Now, Psalm 11, verse 1, the Bible reads,
And the Lord put I my trust.
How say ye to my soul,
Flee as a bird to your mountains?
For although it can bend their bow,
They make ready their arrow upon the string,
They may privily shoot at the upright in heart.
So here David is talking about the fact that
if you're a Christian, if you're upright in heart,
is the way he describes it at the end of verse 2,
if you're a righteous person, if you're serving God,
if you're doing what you're supposed to be doing,
the Bible says that the wicked are bending their bow,
that they may privily shoot at the upright in heart.
They are just ready to shoot you down.
I mean, they are just looking for that chink in the armor
to destroy you.
There are people that are going to be out to get you.
Say, oh, you're paranoid.
Well, the Bible says they are out to get you here,
that they've already got the arrow ready,
they've already got to pull, you know, just picture this.
Somebody's got the arrow already pulled back,
just pointing at you, just watching,
just waiting all the time.
And that's why the Bible says to put on the whole armor of God.
And one of the pieces of that armor, he said,
above all, taking the shield of faith,
wherewith we shall be able to quench
all the fiery darts of the wicked.
You know, a dart is similar to an arrow.
And he's saying you have to have the shield of faith
to be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.
Here he says the wicked bend their bow,
they make ready their arrow upon the string,
that they may privily, what does privily mean?
Secretly.
That they may privily or secretly
shoot at the upright in heart, okay?
So God is saying here that
it's the same answer in Ephesians 6 as in Psalm 11.
The shield of faith, here he says,
in the Lord put I my trust.
Which is basically the same thing as faith.
And so he's saying here that we need to trust in the Lord
and not fear the enemy.
He said, how say you to my soul,
flee as a bird to your mouth?
You know, I'm not going to run away scared.
I'm not going to go hide somewhere, is what he's saying.
Just because wicked people are shooting at me
or attacking me or out to get me.
I don't have to go hide somewhere.
I'm not going to go flee like a bird into some mouth.
Hey, God is going to protect me
and the Lord put I my trust.
I'm going to stand right here where I've always stood
but I'm going to hold up the shield of faith
to quench the fiery darts.
I'm not going to flee like a bird into a mountain.
I mean, it's not exactly a very manly picture, is it?
A bird fleeing and...
You know?
It's not exactly something that you want to be as a Christian.
You know, we're supposed to have boldness.
We're supposed to be strong in the Lord
and the power of his might
and the Bible says,
the wicked flee when no man pursueeth
but the righteous are as bold as the lion.
We have those that will pursue us
but we're still to be bold and be strong and stand up
but it's just good to know
that the wicked have bent the arrow,
they've bent the bow,
they've made right the arrow upon a string.
You don't want to get overconfident.
You don't want to get to the point
where you think that you have no enemies,
where you think that nobody's out to get you
or to attack you.
It's amazing how...
You know, you can continually preach
and sometimes I've almost preached it
to the point of exhaustion
where I just don't even want to preach it anymore
because I'm just tired of preaching it
but people still don't sometimes seem to get it
about the fact that there will always be
bad people among us, okay?
That's what the Bible says, you know?
There are always going to be people
who will try to privily,
the Bible says they use the same word,
that will privily creep in, okay?
Because these arrows aren't going to come at you head on
according to the Bible.
He said that they've made right the arrow
upon the string that they've made,
privily shoot at the upright and hard.
Not a full frontal assault,
not just coming right out and just attacking you
but attacking you behind the back is what's called.
Attacking you from a side angle,
attacking you from a point that's close to you
is what the Bible is teaching you.
And I've preached it, I've preached it, I've preached it.
There will always be people who creep in, okay?
There will always be the Judas Iscariots who creep in
and there's no point in just trying to worry yourself,
trying to figure out who they are
and expose them and get rid of them
because Jesus, he knew that Judas was there.
He said, have not I chosen you twelve
and one of you is the devil?
And yet he continued to be there,
he continued to count the money,
he continued to have the bag as it were.
And so just realize it though,
just let it sink down and say,
hey, there are wicked people who are out to destroy me,
who are out to destroy everyone who's living for God,
yet all that will live Godly in Christ Jesus
shall suffer persecution.
The attack will not always come from front on.
It's going to come privily.
