So just stay there in your Bibles, 1 Corinthians chapter 10.
Obviously I'm not going to preach the whole chapter. We're going to get to 1 Corinthians chapter 10 at some point on Sundays.
But I do want to take basically the title of the message from there and some thoughts from there as well as I preach through it.
But look at verse 14. Verse 14.
Wherefore, my dearly beloved, flee from idolatry.
Flee from idolatry is the title of the sermon tonight.
Flee from idolatry or sins that will get you kicked out of church, part 3.
Okay, part 3.
So if you guys remember the verse that I've been reading for every part of this series is 1 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 11.
But now I have written unto you not to keep company if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator.
That was part 1.
Or covetous. That was part 2.
Or an idolater. That's what we're going to be preaching on tonight.
Or a railer. Or a drunkard. Or an extortioner. With such and one known not to eat.
So obviously on Sunday I've recently preached on church discipline.
How I would carry out church discipline in this church and just going through some basic practices.
Just to be open with you guys. It's something that I want to be open and honest with you guys.
Again, I see many churches go through church discipline and hide the fact and create all kinds of rumours.
And then it's not consistent and then people get upset because they think this person got kicked out or this person didn't. What's the reason for that?
Obviously when you're open and honest and you explain the facts people understand that further.
But flee from idolatry. Flee from idolatry.
Now the first thing you might want to ask, turn to the book of Exodus.
Turn to the book of Exodus. You can leave a finger in 1 Corinthians 10 if you want.
We're going to go there a little bit. But Exodus 20.
And if you know what Exodus 20 is, it's the Ten Commandments.
And I just want to read the first couple of commandments that are there.
Because the first question that might be asked is, what is idolatry?
What is idolatry? What is it to be an idolater? What does it mean?
So let's look at Exodus 20. Exodus 20 verse 1.
And God spake all these words saying, I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
Thou shall have no other gods before me. That's commandment number 1.
The Lord says, I am your God. I'm the one that delivered you out of Egypt.
And I'm the God you ought to worship. You should have no other gods before me. Right? That's commandment number 1.
And then look at commandment number 2.
Thou shall not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
Now notice that it's got a colon after that. So the thought hasn't finished. The sentence is not over.
Is God saying to us that we can't create a graven image?
Is he saying that we just can't create any image of anything?
Nothing in heaven, nothing on the earth, nothing under the earth, nothing in the waters.
Think about how many people have little ornaments in their house.
How many Christians you see driving their cars and they've got little fish to say we're a Christian.
Is God saying we can't do any images? No. He's not saying that because the thought continues.
In verse number 5.
Thou shall not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them, for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God,
visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.
Of them that hate me.
If you're someone that has ornaments and idols and graven images and statues and you bow down and worship that,
God says you hate him. You hate the Lord God. That is another God.
Commandment number 1 was he is our God. Praise God that we have the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,
the God that delivered Israel out of Egypt. That's our God that we serve.
But then he says don't have any other gods before me.
That is idolatry. That is putting your hope and trust, your worship and your love towards something else
other than the Lord God of the Bible.
Now, you might say to me, well, this passage doesn't mention idols.
Okay, now turn to Leviticus. So just turn to the right to the next book in Leviticus.
Because it doesn't mention idols, right?
So we just want to make sure that we're talking about, definitely talking about the same thing here.
Leviticus chapter 19. Leviticus chapter 19.
And today's going to be a bit of a Bible study. We're going to go through a lot of chapters and just read bits and pieces here.
But Leviticus chapter 19 verse 4 is the first mention of the word idols or idolatry or any of those forms in the Bible.
It's the first mention. Now notice what it says in verse number 4. Leviticus 19 verse number 4.
Turn ye not unto idols, nor make yourselves molten gods. I am the Lord your God.
So you can see it's kind of similar to the Ten Commandments, right? It's a little bit reversed.
He says, I am the Lord your God. He says it afterwards.
But because I'm your Lord, you're not to make of yourselves any idols, any molten gods. You see that?
Okay, so God reinforces that they are not to worship idols, not to worship graven images,
because he is their Lord God, very similar to the first and second commandments that we saw just earlier in the book of Exodus.
But now while you're in Leviticus, turn to Leviticus chapter 26. Leviticus chapter 26.
And this is the next mention. This is the second mention of idols. Leviticus 26. Leviticus 26 verse 1.
Because now I want to show you the similarity with the Ten Commandments where it talked about the graven image.
Remember that in the Ten Commandments? It talked about the graven images.
Now look at Leviticus chapter 26 verse 1. You shall make you no idols, nor graven image.
So do you see that the graven image and the idols are the one and the same?
It's an object that you create that depicts something in heaven, depicts something on earth, depicts something in the waters.
And it can even depict God, because he says even things that are in heaven.
