favorite flavor of ice cream.
03:59-04:00
You ready?
04:01-04:03
One, two, three.
04:06-04:06
Me too.
04:11-04:13
I hate ice cream.
04:14-04:18
I mean, I love ice cream.
04:18-04:19
It tastes so good.
04:21-04:22
But I hate ice cream.
04:23-04:27
Ice cream makes me so sick, it just does.
04:27-04:30
And every single time I eat ice cream, nom nom nom nom, it's so good.
04:31-04:35
And then like an hour later, I'm like, why did I do that to myself again?
04:38-04:52
And you know, it always reminds me of what John experienced, Revelation chapter 10, and verse 10, he's talking about this little scroll that signified the judgment of God.
04:52-04:55
John says, "And I took the little scroll "from the hand of the angel and ate it.
04:58-05:11
"It was sweet as honey in my mouth, "but when I had eaten it, my stomach was made bitter." That's the response to God's judgment.
05:13-05:16
He's like, on one hand, it was so sweet.
05:17-05:18
Why was it sweet?
05:18-05:30
Because it's so sweet to think "God's gonna make all things right." And all this wickedness and rebelliousness of people, "God's gonna make it all right." And that's sweet to know.
05:31-05:33
That's sweet to know that God is gonna make all things right.
05:33-05:55
But he said, "It was bitter in my stomach "because it's not a great feeling to think "that God making all things right "means that there are people heading to eternal judgment." That kind of gives you a sour feeling afterwards when you think about that.
05:56-06:02
When you consider that lost people, as God is making all things right, lost people are going to hell.
06:04-06:05
Does that bother you at all?
06:13-06:14
How do you feel?
06:17-06:20
And I know we don't talk about feelings that much, we talk about facts.
06:22-06:23
But today we are going to talk about feelings.
06:25-06:32
How do you feel knowing that God's wrath is here right now?
06:33-06:33
How does that make you feel?
06:35-06:38
After we studied Romans one last week, how did you feel about that?
06:39-06:49
And how do you feel knowing that God's wrath is also coming in the events of revelation, how does that make you feel?
06:53-06:54
Well, let's look at Micah.
06:56-07:01
Just gonna take it a chunk at a time here in chapter one so we can wrap our brains around what's happening.
07:02-07:09
But first, Micah just basically says, "Hey, hey, listen up, listen up everybody, "judgment is coming." Look at the verses two through four.
07:10-07:23
He says, "Hear you peoples, all of you, "Pay attention, O earth, and all that is in it, "and let the Lord be a witness against you, "the Lord from His holy temple.
07:23-07:30
"For behold, the Lord is coming out of His place "and will come down and tread "upon the high places of the earth.
07:31-07:53
"And the mountains will melt under Him "and the valleys will split open "like wax before the fire, "like waters poured down a steep place." So the picture here is like you're in God's courtroom, which is a terrifying thought because in God's courtroom realize God is the plaintiff and he's also the judge.
07:56-08:09
And Micah here in this opening statement is saying, hey, by the way, people, you know, God is not safely far away detached from human affairs.
08:09-08:18
He says, God is, he's coming down and it's going to be absolutely devastating when he does.
08:20-08:23
So why, what's the problem?
08:23-08:24
Why is God so fired up?
08:24-08:26
Well, look at verses five through seven.
08:28-08:33
He says, "All this is for the transgression of Jacob." That's another name for Israel.
08:35-08:40
"And for the sins of the house of Israel." What is the transgression of Jacob?
08:42-08:43
Is it not Samaria?
08:44-08:46
And what is the high place of Judah?
08:47-08:48
Is it not Jerusalem?
08:49-09:01
Therefore I will make Samaria a heap, in the open country a place for planting vineyards, and I will pour down her stones into the valley and uncover her foundations.
09:02-09:05
All her carved images shall be beaten to pieces.
09:06-09:12
All her wages shall be burned with fire, and all her idols I will lay waste.
09:14-09:20
For from the fee of a prostitute she gathered them, and to the fee of a prostitute they shall return.
09:22-09:23
Like, why is God so fired up?
09:24-09:27
He tells you right here, it's transgressions and sins.
09:27-09:31
Specifically, the issue is idolatry.
09:32-09:35
And in that little chunk we read, he said, you know what Jerusalem is like?
09:35-09:39
Jerusalem has turned into like one big pagan altar.
09:45-09:49
Idolatry is a sin that God takes so seriously.
09:50-09:52
Like, well, what is idolatry?
09:52-10:09
Idolatry is when you take the love and devotion and adoration that should go to God, and you give that to something or someone else, that's idolatry.
10:11-10:18
And you're like, "Phew, man, "sounds like those people had an idolatry problem." Hey, hey, you better tune in.
10:21-10:22
Idolatry is the sin of our nation.
10:26-10:29
Like, we don't have, we ain't worshiping like little stone idols.
10:31-10:37
Oh no, no, no, we have so many, we have so many idols that we failed to recognize it.
10:38-10:39
Idols like sports.
10:43-10:45
Idols like music.
10:47-10:50
Idols in Hollywood, they're everywhere.
10:54-10:57
And I think it's gotten so bad that most people can't even recognize it.
11:00-11:06
You know, most of us Pittsburghers can name the whole roster for the Pittsburgh Steelers but can't name the 12 apostles.
11:10-11:16
There's a lot of people that know every word to a Taylor Swift album, but I can't memorize scripture.
11:16-11:18
I'm just not really good at memorizing things.
11:21-11:22
True or false?
11:27-11:34
I don't know what time, I just, oh, Pastor Jeff, I don't have time to get involved in helping a church.
11:34-11:37
I just don't have time to go to small group.
11:37-11:44
But we got time to take little Joey to his T-ball game in Blonox eight days a week.
11:46-11:48
Right, oh, he's on a travel T-ball team.
11:51-11:53
We got games in Dubois.
11:56-12:03
We have time for that because we all know Joey's got a bright future ahead in t-ball.
12:05-12:10
We have all the time in the world for that, but small group for an hour and a half a week?
12:11-12:23
I can't do that." And you say, "Ouch." And I say, well, maybe you're not as free from idolatry as you'd like to think you are.
12:26-12:29
Like, what was he talking about prostitution here?
12:30-12:33
Well, there's a couple things to think about with that.
12:33-12:39
You know, many ancient pagan religions made prostitution a part of their worship, sick.
12:41-12:53
And I think this is brought up in the context of idolatry because when you study your Old Testaments, Idolatry is likened to harlotry, meaning this.
12:54-12:56
Do you know how God feels about idolatry?
12:56-12:58
Do you know how he feels about it?
12:59-13:00
God feels, by the way.
13:01-13:02
Do you know how he feels about idolatry?
13:03-13:08
It's like a man who has a wife that becomes a prostitute.
13:11-13:12
God feels like that man.
13:14-13:17
The book of Hosea, that's what the whole book is about.
13:19-13:21
But understand, God feels.
13:22-13:33
When we choose to put our adoration and love in other things, other than God, he feels like a husband whose wife became a prostitute.
13:33-13:34
That's how he feels.
13:35-13:41
So now are you starting to understand why this is something that fires him up the way that it does?
13:45-13:49
Look at Micah's reaction, verses 8 and 9.
13:50-14:02
He says, "For this I will lament and wail, I will go stripped and naked, I will make lamentations like the jackals, and mourning like the ostriches.
14:02-14:07
For her wound is incurable, and it has come to Judah.
14:08-14:15
that has reached to the gate of my people to Jerusalem." This was Micah's reaction.
14:15-14:16
He says he's lamenting and wailing.
14:16-14:18
He's making lamentations.
14:18-14:18
He's mourning.
14:19-14:21
He was grieving over the state of his nation.
14:21-14:22
And you're like, why?
14:22-14:23
And he tells us why.
14:23-14:25
He says the wound is incurable.
14:25-14:27
There's no recovery from this.
14:27-14:28
There's no fix.
14:29-14:30
God's going to show up.
14:30-14:33
We're not turning this franchise around anytime soon.
14:34-14:35
And listen, people, that is America.
14:40-14:57
You're like, "Is it really that bad?" Well, we saw in Romans 1 last week the manifestation of God's wrath of abandonment has reached its worst when you have a nation that applauds sin.
14:58-14:59
We're their people.
15:01-15:26
at the point that you're a racist, bigot, homophobe if you don't applaud sin. We're there people. The last chunk here, and Micah, he gets very specific. I want to explain to Let's see what's going on here.
15:27-15:35
Micah lists 11 towns in the area that are going to face God's judgment through the invading enemy.
15:36-15:38
And I wanna kinda give you a heads up here.
15:38-15:45
In the Hebrew, all of these towns and the description of what's happening to them, it's all wordplay.
15:46-15:52
It's all puns based on the name of the city or the sound of the name.
15:53-15:56
Understand, Micah wasn't trying to be funny, okay?
15:56-15:59
This wasn't like dad joke time.
16:00-16:07
He was talking about judgment, again, using wordplay based on the city.
16:09-16:15
You know, think of it this way, like, you know how, like, even in our country, cities have, like, special, like, nicknames and things like that?
16:16-16:20
Like, Pittsburgh is known as the, the Steel City, right?
