hymnal. It is officially in December, so now we can really break out the
Christmas music as if we hadn't already. Our first hymn this evening
is going to be 433 away in a manger. 433 433 away in a manger.
Away in a manger, no crib for a bed, the little Lord Jesus laid down his sweet head.
The stars in the sky looked down where he lay. The little Lord Jesus asleep on
the hay. The cattle are lowing, the baby awakes. But little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes.
I love thee, Lord Jesus, look down from the sky and stay by my cradle till morning is nigh.
Be near me, Lord Jesus, I ask thee to stay. Close by me forever and love me, I pray.
Bless all the dear children in thy tender care, and take us to heaven to live with thee there.
Amen. Brother James, do you want to open us for a word of prayer this evening?
Amen. All right, for our next hymn this evening, turn if you would to 429. 429,
hark the herald angels sing. With caroling coming up, you just got to make sure that
we're well practiced, all right? 420, and it's December. 429, hark the herald angels sing.
429 there, we'll start on that first verse, let's sing. Hark the herald angels sing,
glory to the newborn king. Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled.
Joyful all ye nations rise, join the triumph of the skies with angelic host proclaim,
Christ is born in Bethlehem. Hark the herald angels sing, glory to the newborn king.
Christ by highest heaven adored, Christ the everlasting Lord. Late in time behold him come,
offspring of a virgin's womb. Veiled in flesh the God and see, hail the incarnate deity,
pleased as men with men to dwell. Jesus our Emmanuel. Hark the herald angels sing,
glory to the newborn king. Hail the heaven born prince of peace, hail the son of righteousness.
Light and life to all he brings, risen with healing in his wings.
Mild he plays his glory by, born that man no more may die. Born to raise the sons of earth,
born to give them second birth. Hark the herald angels sing, glory to the newborn king.
Come desire of nations come, fix in us thy humble home. Rise the woman's conquering seed,
bruise in us the serpent's head. Adam's likeness now in face, step by image in its place.
So conduct them from above, reinstate us in thy love. Hark the herald angels sing,
glory to the newborn king. Amen. Thank you so much for coming to Pure Words Baptist Church.
If you need a bulletin, lift your hand nice and high and we should have some still over
there on that cabinet for the James. You want to help us with that if someone needs one?
On the front we have our Bible memory passage, Romans chapter number eight and we're really
close to finishing this one and so I'm really excited for those that are participating. Who
has anybody already completed Romans chapter number eight as far as memory? Okay I think
we had like at least one person last time I was here so you know at least you kiddos if you
can quote this week's verse you can get an ice cream treat after the service. Also we have
our service and so many times as well as we have our church stats and then on the right hand
side we have the list of expecting ladies. Continue to pray for Miss Darnell. I know they're
they're traveling. I think they went to Walt Disney World so we'll pray for them that
they're not back sledding and they get back into church. So also we have the list of events.
Tomorrow we're going to do our Christmas caroling and then we're having pizza fellowship
back here at the church and I've ordered lots of pizza already so we'll go out for about an
hour and then come back here and so I encourage you to participate. Try to be here before 5 30
so that way we can get organized and head out right away. Also we have our list of upcoming
preachers. I'm going to be sticking around and preaching for Sunday as well so I'll be here
Sunday morning and Sunday evening and we can we can give the Sunday morning only as a hard time
all right and then also Thursday or December December 19th brother Duncan Urbana is going to
be coming down here preaching for you guys December 23rd we're going to have a cookie bake
off. The second brother Chris Segura is coming back out here and then the ninth brother Urbana
again and then the 23rd brother Naeem so great that brother Segura was able to come out here he
even took pictures y'all got pictures of the guy and so you know he is he's real all right
also we have prayer requests continue to pray for brother Edward and his health
so that's pretty much all I had for announcements at this time we'll go to our
third song 431 silent night holy night all right 431 silent night holy night 431
um
silent night holy night 431 starting there on the first verse let's sing
silent night holy night all is calm all is bright
all is bright round yon virgin mother and child holy infant so tender and mild
sleep in heavenly peace sleep in heavenly peace
silent night holy night shepherds quake
at the sight
all three street came from heaven a farm
her family oh oh sing hallelujah
right the sea here is bull horn rise the same here
is
oh holy night son of god loves pure light radiant beams from thy holy face
is with the dawn of redeeming grace jesus lord at thy birth
earth jesus lord at thy
silent night holy night one drust or let thy light with the
angels let us sing hallelujah to our king
is
amen at this time we'll go to our bible reading as the offering plate is being passed around
turn if you would to acts chapter number 25 acts chapter number 25 brother sampson will read
point all right acts chapter number 25 turn if you would with me i'm going to read this
chapter as always together i'm going to start right here acts chapter number 25 verse 1 where
the bible reads now when festivals will come into the province after three days he ascended
from keshera to jerusalem then the high priest and the chief of the jews informed him against
paul and besotted desired favor against him that he would send for him to jerusalem laying in wait
laying in the way to kill him but the festas answered that paul should be kept in keshera
and that he himself would depart shortly a little let them therefore said he which among you are
able go down with me and accuse this man if there be any wickedness in him and when he
had tarried among them more than 10 days he went down unto keshera and the next day sitting
on the judgment seat commanded paul to be brought and when he was come the jews which
came down from jerusalem stood round about and laid many ungrievous complaints against paul
which they could not prove why he answered for himself neither against the law of the jews
neither against the temple nor yet against caesar have i offended anything at all but festas
willing to do the jews of pleasure answered paul and said will thou go up to jerusalem and
there be judge of these things before me then said paul i stand at caesar's judgment seat
where i ought to be judged so the jews haven't done no wrong as thou very well know it for if
i be an offender or committed anything worthy of death i refuse not to die but if there be
none of these things whereof these accuse me no man may deliver me unto them i appeal unto
caesar and festas when he had conferred with the council answered has thou appealed unto caesar
unto caesar shalt thou go and after certain days king agra and bernice came into
caesara to salute festas and when they had been there three days festas declared paul's case
unto the king saying there's a certain man left in bonds by felix about whom when i was
at jerusalem the chief priests and the elders of the jews informed desiring to have judgment
to whom i answered it is not the manner of the romans to deliver any man to die before that
he which is accused have the accusers face to face and have license to answer for himself
concerning the crime laid against him therefore when they were come hither without any delay
on the morrow i sat on the judgment seat and commanded a man to be brought forth
against whom when the accuser stood up they brought non-accusation of such things as i suppose
but had certain questions against him of their own superstition and of one jesus which was dead
whom paul affirmed to be alive and because i doubted of such manner of questions i asked
him whether he would go to jerusalem there be judge of these matters but when paul had
appealed to be reserved unto the hearing of augustus i commanded him to be kept till i might
send him to caesar then agrafa said unto festus i would also hear the man myself tomorrow said he
thou shall hear him and on the morrow when agrafa was come and burnished with great pomp
and was entered into the place of hearing with the chief captains and principal men of the city
at festus's commandment paul was brought forth and festus said king agrafa and all men which
are here present with us you see this man about whom all the multitude of the jews have
dealt with me both at jerusalem and also here trying that he ought not to live any longer
when i found that he had committed nothing worthy of death and that he himself have appealed
to augustus i have determined to send him of whom i have no certain thing to write unto my lord
wherefore i have brought him forth before you and specially before thee o king agrafa
that after examination had i might have somewhat to write for it seemeth me unreasonable to
send a prisoner and not with all to signify the crimes laid against him by his and a quick word
amen we're in acts chapter number 25 and we're continuing the same storyline that we've been
having in acts where the apostle paul is basically been seized by the romans in protection
against the jews from the jews and he's been questioned and i just kind of being tossed around
the court system the legal system of the romans being in prison at different various times
and in chapter 24 if we look at the kind of the last few verses it says in verse 27
but after two years fortius festus came into felix room and felix willing to show the jews of
pleasure left paul bound so the first few chapters of this situation where we have paul
getting arrested and we have him being accused of the jews and then going to the you know into
the romans hands and then being sent is a really short period of time it's only like a few
weeks or something but then we kind of like fast forward two years as we get into chapter 25
and we see that he's still in the situation of being basically in jail or on house arrest or
some variation therein and it's been so much time that the previous ruler or the previous
leader has been replaced so we had a previous guy in chapter number 24 felix but now we have
festus festus has now come into power and taken felix's position that's what it means by
felix room okay so it says in verse one now in festus has come into the province after three
days he ascended from cesarea to jerusalem so he comes into power and then only three days in
uh he goes to uh jerusalem so they're in cesarea and he's going to jerusalem and while
he's there he says then the high priest and the chief of the jews informed him against paul
and beside him and desired favor against him that he would send for him to jerusalem lying wait
in a way to kill him so right here we have that the jews they can't let this go
i mean it's been two years think about this they went and accused paul
didn't get anywhere didn't have anything of substance to accuse him and then two years later
