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All right, we're here in Exodus chapter 20, and some of you guys are excited. You're thinking, oh, he's preaching on the altar call again. It's like, no, no, not again, okay? Different topic. But we're talking about common versus normal, and what we're talking about here in this sermon is idolatry. Common versus normal, we're talking about idolatry, okay? Now I want you to realize that if you grew up in the Philippines and you're from here, a lot of these statues and idols you see, they might feel normal. However, this represents what is normal, and this is what is common. And if you grow up seeing all this idolatry, it's going to feel kind of normal, because everywhere you go, it's like, oh, wow, there's Jesus up there in the sky, you know, really tall statue of Jesus, tall statue of Mary, okay? But I want you to realize this is what's normal, and we go back to what the Bible, to see whether or not something is normal or not. Just because it's common, that does not mean that it's normal, okay? I want you to realize the idolatry in this country is out of control. It's not normal, it's weird, it's bizarre, and it rivals just about any nation in the world. There are probably only maybe a couple nations that have more idolatry than we have here in the Philippines, okay? It's like a competition between provinces. Like every province wants to have like a bigger statue or something like that. Now as we're starting this, because obviously we are a Catholic country by and large, 80% Catholic, idolatry is coming from the Catholic church, okay? I want you to realize as we're talking about this, to get started we need to understand the Ten Commandments of the Catholic church are different than the Ten Commandments in the Bible. They're not the same, they actually change the Ten Commandments, okay? And we're going to look at that here. Look at verse number 17. Verse 17, and the first point we have here is idolatrous excuses. Basically excuses for idolatry, which is what the Catholic church does. Now in Exodus chapter 27 verse 17 the Bible reads, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor's, okay? When you're reading this verse it says, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house. It's not just referring to the house as a building. It's saying the house and anything inside that belongs to him, okay? That's why it closes off in verse 17, nor anything that is thy neighbor's. The neighbor's house, nor anything that is thy neighbor's. So the things listed between are the things in the house that belong to the neighbor. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, okay? His wife belongs to him, not to you, nor his manservant, okay? If he's bought a servant it belongs to him. Nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor's. This is clearly one commandment and we say, thou shalt not covet, okay? Now the Catholic church says this is two commandments though. They make a distinction. Now when you're reading this verse there's no way you can make a distinction because thy neighbor's house or anything that is thy neighbor's are basically synonymous, the same things. The things in between represents what's in the house. But what the Catholic church says is this, they say that you shouldn't covet your neighbor's wife, and that's commandment number nine, or your neighbor's goods, which is commandment number 10. Now first off, the Bible said thy neighbor's house, not thy neighbor's goods. And there's an important distinction because neighbor's house implies anything that is inside of it. It includes the goods, but anything that is inside, not just basically your goods, you know, what you bought, anything inside that house, which includes the wife, that belongs to the neighbor, okay? But the Catholic church says, wait a minute, there's the neighbor's wife and the neighbor's goods, so thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife is the ninth commandment, according to the Catholic church. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods is the 10th command. Now here's the thing, if the Catholic church splits that commandment into two, that means you've got to remove one of the other 10 commandments. Because you have 10 commandments, and if they make commandment 10, both 9 and 10, you got to say, well, which commandment did they remove, and why did they remove it, okay? Well, here's a quote from Tim Staples, and Tim Staples is perhaps the biggest Catholic apologist. Basically, he defends the Catholic church. He's got a YouTube channel that's part of the Catholic church, like Catholic Answers. He writes a lot of books, and he says, you know, it's offensive to these churches to say that this is only one commandment, because you're saying that means the wife belongs to the husband. That's offensive to women. It's like, yeah, my wife belongs to me. It's like, what are you talking about? That's offensive? He's like, well, that's offensive to say. That's like saying the wife belongs to the husband, and it's like, well, yeah, the husband's the head of the home. That's what the Bible teaches, okay? If you have a problem with the word of God, that's your problem, okay? But that's what he says, okay? Now, here's what I want you to understand, that basically, if we were to split this into two different commandments, this would be very redundant. It'd be very pointless. It's repeating the same thing for a few different reasons. One is this. One of the commandments is thou shalt not commit adultery, so then why later on would one of the commandments be thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife? That's not that much different, right? Meaning adultery's just one step above thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, okay? And so basically, that would be very redundant to have one of the Ten Commandments is thou shalt not commit adultery, then another commandment is thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, just a few commandments later. That would be very pointless. That would be very redundant, because what the Ten Commandments is, is trying to represent basically everything in just short little phrases to hit everything, because there's a lot more than Ten Commandments in the Bible, but it's trying to hit kind of a general recap of everything, okay? That would be pointless. That would be redundant. It would also be redundant, though, because as we mentioned, if the neighbor's goods is one commandment, the neighbor's house is going to have both the wife and the goods amongst it, okay? It'd be redundant to just say that thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods. It makes more sense, and it's biblical, to say thou shalt not covet, okay? It implies everything that's in there. So the question is, what commandment did the Catholic Church remove, okay? Well, the first commandment of the Catholic Church, and this is not going to be King James, because they don't use the King James. They change the way it's pronounced, or said, the words, I am the Lord your God, okay? You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve. Basically the same first commandment that we have, that the Bible has, right? Having no other gods before God, okay? The second commandment of the Catholic Church is, you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. Now wait a minute, is that the second commandment? That's the third commandment. So we've discovered the commandment they've taken out is number two. Now what's the second commandment? Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. Basically idolatry. I wonder why the Catholic Church got rid of the commandment on idolatry. Perhaps because when you drive around and look, they've got idols everywhere. And they say, no, no, that's not the reason. They say that's under the umbrella of the first commandment, having no other gods, okay? And they try to justify it. They basically take it out as being one of the Ten Commandments. Why? They're trying to justify their idolatry. That is the reason why. There's statues everywhere with the Catholic Church. They have idolatry everywhere. The Feast of the Black Nazarene, all these things throughout the Philippines, okay? All these provinces have their own little festivals, these idols that they worship. Idolatry is everywhere. And so in our country, the Catholic Church has removed that as one of the Ten Commandments. Why? They're trying to justify idolatry, okay? Well let's go to Exodus 20, verse three, and I'll show you why they can't do this. Why you can't just combine verses three through six into one commandment. And why it should be two separate commandments. It says in verse three, thou shalt have no other gods before me, okay? And this is the first commandment listed and it's the big commandment listed in the Bible. And this is kind of pretty generic because there's a lot of ways you could put something before God. But basically have no other gods before me, okay? Now I want you to realize thou shalt is usually kind of a signal of a commandment. It's not always because 13 times I believe it says thou shalt or thou shalt not, but usually it's a signal of something else, okay? So I want you to see in verse four, thou shalt 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, okay? So basically thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. What's going to take place then is it's going to describe more information about that commandment. Now here's the thing, even if the Catholic Church removes that from being one of the Ten Commandments, the words are still in the Bible, right? You can remove it as one of the Ten Commandments. It doesn't change the fact he said don't make any graven image. So it's like you can change the Ten Commandments if you want, it still doesn't justify you having like all these like 100-foot tall statues all over the Philippines. That's still idolatry, that's still wrong, that's still a graven image, okay? Verse five, thou shalt 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 onto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me. So you can see in verse three, what he's doing is giving more information on verse two. Basically don't make this image, and then he's saying, you know what, don't bow down to them and serve them. You can see that's under the same commandment. But verse three is different. Thou shalt not have no other gods before me, okay? You can see these are two separate commandments. Now it's very clear when you go to coveting in verse 17 that that is one commandment because it says neighbor's house nor anything that is thy neighbor's. It's clear that's one commandment, okay? But the Catholic Church, they make that two. So they remove the commandment of not making any graven image, and they're basically making excuses for idolatry. I think it's very obvious why they remove that commandment, okay? Now turn to Numbers 21, Numbers 21. And so when it comes to idolatry, the first thing we saw was this, that they make idolatrous excuses. They make excuses for the idolatry. But number two, I want you to see the inevitability of worshiping these idols. That if you're making these religious idols, it's a guarantee that you will end up worshiping them if you make these religious idols, okay? Because the Catholic Church says, we don't worship idols. We don't practice idolatry. We got these giant statues that's like, no, no, no, we're not worshiping them. We're just trying to honor them, right? This big statue of Peter and of Jesus. But we don't worship them, okay? So I want you to see in the Bible that whenever you're making something for a religious purpose, it is inevitable that you will worship it when you're making these idols, okay, in these graven images. Numbers 21, verse 6. Numbers chapter 21, verse 6. And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people. And much people of Israel died. Therefore the people came to Moses and said, we have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against thee. Pray unto the Lord that he take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people. So this is part of basically the people complaining and murmuring and speaking against God and against Moses. And then God basically sends a serpent to basically kill people. You know, he's biting them and everything. And Moses prays for them. And then in verse 8, and the Lord said unto Moses, make thee a fiery serpent and set it upon a pole, and it shall come to pass that everyone that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. And in this special situation, God says, I want you to make this image of this serpent that you're going to look at on the pole, okay? And if you get bitten, you can look upon it and you'll be healed. Now this is a picture of Jesus Christ. Because John 3 says, and as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. And lifted up means dying on the cross, because he says, if I be lifted up from the earth will draw all men unto me. He's talking about dying on the cross. And so throughout the Old Testament, you're seeing pictures of Jesus Christ. That is basically the purpose. We are all guilty, but if we look upon the Savior, we believe on him, we're going to be healed. Okay? So basically, if they got bit by the snake and they looked upon this serpent on this pole, they're going to be healed. This was a picture of Jesus Christ. You can go to John 3 in your free time and read that. I don't have time to go into that, but it's a picture of Jesus Christ. Verse 9, and Moses made a serpent of brass and put it upon a pole. So when it said a fiery serpent, it didn't mean set a serpent on fire. Okay? It gives more information in verse 9. 