Good evening, everyone. Welcome to Steadfast Baptist Church.
Thank you all for coming. We're about to start our services. If you can go ahead and find your seat,
we will get started. We'll start this evening off with our Christmas spirit
in song number 432. Angels from
the realms of glory. Song number 432.
4-3. Sing it out with me. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this church. We thank you
for everyone that's gathered here. We thank you for another day, Lord. We ask
that you fill Pastor Shelley with your Holy Spirit. Help us to sing out with joy unto
you, for your honor and glory. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Alright, next up we have
song number 431. Shouldn't be too hard to find.
431. Silent night. Holy night.
We have our preliminary passage of the week, Psalm 53.
So if you can get this quoted, we pretty much have until Saturday
get that quoted and get that finished. Pretty simple Psalm there.
On the inside our service and soul winning times. Also church stats.
We have a list of expecting ladies. Please be in prayer for our
expecting ladies. We have several there. Children's choir is continuing
on our Sunday evening services. Ladies Christmas party.
If you have not, you really do need the RSVP just so we have an idea.
But thanks to those who are planning on participating this Friday night.
Also upcoming events. Christmas caroling December 8th.
Men's choir is going to be performing on the 21st. Cookie Bake Off.
Christmas candlelight service is December 24th.
And then there's men's preaching and pizza December 31st.
Some other events and stuff that I want to go ahead and just start throwing out there.
I'll put them in the bulletin and update. I'm also going to be making some videos and stuff like that about other events.
Evangelist Fur and Brother Marcel were planning on going to the Philippines at the beginning of next year in January through February.
And Evangelist Urbana is going to be kind of hosting some soul winning events, possibly trying to get into the schools.
It's going to be January 26th through February 4th that they're going to be traveling out there.
And so that weekend, it's going to be basically February 1st is that Sunday, but it's essentially that weekend there's going to be some events, some soul winning stuff that we're going to be doing at the Steadfast Baptist Church in the Philippines with Evangelist Urbana, Evangelist Fur, Brother Marcel.
I think, is there anybody else going with y'all? Christian? Yeah, so we already have a small group, maybe like at least five, six people that are already planning on going out there.
If other people want to go out there, it'd be a great opportunity. You can go to the Philippines, again, January 26th through February 4th.
I just wanted to put that out there. Even if you can't, just pray for them that things would go smoothly, and so we've got that.
I have a lot of other things. I'll probably just wait, but we're planning on doing some conferences next year, some other missions trips.
We're going to do another Caribbean missions trip in the fall of next year, and I'm just going to wait before I announce that.
But we're really looking forward to doing some other trips, and so next year is going to be a lot, a lot of fun, and so we're really looking forward to it.
On the back is our prayer list. Please be in prayer for -- a lot of these are some continued prayers, but continue to pray for the Carlson's,
for their parents' health, and also if you pray for Brother Jared, and then pray for the Scotts, Mrs. Grace and also Brother Horace.
Continue to pray for Brother Tony. Also, if you pray for the Tyak's dad who has kidney disease, pray for the Weathers,
and continue to pray for Brother Paul. We're also praying for Brother Goodwin's sister-in-law's family.
If you'd also continue to pray for Miss Lola and Phoebe, and then we're also praying for the Burns' brother, Joe.
If you'd please pray for the Warners and for their vehicle and job situation, I pray that you'd also continue to pray
for Brother Jameson, for his father, and then also Brother Jimmy asks for prayer for his work as well.
So some prayer requests there for work as well as related to a lot of health issues that we've had.
We'll just say a quick word of prayer as a church family.
Thank you, Only Fathers, so much for Steadfast Baptist Church.
Thank you for all the works that you've allowed us to accomplish this year.
Thank you for our evangelists in the Philippines.
I pray that you continue to bless his work in the church over there.
Thank you for all of our expecting ladies and all the ladies who are pregnant.
I pray that you please help them with their pregnancies.
Please give them a good delivery.
I pray that you would also just be with our church family and friends that are struggling with these serious illnesses,
with these cancers and kidney disease and other ailments.
I pray that you would please just give them comfort, give them healing, if possible.
I pray that you would also just give them just some kind of peace during this difficulty.
For those that are needing a new job or work, I pray that you just help bless them.
Give them wisdom, give them an opportunity, and please help them.
I pray that you would also bless our upcoming year and all the events and all the soul winning that we have planning,
and that we continue to give you all the honor and glory and praise, and it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
That's pretty much all I have as far as announcements.
We're going to sing Psalm 146 in our hymnals and our special binder, Psalm 146.
Psalm 146, chapter number 10, the Bible reads,
"That time the Lord said unto me, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first,
and come up unto me into the mount, and make thee an ark of wood.
And I will write on the tables the words that were in the first tables, which thou breakest, and thou shalt put them in the ark.
And I made an ark of shittim wood, and hew two tables of stone like unto the first, and went up into the mount, having the two tables in mine hand.
And he wrote on the tables, According to the first, writing the Ten Commandments, which the Lord spake unto you, and the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly.
And the Lord gave them unto me. And I purred myself, and came down from the mount, and put the tables in the ark, which I had made. And there they be, as the Lord commanded me.
And the children of Israel took their journey from Beiroth, of the children of Jacob, to Moserah. There Aaron died, and there he was buried. And Eliezer, his son, ministered in the priest's office in his stead.
From thence they journeyed unto Gaddaudah, and from Gaddaudah to Jabath, land of rivers of water. At that time the Lord separated the tribe of Levi to bear the ark of the covenant of the Lord, to stand before the Lord, to minister unto him, and to bless in his name unto this day.
Wherefore, Levi hath no part nor inheritance with his brethren; the Lord is his inheritance, according as the Lord thy God promised him. And I stayed in the mountains, according to the first time, forty days and forty nights, and the Lord hearkened unto me at that time also, and the Lord would not destroy thee.
And the Lord said unto me, Arise, take thy journey before the people, that they may go in and possess the land which I swear unto their fathers to give unto them.
And now, Israel, what did the Lord thy God require of thee but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all his ways and to love him?
And to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, to keep the commandments of the Lord and his statutes which I command thee this day for thy good?
Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the Lord thy God, the earth also with all that therein is.
Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people as it is this day.
Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked.
For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty and a terrible, which regardeth not persons nor taketh reward.
He doth exude the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger in giving him food and raiment.
Love ye therefore the stranger, for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.
Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave and swear by his name.
He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible things which thine eyes have seen.
Thy fathers went down into Egypt with three score and ten persons, and now the Lord thy God hath made thee as the stars of heaven for a multitude.
Let us pray.
Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be in church, and thank you for all the soul winning and the salvations that we've had.
I just pray that you bless Pastor Shelley, fill him with your Holy Spirit to preach unto us.
Help us to receive your word, and help us to make changes in our lives to be better Christians.
Praise in Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
Here in Deuteronomy 10, the verse 1 says, "At that time the Lord said unto me, Hew thee
two tables of stone like unto the first, and come up unto me into the mount, and make thee
an ark of wood."
Here in verse number 1, we have Moses getting the instructions, and again, this is not actually
happening.
This is him telling us what had happened.
So this is him just reminding us of events that had happened in the past.
He's reminding us of how when he got the first two tables of stone, he came down off the
mount, had broken them, and then later God had told him, "Hey, I want you to do that
again.
Make two more tables of stone.
Come back up on the mount."
And now we're going to do something a little different.
He's also supposed to make an ark of wood.
And so he's going to make something to put the two tables of stone in to basically bear
the two tables of stone and to carry them.