they're still wanting to kill paul they're still after paul they still can't let this go
and they're going to this new leader and they're trying to basically get paul again it says in verse
number four but festus answered that paul should be kept at cesarea and that he himself would
depart shortly thither let them therefore said he which among you are able go down with me
and accuse this man if there be any wickedness in him so he comes into power he hasn't been in
power very long he goes to Jerusalem while there the religious leaders they come and they basically
are antagonizing festus and they're saying hey you know there's this guy paul you've got
in your custody let's let's just just send him over here and we'll kill him on the way
down now i'm sure that festus he doesn't necessarily care about paul he doesn't really
care about anybody as you read this as you read the chapter but he's probably just wanting to be
a little careful here like he just came into power he probably doesn't really want to rock the
boat on day three of coming into power by you know sending somebody down to Jerusalem and them
getting killed along the way and them getting killed along the way would potentially make him
look bad maybe be culpable and maybe kind of suspicious that he sent him down there just
randomly right when he came in and so he's kind of like why don't you guys come down and do it
properly you know why don't you just come down if this guy is such a bad guy like you're telling me
he is why don't you just come and witness and then we'll take care of it there you know from
his perspective he's thinking that this guy is wicked that he is really bad let's just go ahead
and fix it the proper way so that way he doesn't have any you know issue but notice that
the jews they're already willing to corrupt the judge we see that they have like there's no
morals the jews that we have in the bible the jews that jesus christ is calling out
they weren't godly people obviously they appeared righteous as jesus described them
but they were full of excess and extortion and they were full of all kinds of wickedness
bribes here that here they're just trying to influence this judge and corrupt this judge
and they're trying to get a judge involved in a conspiracy of murder of all kinds of criminal
offense and all kinds of evil i mean you know what kind of persona or not persona what kind of
perception do you think this guy has of christianity so-called right of the jews religion
when the religious leaders themselves are trying to bribe him and are trying to kill people
outside of the law doesn't that just give a lot of shame to the god of the bible doesn't that
just make the god of the bible look like it's just a fake and it's just a fraud and it's just
you know these guys are just in it for the money and so you know it's really just a shame
that a lot of people probably have a bad perception of christianity solely because of
religious leaders the wicked religious leaders that are in power today you know the charlatans
and the fraudsters and you know a lot of people think christianity is a joke because their
only interaction of christianity is seeing tv preachers or something and look they anybody
can tell those guys are fake you know obviously they dupe a lot of like you know
you know a baby boomer old you know widows or something like that but most people that have
you know any kind of common sense can watch the tv preacher and be like this guy only cares
about money this guy's a weirdo this guy's you know a psycho or something like that
and and so they end up thinking that christianity is a joke they don't think that
christianity is real they don't think there's any power behind it they think that people are
just using the bible for their own gain using it for money using it for power and here's the thing
there is some truth to that because there's been plenty of people who have abused the word of
god have abused positions of authority have abused christianity have have uh used the name
of jesus christ to their own advantage and so it's really important that we have men of
integrity men that are not willing to do such things because you know if just every single leader
just always turns out to be a charlatan and a fraud and a crook and just selfish and just wicked
it destroys a lot of other people's faith along the way you know someone that wants to put
themselves in a position of leadership or really wants to just present themselves as a leader
whether they're official or not you know they need to make sure that they're willing to
count the cost because when they go down others go down with them it's very important that
we have integrity in leadership we have integrity in the house of god and we have men that are
willing to live a life above approach that are willing to make the sacrifices and willing to set
a right example and willing to do the right thing so that people can have faith in the
god of the bible so people can have faith in christianity without the the righteous remnant
without the few pauls out there without the few men that are willing to take that stand
and live a christian life not for one year not for two years for a decade for decades for just
year after year just a long period of time so we can look at a guy and say here's a guy that
served god for decades here's a guy that's doing that which is right for a really long
time he stood the test of time he's seen the people come and go he's seen the wicked get
what they deserve and and really a lot of the bible won't even make sense to you unless you've
lived a life where it's decades of serving god decades because a lot of the things that happen
in the bible take a long period of time you know you but if you go through serving god and
i'm not even saying this from personal experience in the sense that i've seen a lot of
those things come to fruition i'm just saying from understanding what the bible teaches there's
a lot of things in the bible that will never make sense to us until we've gone like a whole
10 years of doing something or 20 years of doing something you know and a lot of people are
very naive to just life experience this is making me think of teenagers right as a teenager
you think you understand everything you finally figured out the whole world you know you finally
got all the information in fact you've now gotten to a point where you're smarter than your
parents but the the thing is is you you really don't understand how much more knowledge
and how much more life experience is going to teach you and how much more you're going to
mature and how much you're going to realize that you never thought of that you've never seen before
and there's just so many layers to that onion of life experience that's out there and so it's
important not to get lifted up with pride or thinking you know it all you know when you
really steadfast when you're really serving god you're going to see epic battles and you're
going to see ultimate victories now paul paul has not even been released from custody has been
multiple years so i'll say this also you could go through a really hard season of your life
that's years years of struggle years of difficulty years of just hardship and it takes a
long time for god to bless you it takes a long time for god you know to turn things around or
for something to change think about with joseph and egypt right they were gonna go through
seven years of plenty but they also went through seven years of famine do you think that was
easy i mean seven years of famine you know this church is only like three years old a little over
three years old i mean imagine if it was like the first seven years are going to be hard
you know that would be you know frustrating you know it might seem like oh man you know
why are we in a season of famine but you never know when god is going to end up giving
that season of harvest or blessing or turning things around and often he uses the hard times
to make good people better to test us to try us to see hey will you really serve me when it's a
year of famine will you serve me when it's a decade of famine will you serve me when things
are hard how about will you serve me when you've been in jail for two years i mean you
don't think that paul woke up you know every day kind of thinking like is this the day i'm
getting out you know like hey god i've been praying every day you know wouldn't it be easy to
quit praying if after two years you still had no results i mean you're just kind of thinking like
i thought i was the apostle paul like you know like if you're gonna leave me in jail
for like two years i mean what you'd kind of it would be easy to lose faith
and i think us in our flesh we struggle with this too we don't realize that sometimes god's
timing is a long time to us at least it seems like a long time right i mean two years is a long
time to wait i mean you know a lot happens in two years you know sometimes god will put us
through a really difficult time for a long period of time to give us character to give us
integrity to give us patience to teach us you know very important lessons and ultimately you
know it's better than being dead because what's the alternative i mean he was rescued from the
jews now be it he's you know and not in a good situation necessarily but through this chapter
we're going to see that paul gets some really unique opportunities that would have never been
afforded to him if he wasn't in this position okay so point you know the first point that you
know we're kind of looking at and look and seeing here is obviously paul's in a bad situation
people still want to kill him and let me tell you when they're going to want to stop
killing him when they die there's going to be people that just want the righteous to die
until they die it's just going to be a fight forever look at verse six and when he had
tarried among them more than 10 days he went down unto cesarea so this is talking about festus
he turns back to cesarea he was there uh more than 10 days about two weeks and the
next day sitting on the judgment seat commanded paul to be brought so as soon as he gets back
i mean this guy is doing the jews bidding isn't he i mean he's basically the jews must have
his number or something the day he gets back the next day sitting on the judgment seat
commanded paul to be brought and when he was come the jews which came down from jerusalem
stood round about and laid many and grievous complaints against paul which they could not
prove now this is an interesting verse because it's saying they showed up and man did they give
him you know all kinds of just evil just all kinds of just horrible slanderous things are
being said about paul paul's a cult leader and paul's a malefactor and paul's wicked
and then it's like oh oh he's a malefactor what did he do well he's bad do you have any
proof of that look this guy said he's bad too like get up here you know weinstein
okay weinstein's like he's bad why do you think he's bad well goldberg said he was bad
you know and goldberg's pointing you know to greenback you know greenback goldberg you know
all these guys are coming up and they're just like bad bad but then there's just really no
evidence they're just like this guy's evil this guy's a cult leader did you hear what he said
do you hear what he believes but at the end of the day you know it doesn't make them look good
because what does it say in verse number eight
it says while he answered for himself neither against the law of the jews neither against the
