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Part of the chapter that I wanted to focus on was there in verse 22 where the Bible says, Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars' hill and said, Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious. For as I passed by and beheld their devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, To the unknown God, whom therefore ye eagerly worship, him declare I unto you. God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is the Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands, neither is worshipped with men's hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life and breath and all things, and hath made of one blood all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed in the bounds of their habitation, that they should seek the Lord if happily they might feel after him and find him, though he be not far from every one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being, as certain also of your own poets have said, for we are also his offspring. And I got the title of my sermon from this passage where it says, One blood, all nations. Now the Bible makes it very clear that there is no such thing as different kinds of people. We're all one blood, essentially. There's no such thing as what many scientists would call racist. Now throughout history, this idea of racism has existed, and even in the Bible. But the word race or racism is not really found in the Bible. The word race is found in the Bible four times, and every single time it's talking about running a race. It's talking about getting from point A to point B as fast as you can, and it may be being a competition, and there's other people running. That's the only concept of the Bible when it uses the word race, uses it four different times. But the concept of racism or the concept of being racist or something like that, it does lend itself to a lot of places in the Bible. There's a lot of places where the Bible's talking about it. And I think the word that comes to my mind would be prejudice. So prejudice would just mean that you kind of have some kind of disdain or dislike or you don't like something about somebody based on some kind of physical characteristic. The definition of racism according to the dictionary says the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially so as to English it as inferior or superior to another race or racist. So the dictionary definition is saying, you know, people that are all of this one race, they're all a lot alike. They have certain physical characteristics that define them in a certain way and that makes them maybe better or worse than other people. So they're looking at the exterior and saying, well, because this person's different, they must be better or worse. Really the concept of racism or that word in the English language didn't really come about until about the 17th century. It's defined back then as a classification of humans into groups based on physical traits, ancestry, genetics or social relations or the relations between them. So they're kind of grouping people based on who your dad is or who your grandfather was or what color skin you have or how tall you are or things that you can just look at someone and you can tell that they're different. Maybe what kind of area of the world that they live in. And by the 19th century though, with the onslaught of evolution, that's when racism really started to take off. That's when they really started classifying and really honing in. In the 19th century, they started noting racists as genetically different human populations. So they're saying, well, these people aren't just a little bit different. They're completely different types of humans. And so they really started making racists as some type of layer. And in 1885, the scientists of those days classified three races. You're either Mongolian, which meant you're from Asia or the Americas. They said Caucasian race, which was Europe or Northern Africa. And then the Negroid race, which was the middle South Africa or Australia. So about the 1800s, they said, oh, there's only three classifications of people. And they kind of just lump in. And I mean, man, to say that all the people in Asia, like India, all those places are the same as everybody in the Americas, that's kind of crazy to think about. I mean, they're just lumping people based on a whim is really all they're doing. But in today's society, they have about, in America, there's about five minimum races that basically everybody has to kind of map in if you go by what the government says. So they say that you're either A, an American Indian or Alaskan native, or two, you're an Asian, or three, you're black or African American, or four, native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, or five, white. Now the interesting thing about this is I worked as a computer programmer, and we did a lot of medical software. And so we had to meet all these government compliances. And when someone would register in the software, basically, they had to choose one of these types of races, they had to say, I am of this category. And the weird thing about it is usually a multi select. So you can say, you know, I'm a white, African American, you know, Alaskan native, you know, they have all these crazy things that you could come up with. And it's just a, it's just a fraud. Because in reality, in reality, back, you know, the 1800s, when travel wasn't as much, people were pretty much, you know, all the same in one continent. I mean, for the most part, they're isolated, they all look the same, they're all kind of the same. But when you look at travel and people moving, we have such a blending of the races. And even in America, we see a lot of people are blended together. But if you go back into history, if you go all the way back to the beginning, he's made of one blood, all nations. So we're made of one blood, we come from one person, Adam and Eve, we come from, and he was made by God. And if you have a second classification, where we all came from Noah, essentially, I mean, if you understand what happened with the flood. But the first point that I'm going to address, and we'll get back to the Bible, is that racism, I've seen that it really comes from false religion. If you want to really know where racism is coming from, it's almost always coming from false religion. Let's think about the big religions of today. How about Islam? Now, are they racist against any group of people? I mean, do they just hate people, a certain group of people that live real close to them maybe? How about the Jews? The Islamic people, people of the faith of Islam, love Jews. Well, let's see what they say in their Quran. It says, and well, you know, there were those among you, Jews, that transgressed the Sabbath, and we said to them, be you apes, miserably slinking. So according to the Quran, they consider Jews to be like