It says in verse two, "And I will write on the tables the words that were in the first
tables, which thou breakest, and thou shalt put them in the ark."
One note is that even if you destroy God's word, He can give it to you again.
And notice He's going to write it the exact same, it's the exact same word, He just gives
it back to man.
And you kind of have a consistent theme in the Bible where sometimes man screws up the
word of God as far as the actual transmission of the written word of God, and yet God just
delivers it again.
You have another story in the book of Jeremiah where the words of Jeremiah are taken to the
king, and the king takes the scrolls and just throws them in the fire and burns them.
And then God just gives it back to Jeremiah and gives it back to man because you can't
destroy God's word.
And at any point that God's word is destroyed, he's just going to immediately give it back
to mankind because we're supposed to have not only, you know, just physical life and
bread and things.
We're supposed to have the word of God, which is more important than bread is what the Bible
actually says.
You know, it'd be weird to think that God wouldn't give us the word of God, yet it's
more important than bread.
You know, why would he give us bread and not give us the word of God?
I believe mankind's always had the word of God.
It's always been available to them.
Now, we do obviously, of course, understand that revelation itself has come in different
periods of time, right?
Throughout time, man got more and more revelation, more and more of the Bible had been revealed
in the man, and it accumulated to what we have today.
But generally speaking, mankind has always had the word of God.
And really, when you understand the New Testament on a deep level, you realize that most of
it's just restating and re-quoting the Old Testament, that it's not like they didn't
have access to that type of information.
They had that same information, and just the New Testament often is putting it in simpler
terms than maybe the Old Testament, or combining them and making it easier on you to understand.
But a lot of the information is still there.
You know, Romans 10 is basically a conglomeration of a bunch of Old Testament scripture.
When Jesus Christ is on this earth and he's preaching to people, most of the time he's
quoting the Old Testament.
He's quoting Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, he's constantly giving
them the law, giving them these commandments.
And so it's not like man hasn't had the Bible, he's had the Bible, it's just more and more
revelation is coming to mankind.
And in some ways you can think about this as almost like we get to understand things
about God even better and better as time goes on, you know, as time goes on.
Some people have this attitude like that everything was only better in its original state, but
God almost has the opposite opinion.
In many cases things get better over time, you know, and in fact we have the Old Testament
replaced by the New Testament, the New Testament's better than the Old Testament.
Some people have this attitude like, oh well the church in Acts chapter 2, that's what
we need to go back to.
Well, maybe the church today is better than the church in Acts chapter number 2.
I mean it's not like there's nothing in the Bible that says we peaked as a church group.
In fact, if you really understand the Bible you realize they didn't peak because many
of the epistles were written to the churches that were early telling them y'all are screwed
up and doing everything wrong.
So we don't want to go back to that.
We want to take the instructions they were given and actually implement them and not
be like them.
So it's kind of weird when sometimes people act like the older is better or the original
is better.
Sometimes you can make improvements.
Sometimes things can even become greater over time, not necessarily in their original state.
Here we have the two tables of stone given back to Moses and he puts them in the ark.
Verse three, and he says, "And I made an ark of shittim wood and hewed two tables of stone
like unto the first and went up into the mount, having the two tables in my hand."
So he makes them, he comes up, verse four, "And he wrote on the tables according to the
first writing, the ten commandments which the Lord spake unto you in the mount, out
of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly, and the Lord gave them unto me."
Verse five, "And I turned myself and came down from the mount and put the tables in
the ark which I had made, and there they be as the Lord commanded me."
So he makes an ark, he goes up to heaven with the two tables, as the text says in verse
four, God writes on the tables, then he gives it back to Moses, Moses comes down off the
mount and puts the tables into the ark which he had made.
So that's just kind of the scenery here.
You know, again, just think about some of the language here, think about what's actually
being described, who's the person that actually wrote on the tables?
God.
It's by the finger of God.
God is the one that wrote the scripture here on the tables.
It's not Moses.
And it's not a metaphor didn't write it.
God wrote it.
Okay.
God wrote it with his own finger and handed back.
I mean, how do these people that don't believe God, you know, has a body or exists or, you
know, is anywhere like how did they get these tables of stone?
Like how did it actually get written on the tables of stone?
You know, it's clear.
He just wrote on it with his finger.
The Bible is crystal clear, God wrote the Ten Commandments on the tables of stone with
his finger.
Now that's what makes the Ten Commandments special.
Some people, you know, don't understand that, you know, there's more than Ten Commandments.
There's not, the Bible's not limited to Ten Commandments.
There's not like only Ten Commandments.
But the Ten Commandments are special because they were written on the tables of stone by
the fingers of God.
And so that's what makes them really special.
And of course they're called the Ten Commandments.
They're actually labeled that in the Bible.
But it's not like other commandments in the Bible aren't important.
Now the Bible does classify that some commandments are more important than other commandments.
The Bible's crystal clear that the most important commandment is to love the Lord thy God with
all the heart, mind, soul, and strength.
And then the second commandment is to love thy neighbor as thyself.
That's what Jesus is quoted as saying in the New Testament.
But then he says, "Upon these two hang all the law and the prophets."
Meaning any law or any commandment or any instruction in the Bible could be classified
under either loving God or loving your neighbor as yourself.
Everything falls under that classification or that categorization of those two laws that
kind of exist.
So if you wonder like, "Oh, I don't know everything in the Bible."
Where's the thing?
As long as you just love God and love your neighbor, you'll always be in compliance.
You'll always be following God's commandments.
And this is what's silly to me, when people get mad about commandments in the Bible, like,
"Oh, that's the Old Testament."
Wait a minute.
It's actually just loving God.
Well, actually that commandment is just loving your neighbor.
Why would that be wrong?
Why would it be wrong for you to tell a Christian to love your neighbor or to love God?
It's never wrong.
So here's the thing.
The law is not bad.
Obviously we understand there's certain aspects of the Old Testament law that were ceremonial
in nature that pertained to the sacrificial system, and that was fulfilled in Christ.
So it has a symbolic significance for us in the future.
Some of it pertains to civil law, how governments should operate and how they should create
laws based on the spirit of the law.
And so maybe it doesn't necessarily apply to us in our individual lives.
It's how things should be.
It's how things should operate.
We should take note of them and encourage our government to apply them because it's
going to love God and love their neighbor as herself.
But look, the personal commandments that are in the Old Testament still apply in the
New Testament because you're still loving God and you're still loving your neighbor
as yourself.
And just because it's like, oh, that's Old Testament, or this is the Ten Commandments,
or it's not the Ten Commandments, it doesn't matter.
If it's loving God or loving your neighbor as yourself, you just do it.
Now, Moses is giving these things, he's putting them in this special ark.
Of course, all of this stuff would then be symbolic of very important things.
We're going to get into that when we come back through this chapter.
But we're just kind of going through it quickly and trying to identify and understand what
this chapter's saying.
Verse six, "And the children of Israel took their journey from Beiroth and the children
of Jacob to Moserah.
There Aaron died, and there he was buried, and Eliezer his son ministered in the priest's
office in his stead."
One thing I'd like to just say is life moves on quickly.
It's kind of crazy to think about.
For some people that lose someone that's really close to them, sometimes time can slow down
or you have time to mourn, but the world doesn't often mourn with you, the world just moves
on.
As soon as they get the dead body out of the road, they just keep driving.
As soon as they get the cars out of the way, hey they just keep driving, they keep going.
And unfortunately that's how life is, that life just keeps going.
And I think that we should always take time to mourn and grieve and feel sad for the people
that we miss.