temp so let me slow down because i want to read this for you correctly it says
while he answered for himself so they laid many grievous complaints the way this is kind
of narrating he's like while he answered himself and then this is him talking okay neither
against the law of the jews neither against the temple nor yet against caesar have i offended
anything at all but festus so so then you know it kind of transitions so they're saying like
he's done all this horrible horrible and then then paul just like just one liner i've not done
anything against the jews or the temple or caesar and i'm done there's my defense i rest my
case you know i haven't done any of these things so then it says but festus willing to do the jews
of pleasure so notice whose side he's on already and let me say something judges oftentimes will
just favor one side over the other they're just already on someone's team they're not impartial
it's not blind justice here right he's already willing to do the jews of service then he he gets
in and they said wilt thou go up to jerusalem and there be judged these things before me now
let's slow down for a second they laid all these charges against paul but they couldn't prove
any of it okay and then paul's just like didn't do any of it so at this point they have
nothing they don't have a confession and everything they said is unprovable so from festus
perspective what would he have to do i mean if someone comes up and says we have a case the
prosecution is coming against a defendant and the prosecution lays out their case they say we
have no case and they're like did you do it no you know what the next thing you gotta do
we're ready to go but what does he say he's trying to give the jews another he's throwing a
bone here he's like well i don't have anything but how about how about you go back to jerusalem
now this shows how wicked festus is because think about it if he just lets paul go now the jews are
going to be really mad at him so instead of letting the jews be mad at him what does he do
he's willing to go along with their conspiracy plot and literally kill paul
and you know what this happens in america all the time where a person is innocent
but because of the mob the angry mob outside the judge is willing to hang the man the judge is
willing to get a bad ruling against the man against the defendant so as to appease the mob
and notice this guy is willing to literally be complicit in murder and a murder plot against
paul just so the jews won't be mad at him just so they won't come and pick at his house
or go protest him or dox him or whatever evil is going to happen and this also shows that
there's no new thing under the sun you know and a lot of cases have happened in this this country
this year where you have like the blm protesters you have anti-profit protesters and all these angry
people standing outside saying we're going to kill the jury and we're going to kill the judge
you better give right justice and blah blah blah and it's perverting judgment it's perverting
judgment and it's not right and let me tell you something when you bow down to the mob
you're their slave forever you have to just decide you know what i don't want to live in
a society where an angry mob gets to tell me what to do i'm going to just take a stand
because you know what when everyone takes a stand they back down it just takes a few
brave souls to actually do the right thing and give the right verdict in a particular case
in a particular subject to me it reminds me of the kyle rittenhouse situation a little bit
where it was real obvious that the prosecution had no case he made it very clear he didn't do it
and then it's just like well what are we going to do here you got to let him go
i mean that's just the rep and praise the lord that there was enough brave souls
that were willing to say you know what we're going to do the right thing and we're going to
write you know render the right verdict here and you know he was not found guilty of
first degree murder it was like first degree reckless homicide or some ridiculous claim
as if he intended to kill these people beforehand or had guile against these people
he'd never met in his life it's it's insane okay but that's just one example there's so many
examples today where judges and the legal system it's just it's just crooked and that's
why the bible in first corinthian six is so adamant about not taking brother to law and not
trying to drag people it's just unjust judgment they're all wicked you know not all i shouldn't say
that but essentially just in generalities the outside of the church judgment's bad and that's
what god said i didn't just make that up i mean god's saying why would you go to the unjust
for judgment you know the unbelievers go to proverbs 29 now if god's calling them you know
unjust then i already know that that's right now proverbs chapter 29 look at verse number four
proverbs chapter 29 look at verse number four here's another reason why
uh a lot of times judgments are perverted not just from all the pressure but kind of the flip
side because not only do these people say like we'll kill you and stone you and you know
harass you if you get the wrong verdict but then on the other side they'll typically say
well we'll give you lots of money and promotion and jobs if you give the right verdict
so they give you the both the carrot and the stick they're like do right get a carrot do
wrong no carrot and the stick you know it's just kind of like they are going to use all
of their tactics to their advantage proverbs 29 look at verse four the king by judgment
establish it the land but he that receiveth gifts overthrows it so notice it's very very important
that any area have righteous judgment because if it doesn't have righteous judgment ultimately
that area will be destroyed okay and you can see this throughout history you can see this in
any area you want to know one of the worst places to live places where they don't have
a good legal system a place where the judges are corrupt the judges already bought and paid
for the judges just do whatever the government tells them they're already paid off or they're
they're too heavily influenced or too heavily biased or there's countries where you're found
guilty before you even walk in the room you're just guilty until proven innocent basically
they wouldn't arrest you if you hadn't done something wrong basically and so
when you don't have good judgment when you don't have righteous judges your city your area
your town your country will be destroyed we can see this throughout america there's certain areas
where the judges are more corrupt than others and in those areas crime is a lot higher there's
a lot more thievery there's a lot more wickedness going on right now in california
theft is insane i mean theft is just going on rampant in certain areas why because they've
already ruled that they're not going to convict people of petty crime the da got up and is
basically like passed new legislation saying that they're not even arrest people for you know
stealing things that are under the price of like 850 or something like that you can look it
up but it's just like what in the world so basically you know when you're robbing someone
be like how much is that worth you know okay and you know i've done a little bit of research
on this because i was just interested i've looked up like criminal defense lawyers okay
and and specifically stealing because i don't know i just had this interest in like what
would happen to someone if they stole a lot of money like what punishments they may receive
about that and so i've like looked this up and the worst thing you can steal in these
situations is money because you can't devalue money but when people steal goods what criminal
defense lawyers will do is they'll try every effort to lower the value of whatever item
was stolen they'll say like oh this car was already dinged up and it was already damaged
and it's really not worth much you know just trying to knock down the price of whatever
it is that they still oh this handbag is a tear it's worn it's out of fashion you know
just basically trying to drive down the price of everything that was stolen and they present
all this evidence to basically devalue property because if they can get it under certain thresholds
the criminal penalties reduce significantly i believe in the state of texas
i've looked this up recently so you can fact check me but i believe you have to be
under it's either 3500 or 2500 i believe it's 35 if i remember correctly anything under 3500
that you steal is not a felony but if it's above 3500 then it is a felony and then when
it gets above more thresholds it becomes even more severe felonies and everything like that
now again if you steal property or goods or whatever that's easier to try and knock down
when you steal cash it's hard to be like well this cash is less than it now it's the amount
that you stole okay and so that's why it's you know if you're going to steal something i'm
not giving you advice here but it's better to steal something that could be devalued at least
from a criminal defense lawyer perspective okay and and it's just the wicked the criminal
system in this world is just so wicked though and so like people are going out and robbing
indiscriminately in california and they're basically getting away with it no one's doing anything
about it and the cops will arrest people but i saw a cop do an interview and they said
right now we can issue them citations and everything like that but the da and the
prosecution has already said they won't prosecute so it's basically just handing them like just a
note says like please stop and it's not working surprisingly you know when you just hand them a
letter and they have to release them because there's two sides of our legal system there's
the people that do the arrest and then there's the people that convict them okay just because
you get arrested doesn't mean anything you have to actually then get convicted on top of that
so if the prosecution will not work with the arresting officer then there's a mismatch that
ends up allowing a lot of people to go free from crimes and it'll frustrate police officers
and it'll discourage police officers from even making arrests i've talked to police officers and
i know they they're discouraged they don't even want to arrest people because they say i'll
just arrest this person then they'll just be out and then it'll look bad that i'm like
arresting people and nothing's happening it'll affect my record and then it's harder to arrest
the person again and then it's like it's all this paperwork and headache and all this
so it's like they basically have to work with prosecution and build the prosecution's case for
them before they want and then make make the arrest and then just hand over on a like a silver
platter with a bow wrapped around it you know the prosecution situation and and the cops are
too lazy you want to do that so they shift the burden to the victim so now the victim has
to basically you know wrap everything around in a bow and just like here's all the evidence for
the prosecution here's it all you know please do your job it's it's kind of a sad reality that
we live in but fortunately if you're a motivated enough victim you can do all that you can just
wrap around a nice little bow and just hand it off to everybody and say here you go and they're