16:20-16:24
And New York is known as the Big Apple, right?
16:24-16:29
And Chicago is known as the Windy City, right?
16:30-16:36
So it would be like this chunk we're looking at here, it would be like if Micah was in our day saying something like this.
16:38-16:41
The Steel City is going to rust away.
16:42-16:46
The Big Apple is going to rot and be thrown in the garbage.
16:48-16:52
and the windy city is going to be leveled by a tornado.
16:53-16:54
See, that's what he's doing here.
16:55-16:58
And I'm not gonna explain all of these.
16:58-17:00
If you want a homework assignment, you can do that.
17:00-17:02
You can look these things up.
17:02-17:07
But I just wanted to give you the heads up that that's what is happening in these verses.
17:08-17:10
So he says, "Tell it not in gaffe.
17:12-17:18
"Weep not at all, and Bethleafra, roll yourselves in the dust.
17:21-17:23
Pass on your way, inhabitants of Shaphir.
17:24-17:30
In nakedness and shame, the inhabitants of Zanon will come out.
17:32-17:38
The lamentation of Bethazel shall take away from you its standing place.
17:38-17:47
For the inhabitants of Moreth wait anxiously for good, because disaster has come down from the Lord to the gate of Jerusalem.
17:48-17:52
Harness the steeds to the chariots, inhabitants of Lachish.
17:54-18:00
It was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion, for in you were found the transgressions of Israel.
18:01-18:05
Therefore you shall give parting gifts to Moresheth Gath.
18:06-18:10
The houses of Aqsa shall be a deceitful thing to the kings of Israel.
18:11-18:13
"I will again bring a conqueror to you.
18:15-18:21
"Inhabitants of Mereshah, the glory of Israel, "shall come to Adulam.
18:23-18:28
"Make yourselves bald and cut off your hair, "for the children of your delight.
18:31-18:42
"Make yourselves bald as the eagle, "for they shall go from you into exile." There again, that last verse, shaving, you know, your head.
18:43-18:44
He was calling the people to mourn.
18:45-18:54
Micah was prophetically seeing the exile take place, and he was crushed by it.
18:57-19:08
As we said, America is currently facing the wrath of God through abandonment, and America is going to face much worse from God.
19:11-19:16
And I want to ask you again the question that we asked at the beginning, how does that make you feel?
19:24-19:27
On your outline, I want you to jot some things down here.
19:28-19:29
So I'm going to ask you, how do you feel about that?
19:30-19:32
The first one is this, are you apathetic?
19:35-19:36
Are you apathetic?
19:36-19:50
many Christians, when we talk about the judgment of God, their reaction is just, "Meh." That judgment is a doctrine that we affirm, right?
19:50-19:52
And we're like, "Yes, that is a true doctrine of Scripture.
19:52-20:01
I do believe." But judgment isn't a reality that we mourn over.
20:05-20:09
For a lot of Christians, they say, well, you know what, yeah, judgment is true.
20:09-20:12
Sinners are just going to get what's coming to them.
20:12-20:13
That's just the way it is.
20:13-20:14
I mean, judgment, it happens, right?
20:15-20:17
It happens, and that's just the way it is.
20:22-20:29
How can we say that we have the love of God in us and be so callous about that?
20:32-20:33
So are you apathetic?
20:34-20:36
Maybe for some of you, you're angry.
20:37-20:38
Letter B, are you angry?
20:38-20:42
Oh yes, listen, there is a place for righteous anger.
20:43-20:44
Absolutely, yes.
20:45-20:47
But many people are just, they're just fed up.
20:48-20:53
And their reaction is just complaining when they see all the sin.
20:54-20:55
Knowing that God's judgment is coming.
20:56-21:03
You know, they think of men competing in women's sports and there's drag queen story hour and there's corrupt leaders.
21:04-21:07
And we're just disgusted and we're condemning.
21:08-21:13
And we're saying, you know what, I can't wait until God punishes them.
21:17-21:17
Are you angry?
21:21-21:23
Let her see, how about this one, are you amused?
21:23-21:24
Are you amused?
21:27-21:35
We look at all the perversion, all the wickedness, And we just make it a joke.
21:35-21:38
We got our memes, we got our reels.
21:40-21:42
We make fun of it on social media.
21:42-21:44
We love the Babylon Bee.
21:44-21:46
Boy, they're really getting their shots in.
21:48-21:51
We just laugh at the absurdity of it all.
21:56-21:57
Maybe you're like me.
21:58-21:59
I've bounced around all three of those.
22:01-22:01
I have.
22:04-22:13
But Micah models the only real appropriate action that God's people should have as their nation faces judgment.
22:13-22:14
He mourns.
22:15-22:23
And church, today I just want to ask you, and I have to ask myself, when was the last time we mourned over the sin of our people?
22:25-22:32
When was the last time we were grieved knowing that God was going to punish the sins of the people?
22:33-22:35
When was the last time that happened?
22:43-23:20
When we talk about sinners facing the judgment of God, listen, we're not talking about hypothetical characters that live in a figurative place that are facing ambiguous consequences. We're talking about real people in my neighborhood that are going to suffer tremendously for their sin. Does that bother you? I'm sure for many of us, you're thinking right now, Okay, honesty check, I get it.
23:21-23:22
Okay, Jeff, I get it.
23:22-23:23
I should mourn.
23:23-23:24
I should.
23:24-23:25
I should.
23:27-23:30
But honestly, I don't.
23:30-23:32
I'm not there.
23:33-23:35
I'm just not there.
23:36-23:45
And I can understand what you're saying, and I see how Micah was mourning over the sins of his people, but Jeff, I'm just not there.
23:50-23:51
How do I get there?
23:52-23:53
I'm so glad you asked.
23:54-24:00
Because in your outline, how do I mourn if I don't feel like mourning?
24:02-24:05
How do I mourn if I don't feel like mourning?
24:08-24:14
I'll give you three things here that I want you to take with you today that I want you to carry with you this week.
24:16-24:18
and you're gonna see a change in your heart.
24:19-24:20
How do I mourn if I don't feel like mourning?
24:21-24:23
Number one, confess your own sin.
24:26-24:30
Because understand that this was the question that I wrestled with, I shared with you.
24:31-24:38
I bounced between all of those, the apathy, the anger, the amusement, and I had to ask myself, you know, God, how do I get there?
24:43-24:45
And this has to be the first step.
24:45-24:47
It takes us to Isaiah's day.
24:47-24:55
Remember Isaiah chapter six, he saw the Lord in the temple, and this was his reaction.
24:55-25:07
He said, "And I said, 'Woe is me, for I am lost.'" Look at this, "For I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips.
25:07-25:16
For my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." You see, Isaiah mourned the sin of his nation, but you see what he did first?
25:18-25:21
First, he came into recognition of his own sin.
25:25-25:32
And before you're gonna feel sorry about the sins of America, you gotta get sorry over your own sin.
25:37-25:40
Can you recognize your own waywardness?
25:43-25:45
I'm talking to Christians now.
25:47-25:58
Christians, do you see that despite the fact that you truly have a love for the Lord, you fall back into rebellion?
25:59-26:01
You fall back into lust of the flesh.
26:02-26:06
You fall back into old patterns of living that dishonor the Lord.
26:09-26:12
And can you recognize it when you do that?
26:13-26:17
It hurts your testimony, it hurts others, it hurts yourself.
26:20-26:26
And if we're going to mourn over the sins of our nation, we've got to confess our sins before God first.
26:27-26:30
And that means, church, we've got to stop minimizing it.
26:31-26:32
We've got to stop excusing it.
26:33-26:35
Are we gonna stop comparing ourselves with others?
26:40-26:42
I wanna encourage you to get specific.
26:44-26:49
To say something like this, you know, God, I see in my own life my tendency to stray.
26:53-26:57
God, I see in my own life my selfish desires that I know are wrong.
27:00-27:02
selfish desires that I go after no matter who it hurts.
27:08-27:15
To pray before the Lord, God, I see my own hypocrisy of criticizing other people's sins while justifying my own.
27:18-27:24
God, I see in my life, I want to do the right thing, but I fail so often at that.
27:29-27:30
Can you get there?
27:35-27:46
Because if you will, the next thing you're going to say is, and I recognize, God, that I live with people who are just the same as me.
27:47-27:48
I'm no better than them.
27:50-27:52
I'm no different than them.
27:53-27:57
Because we're all lost without you.
28:00-28:16
So do a reality check on yourself, and recognize that every single other person has the same problem, a foolish disregard for the God who loves us.
28:18-28:19
Start there.
28:20-28:21
Confess your own sin.
28:22-28:26
to consider the condition of sinners.
28:27-28:29
Consider the condition of sinners.
28:30-28:32
So we're gonna fast forward from Isaiah's day.
28:33-28:36
Well, Jesus was actually who Isaiah saw in the temple, by the way.
28:37-28:39
But we're gonna fast forward to another scene involving Jesus.
28:40-28:42
This takes us to Luke chapter 19.
28:44-28:47
Now this is known as the triumphal entry.
28:48-28:57
You know, they're having this big celebration It says Jesus rides into Jerusalem, but you see Jesus wasn't celebrating.
28:59-29:03
It says when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it.
29:03-29:04
There's what Jesus did.
