(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Okay, we're in Jonah chapter number three, very short chapter, just 10 verses, but there's a lot packed into here. And the main theme, I guess you could say, of Jonah chapter number three is the salvation of a nation, okay? So one thing that I believe that this chapter is teaching us here is that God is interested in saving nations, all right? Now why is that? Nations are made up of individuals, and I'm gonna get specifically what I mean by that in chapter number three, but this is a popular chapter because of the fact that it's one of the most clear scriptures in defining what repentance is, right? And verse number 10, it says, and God saw their works that they turned from their evil way and God repented of the evil that he had said that he would do unto them and he did it not. Now, this is a great portion of scripture for those who believe that you have to repent of your sins to be saved, but they also say that repentance is not a work, you know, they'll say, well, that's not a work, you know, you just gotta repent of your sins. Well, here it correlates works with repenting, but not only that, we see that God repented, right? So we understand that in the Bible, there are times when repentance is in relation to repenting of your sin. For example, Christians are to repent, right? We're to repent of our sins to get right with God, but we understand that that is not necessary for salvation. Some people who believe in repentance of sins for salvation just believe that repentance is always defined as repenting of your sin throughout the Bible, but that's not true because of the fact that we see God here repenting of the evil that he was going to do unto them. God is not a man that he should lie, he's not a man that he should sin and he can change his mind on things and change his ways as well. And so that is a great verse to use there for those who have that argument. Now in chapter number one, chapter number one highlights his disobedience to the commission that God gave to him. Chapter number two highlights his chastisement, you know, he's swallowed by a great whale and chapter number two basically highlights his prayer, his conversation unto the Lord while he's in the belly of the whale. And then we see later on that God has mercy on him and he vomits him out into the land and he travels to Nineveh, the word of the Lord comes back to him a second time so he can go and preach unto the Ninevites and then that's where we pick up in chapter number three. It says, and the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time saying, arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. So Jonah arose and went unto Nineveh according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days journey and Jonah began to enter into the city of days journey and he cried and said, yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Now the first thing that I want you to notice here from verses one and four is that this is the kind of preaching that actually pleases God. How do we know that this sermon that Jonah preaches to the Ninevites, it's something that God commissions, it's something that God is pleased with? Well, he says in verse number two, arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. What does it mean to bid someone? It means to command them, right? It means to instruct them. He's telling them, hey, this is what I'm ordering you to do, this is what I'm directing you to do. And then in verse number four, he cries and says, yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. So there's nothing cotton candy about this sermon. There's nothing light about this sermon. He's not talking about the love of God. He's not talking about the grace of God. He's not even talking about the mercy of God. And look, this is exactly what God wanted him to say. If not, he would have been like, hey, what are you doing? You're doing your own thing. Why aren't you preaching the love of God? Why aren't you talking about my mercy? No. This is not his judgment, okay? This is the type of preaching that God bids Jonah to do. But you know what? It's the same type of preaching that God bids us to do even today. You see, obviously there's a difference between what has taken place in the Old Testament to the New Testament. There's certain things that have been done away with, but you know, one thing that is not done away with is the dynamicy of hard preaching. Is the importance, the element of reproving, rebuking with all long suffering and doctrine. That is still the same. It's not like you have the prophets of the Old Testament and they said some pretty crazy stuff back then and they preached hard. But today in the New Testament, the prophets of the day should preach a lot different. You know, we need to be kind, we need to be nice, we need to be compromises. I mean, we need to be kind. That's not what the Bible tells us to do. You know, there's a reason why even in the New Testament the Bible still refers to preachers as prophets. Because they're prophesying the word of God and a characteristic of a prophet is that they reprove, rebuke and exhort with all long suffering and doctrine. Now go with me if you would to Jeremiah chapter 26. Hold your place there in Jonah. Now the reason this is important is because of the fact that today you have people who really undermine hard preaching. And in fact, if any preacher preaches hard, they're automatically criticized, they're automatically labeled as a hate preacher or you're judging too much. You shouldn't say that. You know, I've had people contact me on social media after this whole Kanye West thing and say, or not actually, I've had people contact me about that too, but there was another one who actually contacted me and she said, you know, she was just like, hey, I heard you're preaching. I just want to let you know you should be a little nicer. Okay. You're a little too hard and I'm just saying, where's the love? Where's the love? You know, and, and I said, well, I do preach love, you know, you're accusing me of not preaching love. How do you know that I don't preach love? He goes, well, I just seen your clips and I saw your sermons and I've, I've watched a couple of your videos and you just seem to be a little judgmental. Okay. You seem to be a little hateful and I'm just saying, you're not going to reach a lot of people with that type of attitude. You know, if you don't have nothing nice to say, don't say nothing at all type of a thing. Right. And I explain to this person, I