like wow but here's the thing about the judges judges can be bought you know and so that's why
you want to just avoid the situation at all costs jesus even teaches this go to matthew
chapter five for a moment that's where i want you to turn go to matthew chapter number five
when we realize that you know the system back then was rigged and you know if you just like
have a brain or if you've ever noticed anything going on in our world you realize that it's rigged
here too then then you really want to avoid the legal system at all costs it should always be
the last resort and if you do something wrong the bible makes it very clear what you should do
it's unequivocal if you actually find yourself committing some kind of crime or you do something
wrong against someone or you injure someone or you do something evil what does the bible say
well look what it says in verse 25 matthew 5 verse 25 agree with thine adversary quickly
whilst thou art in the way with him lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge
and the judge deliver thee to the officer and thou be cast into prison
now notice what happens if you do something wrong you want to get right quick before what happens the
legal system gets involved because once the legal system gets involved you can't stop that train
that train those wheels are in motion things are going to happen you know and so that's why
it's important to not even get that train going now what does he what does god say
verily i say unto thee thou shalt by no means come out fence till thou is paid the uttermost
farthing wow that's scary because you know the bible is not saying that the justice system
will make sure you pay it all it's saying that god will make sure that you pay it all
and that's why it's really really important that when you screw up you get right when you
do something wrong you pay it and you make sure to get it rectified early and often you don't want
to have to go through the legal system because the legal system will fix it apparently but not
because of what they want because god is there and forcing them to take that out on them goviewood
back to acts 25 you know and the bible tells us that verily there's a god in the earth that
judges you know there he really does judge here too some people think like oh well they'll
eventually get it when they go to hell yeah that's true but god also judges here and people are
getting what they deserve a lot in this earth they're getting all kinds of evil that happens to
them all kinds of pain and suffering people are having a lot of punishment and they do they
think it's because you know there is no god it's because there is a god so it's so weird how they
think that they're like oh why would god allow all this bad stuff to happen to me if he exists
and it's like the reason why all the bad stuff is happening is because god does exist
and he's punishing you like for the wicked stuff you did that's the whole reason it's
because you're wicked that's the reason why they don't want to believe god is exist because
they have to admit that they're wicked they have to say oh the bad stuff that's happening to me
is because god does exist and because i'm wicked what they want to believe is i'm good
and i would never let this bad stuff happen to me i would never you know punish myself and
so therefore god must not exist their logic is faulty though you know even pharaoh had to
at one point realize like the lord is righteous and i and my servants are wicked you know i
and my people are wicked but he wasn't willing to stay in that state of mind forever because
he's a reprobate so he can't then he drifts back and then he goes and attacks the lord's
people but in a moment of soberness and consciousness he realized even he was wicked
and deserved all the evil that was happening to him look at verse number uh 10 the bible says
then said paul i stand at caesar's judgment seat where ought to be judged to the jews have
i done no wrong as thou very well knowest verse 11 for if i be an offender or have committed
anything worthy of death i refuse not to die but if there be none of these things where of these
accuse me no man may deliver me unto them i appeal to caesar now a few things in this verse
i want to kind of slow down on this verse because i feel like these few verses are really
important first of all i believe that paul must have perceived the danger he was in from that
statement because and you know he's not stupid he was in jerusalem not hurting anybody in the
temple alone basically just with a few other guys not causing any problems just praying serving
god or whatever you know having a quiet time meditating on the lord and he just gets snatched
up by a bunch of evil wicked jews that drag him out beating him trying to kill him he gets
ripped out of their hands from the roman by the romans then they take them and at some point
the romans say like okay we're gonna bring you back down here and let them kind of question you
again in the middle of being questioned he gets beat again and they're trying to kill him and
they won't harken they won't listen or whatever then they drag him to set caesarea
and they come up and they just just lying about him slandering him wanting him to die
you know saying all this evil about him and then he's like hey do you want to go back there
it's like ah no like duh no but you know it's probably not the best way to answer the judge
just like no right so he kind of he's kind of thinking about it and he's like well i'm gonna
go ahead and appeal i stand at caesarea's judgment right that's the immediate thing that
comes to his mind like get me as far away from these people as possible like i don't want
to go to jerusalem i want to go to rome now that would make sense because if you go back
to chapter number 23 look what it said in verse 11 and the night following the lord stood by him
and said be of good cheer paul for as thou has testified to me in jerusalem so must
thou bear witness also at rome so maybe he put two and two together and he's thinking like
here's my opportunity to stay away from the jews okay which is a good idea and number two go to
rome on a free ticket you know take me to rome let's go god already told him that he would go to
rome and what's the purpose of going to rome so he can testify to the lord so he can do some
work for the lord and so it makes a lot of sense why he would then appeal to caesar
and also you have to understand that when you're in these situations every single word is very
important you want to meditate on the words that you're going to use you want to really think
about the situation you're in because at any moment that he says what if he accidentally
wasn't really really thinking about this and he's like i haven't done anything wrong yeah let me
go down there and i'll tell him how i've done anything wrong again he just issued his
own destiny at that point not necessarily knowing what he was saying was he so that's why when
you're in these situations you want to be really careful here's some good advice say nothing
without a lawyer let me give you some practical advice whenever you've been accused of anything
any kind of legal situation and the cops literally saying like you know anything you say and do can
and will be used against you in a court of law do you know they're giving you your miranda
rights you need to be like hey if he's he's like warning me that he's about to attack me
with anything i say and do maybe i should not say or do anything and a lot of times they'll
bring you into a room and apparently cops don't have to have integrity because i've watched a lot
of interrogations when they interrogate people they just lie i mean i've watched a lot of
interrogations just because i was curious about it like specifically like people that were guilty
and just to see how the guilty people responded that was the goal and then i realized
like wow cops are scumbags because i was like man like they just walk in they're like we've
got you you're nailed we have all the evidence you're going to jail forever you might as well
confess now and they have nothing the like the narrator is saying like if this suspect had
known his rights he could have he could have asked if he's being arrested and the cop would
have had to say no and then he could have walked out but watch as they put the guy under
pressure and then he confesses to the entire crime and you're just like wow you know it was
kind of crazy you know when you watch these like scenes and whatever and i'm not trying to help
criminals because none of you guys are criminals all right but i'm just saying if you get
found in one of these situations you need to ask certain questions like am i being detained
do i have the right to leave can i leave because that's your best thing leave second
thing would be i'm not going to speak to anyone unless i have a lawyer present that's really good
advice because your lawyer you know will know what you can and cannot say what you should should
not answer things like that and they can't even use this against you you know it's not you're
not allowed to be you're not perceived as guilty because you asked for a lawyer to be present that
doesn't necessarily rule into in the court of law now that's why it's funny because at the
pal written house juror his during his trial the prosecution tried to use against him the
fact that he exercised his fifth amendment right to not speak as a like some kind of sign or
evidence that he was guilty or something like that and the judge just like ripped him a new
one because that's not even allowed because if you're afforded the right to basically not speak
so that is to not incriminate yourself or say something foolish or whatever then
you have every right to do that in america at least for now you know we have these rights
you might as well use them and we noticed that paul is using his rights paul has the right to
appeal to caesar and so he says i appeal unto caesar and that's where he's going to go so it's
also no there's no problem in exercising whatever rights you have as a citizen you know whatever god
has given you whatever god has blessed you with you know wherever you find yourself it's important
to be intelligent to be wise to understand your situation understand you know the rights and the
the opportunities you have before you and use all of them to your advantage for the cause
of christ there's no point in just dying early being a fool you know the apostle paul is using
his rights here he's exercising his rights he's defending himself you know he's answering
these questions that were against him and the bible is literally describing you know what
paul's doing is answering for himself defending himself you know protecting himself
from this very serious situation and because you know the enemy is unsaved and because they're
not spiritual a lot of times they'll try to fight you in carnal ways they'll attack you through
money they'll attack you through the legal system they'll attack you in these ways where it
may not appear like it's an obvious spiritual battle look this is a spiritual battle even though
you would think like this is like the court system and this is just like you know weird
criminal matter whatever but isn't this a serious spiritual matter oh yeah it is i mean we're
talking about the apostle paul getting the opportunity to go to rome they're wanting to kill him