29:05-29:06
He wept over it.
29:07-29:10
Why was Jesus mourning over people?
29:10-29:21
Look, it says, saying, "Would that you, even you, had known on this day "the things that make for peace, But now they are hidden from your eyes.
29:24-29:36
For the days will come upon you when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you.
29:38-29:51
And they will not leave one stone upon another in you because you did not know the time of your visitation." See, Jesus mourned over the Jews in Jerusalem for two reasons.
29:53-29:57
The first one is they were lost.
29:59-30:03
And the second reason is they're going to suffer.
30:08-30:10
Think about those two reasons.
30:10-30:13
This is what made our Lord mourn over people.
30:15-30:16
First of all, lost.
30:20-30:21
They were clueless.
30:22-30:23
They were blind.
30:25-30:30
They were people who were completely oblivious to what was really going on.
30:32-30:35
Like, "You sure about that?" "Yeah, I'm sure." Do you remember what Jesus said on the cross?
30:36-30:41
"Father, forgive them, For they do not know what they are doing.
30:42-30:44
Jesus said they're lost.
30:45-30:46
They are so lost.
30:47-30:51
They have no idea that their God is right here with them.
30:52-30:53
They're lost.
30:55-30:58
The second thing we said is they're going to suffer.
31:01-31:03
may Jesus mourn. He says they're going to suffer.
31:07-31:22
Let me ask you some questions. Go ahead and shout out your answer like you did the ice cream. But according to the Bible, when a lost person dies, where do they go for eternity?
31:22-31:23
Shout out the answer.
31:24-31:24
To hell.
31:25-31:27
According to the Bible, they go to hell.
31:30-31:32
And what is hell like?
31:32-31:33
Shout out your answer.
31:33-31:37
Is hell a good place or is hell a place of suffering?
31:37-31:38
Shout it out.
31:39-31:40
Suffering.
31:42-31:43
How long does hell last?
31:43-31:45
Is it temporary or is it eternal?
31:46-31:46
Shout it out.
31:50-32:16
believe all that? I mean, you say it, but do you really believe all that? That hell is a place of eternal suffering for the lost? Well, you say you believe it, but when When was the last time you really stopped to think about that?
32:23-32:28
You know what, people, the internet has us so detached from thinking of people as human beings.
32:31-32:49
We live in a day, instead of actually having a conversation with people, we'd rather text, or we'd rather post something on their social media wall or whatever, we've turned politicians into caricatures in our minds.
32:54-32:57
So when we talk about lost people, we're so detached.
32:57-33:02
We talk about lost people, it's like, that's a concept, that's not my problem.
33:06-33:16
You know, we come face to face with these issues, like the transgender madness, like drug addiction, like abortion, and you're like, not my problem.
33:20-33:21
Until it's your son.
33:23-33:24
Until it's your nephew.
33:25-33:26
Until it's your daughter.
33:27-33:28
Until it's your cousin.
33:36-33:47
And some say, well look, you know what Jeff, "You know, you're saying I should feel bad "about the fate of the unredeemed, "but they did it to themselves." Right, they did it to themselves.
33:49-33:56
Does that make it more tragic or less tragic that they did it to themselves?
33:57-34:13
See, to me, that kind of makes it more tragic that somebody is hell-bent on going to hell Despite warnings, despite God's intervention, they double down on the wickedness.
34:13-34:15
That's more tragic to me.
34:18-34:22
Jesus mourned because people were lost and people were going to suffer.
34:25-34:28
Like, I'm not there, I'm not there.
34:28-34:32
Well, imagine this scenario with me.
34:33-34:59
Imagine you walk out of church today, and you're gonna walk down to Sheetz, and you go out to the sidewalk here, and you're walking down, and you look at this big intersection right here, you see a blind man standing at the intersection, and he starts walking into traffic.
35:01-35:03
And you're like, where's this going?
35:06-35:10
He gets hit by a truck, right in the middle of the intersection.
35:11-35:15
Like a truck going full speed through a green light.
35:21-35:22
Do you have that scene in your head?
35:27-35:32
If you saw that, I promise you, you wouldn't be empathetic.
35:35-35:39
You wouldn't walk away from that going, no, not my problem.
35:42-35:45
I promise you, you wouldn't be angry about that.
35:46-35:50
You wouldn't watch that man get hit by a truck and say, oh, this makes me so mad.
35:51-35:54
Blind people just never seeing where they're going.
35:55-35:57
What is the matter with blind people?
35:58-36:00
Why do blind people walk in the middle of busy intersections?
36:01-36:02
I'm so sick of it.
36:03-36:04
He deserved that.
36:05-36:06
You wouldn't say that.
36:09-36:10
And you certainly wouldn't be amused.
36:12-36:13
Be nothing to laugh at.
36:14-36:19
Be nothing to turn into a meme and put on your social media.
36:24-36:25
What would you do?
36:26-36:30
Well, I'll tell you exactly what you do.
36:31-36:37
You would feel horrible that their condition led to their suffering.
36:39-36:46
You would feel horrible that their condition led to their suffering.
36:53-36:57
What does that say about how we view blind sinners walking into hell?
37:03-37:07
See, this is the case of every sinner that you know.
37:07-37:10
They're lost and they're going to suffer.
37:14-37:16
You need to consider the condition of sinners.
37:17-37:19
Get honest to God in prayer over it.
37:20-37:21
Maybe you need to start there.
37:21-37:27
I would say, "Get in your room, shut the door, "and get on your face and say, "God, I'm gonna confess something to you.
37:27-37:30
"I haven't cared." By the way, God already knows.
37:32-37:33
That's why we're confessing.
37:35-37:36
I haven't cared for others.
37:36-37:38
Remind me, God, that people aren't the enemy.
37:39-37:40
People are the victims of the enemy.
37:40-37:45
Move my heart knowing that they're blind and lost and heading to suffering.
37:49-37:50
How do I feel?
37:50-37:52
How do I mourn if I don't feel like mourning?
37:53-37:54
Number one, confess your own sin.
37:54-37:56
Number two, consider the condition of sinners.
37:56-37:59
And then finally, number three, concentrate on the cross.
38:02-38:18
Romans 5, 8 says, "God shows his love for us "in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." If you're having a hard time mourning the condition of sinners, I just want you in your mind's eye, do it right now.
38:18-38:23
I want you to envision in your mind's eye, Jesus Christ on the cross.
38:25-38:27
Do you have that image in your head?
38:29-38:34
Of our savior, bloody and battered, nailed to the cross.
38:38-38:46
And that scene of the son of God on the cross speaks to the horrifying reality of the magnitude of the wickedness of sin.
38:49-38:51
Do you have that picture in your head?
38:52-39:02
Jesus on the cross, the only perfect person to ever walk on the earth, nailed there to die because that was the price that had to be paid for sin to be forgiven.
39:05-39:07
And most people would rather have sin instead.
39:12-39:14
Look at Jesus on the cross.
39:15-39:21
God providentially allowed his son to be murdered so that we could be reconciled to God.
39:22-39:26
And most people would rather have their sin instead.
39:28-39:30
Look at Jesus on the cross.
39:30-39:40
God provided the way for us to have every single blessing that we could have in this life and the promise of eternal paradise in heaven with him.
39:44-39:46
and most people would rather have their sin instead.
39:50-40:08
God so lavishly demonstrated his love to a world that not only rejects him but mocks him, despite the warnings that he gives to those who do.
40:10-40:17
So if you don't feel like mourning, I want you to stop and concentrate on the cross.
40:19-40:25
I want you to think about how the world at large has responded to this God who so loves us.
40:27-40:28
And you will mourn.
40:31-40:34
For worship team, would make their way back up to the platform please.
40:38-40:47
Church, if we're going to be the people of God, living in a nation facing judgment.
40:48-41:00
If we're going to fulfill any of God's purposes for us, the first thing we have to do is care.
41:02-41:05
Take an honest assessment of where we are.
41:09-41:15
and take an honest assessment of why God is bringing his wrath and mourn.
41:16-41:17
Let's pray.
41:19-41:23
Father in heaven, we bow ourselves before you.
41:23-41:27
And God, we confess to you as a people, we don't mourn.
41:27-41:30
Not like Isaiah, not like Jesus, not like Micah.
41:30-41:32
We don't mourn.
41:33-41:42
But God, I just pray today, in a fresh way, you would break our hearts for the sins of the people.
41:44-41:50
It is so easy for us to just say, well, I don't sin like they do.
41:53-41:54
And we write them off.
41:57-42:15
Father, I pray that you bring us back into the place where we feel, where our heart is moved when we consider sin, sinners, and their ultimate destination.
42:19-42:22
Father, there's not a thing that I can do to make anybody feel anything.
42:24-42:30
But God, I'm asking by the power of your word, by the power of your Holy Spirit, You would break up some hard hearts.
42:32-42:44
Give us a people, give us hearts, rather, so that we would be people of compassion and people who mourn the sins of our nation.
42:45-42:47
We pray in Jesus' name, amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Micah 1:1-16

