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Fred R. Coulter—August 31, 2008
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Greetings, brethren! Welcome to Sabbath services!
I thought it would be good to look in the Bible and see about human government and how God interacts with human government and what kind of leaders we get. So, Let's just do a little review in the book of Genesis.
We know that God created Adam and Eve, put them in the Garden of Eden and showed them the two trees that He created:
- the Tree of Life
- the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil
God told them that if they ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil they would surely die. When you look at the whole event that took place, let's understand what we're talking about.
Genesis 3:22: "And the LORD God said, 'Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to decide good and evil…'"
Most translations have 'to know.' There's a reference in The Holy Bible in Its Original Order that says: to know, to ascertain by observing and experimenting. So, I translated it 'decide' because when you look at the whole overall experience that they went through, that's what it really was. You can't say that Adam and Eve knew good and evil and sinned, and God knows good and evil and didn't sin. You would have to apply one to the other.
God also says in Isaiah, 'I create good, and I create evil.' Evil is the automatic penalty that God gives with every law! Whether it's just a law of physics and you're walking down the steps and you fall and hurt yourself. The law of gravity is the evil in that case, because you broke it by falling.
Likewise, you take any one of the commandments of God, there is an automatic penalty that takes place! Sometimes it's discernable and sometimes it's not. For example, people who break the Sabbath do not discern that they're breaking the Sabbath because they're involved in many activities of self in the world. Their mind is not on the Sabbath, and the penalty that they receive automatically is that they're cutoff from God, and they don't have access to God in the way that those who have God's Spirit and keep the Sabbath do.
When you get to the fifth commandment about honoring your father and mother, you're really not dealing with a commandment that is to your neighbor; your children and parents are not neighbors. The parents are to the children instead of God until they become of the age of accountability. That's why the fifth commandment goes back with the first four, rather than the last six.
Then you have the one concerning murder. There's always a penalty for that: death! There's always a penalty for adultery: lying, cheating, stealing, sexually transmitted diseases. Those are all evil! When God says that He creates good and evil, that does not make God evil. If you have something that is good and you give choice, whether you're going to keep those commandments or not, then you have to have a penalty to enforce the good. To bring people to their senses when they come to the point of getting their lives so messed up that they realize that something is really wrong and return back to God.
In eating of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, they decided to eat. They decided to find out for themselves what was good and evil rather than believing God Who decides what is good and evil!
What we have here in Gen. 2 & 3 with the whole accountis that the Government of God was directly from God to Adam and Eve. When they sinned and decided that they wanted to determine for their own selves:
- what was right
- what was wrong
- what was good
- what was evil
then it put them out of the jurisdiction of God's government by one step of removal: they could not go back into the Garden of Eden!
If they would come to God, which they could at the east entrance, because I think that's where God met with Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel to talk with them. They would obey in the letter of the commandments of God, so their original government was from God to man! Man decided that he wanted to choose his own way. So, God is removed by one step.
Then when you come to Cain, he even removed further. Cain shows the worst of human nature, which is that he's going to do it his way and expects God to accept it his way! That's why it talks about the way of Cain (book of Jude). Cain was another step further removed from the Government of God, because after killing his brother Abel he was exiled to the Land of Wandering!
You know the story of what happened, and we'll see the summary of it in Gen. 6. What happens when men and women cut themselves off from God and do not want the Government of God in their lives?
{Note sermon series: What is the Government of God in the Church?}
It all eventually gets back to God! The closer that you come to God and the more you let God and His ways rule in your life, the better off you're going to be whether you are converted or not. God expects people to obey in the letter of the Law, and He makes judgments in their lives and in nations according to the letter of the Law in how they keep the commandments of God to the best of their knowledge.
Please understand that they are not being judged to salvation. The judgment they are under is: Will they be in the second resurrection? or Will they be in the resurrection to the Lake of Fire?
Things really got terrible in Gen. 6, and we know that Jesus said, 'As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the coming of the Son of man.'
Genesis 6:1: "And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth…" there are only two times that this happening:
- in the days of Noah
- in our day
That's why human nature responding to Satan turn out the same thing!
"…and when daughters were born to them, that the sons of the mighty ones saw the daughters of men, that they were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves from all whom they chose. And the LORD said, 'My Spirit shall not always strive with man in his going astray…'" (vs 1-3).
In other words, since every human being has the spirit of man in them, the human spirit, when people go astray, when people sin, it not only affects the individual life, it also affects God. He gave the spirit, and He created human beings. Of course, it's going to affect God and God's judgment.