You know, at some point we all just have to move on.
And even, you know, this guy, he lost his dad, Eliezer lost his dad, but he has an important
job.
He has to just get in there and start executing the priest's office.
And you know, let the dead bury their dead.
Hey, let's go, let's keep serving, let's keep ministering, you know, we're going to loss
is a part of life, everyone's going to die.
And we don't want to get hung up on the fact that people are going to be lost.
People are dying.
People are coming and going, Hey, I just need to make sure to do what I can right now.
Because eventually I'm going to be that guy that dies.
Aaron died.
Move on.
It really, think about how Moses acts about this.
Aaron died and there is buried and Eliezer and his son took his free.
So he was, he's like, all right, move on.
And I mean, Aaron's a pretty significant person.
He's a pretty significant character.
You know what?
If you just recognize in life, even main characters are just going to die or get taken out of
the way or things are going to change all the time.
And I told Pastor Oz right before I ordained him, you know, because we were just talking
about the future and things that were going to happen, I said, look, our movement and
Baptist and our world and stuff, it's going to change radically five years from now.
Like five years from now, it'll be unrecognizable about what it was, you know, from then.
And we're only a year in, guys.
Okay.
We're one year in.
I just like, you know, think about Steadfast Baptist Church five years ago.
Okay.
This is 2020.
It's like COVID.
We're in Hearst.
Like, it's way different right now than going through COVID and being in Hearst and having
been protested and getting evicted and like, all that stuff is just like, it's way different
than it is right now, you know?
And so you don't really know where you're going to be in the future.
You don't know what's going to happen.
You know, you just take it one day at a time, but major events are going to constantly happen,
life just keeps moving on and you just have to move on with it you just have to keep moving
on just keep going Aaron dies all right let's bury him all right Eliezer you're in you're
the guy next man up next guy let's go sometimes you can have ministers come and go all right
next next guy verse seven from thence they journeyed unto Gudgotha or Gudgotha and from
Gudgotha to Jotbath a land of rivers of waters at the time the Lord separated the tribe of
Levi to bear the ark of the covenant of the Lord to stand before the Lord to minister
unto him and to bless his name unto this day.
Wherefore Levi have no part nor inheritance with his brethren the Lord is his inheritance
according as the Lord thy God promised him.
So God gave all these instructions to the children of Israel at Mount Sinai and you
know once they got those instructions then they enacted them they performed them okay.
Now this is fast forwarding obviously to even Aaron dying but at the same time Levi is going
to be separated in this inheritance Levi is not going to actually inherit the promised
land he's simply just going to be a priest he's going to perform the sacrificial sacrificial
system he has the live of the sacrifices he has the live of the tabernacle he's the live
of the offerings of God and so it seems like kind of a consolation for the priests they
get to eat the cheapest of the offerings right and people are constantly bringing their
offerings to the children of Israel they're constantly sacrificing animals they're constantly
sacrificing and of course biblically they're supposed to be sacrificing the best they're
supposed to be sacrificing the best sheep the best oxen the the cheapest of the offerings
the finest flour and they're they're performing these every single day and them and their
entire family are eating of these great meals so they get to eat great I mean they're probably
eating better than the kings in a sense I mean they're basically eating the greatest
of the offerings every single day steak every single day pancakes every single day I mean
they just have this meal every single day but they don't get to do their own thing they're
not getting to go and build their own farm they're not getting to go and just have their
own house and do their own things that's not that you don't have houses it's not like they
don't live somewhere but they live in the city you know eventually when they get to
the temple and that kind of stuff they're supposed to just basically live where the
temple is near the temple their daily activities or performing sacrifices they don't get to
take a day off when everybody else does on the Sabbath according to the Bible they profane
the Sabbath meaning that they actually have to work you know a double shift they work
throughout the week then they also have to work on the sacrificial system and have to
do all these different burdens the tribe of Levi is broken into three different groups
and they all have different you know performances different burdens that they have to do some
are doing actual animal sacrifices some are just carrying stuff some are you know just
dealing with the different arrangements so you have divisions within the Levites but
they're basically just priests continually serving God now that's Old Testament New
Testament we're supposed to be the priests of God we are the priesthood of believers
and so really what we should think of is we should think of our lives in a similar way
like the priest we should all look at ourselves as being like the Levites now we're not all
the chief priests we're not all the like main guy but we're all Levites in a sense in a
New Testament spin and and what would that look like well we have no inheritance here
just like they had no inheritance there we're not going to whatever we build here whatever
houses we have here even if you own it you're renting it you're just you're just you're
renting it from God it's just a rental so if you have a rental you can take solace and
that everybody's renting okay we're all just renting we're all just borrowing we're all
just stewards and we're all just shepherds of what God has given us and eventually you
know our real home is up in heaven that's our real inheritance that's our real dwelling
place and so we're supposed to be continually serving God now not all of us do that in the
exact same way like I said even the Levites had their different functions their different
duties some would just carry stuff some just had different kinds of burdens some are dealing
with water some are dealing with the sacrifice I mean there's going to be different operations
within the liturgical priesthood but here's the thing they're all trying to make sure
that the house of God is succeeding they're all building the house of God they're dealing
with the things of God they care about the things of God and you know the testament that's
how we should be we should be building the house of God which is the church and we should
constantly be attending and serving God and thinking about him and performing those kind
of sacrifices you know we're supposed to be a living sacrifice in the New Testament we
don't slaughter animals as sacrifice we're supposed to go out there and preach the gospel
and we're supposed to bear the burden of going out and evangelizing and ministering to the
saints and coming into church you know they're singing in the tabernacle or in the temple
we're singing here in the house of God right but it's going to be the it's going to be
similar from a spiritual perspective even though it's very different from a carnal
perspective but we should always look at the Levites and and and think of ourselves as
the Levi we should put ourselves in the Levite shoes and try to make application for ourselves
we're supposed to be separated from the rest of the tribes in what way the same way that
we as Christians are supposed to separate ourselves from the world we're separated from
the world they're living for this world they want to make a name for themselves in this
world the Levites are are concerned with making a name for God they're concerned with what's
God's inheritance and God's house and things of God they're elevating the things of God
above themselves right so they have no continuing inheritance they don't have anything they're
just there for God and you know that's the right attitude that we should have now look
as stewards of the possessions as God's given me you know I'm not saying that there's anything
wrong with owning a house or you know investing or having a retirement account or you know
I think we should be good stewards of all the things that God's given us but at the
end of the day the most important thing is our spiritual inheritance and serving the
Lord because you can't take any of it with you and you know you could be the wise investor
and save up ten million dollars and then when you die what does it mean you know and you
could have like a bunch of stupid kids and give it to them and spoil them and make them
even worse you know like having a bunch of money doesn't even necessarily make things
better all the time right but at the end of the day if God gives me something I don't
want to just squander it and be a bad steward of it I should be a good steward and wise
steward and make good investments you know make good decisions at the end of the day
but you know that's not the most important thing the most important thing is the spiritual
investments that I have is ministering to God and serving God you know you could be
the poorest person in this world and the richest person in heaven so you know that stuff doesn't
really matter but at the end of the day you know what being poor is often associated with
being lazy and stupid so you know we don't want to like have the wrong attitudes we have
to have balance in our lives sometimes we have to rebuke because the reason why we don't
have things it's not because you're so spiritual it's not like you just had all this money
because you worked really hard you just decided to give it all to church and so you're poor
because you're just giving millions of dollars a church you're poor because you're stupid
and lazy and that's a different reason okay and often people they'll try to that are actually
dumb and lazy they'll criticize you you know for having things and say you're covetous
and not spiritual whereas they're not spiritual because the Bible is crystal clear if a man
provide not for his own especially they have his own house he had denied the faith that