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
When you see sin run rampant and celebrated, how do you typically react? Do you merely condemn sinners, are you indifferent towards their being judged, or do you just laugh them off? Why?
The Biblical response to sinners facing God’s wrath is to mourn (see Micha 1:8-9, 16). If you don’t mourn, why not? How can you get to the place where your heart breaks for what breaks the heart of God?

Breakout
Pray for one another to have the heart of Jesus - to mourn over the sinfulness of our nation.

Jeff Miller

August 11, 2024

Nation Facing Judgment

Living in the Wrath of God

Jeff Miller

August 11, 2024

Nation Facing Judgment

Introduction:

Living in the Wrath of God (Romans 1:18-32):

God Abandons thsoe that Abandon Him. (Rom 1:18-23)
Judges 10:13-14 - Yet you have forsaken me and served other gods; therefore I will save you no more. Go and cry out to the gods whom you have chosen; let them save you in the time of your distress.

Hosea 4:17 - Ephraim (Israel) is joined to idols; leave him alone.

They clearly know about God...

But they clearly don't want God.

3 Evidences that God Has Abandoned People:

First the Heart goes: Sexual Immorality. (Rom 1:24-25)
Then what is Natural goes: Dishonorable Passions. (Rom 1:26-27)
Finally, the Mind goes: Debased Minds. (Rom 1:28-32)

