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my face.
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to put it on my face.
Oh, no.
We only have a bunch of points, so we're going to wait for the next one.
Okay?
We only have five points, so we're going to wait for the next one.
Okay?
We're just going to get that right there, and then we're going to wait for the next
one, and then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going to wait for
the next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going to
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wait for the next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one.
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next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one.
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next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one.
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next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one.
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and then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going to wait for the
next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going to wait
for the next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going
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next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going to wait
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then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going to wait for the next
one, and then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going to wait for
the next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one, and then we're going to
wait for the next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one.
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next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one.
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next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one.
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next one, and then we're going to wait for the next one.
That's number one.
Ezekiel chapter 15, the Bible reads, and the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son
of man, what is the vine tree, more than any tree, or than a branch, which is among
the trees of the forest?
Shall wood be taken thereof to do any work?
Or will men take a pin of it to hang any vessel thereon?
Behold, it is cast into the fire for fuel.
The fire devoureth both the ends of it, and the midst of it is burned.
Is it meat for any work?
Behold, when it was whole, it was meat for no work.
How much less shall it be meat for any work, when the fire hath devoured it, and it is
burned?
Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, as the vine tree among the trees of the forest, which
I have given to the fire for fuel, so will I give the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
And I will set my face against them.
They shall go out from one fire, and another fire shall devour them.
And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I set my face against them.
And I will make the land desolate, because they have committed a trespass, saith the
Lord God.
Heavenly Father, Lord, thank you for the King James Bible, Lord.
Thank you for the book of Ezekiel, Lord.
I pray you just fill a passage with your spirit, Lord, and help us to learn something.
In Jesus' name I pray, Amen.
So Ezekiel 15 is this really short little chapter, and the next chapter, chapter 16,
is a really long chapter with 63 verses.
And not only that, chapter 16 is one of the most classic chapters in the book of Ezekiel.
I mean, if I were asked to preach sermons out of five chapters in Ezekiel, you know,
just hit the highlights, chapter 16 would for sure be on that list as one of the most
classic chapters.
So I'm going to cheat a little bit in my series, and I'm going to spill into chapter
16 tonight.
That way I can kind of split up chapter 16 over tonight and next week.
So I'm just going to briefly go through chapter 15, and then I'm going to really get
into chapter 16.
So it says in chapter 15, verse 1, And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son
of man, what is the vine tree more than any tree, or than a branch which is among the
trees of the forest?
Shall wood be taken thereof to do any work, or will men take a pin of it to hang any vessel
thereon?
Behold, it is cast into the fire for fuel.
The fire devoureth both the ends of it, and the midst of it is burned.
Is it meat for any work?
Meaning, is it suitable for any work?
Now, what is he talking about here?
Well, obviously you can use wood for a lot of things.
You can build things out of wood.
You can build structures.
You can build tools.
But the vine tree, a vine like a grapevine or something like that, is not the type of
plant that you can use wood from in order to build things, because think about how vines
are.
They're very crooked.
You know, they kind of grow in this gnarly way.
They're too small and crooked and gnarly to use even to make something as simple as
it says here, you know, just a pin to hang something on, you know, a pin to hang a vessel
on.
You know, you're not even going to make one of those things in your kitchen where you
like hang mugs from it or something, you know, or you hang the aprons on it or something.
He's saying, look, you're not going to use this type of wood to build anything, okay?
So, what is a vine good for?
A vine is good for one thing, and that's producing fruit.
And that's it.
It's not good for anything else.
And if it's not producing any fruit, then the only use you could get out of it, you're
not going to build anything out of it, is you could just use it to burn.
You could just use it for firewood.
And if it's not bringing forth fruit, it's pretty much good for burning, and that's about
it.
And so, obviously, this is an idea that's going to be brought up in the New Testament
in John, Chapter 15, where Jesus uses this analogy of I'm the vine, you're the branches.
Branches that bring forth fruit are going to be pruned or purged so that they can bring
forth more fruit.
But the branch that doesn't bring forth any fruit is taken away, it's good for nothing.
The only thing that men do with them is just gather them to be burned.
And so, this idea is already prevalent in the Old Testament that Israel was supposed
to bring forth fruit, and because they did not bring forth fruit, they're being punished
and their city is going to be put to fire and sword because they didn't bring forth
any fruit.
Already in the book of Isaiah, you have this analogy of Israel being the vineyard, and
God going to that vineyard, seeking fruit from it, and he's not getting any good fruit,
he's getting wild grapes, he's not getting anything usable from that vineyard.
And what does the New Testament say about this?
The kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits
thereof.
So Israel was supposed to bring forth fruit, Israel was supposed to be a light to the Gentiles,
Israel was supposed to make the word of the Lord known and the knowledge of the Lord to
cover the earth as the waters cover the sea.
They failed to bring forth fruit.
They've been replaced in the New Testament by Christians who actually do bring forth
the fruits thereof.
I mean, Christians evangelize the world.
You know, obviously Christians aren't perfect at it, but at least we're doing it, whereas
the children of Israel failed to do that.
And so this analogy of the vine tree is saying, look, I didn't plant you so that you could
produce, you know, planks of wood and boards and plywood so we could build structures.
No, you have a certain calling.