You shall make you no idols, nor graven image, neither rear you up a standing image,
neither shall you set up any image of stone in your land to bow down unto it, for I am the Lord your God.
Again, the same message consistently in the Bible. From Exodus to Leviticus, I am the Lord your God.
So you are not to have any idols, not to have any graven images that you bow down and worship and love and adore.
That's idolatry. Now here's the thing.
Every major religion, believe it or not, every major religion besides biblical Christianity has their idols.
Worships idols. Bows down and worships some image or something that they've built and constructed.
In Buddhism, for example, statues of Buddha. You've seen them all over the place.
Especially around here in Caloundra. I'll explain that a bit later on, but I've never seen so many statues of Buddha.
I've never seen that many in Sydney, honestly. But anyway, I'll get into that later on.
But how many statues of Buddha do you see?
And you know there's all different types of Buddhas. Sometimes they're really chubby and laughing.
Sometimes they're skinny and serious.
And all those different statues are supposed to give them a different spiritual aura or environment or something.
Or some type of protection or something like that.
In Hinduism, what's Hinduism got? It's got thousands of gods, but probably the two most common that I'm familiar with is the god Ganesha.
It's the elephant one. It's where the elephant's kind of like doing this and it's got the big ears or whatever.
I don't know if you've seen that. I've seen that. I've seen that around here as well.
And the other god they've got is that woman with many arms. Have you seen that woman's got multiple arms?
That god's name is Durga.
But they've got thousands of gods. They're the two most common ones that I sort of see around Australia. That's Hinduism.
What's Islam got? Now Islam says they're against idols and statues. That's what they say.
But yet what do they do? They've got a large cubed building, the Kaaba, where they pray, they bow down.
Did God say we ought to bow down to things besides him? No.
They're bowing down, aren't they? Toward Mecca, toward the Kaaba in Saudi Arabia.
So they're worshipping this construction.
I know it's not an image of a person, but they're still bowing down to something they've erected that is not the Lord God of the Bible.
What's Judaism got? They've got the Wailing Wall. It's very similar to Islam.
They've got the Wailing Wall. They're bowing to the wall, aren't they? They're praying to the wall.
They're putting their little prayers in their little holes on that wall.
Because they think it's got something to do with the Temple of Jerusalem.
And yet what did Jesus say? That not one stone would be left upon another. That's not even the right thing.
I read somewhere that it's a wall of a barracks. A Roman barracks, I think it was.
Don't quote me on that. Look it up. But it had nothing to do with the Temple.
And then obviously, what do we have? One of the largest religions. Roman Catholicism.
Pretending to be Christianity. Roman Catholicism.
That religion, I think out of all of them, probably has the most idols.
You go to one of those Roman Catholic churches. All their churches, all their buildings are decorated with idols and images and the stained glass windows and the paintings.
And then if you go to the devout Roman Catholic's house, they've got a huge statue of Mary, the Queen of Heaven they call her, or other saints that they pray to and worship.
And that's Roman Catholicism. All the major religions in this world worship idols, worship false gods, rather than the true God of the Bible.
God was very clear, was he not, of what idolatry was in the verses that we read?
About not making any graven images or anything that you bow down to because he is the Lord God of the Bible.
He is the Lord that's deserving of worship because he says he's a jealous God. A jealous God.
Do you want to drive God to jealousy? Have you ever been driven to jealousy yourself and gotten so angry?
And yet, do you want God's anger upon you with his jealousy, his righteous wrath and his righteous jealousy?
Of course not. If we're his people, we're to keep ourselves for the Lord God.
Now you might say, well yeah, Kevin, you know, we're all, you know, Bible-believing Christians. We don't have any idols.
Well, we'll see. We'll see if we don't have any idols. I hope not. You know, you probably don't. You probably don't. Hope not.
But let's turn to the book of Numbers. You're still in the Old Testament. Turn to the book of Numbers. Numbers 21.
Because I want to show you that it's not just the false religions that have idolatry. It's not just them.
This can happen to God's people. Idolatry can happen to God's people. People can have idols that were once something that God wanted in your life.
And yet you can still turn that to idolatry. Numbers 21. Numbers 21.
And we did sing that hymn today, Look and Live, right? And this is where the story comes from.
Numbers 21 verse 4.
You know, many times the Israelites just speak against God, speak against Moses, they're in the wilderness, they get hungry or whatever.
Something happens and they get discouraged, they get upset, they blame Moses, they blame God.
So verse number 5.
And the people speak against God and against Moses.
That's the God we worship. He would allow this nation that is brought out of Egypt to die.
Because they've spoken against him. So these serpents, God allows these serpents to come and attack the people.
We had one of those red-bellied black snakes in our backyard not that long ago.
But you know, with snakes, you tend to make a bit of noise and they run away.