Mourn
Discern
Wake up
Hope
Worship
Repent
Believe

John 3:36 - Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

00:44-00:45
Let's bow our heads for a moment.
00:45-00:58
I'm going to pray for you to have a heart open to receive the Word of God, and I'm going to ask that you would please pray for me to clearly and accurately and urgently proclaim God's Word to you.
00:59-00:59
Let's pray.
01:02-01:04
Father in heaven, we believe in the power of your Word.
01:09-01:12
And I pray, Father, that there are no distractions in our hearts today.
01:14-01:21
That we can worship you with our minds as we engage your word.
01:24-01:26
Father, you would open our eyes.
01:29-01:34
We thank you ahead of time for the way your word is going to be at work in the lives of your people.
01:35-01:37
We pray in Jesus' name.
01:37-01:40
And all of God's people said, amen.
01:41-01:43
We're starting a series on the book of Micah.
01:43-01:46
So open your Bibles to the book of Romans.
01:47-01:48
(congregation laughing)
01:49-01:52
That series starts next week, actually.
01:53-01:55
This is an introduction to the whole series.
02:00-02:01
But we have to start here.
02:03-02:04
Have you been following the Olympics?
02:05-02:06
You've been watching the Olympics?
02:09-02:12
I read this week, this is so interesting.
02:13-02:17
In the summer of 1924, remember that?
02:18-02:20
The Olympic games were in Paris.
02:22-02:30
Eric Liddell was a Scottish sprinter and a devout Christian.
02:32-02:45
Well, he was supposed to compete on a Sunday, but he had this strong personal conviction about the Sabbath, and he wasn't going to race on the Sabbath.
02:48-02:58
So the organizers of the games allowed him to run in a different event, because they did not want to violate his Christian convictions.
03:01-03:23
100 years later, the Paris Olympics kicked off with opening ceremonies that included a gross parody of the Last Supper with drag queens representing Jesus Christ and his disciples.
03:26-03:28
What happened in 100 years?
03:31-03:32
How did we get here?
03:37-03:47
So much corruption, so much perversion, so much hatred and violence.
03:49-03:58
And we live in a day where people are violently screaming for the right to murder infants before they're born.
04:01-04:02
How did we get here?
04:05-04:12
Well, Christians who know their Bibles say, well, you know, God's wrath is coming.
04:14-04:15
And you're right, it is.
04:16-04:34
But many Christians don't realize this, that the Bible tells us that all this wickedness that we're seeing right now, all this stuff we're watching right now, means that God's wrath is already here.
04:42-04:51
We're starting a series in Micah, and Micah was preaching to a nation, Israel, that was facing the wrath of God.
04:53-05:02
And the message of Micah is the message that God wants his people sitting right here and listening to this here today.
05:03-05:05
This is the message he wants you to hear.
05:07-05:14
As a nation is facing the wrath of God, what do I do?
05:16-05:20
What do I do when my nation is facing God's judgment?
05:21-05:36
What does God call me to do while I watch His wrath come upon people who not only persist in unrighteousness, but they openly mock God while they do it.
05:36-05:38
What am I supposed to do?
05:42-05:44
That's the series coming up in Micah.
05:44-05:51
But before we dive in to Micah, some of us need a reminder.
05:53-06:08
And some of us need to be sold on this truth, that God's wrath is clearly and plainly and obviously here now.
06:10-06:29
And I have to start here because when we go into Micah talking about God's wrath, I know that there are going to be some people, if we didn't do this on-ramp, there's gonna be some people that are like, "Oh yeah, God's judgment's coming." Yeah, right, I know that's all happening at the end and it's coming later and I'll sort of tuck this information away for later.
06:29-06:31
No, no, no, it's here now.
06:34-06:35
We need reminded of that.
06:38-06:41
This isn't a series for the future, this is a series for right now.
06:42-06:50
So in your outline, living in the wrath of God, one point today, and that's this.
06:51-06:53
God abandons those that abandon Him.
06:56-06:57
That's the point.
06:58-07:04
Romans 1, God abandons those that abandon Him.
07:05-07:06
Look at verse 18.
07:08-07:28
Paul says, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven and unrighteousness of men." Stop there. Do you see the word "wrath"?
07:28-07:28
Do you see that?
07:30-07:33
The wrath of God is manifested in many ways.
07:34-07:37
You know, you think of like the revelation events, right?
07:38-07:41
The seals and the trumpets and the bowls.
07:41-07:43
Yes, that is God's wrath.
07:43-07:46
God's wrath is manifested as hell.
07:47-07:53
Eternal separation from God, cast out of his presence for eternity, yes.
07:53-07:59
But another way that the wrath of God is manifest is through abandonment.
08:02-08:03
What is abandonment?
08:04-08:08
It's when God says, oh, you wanna sin.
08:09-08:11
You prefer sin over me, okay.
08:12-08:13
Have it.
08:15-08:17
Have it, I'm done.
08:18-08:19
Have your sin.
08:20-08:21
and see where that gets you.
08:25-08:42
When I think of the wrath of God as abandonment, I can't help but think back to when I was in high school, I was in this biology class, and this particular class somehow was made up of like the rowdiest students in school.
08:43-08:46
And I know you're thinking, why was I in there?
08:48-08:51
Maybe in God's providence, just for a sermon illustration.
08:54-09:13
But this class was made up of like the rowdiest students in school and inexplicably, the teacher many times he would come in and he'd just be about to teach and he'd say, "I'll be right back." And he would leave the room and he'd be gone.
09:13-09:18
It was a two period class because there was like instruction in Eris' lab, he'd be gone for both periods.
09:21-09:33
So let me ask you, when the teacher left the room, do you think this rowdy group of students got better or worse with him gone?
09:36-09:39
You're like, well, obviously better, Pastor Jeff.
09:39-09:41
Yeah, we were great.
09:41-09:45
We were putting together Thomas Kinkade puzzles.
09:45-09:50
And we had a hymn sing out of the tabernacle hymnal.
09:53-09:54
Obviously not.
09:55-09:59
When he left the room, it turned into like the LA riots.
10:01-10:11
And my point is, when his presence was gone, we had zero restraints.
10:13-10:14
So much less than when his presence was here.
10:15-10:22
And you see, that's the truth of God, resulting a nation that God says, "Okay, you want to sin?
10:23-10:31
I'm out." And like that biology class, things ain't getting better when God steps out of the room.
10:33-10:36
God abandons those that abandon God.
10:36-10:38
And you see this throughout Scripture.
10:38-10:44
I could spend a long time giving you cross references, but just a couple here.
10:45-10:53
Judges chapter 10, paraphrasing, you know, Israel sinned again and God was sending other nations to punish Israel for sinning and it happened again.
10:53-11:03
And Judges 10, they're like, "Oh, we sinned against you, God." And God says, "I saved you from so many enemies." But verses 13 and 14, look at what God says.
11:03-11:09
God says, "Yet you have forsaken me," abandoned me and served other gods.
11:09-11:11
Therefore, I will save you no more.
11:12-11:14
Go and cry out to the gods whom you have chosen.
11:15-11:18
Let them save you in the time of your distress." You see that?
11:19-11:20
They abandoned God.
11:20-11:31
God says, "I'm out." You see it, Hosea 417, Ephraim, it's another name for Israel, is joined to idols.
11:32-11:37
God says, "Leave him alone." Let him go.
11:39-12:02
And we're going to see here in Romans 1, this wrath of abandonment is exactly what the apostle Paul was talking about because a spoiler alert, three times in this passage, verse 24, verse 26, and verse 28, three times in this passage, he says, "God gave them up." He abandoned them.
12:02-12:03
He gave them up.
12:04-12:10
Interestingly, that phrase gave them up was actually a courtroom term.
12:11-12:16
It was used to describe what happens to a prisoner that's being sent for his punishment.
12:17-12:21
Like go, I'm giving you up, I'm releasing you for your punishment.
12:22-12:23
That's the word used.
12:24-12:29
The Bible says this happens all through history, Acts 14, 16, write that reference down.
12:29-12:38
It says in past generations, He, God, allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways.
12:40-12:48
Nations have rejected what they knew about God and God abandoned them because of their rejection of God.
12:48-12:52
Listen, that is 2024 America.
12:58-13:01
Like, how in the world do people abandon God?
13:02-13:03
How does that happen?
13:04-13:05
How does that happen?
13:07-13:08
Well, let's read the passage.
13:08-13:10
It tells us exactly how it happens.
13:11-13:21
He says, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
13:22-13:28
For what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them.
13:29-13:41
for his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world and the things that have been made.
13:42-13:45
So they are without excuse.
13:48-14:02
For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, But they had become futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
14:04-14:24
Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man, and birds, and animals, and creeping things." That's how people abandon God.
14:26-14:32
Let's just break it down into one very easy two-part statement, it's this.
14:32-14:33
Here's what Paul's saying.
14:34-14:42
They clearly knew about God and they clearly did not want God.
14:43-14:44
Do you see that?
14:44-14:45
Do you see that in the text?
14:45-14:50
They knew about Him, but they didn't want Him.
14:52-14:53
Let's break that down.
14:54-14:56
They knew God, verse 21, they knew God.
14:56-15:03
When it says they knew God, he's obviously not talking about a personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