It's going to come from someone that you don't suspect.
And so be sober, be vigilant all the time.
You know, guard your children,
guard these young unstable souls
that are a prime target for the enemy.
Guard yourself.
Beware is what the Bible's teaching you.
Not flee, not scared, but just sober and vigilant, okay?
And he says, the Lord put on my throat
and I'll say to my soul,
please the bird of your mouth,
for lo the wicked bend their bow,
they make ready their arrow upon the string
that they may privily shoot at the upright in heart.
Verse three, if the foundations be destroyed,
what can the righteous do?
Now, that's a pretty profound question right there.
If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?
Today, the foundations are being destroyed beneath us.
What are the foundations?
Well, another word for the foundations
would be the fundamentals, okay?
Now, I was riding in the car with Stuckey
the last couple of days, he was studying all this crazy math
and I thought I knew a lot of math,
but this math is really just crazy.
It's all these letters and numbers
and just really long equations and formulas.
It's just crazy stuff,
like stuff I didn't even know existed.
But still, he said he's working on this problem
and he's working on it, working on it,
he's writing all this stuff out
and it was like he accidentally in one spot
wrote a five instead of a four.
And that's what defeated the whole thing.
He knew all this complicated math,
but sometimes it's the most fundamental thing,
the most foundational thing.
I remember the same thing,
I took a test one time in school
and there was this big giant problem
and my work filled up like half the page
and in one place I put seven times three is like 27.
Just in one place, I just goofed up
and that ruined the whole thing,
made the answer wrong, goofed the whole thing up.
And so the fundamentals in math,
if you don't have the fundamentals, you're perfect.
You can't do any of the complicated math
without the fundamentals.
It starts with the foundational math
and he's saying here if the foundations be destroyed,
what can the right say?
That's why we're called the fundamentalists
because we basically believe in the basic foundational things,
that's what we stand strong on, salvation by faith.
Pretty basic, but it's the foundation of everything we believe.
The Word of God is inspired, preserved, infallible, inerrant,
the King James Version only.
It's basically a fundamental, it's a foundational thing
because if we don't have that, we have nothing.
We have no authority for faith in practice.
We believe in the basics, prayer, read the Bible,
go soul wedding, just simple, give the gospel.
Today we have so many complicated programs
that sometimes take people away from
just the most basic things, just read your Bible.
And there's nothing glamorous about it,
just read your Bible, pray, give people the gospel,
knock the doors, go to church.
I'm probably not going to sell a million copies of a new book
explaining that because that's too easy
except nobody's doing it.
And so the Bible says if the foundations be destroyed,
what can the righteous do?
If you take away people's faith in their Bible,
basically you've left them with nothing.
What can they do? How can they serve God
if they don't have the foundation of God's word,
the rock upon which to build their Christianity,
to build their faith?
If they don't have that, they have nothing.
But not only that, but in our society,
just the foundations of right and wrong are being revealed
to where people today will question
the most basic things about right and wrong,
the difference between a man and a woman.
I mean, what could be more foundational?
And yet today the lines are being blurred
between a man and a woman.
And then Christians today, you know, dress,
women dress in a masculine way.
Women dress in a feminine...
Am I saying this wrong?
Women dress in a masculine way.
Men dress in a feminine way.
You know, basically the men grow their hair long and shaggy.
The women cut their hair short or put on pants
or the men are girly with their tailored clothing
and their sissy clothes from Abercrombie & Fitch
and Urban Outfitter and whatever.
Instead of being a man,
instead of being a man, the foundations are being destroyed
of a man being a man, a woman being a woman.
The Bible is God's word.
It's salvation by faith.
It's all Jesus.
It's not by works of righteousness, which we have done,
but according to His mercy, He saved us.
These are the foundations.
Now oftentimes you'll be giving somebody the gospel
and trying to get somebody saved,
and they say, I don't believe the Bible.
You know, and you can show them everything in the Bible,
and they'll acknowledge that that's what the Bible says,
and they'll acknowledge that they understand what the Bible says
and that you believe it and that it definitely says
that it's by faith and that it's eternal life and so on,
but they say, but I just don't believe the Bible.
You say, well, what do you do with such a person?
There's nothing you can do.
If the foundation be destroyed, what can the righteous do?