Here's the result of rejecting God as their Ruler and Judge. We have some 1500 years after the creation of Adam and Eve. What God did was restrict the age that men would live to be. From that time forward, the age of men began to go down, down, down, and even today it is rare to find someone who lives over 100, rarer 110. I don't think there are very many who reach 120. I do recall reading about an Englishman who lived to be 152-years-old. He just ate all of his own food, had his own little garden and he outlived 20 kings. The king who was ruling when he became 152 invited him over to the palace to celebrate his birthday, and he ate the king's fare and died three days later. That's something!
"…for he is but flesh…" (v 3). Even though human beings are flesh, they think they're almighty; they think they're going to go through everything and somehow live forever. People get all upset when people get old and die, wail and scream and moan and groan and all of this sort of thing, forgetting that the Bible says that 'there's a time to be born, there's a time to die.'
When you're young you don't think about dying. The older you get the more you realize that, yes, there is a day coming! As you look in the mirror and see a little wrinkle here and there, a little gray here and there. Year after year hair falls out and more gray shows up and more wrinkles occur and the body doesn't work quite as fast. The joints creak and all of this sort of thing. The internal organs don't produce what they ought to and all of this sort of thing.
Then we come to realization that, yes, I'm going to die! When you're young you never think about it! You think you're going to live forever.
Read the footnote in The Holy Bible in Its Original Order, A Faithful Version that explains about "…for he is but flesh, and yet, his days shall be a hundred and twenty years" (v 3).
Verse 4: "There were tyrants…"—regardless if the size of them. Do we have giants today? Yes, we do! All you have to do is watch an NBA basketball game and you know that there are giants.
"…on the earth in those days, and also after that, the sons of God…" (v 4)—men, not angels! Why is it that the Jews insist that these were fallen angels and don't understand that these were men? Because God didn't give the answer to it until the New Testament when Jesus said, 'The angels do not marry nor are given in marriage.' So, they have this lying mythology that these were fallen angels.
Listen, if righteous angels can't produce offspring or marry, what makes you think that fallen angels have that ability? They don't!
They "…came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. They were mighty men who existed of old, men of renown" (v 4). All of these men were the ones who replaced the Government of God!
Look around the world, look at the leaders, the ones in charge, and look at how they run their countries, their lives and the people who live under them. You will see exactly the same thing going on here. When you have men and women multiplying on the earth, what happens?
Verse 5: "And the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth…" Do we have that today? Yes! How much righteousness in the 'letter of the Law' is God going to recognize?
"…and every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually" (v 5). That doesn't mean that they don't think it isn't a good time, or that it's not exciting.
Let's take Friday night and Saturday football games, do all those kids have a good time? Oh, they think it's a ball! They're breaking the Sabbath!
- How many are involved in illicit sex, drugs and just the excitement of it?
- Are they honoring God when their heroes are the great players? No!
But people, not understanding the good and evil from God's command, decide to make a judgment for themselves what is good and evil. They can't discern what is really good and evil unless it's some serious disease, accident, death or something like that, then they can ask how did this happen? God sees it from entirely different point of view! The answer is in v 6. Sin not only affects human beings, it affects God!
Verse 6: "And the LORD repented that He had made man on the earth…" A little lower than God:
- with a choice
- with abilities
- with capacities
Near God-like things! For the Feast of Tabernacles I read from a book called Singularity is Near by Raymond Kurzweil, where men are thinking that with technology, machines and computers that man is going to live a whole lot longer. Man is going to have a much greater and more wonderful life.
Man thinks that we're going to make ourselves better. We're going to improve ourselves. We don't need God. Ray Kurzweil is an agnostic. When Glenn Beck asked him if he believed in God, he said, 'No, let's not go there.' When Beck said, 'You're agnostic then,' Kurzweil said, yes. Then Beck ask him, 'How are you going to solve the problem of evil?' Kurzweil replied, 'We haven't gotten that figured out, yet.'
If you're going to magnify all this good, are you not then going to magnify all the evil? The ultimate thing that they want to do is have you hooked up so that you have a master computer at home that you can Wi-Fi to directly, or when you come home you automatically backup all your thoughts for that day. That would be good for police investigation!
"…and He was grieved in His heart" (v 6). When evil reaches a certain point of intensity, God must intervene to do something, because He's Ruler of all, and all government ultimately comes from God.
Verse 7: And the LORD said, 'I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, and the crawling thing, and the fowl of the air; for I repent that I have made them.'"
God starts out with this great plan, but He gave Adam and Eve choice. They choose the wrong thing. Instead of really repenting and say, 'God, we'll live the best way that we can with Your Laws,' they embraced satanism like Cain did. Here's what happened, and we see the same thing today. Take a look at all the ads on TV and ask yourself: Is this really good? or Is this apparently good but really evil? How many movies are based upon lying, cheating, stealing, adultery, robbery and so forth? Think about it!
Verse 8: "But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD. These are the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man and perfect in his generations, for Noah walked with God" (vs 8-9).
