Now, we're almost done with our study of the book of Hebrews, and as I mentioned, I think, on Sunday,
I feel like the last four chapters in the book of Hebrews are the main chapters.
I feel like chapters one through nine is sort of laying a foundation.
Paul starts out at the beginning of the book pretty much trying to prove to these Jews,
prove to the Hebrews, that Jesus really is God in the flesh.
Jesus really is the Savior.
He really is the Lamb of God, the sacrifice that would come and die for their sins.
And then as he gets into seven, eight, and nine, he goes on to explain the Old Testament sacrifices,
what they really meant, everything that they really stood for, all the symbolism there.
Then when he gets into chapters ten, eleven, twelve, and thirteen,
Paul closes out this great book in the Word of God with just straight preaching.
I mean, chapters ten, eleven, twelve, and thirteen is just the climax of the book,
where Paul just really starts preaching.
He's laid all the foundation, he's done all the teaching,
and now he just starts to make the application and the preaching in these last four chapters.
These are the greatest chapters of the book.
These are the most quoted.
These are the ones that really are the best ones.
And so I'm excited about the lesson tonight in chapter twelve.
Look at verse number one there.
The Bible says,
We're for seeing we also.
Now, the we also is referring to the people that we learned about last week.
We learned about in Hebrews chapter eleven all these great characters of the Old Testament
and some that are not named.
And God is saying,
the same way they were compassed about with a great cloud of witnesses,
let us follow their example
and lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us,
and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.
Now, you wonder sometimes in a church like ours,
why is there so much preaching against sin?
And you say, good night brother Anderson, you know, preach on the love of God, you know.
Preach on Jesus on the cross, preach on the death, burial, and resurrection.
I love to preach on those things. Those things are vital.
But the reason that we do have a lot of preaching on sin is because sin is what's holding us back,
all of us, from serving God.
That's what the Bible says here.
It says, look, we've seen the example of the people of the past.
We've seen these great men of God in the Old Testament described in chapter eleven.
He says, we know what happened to them.
We know about their sin. We know about their triumph.
Let's lay aside every weight.
Let's not hold anything back from God and say, well, I'm going to get rid of every sin,
but I'm going to hang on to this one sin.
He says, no, let's lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us,
and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.
God says, the thing that's hindering us our Christian life is sin.
The thing that just, it's so easy for sin to hold us back, God's saying here.
He's saying, you want to serve God, you want to win people to Christ,
you want to turn your life around, you want to do great things for God,
but it's the sin that's besetting you, that's holding you back.
And we've got to lay aside every weight. Let's face it.
If we're going to run, as we preached a few weeks ago on a Sunday morning,
about running in the Christian life, not walking and meandering through life,
but God said to run, if we're going to run, we've got to lay aside every weight
and the sin which doth so easily beset us.
Now, you notice two things to listen to there, the weight and the sin.
He says, lay aside the weight and the sin.
The weight is something that's not necessarily a sin,
but it's just something that's taking up your time,
it's eating up all your energy and your time,
and it's holding you back from serving God.
You know, for example, you could say certain hobbies.
Now, there's nothing wrong with having hobbies.
Hobbies are great. You know, sports, you know, good clean activities.
They're great. I mean, I have hobbies that I enjoy.
But as soon as that hobby begins to rob time from reading the Bible,
as soon as that hobby or that activity or that pastime or whatever it is
starts to take priority over church attendance,
it starts to take priority over the things of God,
that's when it becomes a weight and that's when it's time to lay it aside.
There are many things in my life that I've just laid aside
that were not necessarily sinful, things that I love to do.
For example, I used to be heavily involved in kickboxing,
love kickboxing, love martial arts, love fighting sports.
But I just have had to lay that aside for now
because I'm moving towards something that's far greater
than getting in a ring and fighting with people
for recreation and for health and so forth.
I'm working towards something that's so much greater than that.
I'm just going to lay that aside.
There are so many hobbies that I've had.
Now, is there anything sinful about kickboxing? Absolutely not.
Is there, you know, I used to play piano.
I used to play piano for hours a day.
Is there anything sinful about playing piano?
Absolutely not. Playing piano is a wonderful thing.
But I have personally laid that aside
because here's the way I am as a person,
and maybe you're not like this,
that I'm kind of an obsessive person.
When I do something, man, I just want to do it
with everything I've got.
I mean, if I was doing kickboxing,
I was going every day, every single day.
Now, that's going to be a weight for me.
Now, someone else who can do it in moderation
and just go a couple times a week and so forth,
that's great, great recreation.
But for me, I get so into it that it becomes a weight for me
and it just sucks me in.
Same thing with playing piano.
Boy, I would get so involved in playing piano
that I would not serve God like I should.
I wouldn't be reading my Bible like I should.
I wouldn't be winning souls like I should.
And so I always have to stop and monitor
just my priorities in life,
just how I'm dividing up my time in each day and each week
and say what is important and what is not.
Let's face it, there's only 24 hours in a day
between work, between family, between serving the Lord,
between my own walk with God, studying the Bible
and whatever activities and things you have in your life,
something's got to give, let's face it.
But I remember when I was in Bible college,
full-time in college, full-time at work,
overtime at work many times, family, three kids,
a child born while I was at college,
out on the bus routes on Saturday and Sunday,
something always had to suffer, let's just face it.
I couldn't just excel at everything.
I had to decide, planned,
I had to plan and neglect certain things
because something has to give, let's face it.
So you better decide what's important to you in life
and lay aside some weights
so that you can run in the Christian life,
not just walk, not just stroll through life
as most Christians do,
but say, no, I'm going to take off the weights,
I'm going to get ready, I'm going to run
and I'm going to do something big for God
because I'm not going to let things slow me down
and hold me back.
But we preached the whole sermon on that,
so I don't want to belabor that point.
But look at verse number two there, it says,
looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.
Boy, I've noticed this, the word author
is only used in the Bible three times, the word author.
One is when the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 14,
when it's talking about so-called tongue speaking,
which is all the blabbering and crazy stuff people,
it says God is not the author of confusion,
is what God says in 1 Corinthians 14.
He says this is not of God where people are blabbering
and somebody's saying one thing over here
and two people are talking at the same time.
God said in church, only one person should be talking
at a time in church, one person talking at a time.
It says if one person's talking,
other person's supposed to be quiet.
It's not supposed to be a thing where we're all talking
and going around, that's not the way it works.
One person speaks at a time in church
because God is not the author of confusion.
The second time that the word author is used
is in the book of Hebrews in chapter five
when we read that Jesus Christ became the author
of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him.
So Jesus Christ is the author of eternal salvation
and then the third time the word author is used
is right here where the Bible says
that Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith.
Now we studied the word faith last week
and we found out that faith is seeing something
that other people don't see.