You've been created to do one thing, which is to bring forth fruit.
And if you're not going to bring forth fruit, then you're going to get torched because there's
really nothing else to do with you at that point.
And that's the analogy that God's using for Jerusalem.
Jerusalem is the vine tree that's going to be burned because it didn't bring forth fruit.
And then he says in verse five, behold, when it was whole, it was meat for no work.
How much less shall it be meat yet for any work when the fire hath devoured it and it is
burned.
He's saying, you know, after it's been burned, it's going to be even less productive.
It's going to be even less useful.
So burn it again.
Burn it more because it's good for nothing.
Look at verse six.
Therefore, thus sayeth the Lord God as the vine tree among the trees of the forest, which I've
given to the fire for fuel.
So will I give the inhabitants of Jerusalem and I will set my face against them.
They shall go out from one fire and another fire shall devour them.
Because remember, he says, look, if the vine doesn't bring forth fruit, burn it.
Okay, you've burned it.
Now what's it good for?
It's going to bring forth fruit now?
No, it's been burned.
So burn it more.
Burn it again.
Use it as charcoal, you know, just use it until it's completely gone.
And so God's saying that he's going to burn Jerusalem.
The inhabitants are going to get smoked and then he's going to do it again.
They're going to go out of one fire and into another.
And so this is a message of doom for the children of Israel.
And he says, I, when I set my face against them, you shall know that I am the Lord when
I set my face against them.
Now, God is not just glorified when he leads Israel to victory.
When he leads David to kill Goliath, when he leads Israel to defeat the Philistines,
that glorifies the God of Israel.
But what's interesting about this is that God is also glorified when he destroys Israel for their sins.
When he sets his face against them, then shall you know that I'm the Lord.
You see, if you study the Old Testament, you'll notice that a lot of the heathen nations around them,
when they go to war with their neighbors, they see it as a battle of the gods.
So basically, if the Assyrians are fighting against the Babylonians, it's like the gods of Assyria versus the gods of Babylon.
And if the Assyrians win, well, then that means their gods are more powerful.
And this is the way a lot of these pagans interpret the world.
I was reading in my Bible yesterday in 2 Chronicles where King Ahaz, he decides that he's going to start worshipping the gods of the Assyrians
because those gods have been giving them victory.
And then, of course, he gets punished by God.
But the point is that this is the way they think.
So in their mind, a defeat of Israel is a defeat of Israel's God.
And a defeat of other nations, same thing.
Whereas God is explaining in these prophetic books, in Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel,
that Israel's destruction is not because the gods of the heathen are defeating Israel's God.
It's not a defeat for Israel's God.
It's actually proof of God's power because God's saying, I'm the one that's destroying you.
So it's not like God doesn't have the power to protect Israel and so Israel gets defeated and it's a defeat of Israel's God.
No, no, no. Israel gets defeated because God himself brings the judgment and brings the punishment.
And so it's important for God to explain this because of the fact that Israel is surrounded by all these pagans who have this mentality.
And maybe it's not the mentality that we would have.
We would just think, oh, well, this military beat this other military because they just had better troops or better strategy or whatever.
And we would only think of the true one God as having any influence on these things.
But remember, these pagans, they're polytheistic.
And so they think, hey, we defeated Israel. Our God beat up your God or something.
But God's making it very clear in advance that when Israel gets destroyed, it's not because I can't protect them.
It's because I'm actually siding with Israel's enemies against Israel.
And so God himself, and we went over this a lot in the book of Jeremiah, God himself fights against Israel in this situation.
And this is very contrary to the doctrine that's out there that says that God is always on Israel's side and we have to always be on Israel's side.
It doesn't matter how wicked they are.
It doesn't matter how much Sodomite junk they have going on within their borders.
It doesn't matter if they reject the Messiah, reject the Lord Jesus Christ.
We've got to side with them.
But yet, throughout Scripture, we see the Lord himself siding against Israel when they are wicked.
And even rebuking the King of Judah for siding with Israel and saying, why are you siding with Israel?
They're wicked.
And so we need to clear up that false doctrine and realize that God will set his face against Israel, according to verse 7.
And setting his face against Israel brings him glory because he gets glory for destroying Israel.
And that's the way we look back at this and interpret the Babylonian captivity.
We don't see it as God's failure.
We see it as Israel's failure to keep God's law and their subsequent punishment by God himself.
God is using the Babylonians.
And of course, in Habakkuk chapter 1, it talks about how basically the Babylonians are going to give the glory to their God.
You know, Marduk or whatever.
And they're going to say that it was their God that allowed them to defeat Israel.
But God is saying, no, no, no.
It was me that allowed them to win.
And he says, I can lift them up and I can take them down.
And of course, he ends up destroying Babylon thereafter.
He says in verse 8, I will make the land desolate because they have committed a trespass, saith the Lord God.
Now, when we get into chapter 16, we get into the reasons for the doom and gloom of chapter 15.
So in chapter 15, he says, I'm going to burn you and then I'm going to burn you again.
And when I set my face against you, then you'll know that I'm the Lord.
Because I'm predicting this and I'm saying this is going to happen.
So in chapter 16, we get into the reason why God is so angry and why he's bringing this judgment.
