the Lord has done.
Count your blessings
one by one.
Count your blessings
see what God has done.
Count your blessings
see what God has done.
one by one.
Count your blessings
see what God has done.
Are you ever
burnt?
So amid the conflict whether great or small
Scourge God is over
Blessings angels will attend help and come forgive you
We will find our seats, we will find our seats.
Lord, we love you and just thank you once again
for this awesome church.
And we thank you for the ability to gather here
and hear the word of God preach, Lord,
and sing songs unto you.
We love you and we just ask you to fill this room
with your spirit and bless everything that we do.
And it's in Jesus' name, we pray, amen.
All right, for our next song,
let's go to song number 149.
Song number 149.
Very good singing. If you haven't already got a bulletin, you'd like one.
You can lift it with your hand nice and high whenever ushers can come by and get you guys a bulletin.
On the front, we have our Bible memory passage, Jude 1.
verse five, and so it's kind of a longer verse.
And those who can quote the entire book of Jude
can get a special prize.
On the inside, we have service times, soul winning times,
our regional soul winning, our church stats.
And we actually highlighted the year to date in blue
because we've actually already surpassed our 2024 totals
for both salvations and baptisms.
And so that's a lot of hard work.
Let's just give a round of applause to the Lord for that.
Yeah.
You know, that's that's one of the reasons why the devil attacks a church like ours is is looking at a number like that
And of course we'd like to keep numbers like that to remind ourselves of the work that we are accomplishing that
We're actually doing something. We're working really hard
And I think we should try to go ahead and double that for the year
Let's try and work really hard as well. We still have a lot of so many marathons
I saw a lot of people are signed up for our cleave burn so many marathon this Saturday
And it's kind of just a special event because there's a special event where Marshallese people
are going to be congregating in Cleburne at this time of year. And we anticipate that they're
pretty receptive in general. So hopefully we'll be able to go out there and have a good opportunity
to get a lot of people saved. The following week, we also have the
Durant Oklahoma so many marathon we have sign-up sheets out there
Please make sure you do sign up that way we can just anticipate for eating and everything like that
We're gonna be partnering with anchor Baptist Church
And so we'll get to see Pastor Dylan Oz and some of the people from Oklahoma. That'll be a lot of fun
On the right we have the list of our expecting ladies
upcoming events. We just mentioned those. We have Solwending Marathon in Shreveport also in June 28,
and Shreveport's always been a very receptive Solwending Marathon for us, and so that's why we
usually go back there. It's just been one of the most receptive areas we've been to, especially
stateside, and so we encourage you, if you'd like to participate, that'd be a great opportunity.
The meeting location for the Cleburne is there listed in the bulletin, and we're not going to have any
For breakfast or anything. We're just meat. It's just you can just meet at the at the park area
There's also no maps. So it's just basically meeting there
We'll also meet for lunch and I don't have those details in the bulletin yet, but we'll have a lunch plane soon
We'll put it in our
Our group chats and everything like that. So we'll put it in there. Just pay attention to the group chats
And then on the back we have the list of our
prayer list
Before I go through that I was this Sunday
in Vancouver, Washington at a conference about the King James Bibles called the King James Bible
Conference with Pastor Aaron Thompson as the host and there was a lot of other preachers there
for the whole weekend and honestly it was a really awesome conference. It went really well
and the fellowship was great and they had a lot of people come out and I got to meet some new people
and it was it was really just a lot of fun. It was it was really hard to say that it was even
But if you do get a chance to listen to any of the sermons,
I do highly recommend them.
There's a lot of stuff you can learn about them.
Um, I really, I really learned a lot myself from some of the sermons out there.
And if you ever are in that part of the country, uh, definitely consider visiting
past Aaron Thompson.
He's got a church plant in about every city out there.
So, uh, you, you really do have a lot of opportunities, but, um, he's a great
friend of ours and thank you so much to the guys who preached for me on Sunday.
It was great to, uh, listen to their sermons and hear, uh, people still coming
to church and working hard here.
So that's pretty much all I have to say about that.
but on the prayer list, we'll go through this real quick.
We've been praying for the Carlson's,
for their both mother and father's health,
also the Millers, if you'd pray for their mom's cancer treatments.
If you could continue to pray for Brother Horace and Miss Grace for their health issues as well as Miss Olivia as
recovery and then if you'd pray for
Brother Garcia's health. We're continuing to pray for Miss Larky, which seems like she's doing really good and then we're continuing to pray for
Miss Sheila Morris for her health issues for Brother Brad's father and sister
We also have Miss Cindy's friend Miss Angela. We've been praying for her
Brother Jared also has a co-worker Josh if you pray for his health and then if you pray for the naeems
I think he had a praise board. I think things are going well on that
Also, brother Samson said that his surgery went well
And so we'll continue to pray for him for his recovery and then also if you pray for brother furs dad
who's also recovering from surgery and then we we had the Scott family actually gave birth to
Elisha James Scott on
recently this past week and he was 5 pounds 10 ounces of 19 inches long congratulations to them
And we'll go ahead and just say a quick word of prayer
for our church family.
Thank you Heavenly Father so much
for all those ladies who are expecting.
I pray that you would continue to bless them
through their pregnancies.
I pray that you would help them with their delivery.
Thank you for those who have recently had their children.
I pray that you would help them with their just recovery.
I pray that you'd also just help all of these family
and friends and church members
that are struggling with various health issues.
I pray if possible, please just give them a miracle.
Please just heal them.
Please give them grace and give them peace
during this time of difficulty.
I pray that you just help our church family
that needs a need with their finances,
or their car, or with their job.
I pray that you just kind of bless them.
Pray that you bless their upcoming soul-winning events.
Please just help us to be a bright and shining light
in Cleburne and also in Durant, Oklahoma.
I pray that you would continue to use our church
to get many people saved,
and also compel them to get baptized and to serve you.
And we just thank you so much for this church,
and just in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
Pretty much all we have as far as announcements, we'll go ahead and sing our Psalm of the week, Psalm 148 and our Psalm Binders, Psalm 148.
Alright, that was Psalm 148, Psalm chapter 148 in your Binders.
Let's all sing it out together.
everybody now as the offering plates are being passed around go ahead and open
your Bibles to Matthew chapter 22 that's the book of Matthew chapter number 22
Matthew 22, the Bible reads, And Jesus answered and spake unto them again by parables and said,
The kingdom of heaven is likened to a certain king which made of marriage for his son,
and sent forth his servants to call them that were bitten to the wedding,
and they would not come. Again he sent forth other servants, saying, Tell them which are bitten,
Behold, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen, and my fatlings are killed,
and all things are ready, come unto the marriage.
But they made light of it and went their ways, one to his farm and other to his merchandise,
and the remnant took his servants and treated them spitefully and slew them.
But when the king heard thereof, he was wroth, and he sent forth his armies and destroyed
those murderers and burned up their city.
Then saith he to his servants, The wedding is ready, but they which were bidden were not worthy.
Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find bid to the marriage.
So those servants went out into the highways, and gathered together, all as many as they found,
both bad and good. And the wedding was furnished with guests. And when the king came in to see
the guests, he saw there a man which had not a wedding garment. And he saith unto him, friend,
and he was speechless.
Then said the king to the servants,
bind him hand and foot and take him away
and cast him into outer darkness.
There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth,
for many are called, but few are chosen.
Then went the Pharisees and took counsel
how they might entangle him in his talk,
and they sent out unto him their disciples
with the Herodian saying,
Master, we know that thou art true
and teaches the way of God and truth.
Neither carest thou for any man,
Tell us therefore, what thinkest thou? Is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar or not?