It's seeing the invisible.
It's seeing something that God has promised us in our word
that cannot be, in his word,
that we cannot see with our physical eyes
but we believe it because God said it.
And we talked about how the word faith
is sometimes thrown around and people say,
well, I'm gonna do such and such, I just have faith.
But their faith is not based on the word of God.
And we showed going down through Hebrews chapter 11
that of all these people who were living by faith,
who were acting on faith, it was always based on God's word.
That's where their faith came from.
It talks about over and over.
And I don't wanna re-preach last week's message
but every time it says that they received
some kind of promise, they got some kind of a word from God.
That's what faith is based on.
So what I'm trying to say is that Jesus
is the author of our faith.
Jesus is the author of our salvation
but faith covered by hearing the word of God.
I wanna tell you that Jesus is the author of this book.
You wanna look through this book and say,
who wrote this book?
Was it written by a man?
You're looking through this book and you say,
I wanna know who wrote this book.
You know, you preach out of this book
like it's some kind of an authority.
It's like if it says it in this book, it has to be true.
Well, who wrote it?
Was it written by a man?
Was it written by Moses?
Was it written by David?
Was it written by the apostle Paul?
Well, just do a little word search on the word author
and you'll find out who the author of this book is.
The author is Jesus Christ.
Bible says he is the author of our faith.
Everything about our faith is right here.
Faith cometh by hearing, the Bible says,
and hearing by the word of God.
That's Romans 10, 17.
And so this is where our faith is
and this book is authored by Jesus Christ.
But notice something else.
It says he's the author and the finisher of our faith.
That implies he's the one who started it
and he's the one that's gonna finish it.
Now in Revelation chapter 1, I'm gonna turn there quickly
because this theme throughout the book of Hebrews
is brought up so many times about Jesus being God.
You know, there are some cults out there
like the Mormons, the Jehovah's Witnesses
who do not believe that Jesus is God.
They believe he's some kind of a lesser being,
some kind of a lesser created being.
But the book of Hebrews just rings this bell
over and over, I mean just over and over again.
Starting in chapter 1, we saw in Hebrews 1, 8
where the Bible says, but unto the Son he saith.
He's talking to Jesus Christ.
Thy throne, oh God, is forever and ever.
Then we saw in Hebrews chapter 3 where God says,
for this man, speaking of Jesus,
hath more glory than Moses,
and as much as he who hath builded the house
hath more honor than the house.
He said the comparison between Jesus and Moses
is like you're comparing the guy who built the house
versus the house itself.
And he says, for every house is builded by some man,
but he that built all things is God, that's Jesus Christ.
But listen to this, this is Revelation chapter 1.
The Bible says, and this is Jesus speaking,
I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending.
So just like it said, Jesus is the author
and the finisher of our faith.
Jesus says, I'm the beginning and I'm the ending.
Now, he doesn't sound like he was ever created.
It doesn't sound like he ever came into existence
like that he was born in Bethlehem.
No, it sounds like he was the beginning.
You wonder, we talked about so many times
how you read through the whole Bible,
Jesus is the theme of the book, the whole Bible,
from Genesis 1 all the way to the end.
How far do you have to read in the Bible
before you get to Jesus?
In the beginning, okay, there's Jesus.
He's the beginning.
Then you get in the beginning, God.
There he is again.
In the beginning, God created.
The Bible says Jesus is the creator.
That's how much Jesus is in the Bible.
This is in Genesis 1, 1.
And so Jesus is the beginning.
Jesus is the end.
He says here, I am the first and the last.
I am he that liveth and was dead,
and behold, I am alive forevermore.
Jesus is saying here, I'm the beginning, I'm the ending,
I'm the first, I'm the last, I'm the author,
and I'm the finisher.
That's Jesus Christ.
This book, Hebrews, is just constantly exalting Jesus Christ
and lifting him up to the position
that he needs to have in our mind
as the God and creator of the world.
But look back, if you would, at Hebrews chapter two,
I'm sorry, Hebrews chapter 12 here,
and the Bible says in verse two,
who for the joy that was set before him
endured the cross, despising the shame,
and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
So the Bible's saying we're supposed to run this race
looking to Jesus, who for the joy that was set before him
endured the cross, despising the shame.
You know, Jesus said, if any man will follow me,
it says if any man will come after me,
let him take up his cross and follow me.
And must Jesus bear the cross alone
and all the world go free?
No, there's a cross for everyone,
and there's a cross for me,
as the song goes in the songbook.
God is saying here Jesus suffered
for the joy that was set before him.
We've got some joy that's set before us.
One day we're gonna get to heaven,
and we're gonna see Jesus Christ face to face.
We're gonna see the pearly gates open.
We're gonna walk on the streets of gold.
We're gonna walk into heaven.
We're gonna hear the cheering and applause
of those that have gone before us,
saying yes, good job, you made it, you did it.
Not that you made it into heaven by good works,
but that you did it, you ran with patience
the race that was set before you.
You're gonna be crowned with a crown of righteousness.
Hallelujah, boy, that's gonna be exciting
when we get to heaven and walk through the gates.
Boy, loved ones are there, saying man, good job,
you're made, all right, good, you know.
It's exciting.
That's gonna be some joy.
Boy, I can't wait to see my grandpa when I get there.
My grandpa, who was a soul winner.
My grandpa who used to knock doors.
I went down to Southern California a few years ago
to Canoga Park, where my grandpa was one to the Lord,
where my parents were one to the Lord in the church there,
in Faith Baptist Church in Canoga Park.
And I went to that church, and I talked
to Dr. Roland Rasmussen, the pastor of the church.
And boy, he knew me, he knew everything about it.
He has a phenomenal memory.
He had, I mean, he'd never even met me.
But he remembered my grandpa from just 20
to 30 years ago, every detail.
He knew his street address, he knew everything about it.
And I went up to Dr. Rasmussen, and I talked to him,
and he asked me, he said, hey, are you still,
are you going to Baptist Church,
are you using the King James Bible?
I said yes, and he was thrilled to hear that.
And I said, boy, tell me about my grandpa.
Tell me about Dwayne Anderson.
And you know what he said, is the first thing
that came out of his mouth, he said,
man, that guy knocked a lot of doors.
Hallelujah, man, that's the kind of grandpa
that I'm so glad I am.
I didn't know my grandpa very well.
He died when I was nine years old.
But you know what he did, he knocked a lot of doors.
He won people to Christ.
I can't wait to walk through the doors of heaven
and see my grandpa, and have him say,
hey, good job, thanks for carrying on the legacy, Steve.
Thanks for doing what I did.
Thank you.
Boy, that's some joy.
Think about the joys of heaven.
We can go on and on, a whole message
of just the excitement of getting to heaven.