is worse than an infidel so guy not providing well is not the the one that's spiritual or
something like that the one that's providing well is actually spiritual now look you know
obviously we should have balance in our lives we need to have the proper mindset you know
I'm I'm gonna put the things of God first seeking first the kingdom of God and his righteousness
but that doesn't mean there isn't something second that doesn't mean there isn't something
third and you know just because it's second or third doesn't mean I'm not gonna put all
of my effort and energy into it because the Bible is crystal clear whatsoever thy hand
find to do it do with all thy strength do with all thy might is what the Bible says
so you know what we should just be excellent in every area of life but we always want to
make sure that our number one priority is God because we should we should realize we're
a Levite at the end of the day and we can't take it with us and we have we're just a passing
through we're just sojourners here and we should really be more concerned with the things
of God and the house of God than we are with our own possessions or our own things or or
what we have it doesn't really matter now again the carnal person hates this the the
non-spiritual person is like you know Mr. Grinch over here and he's he's clutching
his shekels and he's just like you know he doesn't like this kind of a message because
he's covetous he wants things he wants possession and you know that's the wrong attitude you
know a lot of people would not want to be a Levite if you said you can't you can't own
your own house you can't have your own things you have to just serve God they're like I don't
want to do that but you know what that's the right attitude the right attitude is just you know what
I just want to serve God that's the most important thing even if it costs me a house or a farm or a
ranch you know it's it's insane to think that you should just forsake the house of God to go and
have this like country life to go have this farm life for the things we've got you should be like
a levi and saying i'm gonna have none of that i'm just gonna serve God you know it just well
i just don't want to be a city slicker i don't really care what you want what does God want you
know would it be nice to just go and hide on some ramp somewhere and just be with nature and
whatever frankly i think would be boring as crap and i don't want to sit here and have to grow all
of my own food i like the fact that i can just walk in the store and just this apple looks great
i want to eat it i can just buy it okay i like technology i like the cyber truck there i said it
you can have you can have your little plow your little amish plow out there and not have any
technology or whatever hey i like technology i like advancement i like being in the city i like
that i can just go super short distances to go to the store go to a restaurant or hey go knock on
someone's door and give them the gospel you know because at the end of the day my life is not about
just having as much fun as i can have we need to get people saved and care about the things of
god and you know what i want to be close to church so that i can actually let church thrive
not my little sanctuary not my little ranch not my little castle somewhere but rather i want the
church of god to be a castle you know what do god people would care more about building the house
of god than building themselves and you know at the end of the day you know you can preach it
till you're blue in the face but people are going to be covetous and we need to have an attitude
like the levites they have no part nor inheritance with his brethren you know hey i'm not caring
about those things i care more about the things of god verse 10 and i stayed in the mount according
to the first time 40 days and 40 nights and lord harken unto me at that time also and lord would
not destroy thee and lord said to me arise take thy journey before the people that they may go
in and possess the land which i swear unto the fathers to give unto them and now israel what
does the lord thy god require of thee but to fear the lord thy god to walk in all his ways and to
love him and to serve the lord thy god all thy heart and with all thy soul notice notice again
he's saying in verse 12 i think this is a very important verse but notice he says and now israel
what does the lord thy god require of thee he's like what am i really asking you all to do but
to fear the lord thy god and to walk in all his ways and to love him and to serve the lord thy
god with all thy heart with all thy soul he's saying what am i asking you to do other than just
fear me and serve me just just do what i'm saying that's all i'm asking you to do that's all i
require of you hey just just fear me and just walk in my ways just do the commandments just do what
i'm asking that's all i want you to do that's all i'm asking you to do his yoke and his burden is
easy in comparison to the burden yoke of this world so we're supposed to just fear the lord
verse 13 to keep the commandments of the lord and his statutes which i command thee this day
notice this for thy good it's not like we're serving god in some way that harms us or hurts
us in fact we're designed to serve him and the ways that he gives us commandments are often for
our benefit they bless us they help us they keep us healthy they give us long life they give us
prosperity you know we're going to have the best version of our life by serving god as opposed to
not serving him just like following the instruction manual to the item that you purchased yet you may
not have to follow the instruction manual to use it you may not have to use the instruction manual
put it together but if you put it together according to the instruction manual it works
the best if you follow the instructions and all the maintenance and all the requirements and all
the right places to put the batteries it's just going to work the best and look that's how the
bible is the bible is just simply the instruction manual of how to operate the best and how to work
the best can you technically do other things yes you could but it's not going to always work out
and in our society that's so corrupt you know these things get confusing i remember in junior
high one of my teachers he was he just went on this rant to tell us about frivolous lawsuits
and you know it was kind of a a funny day i don't remember learning anything in this class except
for this conversation but in this particular class he just told us about all these frivolous lawsuits
and he told us about how at mcdonald's you know somebody was suing that the coffee was hot you
know basically they got coffee they spilled it on themselves and it was hot they sued and got a
bunch of money and then mcdonald's had to put on the cup caution hot you know for and again it's
just silly it's silly that we live in a society like that and it's silly that you have to put
these things out there he told us about another one and it was it was extremely bizarre but someone
bought like a hunting blind i don't know if you know what this is exactly i'm not even a hunter
but it was just kind of like a hunting blind that basically had a ladder on both sides
and then it's just a small little box that you can hide in that's what a blind is so it was
something that was lifted up it was this hunting blind well the reason why he bought a hunting
blind had nothing to do with hunting okay if you read the instruction manual on hunting blind
you're gonna install this thing in the ground firmly secure climb up in it wait for some you
know bambi to walk by and shoot it and kill it okay and it's like how is that even hunting
you know it's just you're hiding okay you're as some people call it shopping okay but anyways this
guy worked in a tall building like maybe a three or four story skyscraper skyscraper uses lightly
i guess three or four story building okay and then he actually worked at another building right next
door it's not the twin towers but it was like this okay he had these two buildings and it would take
him like 20 to 25 minutes to go from one to the next and he had to work on the top floor both
but he realized that he could just walk out the fire escape and at the top of the building there
was the other one and they were so close together it was almost like he could just jump but what he
decided is he decided to take the hunting blind stretch it out long ways and just crawl across it
to save him the 20 or 25 minutes every day so but here's the problem after doing it several times
it weakened and in the middle it collapsed and it just fell all the way down he broke his legs
so then he sued the manufacturer of the hunting blind because they didn't warn him that you
couldn't use this to cross tall buildings and he won now you think obviously you could buy a hunting
blind you can stretch it across tall buildings and try to walk at your own peril you know what
that's stupid and you know you as a christian yeah you can technically do whatever you want
but let me tell you something following the bible's commandments and instructions is the best way to
live your life you know when you don't follow god's commandments it's like you stretching a
hunting blind across buildings and trying to walk across it you're going to end up breaking your
legs now the problem is you can't take god to court and sue him and win you try to take god to
court on that he'll just kill you and put you in hell okay so you can't win in this particular
argument you just got to do what he says because that's the reality we live in a corrupt broken
system you know what kind of wicked people are on the jury panel that voted in favor of that client
you know what a harmful thing to do to society and to harm manufacturers so that's why when you read
the instruction manual to anything anymore it's just like you can't do this and this and this and
this and this and this and this warning warning warning warning and don't drink poison and don't
eat poison don't spray it on your face and if you've been in contact with anybody this poison you
know call 911 immediately it's like why at every end of commercial do they have to just give you
this laundry list of every weird thing someone could do with this because of these frivolous
lawsuits that exist and at the end of the day no one even read it or cared we none of us read it
we get these long user agreements we just hit accept okay it didn't benefit society whatsoever