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. Okay? So in this time period, basically when people got bitten, they looked upon this serpent that's up here on this pole, and they would be healed, and it pictured Jesus Christ. You say, what's your point? We'll turn to 2 Kings 18. 2 Kings 18. And I want you to realize in 2 Kings 18, this is over 500 years later. This is a long time later, and this brass serpent is not done. It's actually still around. Notice what it says in 2 Kings 18, verse 1. 2 Kings 18, verse 1. Now it came to pass in the third year of Hoshea, the son of Elah, king of Israel, that Hezekiah the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign. Twenty and five 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, and he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that David his father did. So Hezekiah does that which is right, okay? And notice what it says here in verse 4, he removed the high places, and that's basically where people would worship false gods, he removed the high places and break the images and cut down the groves. He break the images, why? Because they had idolatry in these religious things. He destroyed the idolatry, okay? Look if any of you ever become the president of this country, I want you to agree to me that the first thing you're going to do is destroy the idolatry, okay? Just pass a law and say we're done with it and destroy all of the idolatry, because every godly king in the Bible, that's what they do. They destroy the idolatry, okay? And break in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made. This is the same serpent, this is more than 500 years later, for onto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it, and he called it Nahushtan. What are they doing more than 500 years later? They're worshiping this idol. That's what's going on. You say why? Because when you create this image for a religious purpose, you're going to end up worshiping it. That's what's going to happen. And so look, when the Catholic church makes these big graven images of Peter and Mary and Jesus and Padre Pio or whoever you want to name, okay, look, they're going to worship them. It's inevitable. That's what we see in the Bible. Over 500 years later, now here's the thing. That brazen serpent was created for a purpose, right? It was created so if they looked upon it, they'd be healed. But 500 years later, that purpose is gone. That's not still around, but what are they doing? They're still basically burning incense to it. They're worshiping it, okay? And when the Catholic church has all these idols in the Philippines, don't tell me they're not going to worship them. Don't tell me they don't worship them. I promise you they do. The Catholic church, they have all these idols and everybody has these idols in their houses and there's things in their pocket that they are lucky charms or whatever. Look, they're going to worship them. It's inevitable. That's what you see in the Bible. And so with all this idolatry that's out there, don't let some Catholic tell you that they're not worshiping it. Yes, they are. If they're not worshiping it, how come on the Feast of the Black Nazarene they think that if they rub that little statue of Jesus, they'll be healed from whatever ailment they have? They'll say, oh man, I got the coronavirus. If I just rub this little Jesus statue, it's going to be gone. It's like, good night. It's like, are you kidding me? But you're not worshiping it. You're just praying to it and rubbing it for good luck. And look, I've heard stories in Mexico, which is a Catholic country, with their idolatry that they have these statues and they'll just bend down and pray to those statues and just start crying and tears coming down their face. And I'm sure it's the exact same thing here in the Philippines. That they pray to these things, they think they're somehow magical or they have some sort of inherent power. Look, when you're creating these graven images for religious purposes, you're going to end up worshiping them. God said make the brazen serpent for a time and a place and a reason. That reason's gone over 500 years later and they're still worshiping it. That's what's taking place. Now, turn in your Bible to 1 Samuel 5. 1 Samuel chapter 5. So the first thing we saw was idolatrous excuses, making excuses for idolatry. We saw the inevitability of worship and in 1 Samuel 5 we're going to look at the idiocy of idolatry. Why it is so pointless, why it is so stupid. Now look, I didn't grow up Catholic, so I would assume if I grew up Catholic and I assume you feel this way, that idolatry was probably weird to you when you were a kid. I'm sure in the back of your mind you're just like, you know, is this really something we should do? Make these statues and worship them? But the reality is that when it's so common and you see it all the time, it starts to feel normal. It just doesn't seem like a big deal to you. But when you read the Bible, what you're seeing is we should be angry about this. And I want you to realize, and we're going to see this in a second, that whenever you have an idolatrous country, there's a lot of sin that gets attached to it. And they become wicked as a result of the idolatry. First Samuel 5, I want you to notice verse 1, because we're going to look at the idiocy of idolatry. First Samuel 5 verse 1, and the Philistines took the ark of God and brought it from Ebenezer onto Ashtad. When the Philistines took the ark of God, they brought it into the house of Dagon and set it by Dagon. And Dagon is their god. And we don't know this for sure, but supposedly Dagon was like a fish god. Throughout the Bible, they're always worshipping these half-animals, half-humans. In our present day, we don't really necessarily have those idols here in the Philippines, but here's how we do the same thing today, because you love Spider-Man. This half-spider, half-human with these magical powers, those are always the false gods in the Bible. Batman and Spider-Man and all those X-Men things that you love, the half-animals, half-humans, that's wicked. Throughout the Bible, you're always seeing these half-animals, half-humans, and now Christians are being entertained by it. It's like, oh, it's so cool, he's like a half-spider. Why would you like a spider? A spider? Why would you like a bat? Are you kidding me? But they think it's cool when it's like half-human and half-animal. No, that's weird. That's like Greek idolatry, that's like the pagan idolatry throughout the Bible. That's not something for you to be entertained by. And they are pretty much a god. Look, Batman in those movies is basically like a god. He has god-like powers. Spider-Man has god-like powers. He climbs walls, he shoots out like these nets or whatever, these spiderwebs. Look, they're like god-like powers. It's like, what, do you believe in evolution and all that stuff? Then maybe we shouldn't