It's going to be more exciting the more we do for Christ.
That's why God says, hey, for the joy that was said before,
he endured the cross.
Look, endure the cross that God has laid on you.
Endure the cross, so to speak, in your life
because of the joy that's going to be revealed.
Now look, you can live it up now if you want.
Go ahead and live it up, and try it,
and see that the world doesn't really
have that much to offer anyway.
But try and live it up, and do all the fun,
and all the kicks, and all the excitement,
and have all the fun now.
And pretty soon, it's all just going to get boring, and old,
and blah.
And it's just vanity of vanities, as Ecclesiastes says.
Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher, all is vanity.
Or you can say, I'm going to endure the cross now.
I'm going to suffer a little bit.
I'm going to fight the fight right now.
I'm going to run the race now.
I'm going to endure with patience, looking unto Jesus,
and I'm going to have the joy later on.
I'm not going to get to heaven and say, oh, rah, rah.
But boy, I didn't really, I don't have any grandpa
to run up to and say I was a soul winner.
Because I see my grandpa, it's like,
I didn't win anybody to Christ, I'm glad you did.
But it's not going to be quite as exciting, is it?
But if we say, you know what, let's buckle down.
Let's do something.
I mean, we do rather see Jesus.
Let's say you died and see Jesus Christ.
Do you want to walk up to him and have him say, man,
I'm glad you're safe, good to be here.
And I died on the cross for you to see
that these are the nails in my hands.
It's where they pierced my side.
And I did this for you, and I love you.
And do you want to just say to him, well, thanks.
Or do you want to say, boy, I thank you so much.
And these are all the people that I brought with me,
because I thought that what you did was so important.
I didn't want any of you to be wasted,
because I know you died for everybody.
But I didn't want any of what you did to be wasted.
So these are all the people that I brought with me.
And this is my way of saying, thank you, Jesus.
These are all the people that I got saved with me.
And God says that in the book of Revelation,
in the book of Revelation chapter 5,
God talks about the 24 elders who
received crowns for the great accomplishments
that they had done on this earth, for the people
they'd won to Christ, for the things
that they'd suffered for God, for some of them
that had been martyred for the things of God.
And they had the crowns on their head
that they'd received as a trophy for what they'd done.
And the Bible says they took off their crowns,
and they threw them at the feet of Jesus and said,
thou are worthy to receive all honor and glory and power
and dominion forever.
And boy, I don't want to be, I don't want to just reach up.
I want to throw my crown at the feet of Jesus.
I want to give Jesus some praise here.
I want to thank him for what he did for me
and reach up on my head.
It's like, oh, man, there's nothing there.
Man, I want to take that crown and throw it
at the feet of Jesus.
That's the excitement.
That's the joy that's set before us.
Boy, I'm excited about going to heaven today.
I'd just as soon go today.
I'd just as soon go to bed tonight and just go.
But you know why I'm here?
I'm here to win people to Christ, same reason
that you're here.
And so we need to stay here, and let's fight
the fight while we're here.
But look at verse number three here.
This rate will never be dealt with the chapter.
In verse number three, the Bible says,
for consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners
against himself, lest he be wearied.
I mean, tired.
I mean, he's worn out.
Lest he be wearied and faint in your minds.
You've not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin.
He's saying, hey, look, nobody's beaten you for being a Christian.
That's what he's saying here.
You've not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin.
He says, think about what Jesus went through.
Think about what these people in Hebrew chapter 11 went through.
And think about the fact that nobody's beating you
with a stick here.
Nobody's whipping you 39 times.
You've not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin.
And then look, he goes into another subject here
in verse number five, where he goes
from talking about people suffering for Jesus Christ,
people suffering for the things of God.
He kind of transitions and says, you've
now resisted unto blood striving against sin,
and ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh
unto you as unto children, saying,
my son despiseth not thou the chastening of the Lord,
nor faint when thou art rebuked of him.
What he's saying here is, some of you, in many cases,
you're not suffering for Jesus.
You're suffering because of things that you did wrong.
That's what he's saying.
He's saying, you've now been resistant unto blood striving
against sin.
He says, you've forgotten the exhortation which speaketh
unto you as unto children.
My son despiseth not thou the chastening of the Lord,
nor faint when thou art rebuked of him.
For whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth,
and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
I want to show you several things about this.
Number one, in verse number five here,
he's saying, my son despiseth not thou
the chastening of the Lord.
Chastening means discipline.
That's referring to a parent who disciplines their child, who's
rearing their child and disciplining them,
spanking and so forth.
That's the chastening.
Despiseth not thou the chastening of the Lord,
nor, so we're talking about something else,
nor faint when thou art rebuked of him.
What does it mean to be rebuked?
What does it mean to be rebuked by God?
That's when a rebuke is when I tell you, hey, look,
you're wrong.
That's what a rebuke is.
It's when somebody tells you that you're wrong.
So he's saying, look, when God has to discipline you,
when God has to give you a spanking, so to speak,
or when God has to rebuke you and say, listen, you are wrong.
He says, don't faint.
Don't be weird about that.
And I want to say something.
How does the Lord rebuke us?
I think he rebukes us many times through Bible reading.
Many times I'll be reading the Bible,
and I feel like God's rebuking me,
because it's something that I'm doing, and I read it.
And it's kind of a slap in the face to me when I read that.
What's another way?
The obvious way that we get rebuked is through preaching.
You hear preaching.
Somebody preaches and hits on your sin.
God says, don't faint when you're rebuked of him.
Don't get all upset like Cain.
That was Cain's whole problem.
God just said, Cain, you're wrong.
And Cain said, look, and he even gave him another chance.
He said, Cain, why art thou wroth,
and why is thy countenance fallen?
If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted?
And if not, sin lieth at the door.
He says, look, if you do it right, I'll accept you.
I'll be pleased.
But Cain just could not take a rebuke.
Boy, that is just so indicative of the society that we live in,
people who cannot take a rebuke.
Boy, on the job, you know,
Brother McCoy probably knows this,
but just constantly, you tell somebody
that they made a mistake, and it's just, oh, oh.
People bristle.
They can't handle somebody telling them that they're wrong.
But God forbid that we should be in church
and hear something preached out of the Word of God,
or just reading the Bible,
and where we bristle like Cain and get upset,
because somebody told us that we were wrong.
Yeah, sometimes, all of us need to have somebody tell us,
you're wrong.
And I need that, everybody needs that.
Where somebody says, look, you are wrong,
and we need to be able to take that.
And don't just apply this only to church.
Apply this in your life.
Apply this on the job.
Apply this anywhere.
If somebody tells you that you're wrong,
whenever somebody tells me I'm wrong,
even if it's just something goofy, if it's off the wall,
if I know that they're wrong, and they say that I'm wrong,
every time this is what I do, no matter what it is,
if somebody tells me that I'm wrong about something,
I sit down and I examine myself.