improperly and so it's very important that you pay attention to your life in all areas
not just thinking like well i'm spiritual at church but everywhere else it's you know
not spiritual or something or it's not serving the lord look everything is serving the lord
you know our whole life is serving god in every aspect and in every way and we need to make
sure that we're careful to handle ourselves and i got this really good advice that
if you ever are put in a position to essentially testify like you have to actually answer
you have to you know basically give some kind of advice for yourself you're being questioned
you're put in these situations where you have to testify give a deposition doing things
you know the advice that i was given and i think it's really good advice is that you
should pray for the understanding of every single question asked before answering and that you
should pray and ask god to give you the answer for every single question before you answer
and it'll help you kind of slow down process it and and ultimately you're relying upon
the lord to help you you know rather than just speaking for yourself you know the god of
the universe that spoke everything into existence through his word is a wordsmith let me tell you
and jesus christ he avoided every word salad that the pharisees and the sadducees wanted
to give against them and you know what the bible talks about the holy spirit being with us
the bible talks about uh you know the god giving his his servants words whenever they're
put in these situations you know and so you know ask the lord to help you in one of these
situations i think it makes a lot of sense i think it's really good advice and so that's
something that we can think of here's another thing he mentions though and this is a little
bit different than what we've talked about so far but notice what he says in verse 11
that he says for if i be an offender or i've committed anything worthy of death
i refuse not to die now i think that this verse is actually a really important verse and it's
a really good verse because unfortunately in the society we live today gotten so perverted
weird and they are just history deniers that many christians will deny the death penalty
they like think that it's unbiblical or they think that jesus like abolished the death penalty
or some kind of bizarre doctrine that's being taught but notice paul i guess paul didn't get
this uh memo because notice what he says if he says if i've done something worthy of death
i refuse not to die now in every other category is he not trying to defend the faith
i mean in every other area where they're basically accusing him or falsely accusing
he's taking a stand he's saying nope i haven't done anything wrong you know this is what the
bible actually teaches i'm believing in jesus christ so he's he's fully aware of the old
testament he was raised a pharisee and now that he's been saved and had revelations from jesus
christ he's fully aware of jesus christ doctrine in the new testament i mean this guy's pretty
qualified to interpret for us the differences between the old and new testament i mean if
there was ever a person on this earth that is the most qualified to tell us what changed
from the old testament to the new testament it's paul i mean there's not a better person
who who would you pick of anybody on this earth except the god himself to answer the question of
like hey what changed from the old new testament it's paul so if paul is saying in acts chapter
number 25 that he would take the death penalty then i guarantee the death penalty didn't change
otherwise he would have been like no no guys even if i committed you know something worthy of
death jesus abolished the death penalty man didn't you hear about the woman caught in adultery
that's what i always hear it's like well jesus you know did you not hear that story
and i'm thinking like yeah i did i actually did read that story you know whenever they
brought this woman you know caught in adultery and they're asking jesus about what what moses
said you know and what the law said you know what jesus said and they're like uh no i don't
remember what did he say you know they're like bringing up this story and i'm like
he said he does without sin let him first cast a stone at her and then i say so did jesus say
to stoner or not like uh well he said to stoner sounds like he believes the death penalty
then i mean did jesus really say oh the death penalty is gone guys what did he actually say
throw stones at her i mean that's if you really want to just break it down jesus did not back away
from the death penalty in any way but he did do this he did put a caveat on it so that none of
them would be able to fulfill it and it was a really interesting and clever way to answer
that question because in no way to deny the old testament and no way to deny the death penalty
yet because of what he said though he convicted all of them because they were sinners not willing
to cast a judgment and he avoided a situation where people would have even followed that advice
because look jesus had a big following and i think that if jesus had said stoner some people
probably would have done it some people would have picked up stones throwing stones i mean
adulterous a serious sin and you know i know we live in america where it happens every day
but you know back then these people were zealous of the law they were going to kill
think about this they wanted to kill paul just for the fact that he might have brought a
gentile into the temple they were that serious about the law they wanted to stone people for
breaking the sabbath okay someone committing adultery of course they would have wanted to
stone that woman and if jesus had said stoner there would have been plenty of people that
would have picked up rocks and stoned her and killed her right at that moment but then what
would have happened the religious leaders would have gone to the romans and said hey there's this
insurrectionist that is killing people contrary to roman law because he gave the order to stone her
and a bunch of people did picked up stones and stoned her and killed her and then jesus would have
been arrested found guilty and executed but not on the cross the way the bible prescribed it
and not without sin okay so that therefore he answered it in such a clever way so as to
not deny the old testament yet make it where no one was going to throw a stone because they're
like well i'm center too you know and notice that the bible says the oldest left first and
then it went all the way down to the youngest so the older you are the easier it is to realize
your sin apparently okay the younger you are you're still kind of prideful and think that
you're right but the older you are the more you've read the bible you think like i sinned a lot
but the the death penalty is a very important doctrine and it's something that we should
continue to preach so that people will believe in the death penalty you know in texas praise
god we still have the death penalty if you commit murder and it's first degree it's intentional
and it's the right circumstances you will get the death penalty in texas now there is
exceptions and everything like that but some uh situations i've read i've read there's a long
list of reasons why you die for getting murdered like it's anybody that's a police officer you
get the death you can get the death penalty for that if it's like a first responder like an
emt or a fireman or something like that you kill them intentionally it's it's it's potentially
the death penalty um there's a lot of other circumstances in which it can be a first degree
intentional homicide some kind of violent murder or whatever you can get the death penalty in
the state of texas and the state of texas still executes people unfortunately states like
oklahoma have recently given pleas or have accepted pleas of people on death road and not
uh give them the death penalty and just put them on life in prison you know that what that's
going to do increase crime all it's going to do it's not helping anybody you know grieving
the guy that's you know not going to be killed he may not even like want to be in prison for
his whole life you know a lot of people that are in prison want to die they try to kill
themselves on a regular basis because they just want to die and you know it's harder to kill yourself
than to let someone else kill you as evidenced by a lot of people in the bible wanted to kill
themselves saul didn't want to kill himself but he wanted to die and so whenever no one would
do it he finally tried to do it himself he finally fell upon his own sword but you know
the death penalty is a healthy thing it's a good thing to have in our society because of sin
it's the best way to eliminate certain sins and certain sinners and when it comes to you
know the state of texas praise the lord we have it you know some states don't here's a
state that doesn't have the death penalty wisconsin very sad thing that wisconsin doesn't
have the death penalty because recently there was a man who intentionally was driving or at
least this is the alleged the ledgeman there's a man who is alleged to have intentionally
driven his vehicle through parades this like christmas parade or whatever and he injured like
dozens and killed at least six potentially even more including elderly and even a young child
like eight-year-old boy or something like that and according to two detectives it's already come
out they've given testimony that the guy was like slowing down speeding up swerving and at
times it looked like he was swerving in the direction of people for the most damage making
it pretty clear that it was seemingly intentional but if you look up this guy's rap sheet
he was literally released recently on bond a thousand dollar bond after he'd run over his
ex-girlfriend his ex-girlfriend came and was like you know and argue with him at a gas station
and he intentionally ran over her and then was facing charges was released on bond so those are
pending charges on someone before that he had like a decade of just all kinds of serious crimes
warrants for his arrest in multiple states how about rape and impregnating a teenager
what do you have to do to go to jail like how do you have how do you have all of these crimes
you know that was like a conviction running over his girlfriend with a car all kinds of abuse
and all kinds of other evil that he's done in his entire life i mean it took 20 minutes
20 minutes for the prosecutor just to read the charges of conviction that he's had in his past
just 20 minutes of just like in 2002 this and 2003 this and 2004 this and 2005 this and 2006
and then just over and over and over so where we live in a society where you can commit all
manner of atrocity and crime and evil and still be roaming the streets oh because of covid
right you know literally they've released thousands of prisoners criminals from jails because of covid
in fact a lot of people were saying that the prisoners were trying to find someone that had
covid and like rub their body on them and like have them cough on them or whatever just so they
could get sick so they could be released from prison just you know i mean think about it if
you were in life in prison or you had a long you know 10 years in prison and they say hey just
go get this flu for like a week and you'll get out it's like yeah you're gonna get that
you know everyone's gonna get that and so it's just insane the world that we live in where we