be entertained by the things of the world, those half god-like creatures. And Dagon was supposedly a fish god. From what I understand, basically the bottom half of him, he was like a male mermaid. The bottom half of him was like a fish, and the top half was like a human. That's what they say. We don't know this for sure, but picture a male mermaid, if that's a thing, I don't know. Verse 3, and when they of Ashtod arose early on the morrow, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the earth before the ark of the Lord, and they took Dagon and set him in his place again. So basically they wake up in the morning and their god fell over, face first into the ground. So they pick up their god and put him back into place so they can worship him. I guess if he is a fish in this bottom half, he doesn't have feet to walk, so he can't climb back up and go here, so they've got to pick up their fish god and put him back into place. Verse 4, and when they arose early on the morrow morning, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the ground before the ark of the Lord, and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold. Only the stump of Dagon was left to him. So basically now they get up there, they see their god and their god's been beheaded and lost his arms. All he has is like the bottom half of the stump, which I presumably could say would be like a fish, I'm not for sure, but just kind of like the bottom half is all that's left of him. Verse 5, you would think that you would stop worshiping this statue, right, if he lost his head. If he got beheaded, he lost. Verse 5, therefore neither the priests of Dagon nor any that come into Dagon's house tread on the threshold of Dagon and Ashdod unto this day. But the hand of the Lord was heavy upon them of Ashdod, and he destroyed them and smote them with emerods, even Ashdod and the coast threw them. Now I want you to remember that part, smote them with emerods, because we're going to look at something here in a second, and emerods is kind of like an archaic word for hemorrhoids. And so, you know, basically this is hemorrhoids is what they get smote with, okay? And so, and I'm not going to go in detail to explain what that is, you can figure out on Google, but it's basically part of your nakedness area, okay? It's kind of disgusting, okay? And they get smote with emerods. And in verse 7, and when the men of Ashdod saw that it was so, they said, the ark of the God of Israel shall not abide with us, for his hand is sore upon us and upon Dagon our God. So to translate that last part, for his hand is sore upon us and upon Dagon our God, what they're saying is, you know, they beat up our God, Dagon, our God got beat up, okay? It's heavy upon our God, the ark of Israel, our God got beat up, but we're still going to worship it, even though it got beheaded, we'll just like, I guess, get glue, that heavy duty glue and just kind of stick his head back on. Our God got beat up is what they're saying, okay? Now I want you to go to 1 Samuel 6, 1 Samuel chapter 6, next chapter. Now I want you to see something, and I realized kind of a link just this past week as I was looking over this sermon, because let's say this is a fish god, which it doesn't really matter because in the next chapter, in chapter 6, we're going to see they're worshipping kind of mice, okay? Worshipping animals. But whenever you see cultures that worship animals, what you're going to find is they're filthy disgusting cultures as well. Cultures that worship animals, okay? Now the number one example of this is India. That is the country that worships animals, elephants, rats, all these different animals, they worship. They have all these idols of these animals. They worship cows, okay? Everybody knows that. They worship these animals. And whenever you see a country that worships animals, they are also very filthy, both spiritually and physically. Okay? And you say, well, I think that's offensive. Look, if you look on charts from secular people, India is the number one dirtiest country in the world, and it's because of Hinduism. That's the reason why. They worship animals, and they're filthy, but you know what? There's actually a link in the Bible that proves this, that you're going to be very spiritually filthy if you worship animals. Now it makes sense because this is Romans 1. You worship the creature, and you see this perverted sexual sin in Romans 1, right? They worship the creature, the animal, instead of God. They worship the elephant instead of God. They worship the fish God instead of God, and they're a filthy culture spiritually. Okay? There's a link in the Bible, okay? Now I want you to see here in 1 Samuel 6, because India is essentially the Romans 1 country that we have in the world today. Okay? 1 Samuel 6, verse 1, and we're going to see the Philistines were a very filthy country. They worshiped animals, and they were spiritually filthy. Okay? 1 Samuel 6, verse 1, and the ark of the Lord was in the country of the Philistines seven months, and the Philistines called for the priests and the diviners saying, what shall we do to the ark of the Lord? Tell us wherewith we shall send it to his place. So they're trying to get rid of the ark of God because the ark of the Lord just beat up their God. The ark of the Lord just beat up Dagon, so they say, we've got to get rid of the ark of the Lord. Okay? The ark of the Lord is now because of the ark of the Lord. Verse 3, and they said, if ye send away the ark of the God of Israel, send it not empty, but in any wise return am I to trespass offering, then ye shall be healed, and it shall be known to you why his hand is not removed from you. So basically, if we're going to get rid of the ark of God of Israel, we need to send some sort of offering, because basically that God is mad at us. Because they believe in all these different gods, right? All these cultures. They say, that God is really mad and beating up our God, so we've got to basically appease that God. Make that God happy, okay? So how are we going to make the ark of the God of Israel, the God of the ark of the God of Israel, how are we going to make it happy? Okay? Well, verse 4, then said they, what shall be the trespass offering which we shall return to him? They answered, five golden amrods. I mean, what in the world? You're making a brazen, you're making an image, you're making idolatry out of hemorrhoids. That's disgusting. I mean, what in the world are they doing? Why in the world, why would that even come into somebody's mind, okay? This is the culture that's worshipping the fish god, and then they're making this five golden amrods. That's disgusting. Like, why would you do that, okay? But notice what it says right after that, in five golden mice. What are you seeing? The culture that worships animals is also a perverted culture. You're seeing the link