That means that Noah, Enoch, Abel and Seth in walking with God placed their lives under the Government of God and not under the government of men, though they had to live in the world as we do today. Though we obey the laws of the land, we are under the Government of God in our lives directly, and we are under the government of men because they are the servants of God.
Verse 11: "Now the earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence." Do we have that today? Everywhere!
Jesus said, 'You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars, and there shall be pestilence, earthquakes in different place, and nation against nation, kingdom against kingdom' (Matt. 24). Men are arrogant and think that they are all supreme! But they're not and their breath can go in an instant! This is what happens, and in the end we know that's exactly what's going to happen.
Verse 12: "And God looked upon the earth, and behold, it was corrupt—for all flesh had corrupted its way upon the earth. And God said to Noah, 'The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them. And, behold, I will destroy them with the earth'" (vs 12-13). Then God commanded Noah to make an ark, etc.
Then we see a change in government beginning in Gen. 9 But let's first come to Gen. 8, after they made it through the Flood, which covered the whole earth. It wasn't just in one little valley. It was the whole earth by 15 cubits, which equals 22 feet on average. You have to have a mighty powerful breather to last on top of a mountain for a whole year and be able to get enough air so you can survive the Flood. I don't think anyone would, because when God destroyed all flesh, He didn't destroy the fish. So, the sharks and flesh-eating things in the ocean had a feast for a whole year!
Genesis 8:15: "And God spoke to Noah, saying, 'Go out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and your sons' wives with you. Bring out with you every living thing that is with you—of all flesh, of fowl, of livestock, and of every crawling thing that crawls upon the earth—so that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful and multiply upon the earth.' And Noah went out, and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives with him" (vs 15-18).
That must have been something after being cooped up in the ark. God opened it up and says, 'Come on out!' They looked out and there's the earth again.
Verse 19: "Every animal, every fowl, and every crawling thing, all that crawls upon the earth after their families, went forth out of the ark." A little note for all evolutionists:
Since God is Creator, has He quit creating today? We know that there's a spiritual creation that He's doing in each one of us! Since He gave life to all—male and female—is not everything that is reproduced God's creation? So, God is still creating though the process of pro-creation! Concerning what evolutionists call the evolutionary changes:
- Can God, at any time, cause birds to have longer beaks? Shorter wings? Men like to say natural variation or selection!
- How does that naturally occur?
- How much is it that God actual did in extended creation?
- A little adjustment here, a little adjustment there, etc.?
Verse 20: "And Noah built an altar to the LORD, and he took of every clean animal…" Did they have the laws of clean and unclean meat then? Yes!
If you want to know how bad eating unclean food is, you go online and look up the eating shanties in Beijing, China, and you will see the assortment of the most terrible things you would ever want to eat: snakes, lizard legs, etc. God gave the law of clean and unclean meats from the beginning so that men would know right from wrong. God will not accept an unclean animal as a sacrifice to Him!
"…and of every clean bird… [they were paired by seven pair, all the unclean by single pair] …and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And the LORD smelled a sweet savor; and the LORD said in His heart, 'I will not again curse the ground for man's sake—although the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth…'" (vs 20-21).
You can see that even in little children! They fight over toys! Have arguments! Temper tantrums! Human nature is evil by nature from birth, though it's not developed until later in life! If it is corrected and trained, it will minimize the evil; if it's not it will maximize the evil.
"…and I {God] will not again smite every living thing as I have done. While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease" (vs 21-22)—and it's always been that way!
Now here comes a change in government. Before the Flood, God lived in the Garden of Eden. He was the One Who was Judge and administered His Government on earth. The righteous ones of the line of Abel and Seth came to the Garden of Eden to meet with God. The ones of Cain were left upon their own; so, everything that follows in breaking the Laws of God occurred. Let's see the change in the Government of God.
From this point on, God no longer dwells on the earth in the Garden of Eden, because the Garden of Eden was destroyed with the Flood. God resides in heaven! Now He's going to control the world by His angels (Heb. 2); the world that is now is given in charge of the angels (Dan. 9-10).
Genesis 9:5: "And surely the blood of your lives will I require. At the hand of every animal will I require it, and at the hand of man. At the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man. Whoever sheds man's blood, his blood shall be shed by man…" (vs 5-6).
This is the administration of death to all sovereign nations; God gave authority for the death penalty for the governments of men. This can be good if properly applied with God's laws, or it can be evil when you get a tyrant who wipes everybody whom he decides to kill.
Here's the change in the Government of God; He gives man the responsibility: 'You want to sin, you want to lead evil lives, all right, you administer the penalty of death for those who commit crimes worthy of death. It's your responsibility. If you don't, then you're going to suffer the consequences of that, also.'