But Jesus perceived their wickedness and said,
Why tempt ye me ye hypocrites? Show me the tribute money.
And they brought unto him a penny. And he saith unto them,
Whose is the image in superscription? And they say unto him, Caesar's.
Then saith he unto them, Render therefore into Caesar the things which are Caesar's,
And unto God the things that are God's. When they had heard these words,
The same day came to him the Sadducees, which say that there is no resurrection, asked him, saying,
Master, Moses said, if a man die, having no children, his brother shall marry his wife
and raise up seed unto his brother. Now there were with us seven brethren, and the first,
when he had married a wife, deceased, and having no issue, left his wife unto his brother,
likewise the second also, and the third unto the seventh. And last of all, the woman died also.
Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife shall she be of the seven, for they all had her.
Jesus answered and said unto them, ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God.
For in the resurrection, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God
in heaven. But as touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was spoken
unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob? God is
not the God of the dead, but of the living. And when the multitude heard this, they were astonished
that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they were gathered together.
Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question tempting him and saying, Master,
which is the great commandment in the law?
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy
soul and with all thy mind.
This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, saying,
What think ye of Christ, whose son is he?
They say unto him, the Son of David, he saith unto them, How then doth David and Spirit call him
Lord, saying, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand till I make thine enemies thy
footstool. If David then call him Lord, how is he his son? And no man was able to answer him a word.
Neither durst any man from that day forth ask him any more questions. Let us pray.
Heavenly Father, Lord, thank you for allowing us to be here in church. I just pray that you
and to make changes in our lives, praise and Jesus' name, amen.
Before we get into chapter 22, I just want to remind ourselves of the context of this particular...
passage. First of all, we're in Passover week. So this is the week leading up unto the Passover.
And I believe we're, you know, somewhere around Monday, Tuesday of that week. And if Christ was
having the Lord's Supper on Wednesday, it's crucified on Thursday. So this is kind of leading up to
this. And really, when you understand the Gospels, you'll realize that a large chunk of the Gospels
one week. In fact, I've analyzed it to be about 25% of the
gospels are dedicated to specifically this one week in
human history. Another thing I've kind of just noticed, and
you could check this out yourself, but as you go
through Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, it seems like that each
gospel is just kind of expanding on this week a
little bit more.
So Matthew kind of gives you a taste, Mark gets a little bit more detail, Luke gives a little bit more detail,
and then John is just a lot of detail when we talk about this specific week in time.
And so that's just kind of another thing to think about.
But we get this context here picking up in verse 23 of chapter 21.
And when he was come into the temple,
the chief priests and the elders of the people came unto him
as he was teaching and said,
by what authority doest thou these things?
And who gave thee this authority?
So Jesus is in the temple.
People are congregating this whole week in the temple.
This is Passover week.
This is a very important spiritual time
when people are all gathering together,
a lot of preaching.
This is kind of like their fire-breathing
Baptist Fellowship Conference, okay,
where they're all meeting
and they have lots of different people showing up
and Jesus is getting up
and he's just preaching all kinds of different things.
This is their little Q and A.
They're asking lots of different questions,
but they're not really sincere.
They're actually trying to trap him.
number 28, it says, but what think he, a certain man had two sons.
Now, I want to address just kind of chapter 21.
Chapter 21, they come into the temple, they're asking his authority.
He asked them a question, they can't answer it.
Then he's asking them a question, but what think he?
And he kind of gives them this parable.
Now as we keep reading it gives this parable of two sons and in verse 32
It says for John came in you the way righteousness and you believed him not
So he's kind of rebuking them saying hey, you didn't believe in John
So they ask him by what authority he refutes them. They can't answer it
Then he's rebuking them and saying you guys didn't even believe in John and he gives them this parable essentially of the two sons and
He's kind of explaining how they're worse than the publicans and harlots.
So you kind of get the context, the chief priests, the main rulers are coming in,
they're talking to Jesus, and his first response is basically like,
hey, you're worse than all the publicans and the harlots.
You didn't believe, John, I'm not going to answer your questions.
You're worse than the publicans and harlots.
Then, so that's kind of like the first main rebuke that he has.
They're in verse 33, here, another parable.
So, first of all, he rebukes them for being worse than the publicans and the harlots.
Then secondly, he gives them this long parable about the vineyard.
Look at verse 43.
So, number one, he's basically saying, hey, the publicans harlots are worse than you.
I'm sorry, you're worse than them, I'm sorry, excuse me.
He's saying, you're worse than the publicans in the arts.
And then secondly, he's saying not only that,
the nation that you have is going to be taken from you and given to the Gentiles,
which in their mind is even worse than the publicans and the Pharisees,
because at least many of them were still at least Jewish.
So he's basically just saying, you guys aren't going to get my questions,
you're not going to get your questions answered.
I'm not going to tell you what a theory.
You didn't believe John.
You are worse than the public, than the harlots, and in fact, you're so bad,
you're worse than the Gentiles, and you're going to be replaced by the Gentiles,
and they're perceiving that he's speaking about them.
Then in verse 1 of chapter 22, Jesus answered and speaking to them again by parables.
Notice also Jesus doesn't give them plain answers.
He doesn't give them plain responses.
He's speaking to them in parables because they don't get to hear things the same way as everybody else.
They don't get the same kind of Jesus response as everybody else.
But I think these contexts are really important
because you kind of wonder like,
why in the world are they wanting to kill Jesus so bad?
But think about it, he's walking into their domain.
The temple is kind of their spot.
It's their area of authority.
It's where people come to hear them speak
and no one wants to hear them speak.
Everybody wants to hear Jesus speak.
Then on top of that, he's sitting here abuking them.
you know calling them out saying hey the publicans and harlots are better than you
and in fact even the Gentiles are better than you and so it's just really upsetting
and irritating the chief priests and they're afraid of what's going to happen as a result
of Jesus's preaching they're just very terrified of the words they're saying and what's happening
and they're afraid of losing their nation because he literally said it didn't you see that he's
You see the high priest talking about someone needing to die
lest the Romans take their nation.
And I guess they're kind of afraid of the carnal perspective
of the Romans actually taking their nation,
which is what's so funny is by killing Jesus.
The Romans are going to take their nation.
And if they had received Jesus,
the Romans would have never taken their nation
because he would have been like a mother hen
guarding his chicks.
So it's because of them rejecting him and not believing him
and being fake and insincere.
So he gives them these more parables.
Verse 2,
They would not come again. He sent forth other servants saying tell them what you're bitten. Behold
I prepared my dinner my oxen and my fatlings are killed and all things are ready come under the marriage
But they made light of it and went their ways one to his farm another to his merchandise
And the remnant took his servants and and treated them spitefully and slew them
And when the king heard thereof he was Roth and sent forth his armies and destroyed those murderers and burned up their city
Then saith he to his servants the wedding is ready, but they which were bidden were not worthy now in the first part of this parable
We have kind of an illustration here of a marriage for a son
So we have a father and we have a son of course pretty easy to realize this is talking about God the father and
talking about the Lord Jesus Christ and
There's servants going out bidding guests to come under this particular wedding
What this is being compared to onto is in verse 2 the kingdom of heaven. So we're talking about being saved
We're talking about being a Christian
And it's essentially saying the prophets, the preachers of God constantly come under the Jews
and they would preach under them and try to get them to be saved,
try to get them into the true kingdom of God, into the spiritual kingdom of God,
and they rejected it in many different ways. Notice it said in verse five, but they made light of it.
Just making light of spiritual things, making light of being saved, making light of the things of God.
Not only that, some of them just think it's not that big a deal, so one just goes back to his farm,
another goes into his merchandise.