an ape. I mean, they don't even classify them to be a human. And so we start, you can see in any kind of false religion, that they just classify other people as being inferior, as being something, you know, usually the most degrading thing, you call them an animal, or you can say they're like, they're not even really like a human. They're just kind of like a little bit smarter of an ape. And I mean, we see this in all kinds of false religion. And what's interesting about the Islamic faith is when Allah, when he was like writing his scriptures, at first, most of the scriptures are very kind unto Christians and unto Jews. They'll say a lot of things like they're our brothers, and they're just a little bit off, you know, we need to get them on to the real gospel. They say that, you know, they have the New Testament, they got, you got to get on to Allah and you got to understand our part of our faith. But as, as Muhammad, I'm sorry, as Muhammad's prophet, as he's trying to like, you know, build these relations with the Jews, they end up just kind of like saying, you're, you know, blasphemer, and you don't really worship our God and all these kind of things. So he started having a lot of conflict with the Jews. And the way Muhammad grew his religion is he would just come in and pillage all kinds of Jewish communities. And he would just kill all the men, and he would take the women as his sex slaves. I mean, this guy just sounds like a really good guy, right? I mean, the guy was supposed to be the next prophet after Jesus. I remember when Jesus was just raiding villages and pillaging and taking sex slaves and taking children to be his wives. I mean, that sounds just like Jesus, right? I mean, according to Islamic faith, Muhammad is better than Jesus. That's blasphemy. That's garbage. Anybody that has any kind of sense knows, hey, taking sex slaves is not a righteous thing. Taking a 14-year-old or 9-year-old to be your wife is not a righteous thing. And Islam, you know, as he started to do all these things and hate the Jews, you see in his scriptures, it turned. All of a sudden, he doesn't like the Jews anymore, and all of a sudden, just like slay them, you know, kill them. And the thing about it that's interesting to me is you have one man basically write some kind of book. And you see at the very beginning, it's like, oh, we love them, we be kind to them, we should, you know, treat them well. And then it's just like slay them, and it's just so, you know, bi-polar. And that's what the Islam religion is like. It's so bi-polar. So it just lends itself to you can just believe whatever you want. But if you think about the Bible, it was written over the course of 2,000 years approximately by 40 different people. It has the same message over and over and over. It's consistent. To Him give all the prophets witness that through His name is to receive their mission of sins, right? Of the name of Jesus Christ. Can you imagine getting together 40 of your buddies and to say, let's all write a story and just have one cohesive thought. I mean, this false prophet can't even have one cohesive thought by himself. That just makes it so much more that the Bible is God's word that we can know we can trust it because it's so consistent. In these books like the Quran, you can know it's false because it's just so contradictory. It's so bi-polar. And it lends itself to racism. What about another religion? How about Hinduism? Now, I don't know a ton about Hinduism, but I kind of was researching a little bit. They basically have like four classifications of people. They kind of have like a caste system, kind of. It's not exactly like a caste system, but one of their lower classifications of people is the Shudra or Sudra. And it says that sudroid blacks are repeatedly referred to as animals and never treated as humans in the Hindu scriptures. Here's, here's some Hindu scriptures for you, having killed a cat and a blue jay, a frog, a dog, an iguana, an owl, or a coral, he shall perform the penance for the murder of a sudra. So he's saying if you kill this person, if you kill a man that's a sudra, then you know, you can just kill one of these animals and it's just, it's, it's okay. It's just receiving, it's basically remission of sins according to their scriptures. So instead of, you know, offering a perfect lamb for sacrifices or sins, which, you know, murderers are put to death according to the Bible, they're saying, you know, it's not that big of a transgression. Just kill your dog, just kill a frog, just kill whatever, it's okay. But then there was another quote in here. It says the murder of a sudra by a Brahmin is equal only to killing a cat or a frog or a cow. According to Hindu, I mean, they look at these people as, you know, just as worthless as a frog. I mean, just killing a frog is like killing a human. It says, you may breed cows and dogs in your house, says you may drink the urine of cows and swallow cow dung to expediate your sins, but you shall not approach an adi-dravida. I mean, they think, you know, that cows and animals are just the same as these people and they say for remission of sins, you should drink the urine of cows and swallow cow dung to expediate your sins. Now, that's a religion that I can't get behind. I mean, I don't even know how anybody can say that's the truth. That's the God that I want to worship, the one that tells me I have to eat cow dung to get rid of my sins. But they look at, even in women, I'll read you one other quote that says, killing of a woman, a sudra, or an atheist is not sinful. Women is an embodiment of the worst desires, hatred, deceit, jealousy, and bad character. Women should never be given freedom. Now that's from Hinduism. I mean, they say that Islam, you know, represses women, I would say that's way worse. I mean, they're basically saying a woman is like the worst thing ever. Now that's not what the Bible teaches. The Bible says in Proverbs 19, house and riches are the inheritance of fathers and a prudent wife is from the Lord. And of course, killing a man is always sin, according to the Bible. I mean, you can't go out and just kill people and it's not a sin just because there are some different cassism, just because of who their dad is. Bible says in Proverbs 18, 22, whoso findeth a wife, findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favor of the Lord. The Bible says that a wife is a good thing. It's not full of deceit and hatred and all these horrible things. No, I love my wife. My wife is, you know, the Bible says she's going to be a help me unto me, and she is. I love that I can come home and she's cooked a meal for me, she's, you know, cleaned the house. I mean, having a good wife is a great thing and women are to be greatly valued in Christianity. But we see in these false religions, they're always making different kind of classifications of people. They're always lifting certain people up and they're