Stop and think about what happened in Iraq when we invaded Iraq. All of a sudden they couldn't take care of the prisoners in prison. What did Sodom Hussein do? He let them all free! Opened the doors and they all went out. They created a lot of havoc even within their own population as well.
- What will happen in America if that ever happens here with three million lifers?
Dedicated criminals! It may happen here!
- What if the governments go bankrupt and can no longer take care of them?
- Can't pay the guards?
- Can't pay the electricity?
- Can't feed them?
- Can't clothe them?
- Can't house them?
- Are they going to just lock them up and let them all die?
MSBC had a series on the prison system, and they're talking about the hardened criminals, and they interview them. You know how absolutely set on evil—death, murder and destruction—that these people are!
If it ever comes a time of God's judgment against us, because we didn't execute them the way that God said they should be—for murder, pedophilia, kidnapping, all crimes worthy of death—by the civil governments. Here in Gen. 8 God gave them the authority.
Human beings are corrupt, so you have corrupt judges, police, prosecutors and they actually convict innocent people and put them in jail. That's the risk of getting rid of God in the right kind of judgment!
That's what happens, especially if a dictator gets in. if you don't agree with him, you're gone. The governments fail because they do not have the fear of God, which if they did, there would be far fewer innocent people convicted. They would not allow:
- corrupt judges
- corrupt prosecutors
- corrupt defense attorneys who make all kinds of excuses, which are absolutely ridiculous and not true
All of those are wrapped up in here. So, God says, 'If you want to go your way, here's the government, you do it, it's your responsibility.'
"…for He made man in the image of God" (v 6). Then God made a covenant with all the rest of His creation on earth and said that He wouldn't flood it again.
Now let's see what happens when you get a few generations removed from the Flood and everything is more normal appearing to human beings. Babies are being born and families are expanding and so forth.
Genesis 10:8: "And Cush begat Nimrod. He began to be a mighty one in the earth"—a hero! Everyone looked to him! Nimrod replaced God! That's the ultimate thing that happens. Government becomes the god of the society, rather than God and then the government!
In America and Britain we have more in our history of God and government under God, and people obeying God than you have in, say, Russia, China, Africa, South America, etc. Still, that does not mean that there is not corruption even within that system, because 'imagination of man is always evil' all the time.
If you don't think that is so, how many evil thoughts pass through your mind in a day? Whether initiated by you, television or seeing something? It's there all the time! That's why we need repentance every day!
Verse 9: "He was a mighty hunter against the LORD…." Nimrod said, if you will read some of the other historical accounts, 'I will protect you from the wild animals, but you must submit to me! Eventually, they worshipped him and his wife Semiramis.
"…Therefore, it is said, 'Like Nimrod—the mighty hunter against the LORD'" (v 9)—or in place of the LORD!
When you get Godless men in power, or men who profess to have some sort of religion—but really don't—then you have a government that is corrupt from the top down and through every level of society it begins to filter down. Here is the first real tyrannical government, rebelling against God—repeat of the Garden of Eden—"…the mighty hunter against the LORD."
Verse 10: "And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel…"—Babylon, the system that has pervaded the whole earth from that time until now, with the except of the children of Israel that God called out of Egypt. That goes back to the covenant of Abraham.
Verse 10: "And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel and Erech and Accad and Calneh, in the land of Shinar."
What immediately happens with men who want power? They've got to control, conquer, steal, take the spoil!
Verse 11: "Out of that land he went forth to Assyria, and he built Nineveh, and the city Rehoboth Ir, and Calah"—etc. then it gives the genealogy from there.
Gen. 11 tells us how bad it got. Remember, this is only about five generations after the Flood. Five generations is not very long if a generation is 25 years. That would be 125 years removed from the Flood.
Our nation has been in existence a little over 200 years, and what memory is there of it going back to its origin? What they have today is trying to expunge as much of it as possible so they can bring in a Godless dictatorial government here in America! That's the crossroads and the balance that we are hanging in here right now with the election of 2008.
There are indications that when it says, 'As it was in the days of Noah,' you have two periods of the days of Noah:
- before the Flood
- after the Flood
Noah live 350 years after the Flood.
Genesis 11:1: "The whole earth was of one language and speech." Do we have it today? Computer language and English mostly!
Verse 2: And it came to pass, as they traveled from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar. And they settled there. And they said to one another, 'Come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly.' And they had brick for stone, and they had asphalt for mortar. And they said, 'Come, let us build us a city and a tower, with its top reaching into the heavens….'" (vs 2-4).
- Does that sound a little bit like today?
- What are we doing? Exploring the heavens!
They want to send men to Mars; that will be interesting!
- Did they understand that God was up above the clouds? Yes!
- Who has always wanted to go above the clouds and conquer God? Satan the devil!
- Who is inspiring all of this? Satan the devil!