I mean, if somebody is not going to acknowledge God's word,
they can't be saved, because this is the foundation.
When somebody says, I believe the Bible,
then you can take the Bible and show them how to be saved.
Now if somebody says, I don't believe the Bible,
I'm still going to take the Bible and show them how to be saved,
because faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God,
but if they're never going to acknowledge that the Bible is true,
they can't be saved.
You see, God doesn't spend a lot of time in the Bible
trying to prove how real He is and prove how the Bible is.
He just said, in the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth,
and you either believe that or you don't,
and you say, well, we've got to be able to prove to people
that the Bible is true.
You'll never be able to prove to anybody that the Bible is true.
The Bible has to be believed by faith,
because without faith, it is impossible to please Him,
for He that cometh to God must believe that He is.
You're not going to see that He is.
You're not going to be proven scientifically that He is.
No, you will believe that He is, and that is the only way to be saved,
and you're going to believe not because of science,
but because of what you heard in God's Word.
That's what brings you to faith.
Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God,
not faith cometh by hearing,
and hearing by some ministry that's out to just prove God to be true.
You know, the Way of the Master crowd,
this whole Repent of Your Sins crowd,
they're so into just, we can prove that the Bible is really true.
We can prove it, and this is what they said on Way of the Master.
We don't even need the Bible to do it.
That's what they said.
They said, we'll prove the Bible is true without using any verses.
I'm not interested in that.
That's not going to save anybody.
I don't care about that.
And by the way, it can't be done.
It can't be done.
You can't prove it without the Bible,
because faith is the evidence of things not seen.
Here's the evidence right here that God spoke the world into existence
in six literal days, 6,000 years ago.
The evidence is in my hand.
It's not in a test tube somewhere.
It's not in a science book somewhere.
And people get too caught up in that.
They get too wrapped up in that,
and they go on and on, and spin their wheels,
and this seminar, and this booklet, and this DVD.
Hey, I got a booklet for you.
It's the Bible Preach it, and people get saved.
It's the truth.
If there's no foundational God exists, what can the righteous do?
If there's no foundational, the Bible's God's word,
what can the righteous do?
If someone won't believe that, you're not going to get them saved.
But what's going to cause them to believe that?
Hearing the word of God.
I mean, how many times have you gotten into these arguments,
or debates, or discussions with the atheists,
and you can prove them wrong all you want?
Now, I say you can't prove that the Bible's true scientifically.
You can't.
But you can definitely prove them wrong what they believe.
That is something that you can do.
You can obviously prove evolution wrong.
You can obviously prove that all their atheistic ideas are wrong.
You can prove them wrong even with science.
You can prove them with anything, because they're false.
So everything will prove them false.
History will prove them false.
Science will prove them false.
But it's not going to get people saved.
It's not going to prove that the Bible's true.
You can't prove that Jesus rose from the dead.
There are witnesses that saw him rose from the dead.
But I never even talked to those witnesses.
I believe Jesus rose from the dead because I believe the word of God.
I believe the Bible.
You say, how do you know the Bible's true?
I believe the Bible's true.
And I know, you say, well, do you know it's true?
I do know it's true.
Because now that I've believed the Bible,
the Bible says through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God,
so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
And that's what the evolutionist believes, right?
Everything that's made just appeared.
No.
It was created by God in three days.
How do you know?
Because the Bible says.
How do you know the Bible's true?
Well, then go to hell.
You know what I mean?
That's the end of it right there.
It's like, oh, the Bible's not true.
Okay, fine.
The Bible's not true.
And I'm going to heaven and you're going to hell.
What else can you do?
No.
No?
I mean, you can sit there and argue and philosophize and all this kind of stuff, but you're wasting
your time.
You know?
I mean, definitely if somebody's hung up on evolution, yeah.
You know, you can in a few minutes pretty much take that apart.
I mean, it's not going to be hard.
That's not going to get them sick.
I mean, they need to hear God's word to believe that this is true, okay?
And so don't get too caught up in that stuff.
A lot of people get too caught up in this.
And isn't it funny how everybody who's promoting that stuff is this repent of your sins crowd.
They're preaching another gospel anyway, the way of the masters and, you know, what's this
Kent Hovind's son?
What's his name?
Eric.
Eric Hovind.
Face it.
He is preaching another gospel.