tearing other people down. What about Mormonism? I mean, does Mormonism, I mean, what about the Mormons? Well, I read this one verse, I don't know, I've never really read the Book of Mormon. I don't read much of it, but I found this one verse one time, and it's really interesting. It says in Jacob 3.5, I'll read you a couple of other verses with it. It says, Behold, the Lamanites, your brethren, whom you hate because of their filthiness and cursing, which hath come upon their skins, are more righteous than you, for they have not forgotten the commandment of the Lord, which is given unto our father, that they should have saved it were one wife, and concubines they should have none, and there should not be whoredoms committed among them. So he's saying, look, I mean, if you have filthiness and cursing, it's come upon your skin, meaning your skin color is going to change based on how filthy of a life you are. And it's interesting, in the back of this verse, it says that you shouldn't have more than one wife, and a concubine would be a sin. Well, what happened with Joseph Smith? I mean, the guy had like 30 wives, but I'll read a couple more verses from their book. It says, and now, this commandment they observed to keep, wherefore, because of this observance in keeping this commandment, the Lord God will not destroy them, but will be merciful unto them, and one day they shall become a blessed people. Behold, their husbands love their wives, and their wives love their husbands, and their husbands and their wives love their children, and their unbelief and hatred towards you is because of the iniquity of their fathers. Wherefore, how much better are you than they in the sight of your great Creator? O my brethren, I fear, that unless you repent of your sins, that your skins will be whiter than yours, when you shall be brought with them before the throne of God. So the Book of Mormon teaches that if you repent of your sins, your skin will be whiter, and that if you're not repenting of your sins, your skin is going to be darker. That's why for so many years, the Mormons never had a black person in their church, because they literally thought that they were like some cursed people, that they were just these wicked sinners, just because of the color of their skin. Not because of what they were doing, not because of who they believed in, not because of their faith, not because of the fact that they were transgressing God's laws, but because of the color of their skin. And now they've kind of tried to back down on that, after being so ridiculous to say that, hey, if I go out and I work really hard in the field, and I get a tan, I guess I was really sinning really bad, according to Mormon scriptures. I mean they're saying, look, you've got to repent of your sins, so that your skin will be white enough to get into heaven. That's ridiculous. And you know, the King James Bible never says you have to repent of your sins. But the Mormon, the Book of Mormon says it eight times. But then we get to another religion, and it is a religion, the religion of evolution. The fact that we all came from nothing, or the big bang theory, or that nothing created everything, or you know, even Charles, or Richard Dawkins says that maybe it was aliens that did it. But essentially they just believe there's no God. Now that's a religion, because the definition of religion is the cause and why of the universe. Well, the big bang theory does try to give you the cause and why of the universe, but not by science, by faith. You have to believe that there is no God. You have to believe that we just evolved from nothing, that we just slowly transformed over millions and billions and thousands of hundreds of years. It's a religion. And who did it lend itself to? How about Hitler? A lot of people say, oh, Hitler was a Christian. Now Hitler was a Catholic that converted him to evolution, and he believed that there were superior races. And that's where racism comes from. It comes from false religion. It comes from people deciding, hey, I think we're better than those people, just based on physical characteristics, or based on who their dad is, or based on where they live, or based on physical appearance, but that's not what the Bible teaches. You know, even Darwin, he convinced so many people of his evolution garbage that many British scientists, they traveled to places in Australia and places in Africa, and they were capturing people and killing them just to collect their skulls so that they could, you know, present all these different skull shapes to say that evolution really happened. And they said these people, they're not even humans. They're just like a step above an ape. Reminds me of another religion, you know, like Hinduism, like Islam. How are all these false religions the same, because they all came from Satan. But how about one other religion? How about the religion of Judaism? Now, does this religion have any racism? Well, it's interesting because if you read some of their scriptures, the Talmud, not the Old Testament, it says, you are Adam, man, but goyim, Gentiles, are not called Adam, man. So in their scriptures, they say, look, the only people that are men, or the only people that is a man, is a Jew, and that all the Gentiles, all the goyim, they're not really men. It says in the Sanhedrin, the seed of the goyim is like an animal. Now, the Bible says that everything breaks forth after its own kind. So if our seed is an animal, what are they trying to say? They're trying to say that the Gentiles, they're just producing other animals. Says in Yebomath, says all Gentile children are animals. I mean, they just come out and say it. I mean, they literally think that you're an animal. They do not think that you're a human. Now, I can't even think one could be more racist than that. Says in another version, it says, the best of the Gentiles kill it. The best of snakes smash its skull. The best of women is filled with witchcraft. So the uncensored version of this text appears in the Tractate Soferim. Another place, it says, the best of the Gentiles should all be killed. This comes from the original Hebrew and Babylonian Talmud. I mean, if you read the Talmud, how in the world can you say that these people, you know, they love Jesus Christ. They love Christians. No, they think you're an animal. And they blaspheme the name of Jesus Christ. But all these false religions is where racism really comes from. It doesn't come from the Bible. It doesn't come from God-fearing people. And, you know, we look at American history, there was a lot of racism in this country, even though it was considered, you know, a God-fearing country. But was it really coming from the Bible? Was it coming from all these false religion, all these false ideas getting kind of mixed in? And I would even say for myself, growing up in a public school, I mean, I took races as just a fact. I mean, you go to school and