say, look, I do preach love and I preach the gospel every single week. I see people saved and the Bible commands me, God has commissioned me. He has, you know, commanded and directed me. He has instructed me to preach hard. You know, I'm supposed to talk about the negative things in the Bible and if I don't, then I'm compromising God's word, you know, and this person is like, well, it just seems as though that's all you want to talk about, you know, is negativity. And I explained to this person, I was like, well, the vast majority of the Bible is negative. You know, because we live in a negative world, we live in a sinful world and that's why God wants us to preach hard because he wants the prophets of today to correct that. And you know, and obviously the whole, the subject, the topic of sodomites came up and she said, you seem to be really obsessed over that, you know, you talked about that quite a bit, you know, it makes me think that maybe you're one, she said, although, hey, I haven't heard that before. You know, that's like the car that people pull out. Oh, you talk about sodomites, you must be a sodomite yourself kind of thing, right? And I said, well, you know, this is what the Bible says about sodomites and I gave that person the scriptures and she was like, I'm just saying, you know, you need to take some advice and speak lovingly and all this stuff. And you know, she went on and on and on. And then I said, you know, well, the Bible says, preach the word begins to end season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine. And so I've given you all types of scriptures that tell me that this is what I'm supposed to do, yet all you've told me is you need to be more loving, which is not a Bible verse. And then, you know, and look, I get a lot of trolls, so sometimes I wonder, are these reprobates, you know, I don't know, you know. And so like what I started doing is I started screenshotting some of the conversations. And she had said something that made me want to do that and I basically told her, I said, just to let you know, I'm screenshotting everything in case you decide to go back on what you said. And immediately she starts deleting all her comments. It's like the entire thread just went away. And then she like blocked me and stuff like that or whatever. So we live in a society today that that's all they want to hear, you know. And when you bring up scriptures of God's judgment, they're like, oh, you know, that's all you want to focus on. Well, really, when's the last time you heard a sermon on judgment from some liberal pastor? You don't hear that often, you know. You want to hear sermons that will scratch your ears, that will make you feel good, but at the end of the day, the vast majority of the Bible is negative and God commands us to preach the whole counsel of God. What does counsel mean? It means instruction, right? You know, when you ask for counsel, you're asking for instruction, well, God has given to us the counsel of God and that's exactly what we're supposed to give to people. Now look, the prophets of the Old Testament, all negative people, they're negative, right? Look at Jeremiah chapter 26 verse 4, and thou shall say unto them, thus saith the Lord, if you will not hearken to me to walk in my law, which I have set before you, to hearken to the words of my servant, the prophets whom I sent unto you, both rising up early and sending them, but you have not hearken, then will I make this house like Shiloh and will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth. It sounds like God is very like, you know, just judgmental. He's like, if you don't do what I say, I'm going to destroy you. Whoa, God, that's not very, that's not very God-like, oh no, it is very God-like. It's just not the God that you're talking about. Verse seven, so the priests and the prophets, surprise, surprise, and all the people heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of the Lord. Now it came to pass when Jeremiah had made an end of speaking all that the Lord had commanded him to speak unto all the people, that the priests and the prophets and all the people took him saying, thou shall surely die. Who's saying this? The religious leaders, the pastors, the priests, these people who are actually supposed to be giving the word of God, they take Jeremiah and they're like, man, you're going to die for that. This is not popular. Verse nine, why has thou prophesied in the name of the Lord saying, this house shall be like Shiloh and this city shall be desolate without an inhabitant. And all the people were gathered against Jeremiah in the house of the Lord. When the princes of Judah heard these things, then they came up from the king's house into the house of the Lord and sat down in the entry of the new gate of the Lord's house. Then spake the priests and the prophets unto the princes and to all the people saying, this man is worthy to die for he hath prophesied against this city as he have heard with your ears. Hey, we should put this guy to death because he preaches against America. That's basically what he's saying. He's not a patriot. He's preaching against Trump, our savior, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth, Donald Trump. He's preaching against the Republican Party. He's preaching against Donald Trump. This is not right. He deserves to die. President Trump is our God, I mean our president. Verse 12, then spake Jeremiah unto all the princes and to all the people saying, the Lord sent me to prophesy against this house and against the city, all the words that he have heard. And he's like, oh, don't get mad at me. Don't kill the messenger. God told me to do this. God told me to preach against this city. God told me to preach against Jerusalem because you guys are all wicked. That's why. Go to Ezekiel chapter six, look, and if you don't like that type of preaching, you're going to have a really hard time digesting the Old Testament because it's filled with prophets who preach against individuals, pastors, prophets, priests, nations, everything. And in fact, if you don't like that, you're just going to have a really hard time reading the book of Ezekiel. You know, sometimes they say, well, you guys are so negative, you guys preach against everything. Oh, no, no, no. We don't preach against everything. You know who preaches against everything? Ezekiel preaches against everything. I've never preached against mountains. I've never preached against valleys and rivers and hills. He did. Think about that. I mean, we hit everything. We hit a lot of