They're kind of scared of you, right? Unless you go and provoke them, unless you go and step on them, they'll probably attack.
But generally speaking, snakes are scared of people. Not these snakes.
God made it that these snakes would go into the camp and bite the people and much of the people died.
Verse number 7.
And Moses made a serpent of brass and put it upon a pole and it came to pass that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived.
So if you had the venom of the serpent, you would die from the poison, from the venom.
If you looked upon that brazen serpent, just looked upon it in faith, you would live. You would be healed, right? That's what we see.
Now did God instruct Moses to build this image of a serpent? Yeah, he did, right?
God instructed Moses to do that and Moses did that.
And that's very important because what did we talk about not that long ago about the types that we have in the Old Testament, types of Christ?
This is a type of Christ. The serpent actually represents Jesus Christ.
And I'll just read to you from John chapter 3 verse 14.
So that was a type of Christ, that serpent. And sometimes people say, well how? How does a serpent represent Christ?
Well, when the serpent came in and bit the Israelites, that represented sin. They had been bitten by the serpent, right? That represented sin.
And so when Christ was crucified on the cross, he took all our sins upon himself. He became sin, the Bible says.
And so that was the picture of the serpent on the pole. That was Jesus Christ.
He had become sin for us and the Lord, God our Father rejected the Son because he cannot have sin in his sight.
He cannot have sin in his presence and that's when Jesus Christ died for us.
So you see this brazen serpent is a positive thing, right? It's supposed to help the Israelites understand future prophecy.
It's to help them understand future principle. Hey, by faith I can live. By faith I can be healed upon Jesus Christ to come in the future.
Now, turn to 2 Kings. 2 Kings chapter 18. I want you to look at all these verses. I'm not going to read them all out to you tonight.
2 Kings chapter 18. Because many, many hundreds of years later, we're going to find something really disturbing.
Many hundreds of years later. 2 Kings chapter 18 verse 1.
Now it came to pass in the third year of Hosea, son of Elah, king of Israel, that Hezekiah, the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign.
So with all those names, just so you don't get confused, it's all about Hezekiah. He's about to reign in Judah.
If you remember, Israel had been divided into the northern kingdom and into the southern kingdom.
The southern kingdom was called Judah. The northern kingdom was called Israel.
And Hezekiah was to come to reign. It was his turn to reign in Judah.
And then verse number 2. 20 and 5 years old was he when he began to reign.
And he reigned 29 years in Jerusalem. His mother's name also was Abi, the daughter of Zechariah.
But I just want you to notice that he's the son of Ahaz.
And you can read about Ahaz in chapter 16 later on if you want at home, just for a bit more information.
But his father was a wicked man. His father was a wicked king of Judah.
I mean, praise God that his son was good.
And I think it has to do with his mother. Because his mother's name here is mentioned.
His mother's name also was Abi.
You know these kings, their mother's names aren't mentioned all that often.
And I think it's significant that she's mentioned because she raised a good son.
She raised a godly king, even though his father had turned to idolatry.
His father had brought worship of false gods into Israel.
Now look at what verse number 3 says.
And he, that's Hezekiah, and he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord,
according to all that David, his father, did.
So the Lord's saying, hey, his spiritual father in a sense is King David.
Because King David did what was right in the sight of the Lord, right?
You know, the Lord doesn't see Ahaz really as his spiritual father because he was a lost man.
He was a wicked lost man.
And then look at verse number 4.
He removed the high places.
He break the images and cut down the groves and break in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made.
Well hold on, why is he breaking the serpent?
The serpent that, you know, you looked at it and you lived when they were bitten by the serpent.
That was a positive thing.
That was something that the Lord God had instructed Moses to build.
This was an important relic, was it not?
This had a lot of historical significance.
But why did he break it?
For unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it and he caught it in their hushed hand.
So the Israelites took that brazen serpent image and turned it into an idol.
They prayed, they worshipped, they burnt incense to that image.
And this godly king that the Lord exalts in the Bible took it down and broke it.
Because you can see even things that are godly, even things that are righteous can be taken and made into gods.
And we need to be careful of that.
I know you're not going to fall for the elephant god or the queen of heaven Mary.
But you can turn other things into idols in your life.
Now, let me give you some other idols that I've been thinking about here on the Sunshine Coast as I was preaching this sermon.
Now, in the past a lot of people had gnomes in their gardens.
Do you know what I'm talking about?
Those gnomes?
What's that?
There's a children's cartoon where it's got like...
Or are they elves?
I don't know, anyway it doesn't matter.
But gnomes, they've got gnomes in their garden.
A lot of people use gnomes to decorate their garden.
And I wanted to look up, what are the gnomes, what are they all about?
And I went to a website about gnome history and this is what I read.
It said, small gnome statues began appearing in Europe in the early 1600s.