you're reading the science book and they say there's, you know, these different types of races of people and people are different. And you kind of fall for the idea that, you know, there are tangible differences between people that really make a difference, like that matter. Now, of course, obviously there are differences between people. People are taller, people are shorter, people are bigger. The Bible says a lot of things about that. I mean, the Bible talks about people being larger, you know, being big-boned, as it were. Or the Bible talks about people being tall, like giants, talk about David being rooty or being ruddy, being short. I mean, the Bible makes classifications between male and female. The Bible makes classifications about the color of people's skin, talking about people being lighter skinned, people being darker skinned. So of course, seeing physical traits and looking at people and classifying them, that's not a sin. It's not a sin to say that there's people that are different, and these people over in this area are a little bit different, but what's a sin would be to say that that has some kind of significant importance, to say that some person is inferior to another person because of these physical traits. So let's turn to Genesis chapter, let's turn to Galatians chapter 2. I'll read for you in Genesis chapter 43. Galatians chapter 2. In Genesis 43 the Bible says, and they set on for him by himself and for them by themselves and for the Egyptians which did eat with them by themselves because the Egyptians might not eat bread with the Hebrews, for that is an abomination unto the Egyptians. So in the Bible's talking in Genesis with Joseph, and Joseph's there with the Egyptians, he's you know, becomes second in command, it was still an abomination for the Egyptians to eat with the Hebrews. Now we see in the Bible a lot of times that this racism comes up, that people are prejudiced against another nation, or they're prejudiced against other types of people just because they're of that nation, or just because of how they look, or just because of how they sound. It says in Galatians chapter 2 verse 11, but when Peter was come to Antioch, I would have stood him to the face because he was to be blamed, for before that certain came from James he did eat with the Gentiles, but when they were come he withdrew and separated himself fearing them which were of the circumcision, and the other Jews assembled likewise with them, insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dis-immolation, but when I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto Peter before them all, If thou, being a Jew, lives after the manner of Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compelest thou to Gentiles to live as do the Jews? So is he even Christians, even men of God, could get caught up in this? They could say, you know what, I was sitting with these Gentiles, these people that are unclean or uncommon in the Jews eyes, and when they came, when they're coming up to visit, Peter's like, I can't be seen with these guys. I can't say that I, you know, this guy's my brother, you know, I think he's the same as me, so I gotta withdraw myself. I gotta, you know, judge these people based on where they come from, what nation they are. And that's always gonna be a sin. You see, Paul thought this was such a big deal that he was stood Peter to the face. Can you imagine thinking another brother in Christ, such a great man of God, he's making such a big sin that you gotta withstand him to the face? But that's what we should do when it comes to this racist garbage, that we should have no respect with persons is what God says, and we'll turn to a lot of different places, but even in the Old Testament, they weren't supposed to do that. Think of Ruth, how well she was treated by Boaz. He was very kind unto her. He gave her, you know, the best of the gleanings of the field, and he treated her very kind, but she was not of their lineage. She was not a Jew. She was a Moabites woman. What about the Queen of Sheba? When she came unto Solomon, did Solomon say, oh, you're these goyim, you're this animal, you're these animals, so get away from me. No. He answered all that was in her heart. He gave her all the questions of God. He was kind unto her. And we should be kind unto all people, and it's not a New Testament doctrine, it's the whole Bible. God's not a respecter of persons in any part of it. So the first point is that when it comes to racism, it's not found in the Bible, as far as that we should be racist, that we should have prejudice. Now there is people that were prejudiced, and it's wrong. The Bible makes it very clear. But the Bible makes it clear that there's not to have any prejudice based on the physical traits of different people, or how tall they are, how they sound, or how they dress even. I mean, a lot of people have prejudice just on how you dress. Now as long as it's not sinful, I mean, who cares what you wear? The Bible says, turn to Acts chapter 10, turn to Acts chapter 10, we're going to go through Acts a little bit. In Titus 1, the Bible says, one of themselves, even a prophet of their own said, the Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, slow bellies. So the Jews, they hated the Cretans. They said all of them were liars. They're all wicked, they're all terrible, they just had this prejudice against everybody that was a Cretan. Now you're going to say that every Cretan was just the worst person, they're just all bad, they're just all wicked. I mean, can you even believe the testimony of the Jews? I mean, the Bible was saying that we shouldn't take their testimony as truth, as if it could be condemned. But the Bible says that God is not a respecter of persons, and that's my second point. In Proverbs 28, the Bible says, to have respect of persons is not good, for a piece of bread that man will transgress. In Romans chapter 2, the Bible says, but glory, honor, and peace to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile, for there is no respect of persons with God. The Bible says in James chapter 2, the opening verse is, my brethren, have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons. Now in the Bible, you know, prejudice is not always just about, you know, physical traits as far as like how you look, your skin color, but even money. I mean, in James chapter 2 makes it very clear that one of the biggest prejudices that people have is they like, you know, rich people and they hate poor people. They look at the rich person and they want to be their friend, and they look at the poor person that despise them in their heart, and we shouldn't have any prejudice. God is no respecter of persons in any way, but we're kind of focusing on what the world considers racism. Look at Acts chapter 10 verse 25 says, and as Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him and fell down at his feet and worshiped