After they're gone, or later on, or whatever,
I think about it and I say, you know what,
am I really right about this?
Let me make sure, let me check it with God's word here.
Nobody, none of us is infallible.
So let's not faint when we're rebuked.
Let's take a rebuke.
The Bible says reproof,
and reproof is another word for rebuke,
reproofs of instruction are the way of life.
You know, there's a way of life versus a way of death.
And he says, you know, the reproofs of instruction
are the way of life.
Now, here God goes on for about five verses.
He brings up this subject about discipline,
and he brings up a lot of subjects
about God disciplining us,
but I think you could apply these
to the discipline of our children also.
Because you say, well, boy,
you've been talking a lot about that lately.
The reason I talk about it so much is because it's so important.
It is so important.
If I succeed at everything else in life,
and I fail at rearing my children, I'm a failure.
Let me tell you why.
Think about math.
There's addition and there's multiplication.
I can go out and win people to Christ
and preach the Word of God all day long.
And let's say I can win 10,000 people to the Lord
in my lifetime.
But what if I could reproduce myself in these kids,
as we talked about several weeks ago,
reproducing after our own kind,
as Genesis 1 talks about.
If I could reproduce after my own kind here,
and I can turn these guys into soul winners,
I can turn these guys into loving God,
let's say my potential is X, 10,000, triple.
I've just tripled myself.
Let's say I had 10 kids.
It's like 10 times the soul saved.
10 times everything.
So I'm not going to go out and say,
well, I'm going to neglect my family a little bit
because I've got to go out and see people say,
no, this is vital.
I must multiply.
I must reproduce myself among my children here.
And so that's why child-rearing is so vital.
That's why God talks about it so much,
and that's why we need to talk about it so much
because we have got to know what God says
about rearing our children.
Look how many children grow up and go off the deep end.
Look how many children turn out wrong.
Look how many children don't carry the torch
of the things of God.
It's so rare to find somebody who is serving the Lord
and their dad is serving the Lord
and their grandpa was serving the Lord
and their great-grandpa was serving the Lord,
it's almost non-existent.
That kind of just four generations in a row.
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
Somebody dropped the ball on this child-rearing thing
or else we'd still have families
that just had been raising good Christian kids
just all the way since Jesus.
Somebody's dropping the ball a lot on this,
so that's why we got to talk about it so much.
But look at this in Hebrews chapter 12, verse number six.
Here's the first thing you have to understand.
For whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth
and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
So number one, God's saying,
the sign of love is the disciplining of your children.
Parents who will not discipline their children
do not love their children.
You say, I don't appreciate you saying that
because I know people who don't discipline their children,
who don't spank their children,
and I know that they love their children.
Well, let me read it to you from the Word of God.
This is Proverbs 13, 24.
The Bible says, he that spareth his rod,
this is Proverbs 13, 24.
He that spareth his rod hateth his son.
Now, I didn't write that, I didn't write that.
You know, get mad at me, get mad at God.
Because he's the one that said,
he that spareth his rod hateth his son.
Oh, you mean he just doesn't love him as much
as the person that disciplines?
No, I said he hated his son.
And I think God knows what he meant when he said this.
He didn't just throw words around.
He says, no, he hates his son.
He doesn't love him at all.
Boy, you see this so often with divorced homes, many times.
The popularity contest kicks in,
and it's like, I'm not gonna discipline my son
because I don't want him to not like me.
Because the other spouse doesn't discipline.
And so, I'm not gonna discipline.
You know what?
It shows that you care more about yourself
than what they think of you than what's best for the child.
Because love will say I'm gonna do what's best for the child.
And many times, you even see this in a family
that's not divorced.
Where the parents will not discipline
because maybe the one's moly,
and they're trying to, they're trying to almost,
the kids will sometimes play the parents
one against another and try to get on this side
and try to make one seem more strict or whatever.
Look, love says, I'm not trying to make my kids like me.
And by the way, my kids like me.
But that's not the goal.
I'd rather have them not like me and turn out right
than to like me and ruin their lives.
Now, obviously, both is what's gonna happen.
But if I had to pick, I hope they hate my guts
as long as they love the Lord
and as long as they do what's right,
as long as they don't mess up their life.
So let me give you a little saying that I heard
that I love, it's don't rear by fear.
Fear is the enemy.
We preached on this several weeks ago.
Fear is your enemy.
Fear is not from God at all.
Fear is from the devil.
And fear will ruin your childbearing.
You say, why does fear have anything to do with childbearing?
If you're constantly afraid
that your kids will not turn out right,
then you're gonna be afraid to do what it takes
to get them to turn out right many times.
And this attitude of this scared attitude,
ah, I just don't know if they're gonna turn out right,
and ah, I just don't know if they're gonna like me,
and you can't do that.
You just have to say, I've got God's word.
God's word is telling me what I'm supposed to do.
I've got faith that if I do what God says,
it's gonna work, and I'm just gonna do it.
Every time, without variance,
I'm not gonna try and decide whether it's gonna work.
I'm not gonna get scared and go through life worrying
whether my kids are gonna turn out right.
I'm just gonna say, no, God said this is what I'm gonna do.
I'm just gonna do it.
It's gonna work.
And that confidence is everything in childbearing.
The confidence is everything.
Many parents are afraid to take a stand to their children
because they're afraid that they're gonna cause them
to push them away, so to speak,
because they're taking a stand.
The teenage daughter wants to come home
kind of like Sunday night sermon.
You know, the teenage daughter is dressed scandalously clad.
Dad's gotta put his foot down and say,
you're not wearing that.
They say, well, I'm just afraid I'm gonna push her away.
Don't fear.
Just do what God says,
and you'll be better off in the long run.
Look at the story about the prodigal son.
In the story of the prodigal son, the son leaves.
He goes out and parties his life away.
Do you see the dad in the story running after the son,
saying, no, don't leave.
Come back, come back, wait, come back.
No, he says, listen, I've raised my children right.
I've done what I'm supposed to do, son.
If you wanna live like hell,
you're gonna go do it somewhere else, and that's fine.
And he grows up, and he turns 18, and he takes off.
But you know what?
Just shortly thereafter, he comes back,
and he's in his father's house for life,
and he came back, and he got it right,
because the dad had faith and said,
look, I know that I've done what's right.
He'll be back.
That's why when he comes back, he's waiting for him.
He's on the front porch waiting
for his prodigal son to return.
He knew he was coming back,
because the Bible says, train up a child
in the way you should go, and when he's old,
he'll not depart from it.
And so, God forbid that a child will be rebellious,
but even at the point where they're rebellious,
sometimes you just gotta let them leave.
Fine.