don't have the death penalty we don't have serious uh punishments for these people because
when you have the death penalty people are thinking like i don't want to do that
maybe i won't actually commit that crime because i'll actually be killed
but when they realize that they might get off or you know there's not that serious of a penalty
and i and i looked this up because i was just interested but this man currently faces six charges
of intentional homicide which if found guilty the maximum punishment is just life in prison
that's it that's the max punishment if he gets that but in 1853 they repealed the death penalty
in wisconsin that was a long time ago 1853 now the reason why is they've only had one
execution in all of their state's history one and it was in 1851 two years before they ended
up abolishing the death penalty the person who was executed his name was john mccaffery
he was found guilty of drowning his wife murder just first degree intentional homicide
at the time wisconsin state law the only penalty for first degree intentional homicide
was the death penalty so if anybody was found guilty of first degree intentional homicide
on this was the death penalty so this guy found guilty was sentenced to death was killed well
then after witnessing this guy's execution some legislator or something goes on a campaign to
to end the death penalty now this is the logic that they used they said well because
the only punishment for first degree homicide is the death penalty juries are not convicted
because they because they realize that you know we're basically sentencing this guy to death
if we found find him guilty so they're having too much pity too much empathy for these
criminals and so they're just ruling not guilty on a regular basis and so they wanted to have
lesser punishments to try and entice the jury to end up convicting now that's a long time ago
okay we're talking 170 years ago it's hard to know what's real and this is one thing that
people don't understand when it comes to history usually a lot of revisionist history
meaning we have no idea what was really happening okay i think it's possible that two
things are true about this either a this guy is just making up a lie to try and you know
essentially change the law or it could be true i think it could be true because the bible teaches
that when there's the death penalty says thine eye shall not pity so god is already anticipating
the fact that there's going to be a lot of people that don't have the stomach for putting
someone to death or sentencing someone to death or being willing to be complicit with the death
penalty and that tells me this that they've really probably just don't know the bible
and they probably are just ignorant of god's word and that's why we need the god the word
of god to thunder forth so that people would have the stomach would have the appetite for the
death penalty because it's appropriate you know we shouldn't shy away from such a penalty we
should desire it now go if you would in your bible x is 31. i want to go to a few places
real quick what's interesting is after reading this it says that there is many attempts to bring
back the death penalty throughout uh you know wisconsin's history yet there was it was never
successful but there was in 2006 they did a poll and they asked people they said
we're thinking about bringing back the death penalty and if we brought back the death penalty
on this grounds that someone committed multiple intentional homicides not just one multiple
intentional homicides then we would put them to death 55 percent of the respondents said that
they would want the death penalty for that person so in fact the majority of wisconsin
citizens at that time did say they wanted the death penalty for that situation and what's
sick about it is this guy is literally facing six charges but if found guilty he won't even fall
to the will of the 55 percent in wisconsin which i guarantee if found guilty a lot higher percentage
of wisconsin citizens would probably want him to actually be put to death which is just sad
that literally these the judges and our legal system is not willing to comply with what the
bible actually says and a lot of christians are bringing that number down by having a false
ideology of what the bible says look what it says in exodus 31 genesis exodus 31 look at verse
number 14 okay and we're going to read a few verses here what the bible actually says verse
14 he shall keep the sabbath therefore for it is holy unto you everyone that defileth it
shall surely be put to death there's never do with any work therein that soul shall be cut off
among his people six days may work be done but in the seventh is the sabbath of rest holy to the
lord whosoever do with any work in the sabbath day he shall surely he put the death so the
bible does prescribe the death penalty for the sabbath now in the new testament we realize
that we no longer have to observe the sabbath therefore it wouldn't make sense to have the
death penalty for the sabbath in the new testament okay and people will use this as an example
of how jesus also abolished the death penalty but they really screw up the bible go to matthew
chapter 12 i watched a video recently of somebody you know that was against the new ivy
or something like that whatever that is specifically my sending pastor pastor stephen
anderson and he was saying that you know it's it's wrong for christians to believe in the
death penalty especially leviticus 2013 in the new testament this guy's obviously not seen
this out of my deception so he needs to watch that but this is his justification he says well
he pastor anderson and these people like this are ignorant of of the bible because jesus
broke the sabbath and so he you know uh obviously is cherry picking let me let me word this a
little better and again you should get the verbatim quotes from this guy this is what the guy was
basically saying he said they're basically cherry picking which parts of the old testament law
that we should obey and not obey when it comes to capital punishment because they're not
doing the sabbath and he's like but that's what jesus did and i was like wow you just
said that jesus is cherry picking the old testament to his own his own whims and wishes i was
like that's a wicked thing to say that's a blasphemous thing to say but first of all jesus
didn't cherry pick anything out of the old testament he fulfilled the entire old testament
okay he never sinned in any way but what some people don't understand is how the sabbath works
okay so because of their ignorance of how the sabbath works they end up railing on jesus
but look at matthew 12 verse 1 at the time jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn
and his disciples were in hungered and began to pluck the ears of corn and eat when the
pharisee saw it they said on him behold thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon
the sabbath day but he said unto them have not read what david did when he was in hungered
and they that were with him how he entered into the house of god and did eat the showbread
which was not lawful for him to eat neither for them which were with him but only for the
priests or have you not read in the law how that on the sabbath days the priests in the temple
profane the sabbath and are blameless so what is jesus pointing out jesus is saying look you're
falsely accusing my disciples of breaking the sabbath from a sin perspective okay
whereas you can technically break the sabbath and it not be a sin because there's a provision
or the sabbath now how do you know that well look what jesus says jesus says in verse number
five that the priests profane the sabbath but notice it says this and and are blameless
so when the priests are profaning the sabbath are they sinning no but here's the question are
the priests breaking the sabbath the answer is obviously yes they're doing all kinds of work i
mean they're working their butt off okay they're literally just slicing animals up and dicing them
and you know putting their parts everywhere and burning it and pouring blood i mean they're
working they're sweating they're doing everything you could imagine and it's the sabbath okay but
they're blameless why because god told them to do that on the sabbath this would be the
same logic as when it says thou shall not kill and be like oh i guess you can't have the
death penalty then and you're like no no that's an improper understanding we're not killing
we're just legally executing okay and in the new testament i believe after studying this recently
that really you can just say unequivocally thou should not kill because god doesn't ever say
like kill in the new testament as far as like a positive thing we're putting some we believe
in the death penalty putting someone to death is not killing them killing or murder would
essentially be taking someone's life that's innocent whereas executing someone is giving them
the proper punishment for their crime okay and so i don't believe in killing anyone
killing is always wrong murder is always wrong but obviously there is the act of slaying someone
or the act of putting someone to death that someone could misunderstand is killing
whereas the bible is teaching it's the execution of someone just like the sabbath
someone could be technically doing work on the sabbath and someone thinks they're breaking the
sabbath in a sense that they're sinning whereas they're not now let's keep reading in this because
we're going to get more understanding look at verse number six but i say in you that in this
place is one greater than the temple and if you had known what this meaneth i will have
mercy not sacrifice you would not have condemned the guiltless notice does jesus think that they
have done anything wrong no they're condemning the guiltless for the son of man is the lord
even of the sabbath day and when he was apart at thence he went in their synagogue behold
there was a man which had his hand withered and they asked him saying is it lawful to heal
in the sabbath days they might have that they might accuse him so they want him to heal
somebody to kill him isn't that weird they like want some guy to get healed so they can have
a reason to kill jesus isn't that sick i mean it's so bizarre and they think that somehow that
gives them the right to kill jesus because they don't understand the bible at all okay these
people are fools verse 11 he said to them what man shall there be among you that shall have one
sheep and if it fall into a pit on the sabbath day will he not lay hold on it and lift it out
so he's saying you guys already break the sabbath you guys already know that you're
supposed to break the sabbath meaning that if if something bad happened you know you would
help that person you wouldn't be like oh sabbath you know tough luck you know your kid falls
into a pit and you're like well it's nice knowing you you're like see you later no you'd
pick your kid out of the pit you'd pick the animal i mean you're gonna do something you
know the sabbath wasn't to be a burden the sabbath wasn't to be this like just bizarre day
where you just can't do work even when there's a legitimate reason to do work it's basically
that you're you're ceasing from work on purpose to serve god to illustrate salvation's not
of words that's the whole point okay but it's not to be so burdensome to say like if there's