But the garden or lone gnomes, as we know them, appeared in Germany in the mid to late 1800s.
The gnome was used because local myths suggested that underground gnomes came alive at night to work in the garden and protect the gardens from evil sorcery.
So that's why they use gnomes, to protect the garden from evil sorcery, like a lucky charm, to protect them from evil spirits or evil powers.
Now, you might think, gnomes, they're not an idol.
Yeah, but what are they trusting in?
These people that brought gnomes into their gardens to repel the evil sorcery, what are they trusting in for their protection?
Are they trusting in the Lord God of the Bible or are they putting their trust in an image?
You know, it's a little old man or something, right?
An image and trusting that will protect them.
Okay, I know they're not bowing down to them, I know they're not burning incense to them, but who are they trusting for their protection?
Who are they trusting for the security?
Not the Lord God of the Bible, they're trusting in the gnomes.
And you say, Kevin, why do you bring up the gnomes? Where does that come from?
Well, I mentioned the Buddhist statues, okay?
Because something I've noticed up here on the Sunshine Coast, and look, when I would knock on the door in Sydney and I'd see a Buddhist statue,
it was a good bet that the person I was knocking on the door was a Buddhist, right?
And when I started knocking doors here, I'd see a Buddhist statue and I'm thinking, okay, I'm talking to a Buddhist.
And then some Aussie bloke, you know, not interested in Buddhism at all.
Because what's happened, I don't know if you've noticed this, the gnomes have been replaced by these Buddhist statues.
They're in the gardens, they're in front of the doorway, alright?
And so I looked up these Buddhist statues, why do people put this in their gardens and in their house?
I looked up two sites on these statues.
I'll read both of them a little bit to you here.
It says, it is believed in the Buddhist world that chanting or praying in front of the Buddhist statue gives one some sort of inner satisfaction,
which in turn gives peace to the mind, heart and soul.
So these are idols.
Now the Buddhist will say to you, no, we don't worship.
We don't worship the statue.
Yeah, but you pray toward it, right?
And you're seeking some sort of spiritual awakening or some sort of spiritual protection.
And I'll show you in a minute, when you pray toward this statue.
And another website that I looked at says, these statues are taken as the symbolic representation of the bringer of good luck.
Good luck, it's a lucky charm.
Again, who are they trusting?
Are they trusting that the Lord God of the Bible will protect them and keep them secure and give them joy?
No, they're trusting in this good luck, this bringer of good luck, this statue of Buddha.
Not just good luck, but prosperity, happiness and compassion.
This is why Buddha statues are a common sight in many places like restaurants, offices, homes, hotels and other public locations in many Buddhist regions in the world.
So, yeah, you know, you may not have, you know, the elephant and praying toward Mecca,
but is it possible that Christians have statues of Buddha in their lawns or gnomes and stuff like that?
Probably. In fact, I know there are, because I've knocked doors of people that were saved and they had funny looking idols, even Hindu idols on their wall.
And I'm sure they're thinking it's just protection.
But why would you take a god of a false religion, I know, like they think it's just protect, sorry, not protection, it's decoration.
Oh, I'm just making the place nice, I'm just making the garden nice.
Why would you take the false gods of the world that God despises, people that make these things God says hate him, and you bring that into your house as a Christian.
I know you're not worshipping them, but why would you take these statues and put them in your garden and in your house?
I mean, obviously, if you have that, get rid of them, destroy them.
And you know what? It's not just these idols.
I mean, some people have lucky charms.
They feel like these charms, this thing's going to protect me, I've got to always have it with me.
What about the horoscopes? People in horoscopes.
They come and they read about your star sign, and I've had people come and try to show me in my workplace,
hey, you know, Kevin, what are you, what sign are you, and I'm like, I don't care.
And they're like, oh, and then they figure it out because they know it's my birthday.
And then they're reading out to me, oh, this is going to happen to you. I'm not interested.
This is what's going to happen to you, right?
You know, this is going, hey, that's an idol.
Because again, you're putting your hope and your trust upon this that it's not God.
I know you're not bound to it, I know you're not burning incense to it, but it is replacing the Lord God of the Bible.
Because again, your admiration, your adoration, your love, and your trust is in these things.
Make sure that you're not a Christian that has things like lucky charms and superstitious about if I do this, this is going to happen.
Hey, the Lord God ought to be your God.
And you pray to him, and you serve him, and you take the promises of the Bible,
and you don't take these make-believe false gods and trust in that.
Because that is idolatry.
Flee idolatry, the Bible says, and I'll cover that a bit later.
But the question that comes up is, can an idol harm me, right?
As a Christian, can an idol harm me?
Because sometimes I'm walking to someone's house, and I've been surprised sometimes.
I've walked to someone's house, I just remember, I think it was just a couple of weeks ago,
and there was this huge statue of the Mother of God, the Roman Catholic Mary, the Queen of Heaven.