The truth is, if you take yourself out from under the Government of God:
- Who do you accept?
- Who becomes your ruler?
- Satan!
He may not be right there at your side, he may not be anywhere near you, but he's called 'the god of the world, the prince of the power of the air.' If you take yourself out from underneath the Government of God, he's got you! Satan doesn't have to come and do anything right away. Just wait! Your own lust and sins will catch up with you and then he can drag you down more and more and further and further. People don't understand that.
Then you know what God had to do; He had to scatter them because they were on the verge that anything that they imagined to do would not be restrained.
Verse 6: "And the LORD said, 'Behold, the people are one and they all have one language. And this is only the beginning of what they will do—now nothing, which they have imagined to do, will be restrained from them.'"
- How many times do you hear that you can be anything you want to be?
- Are you going to do it lawfully God's way?
or
- Are you going to do it Satan's way?
- Let's go to the moon. We've been there!
- Let's go to Mars. We're getting close to doing there!
Now they're trying to solve the problem of how men can travel in space and get to Mars, live on the moon, but they're always going to have problems:
- What do you breathe?
- What do you eat?
- How do you get rid of the garbage and refuse?
That's a very important problem!
(go to the next track)
Let's expand a little bit on as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the Son of man. Let's understand that there is really very little doubt that they had technological advancements as we have today, and maybe even more. There would have been no need of destroying all human life if they hadn't. They probably were already altering the genes and chromosomes and trying to create super this, that and the other thing. That's probably why God undoubtedly—not probably—exterminated all human beings and all the animals and birds. They were making them into something that they should not have been, just like they're doing today.
There's a book Secrets of the Lost Races by Rene Noorbergen, and he shows very clearly that they understood about what we call jet planes, etc. there are a whole lot of things that were destroyed with the Flood, but some of them still remain enough so we can get a glimpse of what kind of world that they had.
Besides, you can go to the book of Ecclesiastes and Solomon said, 'That which is has been, that which will be has already been done, there's nothing new under the sun.'
Now let's see how God judges the nations. Then we will see what He does with leaders. We can be virtually guaranteed that every nation will end up with a leader that the morals of the general population deserve.
Since atheists don't believe in God—and many of those who believe in God think that He is way off someplace and doesn't interfere in the kingdoms of men—don't understand what God is doing.
Jer. 18 is directed to Israel, and what God does is reveal that He deals with all the nations of the world. He's warning them that He raised up Babylon, and the Jew were so sinful that God was on the Babylonians side against His own people, because God judges His own people. If they refuse Him and turn their backs on Him, then He's going to judge them and will raise up nations to come against them and conquer them, because they won't listen to God and submit to God.
We need to think about that in relationship to our nations here today. But here's how God looks at it:
Jeremiah 18:7: "If at any time… [always] …I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck it up and to pull it down, and to destroy it."
What did God do with Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel? He sent prophets to warn! If they changed their ways, He would defer!
Verse 8: 'If that nation, against whom I have spoken, will turn from their evil…" So, the question for this election is:
How many people have turned from their evil, as compared to how many people are continuing to increase in their evil? One little sign is that there are fewer abortions than before! That doesn't mean that things are really improving, but there is some improvement.
If they turn from their evil, "…I will repent of the evil that I thought to do to them. And if at any time I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build it and to plant it; if it does evil in My sight, that it not obey My voice, then I will repent of the good with which I said I would do them good" (vs 8-10). This is all nations at any time, at all times!
Jonah is quite an important book. This is a prelude to calling Gentiles after Christ's ministry was over. It's showing that the Gentiles will repent. Some of the Jews did from time to time, but notice that Jonah was sent to them. He didn't want to go, and he said, 'If I go and proclaim what you want they'll repent and then you won't have to do it, so why should I go.'
God made Jonah go, even caused a great fish to swallow him up and talk about bad breath for three days and three nights. Then the fish vomited him out on the land.
Jonah 3:1: "And the Word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time, saying, 'Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out to it the proclamation that I am declaring to you.' And Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the Word of the LORD. And Nineveh was a very great city of three days' journey across" (vs 1-3).
I don't know how far you can walk in a day, but say 15 miles, which would make Nineveh 45 miles across. That's a pretty big city.
Verse 4: "And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried and said, 'Yet, forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown!'"
They didn't do like what happened to a lot of prophets of God from the Jews and the children of Israel to reject the warning. This is why it's here.
Verse 5: "And the people of Nineveh believed God. And). they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them, for word came to the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne. And he laid aside his robe from him, and covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his great ones, saying, 'Do not let man or beast, herd or flock taste anything; do not let them feed, nor drink water. But let man and animal be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily to God. And let them each one turn from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands. Who knows? God may repent, and He may have pity and turn away from His fierce anger, so that we do not perish'" (vs 5-9).