And if you think about that, there's a lot of just times referencing his money, his work, his job, his career.
And then they say the remnant took his servants and treated them spitefully and slew them.
and he preaches the gospel, he preaches the kingdom of God,
many people just weren't interested.
Many people just went back to their business, back to their life,
didn't really care, not that interested.
And then the people that left, that were still interested, the people that are remaining,
they ended up wanting to kill him, and again, this is kind of representative of what happened with the previous generations
and with the previous prophets, and also unto Jesus Christ himself,
where people, most of the time, they just don't care about the things of God.
And if we look at our world today, it's really not much different.
In fact, I went solo in a day and I knocked probably like 40 doors and nobody even wanted an answer.
And it's not like all those people are at church this evening.
It's not like all those people are reading their Bibles this evening.
It's not like all those people are busy going soul-winning themselves.
No, they're just tending to what?
Their farm, their merchandise, they make light of the things of God.
They don't care about the things of God.
And, you know, when it comes to Christianity, not very many people are going to care.
Not many people are going to care about the Kingdom of God.
Many people are not going to get saved.
Many people don't care about the things of God.
And we just have to realize that that's reality.
If you think about anything in this world that's got an elite arena,
you know, most of the people aren't going to ever enter into that.
If we think about professional sports,
most people are probably never going to become a professional athlete.
You know the in the vast majority of people many people don't even play a particular sport
You know what we could isolate it's anything. Let's just say basketball football soccer. There's going to be just a
Large percentage of the world that just doesn't even play that one particular sport
And if we looked at the whole world, I mean there's certain sports that are only played in certain parts of the world even
I mean you could look at cricket. No one plays that that game. It's weird, okay?
But to people that live in India, I'm telling you it is like the most important sport.
Just like here, we play football and then across the world, nobody cares.
And in fact, Texas is one of those areas where football is basically like, it's like religion.
I mean, it's called, you know, Friday night lights because in Texas, I mean, football is just like the biggest thing ever.
And so it just depends on where you live.
And I remember talking to them about this,
and they were saying, oh, well, we're not working tomorrow
because of the cricket game.
And so I was just asking them about it.
And I just said, oh, OK, do you like cricket?
And he was just kind of like, he was kind of weirded out
by the question.
And I didn't understand.
And I was just thinking, he kind of answered like, yeah.
And I was just thinking like, oh, I
just thought it was kind of interesting you really
wanted to miss work to go to the cricket game.
He's like, well, everybody goes to the cricket game.
And I was like, what do you mean?
I said, what if somebody doesn't want to go?
And he's like, everybody goes to the cricket game.
And I was just like, oh, okay.
So it's like a culture thing.
Like, it's just like really big for them.
But let's just be honest, even in cricket.
Very few people are ever going to be the person that plays.
Very few people are going to be the person that enter into that particular arena.
Very few people are ever going to be a professional football player,
professional basketball player, professional any of these things.
It's limited to very few.
And I liken this unto the Kingdom of God and Christianity in this sense,
that very few people are even going to get saved
and then there's even less that actually want to serve the Lord Jesus Christ.
And just like there's very few people that are ever going to be at that
upper echelon, that higher level of athletics and in the same way very few people are going
to actually be dedicated to serving God and living for the Lord Jesus Christ.
It's just the reality of the world that we live in. Many people are going to make light of it.
They're going to just say, oh soul winning is not that important, church isn't that important,
I don't need to read my Bible that much, maybe they just go to Easter once a year, maybe
they just go to church when they feel like it, they're not really that interested in
these things, they're more interested in their farm.
They're more interested in their merchandise and you think you know that seems a little silly
But I know people and I've seen people where they pretty much literally say I want my farm over going to a good church and
They go out somewhere and they have their little farm
They have their little piece of land, but you know
Even if you pursue those things those things can be taken from you
Not only can the farm be taken from you, you can suffer all kinds of other ways by just
not living a godly life or not staying in church or not trying to serve the Lord.
But, at the end of the day, even if your life was great, even if you go out on the farm
and you have all these special cows and you name them Betsy, and you go out and pet her
and she gives you the best milk you've ever had, and finally you kill her and you get
that best filet mignon you could ever wish for.
And you have a happy little chicken coop and they get to wake you up early in the morning
and you're just singing along and having fun.
You know, isn't there more to life than just having a farm?
Isn't there just more to life than having merchandise?
It's not like when we got born, this instruction manual
handed to us and said, hey, work a 40 hour a week job,
make sure to buy a house, make sure you find somebody
that you like to marry, have some kids, get old, die.
Or, hey, go buy a farm, raise some livestock,
make some money, start a business.
I mean, none of those things are told to us,
that's our own decisions.
And in a lot of cases, it's our culture
that kind of dictates those decisions.
And many people feel content just living their life
to just say, yeah, I just go to public school,
I go to college, I get married,
I get a nine to five, I save for retirement,
I grow old, eventually I'll get to go play,
some dumb game on a yacht somewhere on the boat
with my retirement money and then I'll die.
But is that really all our lives are meant to be?
Or has there been more to life?
There's more to life.
We've been called to a marriage.
We've been called to a particular way of life
and it's the kingdom of God.
And let me tell you something.
You know, all of that other stuff is vain and meaningless.
But it just sucks a lot of people out of the kingdom of God in the same way if you really understood professional athletes
Of course many of them are very talented, but I'll be honest with you
Most professional athletes are the hardest working people you've ever met in your life
They're very dedicated
They make a lot of sacrifices.
They're not going out and doing all kinds of different things.
They get up real early in the morning and they work out.
Or they practice their drills or their skills or whatever it is that they do.
You know, you could take a basketball player,
a basketball player, get up super early in the morning, shoot.
200 free throws, then he'll go run and work out.
Then he'll do a bunch of shooting drills,
then he'll do a bunch of dribbling drills,
then he'll go to practice,
then he'll practice with his team,
then he'll play with his team,
then after practice,
then he'll do more free throw shooting
and he'll eat a really strict diet.
He'll only have certain proteins,
he won't have any sugar,
he'll go to bed super early
and wake up and do the exact same thing again the next day.
Just every day. He's just dedicated to his craft
Dedicated to what he's doing nothing's gonna move him people aren't just waking up and just saying like I think I'll just play professional basketball today
No, no, they work super hard. They're dedicated
They're they're thinking about it and in the same way serving God the people that are really serve God and do something big for God are
The same way that they're dedicating their time their effort their energy and their thoughts and the serving God
And you have to realize that our life is not just about the farm.
It's not just about the merchandise.
You can make that if you want.
But you know what, that's not what Christianity is really about.
Christianity is not about the farm, it's not about the merchandise, it's about doing something
for the Lord Jesus Christ and entering into the kingdom of God and serving Him, going to
the wedding.
And of course, we can take this parable in a lot of different ways.
I'm kind of expanding on what the parable is really about.
But again, the parable can be used in a lot of different ways here.
Number one, of course, the most important application is the fact that we're talking
didn't get saved.
Many of them just went to their farm,
went to their merchandise.
But we see that in the world today, don't we?
Not just Jews, we see people today just,
hey, you wanna hear about the gospel?
No, I'm good.
No, I'm not interested in church.
And a lot of them just don't get saved
because they're just not willing to even hear.
They're not willing to let the gospel be preached to them.
Then, many of the people that do hear, they don't even have a positive reaction.
They have a negative reaction, and they want to destroy people
for actually preaching unto them the gospel.
And that's what we see with this remnant here,
is they get very angry at the gospel message and they slay them.
So then, the Father says what in verse 9?
Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find, bid to the marriage.
I like the Father's attitude.