It's huge, I think it's as tall as me or even taller.
I'm walking past and I see this thing and I'm kind of shocked.
But can they harm you?
No, I'll just read to you from the Psalms.
Psalms 135, I'll just read it to you, verse 15.
Psalms 135, verse 15.
The Bible says,
The idols of the heathen are silver and gold, the work of men's hands.
They have mouths, but they speak not.
Eyes they have, but they see not.
They have ears, but they hear not.
Neither is there any breath in their mouths.
So, is an idol, like, alive?
It doesn't have power, can it see, can it hear, can it do anything to you?
No.
An object like that cannot have any power over you.
Especially if you're a believer.
Especially if you've got the Holy Spirit indwelling in you, you have the power of God in you.
Of course, a piece of wood, a piece of clay is not going to be able to harm you, of course.
So don't worry about it.
If you see a huge idol when you go sewing or something, just knock the door.
It's not like you're going to get attacked by the idol.
But, let me say this.
But, even though the idol in of itself is harmless to a believer, okay?
And I'll show you this, actually turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 10.
Even though an idol is harmless to a believer, the worship, the love, the hope, the trust that people have in these idols is actually going toward a devil.
It's true, toward a devil.
I'm not saying that the idol in of itself is a devil.
It is a false god, okay?
But I'm saying there are real spiritual forces of darkness that receive the worship that is given toward an idol.
Okay?
Now, we had a look at that when we read the passage.
So 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 19.
Paul says,
What say I them? That the idol is anything, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is anything?
So he's saying, look, it's nothing important.
The idol itself is insignificant.
It's not anything, right?
It doesn't have anything in of itself that's harmful.
But verse 20,
But I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils and not to God.
And I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils.
So the worship, the sacrifice toward these idols, guess what?
It's toward a devil. It's toward devils.
Okay?
So while the, again, let me reinforce.
The idol in of itself is nothing.
But the worship is being received by a devil.
Okay?
Now, I'm going to share with you a story.
And you might think that you've walked into a Pentecostal church after I've given you this story.
Even though it's a Baptist church.
But, um,
Shortly after Christina got saved, we're still, we're not married yet.
So I gave her the gospel.
She got saved.
Shortly after she got saved, and I actually told Jason this story.
It may have been from my memory about a week or two later.
Okay?
So she believed, she was a Roman Catholic.
And her family was, you know, very much into the Roman Catholic.
They wouldn't just go to the church, but to special, I don't know, worship of, especially the Portuguese, Lady of Fatima.
That's what they call Mary in Portugal.
Like, all these nations in the world have kind of like a version of Mary that is just for their country, right?
And it's a Lady of Fatima for the Portuguese people.
And so, you know, she'd appeared to these children.
Anyway.
So she had, Christina, the family was really religious, really into their stuff, really superstitious.
They had countless items.
Heaps of idols, heaps of images.
Not just images and stuff.
Statues, pictures.
Pictures of saints.
So not just Jesus Christ, but saints.
Christina had one picture of Jesus.
Like, with all the things that she had, she only had one picture of Jesus.
She had a statue of Mary, or maybe multiple statues of Mary.
She had rosary beads, you know what they are?
These kind of beads that they use to pray.
They're vain repetition, empty repetition.
And this thing called scapulas, I'm not sure if you know what that is.
Scapulas, which is this thread.
And I'm going to best describe it. You can ask Christina what it is if you want more information.
But it's a thread with two pictures of saints.
One on one side, one on the other side.
And you put it over you.
And one of the pictures of the saints would be in front of you.
One of the pictures would be behind you.
And that's your protection. That's your lucky charm.
To protect you from the devil or evil spirits or whatever.
She had all these things.
But after she got saved, obviously she was convicted about how evil these things were.
And I was telling her, yeah, you've got to get rid of them.
And there was another guy that was helping her as well.
And he was like, nah, you can keep the pictures. There's nothing wrong with pictures.
And obviously, Christina made a decision.
And I remember this very clearly because I don't remember if I was actually on the phone with Christina.
If I was just talking to her over the internet.
I don't remember. But we were just chatting as per normal.
And then she went quiet.
She went quiet for a few minutes.
So, she went quiet for a few minutes.
And then, Christian, can you give me some water?
She went quiet for a few minutes.
And then she got back on and said, you won't believe what just happened.
You won't believe what just happened to me.
And I'm like, what happened?
So, when she went quiet, what happened was, first of all, not only did she get rid of all her idols and her statues and all that stuff.
She was also getting rid of all her music.
She had all this R&B collection.
And she was trying to be more godly.
But the thing is, she had all the heel song.
All the Pentecostal music going on instead of good old-fashioned hymns.
But anyway, she was trying.
And then she said she heard this loud rumble.