I'd rather have my kids leave when they're 18 years old
than to have them sitting in my house,
me financing all their sinful stinking life,
just say, hey, get out of here.
But it shouldn't come to that,
because as the Bible says in the next scripture
I'm gonna read to you in Proverbs 23
about this same subject about loving your children.
The Bible says right here in Proverbs 23, 13,
withhold not correction from the child,
for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die.
Thou shalt beat him with the rod,
and shalt deliver his soul from hell.
Boy, that's some strong language there.
And God's saying, look,
withhold not correction from the child.
Boy, that word withhold,
doesn't it almost seem like
you're keeping back from them something that's good?
It's, I mean, the word withhold, that's what I think of.
If I'm thinking, think about withholding,
like at your paycheck at your job.
And boy, that's something you want, that's your money.
You're hanging there withholding it from you.
They're holding it back from you.
They're keeping back something that's good.
And God says, when you don't discipline your children,
you're not doing them a favor,
you're withholding something that would help them,
and you're not giving them what they need.
And it says right here,
but that, you know what,
I must have wrote down the wrong verse
because that is not at all the verse I was looking for.
I was looking for the verse that says,
that's a good verse though,
but I was looking for the verse that says about,
if you love your children, because it says,
he that spareth his rod, hateth his son,
but he that loveth him, chaseneth him betimes.
That's the one I was looking for.
That's another one on the same subject.
But anyway, let's move on to the next point.
So I wrote down the wrong verse.
God knows what the sermon is going, but anyway,
turn back to Hebrews chapter 12, if you would.
See, if I write down the wrong verse, I just go with it.
I just kind of like brother Jimenez, nevermind,
but he turned, it was funny in his sermon,
when brother Jimenez was here,
I think you all were pretty much here that night.
He turned to the wrong scripture
and I knew he turned to the wrong scripture
because he said, let's turn to Joshua chapter 10, right?
And he starts reading Judges chapter 10.
And he starts, and he just, he read it.
And I'm thinking to myself,
he's reading the wrong verse, doesn't he know?
I'm like, didn't he prepare the sermon?
I mean, he knows he's reading the wrong verse.
Why does he just keep reading?
Because I thought he'd start reading and say,
oh, it's the wrong one.
But he just keeps reading.
I'm thinking, this is the wrong verse.
I know it's wrong verse.
And I know he knows it's wrong verse.
And he just keeps reading it, right?
And then he just preached like a point on it,
just off the top of his head.
And I remember somebody even came up to me
and said like, boy, this one point
that Brother Hemingway has made.
And it was the one that he accidentally preached.
And I was like, man, God,
it's like God had him turn to the wrong one.
It's funny.
But anyway, it just reminded me of that.
And I thought that was great how he did that.
And it was neat because the thing
that he was looking at in Judges 10
kind of related to what he was trying to go to in Joshua 10.
It's almost like God had a correlation there also,
just the Bible's pretty deep.
But anyway, Hebrews 12, verse number seven and eight here,
the Bible says, if you endure chastening,
means if you endure this punishment of God spanking you,
of God disciplining you,
God deals with you as with sons.
For what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?
But if ye be without chastisement,
whereof all are partakers,
then are ye bastards and not sons.
So God's saying here, look,
every child should get disciplined.
And God says, I definitely discipline all of my children.
And so he says, if you just live like the devil
and you don't get punished,
if you don't get it, he says, if you endure chastening,
then God deals with you as with sons.
For what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?
But if ye be without chastisement,
that means you never get disciplined?
Like you just go out and just live in sin
and you never get disciplined?
He says, then are ye bastards and not sons?
He says, better watch out.
Maybe you're not even saved.
And this is the saying, if he does it, then he's not saved.
Like we're supposed to look at other people
and say, well, he's not getting chastised.
He must be a bastard, you know, he's not saved.
But God is saying, no, if you be without chastisement,
whereof all are partakers,
then are you bastards and not sons.
He said, you better make sure
that you've even believed on Jesus Christ.
You better even make sure that you've been born again,
because if you're not getting disciplined,
you can't be one of my children,
because I discipline my children.
That's what God's saying here.
So God says, when you get disciplined, just thank God.
And I can think of some times, I'm telling you,
there have been times when something majorly bad happened
to me in life.
And I said, God is disciplining me,
because I knew that there was something
that I was doing wrong.
And it's like, when it happened, it came into my mind.
And I just thought, I know exactly what this is about.
And you'll know when God's disciplining you.
The first thing I do when something bad happens,
I examine myself, because sometimes God's disciplining you,
sometimes God's just testing you, like the book of Job.
That's why you should never judge someone else
when something bad happens.
And you don't know whether God's just trying
to make them grow.
He's just trying to put them through some pressure
to make them come out better.
Or you don't know whether God's disciplining them,
so you gotta examine yourself.
But when it happens, rejoice and say, thank God,
God cares enough about me.
Thank God God loves me enough to discipline me.
He's not just gonna let me go the wrong way in life.
He's not just gonna let me make a mess out of my life.
He's not gonna let me waste my life.
He's gonna get my attention, praise God.
Hallelujah, I know I'm saved,
because I'm getting the fire whooped out of me.
I know I'm saved, and I know God loves me.
And not only that, but I must be one of his favorites,
because he's just beating me constantly.
Anyway, but the Bible says here in verse number nine,
furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh,
which corrected us, our physical parents,
and we gave them reverence.
Shall we not much rather be in subjection
of the father of spirits and live?
Now look at that word right there, reverence.
And I think we talked about this last Sunday,
not last Sunday night, but Sunday night before.
Reverence is talking about respect.
Boy, that's something that we need more of
in today's day and age, respect.
And here we're talking about the respect for a father.
Listen, don't let your kids mouth off to you
and disrespect you, Dad.
You are Dad, and don't let, you know,
you see kids smart off to their parents.
Ugh, isn't it just, ugh, it bothers me.
I remember when I was a kid, I was at the neighbor's house,
and the neighbor said, I hate you,
to their mom and dad while I was there.
And I was just shocked.
I thought, man, if I said I hate you to my mom and dad,
I'd die.
I literally thought that I would die.
I mean, I'm not kidding.
I thought that they would just beat me to death,
or kill me, or take a gun and shoot me.
I thought, there's no way I could survive
uttering these words to my parents.
Because in my house, it was just
a little bit different atmosphere.
And my parents were not real strict or anything like that,
but there were just certain lines that you didn't cross,
and that was one of them.
Boy, we need to have reverence for our authority figures.
Here, we're talking about parents, especially.
Kids, you need to talk to your parents with respect.
Don't mouth off to your parents.
Don't just talk to them like your buddy on the playground.
It's like, you need to have a little bit of respect.
You need to answer courteously.
You need to use respect.
Don't just throw around words and call your parents names.