15:03-15:05
He's obviously not talking about that.
15:05-15:08
He's saying they knew that there is a God.
15:08-15:13
Nobody, literally nobody needs sold on that fact.
15:14-15:19
Everyone knows that there is a God, whether they want to admit it or not.
15:19-15:19
Like, well, how?
15:20-15:23
He tells us, verse 20, because of God's power and nature.
15:25-15:27
God has revealed Himself in creation.
15:31-15:36
Everybody knows that there's a God, because He's shown in creation.
15:38-15:53
Every time a baby is born, every sunset, every trip to the ocean, every mountain, every one of His magnificent creatures.
15:58-16:03
We can look around at creation and we see the fingerprint of God on everything.
16:03-16:05
But you know, the Bible also tells us we know it inwardly.
16:06-16:16
In fact, if you go over to Romans 2.15, Paul tells us that God's law is written on our hearts, that we inherently know right and wrong.
16:17-16:23
And that also points us to the one who established what is morality.
16:26-16:27
But is it really clear to people?
16:28-16:29
How clear is it?
16:29-16:34
Well, according to the Bible, verse 19, he says it's plain.
16:35-16:37
Verse 19 says it has been shown.
16:39-16:41
Verse 20 says it's been clearly perceived.
16:41-16:50
Verse 20 says, "So much so that they are without excuse." So we have to be clear, the issue is not ignorance.
16:53-16:54
It couldn't be more clear.
16:55-16:57
Everyone knows that there is a God.
16:58-16:58
Right?
16:58-17:00
That was the first part of the statement.
17:00-17:07
Everyone clearly knows there is a God, but he also says they clearly do not want God.
17:09-17:12
Verse 18 says they suppress the truth.
17:12-17:13
Do you understand what that means?
17:14-17:15
It means they got the truth.
17:18-17:19
They just suppress it.
17:19-17:20
I can't help it.
17:20-17:24
When I hear that word suppress, my mind only goes to one thing.
17:24-17:26
I think of a gun suppressor.
17:26-17:27
Do you know what a gun suppressor does?
17:29-17:31
It quiets the noise.
17:32-17:35
And that's what people do with the truth of God.
17:36-17:39
He's speaking so loudly to them.
17:39-17:42
And I gotta distract myself.
17:42-17:44
I gotta quiet that down.
17:46-17:50
He says in verse 21, they don't want to honor Him as God.
17:50-17:52
That means they don't want to acknowledge His authority.
17:53-17:54
And they don't wanna thank Him.
17:54-17:56
That means to acknowledge His goodness.
17:57-17:59
They just don't want 'em.
18:04-18:05
They will not give thanks.
18:06-18:07
They will not give thanks.
18:07-18:13
You know, it's funny you talk to somebody that doesn't believe in God.
18:15-18:17
Something they all have in common, they're not thankful.
18:19-18:21
Like, what do I have to be thankful for?
18:21-18:22
What has God ever done for me?
18:24-18:25
Oh, really?
18:26-18:27
What has God ever done for you?
18:29-18:30
You know, these people eat.
18:32-18:33
These people breathe.
18:34-18:46
These people have the privilege of enjoying all the, quote, good things that life has to offer, and they have zero appreciation for the one who provided everything for them.
18:49-18:49
Why?
18:50-18:50
Why?
18:51-18:52
Why is there no gratitude?
18:54-19:06
Because I know that I should live a life of gratitude towards this God, but that means I have to acknowledge this God that I don't want interfering with the way that I want to live.
19:09-19:20
You should have that verse underlined in your Bible because thankfulness to God and faith in God go hand in hand every time.
19:22-19:25
You're like, oh, so these people don't worship then.
19:26-19:29
Right, people that don't want God, they're just, they're not worshipers.
19:29-19:33
And that's not true because everybody worships something.
19:34-19:35
Everybody worships something.
19:35-19:37
That's what he's talking about in verse 23.
19:40-19:41
Everybody worships something.
19:41-19:42
Do you know why?
19:43-19:45
Because that's just how we're designed.
19:46-19:51
As human beings, our creator God designed us for certain things.
19:51-19:52
He designed us to eat.
19:53-19:55
He designed us to sleep.
19:55-19:58
He designed us to be able to speak and think.
19:59-20:01
Do you know what else God designed us to do?
20:03-20:07
Hardwired in us, we are designed to worship.
20:10-20:13
Everybody worships something or someone.
20:14-20:15
Something has your affection.
20:16-20:17
Something has your attention.
20:18-20:19
Something has your devotion.
20:23-20:27
And that's why Paul says people abandon God and they worship anything else.
20:27-20:33
He gives a list, you know, they worship man and birds and animals and creeping things.
20:34-20:41
Bible says people worship money, people can worship power, people will turn to anything else, but you're gonna worship something.
20:44-20:50
So the question is, okay, so what is God supposed to do when people abandon Him?
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What's He supposed to do?
20:52-20:59
People are like, yes, God, I know You're there, I don't want You, I'm doing my own thing, and I'm worshiping something else, what's God to do?
21:03-21:06
You're like, God's supposed to say, oh, bless your hearts.
21:08-21:09
I've given you life.
21:10-21:18
I sent my son to die a horrific death on your behalf and you turned your back on me.
21:18-21:22
Well, just let me know how I can bless you.
21:23-21:24
I await your orders.
21:29-21:30
What's God supposed to do?
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Well, the Bible tells us exactly what God does.
21:37-21:40
And as I told you, he says it three times in the passage.
21:41-21:41
What does God do?
21:43-21:50
When you clearly know God and you clearly don't want God, this is one of the scariest things in the whole Bible, people.
21:50-21:52
The Bible says he gives you up.
21:53-21:54
Go ahead.
21:55-21:56
God says, "Go ahead, do it your way.
21:57-21:59
"You think you don't need me?
22:01-22:08
"Oh, you think you know better than me, okay, I'm out." And listen, he's not pouting.
22:10-22:17
He's not some adolescent with a chip on his shoulder that's been rejected and is gonna get even.
22:17-22:18
No, no, no, it's nothing like that.
22:20-22:21
It's God giving you what you want.
22:24-22:25
And that is a horrifying thought.
22:27-22:28
So what happens?
22:29-22:31
What happens when God abandons a nation?
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What happens when a nation knows God and they don't want God and they go their own way and they start worshiping other things?
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What happens?
22:39-22:42
Well, that's the rest of the passage on your outline.
22:42-22:43
I said there was one point.
22:43-22:44
These are sub points.
22:44-22:45
It doesn't count.
22:48-22:51
Notice it's A, B, and C because points are numbers.
22:52-22:53
(congregation laughing)
22:54-22:56
I got you on a technicality.
22:59-23:02
Three evidences that God has abandoned people.
23:04-23:06
And this is a sequence.
23:07-23:08
This is what happens.
23:08-23:10
These are steps.
23:11-23:13
This is a snowball rolling down the hill.
23:17-23:20
This is sewage being flushed, is really what it is.
23:21-23:23
it just gets worse and worse and worse.
23:24-23:28
Three evidences that God has abandoned people.
23:28-23:33
And by the way, it doesn't happen overnight in our culture.
23:33-23:34
This has been happening for decades.
23:34-23:38
How long have we been talking about, you know, them taking prayer out of schools?
23:38-23:42
How long have we been talking about they took the 10 commandments out of the public square?
23:42-23:44
This has been happening for a long time.
23:44-23:47
So don't think that this is just a new thing.
23:50-23:56
This is a sequence that you have watched play out in front of you.
23:58-23:59
So what is the sequence?
23:59-24:00
Three evidences that God has abandoned people.
24:00-24:02
Letter A, first the heart goes.
24:05-24:06
That results in sexual immorality.
24:10-24:11
Look at verses 24 and 25.
24:14-24:19
Hey, they knew God, they didn't want God, they started worshiping other stuff, they abandoned God, so what does God do?
24:19-24:45
Verse 24, "Therefore God gave them up "in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, "to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, "because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie "and worshiped and served the creature "rather than the creator who was blessed forever, amen." So step one is first the heart goes.
24:47-24:50
This is evidence that God has abandoned a nation.
24:52-24:54
Lust dominates the heart.
24:55-25:00
Hear me, I'm not talking about people that are like, I'm really struggling with lust.
25:00-25:06
I'm really struggling with this and I'm seeking to get control in this area of my life.
25:07-25:16
We're not talking about people that are like, you know, the Bible says God's Holy Spirit gives self-control and I'm really seeking the Lord to grow in this area.
25:16-25:17
We're not talking about that.
25:19-25:25
We're talking about unrestrained, let them off the leash.
25:27-25:31
Lust in my heart turns into lust released in my body.
25:34-25:36
Do I need to sell anybody on this really?
25:37-25:48
Do I really need to convince anybody that our culture has turned into dogs chasing after dogs in heat.
25:49-25:51
And I'm not being crass, people.
25:52-25:56
Is that not how we're going?
25:57-25:58
Not how we've gone.
26:04-26:08
That somebody explained to me that there's an app for that.
26:08-26:09
You know, there's an app for that.
26:10-26:18
several apps actually, that you can use your phone and find people for a physical meeting.
26:20-26:28
I'm not talking about dating or relationship apps, I'm talking just to meet up with somebody for that.
26:33-26:35
We have turned into a pornographic culture.
26:37-26:39
And do you know what happens in a pornographic culture?
26:39-26:45
Marriages are destroyed, and women are abused, and children are trafficked.
