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I am happy today, and the sun shines bright, The clouds have been rolled away. For the Savior said, whosoever will, May come with him to stay. Whosoever surely meaneth me, Surely meaneth me, Whosoever surely meaneth me, Whosoever surely meaneth me, Whosoever meaneth me. All my hopes have been raised, O his name be praised, His glory hath filled my soul. And from sin set free, His blood hath made me whole. Whosoever surely meaneth me, Surely meaneth me, Oh, surely meaneth me. Whosoever surely meaneth me, Whosoever meaneth me. Oh, what wonderful love, O his grace divine, That Jesus should die for me. I was lost in sin for the world I pined, But now I am set free. Whosoever surely meaneth me, Surely meaneth me, Oh, surely meaneth me. Whosoever surely meaneth me, Whosoever meaneth me. All right. Let's open up with a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for this day and for the opportunity to be gathered together as a church family. Pray that you would just fill us all with the Holy Spirit now, help us to sing out nice and loud to you from our hearts. And we love you so much. We thank you for all that you do for us. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen. All right. Song 207, Only a Sinner. Couple pages to the left there. 207, Only a Sinner. Song 207, Only a Sinner. Not have I gotten but what I received. Grace hath bestowed it since I have believed. Boasting, excluded, pride I abase. I'm only a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. This is my story, to God be the glory. I'm only a sinner, saved by grace. Once I was foolish and sin ruled my heart, causing my footsteps from God to depart. Jesus hath found me, hath be my case. I now am a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. This is my story, to God be the glory. I'm only a sinner, saved by grace. Here's unavailing, no merit had I. Mercy had saved me, or else I must die. Sin had alarmed me, fearing God's face. But now I'm a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. This is my story, to God be the glory. I'm only a sinner, saved by grace. Suffer a sinner whose heart overflows, loving his Savior to tell what he knows. Once more to tell it, would I embrace? I'm only a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. This is my story, to God be the glory. I'm only a sinner, saved by grace. Morning. Thank you so much for coming to Steadfast Baptist Church. If you don't already have a bulletin, lift up your hand nice and high, and one of our ushers can come by, get you guys a bulletin. And on the front, we have our Bible memory passage, John 1, verse 28. On the inside, we have our service and soul-winning times. Service is Sunday morning, 10.30. We have a Spanish service at 4.30. We also have Sunday evening service at 5.30, and then Wednesday evening at 7. We have a Bible study. We've been going through 2 Samuel, and so we're going to keep going on. We're in Chapter 7 this week, so that'll be exciting. Church-wide soul-winning, we have church meeting here for the soul-winning meetup. So you can meet here at 2 p.m. on Sundays. 10.30s, there's a ladies' group that meets here. There's also Wednesday, 5.15. I do the soul-winning out here. Then Saturday at 10 a.m., we have Brother West leading that. Regional soul-winning times, we have Brother Malton on Tuesdays and Fridays. I think I saw him around here. Where have you been going, Brother Malton? Okay, Crowley and then just kind of all over. So you can see Brother Malton about those two times. Also Saturdays at 10, there's a time with Brother Lugo and Azel, Rome, and Justin. And then I guess the West and Lugos joined together, Batman and Robin there, for DFW last Saturday of the month. And so you can check with them. And then also we have, make sure you're continuing to turn in your church stats to your soul-winning captains, as well as your maps to Brother Dylan. The right, we have a list of our expecting ladies. Continue to pray for them. If you have any prayer requests, please email those in. We'd like to add them to our bulletin so we can pray with you about anything that you need prayer for. Also, we have a couple upcoming events. June 11th, we have the Naeem baby shower. August 18th through the 20th, we have a men's conference. And then Brother Dylan said, if you're missing a wedding ring, see him. So, or just a ring in general. Just see Brother Dylan as far as that is concerned. The baby shower details, we have that on June 11th from 1230 to 2.30 p.m. And they're registered on Amazon. If you'd like to bring a snack or dessert, that's great. And then it's nursing's only preferred. So, that's pretty much all I have announcements as far as the bulletin. We also have some new just cards of like we moved. So, if you're going out soul winning, you can just use these for right now if you'd like. We still also have just our kind of like tracks that kind of have a whole plan of salvation and then the videos in the back. But this also has a gospel video there. So, I'm pretty much just handing out these religiously until we kind of run out. This is kind of a nice thing to send out. And then, but you can still use these to your discretion. We still have the God resource cards. We still have the Spanish cards over there. I think we might be out of the Spanish cards. We need to order some more. I think I'm going to try and just order Spanish tracks like this one as well. And so, that way we have another Spanish thing. But if you just use either the God resource card or just if they go to our website, the Spanish video is still right there on the front. So, that's a good way to help them see a Spanish video. So, that's pretty much all. Again, I have four announcements this morning. Let's go ahead and go to our third song, 323, More About Jesus, song 323. 323, More About Jesus, song 323. I believe this is a new song for our church. Sing it out if you know it. 323, More About Jesus. What I Know, more of His grace to others shown. More of His saving fullness seen. More of His love who died for me. More, more about Jesus. More, more about Jesus. More of His birth through the night. Jesus. More, more about Jesus. More of his saving fullness, see. More of his love who died for me. More about Jesus, let me learn. More of his holy will discern. Spirit of God, my teacher be, showing the things of Christ to me. More, more about Jesus. More, more about Jesus. More of his saving fullness, see. More of his love who died for me. More about Jesus in his word, holding communion with my Lord, hearing his voice in every line, making each faithful saying mine. More, more about Jesus. More, more about Jesus. More of his saving fullness, see. More of his love who died for me. More about Jesus on his throne, riches in glory all his own. More of his kingdom sure increase. More of his coming prince of peace. More, more about Jesus. More, more about Jesus. More of his saving fullness, see. More of his love who died for me. Great singing. As the offering plates go around, please turn in your Bibles to Acts chapter 25. Acts chapter 25, and we'll read the entire chapter before the message this morning. You can follow along silently starting at verse number 1 in Acts chapter number 25 where the Bible read, Now when Festus was come into the province after three days, he ascended from Caesarea to Jerusalem. Then the high priest and the chief of the Jews informed him against Paul and besought him, and desired favor against him that he would send for him to Jerusalem, laying weight in the way to kill him. But Festus answered that Paul should be kept at Caesarea, and that he himself would depart shortly thither. Let them therefore, said he, which among you are able, go down with me and accuse this man, if there be any wickedness in him. And when he had tarried among them more than ten days, he went down to Caesarea, and the next day sitting on the judgment seat commanded Paul to be brought. And when he was come, the Jews which came down from Jerusalem stood round about, and laid many and grievous complaints against Paul which they could not prove. While he answered for himself, Neither against the law of the Jews, neither against the temple, nor yet against Caesar, have I offended anything at all. But Festus, willing to do the Jews a pleasure, answered Paul and said, Wilt thou go up to Jerusalem, and there be judged of these things before me? Then said Paul, I stand at Caesar's judgment seat, where I ought to be judged. To the Jews have I done no wrong, as thou very well knowest. For if I be an offender, or have committed anything worthy of death, I refuse not to die. But if there be none of these things, whereof these accuse me, no man may deliver me unto them. I appeal unto Caesar. Then Festus, when he had confirmed with the council, answered, Hast thou appealed unto Caesar? Unto Caesar shalt thou go. And after certain days, King Agrippa and Burnus came unto Caesarea to salute Festus. And when they had been there many days, Festus declared Paul's cause unto the king, saying, There was a certain man left in bonds by Felix, about whom, when I was at Jerusalem, the chief priests and the elders of the Jews informed me, desiring to have judgment against him. To whom I answered, It is not the manner of the Romans to deliver any man to die, before that he which is accused have the accusers face to face, and have license to answer for himself concerning the crime laid against him. Therefore, when they were come hither, without any delay on the morrow, I sat on the judgment seat, and commanded the man to be brought forth. Against whom, when the accusers stood up, they brought none accusation of such things as I supposed, but had certain questions against him of their own superstition, and of one Jesus which was dead, whom Paul affirmed to be alive. And because I doubted of such manner of questions, I asked him whether he would go to Jerusalem and there be judged of these matters. But when Paul had appealed to be reserved unto the hearing of Augustus, I commanded him to be kept till I might send him to Caesar. Then Agrippa said unto Festus, I would also hear the man myself. Tomorrow, said he, thou shalt hear him. And on the morrow, when Agrippa was come, and Burnus, the great pomp, was entered into the place of hearing, with the chief captains and principal men of the city, at Festus' commandment, Paul was brought forth. Festus said, King Agrippa, and all men which are here present with us, ye see this man about whom all the multitude of the Jews have dealt with me, both at Jerusalem and also here, crying that he ought not to live any longer. But when I found that he had committed nothing worthy of death, and that he himself hath appealed to Augustus, I have determined to send him, of whom I have no certain thing to write unto my Lord. Wherefore, I have brought him forth before you, and specially before thee, O King Agrippa, that after examination had I might have somewhat to write. For it seemeth to me unreasonable to send a prisoner, and not withal to signify the crimes laid against him. Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. Father, we thank you for the morning service and for our pastor, and I pray that you would help him to thunder forth the message you've laid on his heart, and keep us safe as we go our separate ways after the service. And also, please bless the soul winning time coming up at two o'clock. In Jesus' name, I pray. Amen. And we're here in Acts chapter 25, and the part of the chapter that I want to look at here is verse 10, where the Bible says, Then said Paul, I stand at Caesar's judgment seat, for I ought to be judged. The Jews have I done no wrong, as thou very well knowest. For if I be an offender, where I have committed anything worthy of death, I refuse not to die. And really, that's the phrase that I want to look at, is I refuse not to die. And here's the thing. Many people today who get squeamish over this topic, but the Bible clearly teaches what's called the death penalty. And the death penalty is also referred to as capital punishment in our society. And many Christians, so called today, will say, Oh, we shouldn't have a death penalty. We're in the New Testament. That's Old Testament. But as we read this morning, this is Acts chapter 25. I feel like this is pretty much New Testament. I feel like we finally arrived in the New Testament in the book of Acts. And notice that the Apostle Paul doesn't say, Hey, if I've done anything worthy of death, I've been saved by the blood. I don't need, you know, we don't need to put me to death for any reason. He didn't say, Oh, we all deserve death. So this doesn't really apply anymore. Or Hey, don't you realize we're in the New Testament? This isn't really legit anymore. And if that was true, don't you think Paul would have the boldness to bring that up? I mean, he's bringing everything else up in the New Testament. He's bringing up the fact that we don't have to have the meats and the drinks and divers washings. He's bringing up the fact that Jesus Christ, they killed, they crucified. I mean, he has no problem pointing the finger at evil people, at wicked people. But notice he doesn't sit here and say, Hey, we're in the New Testament. The death penalty no longer applies. In fact, he even exonerates the death penalty by saying, if I've done anything worthy of death, kill me. I mean, I don't want, he says, I refuse not to die. I won't even say anything for myself. I won't even advocate for myself. I'll just simply take the punishment because that is what's due. And really New Testament Christianity teaches the death penalty just as well as the Old Testament. Jesus Christ didn't die on the cross so we could have more murder. We could have more rape, or we could have more, you know, all kinds of manner of evil. Really the New Testament is very clear that the death penalty is still in effect. Go to Romans chapter 13, go to Romans chapter 13. I want to quickly go through some of the verses in the New Testament to illustrate how the death penalty is still just as in effect as it was in the Old Testament. In fact, if it's not, many passages in the New Testament will make absolutely no sense. Like this one. Why would Paul say, I refuse not to die if the death penalty has now been eradicated? There's no need for it. Why would we do this thing? Romans chapter 13, look at verse one. Let every soul be subject under the higher power, so there's no power but of God. The powers that be are ordained of God. This server therefore resisted the power, resisted the ordinance of God, and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. The rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same. For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid. For he beareth not the sword in vain, for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Notice Romans chapter number 13. The apostle Paul is saying, hey, we're supposed to submit ourselves to the government, and that the government has a very important job. It's supposed to be a minister of God doing what? That doesn't bear the sword in vain. Now here's the thing. The only way to punish somebody with the sword is death. What historically has anybody ever been punished with a sword, and it's not death. You'd have to go to a weird culture where maybe they're taking off appendages or something like that, but historically speaking, I mean, you don't give a love tap. You don't give a spanking. What do you do? You take off the head. That's what the sword is there for. It's a picture of the death penalty, and notice, why would Paul even bring this up? Why would Paul say, hey, we need to be subject to the death penalty if the death penalty has been eradicated in the New Testament? It doesn't make any sense whatsoever, and I've been doing a series where I've been explaining the extreme views on different topics, and this morning's no different. You know, there's extreme views when it comes to the death penalty, and let me give you those two extremes. One extreme would be no death penalty. That's an extreme view. The Bible is normal by having a death penalty, and then on the other side is having a death penalty for literally everything, okay, and there are cultures that have had ginormous amounts of capital punishment laws. I mean, we're talking about several hundred capital possible offenses of capital punishment. That's the other extreme. There's one extreme saying everything bad should be punished with the death penalty. Then there's another extreme that says nothing should ever be punished with the death penalty, and then you have the Bible, which is going to be right in the middle. It's going to have a really normal. It makes perfect sense to certain rules that we should live by in a civil society. Let's go to Luke chapter 22. I want to keep going in the New Testament for a moment and showing you more passage on this because some people say, oh, well, Jesus got rid of the death penalty. Jesus doesn't believe you should ever, you know, execute or put someone to death or defend yourself. See, that's simply not found in the scriptures. People like to take, you know, a certain scripture that talks about mercy or love or turning the other cheek and twist that into every context you could possibly imagine. But the Bible does not teach if violent predators come and break through your door that you turn the other cheek. That is not what the Bible teaches, okay? And nowhere in the scripture do you see God's people acting like that or thinking that way. In fact, when they tried to take Jesus, I'm pretty sure Peter pulled out his sword and cut the guy's ear off. I don't think Peter was thinking, like, we're pacifists here. Now, of course, Jesus didn't want him to do that because Jesus was supposed to be taken. Jesus is supposed to end up being crucified and that's how they're going to fulfill scripture. But Jesus didn't rebuke Peter by saying, why do you have a sword? In fact, he told him, put your sword back in its teeth. He didn't say, get rid of that, that sword. Like, why would you ever have a sword? In fact, Jesus is the reason why Peter has a sword. Look at Luke chapter 22 and look at verse 36. Then said he unto them, this is Jesus speaking, but now he that hath a purse, let him take it. And likewise his script, and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one. Notice Jesus is saying, hey, buy a sword. And they even came to Jesus later and said, hey, we have a couple swords. He says, it's enough. But he didn't say, oh, what are you doing with that thing? We shouldn't have a sword here, or we never need a sword, or the sword has no purpose, or we can't defend ourselves potentially. Typically speaking, if someone's coming in the night and going to steal you away or steal your goods or whatever, according to Old Testament law, you have every right to defend yourself and you could use the sword. It's just the fact that Jesus in that moment was not willing to defend himself because he needed to be killed. He needed to be crucified for our sins. Go to Mark chapter number seven, go to Mark chapter number seven. So Jesus telling people to buy a sword, and again, the sword is not just for fun, not just a decoration. It's not like when you go see the Asian store in the mall and they just have all these decorative swords that you put on your shelf or something like that. This is something you're carrying around with you. Now today, we even have better weaponry. We have a gun. But the gun is still the same philosophy. We don't have guns to just try to give a light punishment. I mean, a gun is stopping force, and a gun is a lethal weapon. We have to be very careful with these weapons. We don't want to treat them carelessly. We want to treat them with respect. But we have to understand that the weapons that we have are not to just give somebody a love hug or something. These things are to end life if necessary because sometimes life has to be ended. And in Mark chapter number seven, this is Jesus speaking. Jesus exonerates the death penalty in the New Testament. And you know, when I say New Testament, I'm talking about the portion of Scripture. You do have to understand that when Jesus is on the scene, he's not in the New Testament yet. Jesus Christ is living under the Old Testament law. But in Mark chapter number seven, look at verse six. He answered and said unto them, Well hath the zaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honor with me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Sounds like Christianity today. Sounds like the churches across the street. Howbeit in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. Laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men as the washing of pots and cups, and many other such like things ye do. And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. For Moses said, Honor thy father and thy mother, and whoso curseth father and mother, let him die to death. Notice Jesus didn't say, Hey, this, this, don't do this. What was the verse right before? Full well ye reject the commandment of God. Just saying, you guys don't follow God's commandments. Because what did God actually say? God said, hey, if someone's cursing their father and mother, let him die to death. And you know what? Jesus didn't back away and say, I don't like that rule. I don't like that law. Jesus Christ is the law because he's the word of God. How could you say, well, what does Jesus have to say? Anything this Bible says, you know, what does Jesus think? Anything this says, you know, what Jesus doesn't think is what you think. It's whatever this thinks. And notice, I mean, I'm, I keep bringing up verses here. It seems like the death penalty has not just been eradicated from our New Testament scriptures whatsoever. So go to first John chapter five, go to first John chapter number five. In fact, I'm not, I don't believe I'm going to show you a replete list of scriptures this morning, but I just want to show you a handful so that we, that way you're least aware of the, of just the clear and concise fact that the death penalty was not eradicated through the gospel. Okay. The death penalty for civil society is still the expectation and desire of God. And why would it be that all the nations that were founded by Christianity after the gospel actually instituted a death penalty if for whatever reason the death penalty was gone? I mean, all the societies that are built upon Christianity throughout the