He wants someone to show up at this wedding and he invited all of these people. He invited the best people
They refuse. So he's like fine. Let's get anybody
Just go out of the just go to the highways and find somebody that wants to show up to this wedding, right?
Because it's gonna be an epic wedding
He says, so those servants went out on the highways and gathered all as many as they
found, both bad and good, and the wedding was furnished with guests.
I love this too.
It says he gathered both bad and good.
So again, the main context is kind of the idea of salvation.
Many people just don't even want to hear, they don't get saved.
Of the leftover Jews, they pretty much just reject the gospel
and they hate the gospel and want to kill Jesus.
And then we see them all being basically cast aside,
and then who ends up receiving it is just this group of people
out on the highways and hedges, both bad and good.
Now...
Sometimes words have different meanings in different contexts.
We can't just always just insert them and swap them all over the Bible.
When the Bible talks in Romans chapter number three
about there's none good, no not one, what's that context?
And the idea of being perfect and righteous,
no one is without sin.
And that's the context of Romans 3.
What's the context in verse 10 is more about just from a human perspective
If we are comparing ourselves among ourselves, some of the best people and some of the worst
people are at this particular event. Obviously, in the context of Christ, no one is good.
In the context of perfect righteousness, no one is good. But amongst other people,
some people are just jit, just better than others. And he's saying some of the best people
showed up, some of the worst people showed up, both bad and good, and the wedding was
furnished with guests. And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man which had
And he saith unto him, Friend, how cameest thou in hither,
not having a wedding garment, and he was speechless.
Then said the king to his servants, bind him hand and foot,
and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness.
There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth,
for many are called, but few are chosen."
So we have both bad and good.
And again, this is just another way to rebuke
the chief priests and the Pharisees
in the context of the idea that, man,
y'all are going to all be rejected,
and there's going to be many Gentiles
that are going to get saved.
Here's another way that it's kind of rebuking them.
Did you notice some Gentiles are even good?
I'm sure that just rubs them the wrong way
because they think every Gentile is just a terrible person.
But you know what? The Bible actually describes certain Gentiles
that were pretty good people in the context of just humanity,
in the context of us, many of just the best people were Gentiles.
It's not like you had to be a Jew to be a, quote,
good person in the context of humanity.
Now, somebody kind of sneaks in here
and doesn't have on a wedding garment.
The Bible says when he's asked this question though, he was speechless.
So he has no response, he has no way to answer this particular question.
And you know, you could look at this a couple different ways.
You could look at this as just a pure hypothetical, because it's a parable.
And when I say that, I'm saying that this isn't like a real thing where people are
sneaking into heaven.
It's not like somebody is going to accidentally show up in heaven that wasn't really saved
and we're going to have to start confronting these people, like, how do you get in here
or something?
Okay, this is not on the table.
But it's just kind of giving the symbolism of, like, what would happen if someone snuck
into a wedding and they weren't really there, legitimately, well, they're not going to make
it in.
So they're not saved.
You could look at it from another way, though.
Isn't it in a church like pretty much all of us are saved pretty much all of us have the wedding garment on
But occasionally there's gonna be that guy in here that doesn't have a wedding garment
spiritually speaking and of course if Christ were here he has spirits
He could just see he can see the heart
He would know and he could just be like how did you get in here and the guy doesn't really know what to say
And so he's gonna be somebody that's going to hell because so going to church doesn't make you saved
Being among God's people doesn't make you saved.
Having that garment makes you saved.
And what does the garment represent?
Well, the garment represents the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ.
It's the wedding garment.
It's what he applies unto us.
And since this guy doesn't have that,
it shows that he didn't trust in Christ
and he never got that imputed righteousness.
So now he has to stand on his own.
He has to give an account for himself.
And here's the problem.
If you have to give an account for yourself,
you're gonna be speechless, have nothing to say,
and you're gonna be cast in outer darkness.
Because whenever you're questioned about your righteousness, you don't have any.
So it's kind of the same way as it's like, how do you explain your situation?
You can't, you're speechless, because there's nothing to say,
there's nothing you can do to get yourself saved.
Here's the third way I think you could apply this,
is in the context of, let's fast forward to the great white throne judgment.
because at the great white throne judgment
will all be there clothed in white robes,
the robes of righteousness that have been given to us
from the Lord Jesus Christ and the dead,
both small and great, are gonna stand before God
and they're gonna be judged and the books are gonna be open
and they're not gonna have that garment on,
they're not gonna have that righteousness
and they're gonna be found speechless
and they're gonna be cast into the lake of fire.
So I think there's three different ways
you could kinda look at this and just
First, it's just talking about the savers and then saved.
Second, it could be infiltrators and church.
And the third could even be,
we talk about the great white throne judgment.
That's kind of what's being alluded to here.
Notice there are gonna be cast into outer darkness
where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth.
It's interesting when the Bible describes people post death.
Whether it be heaven or hell, they seem to have all of the same attributes that we have now.
Have you noticed that?
I mean, you see the guy that's in hell when he's talking to Lazarus,
he's asking him for a drop of water be dipped on his tongue.
So the Bible talks about his tongue,
the Bible talks about teeth here.
Notice, I mean, there's weeping.
That would imply eyes, that would imply tears.
So, I mean, in a lot of ways,
you know, our post-death experience
is going to be similar in some ways
to our current situation
where there's still pain, eyes, teeth.
You know, I don't understand exactly how that works,
but I just want you to notice that we're not
It's not something completely unique to what we are experiencing now in the sense that we kind of have eyes, teeth,
weeping, all these different attributes.
The Bible says in verse 14,
Now, some Calvinists might just try to rip this verse out of context and try to teach
something weird, but what is really chosen here?
Well, the election, and the word elect means to choose, is by grace according to the Bible.
So if you think about it, many are called in the sense that, hey, everybody's, God
wants to go to heaven.
Everybody wants to go to the marriage,
but only certain people are going to be chosen,
and who's going to be chosen?
Those who put their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ,
those who believe in Jesus Christ,
those are the beginning to be the ones that are saved
and go to heaven.
It says in verse 15,
then went the Pharisees and took counsel
how they might entangle him in his talk.
So after he basically tells them,
hey,
I'm not going to answer your question about authority.
The public ends and the Harlins are better than you.
Your nation's going to be taken from you and Gentiles are better.
And then he just doubles down with another parable
about, hey, you guys aren't even saved
and the Gentiles are better than you.
What is the Pharisees reaction to this?
Hey, we got to figure out how to trap this guy
and entangle him. We want to get rid of him.
How are they going to get rid of him?
Well, they can't really get rid of him themselves.
They don't have the power and authority to just kill him necessarily.
So they need the government to do that.
And this is where they're going to come in with this next idea.
It says in verse 16.
And they sent out unto him their disciples with the Herodians saying,
Master, we know that thou art true.
and teach us the way of God in truth.
Neither cares thou for any man,
for thou regardest not the person of men.
Tell us therefore, what thinkest thou?
Is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar or not?
Now, what does it say in verse 18?
But Jesus received their wickedness, their wickedness.
Number one we can tell we we just know because we have the Holy Ghost telling us here
We just know these people aren't sincere. Why because he said that they're trying to entangle it
So it's so funny that when someone's not sincere
How do they act?
What is a person that's fake? What are they like?
What's the first thing they say when he comes we know that thou are true
You know, this is like if someone comes to you I know you're a man of God
I know you're a really great Christian.
This is what a fake person sounds like.
That's what the Bible is saying.
Now, they don't even just stop there.
This is what's funny.
And teach us the way of God in truth.
Hey, we know that you're true,
and we know everything that you teach is true.
We've never heard anybody teach the Bible like this.
You're the best preacher.