26:50-26:52
Like, why is this happening?
26:54-26:59
Because God gave us up to unrestrained lust.
27:01-27:06
God was saying, you want lust, you want to act like an animal, have at it.
27:08-27:09
That's the first step.
27:09-27:13
The second, the first to heart goes, that's sexual morality, letter B.
27:14-27:16
Then what is natural goes.
27:17-27:21
Then what is natural goes, that's dishonorable passions.
27:22-27:23
Look at verses 26 and 27.
27:24-27:33
It says, "For this reason, "God gave them up to dishonorable passions." Like, well, what is that?
27:34-27:38
He explains in no uncertain terms what that means.
27:38-27:38
Look at this.
27:39-27:46
He says, "For their women exchange natural relations "for those that are contrary to nature.
27:49-27:56
"And the men likewise gave up natural relations with women "and were consumed with passion for one another.
27:58-28:58
"Men committing shameless acts with men "and receiving in themselves the due penalty "for their error." So, the next step, first the heart goes sexual immorality, then what is natural goes, it's dishonorable passions. The next step is perversion. The sexual sin goes from man and woman sexual sin to same sex sexual sin. And by the way, this is a shout out for all the people that say, "Well, you know, the New Testament never says that homosexuality is wrong." You know how many times I've heard that over the years? "Oh yeah, there's something mentioned in the Old Testament law, but you know, the New Testament never really says that homosexuality is wrong." And I would just ask you, what would God have to say to make it more clear than this?
29:00-29:07
Three times, three times right here, God says, "That's not natural.
29:09-29:23
"Do I have to sell you on why it's not natural?" There was a time in my ministry I didn't think I'd have to, but now I'm not so sure that people understand Biologically, what happens in normal relations?
29:23-29:25
That's how far we've gone.
29:27-29:28
He says they've received a due penalty.
29:30-29:31
They're already reaping consequences.
29:31-29:33
You think God's wrath is coming?
29:33-29:34
It is, but it's already here.
29:34-29:36
They're already getting the consequences.
29:37-29:39
That's why he says due penalty, due penalty.
29:39-29:40
Like what?
29:41-29:42
VD.
29:46-29:49
like being unfulfilled, being unsatisfied.
29:55-29:59
Calling it gay is such a cruel, ironic term for it.
30:04-30:09
But here we are as a culture, recently concluded Pride Month.
30:12-30:18
And it's such an appropriate name for a culture that abandoned God and has been abandoned by God.
30:20-30:21
They're patting themselves on the back.
30:22-30:23
We are so proud of ourselves.
30:26-30:32
And here again, he says, verse 26, God gave them up.
30:34-30:36
Unrestrained homosexual lust.
30:38-30:40
Have you noticed that in our culture at all?
30:43-30:47
that God is saying, okay, you wanna be a pervert?
30:49-30:50
Go ahead, I'm out.
30:54-31:00
Finally, the mind goes, debased minds.
31:01-31:02
Look at verse 28.
31:04-31:12
It says, and since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, There's the abandonment thing.
31:13-31:14
Since they did not see fit to acknowledge God.
31:15-31:16
Look at this, here it is one more time.
31:16-31:23
God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.
31:25-31:26
Debased, you know what debased means?
31:28-31:32
It literally means when you test something and you discover that it's useless.
31:33-31:34
That's debased.
31:36-31:48
And what he's saying here is when a culture abandons God, when a nation abandons God and God abandons the nation, the next step is people's minds become useless.
31:48-31:51
There's nothing good that comes from their minds.
31:53-31:57
And what do you call it when you lose your mind?
31:57-31:58
What do you call that?
31:59-32:00
It's called insanity.
32:00-32:01
Right, I heard a few of you say that.
32:01-32:02
It's called insanity.
32:04-32:09
And we live in a culture of absolute insanity.
32:12-32:14
You're like, "Well, what do you mean?
32:14-32:16
"What do you mean we live in a culture of insanity?
32:16-32:19
"What do you mean?" Well, let me ask you a question.
32:19-32:20
How many genders are there?
32:24-32:27
You know that's one of the first things kids learn, right?
32:27-32:29
That's one of the first things children learn.
32:29-32:31
There's boys and there's girls, right?
32:34-32:35
Last number I heard was 72.
32:36-32:37
It's probably double that by now.
32:39-32:43
but I heard literally that there were 72 different genders.
32:44-32:46
That's crazy.
32:49-32:54
That's insane to say that there's 72 different genders.
32:54-32:55
That's insane.
32:55-32:59
It's insane to say there's three, but 72?
33:02-33:02
Insane.
33:03-33:07
That's a debased, useless mind, and what you're left with is insanity.
33:09-33:10
You're like, do you have any other examples?
33:11-33:12
Have you turned on the TV lately?
33:14-33:29
Have you heard that there is a governor of a particular state that passed a law mandating that feminine hygiene products are put in girls' and boys' restrooms in the high schools?
33:33-33:35
You're like some fringe wackadoo, right?
33:37-33:38
No, potential vice president.
33:41-33:42
Insane!
33:47-33:49
You can't rationalize that.
33:54-34:02
We have what are supposed to be some of the most powerful and influential people in this culture that can't define what a woman is.
34:05-34:06
Do you know what that is?
34:07-34:07
It is insane.
34:08-34:09
It is just insane.
34:10-34:11
And I'm not saying that jokingly.
34:11-34:14
I'm saying that literally, that is insane.
34:19-34:22
I was watching about a month or two ago.
34:22-34:23
Did you ever see those reels?
34:24-34:26
They show you those little 10 second clips.
34:26-34:27
Did you ever see those things?
34:28-34:32
I was watching some of those and this person was dead serious.
34:33-34:36
I thought it was a joke, but I had to watch it like three or four times.
34:37-34:38
They were dead serious.
34:38-34:51
But this person, I'm not sure what the gender was, but that person explained, their little video was a tutorial on the proper pronouns if you identify as a frog.
34:52-34:54
And they were serious.
34:58-34:59
That's insane.
35:01-35:01
And you're like, what?
35:02-35:03
You know what, Pastor Jeff, you're right.
35:03-35:08
Now that I think about it, Why does it seem like there's so many empty heads?
35:11-35:14
Because God gave them over to a debased mind.
35:14-35:17
You don't wanna use your mind to worship me and to know me?
35:19-35:22
You wanna use your mind for being an idiot?
35:23-35:25
Be an idiot, go ahead.
35:26-35:30
Come up with your own devices and ideas, and that's what we've come up with.
35:32-35:33
God gave them up.
35:33-36:03
God says, "You want to be foolish, go for it." What is perverse is promoted. What is decent is denounced. All because God is a good God.
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Verse 28, "They did not see fit to acknowledge God." And he talked about cancel culture.
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What he's talking about here in Romans one is what happens when you get a cancel Jesus culture.
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And really it's an abandoned culture, is what it is.
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Do I have to sell you on this?
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Am I some tinfoil hat wearing weirdo?
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Or these things that God's word is describing here, is this what you're seeing when you turn on your television?
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You tell me.
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Is this what you see when you get on your favorite social media platform?
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You tell me.
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Look at the rest of the passage.
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Verse 29, it says, "They were," in case you're still not convinced, look at verse 29, "They were filled "with all manner of unrighteousness, "evil, covetousness, malice.
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"They were full of envy, murder, "strife, deceit, maliciousness.
37:25-37:41
"They are gossips, slanderers, Haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
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Though they know God's decree that those who practice such things deserve to die.
37:50-37:56
Here it is, look at this last phrase, because this is when you know we have hit the bottom.
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Look at this.
37:57-38:11
"They not only do them, "but give approval to those who practice them." This is the bottom of the barrel.
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Not only when society is doing these things, Paul's saying, you know, you've hit bottom when people start applauding these things as a culture.
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(congregation laughing)
38:30-38:31
Like do we applaud sin?
38:32-38:33
Do we applaud sin?
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Applaud is an understatement.
38:38-38:40
We have parades for sin.
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We will change our Facebook profile to a rainbow picture to let people know that we're applauding sin.
38:53-39:07
We have Disney and Sesame Street, two platforms that are supposed to reach preschool children that are promoting homosexual lifestyle.
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Some of the cultural icons with the biggest platforms use them to promote sin the loudest.
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Look at your athletes, look at your actors, look at your musicians.
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And you can see as a culture, we went from tolerance of sin to applauding sin, to I'm proud of you for applauding sin, to if you don't applaud sin, you're a racist homophobe.