a real situation you know someone breaks in your house well i can't defend my house because
it's a sabbath you know that's stupid you know they're not understanding the spirit of the
law here and he's pointing out their hypocrisy verse 12 how much then is a man better than a
sheep wherefore it is lawful to do well on the sabbath days so he's saying if you would pick
an animal out of the ditch how much better would it be for me to heal somebody on the sabbath day
like that doesn't even make any sense and then notice what he answers the question it is lawful
to do well on the sabbath days so is jesus sinning if he heals someone on the sabbath
the answer is no now here's another question though did he break the sabbath
and the answer is yes let me prove that go to john chapter number five go to john
chapter number five
matthew mark luke john john chapter number five i know i'm taking a second to explain this but i
think it's a good time john chapter five look at verse 18 therefore the jews sought the
more to kill him because he had not only had broken the sabbath but said also that god was
his father making himself equal to god now that's black letters i don't have a red letter bible
but you'll see a lot of red and then right there in the black the black is the narrator
and you know the narrator of the bible is called the holy ghost and he's the spirit of truth
and he leads you on truth so when the narrator is telling you something about someone
true and if the narrator is telling us that jesus broke the sabbath it's because he did look
at the verse before it but jesus answered them my father worketh hitherto and i work
that's pretty clear it's unequivocal that jesus said i worked on the sabbath i did work now i
think there's a lot of spiritual symbolism we can even get here too because guess what in
the this the special sabbaths of easter weekend where you had the high day and you
had the normal sabbath which is salvation everyone was resting but jesus was working for
our salvation by dying and going to hell and being risen again and so it's a picture of how
jesus did all the work for us to be saved while we just simply rest but beyond that he literally
broke the sabbath healed people again why do you think he was healing people on the sabbath
to prove a point that we rest and he does the work and that's how we get saved okay
but it also teaches this that just because someone perceives that you violated the old
testament law doesn't mean that you really did he never did and if jesus never broke the
sabbath you can't say oh well jesus didn't believe in the death penalty for the sabbath
oh yes he did he's the word of god you know he's just as much matthew mark luke and john
has genesis exodus leviticus numbers and neuteronomy okay just like levit or exodus 31
that we just read where he was prescribing the death penalty of the sabbath that's jesus there
okay because he's the word of god so it's not like oh now we entered in the new testament
no death penalty no paul said i refuse not to die and we should still believe in the death
penalty we should teach it we should explain it we should educate people on it and we should
have it and look if someone commits six intentional homicides with their vehicle
in the state of texas i hope that the righteous judgment will come and they will get the death
penalty you know there's a sin unto death i do not say he shall pray for it is what the
bible says you know we shouldn't just let these evil atrocities happen in our city and our state
and in our country because it brings more evil we should put evil away from among us
go back if you went to acts 25 acts chapter 25 you know and i get a lot of flack for
believing in the death penalty but you know what i'm going to continue believing it
and you know which uh things i think people should be put to death for everything the bible
said that hasn't been fulfilled in christ okay so yeah a i.e the sabbath is technically not
something that we should be putting people to death for pretty much everything else is
rape being a faggot being a murderer being a rapist oh yeah the guy that is already found
convicted of rape murdered six more people what have you been put to death for the rape
now i think that technically it might have been statutory rape so there might have been an
exception there but i don't know the circumstances but i know this he shouldn't be walking around
free based on the rap sheet that the guy had now that wasn't an equitable fair or righteous
judgment now look what it says in verse 13 i think actually 12 i think i skipped 12 verse 12
then fest is when he conferred with the council answered hast thou appealed unto caesar
unto caesar shalt thou go and after certain days king agrippa and bernice came unto cesarea
to salute festus and when they had been there many days festus declared paul's k or cause
unto the king saying there's a certain man left in bonds by felix about whom when i was
at jerusalem the chief priests and elders of the jews informed me desiring to have judgment
against him whom i answered it is not the manner of the romans deliver any man to die before
that he which is accused have the accusers face to face and have license to answer for himself
concerning the crime played against him now the romans have a pretty decent law here a rule here
a custom because this really is similar to the bible keep your finger here we're gonna go one
other place and then i'm gonna kind of finish this chapter go to juteronomy chapter 17 go to
juteronomy chapter 17 when it comes to the death penalty specifically the bible lays out very strong
uh very strongly what you must do in order to legally convict someone of murder okay or of
a death penalty crime says in juteronomy chapter 17 look at verse number two if there be found
among you within any of thy gates which the lord thy god giveth the man or woman that has
wrought wickedness in the sight of the lord thy god and transgressing his covenant and has
gone and served other gods and worshiped him either the sun or moon or any of the host of
heaven which i have not commanded and to be told thee and thou has heard of it and inquired
diligently and behold it be true and the thing certain that such abomination is wrought in israel
then shalt thou bring forth that man or that woman which have committed that wicked thing
under thy gates even that man or that woman and shout stone them with stones till they die
now think about the way this is worded look at verse four it's told so that's hearsay
okay and thou has heard of it and inquired diligently so notice it's not just hearsay
then you sought to see if this is true and behold it be true so it's saying someone told
you so you had the allegation made then you did diligent inquisition you and then you found
that it was just true notice it be true and the thing certain it's not it's like not only
true it's certain it's like beyond a reasonable doubt you know as a phrase you use in america and
i think that's great if someone's going to be facing the crime that's going to cause them
to be put to death it should be true and it should be certain you know there shouldn't be any
wiggle room we have to make this clear and notice how the bible describes in the next verse
six at the mouth of two witnesses or three witnesses shall he that is worthy of death be
put to death but at the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death notice no one should
ever be put to death because of one witness that is wicked because one person can always
be motivated to lie against another and it's often very easy to lie as a singular person
what's difficult is to have two completely separate witnesses testifying under proper procedure
come with the same craft the same lie it's much more difficult for them to accomplish it does
happen in the bible unfortunately there is two sons of belial that lie about nabal and he gets
killed but it's a lot more difficult in order to meet that threshold that's necessary to put
someone to death and so it protects the innocent it helps the innocent not have to go through
that obviously nothing's perfect there's always a loophole but in general we should have that
kind of system you know in america has had systems like this that are very similar and we
should praise those type of systems we should praise the idea look i'm all for the death penalty
but we want it to be true and we want it to be certain but if it's true it's been certain
they've been lawfully given all their process everything's up and up it's just fact then we
ultimately need to face the the reality that we need to put people to death if so necessary go
back and we'll finish here verse 17 therefore when they are come hither without any delay on
the morrow i sat on the judgment seat and commanded the man to be brought forth against
whom when the accuser stood up they brought an acute accusation of such things as i suppose
now here he gives us a little insight look in verse 18 he says hey when they uh ended up
you know accusing this guy i thought they're gonna have all this evidence and i thought they're
gonna say that he did like you know he killed someone or he's stealing money or like you know
something serious but then when i figured out that this is just a big sham you know this is
what he said verse but had certain questions against them of their own superstition and of
one jesus which was dead whom paul affirmed to be alive and because i doubted of such manner
of questions i asked him whether he would go to druslam and there be judged of these matters
so this guy reveals a lot in this statement but it's not a very reliable statement for a
couple reasons okay but first of all i think he's probably telling the truth in some of this
because it's hard to just boldface like what you typically do is you twist the narrative
a little bit you just kind of bend the truth a little bit in your favor number one i guarantee
you surprised by what they brought his accusation because he's like thinking like man is that all
y'all got this is like this is kind of silly and it's like you guys are both arguing
whether some dude's alive or not it's like think about it's like well these people think
elvis is dead these people think elvis is alive you know it's like this is not a criminal case
you know this is to be fought on youtube you know and for you to be found to be idiots you know
well these people think the earth is flat and these people don't it's like
you know it's like what's going on here you know but obviously he has no respect for the
bible either notice he calls it superstition so he has he doesn't care what the bible says
obviously it probably doesn't help again like i said earlier that the jews are just making
christianity look bad they're making the god of the bible look really awful as far as how
evil and wicked they are and the way he speaks about jesus he's just not he doesn't seem reverent
in any way um but this is what he does he needs a reason to explain why he just randomly
blurted out why don't you just go back to jerusalem because he doesn't want to be tied to
any weird conspiracy theory or be asked questions like why would you make such a statement so he
tries to like twist this narrative of things that are probably true and then basically making
it like well because i didn't really know what they were asking and it's like this weird like
religious thing i was like what why don't you go back to jerusalem so he kind of has a cya