This is what a fake person sounds like.
Why they don't believe what they're saying now look if someone thinks obviously the Bible says even of the the Romans and Turians
That never man spake like this man spake so it's not super
Difficult to think that people would hear Jesus and think wow. He's a great guy. He's true
He preaches the Bible true, but here's the thing. They don't really believe it. They don't actually sincerely mean it
And this next part is kind of giving a hint
into what their angle is.
It says,
neither cares thou for any man,
for thou regardest not the person of men.
They're trying to use this logic here to trap him,
saying, I know you don't care about persons,
you don't respect persons,
and then they're gonna put Caesar on the plate
because they really wanna test this logic with him.
They think that they can kinda
This is their goal.
They're trying to get him to feel comfortable
to just say something that's not right
so that they can then attack him.
They're trying to butter him up to be like,
yeah, yeah, man, those Romans, right?
Those Romans, that Caesar, you know, they're terrible.
You don't respect persons.
We know you say whatever's right.
You're a hard preacher.
So what is their question?
Should we give money to Caesar?
Should we pay tribute?
Pay taxes, basically.
We don't use tribute in our context usually.
It's more taxes is what we typically refer to.
So it's like, hey, we know Pastor Shelley,
you're a great guy, you're a great preacher,
you don't respect persons,
and we know you think the government's wicked
and the government's evil,
and they're using all our tax dollars for evil things.
Should we pay taxes?
What's the goal?
The goal is to get you to say something stupid about taxes
so then they can record you and then take it to the government
and now you're a tax protester and they can take you out.
They're wanting Jesus to say something here
that can be used against him to be taken to the Romans
so that he can be put to death
because they hate him and they're trying to trap him.
He says in verse 18,
but Jesus perceived their wickedness and said,
why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites?
Tempt here is testing.
Why are you testing me? Notice the hypocrites.
Why? Because they don't actually believe anything that they said.
They don't do the things they say.
Show me the tribute money, and they brought unto him a penny.
And he saith unto them, Who is this image in superscription?
They say unto him, Caesar's.
Then saith he unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's
and unto God the things that are God's.
So in an interesting way, Jesus basically answers their question,
Doesn't entangle himself. He says, hey, this looks like Caesar's money pay Caesar's money
So what should be our attitude? Should we pay taxes?
unfortunately, yes
Now is that what anybody wants to hear? No one wants to hear that but since Jesus is not a respecter of persons
He's not gonna tell them what they want to hear. He's gonna tell them the truth. Hey pay Caesar's money
You know, I don't want to be someone that goes to prison for something that Jesus here is saying
Hey, this isn't a fight that we should get in
You know taxes is not a fight we should get in we should just pay our taxes and look taxes are legitimate
Does that mean that everything our government taxes is for is legitimate? No
Does that mean that every use of their funds that they have is legitimate?
Absolutely not.
In fact, it's very little percentage that is legitimate.
But at the end of the day, it's legitimate for government to exist,
it's legitimate for government to tax its citizens,
and it's legitimate for citizens to pay those taxes.
Therefore, we should render our taxes.
Now, it says in verse 22,
When they had heard these words, they marveled and left him and went their way.
Every time they asked him a question to try to trap him, he always outsmarts them.
They cannot beat him.
I also want you to notice something just in this whole book of the Bible,
and really just the Bible itself,
is that you kind of have like a constant debate.
between Jesus and the Pharisees.
And really the true power in a debate
is asking a question that they can't answer.
And what you'll notice is people that are very good at debating
they will ask questions that the other side can't answer.
But because of modern debates
you know, people are not actually held to answer questions,
so they kind of disguise the fact that they lose in the argument or in the conversation.
So when you're asking a question and they just don't answer it,
the person that asks the question is the one that won, really.
If you ask a question and then they just start saying things that don't really make sense and
then that also is a lose.
What you really see is that Jesus is asking them questions
and they're typically forced to answer
because they know the whole multitude
is going to see through them not answering.
Like earlier, hey, was John the Baptist from heaven or not?
And then they're just like, we're afraid to answer because we know how these people treat us based on our answer.
They're going to think that we're bozos if we don't give the right kind of answer.
So then they're just kind of afraid to answer.
And you'll notice people that don't really have answers won't give them.
When you listen to someone that knows what they're talking about, they can give short, concise, quick responses,
and they have good questions to ask.
So it's constantly like an argument over questions,
and you'll notice they're kind of going back and forth.
But when Jesus answers, notice they marveled and left them.
They don't even know what to say.
Verse 23,
And asked him, saying, Master, Moses said, if a man die, having no children, his brother shall marry his wife and raise up seed unto his brother.
Now there were with us seven brethren, and the first, when he had married a wife to deceased, having no issue, left his wife unto his brother.
Likewise, the second also, and the third, and the seventh.
And last of all, the woman died also.
Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife shall she be of the seven, for they all had her.
Now, you kind of understand the context.
Again, he's rebuking the chief priests and the Pharisees so they first send the disciples.
He completely destroys them.
Then the Sadducees pipe up.
So they're kind of like the second wave of people that are coming in and fighting here.
And one of the things we know about them according to the text is they don't believe in the resurrection.
So through their own logic, they think that they have questions or situations that make
the resurrection seem silly.
They don't believe the Bible, they don't believe the Word of God,
they think that through their own logic they can outsmart the Bible,
they can outsmart doctrines of the Bible.
And this is what you'll typically find in seminaries and colleges
where you have professors that teach the Bible and they're actually atheists.
They're actually not even believers whatsoever.
And of course they like the Bible and they love to talk about the Bible
and they have a class where they teach the Bible.
But they actually don't even believe the Bible because by their own logic
they think they've outsmarted things in the Bible and they typically don't believe the miracles of the Bible.
So you meet a lot of professors, a lot of college-educated individuals, people that hold the master's degrees.
They typically don't even believe the Bible at all and they're very much like the Sadducees.
That's who I would like in the Sadducees unto, but they're very easily defeated because they just simply don't even believe in the Bible whatsoever.
Now, they bring up this hypothetical of the brother,
and it's not like they actually care.
It's not like they're wondering who's the wife going to be.
They simply think that this proves that the resurrection doesn't make sense.
Well, how does Jesus answer in verse 29?
Jesus answered instead of them,
you do err not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God.
I like how Jesus is just real blunt.
You're wrong.
Wrong.
Your question is just wrong.
They ask this question just like, you're wrong.
And there's two reasons why.
Number one, they don't know the Bible.
Number two, they don't know the power of God.
Then he answers.
Verse 30,
For in the resurrection,
they neither marry nor are given in marriage,
but are as the angels of God in heaven.
So he's saying, look,
all this marriage stuff is meaningless
because after resurrection marriage doesn't matter anymore.
There is no, no one's married.
Nobody's gonna be given in marriage.
There's no more marriage.
Marriage is limited to this life.
He says in verse 31,
but it's touching the resurrection of the dead.
Have you not read that which was spoken unto you by God?
Saying, I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.
God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.
So,
Two things that he's saying here, number one, they just don't even know the Bible because if they knew the Bible
they would realize that there's no marriage after
Resurrection, so they wouldn't even ask the stupid question. Number two is since they don't even believe in the resurrection
Then they deny the power of God. Basically, they don't understand that God is going to raise people from the dead and understand that those that are
technically dead
that have physically died are actually still alive and they're in heaven.
I want to go to a place in the Bible to look at that,
look at what it says in John 3.
Go to John 3, keep your finger here.
So number one, they err by not knowing the Bible
because the Bible doesn't teach marriage, post-resurrection.
And number two, they don't know the power of God
because the Bible teaches the resurrection
and they don't believe in the resurrection.