It's really just disgusting to me
when I see in public a child mouth off to their parents
and just no respect at all, just flagrantly,
just whatever they think, it just comes out of their mouth.
Teach your kids to make, force your kids
to talk to you with respect, with reverence,
as God says here.
But the Bible says, we have fathers of our flesh,
and we gave them reverence.
Shall we not much rather be in subjection
unto the father of spirits and live?
He's saying, look, you respect your parents,
honor thy father and mother,
but especially, that's the father
that you better have respect for and honor him.
What do you mean by that?
What do you mean respect God?
I mean, don't use his name for a cuss word.
I mean, don't go around, oh my God,
throwing God's name around like it's just a piece of trash,
like it's just some kind of a cuss word,
like it's just a substitute for some other cuss word
that you were gonna use, and just say,
oh, you know, and you even hear people be so vulgar
as to say, oh, Jesus Christ.
I mean, boy, that's terrible.
I mean, look at, you ever wonder
when you're reading through the Bible,
and if you've read through the Bible
for any amount of time, especially the New Testament,
especially when you get into the epistles,
you notice all these titles that are given to Jesus,
like it usually doesn't just say Jesus,
it's usually like the Lord Jesus Christ
to whom be glory forever and ever, amen,
or it's like the Lord Jesus, Jesus Christ,
not just Jesus, but like Jesus Christ,
the Lord Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ,
the son of the Lord, Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory,
all these terms, and you say, come on, God,
why don't you just say Jesus?
And that's why, like, if you get an NIV,
like these newer Bibles, they take out
a lot of those titles, they really dumb them down.
They take out the word Christ like 50 times,
they take out the word Lord like 100 times,
and just, they kinda, if it says Lord Jesus Christ,
they kinda change it to Jesus Christ.
Says Jesus Christ, they just kinda change it to Christ.
And they kinda take off some of those titles.
Those titles and things are there for a reason.
God talks about himself in a very reverential way,
because God's trying to show us, hey, listen,
don't call me the old man upstairs,
don't call me, yeah, you know, J.C., yeah, you know.
He says, no, look, have some respect for me, okay?
Don't have some T-shirt with me on, with my face on it,
some guy that you say is me, you know, that's not me.
Don't wear around some average, yeah, Jesus is cool,
you know, he says, look, that's not the way the Bible reads,
that's not the way the Bible sounds when you read it.
So you treat me with some respect, have some reverence.
Don't just be irreverent and say,
use my name for a cuss word, and just throw me around,
don't call me all kinds of little slang terms and stuff.
Look, why don't you refer to me as Jesus Christ?
Why don't you refer to me as the Lord Jesus Christ?
Why don't you have some respect
and treat my name with dignity
and treat the Bible with dignity,
treat church with dignity,
and treat the things of God with reverence,
is what God's saying here.
You know, we need to have respect and reverence in our day.
Yes, respect your parents,
but respect Jesus Christ 10 times as much.
And, you know, sometimes we use this kind of vernacular
like, oh my gosh.
You know, and really it's just, what are you doing?
You're just trying to sound like the world.
You know, you're trying to sound like somebody
who's saying something that's irreverent.
I don't want, you know, I don't want to be irreverent at all.
But the Bible says here in verse number 11,
or no, I'm sorry, verse number 10,
the Bible says, for they verily,
talking about our physical parents,
for they verily for a few days,
chasing us after their own pleasure.
But he, for our profit,
that we might be partakers of his holiness.
So God says, the purpose of my disciplining you
is for you to be holy like I am.
He says, so that you can be a partaker of my holiness.
Now, does that benefit me as God?
No, God's saying it doesn't benefit him, it benefits you.
He says, I'm disciplining you
so that you can be a partaker of my holiness.
I'm letting you have some of my holiness
so that you don't just live like some kind of an animal,
so that you don't just live a stupid life
and debase yourself and humiliate yourself
and act like an idiot.
I'm letting you partake of my holiness by disciplining you.
For your profit, not for me, you're not helping me.
God says, look, you do whatever you want.
I want you to have some holiness for you.
The rules of this book are for you.
The Bible says that the Sabbath,
which is one of God's laws in the Old Testament,
which is a picture of Jesus Christ,
as we learned about in Hebrews chapter four,
the Sabbath was not made for man,
I'm sorry, man was not made for the Sabbath, the Bible says,
but the Sabbath for man.
God said, my laws were in for your benefit.
He says, look, the Sabbath was not something
that it really bothers me if you work on Saturday
in the Old Testament.
He says, no, that was for your benefit that I made that law,
because I'm trying to show you of the rest.
There's a whole chapter about this
in Hebrews chapter four, for those of you who weren't here,
but in Hebrews chapter four,
God says that rest pictures salvation,
where you've ceased from your own works,
as God says in Hebrews chapter four,
and you've entered into the rest
of trusting Jesus Christ for your salvation,
where you're not working for your salvation.
I wish you could have been here.
It was a phenomenal thing that we saw
the Word of God there.
But anyway, let's move on quickly.
We're running out of time here.
It says, now no chastening for the present
seemeth to be joyous, but grievous,
nobody enjoys getting punished.
It's verse 11.
Nevertheless, afterward it yielded the peaceable fruit
of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.
He says, it's gonna make you righteous.
It's about something that I'm doing for you, not for myself.
When we chasing our children, are we doing it for ourself?
No, we're doing it for them.
It's what's being taught here.
Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down,
and the feeble knees saying,
you know, don't go around like all feeling sorry
for yourself, and make straight paths for your feet,
lest that which is lame be turned out of the way,
but let it rather be healed.
Follow peace with all men, and holiness
without which no man shall see the Lord.
We'll have to skip over a lot of this just for sake of time,
but you know, it says holiness
without which no man shall see the Lord.
God's saying, look, nobody comes and sees me
unless they're holy.
Now, does that mean that we have to live
some holy sanctified life in order to work our way to heaven?
No, because none of us can be that holy.
None of us can live holy.
Now, there's another word in the Bible that means holy,
and I don't have time to explain all this,
but the word saint,
everybody's heard the word saint before?
Now, if you, for example, in the Spanish language,
Santa means holy, because same word saint,
and it's kind of like sanctified,
like we learned about several weeks ago, means holy.
We proved that from the Bible,
but saints are those that are holy.
The holy ones are the saints.
Now, the Bible teaches that every believer
on Jesus Christ is a saint.
Now, the Catholic church will exalt certain people and say,
this person has now arrived, they're a saint.
But even at the end of the book of Hebrews itself,
it says, salute all them that have the rule over you
and all the saints.
That's one of the last,
that's the second to last verse in the book,
where God's saying salute everybody who's saved,
all the saints.
Many other times, for example, the book of Philippians
is written to the church at Philippi.