I mean, he's very strongly saying you have to turn away from your sins and change and
make Jesus the Lord of your life, this kind of stuff.
Don't try to defend him.
That's what he's preaching.
Eric Hovind.
That's the way the masters preach it, okay?
And they're so hung up on this, oh, you know, let's prove the atheist wrong, prove him wrong,
prove him wrong.
When was the last door you knocked and got somebody saved?
Because, you know, I go and knock doors every week and I get people saved all the time.
And very few of them even believe in evolution.
Now, maybe if I were on a university campus or something, a lot more people might believe
in evolution because they've been more brainwashed.
But even then, what's going to break that barrier is the word God.
The gospel of Jesus Christ.
How many times have I talked to the atheists?
Let me give you a tip on winning atheist to the Lord because I've won atheist to the
Lord.
And here's what I did to win the atheist to the Lord.
I said to them, you know, can I show you from the Bible how you can know for sure?
And they said, well, I don't believe a lot.
I'm an atheist.
I said, okay.
I said, why don't you just hear me out for 10 minutes?
I'm just going to tell you what the Bible says.
And just pretend like it's true for 10 minutes.
That's what I always say.
Just pretend.
Pretend that it's true for 10 minutes and listen to what the Bible says.
And then I said, at the end of that 10 minutes, you can decide whether you believe it or not.
I said, just go ahead and listen to it.
And I'm going to show you what it says, and you decide whether you believe it or not.
And they said, okay.
And I showed it to them and went through it with them.
And they said, you know what?
I believe that.
And they got sick.
I mean, sometimes they're going to say, I don't believe that.
But that's not my decision.
They're going to have to make every single decision to put their faith on Jesus Christ
and take their faith out of man.
But many times, I go out soul winning.
And I mean, I can't even think of how small a percentage of the time somebody's really hung up on evolution.
Because really, the fool has said in his heart, there is no God.
I mean, most people have the sense to know, hey, we did not come from the monkeys.
God created all these magnificent creatures and plants and all these different things.
It just doesn't come up that often.
I mean, I'm not going to have a raise of hands, but just stop and think about it.
You go soul winning all the time, right?
O, thou member of faithful word that goes out every week or whatever.
How many times does this really come up?
But how many times do you get people saved without...
And I usually ask people when I'm giving the Gospel.
Do you believe that God created this world?
And that evolution is false and that it came from God?
I ask that to almost everybody I talk to when I'm giving the Gospel.
And they're always like, yeah, I believe that.
Whenever I give them the Gospel first and show it to them, they will acknowledge that.
And they will acknowledge Jesus Christ the Creator.
And so don't get too caught up in stuff like this.
Because you can argue with people, but that's not going to make them safe.
Believe me, I've won some arguments in my life.
I've taken the Mormon and chewed him up and spit him out.
I've eaten the Jehovah's Witnesses lunch, proverbial lunch.
I have tore up the atheist up one side and down the other.
But did it get him saved? No.
Winning the argument doesn't eat off. It's God's Word.
The Holy Spirit, the power of God, is going to have to get somebody saved.
Winning an argument will not get somebody saved.
And so focus on God's Word.
This is the foundation of my faith.
This is why I know I'm going to heaven.
This is how I know I'm saved.
That's got to be the same foundation of their faith.
It can't rest in a man-made science book, whether it be a Christian or secular science book.
Their faith must rest on God's Word.
That's what saved me. That's what's going to have to save them.
That's what saved you if you're saved. It's that simple.
And so he said if the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?
What can you do if people don't believe the Bible, if they don't believe there's a God,
if they don't know the difference between a man and a woman?
What can you do?
That's why it's so important that we make sure that at least in our church,
and in our mind, and in our lives, the foundations are not destroyed.
Because once they're destroyed, there's nothing to do.
Look at verse 4.
The Lord is in his holy temple. The Lord's throne is in heaven.
His eyes behold, his eyelids try the children of men.
The Lord tried the righteous, but the wicked and him that loved the violence, his soul hated.
So basically the Bible's saying here God's up in heaven. He's in his holy temple.
He's on his throne in heaven. He's looking down at us, is what the Bible says here.
The Bible says the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout all the earth.
He sees everything. He knows everything. He sees everything that happens.