topics, do we not? We try to hit on every single sin, every single false prophet and false religion, but we cannot hold a candle to Ezekiel who God told, hey, preach against this hill. Like, okay, you're going to be destroyed, buddy, you know. Look at verse 1 of Ezekiel 6. And look, you know, this is how you know God's mad. He's just like, I just want you to preach against everything. And the word of the Lord came unto me saying, Son of man, set thy face toward the mountains of Israel and prophesy against them. And say ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God. Thus saith the Lord God to the mountains and to the hills and to the rivers and to the valleys. And God told, even I will bring a sword upon you and I will destroy your high places and your altar shall be desolate, your images shall be broken, I will cast down your slain men before your idols. He's talking to an inanimate object. But God's telling him, you better preach against that thing because I'm mad. Oh wow, you just want to preach against everything. Well tell that to Ezekiel. Go to chapter 13. Chapter 13 and verse number 1. So he preaches against the mountains, against the hills, the rivers and the valleys. Can you please picture this? He's at the river and he's like, you know, some guy's out there camping and they're like, is that Ezekiel? What is he doing? He's preaching against the rivers. That guy is too extreme. Look at this guy, he's so, he preaches against everything, you know, the rivers don't even escape his preaching. Look at chapter 13 verse 1, and the word of the Lord came unto me saying, Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel that prophesy saying, and say down unto them that prophesy out of their own hearts, hear ye the word of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord God, woe unto the foolish prophets that follow their own spirit and have seen nothing. So he's not only preaching against inanimate objects, now he's going after the religious leaders, the prophets. And you know what God told him to say, hey, say, tell him this, you stupid prophet. That's what foolish means. I just don't like your spirit brother here, you know, I don't think you should just call people stupid. God says, okay, how about this, foolish prophet, it means the same thing. You stupid prophet, you stupid pastor, that's what he's saying, that's a potty mouth. You know, that's not very nice. I just think you're not going to reach a whole lot of people like that, Pastor Mejia, with that type of tongue, with that type of mouth, you know, you need to wash out your mouth with soap. What I did, it's called the word of God. He's like, I want you to preach against the prophets, against the hills, the mountains, skip down to verse 17, likewise, thou son of man, set thy face against the daughters of thy people, which prophesy out of their own heart and prophesy thou against them. Who's that, the women preachers? He's all right, now that you're done with the hills, now that you're done with the prophets, now I want you to get the women prophets, the Joyce Meyers. I want you to get her and every single Pentecostal, charismatic, pastora that you see, tear them to shreds, prophesy against them. He's mad. Go to chapter 20, and look, we're not even scratching the surface as far as Ezekiel's sermons are concerned. He's mad, you know, and Ezekiel, you know, it's a large book. Look at verse 46 of chapter 20, it says, son of man, set thy face toward the south, like this, and drop thy word toward the south, and prophesy against the forest of the south field. He's like, drop that word, amen. Drop it, drop it. He says, I want you to preach against the trees, okay. Look at chapter 21, verse 2, son of man, set thy face toward Jerusalem, and drop thy word toward the holy places, and prophesy against the land of Israel. Chapter 25, verse 2, you don't have to turn it, it says, son of man, set thy face against the Ammonites, and prophesy against them. 28, 21, son of man, set thy face against Zidon, and prophesy against them. So who's he picking on now? Just cities. Like, preach against that city, against those people, against this place right here, I want you to preach against everything. He would not be invited to any independent fundamental Baptist church today, except for ours, and those who are like-minded with us. I'd love to have Ezekiel come preach for us. The title of my sermon is preach against everything. He's preaching in Zidon, the Ammonites, Jerusalem, I mean, no one is safe from this guy's preaching, you're getting it. If he sets his eyes on you, you're getting it. 29, 2 says, son of man, set thy face against Pharaoh, king of Egypt. Who's that? The ruler of the land, Donald Trump, and prophesy against him, and against all Egypt. Oh, that's Egypt, it's not Jerusalem, we live in Egypt. This is Babylon, this is Egypt, this is Sodom and Gomorrah, spiritually speaking, right? 34, verse 2, son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God unto the shepherds, woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves, should not the shepherds feed the flocks. 32, verse 2, son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir and prophesy against it. He prophesies against Gog and Magog. I mean, there's no one safe from this guy's preaching. So when they come to us and they say, well, you preach against everything. Well, I'm just trying to be like Ezekiel. And trust me, I'm not even scratching the surface when it comes to the amount of topics that Ezekiel came up with. He's preaching against everything. But you know what, apparently God knows what he's talking about. And look, God is not interested in these people's formula on how to reach people. Because their formula is, well, you got to be nice if you're going to reach people. That's not what God says. Go to Matthew chapter 11. Hold your place in Jonah. We're going to go back to that. This is all talking about Jonah right here, okay? Because Jonah is one of these prophets. And they'll say this, well, you got to, you know, we need to be like Jesus. We need to be like Jesus, you know, humble, we got to be humble. We can't just call people out. And what they're talking about is some faggoty Jesus is what they're talking about. Some long dress wearing, Pantene Pro-V hair, Caucasian white male, who's like six feet, you know, six foot five. That's what they're talking about. They say, let's, we need to be like Jesus. And by the way, I agree, we do have to be like Jesus. Because the Bible tells us in 1 John 2, 6, he that saith he abideth in him, ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked. So the Bible tells us that we need to walk in the steps of Jesus. We need to be like him. We need to copy him. Right? Well, let's see what Jesus did. Because the prophets of old, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, they all preach against everything, cities, nations, rulers, prophets, pastors, priests, no one was safe from their preaching, right? Look at Matthew 11, verse 20, then began he to upbraid, who's he, Jesus. Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done because they repented not, woe unto thee, Charles, woe unto thee, Bethsaida, for if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at that day of judgment than for you, and thou Capernaum, which are exalted into heaven, thou shall be brought down to hell. Whoa. He said that to an entire city. He didn't go to the individuals. He goes, I'll just kill one bird, you know, 50,000 people with one stone, you know, just you guys are all going to hell. That's Jesus. I want to be like Jesus. They're right. We got to be like Jesus. And guess what? Jesus said this. No, no, no. I'm talking about like the, like, you got to be like loving like Jesus. That's what I'm talking about, you know. He said this though, you know, well, Jesus didn't hate anybody. Then why did he tell you that if you're going to follow him, you know, you hate father and mother? Does that mean like something else or what? He could have used a different word if that's not what he meant. Think about that. Why did he say that it were better for a millstone to be tied about his neck and that he would drown in the depths of the sea? That is a very morbid way to execute someone. When you talk about someone who offends these little ones who believe in him, he said it were better that a millstone be tied about his neck and he would drown in the depths of the sea. That's mafia style. Think about that. Mafia, they like, they put the concrete on the feet. He's like, nope, tied about their neck. That's a horrible way to die, but Jesus said it. Yeah, but that's, that's, that's what, it's Jesus. But I say unto you that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for thee, he says. Go to Luke chapter number 10, if you would. So what do we see? What do we see the example of Jesus? He's preaching against cities and he's telling them, they're going, you guys are going to hell. He's telling the entire cities, you guys are going to go to hell. Okay. And yeah, he's being judgmental and look, he's behaving like the prophets of old. Cause look, he's, he's not going to tell his prophets to do something that he himself would not say. Right. I was going to be like, hey, preach against these cities, preach against the hills, and then he's not going to do it. That's contradictory. He's like, no, I told him to preach that and I'm going to preach it when I come, you know, look at Luke chapter 10 verse eight and into whatsoever city you enter and they receive you eat such things as is set before you, heal the sick that are there in and say unto them, the kingdom of God has come nigh unto you, but into whatsoever city enter and they receive you not go your ways out into the streets of the same and say, even the very dust of your city will, which cleaveth on us, we do wipe off against you not withstanding. Be sure of this, that the kingdom of God has come nigh unto you. But I say unto you that it shall be more tolerable in that day for Sodom than for that city. And he goes on to reprimand the cities again. So he's saying, look, cities that just completely reject you because you're preaching the gospel or preaching just the word of God, period, you got to shake the dust off your feet and just say, all right, more tolerable for the fags that are in Sodom and Gomorrah than for you, because the word of God actually came to you. Go to Matthew chapter number five. Yeah, but you know, most of these scriptures in the New Testament, brother Mejia, you know, they're, they're, it's, persecution is because of the gospel. You guys preach on other, the controversial stuff. You guys preach against the LGBTQ, LMNOP, HIV, and that's why people are mad at you guys. And that's why you're getting, you bring it upon yourselves. I know we bring it upon ourselves, duh. Who's denying that we're not bringing this upon ourselves? God told us this would happen if we preach against the sodomites or any other wicked person in false prophets. Yes, we bring it upon ourselves, of course. But I want you to see the correlation that Matthew five makes with the prophets of old. Look what it says in verse 10, blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness sake for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake, rejoice and be exceeding glad for great is your reward in heaven for so persecuted they, the prophets, which were before you. Okay. So why were the prophets of old persecuted? It wasn't because they were preaching the gospel. It's because they were preaching judgment. They were preaching against kingdoms, nations. They were preaching against rulers. They're preaching against wicked people. And this is why they were persecuted. No, but you're supposed to get persecuted for the gospel sake, not only for the gospel sake. I don't, I'm not saying the prophets didn't preach the gospel. I'm sure they did. But the vast majority of their message was against their sin. Okay. This is the preaching that God bids us to do. Look, every once in a while, obviously, we're going to preach an encouraging sermon. But you know, the most irritating thing for me to read on comments or messages like, oh, stop judging, preach, preach the gospel, preach Christ and him crucified. Why people are saved here already. Why would I preach the gospel to you if you're already saved? No, I just preached Christ and him crucified. But does anybody here not know that Jesus Christ was crucified? Does anybody not know that? Do you think he was crucified on a stake? Does anybody believe that stupid doctrine? Is anybody here a former Jehovah's Witness that still believes that? Okay. So we don't need to preach that now, right? We need to preach things that are, aside from that after salvation, I cannot preach the gospel every single service. There's an entire book dedicated to doctrine that God wants us to know because there's things that pertain to life and godliness. And God wants you to know how to live a holy life, how to successfully repent of your sins, how to live a life that's pleasing unto him. You need to know those things. Oh, preach