ages, they all add death penalty. I mean, show me a Christian nation that has no death penalty whatsoever. I mean, I don't even know where it is. Even in America today, even our country today, right now, 20 to 2022 America, the death penalty is still alive and well in our country. And let me tell you where it's coming from. It's coming from the Bible. It's coming from the word of God. It's silly to sit here and think like, Oh man, the death, but I don't know where that's coming from. And this is evil. Look, it's coming from the Bible. So if you claim that you believe the Bible, if you claim to be Christian, if you claim to care what God says or thinks you have to agree with the death penalty, this is not an optional idea. In fact, it's very necessary. First John chapter five, verse 16. It says, if any man see his brother, it's innocent, which is not unto death. The last needs to give him life for them. That's not in death. There is a sin under death. I do not say that he shall pray for it. Notice in the new Testament saying there is a sin unto death and he delineates sins that are not under death versus sins that are under death. Now I like this verse for a really specific reason. Anytime I bring up the death penalty with one of these fake Christians or ignorant Christians at best, they'll say, Oh, well, Romans 6 23 says, for the wages of sin is death. That means we all deserve to die. We all deserve the death penalty. It's not fair to identify certain sins and say that they're unto death. They're all unto death. We're all worthy of physical death. And here's the thing. Yes, the punishment for our sin is death, but Romans 6 23 is talking about hell. Talking about dying and going to hell. Okay. And that's the real punishment that we deserve. But when it comes to physical death, when it comes to the death penalty, we're not talking about from God's perspective. We're talking about from man's perspective. Because here's the thing. From God's perspective, he could kill us for any sin. And in fact, you could probably find every single sin in the Bible God kills people for. I mean, at some point in the Bible, someone dies for life. Someone dies for stealing. Someone dies for virtually every sin. Fornication. But that doesn't mean that God wanted us to kill Christians or even unsaved people, put them to death, or every sin. Okay. So notice he's delineating here. In this passage, there are sins unto death and sins not unto death. The way I interpret this verse, and I think it makes a lot of sense, is that when someone commits a sin worthy of the death penalty, we shouldn't pray that God will somehow absolve them of that and they don't have to die. Now in fact, the Old Testament teaches that your eye is not supposed to pity. Those people should still be put to death. Okay. We're not going to pray them out of the death penalty. That doesn't really make any sense. But you know, someone commits a lesser sin, we could pray and ask God to be merciful unto that person. You know, a person lies. A person steals. A person does drugs. A person has, you know, commits some kind of a bad sin and we say, God, please be merciful to this person. Please don't chastise this person in this life. You know, be, you know, long suffering with them. You know, when someone commits murder, we're not going to be like, Lord, please just be long suffering with this person. We don't want anything to happen to them. Let's just be kind. No, no, no, no. Someone commits a sin worthy unto death, we as a society should say, okay, this person deserves a death penalty and we're going to give that to them. We're going to speedily give them the death penalty. Go to John chapter number 8. Now go to one passage that's usually confused to try and suggest the idea that the death penalty no longer exists or that Jesus somehow doesn't like the death penalty or it got rid of the death penalty, which of course they can't find a clear verse like that. You know, if you're going to base your doctrine, I mean, if you're going to take the whole testament and just say it's all radicated, it's all gone. Wouldn't you want like a clear statement? Wouldn't you want a statement that's saying something to the effect of like, hey, the death penalty is no longer in effect. You know, Jesus saying something like that. You know, you never have that verse. You don't have any example of that. In fact, you have many verses saying the exact opposite, like Romans chapter 13, clearly illustrating that the people putting people to death are the ministers of God. You know, that's a pretty strong language. He's not saying like, oh, I know you guys do this and I just kind of tolerate it. He's saying these guys are doing exactly what I want them to do by putting people to death. Okay. Because God wants some people to be put to death according to the scriptures. Now I'm going to go to the old testament. We're going to look at all these examples in a minute, but one example of the death penalty is adultery. That is a capital punishment according to the Bible. And in John chapter number eight, we have a story where a woman is caught in adultery and the Pharisees come and bring this woman to Jesus Christ. In John chapter eight, look at verse five. Now Moses' law commanded us that such should be stoned, but what sayest thou? So the woman's caught in adultery. They bring them up, bring this woman, and they say, hey, Moses made it clear this person should be put to death. And here's the thing, they're right. What they're saying is true. Nothing wrong about that statement. But why did they do this? Verse six, this they said tempting him. Notice that their motives are not sincere. They don't actually have a genuine question here. They're not trying to ask Jesus a genuine question. They're trying to trap him. Okay. So you have to take this passage, you know, if you're trying to trap Jesus Christ, it doesn't sound like the best place to always get doctrine. Okay. Sounds like we better be careful about interpreting this passage or what's being said here. Okay. Now it says that they might have to accuse him. Who are they going to accuse him to? The Romans, right? It says, but Jesus stooped down with his finger on the ground as though he had heard them not. Now I think, I believe that in this, you know, verse, and again, there's a lot of personal opinion. My personal opinion is he's just kind of not answering a foolish question. You know, the Bible talks about avoiding foolish questions and he's, he's just trying his best to just be like, I don't want to answer this stupid question because he knows that they're tempting him. He knows that they're trying to trap him in this particular situation. And if they just go away, then he doesn't have to answer the stupid question because by answering this question, they're trying to get something that they said to use against him. This is verse seven. So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself and said unto them, he that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. So eventually they get an answer out of him and he gives a response. And this is what I always like to ask people. I said, did Jesus say don't stone her or to cast a stone at her? He said, cast a stone at her. And you know what I can see? I could see Jesus saying this and then it's just like this just in Baptist pastor said, cast a stone at her. Okay. And here's the thing. What would be the goal of that? To try and insinuate he's saying what he's instigating violence, right? Or inciting violence. They're going to take his phrase out of context and try to get him in trouble with the law. But you know, at least these Pharisees had enough integrity, not even to take this out of context yet. Now they do later. And here's the fact that they wanted him to say something like this without the first caveat. So then they could just go straight to the Romans and say, here's a guy saying that we should just kill people contrary to Roman law. And you know what? Jesus is not a vigilante as evidenced by the fact that he put this caveat on it. And then additionally, once he's left alone, here's the thing he said, he that is without sin, let him first cast a stone at her. Jesus is without sin. But here's, here's another reason why Jesus couldn't stone her. Because according to the Bible, you have to have the first witnesses be the ones that throw the stone at her. And he didn't witness this. Now, of course, he knows it like he just knows everything. But Jesus is not wanting to go outside of the boundaries of his human nature. Even though he just knows all things, he tries to allow everything to go through the right proper channels through the human process. He's not there to condemn people either. That's not his goal. If his goal was to condemn people, when he showed up, everyone would just die. I mean, all the, he would have just opened a hole and all the Pharisees would have just gone straight into hell because they all deserved it. They were all reprobates, virtually speaking. Okay. So the second time Jesus comes, that's a condemnation coming, okay, where the world is going to feel the consequences of their sin. He's not coming to save the second time. He's coming to condemn. He's coming to judge this world. But the first time he came, all about just saving. Now, those that can't get saved, he just ignores those people as much as possible. And then when they get around, they just follow him around. He just rebukes them. And it's interesting that wherever Jesus goes, you always have this reprobate train following him around. It doesn't matter what city he goes to or what town he goes to. They just have to always follow him around. It's like, isn't there any other churches around here? Isn't there other ministries you can go harass? It's like they got to follow Jesus, don't they? Because they hate the truth. They don't like the preacher that'll call it as it is. They used to follow John the Baptist. Now they follow Jesus, okay? And then after Jesus is gone, they're going to follow Peter. Then they're going to follow Paul. You notice they're always following the man of God. They're never following some fake prophet or something like that. They don't feel the need to go across town to go protest some false prophet. No, they go across town to basically get mad at the righteous guy or the righteous Christians. Anybody doing the work of God? Anybody soul-winning? Anybody preaching the gospel? Anybody standing up for truth? They're going to follow those people around and harass them. Does this verse teach me the death penalty is gone? No. How can I literally say Jesus is saying stoner to death and I say that's an example of where we should get rid of the death penalty? I mean that doesn't even make logical sense, okay? And this is their best argument typically. Like this is their like go-to verse when they say the death penalty doesn't exist, but really they're just twisting this scripture. And of course Jesus isn't advocating violence because if you keep your finger and go to John 18, just flip a few pages, we learn how and why they were trying to trap Jesus Christ. It's the fact that because they're under Roman law, they're not allowed to follow God's Word perfectly, okay? They have certain laws imposed