And he's constantly trying the righteous.
What does the word try mean?
What do you say I'm going to try it? I'm going to give it a try.
Trying is testing. You're going to test something out. You're going to try it.
And God is constantly testing us, is what the Bible says.
Those that are righteous, he will constantly be trying them.
Job said, when I am tried, I shall come forth as gold.
Basically he went through a process of, like gold would do, in order to be purified,
of intense heat and pressure.
And then he came out more pure, more righteous, cleaner.
That's what God is constantly doing in our life.
He's constantly putting you through situations in order to clean you,
in order to purify you, in order to burn off some of the dross in your life
as silver or gold that has an impurity.
You know, there are different levels of gold, right?
There's the 14-karat gold, the 24-karat gold.
I don't really know what that means, but I don't know what the carat means.
Because then the diamond carat is how big it is.
Did somebody explain that to me? None of us.
You can explain it? Explain to me.
24-karat gold is pure gold, and like 14-karat gold is...
Well, 24 is almost pure.
If you divide 24 in half, like an estimated 12-karat, it would be like half gold.
So what else is it?
It's like copper or...
It's an alloy type.
Now, let me ask you this.
Do they add something to the gold to make it 14-karat, or do they just purify it less?
I think they add silver.
That's how much gold is in the driller.
Now, the 24-karat gold is not totally pure, though.
It's not all of it.
But it's close.
That was not my question.
My question is, why are diamonds measured in carats, and that refers to size?
Because it's how much gold is in the driller.
Oh, so it's how much weight of gold is in a certain wannabe, and then the diamond.
So it's a weight. It's a measure of weight.
Now, it's not C-A-R-R-O-T.
No, I'm just kidding.
I'm not that foolish.
Well, anyway, I understand now, so it's a weight thing.
So basically, the gold is purified by heat, by pressure.
They basically remove the impurity, and they want to have as much gold and as little of all the other junk as possible.
Well, it's the same thing in your life.
God is going to put you through some heat, some pressure.
Now, these aren't the things that we like.
These aren't the comfortable parts of our life.
But yet, they end up purifying us.
David said this in Psalm 119.
It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might keep thy word.
So he ignores the fact that the reason why he was keeping God's word, or basically keeping the commandments,
following God's word, is because he's been afflicted.
And sometimes, when things are just going great all the time,
we just get a little bit complacent, and we start to just get a little bit prideful,
and we don't necessarily serve God to the fullest, because we get too comfortable.
We start to relax.
We start to just kick back and just enjoy everything.
When God has to sometimes afflict us...
Because think about this.
Is there a time when you weren't really praying that much,
and all of a sudden, something really bad starts happening?
All of a sudden, you're on your knees, oh God.
So we ought to learn to do that before the bad things happen.
Even with the good time, being on our knees, praying fervently to God,
so that he doesn't have to keep afflicting us to get us to keep his word.
We keep doing wrong, doing wrong, doing wrong,
and then pretty soon, he starts slapping us around, chastising us, because we weren't doing wrong.
And so he has to get us on track.
When in reality, we should have just done the right thing, and then he wouldn't have to.
The Bible says this.
If we would judge ourselves, then we would not be judged.
But when we're judged, we're chastened by the Lord.
See, the word tried and judged are very similar.
Where does the judge sit at a trial?
He judges at a trial.
And so a judgment, a trial, it's basically a similar concept here,
of God having to try us, test us, judge us, chasten us.
All of them are negative things.
Basically, challenges that he's putting us through,
bad things that he's making us go through in order to strengthen us,
and notice, he says, the Lord trieth the righteous.
That means that the more righteous you are, the more of these trials you're going to go through.
Now, what's the opposite of that?
Because he has kind of an opposing statement here.
The Lord trieth the righteous, but the wicked and him that loveth violence, his soul hated.
So basically, the implication here is that he tries those that he loves.
Because on one hand, there's the righteous that he loves,
and then on the other hand, there's the wicked and him that loveth violence, which his soul hated.
And so he's saying that the Lord trieth the righteous.
So basically, he tries you because he loves you.
Whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
And so basically, when God is putting you through testing and hard times or trials,
you should count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations,
which is another word that means the same thing.
Like an attempt. If I attempt something, it means I'm going to try it.
Temptation can mean trial in the Bible.