the gospel, preach the gospel. That's for unsafe people. Okay. Go to 2 Timothy chapter 4, 2 Timothy chapter number 4, and look, hard preaching changes lives. I don't care what anybody says. It's changed my life. It's changed the lives of my family. It's changed the lives of friends and brothers and sisters of Christ. I've seen it work over and over and over again. Hard preaching, biblical hard preaching changes lives. Weak, sissified, you know, just snowflake preaching changes nobody. In fact, it hardens the heart is what it does. It causes people to be discontent with God and his word and his church. You know, people want to be offended. They want it raw. They just want to just tell me how it is. I hate it when people just kind of beat around the bush, you know, they don't want to tell you how it is. They just kind of like don't want to tell you how it is. They just beat around the bush. They don't want to tell you the truth. Don't do that because then you come off as a deceiver. Just tell me how it is. Tell me what I need to hear. Tell me what the Bible says. And that is everybody. No, that's just you. You just like, you just have a palette for hard preaching. God wants me to have a palette for hard preaching. He wants everyone to have a palette for hard preaching because it's what changes people's lives. Okay. Timothy 4, 1 says, I charge thee therefore before God. Oh man, this is pretty serious here. He's like, I'm commanding you before God as God is my witness, he's saying. And the Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing in his kingdom, preach the word, be instant in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine. This Paul Chapel crowd, this Lancaster, liberal, sissified, faggoty Christianity out there, they need to read that, reprove, okay, reprove is to tell someone they're wrong, rebuke is like to yell at them. That's what it means. Oh, you know, yeah, but that's, that's, that's, that's the apostle Paul. Yeah, and he's charging Timothy to do it. If God didn't want us to do it, he wouldn't put 2 Timothy 4 in there. Verse 3, for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears and they shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned unto fables. Look, I sometimes go on YouTube and I look up certain independent fundamental Baptist churches and what they're preaching and their preaching sucks. It sucks. Just be honest. I would name them, but there's like a bunch of them. I would have to take the entire service to label all the churches that preach weak. You know, they put these titles and these lame titles that people just gloss over. The sermon suck. You know, we need to make sure that we get into the word of God and teach doctrine. Well, I don't like that you say those words. Well, you know what? Then go listen to your, you know, Lancaster Baptist Church type preaching if you want something to itch your ears. Go listen to Joel Osteen, who's teaming up with Kanye West. Kane West, they're going to his stupid Coliseum to just pervert the word of God. Go smoke a blunt before Kanye West's service, which is exactly what they do. They go take shots and smoke blunts right before they enter into the service. We need hard preaching. We need preaching that's judgmental. And here's the thing, pastors today, they shun the word of God. They just shun it. And you know why it is? It's because they're ashamed of the Bible. That's why. Okay. Well, all that hard preaching is in the Old Testament. Well, let me read you a New Testament passage of an Old Testament prophet who was quoted in the New Testament about something that's going to happen in the New Testament. Don't ask me to repeat that. The Book of Jude, referring to Enoch, says, And Enoch, also the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with 10,000 of his saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly, among them of all their ungodly deeds, which they have ungodly committed, of all their hard speeches with ungodly sinners, have spoken against him. I mean, did he say ungodly enough? That's Enoch preaching in the Old Testament about something taking place in the New Testament. Okay. Go to Acts or go to Second Timothy, chapter two, you're in Second Timothy four, go to chapter two. Look, this is what the Apostle Paul said in Acts chapter 20, verse 27, For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God. What does it mean to shun? He's like, I'm not going to avoid preaching anything. To shun means to avoid. And mainly it's avoiding it because you're embarrassed of it. Okay. You know, shame on the pastor who would be ashamed of talking about anything in the Bible. This is precious. This is the word of God. The law of the Lord is perfect. But look what it says in Second Timothy 2 14, Of these things put them in remembrance, charging them before the Lord, that they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers. Look what it says, Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly divided in the word of truth. Now we often think of, you know, a workman needeth not to be ashamed. We often apply that to, you know, don't be ashamed when people ask you Bible questions and you don't know what they're talking about. That's not what that's referring to. He's saying the workman, the one who's studying the Bible, should not be ashamed of the word of God. A workman that needeth not to be ashamed, you're rightly divided in the word of truth. You're not shunning the Bible. I don't think that's what it means. Well, look what it says in verse 16, But shun profane and vain babblings, for they will increase unto more ungodliness. And what we have today is pastors, preachers, and churches who are literally ashamed of hard sayings and teachings in the word of God. They're ashamed to talk about controversial things. Why? Well, let me, I have a verse for that. Mark 8 38 says, Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words, in this adulterous and sinful generation of him also shall the son of man be ashamed when he cometh in the glory of his father with the holy angels. God says, you're ashamed of me, I'm going to be ashamed of you. You know what? Today, you not only have pastors who are ashamed of the word of God, they're ashamed of the man of God. Nicodemuses. I have a lot of friends, believe it or not, that are Nicodemuses. They come to me by night. I'm serious. They would not fellowship with me with a ten-foot pole. They would not be seen in public with me. They would never like openly admit that they're my friends, but they will contact me and