and you know what catering to the feeble-minded does not actually help in many cases following
god's commandments is the best way to live your life and when you don't do it you're going to be
screwed up notice what god said i command thee this day for thy good every commandment in the
bible is for your good you know husbands providing for their family and paying all the bills is good
it's for thy good oh i don't want to have to do that it's so expensive it's what i did it's for
that good god wants you to work six days shout thou labor you know sorry that you don't like working
that's your problem but you know what god's doing it for your good wives having a husband and obeying
their husband that's for their good yeah but i'm so so much smarter than him just do what he says
for that good yeah but you know i i want to do it my way just do it his way kids do whatever
your parents say obey your parents it's for that good your parents are looking out for you your
parents love you your parents i mean we're paying for you we love you we want what's good for you
wake up teenagers you're not smarter than your parents just do whatever they say it's for your
good okay hey maybe your pastor actually loves you and cares about you maybe he actually tells
you stuff for your good maybe you get yelled at and screamed at by your boss or by people in this
world for your good you know it's a shame i saw this woman in mobile alabama disciplining her
child very harshly and you know some people would think it's like over the top and and too bad like
too rough or something personally i don't really care but she was disciplining her child it was
like a teenager i think she she spanked him like 23 times you know biblically you can bit 40 so
you know wasn't even up to 40 but it was it was a harsh punishment i'm not going to say that it
wasn't and i'm not even going to say that i necessarily approve of exactly how she did it
but i don't personally care because you know that's her prerogative but this is what i do know
she was doing it because she loved her child her child was being lazy was not getting the chores
done was sneaking out of the house without a parent's permission and you know what he needed
to be disciplined and a loving parent would discipline that child a not loving parent would
just let them do whatever they want let them get away with it not tell them no not stop them from
doing these things no a loving parent is going to discipline you and you know what you children
you should appreciate a parent that's actually disciplining you if your parents thank you if
your parents discipline you you should be thankful but unfortunately one of their family members
recorded it gave it to the cops and she got arrested and she's facing felony charges i mean
this is the insane world that we live in today and you know it just it just made me just made
my blood boil because i'm just like you just want communism yeah you just want communism because
look look children if your parents are taken away from you you know this is going to be replaced
with sodomites and communism and then the sodomites are not going to be so nice to you
the sodomites are going to take every good thing away from you they're going to take away all your
money all your joy all your pleasure all your food and you're going to be living a life of fear
constant fear where everyone's going to turn on you you know you live in communism every single
person is supposed to report you to the police anytime they see anything bad or anything wrong
and so everyone lives in a constant state of fear there's no joy no happiness no pleasure you just
go to work and even if you're good or bad you get the same low pay it is a nightmare what you want
is you want God system you want God's commandments you want to have a long life you know many of the
children hated their lives so much under communism they were willing to run at tanks with their bare
fists to their own death they would run and try to fight a tank with their bare hands that's how
much they just didn't care about living anymore in communism and you know what that's what you get
that's what you're going to get if you turn on your parents if we have an entire generation
just hate their parents rebelling against their parents and not want discipline well then you get
a tank you get the red army to come in and they'll put you into some serious bondage some serious
discipline and they don't love you your parents do love you you know don't allow that wicked
communist idea to get planted in your brain to think like i should turn my parents into the
cops for disciplining me that is wicked that is evil you know what god is going to punish those
people severely i mean there was 42 children that were disrespectful to the man of god and
then he just sent bears to come in and tear them into pieces pour them up you know the way of
transgressors is hard following god's commandments is for thy good obeying your mom and dad is for
thy good it gives thee long life on the land with the lord thy god giveth thee you know don't
rebel against god's commandments you know what obey your mom and dad even if you don't like it
you know sometimes you you think that they're wrong and then later you'll end up realizing
they're right and so you're better off just keep your mouth shut doing it and the few times that
they were wrong well when you're 30 years old you can bring it up and you'll just both laugh about
it okay few the few times it's usually few it's usually rare don't allow yourself to go down a
dark road just obey your parents and you know your life's going to be a lot better off plus
you don't want to reap what you sowed when you start having kids when you start having people
in your life that are under your authority you don't want to have that rebellious spirit come
and bite you in return now look at his verse 14 behold the heaven and the heaven of heavens
is the lord the lord's thy god the earth also with all that there it is only the lord had a delight
in thy fathers to love them and it shows their seed after them even you above all people as it
is this day circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart and be no more stiff neck now verse 14
is emphasizing the fact that god owns everything god is the god of all people but then he's saying
you guys are a special people saying you are of all the people in the world i chose you to be a
delightsome people to love you i chose your seed the word even means specifically and they're above
all people as this day so they're more special than other people but what makes them special
it's not an ethnicity it's the faith in their hearts towards the things of god it's the faith
in their heart in the coming messiah and jesus christ it's being saved that made them special
in the old testament you know it's not like being of a physical descendancy made you special in the
old testament it was believing in jesus christ that made you special in the old testament and
that's what also makes you special in the new testament is your faith in jesus christ notice
again that the circumcision brought up in the old testament we're in deuteronomy right is it talking
about a physical circumcision here no it's talking about a circumcision of the heart because it was
always spiritual it was always god was always thinking about the spiritual things here and
he wanted these people to have a heart that was right with god and the circumcision that was
performed of the heart is being of the real israel's being a real jew is what it means to be saved and
so that's what god cared about he said hey don't be these stiff neck people circumcise the foreskin
of your heart that's faith putting their faith in god verse 17 for the lord your god is god of gods
and lord of lords a great god and mighty and a terrible which regardeth not persons nor take
his reward he doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow and love of the stranger
and giving him food and raiment love you therefore the stranger for your strangers in the land of
egypt so god is emphasizing who he is he's the god of gods so what does the word gods mean a lot
of times the word gods in the bible when it's lower g is typically referring to what we think
of like demons demonic spirits false gods talking about bail sometimes the bible uses this word to
talk about the devil talks about the god of this world but i also believe the word god could just
simply be in reverence to the word ruler so just you know you have god uh in the context of joseph
is like the god of the land is how it's used in the in the book of genesis what does that mean
just means the ruler of the land so how is god the god of gods it's not really talking about
the devil and demonic spirits it's just saying like many of the people in the world that were
the top rulers were considered a god lower g but he's like hey i'm the god of gods i'm the ruler
of rulers i'm the lord of lords i'm the king of kings that's what those labels are referring to
meaning that there is a hierarchy in this world and god is at the top no matter who you are
god is the god of president trump and bb netanyahu and whatever gg ping whatever's going on over there
or whatever's going on in north korea whatever's going anywhere in the world any prime minister in
europe hey he's the god of that person he's in charge of that person he is over that particular
individual pharaoh guess who has the answer to god everyone has someone to answer to everyone is
under the authority of someone they're just very rebellious they're obviously not caring what god
thinks harrid was under the authority of god pilot under the authority of god caesar under the
authority of god doesn't matter who it is they're all under the authority of god because he's the
god of gods so what is he saying hey i'm going to make sure to execute judgment for the fatherless
and the widows the people that can't defend themselves i'm going to make sure that they're
taken care of so you as a ruler or a judge or someone in authority you need to make sure
you're fair and honest with fatherless with widows people that can't defend themselves people that
can't protect themselves because you know i'm going to take you to task if you're not taking
care of the fatherless taking care of the widows which again these are the most defenseless people
on the planet little children with no father and women that have lost their husband are the most