him. But Peter took him up saying, stand up, I myself also am a man. And as he talked with him, he went in and found many that were come together. And he said unto them, ye know how that is not an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company or come unto one of another nation. But God has showed me that I should not call any man common or unclean. Therefore came I unto you without gainsaying. As soon as I was set for, I asked therefore what intent you have sent me for me. So now the Jews, they were kind of mixed up on this racism a little bit. They kind of liked themselves a little bit. They kind of thought, well, we're God's chosen people, and all these other people, they're just all unclean. They're just, they're not worthy of us. We can't even sit with them, we can't even talk with them. Now that's not what God had in mind. God had in mind the children of Israel to be a light unto Gentiles, to be a witness, to show forth God's righteousness and mercy and love and compassion. He talked about how they were strangers in Egypt, and how when a stranger had come unto them that they should treat them well. I was at the love of God to say, oh, you coming unto me, you're inferior. I can't even talk to you, you're just, you're so low, you're so beneath me, you're so unclean. You know, when we go out souling and we talk to different people, they might not be in an independent fundamental Baptist church. They might not have been raised the same way you are, but we shouldn't look down upon them just because they're different, just because they don't have, you know, everything the same as you. We should be gentle unto all men. One time we were sinners, one time we didn't know the truth, and we should be kind and compassionate unto every single person. We should have no respect of persons, and we should never call any man common or unclean. Every man has value unto the Lord. The Bible says, Acts chapter 10, look down a little bit further, look at verse 34, it says, Then Peter opened his mouth and said of a truth, I perceive that God is no respecter of persons, but in every nation he that feareth him and worketh righteousness is accepted with him. So is there anybody in any nation that can't be right with God? No, the Bible's saying, look, anybody that fears God and does well, then it's going to be accepted. If he worketh righteousness, God's not a respect of persons that you can, you know, if you don't live in, you know, God's holy land, that you can't be right with God. No, you can be right with God anywhere on this planet. In any nation, anywhere, he's saying, look, but in every nation he that feareth him and worketh righteousness is accepted with him. So you can be living anywhere on this planet and be right with God. Now, of course, obviously, the Bible gives us a lot of direction on maybe where we should live or types of things. I don't think we should be in some commune. We should be isolated where we can't go out preaching the gospel, where we can't reach people. I don't think that would necessarily be right. But obviously, this is saying, look, you could live basically anywhere in this world, any nation. And if you're doing what God says, you could be right with God. In Isaiah chapter 49, y'all turn to Acts 14, flip over just a couple more chapters, Acts 14. In Isaiah 49, verse 6, it says, and he said, Is it a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and destroy the preserved of Israel? I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth. So even in the Old Testament, what were the Jews supposed to do? They were supposed to be salvation unto the end of the earth. They were supposed to let everybody know God's glory. They were supposed to try and get everybody's sake. Were they supposed to, you know, oh, I can't eat with you, oh, I can't be seen with you, oh, I can't go out here, oh, I can't talk to these people, oh, I don't like this nation. No, they're supposed to be a light unto everybody. Now, of course, the Bible says, you know, we shouldn't just be living with wicked, ungodly people. We shouldn't be just, you know, feasting with those that are, you know, riotous and, you know, just chasing after wicked things. But the Bible's not saying that you just can't go to some nation. The Bible doesn't say in the Old Testament, it didn't say in the New Testament. In Acts chapter 14 and verse 5, the Bible says, But there rose up a certain of the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying that it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses. And the apostles and elders came together for to consider this matter. And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up and said to them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by mouth should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God, who should know of the hearts, bared them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us, and put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. Look, there's no difference between any person on this earth. We're all of one blood. We all came from one man, Adam and Eve, we came from one woman, that's why the Bible says she's the mother of all living, because we all came from those two people. And it's kind of crazy to think that we have so many differences in our physical traits today. It's amazing how God gave us so much in our DNA and our genetics, that we can have so much diversity. I mean there is quite a bit of diversity between a seven foot tall black guy and some pale white young little girl. I mean that's, obviously there's a lot of physical difference there, but we're all of one blood. And even if you go down to the DNA level, there's really, I can't remember exactly, but I saw some scientific study that was saying like, only like .2% of DNA is different between like humans. And most of that percentage is just encompassed by physical traits. Like when it just comes to how your organs are and everything else, I mean our DNA is so similar. And it just comes to lend itself to the fact that we are of one blood. And there are orders of maggots different than animals. The Bible makes that very clear. Turn with me if you would again in Acts. Actually go back to Genesis, go all the way back to the beginning of Genesis, go to Genesis chapter 10. And I'll read for you in Deuteronomy 32, it says in verse 7, remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations, ask thy father and he will show thee, thy elders and they will tell thee. When the most high divided the nations, their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel. So the Bible is saying that God, when he divided the nations, their inheritance, he was separating the sons of Adam. Now look at Genesis 10 verse 32, the Bible says, these are the families of the sons of Noah after their generations, in their nations, and by these were the nations divided in the earth after the flood. So God's saying look, everybody