To all the bishops, and the Bible says, let's see, Paul,
Paul, servant of Jesus Christ, and Timotheus, our brother,
to all the saints in Christ Jesus, which are at Philippi,
with the bishops and deacons.
So God is saying, the saints are everybody who's saved.
So God's saying, look, in order to be saved,
your good life, and your church attendance,
and you got baptized, and wow,
you even gave up some of your sins,
he's not gonna cut it to get you to heaven,
because the only way to get to heaven is to be holy,
and good night.
None of us is holy.
But when we have the blood of Jesus Christ
applied to our hearts, God sanctified,
this was last week, we learned about this,
that was, or this was Hebrews chapter 10, rather,
sanctified through the blood of the everlasting covenant.
The Bible says we've been sanctified.
That means we've been made saints
through the blood of Jesus Christ.
That's what this is talking about here,
that with holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.
You gotta be sanctified through the blood of Jesus Christ,
as we saw in chapter 10, in order to see the Lord.
That's what's being taught here.
Sanctification through the blood of Jesus Christ,
holiness through Jesus Christ.
Now look in verse 15, looking diligently,
lest any man fail of the grace of God,
lest any root of bitterness spring up trouble you,
and thereby many be defiled.
Lest there be any fornicator or profane person,
as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright.
For ye know how that afterward,
when he would have inherited the blessing,
he was rejected.
For he found no place of repentance,
though he sought it carefully with peers.
Now, sometimes we read the Bible,
and we read each individual verse,
and we kinda get the truth that that verse is teaching,
but you gotta see the whole picture that God's painting.
There's a reason why God moves from one topic to the next.
It's not just random,
I'm gonna talk about this for a little while,
nah, they don't talk about this,
and oh yeah, I forgot to mention about this.
He says, look, first of all,
looking diligently, lest any man fail of the grace of God.
What's the grace of God?
The grace of God is, the Bible says,
for the grace of God, which bringeth salvation,
hath appeared unto all men.
So this is somebody who's not saved, is what it's saying.
They meant fail of the grace of God.
Basically, it's talking about a church member
who goes to church, they're among us,
but they've never been saved,
they've never trusted Jesus Christ as Savior,
they're an imposter, kinda like Judas Iscariot
was with Jesus Christ, a fake, a phony, a fraud,
who said that they believed on Jesus Christ,
but they didn't really, they were just putting on a show.
Well, the Bible says here, lest any root of bitterness
springing up trouble you, it's talking about the same person
and thereby many be defiled.
So God says this one person can creep in
and hurt a lot of people.
Many people can be defiled.
What does it mean to be defiled?
It means to be made like filthy, is what it means.
Look at the next verse here.
Lest there be any fornicator.
So now he brings in the idea of sexual sin, fornication.
Or a profane person as Esau.
Somebody like Esau, somebody who is a fornicator.
Somebody who is a wicked person, who's unsaved.
And the Bible, by the way, the Bible says
that God hated Esau, God hated Esau.
He said, Jacob have I loved, and Esau have I hated.
So this is a guy that, this is a very wicked man.
This is a man who God said, I hate him.
God's a pretty loving God.
So when God says, I hate you, you're a wicked guy.
You're a filthy pervert, you're a pretty bad guy.
Well, the Bible says that this person Esau,
what characterizes him in the Bible?
What's the thing that we know the most about him?
Is that for a fleshly appetite that he had,
in this actual story in Genesis,
where he wanted something to eat,
because he was so hungry.
But this fleshly appetite that he had,
in this case for food, was so out of control,
that he sold his birthright in order to eat a bowl of soup.
And you read this in the book of Genesis,
but it says, for you know how that afterward,
when he would have inherited the blessing,
he found no place of repentance,
so he sought it carefully with it.
Repentance is when you change your mind.
It's when you say, well, I changed my mind.
You know, like God repented of the evil
that he sought to do unto the children of Israel,
we learned about several weeks ago.
And it's when you change your mind and say,
well, I think I'm gonna change my mind.
Well, I gave up my blessing, but I changed my mind.
I want it back now, God.
And God says, no, sorry.
Sorry, Esau, the damage is done.
You have just ruined the whole legacy of your children.
You just sent your whole children out of the Promised Land.
They could have been the chosen people.
They could have been the people of God
that would one day bring forth Jesus Christ
and be in the Promised Land of Israel.
But no, you sold it because you were so hungry,
you just had to eat some food, and so you blew it, sir.
And no, it's too late.
You made your decision.
You know, God is the God of a second chance.
Let's not forget that.
And God does give people second chances,
and there's the grace of God.
But let me warn you, especially you young people here, kids,
I want to warn you that sometimes
some kind of a fleshly appetite takes you somewhere
and you do some kind of a sin,
and let me tell you something,
you're not gonna find a place of repentance
and you can cry about it like Esau cried about it.
He sought it carefully with tears.
He said, Jacob, or I'm sorry, he said,
Isaac, don't you have a blessing for me?
Don't, God, can't you bless me?
And he said, no, you blew it.
Watch out, don't blow it.
Now for those, you know, people that have already blown it,
you know, yeah, there's forgiveness.
But you know what?
There's not always a second chance.
Sometimes you just blow it.
I mean, let's face it,
even when there's the forgiveness of God
and the forgiveness of other people,
boy, sin always carries scars with it
for the rest of your life.
You know, when you have that child out of wedlock,
the child doesn't go away.
There's gonna be repercussions for that for years.
There's gonna be implications on that for years.
And so God says, look, I'm a forgiving God,
I'm a loving God,
but don't let some fleshly appetite take over
and cause you to sin against me,
because you know what?
You're not always gonna be able to recover all your losses
and be back where you started from.
You know, you might just never get to where you were in life.
You might just never fully recover from that.
And so this is a warning from God here.
And then God kind of switches subjects here.
I'm not really sure why, but in verse 18, he says,
for a year not come unto the mount that might be touched
and that burned with fire,
nor unto blackness and darkness and tempest.
And the sound of a trumpet, this is verse 19,
and the voice of words, which voice they that heard,
entreated that the word should not be spoken to them anymore
for they could not endure that which was commanded.
And if so much as a beast touched the mountain,
it shall be stoned or thrust through with a dart.
And so terrible was the sight that Moses said,
I exceedingly fear and quake.
Now listen, we're gonna stop our study tonight
at the end of verse 21,
because I really wanna show you this part here,
because this is something that I really wanted
to teach in the lesson here.
This part in verses 18 through 21.
And then we'll have to quit.
Maybe we can tag on the rest of it on the chapter 13.
But next week when we conclude the book of Hebrews,
but the Bible is talking about here.
And if you would turn back to Exodus chapter 20,
this is the last place we're gonna turn.