defenseless people and so he's he has a special heart for the vulnerable special heart for the
people that can't defend themselves that could be easily taken advantage of what does the bible say
about the pharisees they devoured widows houses and for a pretense make long prayers so the
pharisees are fake and they just want to take money away from widows they don't want to help
widows they don't want to do good under widows they want to hurt and harm them you know a lot
of a lot of widows are taking advantage of by false prophets catholic church other groups that
televangelists are some of the worst just praying on elderly women women that lost their husband to
give all their money to them give you know $58 seed give a thousand dollar seed sell all your money
you know and of course other religions like judaism practice all kinds of horrific you know
things to take advantage of widows like reverse mortgages just extracting all of their wealth
extracting all their money to let's literally devouring widows houses reverse mortgages
whereas the bible is saying hey let their nephews which is their grandsons let their children and
their grandchildren take care of them so that they're not allowing jews to devour their houses
they're not allowing Pharisees to come and reverse mortgage all of their equity away
and to put them into the poor house you know it's sad and embarrassing what's happening in our
society because people young people won't take care of their parents they don't love their parents
they won't take care of them they won't put them up they won't protect them from the evils of this
world you know we need children that actually love their parents and will take care of them it's for
your good and look if you take care of your parents I guarantee that's going to plant seeds in your
children's mind of how they should react and how they should behave and incentivize them to more
want to take care of you in your old age but you know what you don't want to take care of your
parents you ship them off to somewhere else you let the government just slowly cause them to decay
on social security which pays like nothing literally I had someone told me recently about
someone they loved is on like social security has no other money social security is only giving them
nine hundred dollars a month and you know they have to live in an assisted living now because
they just can't I think it's beyond assisted living I think it's even more than that they need
as far as care for them and it's just like it costs like two thousand dollars or something a
month just for the most basic cheap garbagey place and they're only getting 900 from social
security I mean it's just it's a shame and embarrassment how our society lives these days
taking advantage of the widows taking advantage of these poor women you know and you know brother
Jimmy Priest is concerned about this at the men's retreat but it's like it's not cool for you as a
man to just never save a dime and have no money and just be in complete debt and then just die
at 70 and now your wife just has no money and is just a predator or just a just a prey to all
kinds of predators and it's going to be like this woman that's just going to be totally taking
advantage of you know maybe you invest for her and take care of her even when you die you know
and that's that's something that i think makes sense i mean the a good man leave an inheritance
unto his children's children's what the bible says you know it would be a shame and embarrassment
that you don't even have two nickels to rub together for your your wife when you die or
something like that you know you should consider you know taking care of her not only while you're
alive but even you know beyond that let's keep reading here it says in verse number well i want
to do verse 19 for a second love the stranger you know i am against open borders i am against open
immigration i do not believe in it i don't think it's right i think we should we should shut it
down i'm not even against deportation you know as an as a policy of our government but that doesn't
mean that i won't be kind and nice to every illegal immigrant in our country and i wouldn't
give them the gospel and i you know i'm never going to turn them in you don't don't think don't
think i would never turn you in okay but at the end of the day you know hey we should love the
stranger still we should give them the gospel we should be kind to them we shouldn't we shouldn't
look down upon them and if hey you know personally if i was the king of the land i would grant amnesty
for most of these people anyways especially the ones that have a job or a house or anything like
that they should be instantly granted citizenship i think we're treating them very poorly as
americans right now we've made them a slave class because they can't actually integrate into our
system and they're not like legitimate citizens which is a total bad way to run a country
the ones that have lived here for years and have jobs and stuff they should just
immediately be granted citizenship and then all the people that moved over with no house no job
they should be sent back immediately okay that's my personal opinion if you don't like it you can
go anywhere else you want all right but what's crystal clear in the bible is that we're supposed
to love them period supposed to love them be kind unto them not look down upon them and this doesn't
even include the races that you like that are here all of them whether they're indian or indian okay
or or asian or filipino or can it canadians even i mean we have to love the canadians okay
we have to love any and all africans yeah that's hard for a lot of people okay and i'm not saying
african americans i'm saying just even africans just like fresh off the boat you have to love
them okay that is what the bible says we should love the europeans we should love the asians we
should love the africans we should love the south americans we should love the indians you know and
frankly speaking i know people of all ethnicities of all nationalities people that i really like
that are super cool people you know even though there might be some religious groups that are
just horrific like islam like hinduism like catholicism don't let that taint you to just hate
every middle easterner or every indian or every mexican you know we should love all of these
different groups of people and you know a lot of them you know they're just trying to escape to
a better life and you know we as christians we should be the ones showing them love and kindness
and giving them the gospel and hey you know maybe god will work in mysterious ways maybe we'll give
them the gospel they get deported and they can take it back to their family you know we could all
things work together for good to them that love god to them that are called according to purpose
maybe they don't get deported i don't know maybe the american government gets so evil and wicked i
want to flee to their country you know to basically not get put in prison or something like that you
never know what's going to happen and you're better off just loving people and being kind to people
and you know not being respected person because the bible is crystal clear god's not a respected
person so we shouldn't be respected as a person either you know we should love the stranger and
the foreigner no matter what we think personally says in verse 20 thou shalt fear the lord thy god
him shalt thou serve and to him shalt thou cleave and swear by his name he is thy praise and he is
thy god that hath done for thee these great and terrible things which thine eyes have seen thy
fathers went down into egypt with three score and ten persons and now the lord thy god hath made
thee as the stars of heaven for multitude so god is basically saying hey i greatly multiplied you
you guys were 70 people now look at you now you're basically a million plus individuals that have
come out of egypt they came out and spoiled the egyptians as the bible says so they have great
wealth and they're about to enter into the land of prosperity the land of milk and honey and
they're going to have great wealth and possessions that they didn't procure themselves basically the
wealth of the sinner is laid up for the just and so they're going to get to inherit great things
you know this number could be used in other passages to just you know to basically you know
compare in different things but it's pretty interesting how just a small number can become
a big host over not that long a period of time and we have to realize that God can multiply things
greatly you know little as much when God is in it you know have faith that even even a church
that's very small you know if you just dedicate yourself to the things of God it can grow to a
great host a great multitude you know if those people are dedicated things of God now this church
specifically I mean we're pumping out babies like crazy I don't know if you know this but it's like
let's see this one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve there's 13 ladies
expecting on our list right now and there could even be ones in the hiding we don't even know some
some ladies you know they don't want to tell us or whatever and that's fine they can have their
privacy keep your secrets all right but you know the ladies that just are really open about it they
actually like their kids they're public about it you know no i'm just kidding they're not ashamed
they're not embarrassed all right hey we got 13 think about this even if we just had like on average
eight kids every year or something like that as a church over 10 years that's just like an 80 new
people right i mean if you had 10 on average it's like 100 new people just be adding to the church
and that's not even reaching anybody else right that's just like internal growth that you have
as a group of people and you know so god can greatly multiply you if you're just faithful
if you're doing god's commandments if you're doing right and i believe god will i believe god will
continue to multiply those that are serving him that are doing what's right he's going to continue
to bless them and multiply them as a group of people and you know having lots of children is
a great blessing according to the bible you know having lots of babies in this church is a great
blessing you know i'm always reminding when i go to an old ivy church and they have zero babies or they have one
and they have one and they're acting like it's the biggest deal in the world like we have one person