upon them that stop them from operating civilly. The Jews are not in control of their area civilly, okay? So therefore they don't have the power and authority to act civilly. Just like you and I are not police officers. I don't think a single person here is a police officer, even if you were, okay? We, even the police, they don't have the authority to do justice. They can only arrest people, okay? They have to then go through the legal process, then they have to essentially take you for a judge. There's this separation of powers that exists in America today where the judge doesn't arrest, the judge sentences, and the police officers don't judge, they just arrest, and so you kind of have this separation of powers. You know what? We as a church don't have civil authority to execute criminals, to punish criminals, to arrest people outside or contrary to the law. We don't have those kind of rights and privileges, so we're subject to American law. This is the same with the Jews. The Jews are not in control of their area. The Romans are in control, civilly speaking. They are the police. The Romans are the police. The soldiers are the police, as it were. They're the officers, and then you have certain seizures and lower level leaders that are their judges, and it's very similar to our system in the sense that the soldiers would arrest people. They bring them before. They have a court case. They have a trial, and then basically sentence is given from whatever ruler is in that particular area, so it's not really any different than what we exist today, just the names are changed. So is it lawful for us to look at someone who's worthy of death and for us to just execute that criminal? No. We're not allowed to do that, just like Jesus and the Jews were not allowed to do that, and it's clear in the Bible. If you look at John chapter 18, look at verse 29. Pilate then went out unto them and said, What accusation bring ye against this man? answered and said unto them, If you were not a malefactor, you would not have delivered him up unto thee. Notice all they can. He's just a bad guy. Verse 31 then said, Pilate and them, Take ye him and judge him according to your law. The Jews, therefore, said unto them, It is not lawful for us to put any man to death. Notice they can't execute him, and notice this. Verse 32, That the saying of Jesus might be fulfilled, which is fake, signifying what death he should die. Here's the thing. Jews don't kill people on the cross. Here's stone people. Their method of execution is actually different than the Romans. So the only way for Jesus to die on the cross is to be executed by the Romans, to fulfill Scripture, okay? And here's, I'm getting a little ahead of myself, but here's the thing. Without the death penalty, we wouldn't even have the gospel. So there's benefits to the death penalty, okay? How about the gospel? How about the fact that he took our death for us, okay? Without the death penalty, we would have never even gotten the gospel. We would have never gotten saved. Now, I want you to go in the Old Testament with me for a moment, and we're going to go to Genesis 9, okay? And I'm going to take a second to get there, but look, when it comes to extreme views, extreme views would be saying no death penalty. That's an extreme view. It doesn't mesh with the Scripture whatsoever. It doesn't mesh with Christianity. It doesn't mesh well with history. And it doesn't mesh well with practicality either, okay? Now, I'll just remind you this too. God is not against killing people in the New Testament. As evidenced by the fact that Ananias and Sapphira lied in the New Testament, God just killed them. And he killed them separately, both for life. And we also have examples in Hebrews chapter 10, it's a fearful thing to fall in the hands of the living God. You know, there's a fiery indignation unto those that are even saved. You know, God in Revelation chapter 2 says he's going to kill Jezebel and all those that have committed adultery with her. He even says he's going to kill her children, okay? 1 Corinthians 5, when the church is throwing someone out of the church, the Bible says for the destruction of the flesh, okay? So death is a reality in the New Testament. God still will kill people on his own in the New Testament. But God also still desires for us to have a civil punishment, criminal punishment for certain sins. And we derive this doctrine from Genesis chapter number 9. Look at verse number 6. Now, this is Noah getting off the ark. It says, Whoso shed his man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed, for in the image of God may he man. Notice God saying here that not only should this person die, he should die by the hands of men, not just by a divine act, not just the flood, or not just a brain aneurysm, or not just fire from heaven, or not whatever, you know, a pit just opening and going straight into hell. He's saying this is the death penalty. And it makes sense that he implemented this here because previously there was no death penalty that we know of. There was nothing really codified in the Word of God. And it makes sense why God didn't necessarily have the death penalty at the very beginning. Because God didn't want a stymie growth. When you have two guys, like when it's Cain and Abel, okay, and then Abel dies and then you kill Cain, there's nobody left, okay? You're still stuck with Adam and Eve, all right? So, you know, and if you keep doing that type of thing, Lamech and some of these others, it's going to really stymie growth. Plus, if you study the New Testament, God allows for there to be tares sown amongst the wheat. Well, why? Because he doesn't want everyone to get plucked up and everyone to be destroyed. You know, he doesn't want the wheat also get destroyed with the tares. So, God is allowing these things to kind of escalate so that evil can exist and permeate another side. And, you know, I would suggest that probably the reason why the death penalty has gotten to just the point of almost not even existing in our country is God means the end times to come to fruition. Think about this. If we really executed God's laws exactly like they're written in the Bible, it'd be pretty hard for the Antichrist to actually come into power. Because who's going to be on his side? Who's going to be all these people that are excited for him and bringing him in and championing him or whatever? Because if when I get through this list, we're going to go through, I want to show you every death penalty we have in the Bible. If we actually went through this list, our country would be a lot smaller. Like, I'm just being honest. Like, I don't think people realize how many people should technically be put to death according to God's word in this society, okay, in our country. And some people said that's extreme. You don't even know what extreme is because in Europe and the UK and in England, they had an extreme view on the death penalty. In fact, in 1688, there was 50 crimes carrying the death penalty in England. Okay, so 50. In 1765, there was 160 crimes that could get you the death penalty. And in 1815, in England, specifically like UK, this area, 225 crimes would get you the death penalty. And it's known as the bloody code, okay. Now, that's a bad extreme. We should never get to the point where there's 225 reasons or crimes in which someone would have the death penalty. In fact, according to some of the research I've done, Henry VIII, it's estimated that he executed 72,000 people during his reign. Some other suggestions say there was 222 laws during the bloody code. But from the 1823 to 1837, they finally decreased the number of capital crimes from 222 to 100. Now, I'll give you just, somebody has like taken a lot of these laws and kind of condensed them into overarching categories. And I have like 21 categories. I'll just read for you. Here are some of the reasons why people were put to death back then in England when they had, it's known as the bloody code, high treason or other offenses against the state. That one sounds scary. Just offenses against the state. Offenses against public order, including riot and destruction of food defenses and bridges. You burn a bridge, put to death. Offenses against the administration of justice. How about this one? Offenses against public health. That's a scary one. I mean, you don't wear the mask, they kill you. You don't get the vaccine or whatever, they kill you. I mean, like, what does that even mean? Offenses against public health? You cough too much in public or something? I mean, I don't know. That's a pretty dangerous sounding one. Offenses against public revenue, including smuggling. Petty treason. Petty treason. I don't know what petty treason is. Like, either you committed treason or you didn't, but I don't know. Stabbing. Maiming, shooting, rape, brand larceny. The word larceny means theft. Okay, so if you ever look up a legal code, larceny is equivalent to theft. Burglary and allied offenses, larceny from the person, larceny and embezzlement by servants, post office employees, clerks and other agents. You thought tampering with mail is a federal offense, this is a capital offense here. I have people mess with my mail all the time. I've had people do kinds of crazy stuff. Offenses by bankrupt. Hey, Donald Trump wouldn't survive that one. Forgery of deeds, bonds, testaments, bills of exchange, stocks, stamps, banknotes, etc. Hey, you put a stamp on there twice, you take some stamp off and you put it on there twice, death. Falsely personating another with intent to defraud. So you just pretend to be someone that you're not, death. Destroying ships to the prejudice of insurance companies. Well, Rockefeller wouldn't like that one with the Titanic. Coinage offenses. You know, like clipping coins. I could think of a group of people that that would really harm Jews. Malicious injuries to property, including arson, arson, piracy. A piracy, being a pirate just simply means that you steal while on the open water, like you're going out and you're committing theft in the seas. So they had a lot. Now some of these are going to match with the Bible, but many of these are not. And most of the ones from my like just kind of cursory glance is mostly about theft. According to the Bible, you're not supposed to be put to death for stealing. Okay, no matter what the amount of money it is, there is no amount of money that you would technically deserve the death penalty or even depending on the person. It doesn't matter which person you stole from. It's still not the death penalty. The only, you know, insinuation really in the Bible is when you're stealing, if you're stealing at night, a person has the right to defend themselves. And if they end up killing you, that was justified. But that's not technically the death penalty because we're not talking about if you caught someone stealing at night and you drag them out to the officer, you take them through the court process. They weren't worthy of death. You wouldn't put them to death. The stealing is not a capital punishment, but we do have a list of capital punishments in the Bible. And I believe that there's 17. Okay. And you could probably take some, I kind of combined a few, you could kind of extrapolate