He says, count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations,
knowing this, that the trial of your faith worketh patience,
but let patience have a perfect work that you may be perfect in your entire life.
He also said that the trial of your faith be much more precious than silver.
So basically, God is saying here that the trial of our faith is something we should rejoice about,
because it means that God loves us.
Because he's trying his sons, the righteous, those he love.
Now he says, but the wicked in him that loveth violence his soul hateth.
You say, well I just believe God loves everybody.
The wicked in him that loveth violence his soul hateth.
God is love. God does not hate anyone.
But yet it says here, the wicked in him that loveth violence his soul hateth.
You say, well I just don't think that hate really means hate.
I think that hate is an indifferent feeling.
So basically, the wicked in him that loveth violence, God's indifferent about.
Doesn't matter to him.
God's indifferent about a lying tongue.
Right? Because it says that God hates a lying tongue.
God is indifferent about the bloody and deceitful man.
That's why he wants him to melt like a snail.
That's why he wants to break his arms.
That's why he wants to knock the teeth out of his head.
Now, if I wanted to break the teeth out of someone's head, I probably wouldn't be indifferent about that.
Yeah, whatever.
So what do you think about someone saying, I don't really have an opinion, but I would like to see God break the teeth out of his head.
I'm not saying I hate it.
But I would like God to break his arm, as it says in chapter 10 verse 15.
Has anybody else noticed how repetitive this is?
We're only in Psalm 11 and almost every chapter.
In Psalm 10, Dave was praying that God would break somebody's arm.
He talked about in chapter 9, he said that the Lord abhorred the covetous, which means hate.
And then later on, it actually said that he hated the wicked.
Chapter 5 says the same thing. Almost every chapter.
And we're only in chapter 11, folks.
Wait until we get all the way through 150 of these things.
And yet, how many times do you hear it?
God would never hate anybody.
He puts people in hell because he loves them.
Stop and think about how madness that is.
And the same people who think it's okay to murder an unborn child will tell you that you should never hate anyone.
It's okay to kill innocent people, but don't hate.
It's okay to do all these things, but God forbid that we should hate.
It's nonsense.
I don't know what else to say about it. I'm tired of preaching about it.
So we're going to go to verse 6.
Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest.
This shall be the portion of their cup, because he loves them.
No, that's not why.
Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest.
This shall be the portion of their cup.
For the righteous Lord loveth righteousness.
His countenance doth behold the upright.
Look, if you would, at Revelation chapter number 8.
Revelation chapter number 8.
Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest.
This shall be the portion of their cup.
Now what does the word tempest mean?
The word tempest is a storm.
Remember when the disciples were with Jesus and the ship,
and there arose a mighty tempest in the sea,
and the waves roared, and it was raining, and so forth.
That's what a tempest is, a storm.
Look at Revelation chapter 8.
This is going to be fulfilled.
Basically what David said in Psalm 11 is going to be fulfilled someday
when God pours out his wrath on the earth.
It says in Revelation chapter 8,
it says,
And when he had opened the seventh seal, verse 1,
there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour.
And I saw the seven angels which stood before God, and then were given seven trumpets.
And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer.
And there was given unto him much incense that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints
upon the golden altar which was before the throne, verse 4.
And the smoke of the incense which came with the prayers of the saints
ascended up before God out of the angel's hand.
And the angel took the censer and filled it with fire of the altar and cast it into the earth.
And there were voices and thunderings and lightnings and an earthquake.
And the seven angels which had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound.
And the first angel sounded, and there followed.
Hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth.
And the third part of trees was burned up, and all green grass was burnt up.
So here we see this rain that's going to come, and this is right after the rapture.
Because the Bible, you say, well, how do you know that's when the rapture takes place?
Well, because the Bible says, immediately after the tribulation of those days,
the sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood.
He said, the sun will be darkened, the moon shall not give her light.
The stars of heaven shall fall from the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs.
So when this darkening of the sun and moon takes place, see Matthew 24, Mark 13, Luke 21,
then the Bible says, immediately after that tribulation, the sun and moon are darkened,
stars fall from the sky, then shall they see the sun of man coming with the clouds and with great power and glory.
And he shall, with the sound of a trumpet, he shall send his angels to gather his elect from the four winds of heaven.