It says in verse 1, again, the word of the Lord came unto me saying,
Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations and say,
Thus saith the Lord God unto Jerusalem, thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of Canaan.
Thy father was an Amorite and your mama was a Hittite and thy mother was a Hittite.
What's he saying here?
You know what he's saying here is that there's nothing special about you ethnically.
Again, a lot of people get this wrong idea about Israel that somehow it's their ethnicity that makes them special.
This makes no sense.
God is not a respecter of persons.
All nations before him are as nothing.
They're less than nothing.
He doesn't care if you're red, yellow, white, black, what nationality you are.
He doesn't look at people as being better because they're this ethnicity.
God is basically saying that genetically and ethnically, Israel is no different from her neighbors.
He says, your father was an Amorite and your mother's a Hittite.
Why? Because ethnically, obviously, Abraham is from that area.
He's from Ur of the Chaldees.
It's not that far away, folks.
And then when he comes into the land, he brings, of course, Sarah with him.
And then you've got Isaac marrying Rebecca from back home.
You've got Jacob marrying Rachel and Leah and having the handmaids from back home.
But here's the thing.
When it comes to the sons of Israel, though, the 12 sons of Israel, you know who they end up marrying some of them?
They end up marrying some local women.
You know, you've got, of course, Judah marrying Canaanite woman.
You've got Sheila being born from that union with Tamar and the family of the Sheila Heights.
Or, I'm sorry, excuse me.
You have Sheila being born from the union with the Canaanitish woman, who's a local woman, and having the family of the Sheila Heights.
Then you have Judah, of course, with Tamar having the additional sons of Pharaoh and Zerah.
So you have the Pharaohsites, the Zor Heights, and the Sheila Heights from Judah.
You know, who are these women?
They're Canaanites.
That's half the gene pool right there, okay?
Then you've got the children of Israel going down into Egypt, and Joseph's wife is an Egyptian.
So the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, I mean, Ephraim and Manasseh are half Egyptian.
You know, we could go on and on and just show all of the intermarriages and things, but again, there's nothing special about even Abraham's ethnicity.
He's from Syria.
So what?
So God is basically saying, you are no different ethnically than your neighbors.
The thing that sets them apart is a spiritual connection.
You know, that Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.
The children of Israel are beloved for the Father's sakes, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but there's nothing special about their nativity or their ethnicity,
because ethnically, they are just from that region of the Levant or Palestine, Syria, whatever you want to call it.
They're ethnically from that region.
They're just human beings, and there's nothing special about them genetically or ethnically.
And then he says in verse 4, and as for thy nativity, in the day thou wast born, thy navel was not cut, neither wast thou washed in water to supple thee.
Thou wast not salted at all, nor swaddled at all.
None eye pitied thee to do any of these unto thee, to have compassion upon thee, but thou wast cast out in the open field to the loathing of thy person in the day that thou wast born.
So here he's using an analogy of basically a baby who is born, and it's not taken care of.
It's just kind of discarded.
It's kind of just not taken care of.
Nobody's cutting the umbilical cord or salting it.
You know, do we salt our kids when they're born?
Or, you know, we need to look into that right now.
But anyway, you know, they're not taking care of it and swaddling it.
It's thrown out into the open field, and it says in verse 6, and when I passed by thee and saw thee polluted in thy own blood, I said unto thee, when thou wast in thy blood, live.
Yea, I said unto thee, when thou wast in thy blood, live.
I've caused thee to multiply as the bud of the field, and thou hast increased and waxen great, and thou hast come to excellent ornaments.
Thy breasts are fashioned, and thine hair is grown, whereas thou wast naked and bare.
So basically, he uses this analogy of basically finding a discarded baby still covered in blood from being born, not taken care of whatsoever, and he basically rescues it and saves its life.
Okay, the Lord does.
So Israel really has nothing going for it until the Lord comes along.
And then Israel grows up to become this beautiful woman, and basically, you know, is one whose breasts are fashioned, her hair is grown, and she's covered in excellent ornaments, wearing fine clothing, and grows up to be a beautiful woman, well-dressed.
All because of the Lord, because the Lord rescued her from just death when she's completely helpless and polluted and dirty and laying in a field.
Okay.
Now, what is this referring to?
Well, this reference to the breasts and the long hair and the nice clothes and the ornaments, you know, this would be a reference to Israel in their heyday.
So God takes Israel from nothing and allows them to grow into this amazing kingdom under King David and King Solomon.
You know, that would be the heyday when they are just most impressive, the most riches, the most power, the greatest military, and so forth is during David and Solomon.
And so that's pictured as the adult beautiful woman.
You know, you could think of that as the pinnacle or the heyday of that.
It says in verse 8, Now when I passed by thee and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love, and I spread my skirt over thee and covered thy nakedness.
Yea, I swear unto thee and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord God, and thou becamest mine, and then washed I thee with water, I thoroughly washed away thy blood from thee, and I anointed thee with oil.
I clothed thee with broidered work and shod thee with badger's skin and girded thee with fine linen, and I covered thee with silk.
I decked thee also with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thy hands and a chain on thy neck.
I put a jewel on thy forehead and earrings in thine ears and a beautiful crown upon thine head, thou wast decked with gold and silver, and thy raiment was of fine linen and silk and broidered work.