them, maybe get to like 25. Or if you combine them even more, maybe you could condense it down even further, like 15 or 12. But from my personal, this is my personal list, 17. Okay. And this is Old Testament perspective. In the Old Testament, there's about 17 things you could do worthy of death. This is normal. It's not normal. Zero. What's not normal is 225. Okay. Normal is 17. Now, number one, we already read is murder. He's so shed of the man's blood by man. Shall his blood be shed? Go to Exodus 21. Go to Exodus 21. And I'm not going to show you every time because some of these are repeated in the, in the Old Testament. Sometimes the Old Testament will bring up capital punishment for the exact same crime in multiple places. A murder is, uh, one of those that's mentioned in lots of different places. Exodus 21. Look at verse number 12. The Bible says he that smite of the man so that he die shall be surely put to death. Now what's interesting in verse 12, if you think about it, Genesis nine, six is saying you kill someone. This verse actually doesn't necessarily say you killed them. Notice what it says. He that smite of the man so that he died. Like you're trying, it's like attempted murder. You're trying to kill this person. And it says, so basically, I mean, you try to kill someone. You'll be put to death. Now this makes sense because think about it. If someone came, you know, in our church or came into our house and they shoot at you with the intent to kill you, and then you are able to basically subdue them without them dying, that would be attempted murder. And according to the Bible, you should be put to death, which makes sense. Just because you weren't successful, even though you tried really hard, doesn't mean, Oh, okay, we'll exonerate you. No, no, no. You should get the exact same punishment. Or if you shot someone in the head, sometimes people shoot people in the head trying to kill them, but they survive or they shoot them in the chest and they survive. That's attempted murder. Notice the Bible saying murder is just death penalty. Okay. And I'm putting this the same category at one, just murder and anything associated with it. Okay. Two, look at Exodus 21 verse 15. This is my second one. And he that smiteeth his father, his mother shall surely be put to death. You know, that's what the Bible teaches. Some people don't like this. You know what, if someone's so brazen enough to literally start attacking their parents physically, that is a wicked person. And, you know, let me explain why this is in the Bible. That in and of itself is, you know, really horrible. But this person left to their own devices. I mean, if you're going to smite your own father, if you're willing to attack your own father, here's my question. What person will you not attack? I mean, if you can't even respect for your own dad, how would you have respect for law enforcement? How would you have respect to your boss at work? How would you have respect to just your average, you know, everyday neighbor or citizen? I mean, you basically are insinuating you're the most dangerous person on the planet when you're willing to literally strike your own parents. And let me tell you something, the most wicked people on this planet will often kill their own parents. How about the recent uvaldi shooter killed his grandmother? I mean, that is a sign of a psychopath. That is a sign of a super wicked person. This person is extremely evil. You know, I remember there was a pastor that it came out, he killed his own father. It's like thinking like, if that doesn't disqualify you from being a pastor, I don't know what does. I mean, it's like, and again, you know, you say, well, what if you were defending yourself? Well, Isaac just took it wicked, wicked ever try to assault your parents or to attack your parents. You should never do it ever. You know, best case scenario, you just run away. You just flee. You know what? You don't assault your parents. It's just off the table. It's just not an option. And if you, someone did do that, that shows that they have such an evil heart. You know what? They are worthy of death. Okay. And it says in the next breath verse 17, and he that cursed his father, his mother, not only the Bible go from the step of actually physical assault, it's saying, Hey, if you're willing to literally just put curses on your parents, you also are the same type of person. You would deserve death. And isn't that what Jesus brought up? These occurs with father and mother, let him die to death. I mean, if you can just look at your parents in the eyes and just say, go to hell, or I hope you die and get AIDS, or I hope whatever evil thing you can think of, like that is wicked. That is evil. You should never curse your parents. You know, the Bible says the exact opposite honor thy father and my mother that thy days may be long upon the earth. I mean, Hey, what's the exact opposite of that being put to death. And you know what? If we live in a society where you could not do this, where it was a capital, I think children will be less likely to do it. You know what today's society, children without hesitation, speak all manner of evil against their parents, about their dad, about their mom, about their grandparents. You know, we should be the exact opposite as God's people. We should only have honor and respect for a parent. And if there's nothing you can say, that's nice. Don't say anything at all. That's the right rule. I don't even think it though. What a wicked sin. So point one murder point to smiting or cursing your father and mother. Here's number three. And it was sandwiched in between this look at verse 16 and he that steals a man and sell them, or he be found in his hand. He shall surely be put to death. So this basically encompasses the idea of kidnapping or slave trade. And you know, that's a lot in this, in this country, unfortunately. You know, they always want to talk about the past slave trade. What about the human trafficking and smuggling that's going on right now? I mean, there's literally hundreds of thousands of people being smuggled into this country, smuggled across states, smuggled everywhere. I mean, you want to talk about the Texas border. You know, they want to, they want to say, oh man, all the people coming across the border, they're going to turn our country blue. How about just all the sex trafficking that's going on? Why aren't we concerned about that? Why aren't we concerned about all the children that are being drug over here so they can be put on drugs and they can be just run through all kinds of rampant types of prostitution and child molestation because that stuff is happening rampantly in our country, let alone even the worst parts of it. There are literal Satanists in this country that are doing worse things with these children that they buy and sell and smuggle. And I don't even want to get into that because the Bible says it's a shame to speak of those things which is none of them a secret. But let me tell you something, there are child sacrifices going on in America today. There is all kinds of evil and horrific things going on. And yeah, if you caught someone selling a child or smuggling a child or kidnapping a child or any person, that person should be put to death. You know, some people they're like, oh, the Bible teaches slavery. Well, how are you going to bring slaves over if you can't sell them? Because this doesn't say just children. Children is like the biggest proponent of this probably in our modern day era. But hey, this is saying very clearly like, hey, you try to sell somebody, you kidnap somebody from Africa, you bring them over here and sell them, you're put to death. I don't know how the slave traders must have hated Exodus 21 back in the day. You know, people want to act like the Bible teaches slavery. The Bible doesn't teach the slavery that existed in this country. That was evil and that was wicked. Okay. And certainly there's no racism in the Bible because God doesn't even have race. How could you, how could the Bible even be racist? It doesn't tell us that there's five races. That's the American government that tells us that there's five races. And the American government also tells us there's 58 genders. So I think they might be wrong on both. Okay. And in fact, I mean, black today is literally like every shade of black, but some people like Kamala Harris, it's like, that's not black ever even seen black. I mean, you know, it's funny. This wall is actually technically black. How many people thought it looked blue though? Okay. Hands all over the building. It's like, some people might think this is Navy. Okay. There's different shades out there. Okay. And there's some people that are of a different ethnicity than black that are darker than black people. You know, whether they be Indian or Hispanic or some other, there's darker Hispanics than black people out there. There's darker. I mean, uh, brother Marcel is like Dominican Republican or whatever. He's Dominican. You think he's black guy. He's just darker than most black people. Okay. It doesn't even make sense. The world that we live in from America's perspective, it only makes sense from the Bible's perspective. And let me tell you something. God's not a racist. God's not a respect or a persons. And you know what? You're stealing people and selling them death period. Now of course there's, there's indentured servitude in the Bible, but that's different than selling somebody. That's someone that owes you a bunch of money and says, I can't pay it off. And they're like, can I just work it off? That's, that's like you and your mortgage company. You didn't even realize you're basically an indentured servant anyways. Okay. That's just you and your car payment. Okay. So don't, don't think that that's slavery. All right. That's silly. Look at Exodus 21 verse 22 now. So here's my fourth capital punishment. First we had murder, second smiting, cursing, father, mother, third kidnapping or slave trade. Here's four and this is Exodus 21 verse 22. It says, if men strive and hurt a woman with child that a fruit depart from her and yet no mischief follow, he shall be surely punished according as the woman's husband will lay upon him and he shall pay as the judge determined. And if any mischief follow the national give life for life. So here would be what I call reckless, um, reckless manslaughter. Okay. Where you're doing something wrong and you end up killing someone. Maybe it wasn't necessarily intentional to kill the person, but you're just being reckless. You're putting people in danger. You deserve the death penalty. It even goes further in this chapter. If you look a little bit further, look at verse number 28. If an ox gore a man or a woman that they die, then the ox shall be surely stoned and his flesh shall not be eaten. The owner of the ox shall be quit. But if the ox were won't to push with his horn in time past and has been testified to his owner and he has not kept him in, but that he hath killed a man or a woman, the ox shall be stoned and his owner also shall be put to death. According to the Bible, if you're putting dangerous animals out there, not on a leash and they kill someone, you're worthy of death. This is what I put