ask me Bible questions. They'll contact me and say, hey, what's your take on this verse and what do you believe about this and stuff like that? But you put us in a group setting with people from their church, it's just like, I don't know who that is. That's a new IFB preacher over there. They would not, put it this way. They wouldn't ask me those questions in public. They message me on Instagram, and then as soon as I answer, they erase the message, you know what I mean? Like, delete, delete. What are you doing? Nothing, nothing. Closet Nicodemus types. So why? Because they're ashamed of me, that's why. They're ashamed that they would even like, if someone caught them, you know, asking me a Bible question, it's like catching them with pornography or something. You say, doesn't that anger you? It used to, but not anymore. You know, I just get a kick out of the fact that I know that, you know, there's Bible college teachers that are teaching my doctrine that I taught their student. So I'm still teaching in Bible college. I'm still a Bible college teacher, amen. It's just secondhand. Because that's why they're asking. But they're ashamed of me. You should not be ashamed of the man of God. And look, you shouldn't be ashamed of me, you know, just like, man, I don't want to be in my family here because, you know, because of him, I talk about fags and stuff, and it's like, oh, you know, it's kind of just, oh, you know. Don't be ashamed of that. Now, if you have a fag for a family member, yeah, don't bring them. They're not welcome here, okay, you know, and I'm not ashamed to tell you that. But I don't want Jesus to be ashamed of me. You know, therefore, I need to be a workman that needeth not to be ashamed. You know, I need to be like, this is, I'm willing to tell this to anybody, regardless of who they are, okay. Go to 1 Peter chapter 5, if you would, 1 Peter chapter number 5. The Bible tells us, elsewhere whosoever therefore shall confess me before man, him will I also confess before my Father, which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before man, him will I also deny before my Father, which is in heaven. Hey, we need to make sure that we're not ashamed of the Lord, of the testimony of the Lord, and of his prisoner. We're not ashamed of the Word of God. You know, we never deny him. We need to deny ourselves and follow him, amen. Look at 1 Peter 5, 2 says, feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly, not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind, neither as being lords or for God's heritage, but being examples to the flock. And when the chief shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away. There's a reward waiting for those who are not ashamed of the Word of God, who are willing to proclaim it, give it without, you know, shunning it and just giving it the full, just complete Word of God, not trimming the message, not cutting corners, just giving it to him the way God puts it within his word, you know. And look, back to like the whole thing about being ashamed, there's like Sunday school teachers that contact me still. It's weird. They contact me, they're like, hey, so what do you think about this and, you know, but yet they go behind my back still and criticize me to their church members and talk about how, you know, how hateful we are and those Andersonites and all this stuff, but then their Nicodemus is coming to me by night still, you know, asking me for Bible knowledge. You know why? Because my preaching doesn't suck, that's why. That's why. Yeah, you better clear your history on your YouTube before anybody finds out you're listening to me. Go back to Jonah. So what I'm saying is this, is that preaching that God bids us to do is often hard. It's offensive. It's in your face. But you know what? That's why people keep coming back. That's why the church is growing. That's why people are growing. Because of the fact that God's word has power, it's not the vessel, it's not the person proclaiming it, it's the content that's coming out of the mouth, okay? So this is what he bids them to do. He says, go there and tell them they're going to be destroyed, okay? Verse 5, I almost hastened. So the people of Nineveh believed God and proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest of them, even to the least of them. So he comes and he's like, hey, 40 days Nineveh shall be overthrown and they're like, all right, you know? They start proclaiming a fast, they start getting right with God. It says, verse 6, for a word came unto the king of Nineveh and he arose from his throne. He laid his robe from him and covered him with sackcloth and satin ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his noble saying, let neither man nor beast, hurt nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed nor drink water. So he's proclaiming a fast even for the animals. Can't feed your poodle, can't feed your fish. No one's eating, okay? Very extreme, but obviously he's just like, I want to cover all bases is what he's saying. But let, verse 8, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and cry mightily unto God. Yea, let them turn everyone from his evil way and from the violence that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn and repent and turn away from his fierce anger that we perish not? So one thing that we can take from this, I'm going to give a couple of principles and what I believe this is referring to. The one thing we can take from this is that this king is very zealous. I mean, he's revenging all disobedience when his obedience is fulfilled as the Bible says. He's making sure that everyone repents. He's even placing potato sack, sackcloth on the animals themselves. He's like, God, I mean, we're all getting right with you. Please don't destroy us, okay? They're afraid, okay? So God is calling the city to repentance. Now what is the main sin that we see here that he's telling to repent of? Violence. Because he says in verse number 8, it says, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and cry mightily unto God. Yea, let them turn everyone from his evil way and from the violence that is in their hands. This is not to say that they're not guilty of other sins, but God saw it fit to talk about this specifically and he's saying, look, you guys are violent and look, we know what God thinks about violence. The Bible says that he hates the soul who commits violence. And in fact, he destroyed the whole world with the flood because of violence. Now here's the thing, so people often wonder like, did