there, okay? And the reality is, it's the same thing when you look at a culture today like India. Like I said, it's not really in our country, worshipping animals, but in India, as they worship animals, look, a lot of their brazen images in India are of humans and bestiality. That's what you see in their sculptures throughout India. It's disgusting. That's there for everybody to see. That's part of India. That's part of Hinduism. Because when you worship animals, there's a link with being filthy, okay? That is what you see, and you see it here in 1 Samuel 5, because there's no new thing under the sun. With the Philistines, they're worshipping animals, and then they're like, oh, let's make five golden hemorrhoids, along with five golden mice. Why? Because they worship animals. That's why they're making golden mice, and they have a fish god, and whatever animals that they worship besides that. Turn to Exodus 32. Exodus 32. And as you turn to Exodus 32, let me just read you in verse 5. As you turn to Exodus 32, from where we just were, where it says, wherefore ye shall make images of your hemorrhoids, which are hemorrhoids, hemorrhoids or hemorrhoids, and images of your mice that mar the land. So basically, the mice are destroying their land, are marring their land. They're blaming, basically, those things. And then they say, as a result of the mice harming our land, it's because like the mice gods are mad at us or whatever, okay? Now, this sounds stupid, but let me explain to you, and I said this like 14 years ago or so, and I remember somebody I knew in college was so angry with me when I said this about India, okay? You know why India's poor, and why they don't have food? Because they don't eat meat, for the most part. They don't eat the cows, but even more so than that, rats which they worship, the rats eat up all of their good food, and they let the rats do that, and that's a fact, okay? It's the same thing here. Mice are marring the land, oh, let's just, you know, worship the mice. The rats are marring your land, and you're letting the rats just eat all of your good food. It's like, no, you can kill it, okay? We're giving, we're put above the animals that are out there, especially when they're eating up all your food and making your land filthy, okay? Exodus chapter 32. Exodus 32. But what you see, though, even if it's not worshiping animals, when a country is idolatrous, you're going to see wicked sin involved, and we see it in Exodus 32. Notice what it says in verse 4, Exodus 32. Exodus 32 verse 4, and he received them at their hand, this is Aaron receiving their golden earrings and stuff that they broke off, and he received them at their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool after he had mated a molten calf, and they said, these be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. So basically, Aaron makes basically a graven image of a calf, the golden calf, which we're all familiar with, okay, which is worshiping an animal, right? You're seeing that in verse number 4, they're worshiping an animal, they make a golden image. Verse 5, and when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it, and Aaron made proclamation and said, tomorrow is a feast to the Lord. You make a golden image, and now you're going to make a feast to the Lord? It's like, it seems like you're going against the things of God. You make a golden calf, and then, oh, we're also going to make a feast to the Lord. You're mixing in your wickedness, and all these cultures and religions that are wicked, they mix in spirituality with their idolatry and wickedness. That's what they do, okay? Verse number 6, and they rose up early on the morning and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings, and the people sat down to eat and to drink and rose up to play. Look, the Bible's being discreet when it says rose up to play, but you can imagine fornication is taking place and all kinds of wickedness is taking place. You say, why? Because when you're worshiping idols and you're worshiping animals, you're also going to see wickedness come as well. That's what's taking place, okay? You see the link there. Now, turn in your Bible to 1 Kings 15, 1 Kings 15. Look, if you remove the idolatry from this country, you know what you'd see? The percentage of Sodomites would decrease. The wickedness would decrease. The amount of children being born out of wedlock would decrease. The sin and wickedness in this country would start to get less and less. Idolatry causes people to be wicked people. That's what takes place. You see the link in the Bible, and look, by no means is the Philippines a godly country, okay? I'm not saying we're the number one most wicked country, but let's not pretend we're like the godliest country either, because we're not. Now, I don't know what the ranking system is, but the Philippines is not near the top, okay? We are a very wicked country. There are a lot of problems in this country. In a large part, it pretty much originates from the Catholic Church, but idolatry is a large part of that problem, okay? First Kings 15. So we see first idolatrous excuses or excuses for idolatry. We see inevitability of worship. We see the idiocy of idolatry, because obviously Dagon had no real power, and neither did the idols in this country. But I also want you to see the intention of believers, okay? What does this information mean to us? What should we do as a result? What's the intention of us as believers? Well, notice what it says in First Kings 15, verse 11. And Asa did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, as did David his father. Now in verse 11, it says Asa does that which is right, okay? So Asa is a good king. He's not perfect, but he does what is right, okay? Right after that, it's going to tell you the things that he did that are right and good, okay? What does it say right after that? And he took away the Sodomites out of the land. Now wait a minute. These are not my words. In fact, I'm not even going to give my opinion on this. I'm just reading it to you. He does that which is right, and right afterwards he took away the Sodomites. You interpret that for yourself. He did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, and he took away the Sodomites out of the land, okay? It's pretty clear there. Now notice what it says right after that. Not only that, though, and removed all the idols that his fathers had made. So he gets rid of the Sodomites out of the land, and he gets rid of the idolatry, okay? Those are the things that he said are really wicked we need to get rid of, and God said that's a good thing. And guess what? The Philippines could use a modern-day Asa, right, to get rid of these things. The idolatry is out of control in this country, and as a result of the idolatry, you're going to see a lot of sin that takes place. That's what takes place, okay? Verse 