in the same category as reckless manslaughter. You know, you drink and drive and you kill someone. That's reckless manslaughter. It shouldn't be a $10,000 fine. It should be the death penalty. Hey, you want to eliminate drunk driving. That's a pretty easy way to do it. Hey, you know what? You want to get rid of pit bulls everywhere. Hey, this is a great statute to implement where people let these dangerous animals just out. I mean, and you say, oh, but dogs are so sweet. Look, it's like a wolf. Wolves in the Bible are not cool. And dogs don't have any positive mentions in the Bible. Sorry. That little Fido you love so much. Now I'm not saying that every dog's like this dangerous predator. Chihuahuas can't hurt a fly. Okay. They're like a little rat. But what I am saying is this, that, you know, if we had a high view of life, then we wouldn't let all these dangers just exist in our culture. And, you know, children are often killed by pit bulls. And here's the thing. Pit bulls don't exist naturally. Virtually no dog exists naturally. It's through selective breeding that we have all these ridiculous animal types. Okay. So what if I could take a lion and selectively breed it down to where it's a little bit nicer? It's still not a cool pet option. It's like, look at my cool little lion. He doesn't bite often. It's like, no, no, no. But just because I can take a wolf or some random dangerous predator beast and kind of shape it into a poodle and you're like, what is that? You know, but then some people selectively breed him to be as mean as possible, like a pit bull. Okay. And there's other breeds that are pretty dangerous out there. You know what? If you have that type of beast, you better keep that thing locked up. I'm not mad at you for having one, but I would be mad at you if you allowed that to be anywhere near children or to get out or to hurt somebody, even the postman. Okay. Let's protect our postman. All right. Not just the Democrats care about them. All right. Exodus 22. Look at 22 and look at verse 18. So point one murder to smiting a cursing mother and father, three kidnapping, slave trade for reckless manslaughter. Here's our fifth category for capital punishment. X is 22 verse 18. Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live. Amen. Witchcraft, sorcery, wizardry, Harry Potter should be put to death. You know, it's silly. I literally went to a church and and they're trying to promote this book. It's called finding Jesus in Harry Potter. And I'm like, I already found it. It's right here. They should all be put to death. Well, he's a good witch. You know, he's a good wizard. It's like, no, there's no such thing as a good wizard. Okay. That'd be like, he's a good murderer. He's a good rapist. He's a good adulterer. These are incompatible words. Okay. And you know, no, there's no such thing as good magic and good spells and all this stuff. No, it's all junk. It's all satanic. It's all the devil. And you know what in America used to be, it didn't suffer a witch to live and it should be the same today. There's other places that bring up the wizard and everything for sake of time. I'm just going to get, I'm going to kind of go through this quickly. Look at verse 19. Who's so reliable to be so surely with the death, please, man, bestiality number six. You know what? But that is it's sad today that that's not happening. I mean, in America, someone commits bestiality, they don't kill them. In fact, I don't think there's any legal punishment. And that's, that's, that's extreme. Okay. Verse or number seven, look at verse 22 or 20. He that sacrifices unto God, save unto the Lord only he shall be utterly destroyed. So here's another thing, false religion and false prophets put to death. Okay. Now go to chapter 31, chapter 31. And look at verse 14, chapter 31 and look at verse 14. He shall keep the Sabbath. Therefore, for it is Holy unto you. Everyone that defileth it shall surely be put to death or sort of do with any work there in that soul shall be cut off from all your people. And here's the thing. This is the only capital punishment that I find is in the old Testament that should not exist in the new Testament. Why? Because specifically the Bible talks about in Colossians that we're not supposed to judge any man in respect of any Holy days or Sabbath days. So I have a clear verse in the new Testament saying, Hey, the Sabbath is not something that's observed anymore. It was fulfilled in Christ. It's fulfilled in Hebrews chapter number four, very clearly. Jesus is our Sabbath rest. And so in the new Testament, we don't have the Sabbath. You know what? In the old Testament, I still believe that you're supposed to be put to death for it. And if you're thinking about it, what's the symbolism? Well, if you try to work your way to heaven, you're going to go to hell. That's the symbolism. That's why that existed. Okay. Because salvation is either no works and you get to heaven or you add any work. I mean, this doesn't say like just a ton of work. This is like you add any works to your salvation. Hell yeah. Just like the Sabbath. They didn't want to even pick up sticks. Okay. So yes, you add baptism to your salvation. Hell, you add anything to your salvation. Hell is either faith alone or nothing. Leviticus 20. Get some more. So we've had eight so far. We're about halfway through the biggest chapter. 20 is going to really catch us up here. Look at, look at, uh, verse number one. And this is my ninth capital punishment I find in the scriptures. Leviticus chapter 20 verse one and the Lord is speaking to Moses saying, again, that's the state of the children of Israel. Who shall we be of the children of Israel or the strangers that sojourn Israel that giveth any of his seed on the Molech. He shall surely be put to death. The people of the land shall stone him with stones. How is that a hard one? I mean, man, you're just sacrificing children into the devil. Yeah, of course that person should be put to death. And that really kind of even correlates with the false religion, but I kind of made it, it is a separate point. So again, you can kind of recategorize these and I'm just giving you, I think it's about 17. Okay. Look at verse 10 and the man that committed adultery with another man's wife, even he that committed adultery with his neighbor's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death. The adultery is capital punishment for in the Bible. Now, you know, again, I want to make some things clear here. I'm not saying that every form of adultery is capital punishment. I'm saying that this type of adultery, physical adultery. Okay. If you commit adultery through remarriage, that wasn't worthy of the death penalty, according to the Bible, even though it's still technically adultery. Okay. There's, there's certain sins that, you know, there's layers of that sin and there's certain progressions of that particular sin. Just like if you accidentally kill somebody, you aren't worthy of death, but if you killed them on purpose, you're worthy of death. Okay. Divorce and remarriage while technically adultery, not worthy of the death penalty. Thought crimes are also not worthy of the death penalty. Okay. Yeah. Everybody is committed adultery in their head. Okay. Unless you're just blind, deaf, mute, and not living, you're in a coma or something. Okay. Like everybody's, you know, had a bad thought about the opposite gender at some point in time. Okay. And so according to the Bible, that is a form of adultery, but as adultery in the heart, no one should be put to death for that or otherwise no one would live. But just think about how much adultery has existed in America. You had just these two, I mean, just the abortion. I mean, there's been 60 million abortions in America. Some of those were repeat offenders, but I mean, that's a lot of people, the abortion doctor and all these women, I mean, just the adultery in our country. And I don't even want to know, but the numbers are going to be just on those alone, false religion, you know, and, and, and, uh, essentially abortion and adultery. I mean, how many people are in the government still are existing? We need a new, new government real quick. Okay. Uh, here's, here's another one. Uh, verse 11 and the man that lied with his father's wife and then covered his father's nakedness, both of them. So surely you put the death, their blood shall be upon them. So this is like the incest. Okay. And it's not just that one. It's also in verse 12. And if any man lied with his daughter-in-law, both of them shall surely put the death. They have wrought confusion. Their blood shall be upon them. It's also verse 14. And if a man take a wife and her mother, it is wickedness. They shall be burnt with fire, both he and they, that there be no wickedness among you. So any of these really close incest statutes, the death penalty. Okay. I say, amen. You know, this will get rid of a lot of those Mormons and whatever freaks there are out there. Uh, and, and some people in New Jersey, you laugh incest like this is legal in Jersey. Isn't that sick? I mean, it's just disgusting what our country is coming to. Verse 13. If a man also lie with mankind, as he lies with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination. They shall surely be put to death. Their blood shall be upon them. Hey, I didn't write the Bible. The Bible said that homos are supposed to be put to death. And, you know, I like the way this is worded because it's not saying sodomy, saying homosexuality. Because a lot of times in America, they made their statute more ambiguous and they said sodomy. But the problem with that is because of its unclear terms, people try to wiggle their way out of that. And that's literally even what's caused problems in our country. As people have said, oh, well, technically due to the 14th amendment, sodomy is not, uh, equally attributed to married couples that are straight versus ones that are not. Here's the thing. Homosexuality doesn't exist in a monogamous, great relationship. It can't exist. It's literally impossible. But therefore, that's what the law should actually say. God actually knows what he's doing here. He didn't use unclear terms. He unequivocally says, hey, any form of this is death. He doesn't get into specifics. Praise God. I don't want the details. He's just saying, hey, you guys doing anything together? Bye. You know, the death penalty. You know what? That is how our society should exist today. 