- that did happen before the Flood
- it didn't happen with the Jews with Jeremiah's ministry and prophecy
Verse 10: "And God saw their works that they turned from their evil way. And God repented of the evil that He had said He would do to them, and He did not do it."
Then Jonah got angry! He said, 'I told You, God, they would do it.' Then God caused a gourd to grow up when it was hot and give Jonah a little shade. Then God sent a worm to cut it down and Jonah said, 'Why did You do that, Lord?' Just to let you know that I'm going to do what I'm going to do!
There's only one real account. Let's also understand that it doesn't matter how old you are, because this king became king when he was eight-years-old:
2-Chronicles 34:1: "Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign… [v 2]: And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, and walked in the ways of David his father, and did not turn aside to the right nor to the left. For in the eighth year of his reign… [now he's 16] …while he was still young, he began to seek after the God of David his father. And in the twelfth year… [now he's 28] …he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places… [all the statues and idols and images of Baal] …and the groves, and the carved images, and the molten images. And they broke down the altars of Baalim in his presence. And he cut down the images, which were on high above them, and the groves.…" (vs 1-4).
As I've mentioned in other sermons, if America is really going to turn it's way around, you're going to have to have something pretty close like this to happen. We'll just have to wait and see. What Josiah did was to get rid of:
"…the carved images and the molten images he also broke in pieces, and made dust from them, and scattered it upon the graves of the ones who had sacrificed to them. And he burned the bones of the priests upon their altars and cleansed Judah and Jerusalem" (vs 4-5).
Verse 8: "And in the eighteenth year of his reign, when he had purged the land and the house, he sent Shaphan the son of Azaliah, and Maaseiah the governor of the city, and Joah the son of Joahaz the recorder, to repair the house of the LORD his God. And they came to Hilkiah the high priest, and they delivered the money that was brought into the house of God, which the Levites that kept the doors had gathered from the hand of Manasseh and Ephraim, and from all the remnant of Israel, and from all Judah and Benjamin, and they returned to Jerusalem" (vs 8-9).
To make a long story short, they began to clean the temple. They began to get rid of everything. Here's the beautiful temple of God that Solomon had built, remodeled by the evil king Manasseh with all the idols to the host of heaven and Baalim and so forth. Josiah get rid of all that, and now he began to clean it up.
Verse 14: "And when they were bringing out the money that was brought into the house of the LORD, Hilkiah the priest found the Book of the Law of the LORD written by the hand of Moses." They got clear into the Holy of Holies! So, here is the Book of the Law.
Not like today; we're all sitting here with open Bibles. They didn't have that back then. That means that we're far more accountable before God than they were back there.
Verse 15: "And Hilkiah answered and said to Shaphan the scribe, 'I have found the Book of the Law in the house of the LORD.' And Hilkiah delivered the book to Shaphan. And Shaphan carried the book to the king and brought the king word back again, saying, 'All that was given into the hands of your servants, they are doing. And they have gathered together the money that was found in the house of the LORD, and delivered it into the hands of the overseers and to the hands of the workmen.' And Shaphan the scribe told the king, saying, 'Hilkiah the priest has given me a book.' And Shaphan read it before the king. And it came to pass when the king heard the words of the Law, he tore his clothes" (vs 15-19).
This is a sign of great repentance! Very similar to when the king of Nineveh took off his clothes and put on sackcloth.
Verse 20: "And the king commanded Hilkiah, and Ahikam the son of Shaphan, and Abdon the son of Micah, and Shaphan the scribe, and Asaiah a servant of the king, saying, 'Go inquire of the LORD for me and for those who are left in Israel and in Judah, concerning the words of the book that has been found, for great is the wrath of the LORD that is poured out upon us because our fathers have not kept the Word of the LORD to do according to all that is written in this book'" (vs 20-21).
This is typical of many periods in the history of Israel. The men who should know better became corrupted and evil. When that happens, God still let's them know His Word. But since they have been so sinful, this time from the mouth of a woman!
Verse 22: "And Hilkiah, and those of the king, went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum the son of Tikvath, the son of Hasrah, the keeper of the robes. (And she lived in Jerusalem in the second quarter.) And they spoke to her about this."
If you know anything about God, it doesn't take a great genius to figure out what to do. Repent!
Verse 23: "And she answered them, 'Thus says the LORD God of Israel, "Tell the man who sent you to me, 'Thus says the LORD: "Behold, I will bring evil upon this place and upon its people, even all the curses that are written in the book which they have read before the king of Judah, Because they have forsaken Me and have burned incense to other gods… [adultery, lying, cheating, stealing, murder, drugs and all of those things] …so that they might provoke Me to anger with all the works of their hands…."'" (vs 23-25).