He said, from the uttermost part of the earth to the uttermost part of heaven.
When the trumpet sounds, right?
Now, in chapter 6, at the end, when the sixth seal is open,
we saw in verse 12 that basically the sun and moon are darkened.
Okay, that's when that takes place.
And then right after that, we see in chapter 6, verse 17, it says,
for the great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand?
Now remember, the Bible says in 1 Thessalonians 5, said,
for God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ.
And so basically, before God's wrath is poured out,
after the tribulation, though, according to Matthew 24, Mark 13, Luke 21,
and every other verse in the Bible that even remotely mentions the second coming,
okay, after the tribulation comes the rapture.
The tribulation is when basically God's people are going to be persecuted by the antichrist,
and there will be tribulation upon the earth, such as was not, since the world was,
nor ever shall be.
Persecution, people will be beheaded for not taking the mark of the beast.
There will be famines, wars, pestilence, horrible time in this world.
But after that tribulation, the sun and moon are darkened,
Jesus comes in the clouds with the trumpet, the dead and Christ rise first,
we which are alive and remain are brought together with him in the clouds.
Then he begins to pour out his wrath.
They said, the great day of his wrath has come.
Well, look at chapter 7, and you'll see this great multitude appear in heaven right after.
He said, the wrath is come today, and the sun and moon have been darkened.
All of a sudden we see in verse 9, after this,
so after what? After the sun and moon are darkened.
After this I beheld and lo, a great multitude which no man could number,
of all nations and kindreds and people and tongues,
stood before the throne and before the land clothed with white robes and palms around.
Now where is God's throne?
We just read in Psalm 11, the Lord's throne is in heaven.
And it says, and cried with a loud voice saying,
The salvation to our God would sit upon the throne and under the land,
and all the angels stood round about the throne and about the elders and the four beasts,
and fell before the throne on their faces and worshipped God, saying, Amen,
blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power
that might be unto our God forever and ever, Amen.
And one of the elders answered, saying unto me,
What are these which are arrayed in white robes, and whence came they?
And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest.
And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation
and washed their robes and made them white with the blood of the Lamb.
Therefore they before the throne of God and serve Him day and night.
It is temple and Eve that sitteth on the throne and shall dwell among them.
They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more,
neither shall the sun light on them nor any heat,
for the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them
and shall lead them into living fountains of waters,
and God shall wipe away all tears of their eyes,
and when He had opened the seventh seal,
and then he begins to describe basically this raining from heaven,
fire, brimstone, hail, and blood pouring out of the sky,
and horrible tethers, as the Bible says,
snares, fire, and brimstone falling from the sky.
Now when did God do this in the past?
Well, one time.
One time in the Old Testament, Genesis chapter 19,
Sodom and Gomorrah.
Sodom and Gomorrah were the cities in the Bible
where the men of the city were exceedingly sinful, the Bible says,
and that they were homosexuals.
They were homosexual, they were queer,
and these dirty, filthy, vile sinners, as the God called them,
He basically poured out fire and brimstone upon their city
and destroyed it to where it does not even exist to this day.
I mean, it's gone.
And the Bible says that they were set forth for an example,
suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
Now I'm sure in your math book, back to your math book study,
I'm sure in your math book sometimes it gives you an example, right?
Now if it gives you an example,
there's going to be some problem to solve after that example
that follows that example,
because it wouldn't make any sense here.
Let me give you an example of how to do it,
and then you just never use that again.
So an example is something that goes before
that's basically interpreting or explaining
something that's going to come after.
Does that make sense to everyone?
In order to have an example,
there has to be something that follows that example,
because examples are followed.
So if God said about Sodom and Gomorrah,
and the cities about them in life matter,
Admah, Zeboam, and Zor, the other three cities around them,
and the cities about them in life manner,
giving themselves over to fornication and going after strange flesh,
are set forth for an example,
suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
The eternal fire would be like the fire that's burning in hell.
Basically he poured out fire and brimstone from hell
upon those cities as an example
of what he will once again do someday.
That was only the first time that he did it.
He will do it again,
and he'll do it again in Revelation 8,
which is the first thing that happened,
not even one day elapses from the rapture taking place,
and the Bible says a half hour goes by,
and then basically this rain of fire and brimstone
from the sky begins.