13, I have, my number 13 is blasphemy. Go to chapter 24 and look at 16. Chapter 24 and look at verse 16. And he that blaspheme at the name of the Lord, he shall surely be put to death. Boy, that would be nice because I hate blast. I hate hearing the blasphemy. It grinds my gears when people just constantly are blasting in the name of the Lord and saying all evil against Jesus, having billboards with it and signs. How can any Christian just look at that and tolerate that? Oh, so awful. Deuteronomy chapter 19. Go to do right. Chapter 19. Here's another provision where you could be put to death. And this one's a little, uh, nuanced in the sense that it, it doesn't dispel it out, but from the context, you can understand that this is also a death penalty worthy crime. It says in Deuteronomy chapter 19 verse 16, it says, if a false witness rise up against any man to testify against them, that which is wrong, both the men between whom the controversy is shall stand before the Lord or the priest, the judges, which shall be in those days. And the judges will make diligent inquisition and be all of the witness be a false witness and have testified falsely against his brother. Then you shall do unto him as he had thought to have done unto his brother. So shall they put the evil away from among you. And again, this is, this is all encompassing. This is anything, but if someone lied about something worthy of death, you get caught lying, then you should be put to death. So another way to be put to death would be a false witness to a capital crime, the capital thing. Chapter 21. Look at verse 18. If a man of a stubborn rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and that when they have chased him will not hearken unto them, then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him and bring him out unto the elders of his city and under the gate of his place. And they shall say unto the elders of the city, this, our son is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey our voice. He's a glutton and a drunkard and all the men of his city shall stone him with stones that he die. Those shall they'll put evil away from among you and all Israel shall fear. Again, I broke this into three, but this could technically be one, just basically anything against your parents, right? Because if you smite them, you curse them, or you're just stubborn or rebellious, all three of those are the death penalty. I broke them into three. You could, you could quantify that down to one because it's kind of the same crime essentially. Look at chapter 22 and look at verse 13, chapter 22 and look at verse 13. If any man take a wife and go in under her and hate her and give occasions of speech against her and bring up an evil name upon her and say, I took this woman and when I came to her, I found her not a maid. Then shall the father of the damsel and her mother take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel of virginity under the elders of the city and the gate. And the damsel's father shall say unto the elders, I gave my daughter and this man to wife and hated her. Let me have given occasions of speech against her saying I found not thy daughter a maid. Yet these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity. They shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city and the elders of the city shall take that man and chastise him. They shall immerse him in a hundred shekels of silver and give them unto the father of the damsel because he had brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel and she shall be his wife who may not put her away all his days. But if this thing be true and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel, then they shall bring out the damsel at the door of her father's house and the many of her city to stone her with stones that she die because she had folly in Israel to play the horror in her father's house. So shall they put evil away from among you. So committing fornication according the Bible is not worthy of the death penalty. And don't get confused on this statute. This statute is not even saying if you're not a virgin you'd be put to death. It's saying if you're not a virgin and you lied about it you would be put to death. Now when you think about this really it's pretty similar to just adultery because typically in an adultery situation what are you doing? You're lying with someone that's not your spouse and you're dishonest about it because you're not going to tell them you later get caught or found out. And we don't know when this person committed this sin. Technically they could have even committed it while they were engaged or they were betrothed. And according to the Bible if you were to lie with someone that's betrothed, look at verse 23, if a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto her husband and a man find her in the city and lie with her and you shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city and you shall stone them with stones that they die damsel because she cried not being in the city and the man because he hath humbled his neighbor's wife so that's what put away evil from among you. Notice if you commit this type of adultery while you're engaged even though you're not technically married yet that's also worthy of the death penalty. Basically adultery while married death penalty adultery while engaged death penalty and if you committed some kind of carnal act and you claim to be a virgin you lied about it also the death penalty because it's similar to that type of adultery defrauding and really that will discourage adultery in a nation. I mean and you know it's a grievous sin. I mean when it comes to sins that hurt someone's heart I mean adultery is up there. I mean you know it really just and here's a bad thing about it it's hard to move on like when you know you you have someone just like committing adultery against you and especially if they don't repent then you put these people in these weird scenarios where they like don't even know what to do and then you have all these people and these just crazy weird scenarios where they're like what do I do I'm not supposed to get divorced and I'm not supposed to remarry but my spouse is just committing rampant adultery on me and they don't care and it's just like you're just basically running this person through the ringer and it's really what you know the children miserable God and that's why he kind of has Hosea as a picture of this man it's just one of the most grievous things the horrible thing you know at least if you kill the adulterer the person can eventually move on yeah you're gonna be sad for a while sucks no one likes it terrible you know what then you can at least get remarried through the proper channels you can move on and life can be restored and that person can have happiness and they and you know basically forget about that evil but you know the way our society is right now it's just so many people have to just live with adulthood you have to live with the fact and I'll tell you what I mean the idea of another man being with my wife while we're both all alive is just so horrifying I mean and then some people have to live with this way divorce remarriage does this you know and people are just living with another person and then they go to the next person they go the next person I mean this is not a healthy society this isn't even and you know it's really suffering from all this is the children children are just really just hot in a bad situation and let me tell you something if you're a child and you're in this situation it's not your fault you know what it's the parents that are sinners and you should learn from their mistake and say I'm not gonna do that I realize this is a serious thing and I don't want to be like that or do that and I can learn from that mistake look at jr. 22 and look at verse 25 but if a man find a betrothed damsel in the field and the man force her and lie with her then the man only that lay with her he shall die last one I have is rape let me just remind you I just went through and I you know maybe there's another one I missed please please tell me if I missed one I don't think that I did but for the Bible murder smiting or cursing your father mother kidnapping reckless manslaughter witchcraft wizardry familiar spirits bestiality false religion or being a false prophet breaking the Sabbath sacrificing children molech adultery incest homosexuality blasphemy a false witness for a capital punishment stubborn rebellious son virginity fraud and rape I mean how could you sit here and be like well I think those people are great people and well I just don't think you know this isn't a theocracy but you just don't even understand what a theocracy means because honestly our country was established to be a theocracy have you ever realized that our Constitution says that we're endowed with certain and ideal rights from our Creator you know you know that's called a god okay and you know there used to be this the the top supreme law of the land the Bible if you went into a courtroom anything the Bible said went they had laws emanating from the Bible but the Bible is the top you know they call that theocracy and in fact in America in Connecticut I have an exact reprint of the laws of Connecticut in 1673 I have the capital the laws here in my sermon notes I also have I can show you but here's the number one capital punishment law in the laws of Connecticut in 1673 in America if any man or woman after legal conviction shall have or worship any other God but the Lord God he shall be put to death explain to me how that's not a theocracy you know when people talk about religious liberty or the fact that we're not supposed to have the government telling us what religion that was within the confines of Christianity people don't understand the context was you can worship God however you want but it was not saying you can worship Allah it was not saying you can worship Baphomet it was not saying you could worship some Hindu God or Muslim God or be an atheist or blaspheme God in fact here's the second law if any person within the scholars colony shall blaspheme the name of God the Father Son or Holy Ghost with direct express presumptuous or high-handed blasphemy and shall curse in the like manner he shall be put to death I mean that's America people want to say hey I wonder why our nation was so great that's why you know this stupid MAGA movement that wants to make America great again why don't they bring these things up because you know what made America great is the fact that God was at the top of our nation you know they still say oh we pledge allegiance to the flag one nation under what God and I always think it's special silly because all you guys blaspheme God all the time how can you get up and pledge to God let's say that or even our state is under God these people don't even know what they're saying they're just mindlessly repeating things not even realizing our nation was supposed to be a Christian nation okay and then when you go down this list virtually everything that I showed you is on this list to witchcraft murder bestiality sodomy and specifically I like how they worded it if any man life of mankind is the life of a woman both of them committed abomination they shall surely put the death it didn't say sodomy it said that and they put Leviticus 20 13 and you know some states even put Romans 1 next to it praise God because they realize this isn't just an Old Testament doctrine this is a New Testament doctor who men with men are worthy of death according to the Bible incest and it specifically brings up if you lie with your mother father's wife wife and a mother and daughter or daughter in law that sounds familiar sounds like exactly we just read doesn't it it says if you force someone rate if you're a man stealer if a man steal the man or mankind and and fell of him he be found in his hand he shall be put to death sounds like they knew this they need to apply that one to slave trade I'll tell you what they kind of