They don't believe in the power of God.
They don't believe in salvation by faith.
They're not saved.
The Sadducees are sad you see
because they're not going to be resurrected.
All right? That's how you can kind of remember that.
Now, it says in John 3, verse 16,
for God to love the world,
that He gave His only begotten Son,
that whosoever believed Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
So the Bible makes it clear that when we believe in Jesus Christ,
we're never going to perish.
That's a pretty simple verse that's a pretty familiar verse should not perish
Meaning you're not dying in a spiritual sense. You're perishing when you go to hell, okay?
You have everlasting life
It says in verse 36 he that believeth on the sun hath
Everlasting life and he that believeth not the sun should not see life with the wrath of God to bite with them
So he's contrasting these two people look at John 5 verse
24
Verily, verily I say unto you, he that heareth my word, and believeeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but has passed from death unto life."
So again, the Bible is bringing up this concept that we've already passed from death, we've already been, we've already died with Christ, we've already been crucified with Him.
So there is no physical death for us, in the sense that, okay, let me say this differently, technically we will physically die, yes.
But there is no death that we have to experience post our physical death,
because as soon as we die, we're in heaven.
So we don't really experience death.
Death, there would never be a point where I'm consciously dead.
Because as soon as I physically die, I'm with the Lord in heaven,
so I just don't ever experience death.
Oh death, where is thy sting?
Oh grave, where is thy victory?
Now, the Bible says this explicitly, look at chapter 8, verse 51.
That's why the Bible is trying to encourage you to not be afraid of death,
because the only fear of death, really, is hell.
That's the fear of death,
because technically, to depart and to be with Christ is far better, as the Apostle Paul said.
So, in fact, dying is actually a good thing in some ways.
Obviously, none of us want to. We should all have a desire to live.
But look what the Bible says in John 8, verse 51.
Verily, verily, I say to you, if a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.
What is keeping him saying?
Believing on the Lord Jesus Christ.
You believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will never see death.
The Bible says in Hebrews that he should taste death for every man.
So Jesus experienced death for us a very, very short space.
Three days and three nights.
That's what it means by taste.
It's short.
But we never have to see death.
We never have to taste of death.
We never have to experience death.
We won't know what that's like.
The Bible says that we won't even see death.
Verse 52 then said the Jews unto him,
Now we know that thou hast a devil.
Abraham is dead.
And the prophets and thou sayest him,
Man, keep my saying,
He shall never taste of death.
So again, what are they thinking?
Physical death.
Oh, you're saying that we're going to taste death?
Abraham's dead.
What are you talking about, man?
This is silly.
Art thou greater than their father Abraham which is dead and the prophets are dead and thou make make us now thyself
Jesus answered if I honor myself my honor is nothing it is my father that honoreth me of whom you say that he is your God
Yet you have not known him, but I know him and if I should say I know him not I shall be a liar
Like unto you, but I know him and keep his saying your father Abraham
Rejoice to see my day, and he saw it and was glad then said the Jews on them now are not yet 50 years old
And that's now seen Abraham
Jesus say none of them very very nice and you before Abraham was I am
Then they took up stones that cast him.
Now, in this context, we learned a couple of different things.
Number one is that Jesus Christ is saying in verse 56,
your Father Abraham adjoys to see my day and he saw it and was glad.
How do you see it if you're dead?
You don't.
That also gives kind of credence to other verses in the Bible.
You can think of the Hebrews chapter, I believe it's number 12,
where it says that we have a great cloud of witnesses.
So, what is this great cloud of witnesses?
was in the cloud of witnesses
witnessing the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And we see all of the sons of God
shouting for joy when the cornerstone was laid.
That was the death of Jesus Christ.
That was the crucifixion,
the death bearer and resurrection
of our Lord Jesus Christ.
So that's what the Bible is alluding to
in the book of Job.
So look, all of these people that have died,
I believe they are up in heaven,
looking down, cheering us on, paying attention.
You can see very clearly
in the book of Revelation, a whole group of saved believers
begging God like, how long, oh Lord, until He judges, until things happen.
So they even experience time, I believe, in the same way that we're experiencing time.
It makes sense because based on all the different descriptions that are happening in the Bible.
But what this also tells us is that Abraham's not daddy's living.
But we also know another thing about Abraham. Abraham didn't always live.
What did it say in verse 58?
Before Abraham was, I am.
That means that Mormons are wrong.
They think that we have pre-existence to conception.
The Bible is saying, hey, there was a time when Abraham was.
There's an origin to Abraham and before that was Jesus Christ.
So Jesus Christ, why?
Because he is not a created being.
He's from everlasting.
And, of course, Jesus Christ is the root and offspring of David, which is really interesting.
We can't even wrap our minds around that fully.
But Abraham came into being at some point.
He never died, he went to heaven, and he looks down.
We even see, I don't know if it ever really happened
or if it's just a story, but we have that rich man.
He was talking to Abraham.
We have Moses and Elijah coming on the Mount Transfiguration
talking with Jesus.
They appear to be alive.
And so we have no indication that they're dead.
They are in heaven and they are alive.
Yeah, they've shed their physical body,
but that's not what was keeping them alive.
You know I shed my fingernails all the time and I shed my hair all the time and I shared dead skin all the time, but I didn't die
We're all constantly shutting I shed beard hair
We're all you know snakes will sometimes just shed their skin
You can just like see them shed they didn't die and yeah, I'm gonna shed this body, but I didn't die
Death is going to hell
Death is a state of being hell as its location
And so if you die physically and you're saved,
you didn't die, you are alive, you're in heaven.
Whereas if you die physically and you're not saved,
you are now dead and you are in hell.
That's why it says that the dead gave up them,
which was in the sea.
Death and hell gave up the dead, which were in the sea.
And so we see the state of being is death.
its location is hell.
Go back if you went to Matthew.
So when Jesus Christ is talking with these Pharisees,
he's trying to say,
you don't understand the power of God.
Hey, as soon as you die, you're alive still.
You're just in heaven.
You're in a diva location.
Yeah, you don't have your physical body.
But you know what?
I mean, the Apostle Paul is trying to make it clear
in Romans chapter number seven
that, oh, wretched man that I am,
who shall deliver me from this body of death?
It's not even a bad thing.
You see, the caterpillar sheds his body
and becomes a butterfly.
And in a sense, that's what's gonna happen to us
that we're gonna shed our cocoon
and we're gonna become a butterfly.
We're gonna be a better version of ourselves.
The best is yet to come.
Now that's hard for us that are getting older
because we feel like we're getting worse.
Your back hurts your vision gets dim. You can't run the way you used to run
Sleep isn't as much fun as it was. You know, the things decay a little bit as you age, right?
But when we die, we're actually gonna become better and we're gonna we we don't even know what that's like
Now this is how he responded to the Sadducees
He's not the God of the dead but the God of the living verse 33 when the multitude heard this they were astonished at his doctrine
But when the Pharisees had heard that he had put the Sadducees of silence, they were gathered together.
So again, the disciples came, he shut them up.
The Sadducees come, he shuts them up.
What is the Pharisee?
The Pharisees, you know, you kind of think about these people,
it's kind of like what a reprobate is like, where they just, they're insatiable.
Nothing is going to stop them.
It's like, man, this guy keeps just debunking everybody.
Wouldn't you think like, hey, let's get on his team.
Let's actually believe what he's saying.
No, it's our turn to trap him.
It's finally the Pharisees.
Another thing I would like to say is you kind of can realize in the Bible that the Pharisees are better than the Sadducees.
Sadducees are kind of like the lower rung, the worst group.
The Pharisees are a little bit better.