This loud rumble.
And she didn't know what it was.
She turned off the music.
And then she could still hear the rumble. She thought it was the stereo.
Turned it off.
And then she noticed that it was coming from her door.
This violent sound, this violent rumble coming from her door.
And this was like a day or two after removing the idols, as best as I recall.
This was many years ago.
And then when she looked at her door, Christina tells me that it was defying the laws of physics.
The door was bending and waving.
I mean, this is a solid wooden door.
And it was bending and waving like water, like waves or something.
And it was shaking violently.
And Christina at that point freaked out.
Like, she froze.
Have you ever been so scared you just freeze?
Like, what do I do?
That's what happened to Christina. She just froze.
And was just freaked out about what was going on.
And then she was like, dear Jesus, please help me.
And as soon as she said the name of Jesus Christ, it stopped.
And that's when she came on and said, you won't believe what just happened.
And after that happened, she opened the door and her mum and brother were on the other side.
Like, in the living room or whatever.
And she asked, did you guys hear that? Were you guys moving my door?
And they were like, no, what are you talking about?
But here's what I think what happened.
I think Satan had a stronghold in that household because of how much they worshipped and loved the idols.
And this was like one last push, one last battle.
And I think the devil was trying to scare Christina into going, hey, so you got rid of these idols and now look what's happening to you.
Like, bring them back.
You need these idols to protect you from the evil.
And yet that was where the evil spirits were coming from.
This is a Baptist church, just in case you're wondering.
No, but that's a true story.
You can check it out with Christina if you want.
I just bring that up just to show you that the worship and the love and the hope and the trust that you can have in idolatry is actually being sent to a devil and not to the Lord God.
Turn to what we've made to 1 Samuel 15.
1 Samuel 15.
Because something's come up also just yesterday.
A friend of mine sent me this link probably a week or two ago, but I only got to watch it yesterday.
Something's come to my attention recently and I was thinking about this sermon on idolatry and I came across this passage and I thought, hey, this is fitting.
This is fitting to what we're teaching because, again, I know you guys aren't going to be worshipping some saint or some elephant or anything like that.
But look at 1 Samuel 15 verse 1.
So again, this is a time when King Saul was just getting worse and worse and God was getting angry with King Saul.
He kept failing the Lord and this is when God just had enough of King Saul.
So let's look at verse number 1.
1 Samuel 15 verse 1.
And Samuel, so Samuel's a prophet, he's a priest as well.
Samuel also said unto Saul, the Lord sent me to anoint thee to be king over his people, over Israel.
Now therefore hearken thou unto the voice of the words of the Lord.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I remember that which Amalek did to Israel, how he laid weight for him in the way when he came up from Egypt.
Now go and smite Amalek and utterly destroy all that they have and spare them not, but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.
So the Lord says to Samuel, to say to Saul, you need to go to the Amalekites and wipe them out. Destroy them.
Kill every man, every woman, every child, every creature, ox, sheep, just destroy it.
Lay waste to it. It's time to go up. My judgment has come upon the Amalekites.
It's time for you to totally, is there any question of what the Lord commanded King Saul in this passage?
No, he says wipe them all out. Let's go down to verse number 8.
Verse number 8. And he took Agag, so after Saul goes and attacks the Amalekites, he took Agag, the king of the Amalekites, alive.
Was he meant to keep anybody alive? No, he was meant to wipe them out.
But yet he keeps the king of the Amalekites alive and absolutely destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword.
So Saul's thinking, yeah, you know what, I'm obeying the Lord, I'm wiping them all out, but I'm going to keep the king alive.
Verse 9. But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and of the lambs, and all that was good, and would not absolutely destroy them.
So the armies and King Saul, so wow, you know what, they've got good cattle, they've got good sheep, they've got good lambs and oxen.
Hey, let's just kill the bad ones, let's just kill the ones that aren't good, and let's just keep for ourselves the ones that are good, the ones that are going to be productive for us.
But everything that was vile and refused, that they destroyed utterly.
Verse 10. Then came the word of the Lord unto Samuel, saying, It repented me that I have set up Saul to be king, for he has turned back from following me, and have not performed my commandments.
And it grieved Samuel, and he cried unto the Lord all night.
And when Samuel rose early to meet Saul in the morning, it was told Samuel, saying, Saul came to Carmel, and behold he set him up a place, and is gone about and passed on and gone down to Gilgal.
And Samuel came to Saul, and Saul said unto him, Blessed be thou of the Lord, I have performed the commandment of the Lord.
So Saul said, I have obeyed the Lord, I have kept his commandments.
That's what Saul thinks.
And Samuel said, What meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ease, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?
And Saul said, They have brought them from the Amalekites, for the people spared the best of the sheep and of the oxen.
Why? Why did they spare them?