Thou didst eat fine flour and honey and oil, and thou wast exceeding beautiful, and thou didst prosper into a kingdom.
And again, the kingdom is not referring to the time in Egypt.
It's not referring to the time of the judges.
The kingdom specifically is when they have a king, which really reaches its pinnacle under David and then Solomon.
And thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy beauty, for it was perfect through my comeliness, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord God.
He's saying, look, the reason that you're so beautiful, it's not that you're just intrinsically beautiful.
It's that I decked you, cleansed you, put all this fine clothing on you and jewelry upon you.
I made you into what you are.
You were nothing without me, is what he's basically saying to Israel.
Verse 15 says, but doubt its trust in thy own beauty, and play it's the harlot because of thy renown, and pour it'st out thy fornication on everyone that passed by, his it was.
And of thy garments, thou didst take, and deck it's thy high places with diverse colors, and play it's the harlot thereon, the like thing shall not come, neither shall it be so.
So the analogy is that basically he takes her and adopts her and clothes her and covers her in ornaments and so forth and makes her into something beautiful.
And then what does she do?
She turns around and just uses that beauty to attract dudes, the wrong kind of dudes, and she just goes out playing the harlot with everybody who passes by.
So she just becomes just a sleazy woman who's just easy and she's just out playing the whore with everybody that passes by.
And she's taking the beautiful garments that he gave, the jewelry and the beautiful garments and stripping them and getting naked with these wicked men that she's fornicating with.
And then taking those garments that God gave to beautify her and using them to beautify basically ornaments or what's the word?
Shrines onto false gods, altars of false gods.
So the stuff that was from the Lord to beautify Israel, Israel's going to turn around and use that stuff to beautify the altars of a false god.
So basically all the gold and silver and precious things of the temple that was built by Solomon, a lot of that stuff is going to go toward the worship of other gods.
They're going to use all the wealth and money that Solomon brings in to build temples onto false gods and to deck out these high places and so forth.
So the analogy is that worshiping another god for Israel is like playing the whore or fornicating or being unfaithful to the Lord.
It's the same thing in the New Testament where the Bible says, ye adulterers and adulteresses know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God.
Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.
You know, God expects faithfulness to him.
Just as I'm to be faithful to my wife and she's supposed to be faithful to me, God expects Israel to be faithful to him.
And in the New Testament, God expects Christians to be faithful to him.
And worshiping other gods or being seduced by the things of this world where now all of a sudden instead of serving God with our lives, we're serving the cares of this world, it's sort of like a spiritual adultery.
It's like we're neglecting our lawful spouse, the one that we should be faithful to, and we're going out and just being with other people.
And that's what the analogy is here of Israel playing the whore.
It says in verse 17, thou hast also taken my fair jewels of my gold and of my silver, which I had given thee, and made us to thyself images of men, so building idols in the shape of human beings, and didst commit whoredom with them, and took as thy broidered garments and cover its them.
So, you know, you're clothing these statues of false gods and idols with the clothes that I gave you.
And thou hast set mine oil and mine incense before them, my meat also which I gave thee, fine flour and oil and honey wherewith I fed thee.
Thou hast even set it before them for a sweet savour, and thus it was, saith the Lord God.
Moreover, thou hast taken thy sons and thy daughters, whom thou hast borne unto me, and these hast thou sacrificed unto them to be devoured.
Is this of thy whoredoms a small matter, that thou hast slain my children and caused them to pass through the fire for them?
Now, look, you can see why God is so angry.
God is justified to completely destroy Jerusalem, to set his face against Jerusalem, to put Israel into captivity, because what?
Not only are they worshipping false gods, which is obviously wicked, to worship idols and to forsake the Lord and worship these false gods, take all the wealth and goodness that God gave them, and then bestow it on a demon or a devil, because that's who they're worshipping when they worship false gods.
According to the Bible, they're worshipping devils.
They're worshipping these devils, building idols, and so forth.
But not only that, one of the most disgusting things that they do is human sacrifices unto these false gods, and they do this with babies.
This is called infanticide, right? Murdering of babies.
And here's the thing, in the United States of America, we have this too. It's called Planned Parenthood.
It's called abortion. Just like people in the ancient world would sometimes murder a newborn baby or drink poisons to have an abortion or whatever, guess what?
There's nothing new under the sun, and the same thing's going on right now in America.
We've got people worshipping at the altar of Planned Parenthood and passing their sons and their daughters through the fire unto Molech, you know, burning their children, killing their children.
Now, you know, they may not be throwing them into the fire, but they're using a saline solution or whatever to burn their flesh, to burn them and destroy them in their mother's womb.
It's disgusting and evil.
And so America is guilty of this same thing, where we used to be a Christian nation, and in God we trust, and we're worshipping the Lord, and the Bible went into our laws and our system of government.
But yet now today, in many ways, we've become a pagan nation, and people are more interested in the God of money, they're serving mammon instead of God, and because of that, they will kill their own children through abortion.
You know, look at the reasons why people have abortions. What do they say? Oh, you know, I'm just not ready to have a child.
But it's pretty much a financial reason that typically comes up as why they're not ready, because they can't afford it.