came from Noah after the flood, when he wiped out all of mankind, there was only 8 people from the ark, he's saying he divided the sons of Noah into their nations and by these were the nations divided in the earth after the flood. How do we have the nations that we have today from the dividing of Noah's sons? Flip over a couple more chapters to Genesis 17, I'll start reading in verse 3, and Abraham fell on his face and God talked to them saying, as for me behold my covenant is with thee and thou shalt be a father of many nations. Now I don't know if the Jews have ever read this verse, but it says that Abraham was a father of many nations, not just one. You know, they kind of like to think that they're just the only people that came from Abraham. No, Abraham was this father of many nations. Look at verse 5, it says, neither shall thy name anymore be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham, for a father of many nations have I made thee, and I will make thee exceeding fruitful and I'll make nations of these and kings shall come out of thee, and I will establish my covenant between thee and thy seed after thee and their generations, for an everlasting covenant to be a god unto thee and thy seed after thee. You know, the interesting thing is the Jews claimed that they were special because they were Abraham's, you know, Abraham was their father, but the people that they have the most conflict with, what, the sons of Ishmael? I mean, he also had a father, guess what his name was? Abraham. You know, Abraham is a father of many nations, and when it's talking about the blessing, it's talking about Jesus Christ, and we can all be blessed in the Lord Jesus Christ, every single nation. Now, of course, God chose a peculiar people. He chose a special people to be his chosen people and do wonderful miracles and give them the oracles of God and lead them, you know, give them salvation and give us a lot of examples of how to live the Christian life, of things to do, of what salvation really means. And, you know, there's a lot of people even today where people have more privilege than others. I mean, wouldn't it be great to be born in America unto a God-fearing family that goes to an independent Baptist church? That person has a lot of opportunity in their life. What about, as opposed to somebody living in Malawi, the poorest country on the earth, where if you work all day you get one dollar. Now, that person doesn't have the same privileges in life. They don't have the same, maybe, calling. But God has equal value. He's not a respecter of persons. When it comes to the law, he's not going to look at you in America and say, oh, you're lying? Well, you get a pass. But this guy over here, he's not going to get a pass. No, God's not a respecter of persons when it comes to judgment. He doesn't care how much money you have. He doesn't care what color of skin you are. He doesn't look at you the same way we look. He looks at your heart. So the second point is that God is not a respecter of persons. And when it comes to racism, it comes from false religion. It doesn't come from this book. You know, a lot of Christians have taught, you know, racism. They believed a lot of racist things. But they weren't getting it from this book. And I'll just, you know, it's interesting, there's this convention called the Southern Baptist Convention. Now, the interesting thing about the Southern Baptist Convention is in the, with the Civil War times, there's basically one big Baptist Convention, National Baptist Convention. And now, when there was this big conflict about slavery, about who should have slave owners, well, the convention was in the north, and the convention passed a new legislation that said, if anybody wants to be a missionary, and we're going to financially support them, they cannot be a slave owner, because the Bible condemns, you know, slavery and, you know, all this racism and all this stuff. And the south said, well, you know what, they've just transgressed us and they've broken covenant. So we're going to separate and call ourselves the Southern Baptist Convention. You want to know where the Southern Baptist Convention came from? It came from wanting to have slavery. About, they had nothing to do with the Bible, it had nothing to do with about being Baptist. The Southern Baptist Convention was born of racism, was born of slavery. Now, of course, a lot of them probably did believe a lot of the Bible, maybe even a lot of them were saved. But it didn't come from this book, and you got to separate the two, that racism comes from false religion, it comes from man's heart, it comes from pride, it comes from arrogance, it comes from wanting to lift oneself up, wanting to have more power, to put other people down. It doesn't come from this Bible. And even if a Christian is racist, it's not coming from this book. And I would not want to be a part of an association that was founded because of racism. And they're on the wrong side. But let's look at our third point. Go with me to Jonah. We're going to look at Jonah because I think the story of Jonah really focuses on this point. But in Mark chapter 16, the Bible says, and he said to them, go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Now how are you going to preach to every creature if you have prejudice against others? If you decide that some people are better than others, if you have respect of persons, if you're deciding, you know, I don't really like those people. How are you going to preach to every creature? So first of all, this racism is coming from false religion. Second point, that God's not a respecter of persons. And why? You know, we didn't preach to every creature. And if we get all the racism out of our own heart, if we get purged with God's Word, if we understand that we're all one blood, if we all understand that God's not a respecter of persons, it'll be easier for us to want to preach to every creature. It'll be easier to have more love in our heart towards men. Look at Jonah chapter 3 verse 10. And God saw their work that they turned from their evil way and God repented of the evil that he said that he would do unto them. And he did it not. Now the story of Jonah is a really well-known story, a lot of people know this very well. But Jonah was told to go preach into the city of Nineveh and he didn't want to so he fled from the presence of the Lord, is what the Bible says. But eventually he was swallowed by a whale because of his disobedience and then he was spit out. And now he had a fear of God on him because he'd been in the belly of a whale for three days and three nights. And you know, he described it as being like hell and it probably was pretty horrible. So he's like, you know what? It's better to just serve God. It's better to just do what God said even if I didn't want to do it. So he goes into the city and he says, you know, you have 40 days and Nineveh should be