13, and also Meike's mother, even her he removed from being queen because she had made an idol in a grove and Asa destroyed her idol and burned it by the brokhedron. And so he removes his mom from being the queen because she made an idol. Now that's pretty harsh because I think all of us would say, man, we love our moms, right? But he says, you know, mom, you made an idol. I got to remove you from being queen, okay? That's what he does, and that was good according to the Bible, okay? Turn to 1 Corinthians 5, 1 Corinthians 5, 1 Corinthians 5. What I'm trying to show you is this, that as believers, we should hate idolatry. It should be offensive to us. We should not say anything positive about it, and look, I don't shy away from telling people that I get saved that idolatry is wicked. I tell Catholics that all the time when they get saved. Say why? They need to learn their church is wrong, and look, people can hear the gospel and get saved but not fully understand all the problems with their church, okay? And look, I don't shy away from telling them, you know, idolatry is wicked, it's disgusting, it's filthy. Sometimes when I go to Revelation 21, 8, I kind of just mention, you know, like idolatry, that's kind of like the big statues of Mary and Peter and the Feast of the Black Nazarene. And look, everybody I've gotten saved has never been offended when I've said that. If somebody gets offended, they're probably not going to listen to the gospel anyway. Now I don't spend 20 minutes on it, but I just kind of say in passing, like, yeah, that's what idolatry is. You've got these big idols and you're worshiping them, okay? Notice what it says in 1 Corinthians 5, verse 9, 1 Corinthians 5, verse 9, I wrote on you in an epistle not to company with fornicators, yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world. And that was obviously the big problem with the Church of Corinth is they had fornication. A man had his father's wife, okay? But it says not just the fornicators of this world, but it says, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters, for then must he needs go out of the world. And it lists a lot of different things in there. And one of the things it mentions is idolatry. Extortion is basically stealing money from people. And that is the reason why we've kicked people out of this church. The couple times we had to kick someone out of it was due to extortion. They were basically, you know, trying to deceive people and guilt them into giving them money as a form of extortion, okay? Bible mentions covetousness, fornication. It mentions idolatry, okay? Now if we get somebody saved, they might not understand all the problems with idolatry, but that is something that can get you kicked out of church, the Bible says. And look, throughout the Philippines, idolatry is very common and you see it and you say, wow, I see this all the time, so it's not really that big of a deal. No, it's a big deal. It's something that will get you kicked out of church. And as believers, when you see those statues, it should offend you. You should be angry at seeing those statues, because it's not just a statue. The result of that is it's going to be a very sinful country, okay, and God is angry due to idolatry. Now turn in your Bible to 1 Corinthians 8, 1 Corinthians 8. And you know what you'll find? Nobody's ever really going to tell you that they worship a statue. I mean, they don't say they worship animals in India. They say the same thing as the Catholic Church. We don't worship cows. We pray to them. We give them offerings. We don't worship them, though, and so we don't worship those statues. I'm sure in Thailand, I guess I'll ask Brother Tim after the service, they're going to say we don't worship that 500-foot tall statue of Buddha, even though we have to rub his belly before we go into the restaurant for good luck. We don't worship it, though. I mean, we rub the Feast of the Black Nazarene, you know, that idol of Jesus, but we're not worshiping it. It's not idolatry. It's not idolatry at all. What is idolatry, then? I mean, if that's not idolatry, then what is idolatry according to the Catholic Church? What do they consider wrong? Okay, I don't get it, because if that's not idolatry, I don't know what possibly could be. 1 Corinthians 8, verse 4. 1 Corinthians 8, verse 4, as concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered and sacrificed unto idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world and that there is none other God but one. So in verse 4, what it's saying is basically, as believers, as saved people, we know this idol has no value. It's nothing. It's fake. Now, we know that. A lot of unsaved people don't realize that, though. A lot of unsaved people every year, they worship these idols, they think it's real. They think that they'll actually, it's like their modern-day Dagon, and they think they're going to get good luck from it or something like that. Verse 5, for though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, as there be gods many and lords many, and let me just say this as a side point. All these big statues of Peter and all these things, these are like the Greek gods in modern-day. Now they're just like the saints. Before the Catholic Church started with the Greeks and the Romans, before the Catholic Church started with the Roman culture, they just outright worshiped basically the sun god and all these different things. Now though that the Catholic Church came and became like, we became Christian, right, the Catholics supposedly, they're just morphing in Roman paganism with their culture, and they're saying it's Christian, and so they still have these statues, and now they're worshiping Peter and Mary and all these different statues. It's just the Roman gods. That's all they're doing. There's not much of a difference. Verse 6, but to us there is but one God, the Father of whom are all things, and we in him and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him. Verse 7, how be it there is not in every man that knowledge. And throughout the Philippines, guess what, there is not in every man this knowledge that this idolatry is fake, it's weird, it's wrong. They think there's actual value in these statues. They think that they're real. They think they're going to get good luck by having these statues. I've been to homes, relatives of my wife, and I don't really understand why Catholic families have like 50 statues of Buddha in their house. I haven't figured that out, but there's all these idols within the house and they just kind of have it as like a good luck charm. They have it right beside their bed. They just like to have their idols all over the house because it somehow gives them good luck by having Buddha everywhere. It's like it's weird. Turn in your Bible to Acts chapter 19, Acts 19, but you have to understand when we get