pregnant in our church and and i'm just kind of thinking like oh man is it a low month a low season
for you guys or something like that you know and it's just kind of crazy because i mean they're
running 500 they got one baby you know they're running 600 that one baby well you know their
numbers aren't going to be multiplying they're going to be diminishing greatly okay and so you
know a church like ours we're greatly multiplying and adding and you know what it's just blessing
from god it's just a blessing and a miracle from god and we should always be thankful to him
and recognize hey if they went from 70 to million they're supposed to bless god and say like wow
thank you god for doing what you did for us in the same way as we keep adding children and babies
and growing we should constantly be blessing god and thanking god for what he's doing it's not us
we're not special you know i would love to take credit for every single person in our church but
i feel like i can't take credit for any and frankly speaking i can go out and get someone
saved i can drag them here i can dunk them i can drag them to every single service and usually
they still will leave i mean i can i can put in so much effort i've i've done so much for people
to bring them into church and you i can't get them to save my life it's like i'm buying them
lunches i'm buying them meals i'm giving them clothes i'm bringing them in i'm doing everything
i can and they're just like bye and then people you scream and yell out and do nothing for they
can't i can't get rid of them you know it's like go figure how does that work it's because god
builds the church and you know what you should care more about is the doctrinal integrity of
the church than all the efforts and energies you did because think about it if building a church
was me going out and doing some special follow-up or some special dragging people in well then
couldn't i get all the attention and glory for that and say well the reason why this church is
because i built this church and i dragged these people in here and i got you saved but you know
what god doesn't want that god wants to get the glory for all the work done in the church and god
wants to be the one that gets all the praise for building his church you know what god does get the
praise in this church because he's the one building it you know we don't want to sit here and lift
ourselves up and think that we're so special and look i'm not down on anyone trying hard to bring
people to church i'm not down on anyone trying to evangelize but let's just be honest god to
get the credit for it if god's the one that does it if god's the one that performs the operation
because how is it how are you any more special than me to knock on the right door of the person
that's actually interested in things of god man it's a it's a stinking lottery out there
because you you knock doors you don't even know if they're going to be receptive or not receptive
is it a jew is a hindu is he tall is he small it doesn't matter you don't know we're just supposed
to all go out there and you know what we're all on the same team anyways who cares if you brought
the visitor or i did or he got him saved or you got him to encourage to go back get a baptism
it doesn't matter we're on the same team we just want to go out there and do the works
and you know what let god be the one that gets the glory let god be the one that gets the praise
and let god be the one to be recognized for the growth of a church for the building of a church
for the success of a church and you know what i believe a church that's giving the honor and
glory to god and working for him he's going to thrive and the church is going for its own name
its own recognition its own praise will fail and squander and god will bring them low the best way
up is to humble yourself and to little yourself and give him the glory and the praise because
when you start lifting yourself up and acting like it's about you and you want to be successful like
me hmm just follow my amazing example you know what god's going to just show you how bad of an
example that is you know we should all be following this this is the example this is what we should do
and look i'm all for people setting a good example i'm all for us working hard but at the end of the
day can we just give the recognition to god can we just say hey it was god that built this church
hey it was god that helped us you know i also think this if you're a person that's just blessed
with lots and lots of kids don't go around like flexing like i'm pretty good you know i'm pretty
awesome at this or this is like funny thing you know where this guy's having a gender reveal party
and this is this guy and he's having a girl and he's kind of like mad about it he's having a girl
and it's funny because this one guy walks up and he's like personally i would have had a boy
and it's like like you have any control over that you know it's not like you're so much more
special that you could have a boy or a girl or whatever and okay we're all doing the same things
to have kids i guarantee it okay you're not extra special you know why you're getting more kids than
others it's a blessing from god and if you recognize the blessing from god then thank god
and if you want more kids ask god for more kids right because at the end of the day it's god
that's opening closing the womb it's god that's blessing us and i shouldn't think like i'm better
than someone if i have more kids than them or less kids you know what god gets to decide how he wills
how many kids you're gonna have you get one kid just be glad that you had the one kid you have two
you have three you have four you have 20 whatever it is just praise god for it and let god be the
one that gets the glory for our children let god be the one that gets the glory for our church
let god be the one that gets the glory in all things he's the one that gets the preeminence
he's the one that we should care about you know don't sit here and try to think oh
look how wonderful we are we greatly multiplied and we stole the stuff from egypt and we walked
through the red sea and we conquered the wilderness no no no god led you all the way god is the one
that delivered you god is the one that multiplied you god is the one that grew you let us give god
the praise and the glory for this now i want to just focus on a few symbols here that i noticed
that i thought were kind of cool if we kind of go back through this chapter for a few minutes
did you notice at the beginning he has the two tables of stone and then he puts them in this
arc of of the covenant this arc of wood i think there's a lot of symbolism that we could look at
this also if you kind of notice um one of the things that he said is that he had fasted for
another 40 days i don't know if you had noticed that um let's let's see i can't remember which
verse that was someone help me yeah verse 10 and i stayed them out according to the first time 40
days and 40 nights okay so the first time he fasted for 40 days and 40 nights which i think you
know if you go back to my previous sermon moses often is symbolizing jesus christ here so jesus
also has a 40 days and 40 nights fasting period in the wilderness with the devil when moses goes
up the first time he kind of has this 40 days and 40 nights of fasting well keep your finger go to
axe chapter number one go to axe chapter one he goes up and he's with god again for another 40 days
which is kind of an interesting thing in the book of axe the bible tells us about after the
resurrection of the lord jesus christ that he spent a specific amount of time with the disciples
look at axe chapter one verse number three talking about jesus to whom also he showed himself alive
after his passion by many infallible proofs being seen of them notice this 40 days so in the same
way jesus also spends 40 days after the resurrection appearing unto his disciples fellowshiping with
them communing with them now we have the 10 commandments when he first came down off the
mount he break them then he goes up and gets them again i believe we could look at this
and i preached this the last time but you know the 10 commandments could kind of picture a few
different things but one of the pictures is you know how jesus christ basically became sin for us
he also broke the law in a sense or he fulfilled the law you know we broke the law and then he's
you know putting it back together so he goes back up there and he gets it again also how hey
we still keep the 10 commandments right it's not like the 10 commandments went away
yeah we're still supposed to keep them in the new testament but i think it's picturing the new
testament now think about this he has this ark made out of wood so he puts the 10 commandments
in the wood and this is to preserve and to protect the 10 commandments so if you could think about
this it's it's basically keeping the law now what is it that causes us to keep the law it's the
cross of jesus christ it's what he did for us that causes us to keep the law perfectly is through
his sacrifice and what he did we get to go in through his righteousness which preserves the law
i think there's like three different things i thought of when it comes to this picture
because number one through the cross it's basically him he was one that kept the commandments number
two when you follow jesus when you're saved and you're walking in the spirit you're also going to
keep the commandments perfectly so as long as the 10 commandments are in that arc they're going to
be safe in the same way as long as you're following christ and you're following the spirit of christ
you're going to be with it you're always going to be keeping the law perfect and you're going to be
keeping the law safe here's the third thing though the bible talks about is it kind of pictures us
in this new testament in a few different ways and we're an earthen vessel you know this wooden
thing is like an earthen vessel and the bible talks about how the new testament is different
the old testament you had tables of stone put in a physical arc in the new testament he puts the law
into our heart and we're that vessel that carries the tables of stone and it's written
engraved in on our on our heart okay let's go to some verses on this go to jeremiah chapter 31 go
to jeremiah chapter 31 so we have a lot of different symbols here a lot of different pictures
i'm not going to take time to develop all of them you can probably come up with some cool stuff on