But, you know, affording children is something that you should think about before conceiving them, number one.
But number two is that, you know, affording children is really just based on priorities.
It's not like these people that are saying that they can't afford children are living hand to mouth and don't know where their next meal is going to come from.
People in America are not starving to death. I don't care what anybody says, America is not starving to death.
There is plenty of food going around. Even poor people, even homeless people have so much food, they don't even know what to do with it, they can't even finish their food.
And don't tell me I'm wrong about this, because I ride my bicycle all over Tempe, and I see it with my own eyes.
And, you know, a few weeks ago or months ago, I brought up a particular overpass that bothered me.
So yesterday, I went over that same overpass. And, you know, I went on it northbound and then I went southbound.
And remember, southbound was the really bad side, where it was just, and I remember now where it was, it was rural road crossing over the 60.
So one side is a little wider than the other and has like a chain link kind of going over it. It's a pedestrian overpass over the freeway next to rural.
The other side is a little more minimal, right? But it's still concrete on both sides and it's a little pathway.
So I'm riding northbound and it was just filled with trash. Just all kinds of fast food and junk food, trash.
Because these stinking bums, not only do they not work for their food, but then when they eat the food they didn't work for, they just throw it on the ground.
Even though there are trash receptacles literally everywhere. Everywhere. Like, it'd be one thing if there were no trash cans.
But go around the city of Tempe, you don't have to go very far to get to the trash. I don't care who you are, where you are.
I mean, there are public trash. Every bus stop has a trash can. All the businesses have trash cans.
There are trash cans everywhere. But you just see these people, they just eat and throw it on the ground.
But not only that, and this is what really bothers me, they don't finish their food.
You can even maybe consider this a Thanksgiving tie-in if you want.
You know, because it's food related.
I mean, talk about, you know, here's one way to be thankful for your food. Eat it!
I mean, how thankful am I for my food if I don't even eat it? If I take a few bites and just throw it away.
If my parents send me a lunch and I take my lunch and I end up just throwing away my lunch because I didn't eat it, I don't think I was very thankful for that lunch, was I?
But these bums, not only do they throw their trash on the ground, they don't even finish their food.
So as I'm riding northbound, there's just all these packages of food and you look, I'm looking at them.
You know, when you drive by, you don't see this stuff. When you're on the bike, you see more.
You slow down, you're closer. You see that all the food is like half full, even totally full.
There was like a bag of Cheetos that it had to be 90% full.
I mean, it was just spilling. The cup was running over of Cheetos.
It was just teeming with Cheetos and I'm just looking, I'm just like, what is going on here?
And it's just all junk food, all the most unhealthy junk food and it's all half eaten, trash, whatever.
So, you know, I rode by and just thought, oh man, what's the deal? Why can't they finish their food?
Then, you know, a little bit later, I'm coming back the same way and night had fallen.
So it's like 6.30 PM or something. I'm riding southbound and I'm on the other side, the big wide side with the roof over it,
which is usually even junked up worse and there's more bums just trashing the place.
This time they've taken it to a whole new level because they have pitched a tent that literally filled the entire pathway from wall to wall.
So the tent is up against the concrete on this side, up against the concrete on this side and it was just like a big like six man tent just blocking the path, blocking the road as it were.
I mean, it's, you know, it's for bikes and pedestrians and look, a lot of people are walking down rural and riding their bikes down rural at that time.
It's a busy street, not just for cars but for pedestrians. You know, that's how some people get around.
They get around on their bike, they get around on foot. That's how I get around a lot.
My wife and I share a vehicle and I have a church vehicle for church stuff and I do a lot of just stuff just on foot or on my bike.
And so, you know, I'm riding toward this blockade and I'm just like, I'm not stopping.
I'm going through this thing, you know what I mean? Because I'm like, why should I sit here and stop my bike, push a little button and have to wait to cross rural and wait, you know what I mean?
Like, I'm trying to get home. This is the path. This path is made for me.
My tax dollars pay for this path. You know, other pedestrians need to go down this path.
I guess everybody else is just turning around and crossing and going through their other little trash side.
So I'm just like, I'm going for it, you know. So I just biked through the tent, okay.
So I just, I bike up against the side of it and basically my strategy was to kind of bike over the left side and to crash through the left side of the tent and then kind of just push it away and kind of try to get between the tent and the concrete wall.
So I kid you not, because I figured like this will be easy to just crash through because it's just a tent, just kind of bust through on the left side, but I kid you not, I run into a person in the tent.
Like, the tent was so full of people and I don't know if they're all just getting high in there or what, because it's not bedtime.
It's 6.30, it's not bedtime, okay. They just sleep, sleep in the night, but they're all in there doing who knows what, getting high or whatever they're doing, and I come busting through and I run into a body.
And so I just like, I shove this body like through the tent, I don't even see who I'm shoving, because I mean it's just, I'm just like out of the way, you know, because I'm trying to get my bike through here.
I'm like, I'm going this way, this is the path. So I was just like shove this, I'm shoving the tent, I'm shoving this guy, then this head pops out of the tent.
And it was like, the guy's face, he wasn't even mad. He wasn't even mad, he just kind of looked like, oh, sorry.