people saved, they're not going to have this knowledge. Just getting saved does not necessarily mean they're going to have all the knowledge in the world about these things that are false practices. Some Catholics might get it immediately, but you know what we're going to find? Some Catholics are going to get saved and they might still have some Catholic practices in them and they're going to have to learn these things. The only way to really learn that is to be in church and you hear the word of God being preached. But sometimes these Catholics are going to get saved and they don't fully get all this stuff yet. To get saved, you must change what you believe and quit trusting in the sacraments and all these other things, following the commandments and living a good life and baptism and all these things, but somebody could get saved and not fully understand why this is so wicked. Now, it's very clear this is not in the Bible, so why in the world does this even exist? We saw our first point is idolatrous excuses. The Catholic Church and here in the Philippines especially, they make excuses for idolatry. They're going to say it's not wrong, we're not worshiping the idols, we're just venerating them, which basically means to worship. We respect them very, very, very deeply, but we don't worship them. That's what they say. We respect them, we give honor to them, but we don't worship them. It's no different with any of these religions, though, because the Orthodox Church, they have something different. The Orthodox Church would split off from the Catholic Church during the Great Schism of the 11th century. The Orthodox Church, which is the second biggest Christian religion in the world, huge religion, they have images, actual images. Instead of just these statues, they basically have these big pictures of Peter, and it's even worse in the Orthodox churches, because I would literally have 50 different images behind me as I preach. It's everywhere. If you've ever seen these videos with the Orthodox Church, it's really creepy. They go to the hospital with all these, they worship Mary also, and there's this famous thing from Mary, the belt of Mary. Apparently she had a belt, I don't know, but it's a very famous thing, and they supposedly got it, and they bring it in this little container, and when people are at the hospital, the Orthodox priests will visit them and bring this belt, and they have music playing in the background in these videos that is really creepy. Like very, very, because Protestant music can kind of be creepy with the organs, but it's like really creepy, and then all of a sudden you see these people in the hospital bed, and they're basically just tears coming down their face and crying, and then they just touch it and they think somehow it's going to heal them. It's no different than the Feast of the Black Nazarene. And look, there's no new thing under the sun because I'm sure with Dagon it was the same thing. Basically we go and just rub the little male mermaid in the morning, like his feet or whatever they call them, those flippers, and somehow it's going to heal me. That's what they honestly thought. Why? This is what takes place with idolatry. And whenever you see these cultures, they're not godly when they have all this idolatry. When you worship the creature especially more than the Creator, you're going to be wicked. But they're also worshiping man above the Creator as well. Even if they're not worshiping animals, worshiping the animal above the Creator, you're going to be wicked, but when you worship man above the Creator, you're going to be wicked as well. And that is what this idolatry is. They're worshiping man instead of God. Now I know they don't worship Mary, supposedly. We all know that they worship Mary, whether they want to admit that or not. Why does this even exist, though? Because we saw idolatrous excuses, the inevitability of worship, the idiocy of idolatry, and the intention of believers, what we should intend to do as believers. But in Acts 19, in conclusion, we're going to see kind of the reason why idolatry is so common. Acts 19, verse 24, for a certain man named Demetrius, a silver smith which made silver shrines for Diana, brought no small gain onto the craftsmen. So we see basically this goddess Diana, okay, which they used to worship. She used to be very famous, and the Bible says, they said, man, everybody in the world worships this goddess Diana, okay, this false goddess Diana, okay? This is less than 2,000 years ago. But notice how it says they brought no small gain onto the craftsmen. You know what that's saying? No small gain of money. See the people that made these idols are bringing in lots of money. Look, if you want to make a lot of money, start making some idols. You will make money, okay? I remember when I was in Guyana on a missions trip, and I was still waiting there for a few weeks, and I went into this person's house, or the outside of his house, he was cooking outside, and this guy was Hindu, okay, because there's a lot of Hindus in Guyana, and he was with his Christian so-called friend, and they're outside talking and everything, and I was going to try to give the gospel, but I realized the Hindu guy was a little bit drunk, okay? And he's trying to talk to me, and I said, no, no, I don't have time, let me go. And he said, no, I want to show you something. He's like, no, you have to understand. He's like, I love Jesus. And I'm like, all right, all right, I'll just go. And he kept saying, I love Jesus. And this is a Hindu, okay, because they worship anything. You say something, you could hand them a shoe, and they'll say, okay, I'll worship that too, okay? They're like, I love Jesus. He's like, I love Jesus. And I'm like, all right, well, he's like, no, let me just show you something before you leave. And I'm like, okay, and he has this cabinet, okay, that's outside, and he opens it. And I was mesmerized. I mean, he had like the fanciest idolatry I've ever seen in my life. I literally stopped for a second, and I was like, wow, just like gold and silver. And this guy lived in a poor house. He did not have much money. Every cent that he made, you know what he spent it on? Idols. And I promise you, those idols were not cheap. And I just looked at that for a second, I was like sort of memorized, then I started to get kind of scared. I was like, this is really creepy. We've got this drunk Hindu that's like showing me these massive idols and everything. He's like, all right, thanks for your time, and I just kind of rushed out of there, okay? But I promise you, he spent a lot of money on that. And that's what you're seeing in Acts 19, verse 24, it says, no small gain unto the craftsman. And realize the Bible says the love of money is the root of all evil. I want you to realize that the Catholic church, as well as anybody who's making this