your own too but jeremiah 31 look what it says in verse number 33 says but this shall be the covenant
that i will make with the house of israel after those days sayeth the lord i will put my law in
their inward parts and write it in their hearts and will be their god and they shall be my people so
notice he's going to put the law into our hearts just like he put the law into the the ark of wood
it's like he's putting the law into our hearts and this is picturing what the new testament the new
covenant so you have the old covenant which was broken and it was fulfilled in christ then in the
new time the second time around he puts the law into our hearts and that's what's going to last
and that's what's going to sustain forever so he was already foreshadowing and picturing the new
testament there with moses specifically it's also brought up in deuteronomy the prophet that's going
to come but go if you would to hebrews chapter 8 go to hebrews chapter number 8 and we'll get
even more detail on this particular point but there's a lot of foreshadowing a lot of pictures
here also we saw and i'm not going to go there for a second time but he talked about how he
wanted them to circumcise their heart and in romans chapter number two the bible is crystal
clear that a true jew is not of an outward circumcision but the inward circumcision which
is that of the heart which is not by the letter of the law it's basically by the spirit and so
you know everything was about the spiritual even in the old testament he wanted them to get saved
by faith in jesus christ they were supposed to be a spiritual nation just as they were supposed
to be a carnal nation and here in the new testament you know all the spiritual applications still
apply to us hebrews chapter 8 look at verse 10 for this is the covenant that i will make with
the house of israel after those days say the lord i will put my laws into their mind and write them
in their hearts and i will be to them a god and they shall be to me a people so notice that what's
making us as people is in putting the law into our hearts in the same way what made this generation
his people it was that they were circumcising their hearts and that was what's actually making
them his people he even says at the beginning of deuteronomy this is a very important point he said
i did not make this covenant with your fathers i'm making with you i'm making with you why because
they did not have faith they did not believe and in the same way all the covenants of god are for
those who believe not for those who do not believe it's for the believing israel not for the
unbelieving israel they have no part they have no it's not their god says in verse um 11 and they
shall not teach every man his neighbor and every man's brother saying know the lord for all shall
know me from the least to the greatest for i will be merciful under their unrighteousness and their
sins and iniquities will i remember no more and that he say at the new covenant he have made the
first old now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away just like those broken
tables that just perished and wasted away the old covenant has perished and waste away in a
spiritual sense and now we're in the new covenant and that new covenant is based on the law being
put into our hearts hebrews 10 also brings us up in verse number uh let's look at verse 15 where
the holy ghost also is a witness to us for after that he had said before this is the covenant that
i will make with them after those days say the lord i will put my laws into their hearts and in
their minds will i write them and their sins and iniquities will i remember no more so and
again he's trying to like in the book of hebrews help people make the transition from the old
sacrificial system to the new testament and recognize hey all these things have been fulfilled
they're waxing old they they've been perished they have nothing to do anymore we need to apply
the spiritual applications of these things and he's saying hey you don't need to have this like
daily sacrifice anymore you don't need to have this once a year atonement anymore christ has
already fulfilled all of that and he was a once for all sacrifice we're getting away from all of
that that was all pictures no one was saved by the blood of bull and goats there was no remission
of sins in the blood of bull and goats it was always a spiritual salvation it was always looking
to Jesus that and now that he's come things have changed there's been the necessity made a change
also the law you know we have a new priest not after the order of uh Aaron but after the order
of Melchizedek and he says in verse 18 now where remission of these is there is no more offering
for sin we're not doing any more animal sacrifices ever again verse 19 having therefore brethren
boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus by a new and living way which yet
consecrated for us through the veil that is to say his flesh and having a high priest over the
house of God let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith having our heart
sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water let us hold fast the
profession of our faith without wavering for he is faithful that promised and let us consider
one another revoke unto love and good works not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together
as the manner some is but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching
why is verses 24 and 5 there because they were they're always assembling and congregating to
perform like the animal sacrifices they were performing you know certain rituals certain
ceremonies you know the feast of tabernacles or all these different ceremony things they've all
been they've all been taken away they're no longer there there's no more reason to gather for animal
sacrifices there's no more reason to gather for these specific holidays and situations so then
what do we do well we still gather you see he doesn't want us to forsake the assembling of
ourselves together but now we assemble in the new testament church and now we have a new system
that's that's come into place and this is how god wants us to worship him in spirit and truth is in
the new testament and the new testament church and we don't want to forsake the assembling of
ourselves together we still want to come together and assemble we're just not doing animal sacrifices
we're not doing you know these old jewish customs anymore they've been done away they have waxed
old and so it's kind of like you understand he's doing this second picture of putting the table of
stone in the ark you know it's no longer this outward performance it's an inward thing and so
now everything's inward now everything's spiritual now everything in the new testament is different
and they think this is the covenant that i made this is what i was trying to you know foreshadow
and picture is the new testament is the new covenant you know so as we think about deuteronomy
chapter number 10 how can how can we reflect on this well we realize that hey the tables of stone
we don't have to carry them in a physical ark like the levites did we carry it inside of us
we carry the word of god inside of us and yet we're supposed to still care about the things of
god not ourselves we don't have an inheritance here we have no continuing city and what is the
whole purpose what what did god say like what do i require of thee to serve him and to follow his
commandments and it's for our good it's what's going to bless us and if we do it he's going to
greatly multiply us and we're going to have great success and we make sure to give him the
recognition for it so it's all about you know if we take the new testament application it's all
about church now it's all about the serving god and the church and we are the ones that are
bearing the 10 commandments inside of us we are those priests everything we're doing is for our
good you know don't let people give you a different carnal world mindset every the devil wants to get
you out of church the devil wants to get you to stop assembling and stop caring about your real
purpose in life he wants you to care about your inheritance care about the things that are now
that you can see you know god wants us to walk by faith and god wants us to exercise our faith
and serve him and you know have faith in him until we get carried home and of course we need to take
those those admonitions seriously we need to provoke one another under love into good works
and not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together next year i'm telling you we are planning
even more soul winning and just more missions trips and just conferences and just all kinds of
awesome cool things you know and it's never been a it's never been a better time to be serving god
it's never been a better time to have an opportunity to serve the lord don't let people
drag you away don't let the things in this world drag you away hey for this christmas why don't
you think about jesus a little bit and hey i'm all for getting gifts and having fun and you know
singing you know christmas songs you want to sing about it grandma got ran over by reindeer whatever
i don't know you know but hey bring grandma to church too you know she could get ran over by the
preaching or something you know i don't know but at the end of the day like let us not lose focus
of what's really important and what god really would have us do you know this christmas season
think about him and think about the fatherless the widows and the strangers and let us go out
there and preach the gospel and get them saved all right let's close in prayer thank you heavenly
father so much for the word of god thank you for making the new covenant with us hey thanks for
bringing so many people to our doorstep in this country that we can preach the gospel to i pray
that we wouldn't be bitter and and hateful towards the stranger towards the widows and the fatherless
but we'd love them we'd give them the gospel i pray that you give us a heart to not only reach
those in our neighborhood but to go to go into all the world and preach the gospel of a creature
and to love uh people and want to get them saved i i thank you that you give us an opportunity to
have reward in heaven and to an everlasting inheritance not to one that perishes on this earth
and in jesus name we pray amen we'll go to our last song it's going to be the first noel 421 421
21 sing it out the ones dismissed