Think about all the works of our hands today, that occupies peoples' time and fills their minds with evil. All the electronic games, sports, cell phones and everything like this. Why should teenagers have cell phones? People are going to get mad at me with this. What did you do before there were cell phones? There's more evil committed with cell phones and text messaging by teens than you keeping track of where they are. If they have a cell phone they can tell you anything they want, and they can say they are home when they are not. Plus, it opens the whole world of evil that's on the Internet than can come through the cell phone to them.
My recommendation is that teenagers should not have them. 'Oh, you're being harsh!' Maybe I am being harsh! But how many kids have been entrapped because they have them and because of the pressures of their peers. And that's not counting the health issue of what it does to the brain.
Stop and think about what would have to happen to really cause God to turn back the judgments that are coming against us. It would have to be mammoth! Will some of the disasters cause people to wake up and repent? Possibly! Maybe those directly involved in whatever disaster, if they survive. When you see the mighty power of God, and a hurricane is nothing more than one huge gigantic tornado, mammoth!
- What is it going to take?
- Will people, when they hear the Word of God, voluntarily repent?
- Will people quit sinning and turn to God?
or will they say:
- Whose to say that this is the Word of God?
- You're an old fogie, who do you think you are?
That's not the question, the question is:
- What is the behavior of everyone involved?
- What is the average age of all the people in any given country?
That's what God is looking at!
Verse 25: "Because they have forsaken Me and have burned incense to other gods, so that they might provoke Me to anger with all the works of their hands. And My wrath shall be poured out upon this place and shall not be quenched. And as for the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of the LORD, so shall you say to him, 'Thus says the LORD God of Israel concerning the words you have heard, "Because your heart was tender and you humbled yourself before your God when you heard His words against this place and against its people, and humbled yourself before Me, and tore your clothes and wept before Me, I have even heard you also," says the LORD.'" (vs 25-27).
There is a good example. There is always room for repentance. When there is repentance, God honors it, when it's true repentance to Him!
Verse 28: "'Behold, I will gather you to your fathers, and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace, nor shall your eyes see all the evil that I will bring upon this place and upon its people.' And they brought the king word again."
What happened? He helped bring all the people of Judah and Jerusalem, all of those of Israel that would, to enter into a covenant to keep the commandments of God! That stopped the wrath as long as Josiah was living.
Verse 29: "And the king sent and gathered together all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem. And the king went up into the house of the LORD, and all the men of Judah, and the people of Jerusalem, and the priests, and the Levites, and all the people from the great to the small. And he read in their ears all the words of the Book of the Covenant that was found in the house of the LORD" (vs 29-30). He was probably reading Deut. 28!
Verse 31: "And the king stood in his place and made a covenant before the LORD to walk after the LORD and to keep His commandments and His testimonies and His statutes with all his heart and with all his soul, to perform the words of the covenant, which are written in this book. And he caused all who were found in Jerusalem and in Benjamin, and the people of Jerusalem, to stand to it according to the covenant of God, the God of their fathers. And Josiah took away all the abominations out of all the territories…" (vs 31-33).
If we translate that into today's terminology, not only would you have to go after all the idols, which are throughout the land, all the temples of other gods, which are here throughout the land, especially the temple of Planned Parenthood where the commit all of the abortions. You would have to have great resignations of judges, schoolteachers and repentance of people on a mss scale, completely unheard of in the history of the world.
The truth us, political solutions never solve spiritual problems!
What did Josiah have to do? He had to address the spiritual problems first, and he did. He had to clean it all up.
Let's look a few other things here to show what would need to take place. Stop and think about this:
- Could you get the cooperation of the Catholics to do this? They would have to destroy all their images of Mary and Jesus! I doubt it!
- Could you get all the senators and congressmen to agree to this? I doubt it!
- Could you get all the judges to agree to abandon their own humanistic judgments and use the judgments of God? I doubt it!
- Do you think that you could get all the people to begin keeping the Sabbath instead of Sunday? I doubt it!
- Do you think you could get them to all—every one of them—to forsake all of their pedophilia, pornography, adultery and fornication? I doubt it!
- Do you think that you could get them to forsake their drug purchasing and selling? I doubt it!
That's why God has to judge human government, because all human governments are under God. If they don't follow the Laws of God in the letter sin increases and multiplies everywhere, then God's destruction has to come! People won't listen!
Did we learn the lesson of 9/11? I know that a lot of people say that the government did it. Well, I read Lev. 26 and God says that He's going to send terror! God is the One Who did it! Did we repent? No! We said for everybody to go to church in their synagogues and pray to God; God bless America! Didn't happen, did it?