overthrown. He just preached a hard message. He said, get 40 days and the city of Nineveh should be overthrown. But then what happened? They repented. They, you know, they put on sackcloth and ashes and they ended up getting right with God and God saw their works that they turned from the evil way and God repented of the evil that he said he'd do unto them and he did it not. But look at verse, look at chapter four, look at verse one, it says, but it displeased Jonah exceedingly and he was very angry and he prayed to the Lord and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying when I was yet in my country, therefore I fled before in a Tarshish, for I knew that thou art a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and a great kindness and repentance be of the evil. Therefore now, Lord, take I beseech thee my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live. Jonah had so much hatred in his heart for these people of Nineveh that he was like, he wanted to die after he saw them all get right with God. He didn't even want to go. He was so, he, and he said, was this not my saying? He's saying, look, I was saying before I even, you know, fled from your presence of the Lord, that if I go there and preach, they'll probably get right with God because I know that God's merciful and he'll probably not destroy their city. I mean, he's saying, look, I know God's merciful, I know that he's gracious, I know he's slow to anger and he's going to repent of his evil. So if I go and I preach this message unto these people, they're going to get right with God. But he didn't want that. He wanted them to be destroyed. And now in America today, there's a lot of Christians, there's a lot of people that would be fine if some nations on this earth got wiped away and even I myself got carried away. I would say, you know, maybe five, seven, eight years ago when there was a lot of tension like right after 2001, right? When we thought we were bombed by terrorists, we thought, you know, all these Muslims are trying to kill us. They're coming, they're bombing our country and they're, they're, they're radicalized. They all want to murder us and, you know, I just felt for it to look like a seeker. It's a bunch of lies because obviously our government did it and then we come in there and we're the great Satan unto them, but that's a different sermon. But the point is I fell hook, line and sinker with the idea that all these people, these Muslim nations just deserve to die. That you know what? We just nuked them off the face of the planet. Was that the spirit of God? Now that's the spirit of Jonah. And you know, if I thought, man, if I go over to this country and I preach the gospel, a lot of people might get saved, but I'd rather just nuke them. Just get rid of them. Just wipe them off the planet. That's a wicked and ungodly attitude. We should never have that attitude towards any nation because there's going to be a lot of people, no matter where you go, that if you preach the gospel, they'll get saved and we should have love for other people. We should never take the attitude of Jonah. We should never be racist. And a lot of people in America, you know, we struggle with that word because it's politically incorrect to be racist. You say, oh, you know, I'm not racist, but bomb them Muslims. You know, it's like, what are you saying? I mean, they have this compartmentalized idea that, you know, because of slavery, we got to have affirmative action, but, you know, we can just bomb the Middle East. We can just bomb, you know, China. We can just bomb South or North Korea. We can just, you know, nuke Russia, whatever country, one of the most hated countries in the world. It doesn't matter. We as Christians, as God's people, should say, you know what, we're one blood and we should want to go ahead and preach the gospel unto those people. You know, I'm not going to read for the sake of time all of Jonah, but God has this gourd go over the top of Jonah to protect him from the sun and the gourd perishes and Jonah's angry. He's like, man, I really wanted that gourd and he's upset that the gourd perished. And God was saying, how can you be upset that a plant would die, but not that 600,000 people would die? I mean, that's, I mean, to put it in perspective, he's saying, look, you care that the stupid plant died and you don't even care that this great city of 600,000 people would die? How much more as a Christian should we have that love towards other people and decide, you know what, I want all people to be saved. And I was trying to think of a city that I thought was really kind of fitting in this. And to me it was Mexico City, because I think a lot of Americans today look down upon Mexico. They look down upon that country, they say, that's just, you know, that's a disgusting place, that's a dangerous place, that's a place I would never want to go to. But Mexico City is one of the largest cities in the world. Just by looking at some of the statistics, they say in the city proper, there's 8.8 million people. That's a lot of people. And if you look at the surrounding area, it's 21.2 million people. You know, I've heard a lot of people in this church saying that Catholics are really easy to get saved. That they're some of the most receptive people. And we know that Mexico's pretty poor. If you look at their statistics, Mexico City is 82% Roman Catholic. 82%. I mean, talk about some receptive soul-winning. But you know, there's a lot of missionaries that go out there and they're banging their head against the wall at countries that are not receptive. They go on to North Korea. There's a list of the top 10 least Christian-friendly countries. North Korea is one of them. And when I was going to an infinite funnel Baptist church, there was a guy coming to there that wanted to go to North Korea. What if this guy decided to go to Mexico? How many more people could he get saved? And you know, when Paul, we don't have time to get there, but when Paul was speaking of the Jews, he was banging his head against the wall a lot. And eventually he said, judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. The Bible teaches that you should go where it's receptive. That you should go where you can get a lot of people saved. And now do you think if Paul had just stayed there and preached to those Gentiles day after day that he might've gotten one or two or three of them saved? He probably could have. But if he goes into the Gentiles, he can get thousands and thousands and plant churches and start a big move of God. You know what? I think of a guy from our church who was a native in Spanish, which we have a lot of people like that, decided the purpose of his heart to go to Mexico city, he can do big things for God. He can save a lot of people. Says in James chapter two, but to give respect to persons, you commit sin and are convinced of the law as transgressors. We shouldn't, you