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And God helped these churches that are flying their rainbow flags.
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Churches that should be praying for repentance, churches that should be seeking to point lost people to Jesus Christ for healing.
40:01-40:06
And instead, we wave a flag for approval and applause.
40:10-40:10
God help us.
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God gives them up to useless minds.
40:21-40:22
You want foolishness.
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God says, you wanna be foolish?
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Okay, go for it, I'm out.
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So there it is.
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That's the description of what happens when people reject God.
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And then God returns the favor.
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He simply abandons them.
40:50-40:53
And that is a most terrifying kind of wrath.
40:57-40:59
And church, we are immersed in it right now.
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You saw these verses 29 through 31.
41:05-41:11
He prophesied, Paul prophesied about things that we watch on the news right now.
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It's hateful, it's violent, it's ruthless.
41:21-41:25
Look at those verses and turn on the news and watch people burning down businesses.
41:26-41:35
Watch the riots, watch the mass shootings, watch the, I don't know, you can turn on the TV and watch a presidential candidate nearly get assassinated.
41:36-41:37
That's where we are.
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That speaks to where we are as a culture.
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And the point is this, my friends, God's wrath isn't just something that's coming.
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He says it's here.
41:59-42:00
So what do I do?
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Like, yeah, I see it.
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I see it, Jeff, what do I do?
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Well, the prophet Micah told Israel in the Old Testament what to do in light of God's wrath.
42:14-42:17
And this is still the message for God's people in 2024 America.
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As God's judgment is revealed to us.
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So what are we supposed to do?
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Oh, it's gonna take seven weeks for me to tell you.
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And Taylor, we're not starting right now.
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But what are we to do?
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First of all, we are to mourn.
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That's next week's message, we're to mourn.
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When's the last time you've mourned over what's happening?
42:55-42:58
Micah tells his people, God's word's telling us that we need to discern.
43:00-43:02
You're like, we just had a series on that.
43:02-43:04
Well, it comes up again, so guess what?
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We're covering it again.
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We need to discern because we can get so roped into the foolishness.
43:17-43:18
What else do we need to do?
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Church, we need to wake up.
43:21-43:24
That's what Micah told Israel, and that's what we need, church.
43:24-43:25
We need to wake up.
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Wake up.
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Man, things are really bad.
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Yeah, you know what else we need to do?
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We need to hope.
43:36-43:37
We need to hope.
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You know things will not always be as they are now.
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I have that on really good authority.
43:46-43:47
We need to hope.
43:49-43:51
Also in the meantime, we need to worship.
43:54-43:56
I think everybody worships something, right?
43:56-43:58
Yeah, we need to worship our risen king.
44:02-44:04
In church, even for God's people, you know what we need to do?
44:04-44:05
We need to repent.
44:11-44:15
We're not some untouched hospital room in here.
44:17-44:18
We need to repent.
44:21-44:22
And finally, we need to believe.
44:24-44:25
That's what God wants from us.
44:27-44:31
That's really the only thing God's ever asked of people is that we trust what He says.
44:32-44:33
We need to believe.
44:35-44:41
We're going to close our time gathering around the Lord's table if our communion servers would come up and our worship team would come up.
44:43-44:45
We're going to gather around the Lord's table.
44:49-44:53
You know, as we're thinking of God's wrath, there's a verse that always comes to mind for me.
44:54-44:55
I think we have it on the screen here.
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John 3.36.
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Look what Jesus said.
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"Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.
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"Whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, "but the wrath of God remains on him." Just look at that verse for a second.
45:25-45:26
We're talking about the wrath of God.
45:26-45:31
Do you know what you have to do to receive the wrath of God?
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The answer's nothing, 'cause you got it by default.
45:42-45:45
If you haven't received Jesus Christ, you're under God's wrath.
45:49-46:03
But if you have turned from your sin and received Jesus Christ, this is why we gather around the Lord's table, we celebrate this glorious truth, because this reminds us that Jesus took God's wrath for you.
46:05-46:18
And though we as believers are, yes, collateral damage, living in a nation under the wrath of God, the day is coming when we will be delivered from the worst of it.
46:24-46:37
But you know, if you're a believer in Jesus Christ, this world is the only taste of hell you will ever experience.
46:41-46:53
But I gotta tell you, if you are not a believer in Christ, if you have not received him, then this world is the only taste of heaven that you're ever going to experience.
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This is for God's people.
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So I'm gonna invite you to stand.
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Our worship team's gonna play here in a moment.
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We're going to ask that if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, you don't have to be a member of this church, but you do have to be a born again believer in Christ.
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We invite you to come down the center aisle, take the elements back to your seat by going to the outside aisle.
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I'm gonna ask that you hold onto them.
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And in just a moment, as a sign of unity as a church, When everybody has received, I will lead us in taking the Lord's Supper together.
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So please, when you're ready, come.
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The wrath of God is here.
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But the worst is coming.
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And thanks to Jesus Christ, we will be saved from the worst.
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Because on the cross, he took God's wrath upon himself.
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The Bible tells us on the night that Jesus was betrayed, he took bread and he broke it and he gave thanks.
47:58-48:02
And he said, "This is my body, which is given for you.
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"Eat this in remembrance of me." The Bible tells us that after the meal, Jesus took the cup and he said, "This is the blood of the new covenant, "which is poured out for the forgiveness of sin.
48:18-48:25
"Drink this in remembrance of me." Would you please stand as we close in worship?

Small Group Discussion
Read Romans 1:18-32

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
How is God’s abandoning people a manifestation of His judgment? What are the three things God “gives people up” to (Romans 1:24, 26, 28)?
How exactly is thankfulness connected to faith (Romans 1:21)?
What are some ways that you see debased (useless) minds in our culture today (see Romans 1:28)?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Discern

Introduction:

4 Clues You're Hearing a Bad Sermon (Micah 2:1-13):

Mourn

Introduction:

How does the thought of God's judgment on sinners make you feel? (Micah 1:1-16)

How Do I Mourn If I Don't Feel Like Mourning?

Living in the Wrath of God

Introduction:

Living in the Wrath of God (Romans 1:18-32):

3 Evidences that God Has Abandoned People:

Upcoming Small Group Questions CLICK HERE

How much of the Bible have we covered since 2011?

Introduction:

4 Clues You're Hearing a Bad Sermon (Micah 2:1-13):

Audio Transcript

Introduction:

How does the thought of God's judgment on sinners make you feel? (Micah 1:1-16)

How Do I Mourn If I Don't Feel Like Mourning?

Audio Transcript

Introduction:

Living in the Wrath of God (Romans 1:18-32):

3 Evidences that God Has Abandoned People:

Audio Transcript