To sacrifice unto the Lord thy God, and the rest we have utterly destroyed.
So he says, Look, I'm just trying to serve the Lord.
I'm just keeping these so we can sacrifice them to the Lord, we can serve him and worship him.
But he disobeyed the Lord. He disobeyed him.
Then Samuel said unto Saul, Stay, and I will tell thee what the Lord hath said to me this night.
And he said unto him, Say on.
And Samuel said, When thou wast little in thine own sight, was thou not made the head of the tribes of Israel?
And the Lord anointed thee king over Israel.
And the Lord sent thee on a journey, and said, Go, and utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites, and fight against them, until they be consumed.
Wherefore then didst thou not obey the voice of the Lord, but didst fly upon the spoil, and didst evil in the sight of the Lord?
And Saul said unto Samuel, Yea, I have obeyed the voice of the Lord, and have gone the way of the Lord, which the Lord sent me,
and have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites.
But the people took the spoil, sheep and oxen, the chief of the things which should have been utterly destroyed,
to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God in Gilgal. Hey, it's for your God, Samuel. This is why we've done it.
Verse 22, And Samuel said, Have the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord?
Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken them the fat of rams.
What is better, for you to try to serve the Lord the way you want to, or to just obey him?
What is better? What pleases the Lord? Samuel says, Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice.
And yet, Saul, he wanted to sacrifice to the Lord in his own way, in disobedience to the Lord, doing his own thing.
But look at verse 23, and this is what I want to draw your attention to.
For rebellion, so he had rebelled against God, for rebellion is as a sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry.
The stubbornness of Saul is being compared here to idolatry.
Because thou, why is it idolatry? Pay attention now. Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord.
He rejected the word of the Lord. He hath also rejected thee from being king.
Rejected thee from being king. That was it. God had enough of Saul. That was going to be the end of him being a king.
God's going to deal with it, and he's going to raise up another man, as we know was King David, later on to be the king of Israel.
But I want you to understand, what is idolatry here? He was stubborn. It's compared to idolatry. Why? Because he rejected the word of the Lord.
Can you believe that? Rejecting the word of the Lord is idolatry.
Now, the reason I bring this up, just to bring it full circle, is because a friend of mine a couple of weeks ago sent me a video link, and I just thought he just wanted me to respond to it.
I didn't realize what it was, but I started watching it yesterday, and it's about a new English translation.
A new English translation of the Bible. It's called the Pure Word Translation.
The Pure Word Translation. I'm calling it the Putrid Word Translation. The Putrid Word Translation.
Now, I went to their website. I'm going to read to you a little blurb on their website. It says this.
With more than 20 years of research, led by Dr. Harry Miller and Brent Miller.
So Dr. Harry Miller is this main guy that's leading it. Here's the guy on the video that I watched as well.
To develop more accurate processes for English translation, the Pure Word now offers the world's first and only hermeneutics-based monadic Greek to English translation that can save scholars, pastors, and Bible students from the countless hours needed to re-translate the original Greek meaning of all 27 books of the New Testament.
As a result, the Pure Word is not intended to replace your preferred version of the Bible, but rather to be used alongside it by anyone wanting to dive deeper into the New Testament Scriptures.
So if you want to study the Scriptures, you want to get deeper into the Scriptures, they're saying this is the Bible for you. This Pure Word Translation.
We're not trying to get rid of your other Bibles, but you can read it alongside it. So when you get stuck, you don't know what this means, you can read the Pure Translation, and that can enlighten your understanding.
Now, first of all, I watched this video, and remember when I preached about the King James Bible, and I said to you how all these modern Bibles, they always go back to the King James Bible and say,
Well, you know the King James Bible was good for some period of time, but now we've got this translation. This translation is for this new generation, for this English.
They never compare themselves to one another. They never say, Well, the NIV has done its time, and now it's time for a new Bible. They never say, Oh, the New King James Bible served us well, now we need something else.
They always go back to the standard, the true standard that they know, which is the King James Bible, and that's exactly what they did in this video.
And this video came out just this year, 2018. So even in 2018, when they created new modern English Bibles, which we already have hundreds of, they're still going back,
and in the video they're saying, Well, you know, the King James Bible was good for this, it's very poetic, but it doesn't really grab the meaning, they were saying.
It doesn't grab the meaning of the word, and that's why they needed this new translation.
Now, I'm going to show you just how bad this translation is, and I'll tell you why I'm tying this in.
Because they rejected the word of the Lord. They're trying to do something they think is godly. They're trying to do something they think is righteous.
They think, Hey, this is going to help countless Christians to know the Bible better, like King Saul.
This is going to help, we're going to have all these oxen, these great sheep, and it's going to be great for sacrifice.
But they disobeyed the Lord. And what they've done, this is such a perversion, it's on sale now this year, it's come out recently, such a perversion.