It's like, what is this? But then now that I think about it, the guy's head probably wasn't even the guy that I shoved, it was probably like a domino effect where I shoved this guy, and then that shoved the guy next to him, next to him, and then some head popped out.
You know, and this all happened in a matter of seconds. Just kind of crashed through, shoved the bomb, shoved the tent, it's like fighting my way through this tent.
And it was like, it was still faster than crossing the street, so I have no regrets.
But it's just, you know, these people aren't starving. There's food everywhere. There's food all around the tent, half eaten, trash, junk, food, and these are the people that are supposedly, you know, hungry, so hungry, anything helps, God bless.
If you're hungry, you'll finish your Cheetos, because you know what, I've been hungry before, and I ate the whole bag! If I'm hungry, I don't stop until the bag is empty, and then I'm, you know, I'm shaking out the powder.
Those of us who work for a living, you know, we're licking the lid of the container, and we're sticking our finger in and getting out every little morsel.
Now, can somebody tell me what this has to do with the sermon? I got a little bit off track, okay. But anyway, we're not starving in America. Nobody's hungry in America. Okay, what did that have to do with the sermon? Somebody help me out.
Yes! All right. Yeah, so here's the thing. When people are saying like, oh, I have to have this abortion because I can't afford the baby, it's not because they're starving, because there are all kinds of food banks. Here's the thing, these food banks in Arizona, they can't even get rid of the food.
Middle class people start getting the food from the food banks because they're just like, okay, we don't even need you to be poor anymore. We just need someone to eat all this food.
And so we have a lot of middle class friends and stuff that are just constantly hitting up food banks and just loading up at food banks just to save a little money on groceries because there's just so much to go around.
It's not that people are starving. It's that they've got to have all their toys and they've got to have their booze money. I mean, alcohol is expensive. Alcohol is expensive. Going out and partying is expensive. Dining out is expensive. Drugs are expensive.
It's not that people can't afford having a kid. It's that they choose to spend their money on other things because you could lower your standard of living and actually have the kid that you conceived.
And you know what? If you're not ready to have kids, don't get married. And if you're not married, don't have sex. It's that simple, folks. You keep that within marriage.
You don't just open your feet to everyone that passes by, as Ezekiel said in Chapter 16 here. No, you don't just be the slut described in Ezekiel 16.
But no, you actually wait until you're married to have that relationship and the product of that relationship is a child and you have the dad that's going out and working hard and bringing home the bacon.
And since we live in the land of opportunity, since we live in one of the most prosperous countries in the world, since we're in America and everybody's hiring, literally everyone is hiring, you need to have that kid.
And you're not like, oh, I'm just not ready. Well, you should have thought about that before you entered into that relationship.
And murder is never right. You can't murder your baby for any reason. It doesn't matter how inconvenient it is or whatever.
And obviously, most of these babies that are being murdered, the vast majority are the products of fornication. They're not the products of a married couple, let's face it.
So if you quit with the fornication, that would get rid of a lot of the abortion right there anyway in the first place.
But even some married people would even do this, unfortunately. And it's wickedness. It's not less wicked because you did it right before it was born.
There's not something magical that happens at birth where the baby is suddenly alive now or it's suddenly human now. It's human from the moment it's conceived.
I mean, how many times do we have examples in the Bible of babies in their mother's womb reacting and when Elizabeth comes into contact with the Virgin Mary and the babe leaps in the womb and everything because of the fact that that's a human being?
Okay. We can go on and on about that, but I'm not going to. But fornication, abortion, worshipping other gods. It says in verse number, let's pick up where we left off here.
It says thou has built, where was I? 22. And in all thine abominations and thy whoredoms thou has not remembered the days of thy youth when thou was naked and bare and was polluted in thy blood.
And it came to pass after all thy wickedness, whoa, whoa unto thee, saith the Lord God. Don't you love that little interjection?
That thou has also built unto thee an eminent place and has made a high place in every street. Of course, the high places are where they worship other gods. Okay.
But here's what I want to wrap up tonight with a thanksgiving thought for you. Okay. Is that he says, look, in all of your partying and fornicating and carrying on and doing all these horrible things and worshipping other gods.
It's like you never stopped and remembered how I rescued you when you were an outcast and you were polluted in your own blood. You haven't stopped to think about that, you know, where you came from.
And I think there's an important lesson there for us today to always remember where we came from and to always remember that everything that we have comes from God.
Everything we have comes from God, period. And don't get all smug and think that you're so great and you're so righteous. And look, please don't go out of here and say that I hate homeless people because I don't.
Let me tell you something. I am confronted by these homeless people constantly because I'm constantly walking and riding my bike places. So I'm constantly right there with these people.
And I will tell you the emotion that I have most frequently, 99% of the time. It's not anger. I feel bad for these people because their lives are so pathetic. It's ridiculous.
And unfortunately, they've chosen this lifestyle. No one has to live that lifestyle in America today. No way. If you have a pulse, you're hired right now. I'm not kidding.
I mean, everybody's hiring. There are all kinds of menial jobs you can get. And the minimum wage is high enough to where you can survive. You can live on that. You don't have to be homeless.
Okay. I will admit I was angry when I crashed through the tent. I'll admit I'm not going to lie to you. I was mad because I'm trying to ride my bike and this obstacle is in my way and I did lose my temper.