people get saved in Nineveh? Is this what's taking place? I'm not saying that people did not get saved in Nineveh, but I don't believe this is referring to the salvation of the individuals found within Nineveh. And the reason for that is because of the fact that he's telling them to turn away from their wicked ways, okay? That's not how people get saved. They don't get saved by repenting of their sins. He said, so what's being saved here? The nation is, okay? You see, individuals get saved by believing on the Lord, by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ, whereas nations as a whole, they can avoid the judgment of God by turning from their wicked ways. If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray and turn from their evil ways, then I will hear from heaven and I will heal their land, he says. So in order to restrain the judgment of God upon a nation as a whole, that nation as a whole needs to live righteously, they need to turn from their wicked ways, from all whatever, whether it's sodomy that they're allowing in the land, whether it's drunkenness, it's violence, this is how God saves a nation, okay? And he does it through the preaching of God's word. So an individual does not get saved from hell by turning from their wicked ways, we understand that. Now why is it that the nation needs to repent of sin, to be spared but not an individual? Well, here's the thing. So he goes there, he preaches against the city, and he's preaching against the violence and they get right with God, okay? The Bible tells us in Psalm 9 verse 17 that the wicked shall be turned into hell and all nations that forget God, okay? So keep that in mind. So God is concerned with nations because nations are made up of individuals. But why does he care to save a nation per se and not just go to each individual? Because of this, when a nation turns from their wicked ways, they're basically legislating righteousness, they're legislating morality. So in other words, things that are sinful to God become criminal, right, to the individuals that legislate laws and rules to say, if you do this, you're gonna be punished. You know, if you commit murder, you shall surely be put to death. You commit sodomy, you shall surely be put to death, okay? You know, you steal or whatever, you know, there's laws in the land that begin to become legislated through the powers that be, right? And that's legislated throughout the land, that's enforced, consequences are put forth when you break God's commandments, specifically the laws of the land. You say, well, what does that have to do with salvation of the individual? Well, when you set forth laws that say, hey, there's consequences to your actions, that person lives with the understanding that my actions have consequences. So when the person realizes my actions have consequences and we give them the gospel, we tell them that the wages of sin is death, they're more apt to actually receive the gospel and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. That's how it works for any nation, okay? This is why God tells nations to repent of their sins, to turn from their evil ways. Why? Because when you do, it creates fertile ground for people to get saved. Because they realize, wow, you know, if I do this, I'm gonna pay the price, just as because I've sinned, I'm gonna pay the price as well. Look, this is why, for example, the Bible tells us regarding the chastisement of children, that if we chastise our children, thou shalt deliver his soul from hell. He's not telling you to beat the hell out of them. What he's saying is, when you chastise your child, it teaches them that life has consequences when you make the wrong actions. And they grow up understanding there's consequences to my actions, and their heart becomes fertile, becomes ready to receive the gospel, okay? Because part of the gospel, part of our deliverance of the gospel, is to tell them, you're on your way to hell, you're a sinner. You've broken God's commandments, okay? You know, as it is written, there's none righteous, no, not one. There's none adjustment upon earth to do with good and sin if not. You've broken God's commandments, and you deserve the punishment of hell. And then they understand that, because they've lived with that their entire lives, that they've suffered the consequences of their actions, and then they get saved, okay? Now look, this is also true for the Christian. Why? Well, because of the fact that we understand that, you know, when we repent of our sin, we're not repenting to maintain our salvation, we're repenting so God doesn't destroy us. So God doesn't pour wrath upon our lives, because the Bible tells us, in Hebrews chapter 12, that he will chastise us. And if we live without chastisement, we're bastards, the Bible says, okay? So when a nation legislates righteousness, it creates fertile ground for an individual to believe in God, trust Christ. And let me give you a perfect example of this, is, you know, on Monday, Lord willing, if I don't start vomiting tomorrow, we'll be in Belize. And I've heard nothing but great reports about Belize. You know, the people who have gone there before have told me that, you know, obviously Belize is colonized by the British, and because of that, they brought the King James Bible over there, and that's the main Bible that they use. And guess what's illegal in Belize, sodomy. It isn't any coincidence that the people in that land are super receptive towards the gospel. I mean, the missionaries who have gone there have told me, man, people get saved left and right, you can get them saved on the bus, on the way to, you know, the city they're going to, and the markets, and their houses. People are just receptive. Well, that's not by accident. The reason it's receptive is because there's still a little bit of righteousness in that land. Are you trying to tell me that just because sodomy is illegal in Belize, that that's why they're receptive? Yes, yes, of course. The rulers of that land, because they're legislating some form of righteousness, this is the reason why people are receptive towards the gospel, okay. Now, America, for example, we're not necessarily a Christian nation. Obviously, this is fag land, okay. But here's the thing, we do have as our foundation, in a sense, the Bible. People still believe in God. They're still getting saved. We've got a couple saved today. We're getting thousands saved since we started the church, okay. But obviously, the nation, our nation as a whole is going to hell in a handbasket. Just as Nineveh