Also, a thing that I would note is that some Pharisees I believe get saved in the Bible,
whereas no Sadducee ever gets saved.
And it's kind of like, it's almost like this leftist, communist, Democrat party,
where it's like all of their leaders are just not saved,
and probably never will get saved.
But then it's like, of the conservative side, most of them still aren't saved,
but maybe a couple of them might come over to our side eventually, right?
So it's like, how dare you like Republicans more than Democrats?
Well, it's kind of like liking Pharisees more than Sadducees, really, okay?
I mean, yeah, if push comes to shove, give me a Pharisee all day long.
But at the end of the day, it's not like the Pharisees are a good group, right?
And so we kind of keep that balance. We should at least look at the Republican Party like they still have some serious problems and
Typically what people do is they kind of say like the Pharisees point out the problems of the Sadducees
Sadducees point out the problems of the Pharisees and they're like pick one and this is like no
It's like what Jesus said and Joshua and nay, you know, I'm not on either of your team
I don't want to be on either of your teams. But again, that's just kind of give you an idea of what these people are a little bit like
It says in verse 35,
then one of them, which was a lawyer,
asked him a question,
tempting him and saying,
now again, the lawyer here,
it's probably not exactly like our lawyers of today,
but it's just someone that studies the law of God.
That's kind of what is being implied here.
Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
Verse 37, Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind.
This is the first and great commandment, and the second is likened to it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
All in these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
Notice, not only are all sins not equal, not all laws are equal.
Some laws are more important than other laws.
What is the most important law is loving God.
What's the second most important law?
Loving your neighbor.
You can almost even look at this as the Ten Commandments.
The first like half of the Ten Commandments
are pretty much dedicated to loving God,
and then the second half is dedicated to loving man.
And really another thing you should understand
is that everything in the law is fulfilled in one word,
and that's love.
Loving God and loving your neighbor is what it means to follow the law.
And it's so silly when people will buck at things in the Bible and act like it's somehow not loving.
No, everything in the Bible is loving.
It's either loving God or loving your neighbor and really it's ultimately just loving God in general.
And so we have to understand that we should appreciate everything in the Bible,
all of the Old Testament commandments. Of course there's some things in the New Testament that have been done away
because they have no more significance. They were spiritual
pictures that have been fulfilled in Jesus Christ
and now
There are no longer things that we have to do.
The meat, drinks, divers, washings, and cardinal ordinances.
We don't have to offer a physical lamb on an altar
because Jesus was the lamb for us.
And so we take him as that lamb.
All the sacrifices we're picking Jesus,
since he already fulfilled them,
we don't have to do those anymore.
Because Jesus came,
he broke down that middle wall partition between us,
so there's no more division between the Jew and the Gentile.
Therefore, there's no more division
between the clean meats and the unclean meats,
And hey, bacon's great just like the Gentiles are great.
You know, there are some parts of the Old Testament law
that forbid certain unclean meats, and I still don't like them.
But I like the bacon, okay?
And again, if you like some of the unclean meats,
that's for you to party with because everything's on the table.
I mean, the Bible says nothing to be refused
if you're received with Thanksgiving.
So according to the Bible, you can pretty much just eat anything.
Now, not all things are expedient, okay?
But you can eat anything. You can even eat a corn dog.
I hate corn dogs. I think it's like probably my least favorite food
In fact, the smell alone is just would possibly make me hurl
But this what's funny about corn dogs when I was little I loved corn dogs. I
Ate corn dogs. So no when I was a child. I was like in the Old Testament. All right
or maybe it's vice versa, maybe I'm doing this backwards,
but when I was a child, I loved corn dogs and I ate them,
but here's the problem, I got really sick one time
and threw it all up, so then I guess from then on,
it just, that smell just is associated to me
as something that's really negative,
so I just, who likes corn dogs, all right, let's see,
okay, yeah, there's a lot of problem people
in this room, I'm telling you what.
But I'm just saying like for me, it's just something that I don't really like anymore. There's nothing wrong with a corn dog
It's just something that I personally don't like anymore, but you know what if you pray
God can still sanctify that corn dog
And hey, if you want a corn dog have one right after the service. I am for you
I just don't want it right and of course we all get to have our own preferences
But you know praise God that some things are on the table the corn dogs on the table
And I have to think that that's a New Testament food.
I don't know what's... Who knows what's in the corn dog?
Is it a hot dog wrapped in...
Is it just a hot dog that's wrapped? Does anybody know?
I think most people are nervous about what's actually in it.
What is it?
It's just a hot dog wrapped in cornbread.
It's just a hot dog wrapped in cornbread, folks, okay?
Now, here's the more important question. What's in a hot dog?
Okay, no, just kidding.
I think hot dogs can be all beef or they can be chicken, pork, and something else.
That's like what it says, and something else.
But obviously the chicken, pork one, hey, that's a New Testament food.
So that's been done away with in Christ.
We don't have to necessarily, you know, get...
these rules from the Old Testament and say,
oh, you're not a Christian because you eat corn dogs.
And look, the Torah observing Christians out there
will try to enforce these Old Testament laws.
They would say, no corn dogs, no bacon, no sausage, no ham.
You know, someone that teaches this
is to your surprise, Joel Osteen.
I heard Joel Osteen get up and teach
that you should not eat bacon.
I was thinking, like, man, how does he still have a church after a message like that?
You know, that's crazy.
You know, but of course the Bible warns in 1 Timothy 4 that there are certain doctrines
of devils and one is commanding to abstain from meats.
And so, you know, that's not our doctrine.
We're Baptist.
We embrace the meats here.
And again, the meat, drinks, divers, washings, and cardinal ordinances were only imposed on them until the time of Reformation,
but Christ's being come, it's been done away.
So we don't have those things.
But, you know, all the other stuff is still there, folks.
All the other stuff is still loving.
All the other things in the Bible, you know, like Leviticus 2013, is still loving.
Like Deuteronomy 22, I mean, all the different laws and statutes about marriage and loving your spouse and being obedient
and not worshiping false gods and not eating blood and not committing fornication
and not getting marks printed on your body.
All that stuff is still in the Bible and it's still loving.
It's unloving to not do those things.
Now, it's also loving to offer some bacon to someone.
Okay, why that's loving my neighbor and it's loving the the Gentiles when we lived in the Old Testament
It would have been unloving to serve in someone that if you were a part of the nation of Israel
Because we're trying to follow God's commandments and it's it to me
I kind of liken it unto the idea of
When you're a kid you kind of have to follow mom and dad's rules
And there's some rules that are even age-specific.
You're not technically allowed to drive until you're 16.
I know there's exceptions with work visas and permits and all kinds of things.
You can get a hardship, but just generally speaking,
the law of the land is about until you're 16, can you drive?
Here's the thing, would it be wrong for you to drive at 15?
Yes.
Would it be wrong for you to drive at 17 with a license?
No.
You're fine to do that.
You have the license too.
Okay?
So if you think about it in the New Testament, Christ gave us a license in a sense to where
we can now eat the meats, drinks, divers, and washes.
We can do those things which in the time past were not lawful, but now they are lawful.
Doing drugs when you're 15 was wrong and doing drugs when you're 17 is wrong and doing drugs when you're 77 is wrong
Because you just shouldn't do those kind of things
You shouldn't go out you should be sober is what the Bible says and it's so silly how people today
When you try to show them Old Testament laws Old Testament scriptures and say hey you're in violation here
They'll be like oh you're trying to bring me under the law
No, I'm trying to show you how to love God and how to love your neighbor as yourself
I'm trying to show you how to be loving.
That's what I'm trying to show you.