Okay. I'll admit that. But that's not how I normally feel. Normally, I'll look at the bag of Cheetos and get mad. But when I look at these people, I feel bad for them.
Because if you look at their faces, if you actually stand next to them, because I'm constantly standing next to them, pushing the little button and waiting for the light to turn green and standing next to them, you look at these people and they're so sad.
They're so depressed and they have no dignity and no self-respect. You can just tell that they're so beaten down. But it's like, listen kids, drugs don't make you happy kids. Drunkenness doesn't make you happy.
And you know, anytime you're tempted kids to think about taking drugs or to think about drinking alcohol, just look out the window as you drive through Tempe and look at these people by the side of the road and ask yourself if that's where you want to end up because that's how those people ended up there through drugs and alcohol.
And let it be a lesson to you. And when you want to just burn everyone in your life, when you just want to burn your relationship with your parents and burn your relationship with your siblings and burn your relationship with church and just kind of give the finger to all of your whole circle of family and friends, just remember these people also did that which is why no one's helping them.
See, here's the thing. You know, if I ended up losing everything, you know, I could turn to my mom, I could turn to my dad, I could turn to my brother, I could turn to my sister, I could turn to my church, I could turn to other churches, you know what I mean?
You want to have those people in your life that you can turn, don't just burn everyone around you, destroy your relationship with your parents, destroy your relationship with siblings, destroy your relationship with the church and then you're all by yourself and then you get into trouble and there's nobody there to help you.
Drugs, alcohol, destroying family relationships, these are the type of lessons you should take.
And you know, some people would say, oh, you shouldn't think that when you look by them. You know what the Bible says? The Bible says I went by the field of the slothful man and I took lessons from it, I took instruction from it and it motivated me to work hard so I don't end up like that guy.
That's what the Bible says. Okay. And look, I'm for giving them the gospel, I'm for helping them and anybody who has actually wanted help from us that actually wanted to get their life together, we have helped them.
We've gotten them hotel room, we've given them clothes, we've taken them to get a job, but typically when we tell these people, all right, let's take you to go get a job, we got a place that's hiring today because we know where the spots are.
Typically it's like, well, can I go Friday? I'm a little busy. Oh, your calendar's a little booked, oh homeless man.
You think you could pencil us in a little later in the week to get your butt out working?
But I'm telling you, my friend, that when we look at that and see that, you know, we should also realize that that could be us if it were not for the Lord.
Like if we did not have the Lord guiding us, if we didn't have Christ in our hearts and if we didn't have the word of God giving us wisdom, that could be us.
And you say, oh, I'd never end up like that. I could never end up like that. Yeah, you could. I mean, think about it. I'm not going to ask for a raise of hands, but think about what you were like before you were saved.
You know what? I bet, I'm not going to ask for a raise of hands. I bet there are people in here who probably took drugs at some point, you know, in the past.
I hope nobody's on drugs right now, you know, but the point is, I guarantee you there are probably people in here that took drugs in the past.
Well, you know what? Thank God that you're here right now and that God has delivered you from that fate of where drugs will eventually take you.
And even if you say, well, I was never going to go that far with it, you know what? I've personally known people who got one bad batch of drugs and their minds just fried.
One bad batch. Oh, no, no. I just smoked pot. Yeah, until you get the pot that's laced with something else that they didn't tell you about.
And I could tell you story after story about the people who got one bad batch of drugs and spent the rest of their life just not there.
Just out wandering around the city. You know, I remember there was a guy in Sacramento who used to walk around with a CD in his hand, screaming at his own reflection in the CD.
The guy's insane. But there are all kinds of people like that. And I'm telling you, a lot of it is from bad drugs. Overdose of drugs or whatever. It can happen.
You know, I can tell you right now, if I had not been raised in a Christian home, if I had not been raised in a Christian home, I know that in my flesh, well, it's no good thing.
I know myself. And you can look inside your heart, too. I can look inside my own heart. I know that without the Bible and without Christ and without the Word of God as my guide, I can guarantee you I would have been out there partying and sinning and fornicating and doing all that.
It's true. I'll just be honest. It's the Word of God and my Christian upbringing that saved me from that stuff.
So it's really nothing that I can glory of like, oh, I'm better than these people. I'm not better than those people. Because but for the grace of God, there go I.
You know, if I did not have parents that brought me up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and if I did not have the Book of Proverbs ingrained in me as a young man, and if I didn't have the Bible and church scaring me into serving God by the fear of the Lord.
The fear of the Lord being the beginning of knowledge and wisdom and understanding and the fear of the Lord causing me to depart from evil.
You know, I could have easily gone down many dark paths, you know, and I could have ended up a very wicked, rotten person and ended up, you know, destroying my life and being miserable and being out there, you know, at the end of my rope or whatever.
Thank God for Christian parents. And you know, you kids that are growing up in a Christian home, you don't even realize how good that you have it.
You know, I grew up in a Christian home and I'm so thankful because I know that that's what caused me to be living the life that I'm living right now.
You know, it's not because there's something special about me. It's because my mom and dad were Christians and raised me in the Word of God.