was destroyed, by the way. Nineveh repented here and God spared them, but we see later on in Nahum, I believe the book is, that Nineveh gets destroyed. It was another generation that rose up and God ended up destroying their nation. Well, guess what? Withhold the judgment of God upon America if we just keep doing what we're doing, but eventually, you know, America is going to be destroyed. If you don't believe me, go watch Babylon USA, okay. You know, our country is going to get destroyed, but one of the reasons why it's becoming less receptive in America is not because we're a Christian nation, but because we have an abundance of possessions. It's a very rich nation. And even the most poorest person still is like living like a king in comparison to real poor people in different countries, okay. Don't let these fools off the freeway with their signs, you know, need a dollar for karate classes, family got kidnapped by ninjas, whatever, need a dollar for karate classes, fooling them to thinking that they're actually poor. These people make thousands of dollars a week, okay. They're a bunch of derelict delinquent people who are just lazy. They need to get off their rear end and go get a job, okay. There's no such thing as poor people in America. The only poor person in America is the person who's unwilling to bring his hand to his mouth. They're so lazy, they can't even feed themselves, okay. They're poor in character is what they are. That's the only poverty that we have in America is the lack of character, the poverty in character and a work ethic to put in the hours necessary to make a paycheck and feed their family, okay. But there's no poor people here. You know, the reason people are getting so close to the gospel in different parts of America is because of the fact that the richness, the riches that America has and look, this is true in regards to a nation because a couple months ago, I went to Sweden, for example. That is a nation that's going to hell fast. You went there, you know, about a month ago, right, or two months ago or something. It's a wicked, I went over there, I'm like, nah, I'm gonna get people saved, come on. The gospel is the power of God and to salvation to everyone who believe it. I'm like, dude, these people are closed. But is it any wonder that the rulers there are freaking wicked as hell? Is it any wonder that these people are super, you know, atheistic and antagonistic towards the word of God? They're a bunch of feminists and abortionists and they just hate things that are of the Bible. This is why, you know, when the rulers are like that, the people who dwell within those nations, that's why they're unreceptive towards the gospel because they're not legislating morality. I don't think you should legislate morality, I do. God believes that. If you want to save your country, execute the laws of God. Make the laws of the land the laws of God. Start putting people to death for things that they're required to be put to death for, murder, But that's a whole other sermon in and of itself because of the fact that it's not because they don't want to put them to death, it's because they're making money off of the prison industrial complex is what it is. Make a lot of money off of the prison system so they need clients. They need, you know, they can't have vacancies within the prisons. They need money so that's why they keep them in the prisons there, okay? So what I'm saying is this is that Nineveh, you know, the reason Jonah's preaching to Nineveh is to save the nation so that individuals later on can be saved. This is the reason why, you know, the prophets of old preached against any nation in the Bible. It was to save the nation from impending judgment so that people can fear God and in turn individuals can be saved, okay? That's what it's for. Go back to Jonah, look at verse number 10. So they repented, they got rioted and it says, And God saw their works that they turned from their evil way and God repented of the evil that he had said that he would do unto them and he did it not. That's a huge blessing, you know, God's like, this shows you how great God's mercy and compassion is, you know? He's like, okay, you guys put it in the effort, I'm not going to destroy you, you know? And you know, who knows? Maybe America was supposed to be destroyed like 10 years ago, you never know. And maybe he began to see righteous churches who begin to rise up and prophets who begin to rise up and preach and say, you know what, because you guys are actually holding down the fort here in America, I'm not going to destroy our country or I'm not going to destroy America, okay? Now here's the thing is, look, it's not just new IV preachers too, by the way. There's churches out there who are independent fundamental Baptist, they may not have as much fire, they may not, you know, preach as hard, but if they're preaching the Bible, you know, that's a righteous church. If they're winning souls, if they're teaching people in the way of righteousness, you know, they're doing their job, okay? That's great. But we want to make sure that we as Jonah, we save our country the right way by preaching hard. We don't take the Cain West and Joel Osteen route where everything's just sweetness and light and, you know, it's a cookie cream type of Christianity that everyone just loves, you know, this is bitter. We need to give them the bitter waters, okay? And tell them of the impending judgment that's going to come on our nation here. I just want to thank you so much for your word and, Lord, I'm thankful for the Jonahs and the Ezekiels and the Jeremiahs in my life who preached hell, fire, and damnation and they scared the fire out of me and they put the fear of God in my heart and they made me, through their preaching, I got right with God, I cleaned up my life and I'm very thankful for them. I pray, God, that you'd help us to carry the baton, carry that torch, Lord, and pick up where they left off and help us to be the prophets and priests and preachers that need to preach the word of God to people and talk about the impending judgment upon a nation who disobeys God and I pray, God, that you'd fill us with your power and your spirit and obviously we don't want to save America just for the sake of saving America so we can be patriots. We want to save America so we can save, spiritually speaking, the individuals found within this nation and that's the most important thing and I pray, God, that you'd help us to do so. We love you, we thank you, and we pray these things in Jesus' name, Amen.