Exodus chapter 20, the second book of the Bible,
halfway through the book.
Exodus chapter 20, familiar chapter,
this is the 10 commandments.
Chapter, verses one through 17,
God is giving us the 10 commandments
in Exodus 21 through 17.
Now, many people think that,
and I thought this, and it's like this in the movie,
when I was a kid, I watched that movie,
the 10 commandments.
But anyway, they think that the 10 commandments
were given to Moses upon the mountain verbally.
But in this story in Exodus chapter 20,
if you read this, God actually spoke these 10 commandments
to the entire nation of Israel.
Later, he gave it to him on the tablets in written form,
and he brought that down from the mountain.
But at this point right here,
God is speaking to the entire nation of Israel,
these 10 commandments, audibly speaking to them.
Now, let me read this for you.
Stay there in Exodus.
I'm gonna read to you what it says here in Hebrews.
It says, which voice, it's like God speaking
to the children of Israel,
which voice they that heard and treated,
or begged or asked and treated,
that the word should not be spoken to them anymore?
He said, don't talk to us anymore.
We don't wanna hear it.
Now, let's go back and read the story
and see if we can shed some light on this.
Exodus chapter 20.
You can find out what God's talking about here.
Look at verse 18.
God just finished giving us the 10th commandment
in verse 17, is the 10th commandment,
thou shall not covet.
Then in verse 18, the Bible says,
and all the people saw the thunderings
and the lightnings and the noise of the trumpet
and the mountain smoking.
And when the people saw it,
they were moved and stood afar off.
And they said unto Moses, speak thou with us,
and we will hear, but let not God speak with us
lest we die.
And Moses said unto the people, fear not,
for God has come to prove you,
and that his fear may be before your face.
And they said, listen, God's just trying
to give you the law here so that you don't sin.
And then it says in verse 21,
and the people stood afar off,
and Moses drew near under the thick darkness where God was.
So what's happening here?
They're hearing a voice speak to them,
and it appears from the story that they're scared to death
just because of the lightnings and the thunderings
and God speaking to them.
But you know what?
If you read Hebrews chapter 12,
and remember, the New Testament is basically
shedding mass amounts of light on the Old Testament.
A lot of times reading the Old Testament,
things are confusing.
The New Testament kind of exposes to us
what's really going on.
Well, let me read for you Hebrews chapter 12.
This is what God is saying about it.
They entreated that the word should not be spoken
to them anymore, why?
For they could not endure that which was commanded.
Does it say that they had a problem with the voice
that God was using?
Or the thunderings?
It says they couldn't endure that which was commanded.
And you know, this kind of reminds me many times
of people who go to a church and they say,
I don't like to go to the church where the preacher yells.
And they say, I don't like the yelling and the screaming
and the stomping and the, you know, throwing things.
They say, I don't like that.
You know what?
They can't endure that which is commanded.
That's the real problem.
When you get down to the root of it,
they don't, it's not that they don't like the yelling,
it's they don't like what's being yelled.
They don't like what's being said.
And that's where they kind of hid behind an excuse here
in the book of Exodus saying,
oh, you know, no, you talk to us, Moses.
We want to hear it from a man.
We don't want to hear it from God
because we can't endure that which was commanded.
The commandment is what they had the problem with.
Here's the progression,
and I'm going to wrap this up and be done,
but here's the progression in the books of Exodus,
Exodus 20 through 32.
And this brings us back to what we were on Sunday night.
But in Exodus 20, they say,
we don't want God to speak to us.
We want you to speak to us, Moses.
We'd rather hear it from a man
than to hear it straight from God.
That's like when you go to church
and hear the word of God preached,
but you don't read it yourself.
That's what it's like.
It's like saying, I don't want to hear it straight from God.
I don't want to read the Bible and get it straight from God.
I want to get it from Moses, the preacher.
I want to hear him say it.
Why?
Because you know what?
I'm never going to preach it as hard as God preaches it.
And so you don't want to read this whole book cover to cover
because you don't want to be held responsible
for what's in here.
And you don't want to endure that which was commanded.
And just like they said,
we don't want God to speak to us.
We want to hear it secondhand.
We want to get the toned down version from Moses.
We want to get the part that he preaches to us.
I can't, I can't probably preach to you this whole book.
You know, maybe the next 20 some years,
keep coming and we'll preach the whole book.
But hey, look, you're not going to get it all
unless you read it yourself.
And the reason that many people don't want to read
the word of God is because they don't like what it says.
Because nobody reads this book
and has no change in their life.
Nobody reads this book and just keeps living like hell.
No, you read this book, there's some commandments there
and it puts you at a crossroads where you say,
I'm going to do this or I'm not going to do it.
And you say, I don't want to hear it from God.
I want to hear it from a man.
I go to church Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night.
That's where I get my Bible.
That's where I get my preaching.
That's where I get the things of God.
No, go to the mountain and get it from God himself.
Get it straight from the source.
Because you know what happened after this?
First they said, we don't want what God says.
We want to get it from Moses.
What's the next step?
They say, we don't want Moses.
This is where we were on Sunday night.
They said, now we don't want Moses anymore.
We want Aaron, who permits rock music,
who permits nudity, who permits idolatry,
who permits partying and fun and he's alive.
You know, this is the way it goes.
Number one, you say, I don't want to get it straight from God.
I'm going to get it from Moses.
I'm going to get it from a man of God.
Moses was a great man of God.
I'm going to get it from a great preacher.
I'm going to go to a great Baptist church
that's going to preach it like it is
and tell it straight down the line.
But you don't read this book yourself,
eventually you're going to come to a place
where Moses is gone.
He went to the mountain for 40 days, he was gone.
One day, you know, Moses is gone.
You move out of the area perhaps.
Maybe, you know, that something happens.
The pastor dies or something, whatever.
And Moses is gone.
If you don't, man, if you haven't been getting it straight
from God, you know where you're going to go?
You're going to go to Aaron.
You're going to go down the road to Aaron's church,
which is not a Baptist church, you know,
which is not King James Bible, which is not preaching hard,
which is having nudity on the platform, you know,
which is having girls up there singing in their miniskirts,
which is having the rock concert and the partying
and the idolatry and the ungodliness,
because you said, I don't want to get it from God.
I want to get it from Moses.
And then I'll just get it from Aaron,
who's the liberal preacher down the street
who just lets us do whatever we want.
He doesn't preach hard.
He doesn't preach on sin.
He's a weak leader.
He's a weak man.
So what's the point?
The point is, read it for yourself.
Don't try, don't rely on me to feed you.
You know, you pick up the spoon and feed yourself
out of the word of God.
Go straight to God and say, God,
I want the straight, unadulterated, uncensored,
every word of God is what's going to build me.
It's going to build my faith.
It's going to tell me what you've commanded me what to do.