you know whenever they're like why did you suggest he go to Jerusalem because that's not
proper that's not following the right procedures or whatever he hasn't had some kind of narrative
to explain himself also helps us realize that history often revises itself throughout the mouth
of many witnesses the telephone game is this really what happened no because the bible
already told us look back at what it said in verse number nine but festus willing to do the
jews a pleasure answered so the bible tells us what his real motive was what was his real
motive he was trying to get paul killed and get a favor for the jews get some kind of goods
on the jews you know take advantage of that situation when he's talking to agrippa he's not
like hey man i was trying to get like some some extra bread on the side from the jews or
whatever you know i was trying to get a deal with the jews now he's like oh just you know
he was asking you know they're asking religious questions i don't know them so that's why i was
like maybe you should go back to Jerusalem or whatever even though that doesn't make any sense
whatsoever verse 21 but when paul had appealed to be reserved in the hearing of augustus i
commanded him to be kept till i might send him unto caesar so he's like well you know but he
did say the right thing and i have to go send him to caesar then agrisa said to the festus i
would also hear the man myself tomorrow said he thou shalt hear him and on the morrow when
agrippa was common bernice with great pomp meaning that they basically just have a huge group
of people it's a lot of prestige or you know they're basically it's a big deal says and was
entered into the place of hearing with the chief captains and principal men of the city
at festus commandment paul is brought forth now i think what's an why does it save great
pomp why does it bring that stuff up think about the opportunity that paul's about to have
paul is literally going to be brought in front of the most powerful people in the world and
not just a few all of them basically he's just this big entourage of the king and all his men
and all the chief captains and all the the greatest men of the entire you know the bible
says in the proverbs and it's talking about like a righteous person that he won't stand before
mean men he's gonna stand before kings mean means average okay not they're like rude or
something or they're like hostile it's just meaning that they're just average he's gonna
stand before kings and notice paul gets an opportunity to preach the gospel of jesus christ
to the most powerful people in this area that's a cool opportunity but it took two years in prison
it says in verse number 24 and festus said king gripa and all men which are here present
with us you see this man about whom all the multitude of the jews have dealt with me
both at jerusalem and also here crying that he ought not to live any longer when i found that
he committed nothing worthy of death and that he himself has appealed to gustus i have
determined to send him of whom i have no certain thing to write unto my lord
wherefore i have brought him forth before you and specifically before the o king gripa
that after examination had i might have somewhat to write forcing me to be unreasonable
to send a prisoner and not with all to signify the crimes laid against him now this is
this is funny when you think about it okay he's like hey everybody we brought paul
and every jew wants to kill him they all said he should die but we have no idea why like
no one can tell us what the problem is like all they said is kill him you know but we don't
know what's going on why don't you guys figure it out like can you guys figure out because
i have to send him to caesar and when i send him to caesar they're going to be like
why is this man brought here and they don't want to be like
ah you know he's like i gotta write something you know and here's the problem he has literally
nothing to write now you know that tells me that's a pretty cool testimony i mean think
about it paul i mean this guy doesn't want to be on his side he's not on his side
but he's literally he's just staring at a blank piece of paper and he's just like
i don't know what to write you know the jews don't like him you know like that's not a good
that's not going to make him look good it's going to make him look like an idiot that
he's wasting caesar's time bringing people to caesar and it's like the jews don't like him
he's going to be like what are you doing why are you wasting all these government resources
and all this effort and energy on a guy that we have no reason to accuse him so they're hoping
that they can just keep asking him just like keep talking to them and be like say something
wrong or you know what's going on but also i think this they made it clear to everybody
that this guy is like wanted to be killed by everybody which is kind of a cool intro because
it's going to make everybody want to hear what he has to say think about it people love to watch
like criminal cases and like the worst people they just want to hear what they have to say
they want to hear them testify and whatever you know a point that i had in my notes was that
it's obviously not against the bible to testify on your defense because paul did
so you know when you get an opportunity to testify just give witness to jesus christ
and his word of god go to first peter chapter two is the last verse i want to show you real
quick i know i preached a little while but i don't get to see you every day so
you got nothing better to do i could tell first peter chapter number two
look at verse number 11 the bible says this dearly beloved i beseech you as strangers and
pilgrims esteem from festivity lust which war against the soul having your conversation
honest among the gentiles that whereas they speak against you as evildoers they may by your
good works which they shall behold glorify god in the day of visitation so you know you're
gonna sometimes be falsely accused but notice how you overcome them with your you know good
works you just keep doing right and it just keeps proving them wrong and you just keep
moving on and you know what you're in good company when the only accusation someone can
make against you is what you believe right i mean isn't that the only reason they hate paul
this is the only thing they can bring well this guy believes jesus rose from the dead
that's really like that's the accusation you have he believes in the resurrection
he believes in christianity at the end of the day that's why yeah uh his preaching and his
beliefs you know and look there's gonna be christians that are gonna be persecuted and
you know what it's it's funny to me when they're gonna drag you before court and the
only thing they can have to accuse you is what you preach and what you believe and it happens
you know and you have to say you know what i must be in good company you know jesus what do
they have against them what he preached and what he believed right what do they have against paul
what he preached and what he believed and you know what the people that we want to follow are
people that preach and believe the bible not you know paul doesn't have any other problems
and obviously it's really important to have a good testimony because what if paul had also done
something a little bit bad too well then they would just bring that they would just well he kind
of stole a little bit of money well he kind of did this too well he kind of hurt this person
well he kind of did you know they just have nothing so important to live a life above reproach
so that god can use you to give him a lot of honor and glory god can't use the guy that's
you know convicted of five felonies here you know that guy's not going to really have the same
testimony here it's not going to be effective they're going to be like well why are you bringing
them here because of the five felonies you know your honor it's real obvious whereas the guy
that's done nothing wrong it's just his preaching and his beliefs then all of a sudden
they're going to look like idiots and it's going to glorify god and whereas they speak
as about you as evildoers you're going to win a lot of people over because they notice
they're like this this isn't fair this isn't right you're obviously persecuting this guy
for what he believes and it's going to cause the work of god to be magnified they're also going to
say hey here's someone that actually believes what he's saying he's not looking for bribes
he's not looking for money these jews these guys are just a bunch of greedy scumbags these
guys are a bunch they're committing murder and you know conspiracy to murder and all this evil
whatever paul he's done nothing wrong and he's still sticking with his faith he's he's still
facing criminal charges and all this evil and he won't denounce his faith he won't go back on it
uh the previous guy felix was trying to get money from him he was trying to get a bribe from
him and look paul didn't even bribe him paul won't do anything that's not biblical that's
not the word of god he has the right testimony and then god's going to use him to do great
things on his behalf because he's not going to compromise he's going to stay faithful to god's
word and you know what when you just stay faithful to god's word maybe it's two years in
prison maybe it's a long period of time of suffering but you know what eventually god can
use you in a mighty way let's go in prayer thank you heavenly father for this chapter of
the bible thank you that you're willing to use us to give you honor and glory and i pray
that we would humble ourselves and realize that you know if we have to go through difficulty if
we have to go through things that we don't understand that we'll trust the word of god we'll
trust that you're a faithful creator that we don't have to dream up all the scenarios and all
the things that we have to do but rather we can just take one step of faith every day
that we can trust your commandments we can know if we do that which is right
you'll put us in the places and the positions that we need to be put in
and and not to get in a rush or to be hasty to resolve situations on our own but rather
that we just trust in the lord and allow through god's timing through god's providence
that he would get the honor and the glory through our faithfulness
and that we would just continue to trust and depend on him alone in jesus name we pray
amen go to 423 for our last song brother camera's gonna lead us 423 joy to the world
all right 423 joy to the world four two three joy to the world
we'll sing they're starting on the first let's sing joy to the world the lord is come let her
receive her king let every heart prepare him and heaven and nature sing and heaven and nature
sing and have and have and nature sing joy to the world the savior reigns let men their songs
employ wild fields and floods rocks hills and plains repeat the sounding joy repeat the sounding
joy repeat repeat the sounding joy no more let sins and sorrows grow nor thorns infest the ground
he comes to make his blessings fall far as the curse is found far as the curse is found
far as far as the curse is found he rules the world with truth and grace and makes
the nations prove the glories of his righteousness and wonders of his love
and wonders of his love and wonders and wonders of his love
amen and with that you are dismissed have a good night
you