know, it's not as popular, it's not as exciting in Mexico city. A lot of people are like, you know, I want to go to, you know, somewhere in Europe. I want to go to Africa on the safari. I want to go to these cool places like Mexico city. I don't want to go there, but then, you know, the Bible says we shouldn't have any respect for persons. We shouldn't say, Oh, these people are inferior. These people are, you know, I don't care if those people get saved. No, we should have a love for people. And if you just want to get a high soul count, if you just want to win as many people to I think that would be a great place to go. But, you know, missionaries are going to North Korea, North Korea. No, the Jews were not receptive, you know, I was looking at that military gets saved website that's a lot of people have used or heard about, you know, they, they have some listings in Mexico, but they only have seven listings in Mexico. I mean, there's not, I don't think there's been that many missionaries that have gone to Mexico, at least from an independent bottom of the Baptist church, but I did find one and they, you know, cause I was interesting, do they even allow Solane? You know, is it like legal? Is it something that's looked upon like that you could even do? There's a church that I found in Puebla and they said that they passed out a hundred thousand tracts in one day at some break and said they went into some small town, 16 of them, and they went to Solane and they got 30 people saved and 15 of them came to their church the next day. I mean, it sounds like a really good place. It sounds like a place that could be really receptive in the gospel. And I talked to a brother Garrett, he said, you know, they have all kinds of religious praise going up and down the streets. He said when he was with the charismatic movement that they were like parading up in the streets about Jesus and all kinds of things. I mean, I think Mexico city's probably, I've never been there. I've never gone, but from the looks of it, it sounds like it could be a really great place for Solane. You know, when there's only seven churches in an entire country, that's pretty sad. I mean, you think about a city of 20 million people. I mean, you could just have, you could probably have a thousand churches. I mean, but that's never going to happen. But if someone would get on fire for God, they could do a big work and they go to Revelation chapter seven, that's where we're finished. So I was looking at another list and it was most hated countries in the world. It's kind of an interesting list. Guess who's number one? America. I mean, we're so great. We just love ourselves. Number two, Israel. Number three, North Korea. Number four, Russia. Number five, Germany. Number six, Japan. Now these are all, you know, like powerhouse countries. They've exceeded a lot of dominance over the world. You know, they've had really bad wars. I mean, think about Hitler. I mean, I wonder why Germany's hated. You know, you think about America and their acts of, you know, confronting terrorism. I wonder why we're hated. Israel bombing people, Russia with all their murder, but you know, number seven is Mexico and you know, nobody thinks of Mexico as some like world dominant power that went and just like slaughtered all these people. You know, people just despise Mexico. They just despise the people of that country and to me it makes me think of Nineveh. The fact that they did, they said in Nahum that it was a bloody city when they're talking about the city of Nineveh, you know, Mexico has really high crime rates. Look at Revelation chapter seven verse nine, it says, After this behold, and lo, a great multitude, which no man could number of all nations and kindreds and people and tongues stood before the throne and before the land, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands, and cried with a loud voice, saying, salvation to our God who sitteth upon the throne and unto the land. You know what, the Bible says that there's going to be people saved from every nation and I believe God wants to send a prophet unto Mexico. You know, and if there's some man of God that, you know, has the native tongue of Spanish, you know, speaking Spanish, he might say, I don't want to go back to Mexico, but I think you could do great things for God and we shouldn't despise in our heart. We shouldn't have any racism in our heart and say, you know what, I just hope that nation goes to hell. I'm going to stay where it's, you know, fun and exciting and there's all the cool people and all the rich people. No, I mean, most of the people that I know that are really good at sewing, really love sewing. They love going into the poor neighborhoods. They love, and I mean, I think Mexico, it's just poor neighborhood after poor neighborhood after poor neighborhood, just Catholic after Catholic after Catholic. I mean, I think you could get, I honestly believe that if someone got on fire for God and went there to start a big church, that they could see over a hundred thousand people saved from their ministry, from the people that they're training in their church, from being able to start other churches, from going out soul winning day after day after day. I mean, I think you could see big numbers for God or you could go to North Korea and see two people saved. I mean, what, what does God really want you to do? Does God want you to sit there and bang your head against the wall with the Jews or a little turn unto the Gentiles? But you know, I think what stops a lot of people is that, is having some prejudice in their heart. Deciding, you know what, I don't, I don't really like those people. I don't really like, you know, that nation. I don't really like that people's culture. I don't really like, you know, Paul said that he became a servant unto all. He became all things that he might at least means, by all means, save some. Paul did not have respect of persons. He wanted to see the world saved. And you know, I think we as Christians should be the same way. We should never look at another nation, at another person with anything but love in our hearts and decide, you know what, they're a child of God if they believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I wouldn't win that person to Christ. Let's bow our heads in prayer. Thank you Jesus for your word. Thank you that you have no respect of persons that no matter who, what family we're born in, no matter what nation we are, that we can still do big things for you, that we can be accepted in your sight if we fear you and we live righteously. I just thank you for everyone in this room. I pray that, you know, you might raise up a man of God that would go to some of these countries that aren't looked upon in as much favor, that they could do a great work for God, that they could see many people saved. I just thank you for this church and everyone in this room, in Jesus' name we pray.