And someone that's trying to tell me to not eat bacon
is hating me and teaching a doctrine of devils,
like Joel Osteen, shocker.
The one thing he's against, right?
He wouldn't preach against fornication or drinking,
but he'll preach against bacon.
Only a devil could teach something like that.
I'll tell you what.
Bible says in verse 41,
while the Pharisees were gathered together,
Jesus asked them, saying,
what thing ye of Christ, whose son is he?
They say unto him, the son of David, they say,
Thon to him, how then doth David in spirit call him Lord,
saying, the Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou on my right hand,
till I make thine enemies thy footstool.
If David then call him Lord, how is he his son?
And no man was able to answer him a word.
Neither durst any man from that day forth ask him any more questions.
Now, I really love this passage of Scripture
because a couple of things that proves about Jesus Christ
Number one is the pre-existence of Christ.
Now, we saw that in John chapter number eight
because before Abraham was, I am.
But not only we see the pre-existence of Christ,
we see the pre-existence of Christ in correlation
to the distinction of the father and son.
Because notice what it said in verse 44,
the Lord said unto my Lord.
Now, this is quoted from Psalm 110.
If you would go back there a little bit.
Psalm 110 is the quote.
But he's trying to say, hey, when David was on this earth,
the Holy Spirit came inside of him,
and he said, the Lord said unto my Lord.
Now who is David's Lord in the Old Testament?
It was Christ.
It was Jesus Christ.
So then who was the Lord speaking unto his Lord?
Or as the Bible says, the Lord said unto my Lord.
It's the Father speaking unto the Son.
So we have in the Old Testament,
before the incarnation of the Lord Jesus Christ,
the Father speaking to the Son.
And we have David calling Jesus Christ his Lord
because Jesus was already the Lord before the incarnation.
Christ didn't have to become the Lord.
Christ was the Lord, Christ is the Lord.
Christ has always been the Lord.
You don't have to make Him the Lord of your life either.
He's the Lord.
He was David's Lord.
Now what does it say in Psalm 110 verse 1?
The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool.
The Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion, rule thou in the midst of thine enemies.
Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power and the beauties of holiness.
From the womb of the morning thou hast the dew of thy youth.
The Lord hath sworn and will not repent, thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.
The Lord at thy right hand shall strike through kings in the day of his wrath.
he shall judge among the heathen, he shall fill the places with the dead bodies,
he shall wound the heads over many countries, he shall drink of the brook in the way,
therefore shall he lift up the head."
So the Bible is giving a prophecy of what it's going to be like when Jesus Christ is ruling.
When Jesus Christ is ruling, what's it going to be like?
Well, notice in verse 6, he shall judge among the even, he shall fill the places with the dead bodies.
He shall wound the heads over many countries, saying he's going to take out all the leadership
and he's going to rule with a rod of iron.
That's why I find it so preposterous to even suggest or hint at the idea
that Jesus was somehow ruling and reigning in the Old Testament in Israel prior to all of this.
Because the Bible is making it clear when Jesus Christ is ruling heads are gonna roll
That is going to be a time of peace, and it's so silly to even specifically put him over a land of the Canaanites in which all the Canaanites were the most wicked, evil, ungodly, abominable people worshipping false gods.
Can you imagine Jesus Christ ruling over a nation where everyone is worshipping false gods, false religion, sodomites galore?
No, the one time there were sodomites and he was on the earth, he didn't even get near.
He sent a couple angels to check it out.
And as soon as they got out, he just nuked it with fire.
That's what he was like.
He wasn't going to sit there and just let
sodomites do their thing, and people
that are committing incest and bestiality
and worshiping false God.
You think he's going to tolerate all that
in his physical presence?
I mean, that's absurd.
That is absurd.
When Jesus Christ comes to rule and reign,
heads are going to roll immediately.
He's gonna fill places with their dead bodies. This is what you can call the the battle of Armageddon at the battle of Armageddon
When Jesus Christ returns on a white horse before he even touches the ground
There's going to be a sword proceeding out of his mouth and it's going to destroy this
entire army.
And there's going to be a blood bath up to the horse bridles, just a giant blood bath.
And then I believe if you study the context of Ezekiel, it applies to where we're going
to be burying the bodies for seven months.
That's how many dead bodies.
There's going to be so many dead bodies at the very beginning of the millennial reign
of Christ that we're going to be burying bodies for seven months.
That's how many dead bodies are going to be there at this battle of Armageddon.
That's ushering in a time of peace.
And we don't even need weapons anymore because basically it's just a time of peace.
Christ is ruling and reigning.
And if you live in a country that doesn't worship him, they're not even going to get rain.
It's going to be a famine and a desert area.
And so that's just kind of what's being alluded to here.
But the Pharisees, they didn't know how to answer this question.
He says, hey, what think you of Christ? Who's son is he?
They're thinking of Christ as being an earthly person, and he's trying to help them realize,
no, Christ is a spiritual thing.
Christ is pre-existent to David because he's the Lord.
Their Christ is going to be a carnal, physical leader and ruler.
He's the Antichrist. That's the Christ that they want.
And it's a created being that's going to come in and he's going to clear himself, God.
And many Jews, I believe, are going to believe on the Antichrist, going to take his mark.
And they're going to hope to usher in all of these horrible things that we read in the Bible.
But by them ushering them in, it's going to be a fake, imposter version.
The Bible says in Ezekiel that people are going to get eventually the Father's name in their foreheads.
So where do you think that mark idea is coming from?
Look, the devil can't think of anything new.
The devil is his copycat, the devil is just going to do whatever God wants.
He's just trying to be like the most high.
He wants to be the guy sitting on the earth, ruling and reigning.
He wants people to have his name in their foreheads.
I mean, realize 666 is the number of his name.
He wants them to have their name.
Where do you think God's going to do that?
The devil just tries to imitate and copy everything that the devil does,
and you know his ministers are the same too, where they just try to copy.
You say, why do we have so many infiltrators in our church?
Because the devil is going to constantly send people in here to mimic and imitate us.
But you know what, since they don't have a wedding garment,
they'll be cast out and they'll be put in the lake of fire.
You know, I think if we just look at this as a big picture,
we just have to understand that when you serve Christ,
there's going to be a lot of opposition.
I mean, they didn't stop at one go.
They're trying to just get Christ and get Christ.
Here's another parable.
Here's another way to entangle them.
Here's another thing we want to say.
I mean, they're never going to give up.
And you have to understand, as long as you're in church
and as long as you're trying to serve God,
the enemies will not give up.
We will continually have infiltrators, bad actors, bad people.
The devil's going to bring all kinds of storms against you.
Hey, when the devil brought a bunch of storms against Job,
and it didn't work, he went back to God and said, hey, let me do more.
He said, hey, I took away his kids, I took away his money, didn't work, let me take his health now.
And you know, we should never allow the devil to stop us from serving God and getting out
of his will and doing what he has.
You know what?
I don't want to go to my farm.
I don't want to go to my merch and dice.
I just want to do what I can for the kingdom of God.
It goes in prayer.
Thank you, Heavenly Father, so much for this great story and for all of these different
lessons that you taught us in the Bible.
I pray that
We would not get distracted with the cares of this world and deceitfulness of riches.
I pray that we wouldn't just be looking for our farm and our merchandise.
I pray that we wouldn't be just looking for all the things that we can have,
but rather we would be making sure to make you a priority.
Pray that you would just bless us that you would keep us safe from all the enemies from all the attacks
I pray that you would strengthen us help us to have trust in you when the storms and the enemies come
And I pray that we would just keep doing all these great works in the honor and glory of your son
And since Jesus name we pray amen
All right in closing let's go to song number 255
Song number 255 come and dine