Look at Luke 17 quickly,
and I'll show you this one more time.
Luke chapter 17.
I heard somebody say one time,
I've heard a lot of preachers say like,
well, you know, God doesn't destroy America,
you know, you have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah.
But the truth of the matter is,
I mean, he's going to do the same thing again,
but he doesn't have to apologize to anybody
because he will do it again.
It's just when he's going to do it.
We don't know what the timing is,
but it's going to happen, you know.
We don't have to worry about that.
Well, if he doesn't know,
he will rain fire and brimstone
upon the wicked and horrible tempest.
This shall be the portion of their cup.
But look at Luke 17.
It says in verse number, let's see here,
verse number 26.
And as it was in the days of Noah,
so shall it be also in the days of the son of man.
They did eat, they drank, they married wives,
they were given to marriage
until the day that Noah entered into the ark,
and the flood came and destroyed them all.
Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot,
they did eat, they drank, they bought,
they sold, they planted, they builded.
Watch this.
But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom,
it rained fire and brimstone from heaven
and destroyed them all.
Even thus shall it be in the day
when the son of man is revealed.
So it's going to be the same as in the day
when the son of man is revealed.
Every eye shall see him,
and they also which pierced him,
and all kittens of the earth shall wail because of him,
even so, amen.
He's going to come in the clouds,
he's going to sound the trumpet,
we're going to be caught up together
with them in the clouds,
and then he's going to be in a poor eyes wrap,
and it's going to be the same
as it was in the days of Lot,
and that the same day Lot went out of Sodom,
it rained fire and brimstone.
The same thing is going to happen again.
Just like Noah,
the same day he went into the ark,
it began to rain water,
which turned into a flood.
Now here's something else interesting in this passage.
Where did the fire and brimstone come from?
Verse 29.
The same day that Lot went out of Sodom,
it rained fire and brimstone from heaven
and destroyed them all.
You see, God is the creator of both heaven and hell.
A lot of people have this idea that
God is reigning in heaven
and that the devil is reigning in hell.
The devil is not reigning anywhere.
The devil is basically a creature
that's going to be destroyed and sent to hell,
but he's not going to be ruling and reigning in hell.
People think that somehow the devil is going to be in hell,
reigning and have some kind of authority.
He's going to be tormented worse than anyone in hell.
The devil will.
God is the one who basically has the power
over heaven and hell.
He has the keys to the helm of death.
He has the key of the bottomless pit.
And here the Bible says that God rained fire and brimstone
from heaven because God is the author of judgment
and justice.
God is the one who's going to punish.
God is the one who created hell.
God is the one who superintendents heaven and hell.
And God can pour out fire and brimstone from heaven
because he's in heaven
and he's the Lord of all these things.
People today, they only want the positive only.
They want to go to a church that's positive only.
But wait a minute.
There's nothing positive about Psalm 11
telling you that God's going to pour out fire and brimstone
and a horrible tempest upon the wicked.
It's going to happen.
There's nothing positive about that.
But we need to accept from God's hand the good and the bad,
the positive and the negative,
and not stand in judgment of God and say,
well, I just want a God that's good all the time.
He is always good.
He's always right.
But in order to be right, you have to punish the wrong.
And that's what God's going to do someday.
And so rest assured, Sodom and Gomorrah was just part one.
Part two is coming of the same thing.
That example will be followed once again in the last days.
And let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, please just bless this teaching to our ears there, God,
and help us to study your word
and love the Bible and love the book of Psalms.
And God, help us to go out and win people to Christ
and give them the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.
Help us not to get caught up in all these new methods
and all these programs and CDs and DVDs,
you know, telling us all the scientific things.
And God, help us to just keep the main thing the main thing.
While science has its place and history has its place, dear God,
help us to understand that your word is where the power is.
Your word has the power to save, to regenerate.
Your word is what's going to break through
the heart of stone, dear God.
And your word is the one that's going to create
faith in the heart of the unbeliever.
Help us to stay focused on your word.
If we have something scientific to show,
let's show it from your word.
Let's show what the Bible says,
because that's going to be the power.
And so, Father, help us to be successful
as we try to win our friends and loved ones to the Lord
and as we go out and knock doors,
just fill us with your power
and use your word in a powerful way.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.