screwed up their false witness conspiracy now a couple of these aren't put in there like treason eat like treason and conspiracy and stuff like that I don't think that's necessarily a wrong statute for a country to implement but it's not emanating from God's law directly I typically believe that we should just stick with what God said period hey now if your treason is involving plots to kill and murder and that actually does fall on some of these statues and you can put that person to death what if the treason was just related to a financial crime I don't think you should necessarily put the death for that type of a situation and so you have to kind of evaluate these things in my opinion strictly on God's Word not coming up with our own statute okay my opinion on capital punishment is nothing more nothing less than God said and that's not I'm not telling you my opinion on capital punishment I didn't get up here and say this is what Jonathan Shelley thinks I'm just telling you what the Bible said people get really mad at me and you know people say oh you're advocating in a silent violence in our country you know by getting up and reading the latest 2013 well here's a question does that mean that the Texas government is advocating violence because you know in the state of Texas murder is still worthy of the death penalty I'll give you I can't read them all for sake of time but murderers of a peace officer or firemen who is acting in the lawful discharge of an official duty or or who and who the person knows is a peace officer or firemen that person should be put to death if they kill that person now this is kind of a stupid law because why are policemen and police officers and firemen more important than other citizens like why is it well if I kill a policeman that I'm put to death but if I just kill a plumber I'm not right that doesn't that's kind of a stupid law you know murder should just be murder okay now some people don't even realize this in the state of Texas in April 2021 or April 21st of 2022 Carl Wayne Butian was executed in the state of Texas and Harris County that is in the Houston area in 2021 three people were put to death one in Harris County and two in Tarrant County welcome to Tarrant County now you know what's sick about this is Carl Wayne Butian he committed murder in 1990 and he was put to death in 2022 that's a lot of time he also he was he killed someone okay he killed a police officer that stopped him it had so many previous charges burglary drugs even sexual assault of a child and it's like why did we have to wait to get to that point and of course he killed a cop that's the only reason he actually gets the death because if you just kill a person you kill a woman you know you kill a baby no death penalty right because it's called abortion Gavin Newsom suspended the death penalty in California in 2019 there was 737 people on death row in California if you look it up the site their own government site you can shit check how many people they've killed and then it'll filter and show you all the convicts it's like did they kill one person two people three people four people five people then they just have six plus I click the six plus there's over a dozen people that have killed more than six people and they're not going to be put to death I'm thinking like how is that normal how is it normal to say here's a guy who's literally raped and killed woman after woman after woman after woman and we won't put them to death and then you think that I'm crazy for wanting that person to be put to death right now you're crazy you're insane for thinking that you know the death penalty is a good statue good Ecclesiastes chapter 8 the last place I'll return and you know there's benefits to it first of all we get the gospel praise the Lord on that one but secondly we rid evil of our society we can live in safety and peace you know I'm just bringing a murder how about some of the other things are going on our country how about just rape I mean there's hundreds of thousands of rape in our country every year how about the fact that you can literally molest a child and not get the death penalty how is that reasonable how is that normal and you know these pedophiles they literally molest children so much I mean there's such a repeat offenders in these it's just it's mind-boggling to me how we live in a society that would claim that that's cool you know why that's the reason because after reading this list nobody in our government would probably be alive virtually speaking so of course none of them want to pass these laws or these statutes you know and why do we even have a society like that because preachers stop preaching this stuff so you go find me a church in this area that's gonna give you all the death penalty list you know say I don't like your list okay give me yours I want to know what church in this area has a death penalty list oh I don't want to do it okay I'll get docked already happened so I can't really they'll protest my church okay well that'll happen they'll they'll get mad at you okay they'll kill you that's fine because I'll just go to heaven I mean you know I'm all for the death penalty just like Paul was and people say oh you just want to kill a certain group of people yeah I want to kill murderers I want to kill rapists and you know if I was a murderer or rapist please put me to death I refuse not to die hey if I committed any of these things I refuse not to die and I would be willing for our country to say let's do this so if any of us are guilty at any point in time we just take the execution we just go home early okay and just because someone's saved doesn't mean that you wouldn't put them to death okay that's a silly idea but notice what it says in Ecclesiastes chapter 8 verse 11 because send ins against an evil work is not executed speedily therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil no we have this so much evil in our society because of it but again let me remind you of some of the cool let's you know let's send an apostle note okay the death penalty what's cool about the death the gospel I mean you can't get any cooler but we wouldn't have Abel you know in the sense that if we didn't have someone killing somebody okay how about this story you wouldn't have Shadrach Meshach and Abednego without the death penalty we would have never had anybody thrown in the fiery furnace and then Jesus showing up that was pretty cool we would have never had Daniel in the lion's den we would have never had James as a martyr we would have never had Stephen as a martyr some of these are the coolest stories ever I mean wouldn't had Paul influenced by Stephen's death to go out and be the apostle that he was and you know what we wouldn't have all the cool beheadings in the new in the book of Revelation the beautiful sacrifice of Christian standing for God getting their head chopped off for the Lord and getting a cool crown you can't even get that crown without being executed there is a crown in heaven that you can only get if you get beheaded now I'm not saying you can't get other crowns there's lots of crowns okay some of you are thinking like I don't know if I want that crown but imagine you like transport to heaven and there's this awesome crown you're like that's cool how do I get this your head has to get chopped off okay interesting I mean that's a reality without the death penalty you can get it and you know all these liberals that say they're gets the death penalty they're liars because they're gonna kill a bunch of Christians in the future and they don't they have no problem with me died they would be so excited they would love it if Christians were put to death you know they're hypocrites it's not like they're sitting over here saying like we don't blend definitely for anybody it's like they would love it for me they would love it for a Christian they would love it for anybody that actually believes in righteousness and you know they would put death immediately Jesus again they're a bunch of hypocrites or a bunch of losers and you know what I still think it's beneficial to teach this doctrine even if our country will never do it just so we have the right mentality and and God forbid that any of you would ever commit one of these sins even though you can get away with it without the death penalty I mean you can commit adultery in America and I mean they're the cops with nothing you can call the cops this person with adultery okay here bye I mean you can commit all kinds of crime and they don't even care incest they'll be like that's weird but I mean you can commit all kinds of bestiality I mean think about the wickedness that you can come in in our country and technically get away with it from a civil society perspective you know what we as God people should reject all of this evil reject all of this bill preach against it and against it and tell our government what should really be the case and you know what there is two things you can be killed for in Texas right now a second repeat for fender child molester and and murder there's nothing saying that our government couldn't get a little stronger on those and by us saying what the Bible says maybe we could influence our nation in our country to actually bring back some of you or implement some of these things God willing and I'm gonna keep preaching it until I die all right let's go to prayer thank Heavenly Father so much for the Word of God thank you for giving us clear laws thank you for dying sending your son to die for us and that we realize that you suffered the death penalty for us and so that we could go to heaven and I pray that we wouldn't get mad about the death penalty we would embrace all of God's teachings no matter how good bad or ugly they are and that you would continue to protect our church from the evils that are out there you know that you're allowing them to exist but I pray you just protect us from that evil and Jesus name we pray amen all right for our final song 212 Oh happy day 212 Oh happy day on 212 nice and loud Oh happy day Oh happy day that fixed my choice on thee my Savior and my God well may this glowing heart rejoice and tell its raptors all abroad happy day happy day when Jesus washed my sins away he taught me how to watch him pray and live rejoicing every day happy day happy day my sins away Oh happy bond that seals my vows to him who merits all my love that cheerful anthems fill his house well to that sacred shrine I move happy day happy day when Jesus washed my sins away he taught me how to watch him pray and live rejoicing every day happy day happy day when Jesus washed my sins away is done the great transactions done I am my Lord and he is mine he drew me and I followed on charmed to confess the voice divine happy day when Jesus washed my sins away he taught me how to watch him pray and live rejoicing every day happy day happy day when Jesus washed my sins away now rest my long divided heart fixed on this blissful center rest nor ever from my Lord depart with him of every good possessed happy day happy day when Jesus washed my sins away he taught me how to watch him pray and live rejoicing every day happy day happy day when Jesus washed my sins away God bless thank you all for coming you are.