Let's see what Solomon saw; Ecclesiastes 4:1: "So, I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun…. [there are a lot of oppressions] …And behold the tears of the oppressed ones…"
Just stop and think about this all around the world: Iraq, Iran, Darfur, Zimbabwe, Soviet Union—shouldn't be called Russia because it's still the Soviet Union—China: oppression!Why do they oppress? Because the people have not been taught about God, and the people become more lawless! They must have a an authoritarian rule over them, because they are not able to rule and govern themselves with the Laws of God.
Some nations need leaders like Hussein, because it's the nature of the people. Until there's repentance of all of that which is founded in:
- wrong government, because they reject the true God
- wrong religion, because they're worshipping Satan the devil
- wrong societies, because they don't follow the Laws of God
Nothing works out! There's a little good in between, but it all ends up in trouble, and sooner or later in death.
"…all the oppressions that are done under the sun. And behold the tears of the oppressed ones, and they had no comforter!…." (v 1).
Those make great ads! Send all your money so we can help the children, and 80% goes to the ones who are sponsoring. In some few cases most of it goes to the little ones, but they never amount to anything.
I was thinking about that while I was watching the weather on this latest hurricane. I think of all the people on those islands who live down there in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. Every year tornadoes come through there and rip up their land and flood them out. I was thinking: what a terrible thing! But look at the religion that they have there: voodooism and witchcraft; you've got some of the worst satanism there is on the face of the earth.
- God is the One Who controls the weather!
- God uses these things for correction!
"…And on the side of those who oppressed them there was power, but they had no comforter. Wherefore, I praised the dead who already have died, more than the living who are yet alive. Yea, better than both is he who has not yet been, who has not seen the evil work that is done under the sun. Again, I considered all labor, and every excellent work, that it is a rivalry between a man and his neighbor. This is also vanity and a striving after wind" (vs 1-4).
Ecclesiastes 3:16: "And again I saw under the sun the place of judgment…" Look at our Supreme Court!
I think it's interesting that the one running for president as a democrat actually turned on Clarence Thomas, which was a shock to everybody. He wouldn't have appointed him, Roberts or Alito. Then the one running as a republican said that he do away with Ginsberg, Stevens and so forth. Well, what do we have at the Supreme Court? It's right here, let's read it:
"…I saw under the sun the place of judgment that wickedness was there…" (v 16). Where did Roe v Wade come from? Right there! And the states did not have the gumption to stand up and say that the Supreme Court must enforce the Constitution. 'They have broken the Constitution with this or that judgment and we will not follow it!'
Just like someone comes out in the Church with something that is against the commandments of God, no one in the Church is bound to follow it! If they do, they're going to go 'down the tube' with the one who is teaching it to you. We've seen that happen!
"…and in the place of righteousness, that wickedness was there" (v 16). All the pedophilia priests, all the whoremongering, lying, cheating and stealing.
Verse 17: "I said in my heart, 'God shall judge the righteous and the wicked…'" Eventually it's going to come!
There's a saying that is pretty apropos to that, which is 'the worm turns,' and the worm of God's judgment is going to turn! When the rottenness and corruption comes, you're not going to be able to stop it.
"'…for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work.' I said in my heart, 'Concerning the matter of the sons of men, may God reveal to them, that they might see, that they themselves are but beasts'" (vs 17-18).
Every human being, before he can even come to the knowledge of God, has got to recognize the inheritant evil within him or her. The sins that they have committed against God—knowing or unknowingly—and have in whatever degree ruined their lives for doing what they were doing.
Where there's repentance, there's recovery just like we read in 2-Chron. 34. But, you see, they have to understand it. What is the last dictator of the world called? The Beast who says, 'I am God!'
Then Solomon gives a little wisdom here. Before you get all high and mighty as to who you are:
Verse 19: "For that which happens to the sons of men also happens to beasts—even one thing happens to them. As the one dies, so dies the other; yea, they all have one breath; so that a man has no advantage over a beast; for all is vanity. All go to one place; all are of the dust, and all return to dust again" (vs 19-20).
That's what happens! That's the way that life is!
Scriptural References:
- Genesis 3:22
- Genesis 6:1-13
- Genesis 8:15-22
- Genesis 9:5-6
- Genesis 10:8-11
- Genesis 11:1-4, 6
- Jeremiah 18:7-10
- Jonah 3:1-10
- 2 Chronicles 34:1-5, 8-9, 14-33
- Ecclesiastes 4:1-4
- Ecclesiastes 3:16-20
Scriptures referenced, not quoted:
- Matthew 24
- Hebrews 2
- Daniel 9; 10
- Deuteronomy 28
- Leviticus 26
Also referenced:
Sermon Series: What is the Government of God in the Church?
Books:
- Singularity is Near by Raymond Kurzweil
- Secrets of the Lost Races by Rene Noorbergen
FRC:bo
Transcribed: 12/5/18