idolatry, they love this because they make a lot of money off of it. They make tons of money off this idolatry. People spend all of their hard-earned money to have these idols in their house. And if you've ever been at these shops, you know, you're at the mall or whatever, and then you see they have the prices on these idols, it's expensive. They spend some serious money on idolatry. They spend lots of money, it's like, man, why don't you just buy a car with all that money? It's like, they spend some serious money on idolatry. And that's what you see in verse 24, no small gain unto the craftsman, whom he called together with the workmen of like occupation. Occupation's your job. Their job is to make idols. That's how they make their money, in verse 25, and said, sirs, ye know that by this craft we have our wealth. And so the Bible says, like Paul the Apostle, by him, as his craft was being a tent maker, okay, he made money by making tents. These people, their craft is idols. That's how they make money. They make a lot of money by making idolatry. It's the same thing in the Philippines. These idols are expensive, they make a lot of money off of it, okay. And notice what it says, verse 26, moreover ye see and hear that not alone at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people saying that they be no gods which are made with hands. It's like, yeah, guess what, they're not gods, okay. This statue of Mary is not a god. This statue of Jesus is not a god. Yeah, it's not a god, okay, that's pretty basic information, okay. But I want you to see what is in the heart of these people because these people are not offended that Paul is preaching a false, or preaching a true religion, a different religion. That's not why they're mad. And the reason why we can tell this is because of the words that come out in verse 27. We see what is in their heart. Verse 27, so that not only this our craft is in danger to be said it not, basically how we make our money, but also that the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised and her magnificence should be destroyed whom all Asia and the world worshipeth. So in verse 27, what's the first thing that comes from their heart? Are they upset that basically it's another religion? No, they're worried about their money. The love of money is the root of all. Our craft is in danger to be said it not. Man, we could lose our business. It's like I've been making lots of money making these idols of Mary my whole life. It's like I could lose my job, okay, I'm making money by making these idols of Diana. And it's like now I'm going to lose all my money. Also, this is another religion too, that's bad too. The magnificence of Diana is also going to be destroyed, but the first thing they mention is our craft is in danger to be said it not. So you can't help but speak the things that are inside of your heart. Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh. And what's inside of their heart is we're going to lose our money. When it comes to idolatry, the reason why it exists is because people make money off of it. And quite honestly, people are a little bit foolish to believe this. And I understand it's common, so maybe you grew up and it seemed really normal, but it's kind of foolish to think that some statue you make actually has some sort of power. And it's certainly not a biblical thing, okay, verse 28. And when they heard these sayings, they were full of wrath and cried out saying, Viva! Great is Diana of the Ephesians. Sorry, I got caught in the Feast of the Black Nazarene for a second. Viva! Viva! Great is Diana of the Ephesians. That's what they're crying out. And basically they want to kill them because of this, okay, why? People take their idolatry seriously. And look, we don't go stream preaching, but I'm just telling you, if you go down to the Feast of the Black Nazarene and start stream preaching, people are going to start screaming Viva! Who knows what's going to happen to you? I don't know. It's like that's not something we're going to do as a church. We'll talk to people one-on-one and give them the gospel, but these people really believe in this stuff. And you preach against it, they're going to be mad, and the people that are the higher ups that are behind it, they're going to be even more angry. Why? Because they've got money attached to it, and that's what they really care about, okay? Now look, I want you to understand as we're talking about this series, Common versus Normal, because I didn't grow up in an idolatrous country in terms of physical, actual idolatry. Idolatry is really not that big in the U.S., at least compared, because when you read the Bible, it almost seems bizarre growing up in America as they're talking about all these idols and these fish gods and everything, because you don't really see that. They have the Spiderman and Batman, these movies and stuff like that, and you hear about it, but you don't actually see this stuff. But here in the Philippines, this is very common, and it probably felt very normal, especially if you were raised Catholic, it felt just normal to you. I mean, my wife tells me that when she grew up during the Magda Rame celebration, which is where they crucify themselves and beat themselves, when she was a kid, she's like, oh cool, here are the Catholics that are going to crucify themselves, that are going to beat themselves up. You say, why? Because it's very common, and so it's like, oh wow, this is normal. People just crucify themselves. They beat themselves. It feels normal when it's common, and for some of you, it might feel normal because you were raised with this. But as Christians, we need to remember the intention of believers. We should look at it like King Asa and say, this is wicked, this is disgusting, and look, idolatry is destroying this country. And unfortunately, since the Catholic Church is behind this, it's probably never going to stop in our country. But the result is sin always follows idolatry, because they're not worshiping the Creator, they're worshiping a statue and a man and an animal. It's wicked. Let's close in a word of prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be here today and just getting to see what you have to say about idolatry. Help us to understand as believers how wicked it is, God. But help us also to realize that people that grow up with this, it's not their fault when they're raised Catholic. They don't know any better, and we just need to give them the gospel, get them saved, and then teach them all things, and then they can understand these things. But they're not going to understand it unless they're indwelled with the Spirit of God. Help us just, to the best of our ability, reach more Catholics in this area, get them saved, bring them to church, and help them to learn the ways of God. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.