That's why I'm here right now. I wouldn't be here if it weren't for my parents. Okay. And you know what? I've lived a very happy life. I've been very blessed. I'm very happy right now. It's been great.
And it's been great because I've been following the Lord and I've been following the Lord because my parents from a child taught me the Holy Scriptures.
And you know, if you're here today and you grew up in a Christian home, you should be thanking God every day, but especially tomorrow on Thanksgiving. Thank God for Christian parents.
Thank God for Christian parents because that's why you're here. And you know what? If you have Christian parents and then you go out and be an idiot anyway, and you go out and get drunk and take drugs and fornicate anyway,
you are going to get a serious whooping from the Lord. Even if you're saved, you're going to get some mad chastening out there.
And if you're not saved, wow, you're going to really split hell wide open. It's going to be really hot for you if you could grow up hearing all this gospel preaching and not get saved and hear the gospel clearly from your parents and not get saved.
But you know what? You say, well, Pastor Anderson, what am I supposed to be thankful for, you know, because I didn't grow up in a Christian home. So what am I going to be thankful for tomorrow?
You know what you ought to be thankful for if you didn't grow up in a Christian home is that basically that God took you up because here you are now.
So you got saved at some point. You came to Christ at some point. And here's the thing.
You know, this baby in the story who's, you know, mother is a Hittite and father is an Amorite, right?
I mean, was adopted by who? You know, the Lord. And the Bible says, when my mother and father forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.
And so those of you who didn't grow up in a Christian home and you say, oh, man, you know, I had a gnarly childhood and I lived a life of sin in my 20s or whatever.
You know what? Thank God that you were able to get out of that before it was too late and that you got the gospel, that you got saved and that you changed the course of the direction of your life so that now you can be blessed.
And you know what? We have a lot of people in our church that in fact, the vast majority of people in our church did not grow up in a Christian home.
The vast majority of people in our church got saved later in life.
And so they know that what I'm saying is true because they've kind of seen the other side and they know there's nothing there worth having.
But those that have lived that rough life, you know, remember how God has taken you out of that and be thankful for that.
Be thankful for the fact that you could have gone further into that and that basically now you're being blessed by God.
And we have tons of people in our church who did not grow up in a Christian home, but yet now they're living godly lives.
They have families. They have Christian homes and they're living productive, happy, godly lives.
So the bottom line is don't make the mistake that Israel made where they kind of forgot where they came from.
Instead of whining about all the things about your life that aren't perfect, think about how bad your life could have been or think about where you came from if you've been in that bad situation already.
There's a lot for all of us to be thankful for because everything we have is from God. If we have a nice place to live, that's from God.
If we have a good job, that's from God. If the turkey's good tomorrow, thank God.
If the green bean casserole is there in spite of the supply chain problems, thank God.
Because Panda Express has been out of green beans for like a month. I can testify to that.
But you know what? I saw my wife chopping green beans this afternoon.
So the supply chain has come through for us because of the fact that the green bean casserole is my favorite part of the meal.
And there's no amens on that.
Come on, the crunchies on top? The onion crunchies? Can I get a witness?
But look, you know what? All the good food, every good thing, every good gift and every perfect gift is from above.
And so God gives us the power to get wealth. God gives us our daily bread. God gave us that turkey and that food.
I bought it myself. Yeah, with the money that you made, with the talents and the skills and the brain, God gave you.
Everything we have is from God. We owe Him thanks for everything that we've done.
And don't come at me with these Facebook posts about how Thanksgiving's a bad holiday. I'm not interested, all right?
I like Thanksgiving. And we all need to stop and give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good because His mercy endured forever.
And so whether you grew up in a Christian home, that's a huge thing to be thankful for.
Or if you lived a sinful life and you were able to successfully get on a right path of serving God, that's another big thing to be thankful for.
Both of those things should have us praising God tomorrow. Let's not ever forget where we came from or where we could have ended up without the Lord.
And as it says here, she trusted in her own beauty instead of realizing, hey, God gave me everything that I have.
Let's not trust in our own brains or our own brawn or our own beauty or our own wisdom.
Let's realize that everything we have comes from the hand of God and be thankful for it. Let's bow our heads in our word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for the book of Ezekiel, Lord, and we just pray that every single person here would be thankful to you and acknowledge you.
And to realize just how good we have it in America and especially how good we have it as Christians.
And Lord, I pray that everyone would just have a blessed Thanksgiving and that the time with family would be sweet tomorrow.
And that there would also be a time of acknowledging you in every house. Let no one who's here tonight fail to acknowledge you at Thanksgiving tomorrow.
And in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Amen. Please turn your song books to hymn number 441.
Great is Thy faithfulness, number 441.
Let's sing it out all together on that first verse. Hymn number 441.
Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father.
There is no shadow of turning with Thee.
Thou changest not by compassion's they fail not.
As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.
Great is Thy faithfulness, great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
Summer and winter and springtime and harvest.
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above.
Join with all nature in medical witness.
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.
Great is Thy faithfulness, great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
Pardon for sin and the peace that endureth.
My own dear presence to cheer and to guide.
Strength for today and pride, hope for tomorrow.
Blessings all mine with ten thousand beside.
Great is Thy faithfulness, great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
Morning by morning new mercies I see.