I mean, talk about, you know, we look at modern versions, and we know how some versions have removed passages, have added words and all that.
Now, this is something else, and I'm going to compare to you John 3.16 here, okay? John 3.16.
Now, the King James Bible, you guys know it.
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him, says faith on Christ,
whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
How do we receive everlasting life? By believing on the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is a beautiful verse. How many people have been saved just understanding that one verse? Okay, think about it.
And then let me read to you John 3.16 from the Pure Word.
I need some water before I read this.
In this example, I'm sorry, sorry, no, no, I'm sorry, I'm rethinking.
Alright, the Pure Word, John 3.16.
Because God has loved in such a manner the Satan's world, so that He gave His Son, the only begotten risen Christ,
in order that whoever is continuously, by his choice, committing for the results and purpose of him,
should not perish, but definitely should, by his choice, be continuously having eternal life.
Do you guys want to memorize that verse this Sunday?
John 3.16 from the Pure Word translation.
I mean, I don't know if you heard what I just read there.
First of all, first of all, because God has loved in such a manner,
I don't know, by the way, they destroyed all the laws of grammar for this translation.
On purpose.
But God has loved in such a manner the Satan's world.
Does God love Satan's world?
Is that what He loved when we talk about John 3.16?
Of course not.
He doesn't love the kingdom and this world of Satan.
He loves the people of this world.
He came and died for the people in this world, not for Satan's world.
He came for the souls that are lost.
He doesn't love Satan.
What wickedness.
So that He gave His Son, the only begotten risen Christ, in order...
This is the bit where we say that whosoever believeth in Him.
Alright? Believe. Easy.
You trust in Him, you put your faith, full faith, and trust on Christ alone.
In order that whoever is continuously by his choice...
So you've got to choose to continually commit for the results and purpose of Him.
And when I watched this video, he was explaining this verse.
He goes, you've got to commit, you've got to live for Him, and you've got to die for Christ.
That's what believing means.
Because we're so stupid as English speakers.
We don't understand what God meant when we got believe.
It was about continuously striving to live for the Lord and die for the Lord.
That's what believeth means actually in this pure word apparently.
Should not perish.
But definitely should, by His choice, be continuously having eternal life.
So if you do that, if you continue to live for the Lord, then you are choosing also to continuously have eternal life.
Meaning that if you choose, you know what, Lord, today I'm going to live for myself, that you've lost eternal life.
That's what it means.
If you decide to just live for yourself, go and commit sin, stop being faithful to the Lord, you know,
when we fail and we sin, that's what we do basically, then you've lost your salvation.
It's something you need to continuously strive for.
I mean, it's turned John 3.16 on its head.
Instead of Jesus Christ coming and living for us, living a righteous life, instead of Christ coming to die for us,
no, you've got to live and die for Christ.
That's what he's teaching.
And then look, and then it says this, and this is on their website.
In this example, in this example of John 3.16, both the King James Version and the Pure Word present similar messages.
Oh yeah, really similar.
Total and opposite messages regarding the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ.
However, the original Koine Greek to English translation found in the Pure Word provides more original depth
regarding the meaning of believer in Greek.
That was condensed by the scholars who translated the 1611 King James.
These guys have rejected the Word of God.
This man, what's his name?
Dr. Harry Miller has had his name removed from the Book of Life.
I mean, this is not just messing up a translation.
How much has he added?
And he's destroyed the Gospel.
Do you see what the purpose is for this new translation?
Destroy the Gospel, destroy the crystal clear Gospel, and bring a workspace Gospel,
and other Gospel, a Gospel that will damn souls.
This is a damnable heresy, and this man has lost any chance for him to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.
His name has been removed from the Book of Life, and he's going to split hell wide open when he gets there.
That's his end.
Revelation 22 verse 18.
For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book,
if any man shall add unto these things.
How much did we see added in that one verse?
If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book.
And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy,
they took away beliefs, now it's works, now it's strive and live for him,
God shall take away his power out of the Book of Life and out of the Holy City,
and from the things which are written in this book.
That's a sin of rebellion. That is idolatry.
And so hey, it's not just worshipping idols, not just having these trinkets and lucky charms and things like that.
If anyone comes to this church trying to change our Bible,
trying to say hey, this version is much better than your old King James Bible,
and trying to change our minds about that, that is idolatry,
and that's going to get you kicked out of church as well.
Okay? That's going to get you kicked out of church as well.
Let me end with this. 1 John 5 verse 20.
And we know that the Son of God is come and have given us an understanding,
that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true,
even in his Son, Jesus Christ.
This is the true God and eternal life.
But then he says this.
Little children, keep yourself from idols. Amen.
Keep yourselves from idols. Amen.
So this is the same teaching that we saw in the Old Testament.
Who's our Lord God? Jesus.